A few pics from today’s ride taking in the lay of the land….

 

Nice photos
My Uncle fought in the Philippines. Would like to see some photos of monuments battles

 

Nice pics. Is that on Luzon? My older brother's best friend was in the Navy during Viet Nam and ended up staying in the Philippines for 40 years after his hitch was up. And like 71on72 said, my uncle was also over there during WWII.

 

There were some major battles near and in my location here against Yamashitos forces. Check this video I made a few years back.



Yes, Luzon about a seven hour drive north of Manila.

 

Riding through Lamut, Ifugao.

 

There are a lot of retired American servicemen here. Lots of them were stationed in Subic Bay and in Clark where there were large bases. And a lot passed through these places sometime during their career even if they weren’t stationed there. It’s a good place for retirees. Marry a local girl, builld a house, FTW….

 

Friend of fine I worked with in San Diego married a much younger girl from the Philippines. His third marriage. They met through one of those on-line Lonely Hearts Meet Your Match website.
It wasn’t long after when her parent came from the Island to pay them a visit. Then the grandparents, brothers and sisters, nieces and nephews. It was like a Larry David episode.
Last I heard from him he was still working.

 

Getting a visa to go to the States is not so easy for Filipinos so I’m not sure what was going on there.

But yeah Filipinos are very family oriented and in some areas tribal. You have to navigate that and find a place where you are comfortable if you marry into that. What I did was take a position that we would mutually help each other. Helped one niece financially to go abroad as a nurse made it clear that she would pay us back. She did and went one to help her younger siblings study. They are doing well.

Another niece lived in our house and helped take care of our kids for free. When our boys got older we paid for her training as a caregiver and she got a job in Ireland. We paid her expenses going there. Now she is married and has her own family in Ireland. It was a mutually beneficial interaction.

Also, at one time we owned five hectares of prime first class irrigated rice field. We let my in-laws work the land in a share crop arrangement. My wife is the youngest of her siblings and she said we better sell the land because when her sisters die their children might claim tenant rights and try to steal the land. This happens in the Philippines. So what we did was sell the land to them and let them pay it off over a span of years. They have increased their land holdings since. So that was another mutually beneficial arrangement.

I’m on good terms with most of my in-laws. That’s important in the Philippines. They have helped me on numerous occasions.

Another thing you have to be aware of is fund raising for various community events. You have to find a balance there too where you are viewed as part of the community, but they are not bleeding you dry. Someday you will need the community too like when a large typhoon hits and does a lot of damage or something like that.

I have seen foreigners completely mismanage these tribal aspects of living in the Philippines to where they are overtaken and destroyed when if they used a little strategy they could have turned things into a mutually beneficial arrangement.

 

Took a ride up to Kiangan, Ifugao. This is the place where General Yamashita made his last stand in the Philippines ultimately leading to his surrender and the end of WWII in the Philippines.

Kiangan is a beautiful small town high in the Cordillera Mountains in Ifugao Province. There is a big war memorial there with immaculately kept gardens. There is an Ifugao Museum. The curator lady there had lots of stories and history on the area. We learned about WwII, the surrender and life in Ifugao. She told us about Governor Gallman, a military man, during the American administration. He was able to end the practice of headhunting in the Cordillera Mountains. He gained the trust and respect of all the Cordillera mountain tribe leaders and married an Ifugao woman. Quite a story.

It was a great ride through the cooler mountains. Bought a guyabano along the road. One of my favorite native fruits.

Some pics:

 

I noticed you changed shirts.
Is there a story behind that?