Since my mate Luis left the Philippines I haven't really been up to much - well nothing of much interest other than work, which is a continual grind because those sitting in the circle continue to piss on us in the stalls.
It's been raining rather a great deal of late. A couple of weeks ago it just lashed down with rain continuously for a week. And I'm not exaggerating. It was getting to the point whereby if the rain didn't let up I was going to start building an ark.
Of course, the rain has stopped all work on site and put us back a week. This wouldn't have mattered one iota if those hob-nobbing in the stalls had paid attention to the fact that the show can't start until all the props are on stage. But no, they send them on at the last minute and then crib if there's a delay. To be honest, I'm sick of this never ending merry-go-round of me telling them what needs to be done and them not listening. It's like being stood in the middle of railway track, seeing a train coming and not being allowed to step out of the way.
Similarly, this is our third contract with this client who simply refuse to install the roads or the drainage until the end of the project, when this is the first thing they should do. Hence, they end up with a shiny new power station in a sea of mud half the time and we end up working in a big puddle.
And don't get me started on the local red tape and bureaucracy. The people I did the dive course with have been stopped from operating. Jealous competition, petty red tape, endless hoops to jump through and as many obstacles that a stifling and ruthlessly inefficient civil service can put in the way of private enterprise and which has one aim and one aim alone: to create a hugely complex system that can only be bypassed through the generation of unaccounted income.
Not that there's much diving to be had in Subic Bay at present. What with the rain, the flood water has flushed all the rubbish and detritus out of the rivers and water courses that are generally used for rubbish disposal, and deposited it all in the bay. Combined with a total lack of erosion control on farms and moreover construction sites, vast quantities of silt are washed down the rivers to be dumped in the seas. Hence, Subic Bay is now a muddy brown. Still, once it and all the rubbish settles to the bottom of the ocean it'll be forgotten about. That is until it blankets and kills the corals and turtles and sea birds wash up dead on the shores from eating plastic bags and the tourism trades dies along with it. Perhaps I shouldn't go on like this but it is a crying shame.
Speaking of turtles, there is a turtle sanctuary down the coast from Subic and I popped in to have a look. Not much going on as I was told it wasn't turtle egg laying season on the adjacent beach. They did have three turtles in a turtle shaped pond no bigger than a kiddies paddling pool. Pretty depressing actually. The Hawksbill had a hunchback and couldn't balance itself properly in the water. There was what I was told to be a grey turtle but the nearest match I could find on the internet that looked like what I saw is an Olive Ridley turtle. This one, so I was told, couldn't swim underwater (??) and so was left in the pitiful pool trapped in the flipper of the pond layout, constantly bashing into the end of it. The third turtle in the pond was a green turtle that had the most amazing markings on it's head. He (she?) seemed to be the only one that was normal.
Despite it being turtle off-season and there being nothing to see or do other than feel sorry for the captive turtles in a puddle, I was asked to pay the entrance fee, which the guy took and put straight in his pocket. I mean, no shame, no embarrassment, just straight in his pocket. Now you could argue that he was going to put the money in the cash box later but I'd argue that he wasn't.
My immigration visa has expired. It's not just a simple case renewing it: oh no, that would be too easy. In fact it expired several weeks ago but due to the painfully slow processing of any document by government agencies our lawyers have had to apply for extension letters whilst the visa is being prepared (prepared = sitting on someone's desk in the hope that it generates some "unaccounted income"). To make matters worse, I had to go for the same interview I had two years ago with the man with a beach ball up his shirt (see the second half of Everyone & Their Mum Is Packing). I hate these interviews. They're so pointless. I hate being asked why I'm working in the Philippines when there's 10 million Filipinos (that number isn't an exaggeration) working in other countries around the world, with a fair few in the nursing profession in the UK alone. If it wasn't so crummy working in the Philippines, earning next to nothing and being taxed to death then perhaps most of their skilled workers wouldn't leave to go and work overseas and cause a brain-drain on the Filipino economy. There's an awful lot to put right.
But what am I saying? There's just as much that needs putting right in the UK unfortunately. I suppose that should be my response to the interviewer: I'm working in the Philippines because I don't want to have to go home to work in another bankrupt, corrupt, third world country.
It's not all bad news. At least the yelping dogs seems to have settled down and been quieter. I've also noticed that they've started taking them for walks so that's probably gone a long way in getting them to relax rather than just leaving it locked up in a tiny cage 24/7. There was a huge furore in the UK press over a Filipino who had pegged his puppy dog on the washing line. I actually thought it was quite funny and when seen in the light of how most dogs are kept in tiny cages here, it wasn't particularly cruel at all. There are far bigger issues at stake.
I had another trip to Singapore. All rather routine and hugely expensive. But not withstanding the exorbitant cost of the place, it's so good to go somewhere that works. I mean really, super-efficiently works. It sets the standard that other countries can rarely match.
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