“So... I'm wondering what the crime rate is here, because this is the ghetto.” This was spoken by a man my co-worker and I had just picked up from the airport. Being a 1st time visitor to the Philippines, he was viewing our surroundings through fresh eyes. Needless to say, we burst into laughter. I laughed so hard I cried a little. Looking around, it is very true that this appears to be an inner city hood. I find myself still going through some stages of shock as we continue to adjust here and I think that there are things that I have a hard time 'seeing'. People ask me what it is like here and I struggle to find words to explain it. The differences are so overwhelming that it is hard to know where to start. The very undercurrent of life seems to flow differently, as if there was another type of gravity causing it to behave in ways that make no sense to a Westerner's sense of reason. How do you describe an orange to an apple who has never seen an orange before? “Well... it's.. hmm.. different.”
People here are used to shabby. Most are lucky to live in housing that is made with permanent walls. Many of the residents of Manila have migrated here from outer Provinces that are extremely poor. Little food and no jobs has motivated them to seek their fortunes in the 'Big City'. Unfortunately, here they have found jobs are still scarce and the economic system is one that keeps them from every truly getting ahead. It is normal to see a building made of more than two types of materials. A few of the walls may be concrete, but when the money for that runs out, the rest are finished with wood or metal sheeting or sometimes old canvas banners. Most squatter homes are made of scrap wood, branches, and canvas. Bars cover everything. Windows, doors, and driveways. Tall cement walls surround almost every house and razor wire curves around properties in even the nice neighborhoods. Behind these shabby exteriors are normal homes and successful businesses. No one here seems to mind, or even to notice, that their buildings are not aesthetically pleasing.
And this is why we were laughing. The 'ghetto' we were driving through is a pretty decent part of town. Crime is lower here than in LA and for a metro area of 26 million people, that's not too bad. The other reason for my laughter~ we were only a short distance from where this visitor was going to be staying while he was here. I wonder if he was able to see past the haphazard way this country is pieced together and discover what is hiding underneath..
