Photos et lettres des Philippines, de France et d'ailleurs

Once my son Fabrice left, I found the house empty as it is true that living alone in a place called 'paradise', it's still being alone especially at night after 5:30 when Dodong, my gardener and handyman goes home.
I wanted to escape a few days but in avoiding using too much my old knees with their weakened cartilages. My wife did not want me to I venture to the heart of the island of Mindanao on the pretext that in case of kidnapping I would never find anyone to pay my ransom. Nevertheless I made a few road trips in my surroundings.

(Typical rural house called kubo)

Therefore it is to Cebu City and Ormoc in Leyte that I decided to spend a few days for the umpteenth time.
I negotiated with one of a Supermarket parking lot’s guards, permission to leave my vehicle against tipping, for three to four days to spare me the first 800 meters of walking with my luggage from home to the main road and then wait and take an overloaded Jeepney to Dumaguete.
Then I embarked on the Ocean Jet fast craft between Dumaguete to Cebu city via Tagbilaran, instead of riding a tricycle + boat + bus that would have cost me less though for the same journey’s duration of four hours in the two cases.
 
http://oceanjet.net/

The boat is certainly less tiring and can justify the additional expense of 10 €. The interior resembles a large airplane and you can eat and watch a movie in an often too cold air conditioned atmosphere. It is curious that in tropical countries the locals tend to set the air conditioning always too low.
Thus I left on Tuesday, September 20 at 7:30 am, so I arrived in Cebu at 11:3 am. I took a taxi from the port to SM, the giant Cebu Mall. When one is not too much loaded with baggage, it is best to avoid taxis off the boat because instead of using their meters the drivers will propose a set price twice the amount that you would normally have paid. However everything is relative because it would be for the same race 4-6 € instead of 2 € 3 €. Here in Cebu the taxis drivers are far more honest than in Manila.
I had my lunch in my favorite Thai restaurant in SM. I took my time as the departure time of the Superset fast craft bound to Ormoc was due at 4.40 pm.

http://www.supercat.com.ph/

He then took another two hours and a half to reach my final destination. At the pier I took a tricycle to go to the little David’s Inn hotel, which was highly recommended on the Internet and where I already had booked a room in advance.  Nevertheless located a bit out of town, the driver had a hard time to find the place and I got irritated when he asked me to guide him.
It was already almost 8 pm when I arrived and I was given for 750 pesos (12.50 €) a very nice and comfortable room with a flat screen TV but unfortunately an air conditioner too noisy for my liking.
This hotel run by a New Zealander has also a small restaurant with good and cheap food. A dinner I chose ox tongue and French fries and 2 beers for 6€ and in the morning I took a hearty American breakfast for 3 €.

http://davids-inn.homestead.com/

The Tugod festival, which I attended last year, was in three weeks and Ormoc was so quiet and cloudy that I transferred to Sabin Resort just out of town and located by the sea.

http://www.sabinresort.com/

Prices were not the same as David’s Inn and I had to pay 2100 pesos (35 €) per night for a large room by the swimming pool.
It is also interesting to note that access to the sea is closed and all the charm of the resort revolves around its beautiful pool and garden.

(The swimming pool and the garden of Sabin Resort)

The next day at 1:45 pm, I took the Supercat boat back to Cebu.
I had not reserved any hotel room so I only found a free one at Le Carmen hotel. I would not recommend this place expensive for the quality offered (1400 pesos) and which has no restaurant for breakfast.

It is in the morning while waiting for a taxi to go to SM that I was still faced with the spectacle of street children sleeping on the sidewalk in an area however, rather well off.
It was again an opportunity for me to shout my head-off against the clergy who has always put a spanner in the successive Philippines governments to prevent them from promoting birth control in this country with the highest birth rate of South-east Asia.
In 1980 there were in France 50 million inhabitants to 55 million in the Philippines. In 2011, in France there are 65 million inhabitants to more than 95 million in the Philippines.

Grow and Multiply, God Will Provide! 

(Cebu street kids. Photos taken with my cellphone)

After doing some shopping at the SM Mall, on this Friday, September 23 at 3 pm I was again on board of the Ocean Jet fast craft to return to Dumaguete and then my house after having got back my vehicle at the Hyper mart parking lot.
After a light dinner in Dumaguete I drove to my house where again I found a great quietness only disturbed by the sound of the waves in the background and at night the barking of Zarah, my Doberman / Rottweiler female dog, keeping a close watch of our premises.
It also happens that Zarah sometimes is baying at the moon what she wasn’t doing before her brother’s death Zoey last June. I questioned my house keeper on this issue who replied with great seriousness that the dogs had the ability to see ghosts therefore it was when the spirit of his late brother appeared that she was howling especially during full moon nights. Should we believe that?

(My son Fabrice et Zarah)

Since arriving in the Philippines I am looking for a Doberman puppy with a black coat to be Zarah’s companion and when adult her mate. But it so seems that breeds of dogs are like fashion and here now the Dobermans are hard to find as out of fashion. Although in a pets shop I was proposed one one with a skin disease and as thin as a skeleton for the modest sum of 200 €. This is often the problem of foreigners in the Philippines who are taken for both rich and morons by some people.
At the end of last week when raining, I was surprised to see on the beach in front of the house the unusual spectacle of many seabirds Their presence probably due to schools of fishes did not escape the villagers who rushed boats and nets out to enjoy the windfall.
The fishing continued the next day with a sunnier weather and also the following day but it was already finished and the small fishes, caught or eaten by birds will never become big.

(Mag-abo, the villagers fishing)

(The little fishes will never grow big)

It is also last Thursday returning home that for the first time in six years, my house keeper forgot to wedge the entrance gate with a stone. Obviously this is when a gust of wind slammed it on the vehicle’s door damaging the paint and denting it slightly. I think that when he saw my face after being back from the garage where I had left the Pajero, Dodong my helper had tears in his eyes and I comforted him as best I could by telling him that it was not a drama and it could happen to anyone. Certainly if at lunchtime, he had a little less celebrated the nearby fiesta with Tanduay (local rum), he would have thought to wedge the gate but hey it was an accident and it's no use crying over spilled milk.
I got the car back on Saturday afternoon and the body repair cost me only 1500 pesos (25 €) but as they say in France 'value for money'. The retouch of painting was a darker red than the rest. This might have been unacceptable in France, but the bill would also have been more than 25 €.
Apart from dealers of major brands, garages in the Philippines look like scrap yards with no hydraulic ramp or pit. Car mechanics are just like the country all in contrasts and worst is near the best. If needed, it is the client to go and buy spare parts in auto stores most often owned by ethnic Chinese as the parts they sell.
To end this September in a good mood, on September 30, I went to Samboan in the south of the island of Cebu where I was invited by Fabrice and his wife Lotlot for the fiesta of the city. For this occasion every year they greet a lot of people and among them the French speaking people of the area.

(No fiesta without the traditionnal lechon baboy, roasted piglet)

(Part of the women guests who here like to be together)