New Year 1998

[Panserhansen]

This was my first trip to the Philippines, and we were not planning to much when we were travelling around the country. Me, my wife and mother-in law wanted to go to Palawan, "the last frontier". So we arrived on a flight in Puerta Princesa with out usual procedure, without having booked a hotel. Standing outide the arrival hall mid-day in the heat with our suitcases looking for a taxi, there were none. I watched some other westerners being picked up by represants from their hotel and cursed myself for not having done some more reserach. Some local guys on tricycles saw the "sucker"-sign in my forehead, and were quite eager to "help" us, and wanted us to go with them to a travel agency to book a nice hotel. In lack of options we reluctantly accepted. Well, at least they drove us to a travel agency and not to a distant hospital to remove our kidneys. A few minutes later we were sitting in the office and looked at brochures of expensive resorts. 150 dollars or so for a night, plus VAT, plus transport, plus plus.... that was way expensive back then when the dollar was higher. Our budget was usually 15-20 USD. We declined, and asked them to go to another agency. I went in, grabbed a list of hotels in Puerta Princesa with prices and found one for 700 peso a night. We asked the tricycle guys to take us there. I had never taken a tricycle before, and they charged 100 peso, 10 times overcharhge. I was tired, just wanted to go there and payed them off.The hotel/motel was brand new and quite small, only 6 small rooms - but clean and quiet. There was only one young guy in the reception, and looked surprised when the three of us arrived. No guests at the hotel except us. We checked in and the tricycle guys were still hanging out in the reception, trying to extract every single peso from us. Now they were trying to sell jewelry to my mother-in-law. I shooked my head, went in my room and laid down for an hour. They even knocked on my door, but i told them nobody's home.Finally, the guys left and I asked the receptionist if they had any food. There was a kitchen in the lobby, but he sadly told me the cook was given the day off. My mother-in law was allowed to use the kitchen, and he even drove her to the wet market. Coming back, she had shopped plenty of meat, fish, crabs, spices and a cage of beer for my instructions. She is an excellent cook, so the lobby soon smelled of delicous food. Our receptionist set a large table for us in the lobby, and quite soon we were having a marvellous dinner. Of course we invited him to eat with us, and during the evening several other locals joined the party. One of them even with a karaoke machine, so the party was getting more and more noisy and funny.Clock was approaching 10pm, and we went out of beer. One of the guys offered to drive us to a larger hotel, and soon we were there having drinks and enjoying live music with more people. At midnight we watched the fireworks between us and the clear stars, and I made some thoughts about this strange country. From trying to be hustled by some people, we managed to find others making us the best new years eve ever.Now this story told me there are people who can make your days miserable and there are people that can put the smile back on your face. The first kind will probably look for you, but you have to look for the others yourself.

[Mr Lee]

Great story and typical. I have met some great people in the Philippines, both Filipino and expats and some of both would do their best to empty peoples wallets. Panser, since Paul listed a hotel, maybe you could tell us the name of the hotel you stayed in and any contact info you might remember, in case one of us ever wants to go there and if they are still in business. Thanks.

[Jollygoodfellow]

This was my first trip to the Philippines, and we were not planning to much when we were travelling around the country. Me, my wife and mother-in law wanted to go to Palawan, "the last frontier". So we arrived on a flight in Puerta Princesa with out usual procedure, without having booked a hotel. Standing outide the arrival hall mid-day in the heat with our suitcases looking for a taxi, there were none. I watched some other westerners being picked up by represants from their hotel and cursed myself for not having done some more reserach. Some local guys on tricycles saw the "sucker"-sign in my forehead, and were quite eager to "help" us, and wanted us to go with them to a travel agency to book a nice hotel. In lack of options we reluctantly accepted. Well, at least they drove us to a travel agency and not to a distant hospital to remove our kidneys. A few minutes later we were sitting in the office and looked at brochures of expensive resorts. 150 dollars or so for a night, plus VAT, plus transport, plus plus.... that was way expensive back then when the dollar was higher. Our budget was usually 15-20 USD. We declined, and asked them to go to another agency. I went in, grabbed a list of hotels in Puerta Princesa with prices and found one for 700 peso a night. We asked the tricycle guys to take us there. I had never taken a tricycle before, and they charged 100 peso, 10 times overcharhge. I was tired, just wanted to go there and payed them off.The hotel/motel was brand new and quite small, only 6 small rooms - but clean and quiet. There was only one young guy in the reception, and looked surprised when the three of us arrived. No guests at the hotel except us. We checked in and the tricycle guys were still hanging out in the reception, trying to extract every single peso from us. Now they were trying to sell jewelry to my mother-in-law. I shooked my head, went in my room and laid down for an hour. They even knocked on my door, but i told them nobody's home.Finally, the guys left and I asked the receptionist if they had any food. There was a kitchen in the lobby, but he sadly told me the cook was given the day off. My mother-in law was allowed to use the kitchen, and he even drove her to the wet market. Coming back, she had shopped plenty of meat, fish, crabs, spices and a cage of beer for my instructions. She is an excellent cook, so the lobby soon smelled of delicous food. Our receptionist set a large table for us in the lobby, and quite soon we were having a marvellous dinner. Of course we invited him to eat with us, and during the evening several other locals joined the party. One of them even with a karaoke machine, so the party was getting more and more noisy and funny.Clock was approaching 10pm, and we went out of beer. One of the guys offered to drive us to a larger hotel, and soon we were there having drinks and enjoying live music with more people. At midnight we watched the fireworks between us and the clear stars, and I made some thoughts about this strange country. From trying to be hustled by some people, we managed to find others making us the best new years eve ever.Now this story told me there are people who can make your days miserable and there are people that can put the smile back on your face. The first kind will probably look for you, but you have to look for the others yourself.

Ahhh love a story with a happy ending. Your braver than me, I would have had every thing pre arranged before I got there but I guess it makes an adventure out of it. In the end you probably had the most memorable new years eve ever. :3_8_14[1]:

[Panserhansen]

Panser, since Paul listed a hotel, maybe you could tell us the name of the hotel you stayed in and any contact info you might remember, in case one of us ever wants to go there and if they are still in business. Thanks.

Sorry, I don't remember the name of the hotel. We only spent one night there before going to Nagtabon Beach further north. Now that was an interesting tour as well. We booked a minibus with some other tourists, and spent the night there. Beautiful and quiet beach, but when the darkness came, kind of spooky. Here too, we were the only guests. The generator did not work, or the grumpy german running the place wanted to save money. Absolutely nothing to do except reading books in the light from the parafine lamps, and listening to coconuts falling on our rooftop. Felt like Robinson, a nice experience but one night was enough.Day after, we went to the beautiful Underground River before heading back to Puerta Princesa. The trip itself was horrible, roads were in terrible condition and a trip that should have taken 45 minutes on a regular road took 4 hours.Panser

[WOF]

My 1st trip was in may of 2005. I posted this story on The world of filippinas site in june after I got back. I just copied it so I could post it here .What an unreal trip this turned out to be. The flight over wasn't to bad even tho I'm not a big fan of flying ( my way of saying it scares the hell out of me lol ) When I got out of the airport my girlfriend was there waiting for me across the street along with about 20 members of her family. lol I had seen lot's of pic's of her and some video's that her cousin had sent me but she was by far more beautiful in person then any of the pic's had made her to look. 1St thing they wanted to do was eat. I swear I don't know how they can eat as much and and often as they do and still stay so tiny. lol The 2nd day I was there was her 21 st birthday. So I paid for a birthday party for her and asked her to marry me right there at her party in front of about 150 people lol. Thank God she said yes coz I'm sure I would have died of embarrassment right there on the spot lol. I was then informed by her brother in law that I also had to ask her mother , 2 of her brothers and because her father was dead I had to ask her uncle. So I did . All said yes. lol Her mother allowed her to stay with me at my hotel as long as there was no sex. She was still a virgin and they wanted to make she she stayed that way till after we were married. Day 3 her and I and 2 of her girl cousin's went to a resort swimming We had a blast. we stayed until about 10:30 pm. I didn't think anything about it at the time. 10:30 pm in USA is early. But when we got outside there wasn't a taxi or multi cab any where. so we started walking towards the main road . It was about a 3 mile walk. About half way there we get into the middle of some kind of huge block party. Now up to this point I had felt really comfortable around the local people so this didn't bother me at all. i thought it was great until my girlfriend looked at me and said I'm SCARED. I asked her what she was scared of and she said that most of the guys there was drunk and she was scared for my safety.. Ok I'll admit now I'm worried. lol. We didn't waste much time getting through the crowd. And soon was in a taxi and on our way. I spent 19 days there and not one time did anyone ever say anything bad to me or about me where I could hear it lol I felt very welcome there and was treated like a king by everyone. Now who can visit the Philippines and not talk about the way they drive ? lol Now I've read about it here on the site but there's no way you can make someone understand till they see it for their self. It's really amazing. I think the drivers over there are the most skilled drivers I've ever seen in my life. Not always safe lol but very skilled. I think the thing that impressed me the most about the drivers is there was not one sign of road rage. no one yelling or cussing at other drivers. no one flipping the bird. I was truley impressed. the Only time I had any kind of a problem was from her brother in law. For some reason he thought he was the head of the family. I guess coz he thought he could speak English better then the rest or he was going to try to run things lol. after my gf and I returned from going to the beach by our selves He came up to me and said he needed to talk to me . He Wanted to know why I had not invited the whole family to go with us. He kind had an attitude about it .That didn't set to well with me . So I told him that there would be times when I would want to do things alone with my gf. And when I wanted to I would invite who I wanted and when I wanted. He backed off after that and the rest of the trip was great. After about a week we decided that we wanted to get married right away. there was between 250 and 300 people at the wedding. there was 9 brides maids and 9 groomsmen. we had three hogs and had a caterer come in and set it all up and do the cooking. we had a live band. a beautiful wedding cake. i don't even know how much soda and other drinks. but the whole thing only cost me about $600.00 usd's.that was for all the dresses flowers food, band, everything. try to get that here maybe if your lucky around $6,000.00 usd's lol To sum it all up , I had the greatest time of my life there.

[Mr Lee]

WOF welcome to the forum, interesting story. Thanks for sharing it with us. :thumbsup:

[jamesmusslewhite]

A very entertaining story, and I enjoyed reading it.

[Travis]

yes interesting :thats-funny:

[Jollygoodfellow]

My 1st trip was in may of 2005. I posted this story on The world of filippinas site in june after I got back. I just copied it so I could post it here .What an unreal trip this turned out to be. The flight over wasn't to bad even tho I'm not a big fan of flying ( my way of saying it scares the hell out of me lol ) When I got out of the airport my girlfriend was there waiting for me across the street along with about 20 members of her family. lol I had seen lot's of pic's of her and some video's that her cousin had sent me but she was by far more beautiful in person then any of the pic's had made her to look. 1St thing they wanted to do was eat. I swear I don't know how they can eat as much and and often as they do and still stay so tiny. lol The 2nd day I was there was her 21 st birthday. So I paid for a birthday party for her and asked her to marry me right there at her party in front of about 150 people lol. Thank God she said yes coz I'm sure I would have died of embarrassment right there on the spot lol. I was then informed by her brother in law that I also had to ask her mother , 2 of her brothers and because her father was dead I had to ask her uncle. So I did . All said yes. lol Her mother allowed her to stay with me at my hotel as long as there was no sex. She was still a virgin and they wanted to make she she stayed that way till after we were married. Day 3 her and I and 2 of her girl cousin's went to a resort swimming We had a blast. we stayed until about 10:30 pm. I didn't think anything about it at the time. 10:30 pm in USA is early. But when we got outside there wasn't a taxi or multi cab any where. so we started walking towards the main road . It was about a 3 mile walk. About half way there we get into the middle of some kind of huge block party. Now up to this point I had felt really comfortable around the local people so this didn't bother me at all. i thought it was great until my girlfriend looked at me and said I'm SCARED. I asked her what she was scared of and she said that most of the guys there was drunk and she was scared for my safety.. Ok I'll admit now I'm worried. lol. We didn't waste much time getting through the crowd. And soon was in a taxi and on our way. I spent 19 days there and not one time did anyone ever say anything bad to me or about me where I could hear it lol I felt very welcome there and was treated like a king by everyone. Now who can visit the Philippines and not talk about the way they drive ? lol Now I've read about it here on the site but there's no way you can make someone understand till they see it for their self. It's really amazing. I think the drivers over there are the most skilled drivers I've ever seen in my life. Not always safe lol but very skilled. I think the thing that impressed me the most about the drivers is there was not one sign of road rage. no one yelling or cussing at other drivers. no one flipping the bird. I was truley impressed. the Only time I had any kind of a problem was from her brother in law. For some reason he thought he was the head of the family. I guess coz he thought he could speak English better then the rest or he was going to try to run things lol. after my gf and I returned from going to the beach by our selves He came up to me and said he needed to talk to me . He Wanted to know why I had not invited the whole family to go with us. He kind had an attitude about it .That didn't set to well with me . So I told him that there would be times when I would want to do things alone with my gf. And when I wanted to I would invite who I wanted and when I wanted. He backed off after that and the rest of the trip was great. After about a week we decided that we wanted to get married right away. there was between 250 and 300 people at the wedding. there was 9 brides maids and 9 groomsmen. we had three hogs and had a caterer come in and set it all up and do the cooking. we had a live band. a beautiful wedding cake. i don't even know how much soda and other drinks. but the whole thing only cost me about $600.00 usd's.that was for all the dresses flowers food, band, everything. try to get that here maybe if your lucky around $6,000.00 usd's lol To sum it all up , I had the greatest time of my life there.

The type of story that almost brings a tear to my eyes.Now tell me how things are now,that was 2005,is it all good?

[BigMoneyBruce]

Panserhansen any update on how things with the wife or her family are going?