What is the minimum salary in Philippines for a university graduate? The answer would depend on so many things: where you graduated; what profession or degree; where you are having a job. What can you afford as newly graduate? As a neophyte? As a newbie? As a freshperson? A cheaply paid job that is more often than not an insult to your education and effort to finish... or is it? I have to admit it really depends on which one you are: overqualified, underqualified or unidentified. I also have o admit that diplomas are rebuttable as the quality of education all over the country is not the same: others are superior while others, let's admit is, are... well you know what I mean, right?

The topic that I have had with someone last weekend it the poverty in Philippines. This person told me that television is sucking each and every soul of Filipinos. Why? Because of the commercials: buy this car, buy this phone, this TV brand, all the appliances and electronic gadgets you can think of. The truth is, how much does it cost? Say the cellular phone is around Php 10,000 (majority of and you bought it. If you are a newly grad, do you think you can still live for the remaining days of the month after you bought the phone? Say your gross income for the month (an even bigger estimate compare to average) is Php 15, 000, you still have Php 5,000 left. But the truth is, you still have to pay taxes and it's around Php 750. You are left with Php 4,250. Are you renting a place? Are you sharing expenses with parents? Are you buying load for that phone you bought? Are you eating at all? Are you commuting for work? In short, it is very difficult to live with such salary if one has to buy a gadget. Or an electronic appliance for that matter: television set, DVD player, sterio, MP3 player, washing machine and all these things. Add the fact that you have siblings to spend for.

What I am saying is, Filipinos has the same aspirations in terms of material stuffs as western people do. But is the income the same? Television has redefined what is a need and what is luxury: all that is advertised in TV now is somewhat a "NEED". And that is bad. People are having debts just to buy these gadgets... is it good? It is good if you don't get buried in debts which happens usually. It is good if you are not thinking of your future and save for yourself. Why? I have to tell you that you are not 100% healthy all the time. Do you have health insurance? Do you have dental insurance? These things? Think about your future. gadgets only cause you to spend more. Buy the necessary, not the poshy that you don't actually use those functions as I know people can ever hardly use the call function there. Phones are mostly use to brag and that is not so good.

Mind you, here in Netherlands, regular salary, the basic, the lowest salary for a newly graduate is €1,700. And how much is the price of a mobile phone? A colored, with camera, with radio phone can cost as low as €30 and that has a €15 load in it already. Now do you see the difference? The percentage to gross salary in Philippines versus here in Netherlands is 0.0176 % versus 66.67%. Now do you see? Save for your lives, these gadgets can be stolen, lost and even not be properly used. Bragging and making the gadget as a social symbol is a shame. Build your future instead!

Honestly, you can just be left open-mouthed at the simplicity of idea. But before that, I would like to note some things.

First, my country, the Philippines, has this outstanding clamour that its people just go out and work abroad rather than help the country improve.


The overflowing trash...
Second, scholars have been sent out to observe and share their ideas back home to give way to improvements, comparisons and better practices.

Third, I am sharing my ideas what I see from out of Philippine territoty/bounday and I am sharing through blogging for I cannot be personally there to make it happen.

Fourth, even if I am present in the Philippines, who would hear me if I don't have money? Not a politician, not an actress and not the one who can pay people to listen to me? Now this is the problem! We cannot really tell that those scholars do not go back or did not go back! It is also possible that they are/were back in the Philippines full of enthusiams but those ideas were just sprayed with malicious preventions from those who are in power and do not want change. However, it is also possible that those scholars and abroad workers, the creams of the crops, just choose to settle away in order to avoid a lot of disappointments that are currently going on in the Philippines.


How nature and beauty is damaged by these garbages...
What I am driving here? Ideas. Yes, ideas. Ideas are many. I have seen them in my friends back in the university supported by the entre Filipino tax-payers. Yes, the Iskolars ng Bayan (The Nation's Scholars) as they say and I was/am one of these people. I have to apologize however to my countryment for I am not there to burden the sufferings you are currently encountering. Plus, I want to admit that if indeedI was there, as I was a couple of years ago, I was only a slave of a multinational organization making me work 24 hours and draining my brain and body with pleasant thoughts and energy. So what is the difference? Nothing eally much... but in my opinion, much is the difference. I can blog and share my views and really see our own short-comings as Filipinos, admit it, and make move for the change. Moreover, since the value of money here is greater when spent there, a little savings from here can help me help my feelows in need in the future back there.

Back to the "move" I was talking about on top, it actually refers to minimizing the garbage. This is not just plain criticism but I have to admit that the cities in the Philippines are dirty! And so are the provinces, though the latter is not that obvious since they are not as crowded as the cities. One reason? Plastics! Yes, even that alone can constitue a lot of garbage!


Believe it or not, this grocery trolley can contribute hugely more than we realize how much...
Here, where I currenlty stay, plastics in department stores are sold. It is actually ranging from €0.30 - €2.50 depending on the quality and style and usability and durability and a lot more factors. This means, if one just throw his/her plastic bag, another expense would be made if there is another grocery purchase. And that hurts a lot! I mean the buget and the pocket!

What I am sugesting, is, since Filipinos are very difficult to discipline in terms of garbage, why would this plastics be sold instead of being freely given? This way, Filipinos would value these plastics better and not just throw them. A move from the congress making all stores put costs in the plastic bags would be a good "preventive" move to lessen garbage. Can you imagine 90 million individuals throwing at least 1 platic per week? Isn't that disturbing? It can be seen actually during low tide how dirty the seas get and the rivers and creeks are clogged due to garbage. I saw it myself in so many places in the country!

I know what will be the reply to this: A rally of opposition from the masses... but of we think of our future and the ultimate effect, this is for our own good. If you don't want to spend for plastic bags, buy one cloth or real bag for groceries and use it for years! It is just a matter of mind set how people can make situations to their advantage and not just oppose every move for progress everytime.

You dream of a clean environment for your children? So make this happen! Support and do not oppose! Plastics if burned are dangerous and it is really a thing that do not deconspose just on time... it is a very damaging material and we need to prevent the mutiplication of this kind of garbage (or any other garbage in the Philippines for that matter).

They say don't just complain unless you have a better solution. My solutions are set out in this blog and I do hope, people and some policy makers can discover this someday and they just stop dreamy beefy amounts in their pockets and bank accounts!

Please help a clean Philippines, try at least in your part. No littering, proper waste segreaìgating and use of recycled plastics will greatly help.

If we are oppressed, or if we feel oppressed and feel poor, is it fair to swindle others? Below is one of the many notable responses to my posts. If you want to view the original posts, responses and the whole story, simply CLICK HERE.

Hi, As a foreigner married to a Filipina, I can sympathise with you, the young guy in Canada. I know Canada to be a place of relentless work for low pay, and cold-hearted company policies driven my the N American corporate moral-lacking ethic.

1. -It is not those who are in poverty that I mind helping, it is finding out that the Phil family medical bills were based on ailments that were never treated, despite the med money sent over.
2. -It is the spending of cash sent over, after a desperate plea for medical help, on a phone bill that is ten times what I pay in N America.
3. -It is the second request for med money after the first has been spent on the phone, or other items, and the medical situation is used again to extract money.
4. -It is the assumption that as I am a foreigner, I am rich, and therefore a bottomless pit that is used for money.
5. -It is the guilt trips put upon my wife to get her to send her earnings over there, instead of paying bills here. In a 12 year marriage that has been a delight in all other respects, I have seen the following:

• -A $200 a month budget for family assistance exceeded by up to $400 a month as a regular thing.
• -The Phil family quit work of any kind, then manipulate to get the $200 budget increased by regular "emergencies" to maintain their retirement
  

-My family here in N America increase its debt load by over 50,000 bucks, then file bankruptcy.

-My personal pension fund get ransacked to the tune of over $30,000 dealing with bills created by budget overruns.

-I have seen photos of DVD players in the background, when they were $400 items, and I could not afford one.

-I have seen photos of parties, at times when I cannot afford a birthday gift, or even flowers, for my wife.

- I have had a miserable Pinay individual who works at a local Walmart and who is a drug and alcohol user accuse me of being unreasonable as I married a Filipina, and part of that is that Filipinas have to send money home.

-I have had the same individual accuse me publicly and at her workplace of being unreasonable for not liking the small of burning fish, and complaining about it, this being when relatives paid me the continual insult of selecting fish as a toasted offering inside my house at times when I had a day off, yet never when I was away at work.

-I have today heard of a Filipina friend who currently on a visit home has had to go to her sisters house away from the city to avoid the relatives demands for money in large amounts, like amounts enough to buy cars, and then they get annoyed when refused.

-I can with all honesty say that in the years I have been involved, there has not been one single transaction involving money that has been honestly presented.

-Every demand or request for help has been later found to be based on a lie.

-About a year or so ago I attempted to assist with finance for the starting of a business, and all that transpired in the end was that a PC was purchased, and then the relative involved informed me that the Internet Cafe business was no longer any good, and so he would not be going ahead with it. This was coupled with a photo a few weeks later of the same relative working at his PC, a dual-core Intel processor with illuminated Neon case. Meanwhile, I am STILL using a PC that is 7 years old.

-This was followed some weeks later by the father of that same relative crowing about how well his son has done, and how his son has a better computer than we do.

- We some years ago paid for a university course on computers for the same individual, in order to qualify him as having had continuous education since high school, and he decided it was better to take the course money and spend it. He then needed to pay the course (another 700 bucks the wife sent that I advised was throwing good money after bad) to get the paperwork, but by that time had been refused immigration. Tough, Eh? It would be interesting to contact the university and see how much the 700 outstanding tuition really was. Probably another theft of funds from the rich americans

-I hate to say this, but if I had to do my life over again and went for a similar deal, I would make it clear: There will be no funds sent over at all, not a single penny, not for Christmas, none at all. No gifts that others, the recipients, decide what they are either. There would be a fund that will buy a second house in N America, and the rent once the house is fully paid for the rental income will be providing all sole funds after rental expenses. That way, right now, my wife would own a spare house that she can later rent out for her own retirement.

-We borrowed the airfare from a friend so that the family could come over here to live, against my advice and judgment. I was wrong on one thing. They do actually work now that they are forced to, having come out of the Philippine retirement that I (my wife even more so) financed for all those years. But they find the work in North America hard, and so they will be returning. Not on my money they won't. They now have a problem, they owe a load of airfare money for getting here, and drink and smoke too much to save for their return. And no doubt I will be left maxxing out my credit card again, and taking more pension out to pay it down, just to pay off the airfare that was spent getting them here. But the goose has laid it's golden egg, and will lay no more.

Can you imagine that? How such a person can write that long only as a response to some posts? We can be poor but with dignity but that is not the case, because I myself see how my countrymen are. If they see a lighter color or anyone from outside the country, all they cna see is money. As long as someone is out of the Philippines, Pinoys think it's money. A big shame. A bad attitude!

With my travels so far, only Filipino men I have seen are without shame pissing everywhere they feel like pissing! I don't really know where this habit have originated and how the country have tolerated this. To be honest, this is not only happening in the Metro manila area, nor solely in the cities but everywhere in the country.



When I was still a kid and was walking my way to school, friends and schoolmates just pee around like this is the most correct action ever! Until high school, college, university, work and until now, this pissing scene is still very active and growing!. Indeed the government has a big role in providing public toilets for everyone but this is not an alibi. Why women do not urinate just anywhere? It means that it is really the fault of men (Pinoys). If women can contain their urge to pee, why men cannot? And why are they excused to pollute the surroundings? Such a schifo!




Filipino men do not understand the meaning of respect and urbanity! I feel sad when they just blame the government for all the negative things in their lives but they do not look at the mirror and see how wrong they are even in the smallest of acts. They don't understand that with this kind of habit and attitude, they should be ashamed to ask anything from the government or from anyone. They don't even respect their own surroundins, their own country, and above all, no respect for each and every one. No respect for themselves as well because they are the ones who dirtied themeselves. If this is the case that the Filipinos don't have respect for their own race and nation, who else can respect Filipinos? NO ONE!



Aside from the polluton and garbage problems that are very rampant in the country, Filipino men's piss is another big problem. If this habit persists, there will come a time that there is no single square meter in the Philippines that does not smell of piss... Yuckkk... a real yuckkkky! Even with this sole habit, I don't think the country deserves to be better! It's people don't even respect it by pissing like dogs! Maleducated! Ignorant and a dirty act done by so many Pinoys! Have a little SHAME on yourself, MAN!



If you want to see another pissful article, see "this. You will see that I got the photos' links " here.