well I arrived in Mindanao yesterday at 12 noon. I am in Ozamiz which is one of the poorest cities in Mindanao. It's quite quaint in a way, I have seen it before but it still tickles me, when the plane lands at the airport you are literally no more than 50 yds from their back doors!!! Can you imagine opening your back door in the morning to see a jet plane go screaming past in reverse thrust trying to brake... only in the Philippines.
From the "airport".... more like just a landing strip, I had to get to my hotel.... there are no cabs just motorcabs as they call them, basically a motorbike with a sidecar. I stay in the best hotel in the city... well there are only 2 and this is the better one but it leaves a lot to be desired. It wouldn't get a 1 star in the UK but this is a poor city so I understand. I was really surprised and pleased to see that they have had wi fi installed... I thought... my goodness they are moving with the times.... I can now use my laptop when I get bored. The whole city closes at 9pm.... no kidding.... after 9pm even the street lights go out !!! so wonderful at 9pm I can go online and keep myself entertained... then I find out that I can only be online in the lobby area not my room... that's not so bad.... then I find out that the wifi is off from 10pm .....!!!!! I can't win. Also in the hotel you can only have hot water for 2 hours per day.... can you believe that !!
Basically there is nothing to do in Ozamiz, the city ( really only a small town) is only for people to come into work and sell their wares. It has a few big shops that supply the city with most of it's needs. so at 9pm everyone goes to bed.... that is why at 6am everything comes alive... except me of course, I am just recovering from bad sleeping so was still asleep at 8.30am until I got my first text !!!! Texting is such a way of life here, just like the UK I suppose or anywhere else for that matter, but NO ONE phones you here... it's always just a text, texting is so important that the President of the Phils has just got the major phone companies to reduce the cost of a text from 1 peso to 50 centavos.... that's about 1 penny to a half penny per text.
I hope you all have a great Thursday......
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