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

This little humorous note was handed to me some time ago by an authentic English Lord who came from Manila to Dumaguete to attend a meeting of bikers and their 'Harley Davidson.  Although he was Lord of the Admiralty, he was also 'biker' and tattooed.
A real character

(Two of the bikers)

Here is the note:

Dear friend / potential investor,
I understand that your girlfriend has suggested some exciting new business concepts.
Let's see, you are starting to start a new venture: piggery, tricycles, jeepney, poultry rising, rice lands, rice mill, a coconut plantation, fish pond, restaurant, bar….oops done that!  Education? Sending her to school for secretarial…..oops done that! Sending her to school for seamstress and tailoring…oops done that! Fishing boat for her father…yup, you have done that too!
Mate! The best idea is to set up a pawnshop, so you can get back all the jewellery that all the unlucky foreigners have bought for their girlfriends or wives at a fraction of what they paid for it!
On the other hand, you could also do lending against the houses built by the foreigners for the families of their girlfriends, or setting up shop inside the Casinos, Mah Jong parlors and Tong-its houses

Just a few simple rules to helping the Family:

1. It was never a loan, it was given!
2. to do business here, leave your morals at home!
3. Only bastards and cream rise to the top!
4. If things were easy here, everyone would be rich!
5. It is not because they speak English, wear Western clothes, and love Western music that they are Americans!
6 Because it yours, the relatives think it is theirs!
7. If the family has not bought, no matter what you give, it will not be respected of taken care of unless they got it on their own. 
8. a business arrangement with the family means: you finance, pay the bills, re-stock and never see any return past the first or second installment (if you are extremely fortunate).
9. If the family survived all these years without you, why can they survive without your help? Who paid the bills before you joined the family?
10. If you are invited to a party, you are the party!
11. Why do you think the family was so to welcome a 60 years old to marry their 20-year-old 20 years and do not mind you calling your 40-year-old Father-in-law "Tatay" (Uncle)?
12. Resign yourself, you will be supporting them whether you know it or not unless she was an orphan and has no uncles or aunts or grandparents, or nieces and nephews or family friends.

If you have not heard these excuses yet, you will soon:

-- "The chickens all died and we need more" means "it was Fiesta time and we ate them all"

-"The piglets died" means "we sold them".
-- "The brood sow died" means "sister's birthday celebration, we ate it"
-- "The banca boat sank in a typhoon" means «Either we sold the engine and nets, or it was confiscated because we were doing dynamite fishing."
-- "The tricycle needs a new engine means "boyfriend ran it without oil coz he couldn't afford it. »
-- "The jeepney needs new tires" means  "We sold the new ones months ago and the used tires are all flat."
-- "Our  fish pond has to re-stocked, someone stole all the fish" means  "Guess who did that and sold all last year's fingerlings?."
-- "The storms destroyed the rice harvest: Only got 2 sacks per hectare" means " we bought more rice lands for ourselves and didn't tell you we really got 100 sacks per hectare. "
-- "The typhoon destroyed all the coconuts" means «We put a down payment on a new 4-wheel drive for 'Tatay'."

But let's face real hard facts: alimony here is a TV set, refrigerator, bed and electric fan. Quite unlike back home.
And let's face it, if it was so good back there we wouldn't be here! And if everything was organized, everything worked like it was supposed to and all of these things really don't happen for real, we wouldn't have anything to talk about.
One last point, if your maid hasn't fried 2 TV sets or major appliances and burned an electric rice cooker on top of your stove, you haven't been here long enough yet!

Oh we are not joking.

Best regards

                                                                                                             Ron Milhench

I hope you find it amusing but it should be more understandable for residents in the Philippines.

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