Everyone has a cock in their front yard

1/3

If Indonesia is the land where second hand smoke doesn't exist, then the Philippines is the land of cheap haircuts, really cheap alcohol, and drunken karaoke every night of the week.

At 250 PHP, this bottle of Mojitos Tequila sits at
$7.00NZD. Safer communities together.

Yes that’s right I am in the Philippines and I have been here for some time. At of the time of writing, I have been here for 14 days but due to the combination of a lack of wifi and atrocious cellphone reception coverage, I have been letting my writing responsibilities slip. (In case you were wondering, wifi hasn’t really reached the hospitality industry in Bogo).

The start of my journey began at Cebu Mactan International airport where the immigration officer sent me to the naughty corner for what felt like a really long and scary game of ‘who wants to be a millionaire’, except without the prizes or the multi choice questions. (which I wasn’t too keen on doing seeing as I’d been awake for almost 22 hours by this point)




Spending several days in Cebu city I came to realise that shit must go down here on a fairly regular basis judging by the number of shotgun armed security guards I managed to count within a 30 minute stroll. In fact the first store I visited ( a 7/11 convenience store) had one security guard outside, and one inside, behind the counter (one of them is like the bait I guess).
I didn’t actually witness anyone get shot during my time here but managed to spot one armoured car and a convoy of police vehicles carrying officers armed with assault rifles, prompting the idea that perhaps this was all just an elaborate undercover national defence plot to quell a potential Chinese invasion.

Central Cebu City

I was soon whisked away to Bogo which is probably the cultural equivalent of Rangiora to Christchruch,NZ. Bogo has a Mcdonalds but not not an H&M, just like Rangiora, however unlike Rangiora, everyone seems to have at least one dickhead rooster tethered to a pole in their yard (because apparently they’re awesome at fighting).

As this is a part of the country which isn’t a must-visit destination for overseas tourists, the culture here is very much Filipino. You won’t find fruit and vegetable smoothies here; the options are meat, sea meat, rice, and beer. The backpacker tourism industry doesn’t really exist here and it’s obvious, judging by the lack of wifi in the the several establishments I’ve been staying at so far.
The only foreigners you’ll really find here are old white guys - and clearly the reason for that is that they really like eating at Jolibee.

I have much more to say but I'll cut it off here because attention spans.