The Philippines Introduction

   Some of my Philippine friends will read these blogs about their home country, what I say to you is, please do not get offended if you read some things that may seem insulting. Traveling around your home country gave me a couple of different perspectives, one as a foreigner alone and one as a foreigner with a Philippine wife. As a traveler I learned to try to cover as much of the country as time permitted and learn as much as possible about the country's culture and people.

   The Philippines is a tropical country with a hot and humid climate; makes for delicious fruits and vegetables. The country also has the rainy season of which the typhoons cause the most worry and destruction. If you want to witness mother natures wondrous power then you can land on one of the thousands of islands that make up Philippines and try to survive a typhoon, earthquake, flood, or volcanic eruption.

   Within these thousands of islands surrounded by different seas there are beautiful beaches, some of the most beautiful that I have seen, particularly on the Visayan Islands. Many of the beaches are isolated with no tourists.....part of the reason may be the vast number of beaches available and the other part may be the lack of tourists. Unlike Thailand which is so popular with tourists the Philippines has a reputation for being dangerous. The National Peoples Army (NPA) live on many of the islands. This group formed to fight corruption of the Philippine government but they themselves extort money from locals, abduct foreigners for ransom and generally cause havoc for the peoples of the country. Muslim extremists live on the second largest island of Mindanao and they often tarnish the reputation of the Philippines when they detonate bombs.

  So this blog is not a history lesson but rather the start of a series on the Philippines which gives my own perspective on my experiences while there traveling (twice). As in many other developing countries the beauty can be breathe taking, the pollution in the cities unbearable. The people can be awesome friendly or dangerous and rude. You will see on further blogs what I encountered.

  By the way, my Philippine friends in Canada are awesome.........especially you Zeny