I am still going to Mango Lounge often and the number of expats going there is increasing. It’s a great place to hang out. Expats from the next town north of us, Catarman, come down here because they don’t have a tight nit community like we do here. Besides, they say, there is not much to do there. There has been talk about the expats here traveling up there to check things out, but I’m not sure it’s a good idea. I think it would be better if we went south, down to Tacloban to see the expats there. Their community is doing okay, not as well as ours, but they do have a regular meeting place. Our mission would be to go there, meet a few expats and eat in some of their favorite restaurants. There are supposed to be at least a few fine eating establishments there. Of course, the same thing was said about Catbalogan (the next town south of us). We went there and no expats showed up to meet us and the food we had was sub-par. Edible, but not even close to the good food we have here in Calbayog. We just need to find a sponsor down there in Tacloban to show us where the expats hang out and a couple of good places to eat. I think I should be able to find someone to show us around a little bit. The trip to Catbalogan was only a 2- to-3- hour trip, so we did that in 1 day. The trip to Tacloban is a 5-to-6-hour trip, so we would make that an overnight trip. We already know that they have a great submarine sandwich shop there in Tacloban (close to the airport). I’m sure we will be stopping there, maybe our last stop before returning home. Supposedly there is an Italian and another restaurant there worth visiting also. I hear the Tacloban expats have a hangout, but normally only meet on Friday and/or Saturday nights. We’d probably leave Calbayog early one Friday morning and head back probably late morning or early afternoon, Saturday. Our thought is to rent a van/bus and hire a driver. If there are enough of us, 10-12 expats, then it should not really cost that much each. We had 7 of us go to Catbalogan and almost 2 more, but 1 got sick and the other had a last-minute problem to take care of. So, it’s not out of the question to think we could get a dozen expats to go on the trip. Although the Italian Express (the submarine sandwich shop in Tacloban) has wonderful sandwiches, we now have our own little sandwich shop here in Calbayog. There are only a few sandwiches and coffee mostly, but we’re new, we’ll improve. Already people are praising the sandwiches, especially the Meat Feast and Chicken Salad. Next week (or maybe 2 weeks) we will start making floats. Yes, real ice cream floats, with lots of ice cream. I think the idea is to start out with the basics like vanilla, chocolate, strawberry and mango. It’s something several expats say they are looking forward to. I want, no I need to say, that while we were in Catbalogan, I got very upset with one of the companies there. Here in Calbayog, I go to ML Huiller all the time to get money that I sent to myself via Xoom. I tried to get money from the same company there. They would not give me any money. I had the proper identification, but they insisted that their computers were saying that I need to have my passport to get money. How ridiculous. I’ve been here in the Philippines 14.5 years. I don’t carry my passport around with me, nor am I required to. I had my ACR card, a national ID for the Philippines, and you cannot get one of those without having a passport. I don’t know what their problem was, but after they put me off for so long before announcing their ludicrous demand, I just told them to give me my ID and paperwork back and I’ll go someplace else that isn’t run by a bunch of idiots. I’m sorry to say that as we were leaving Catbalogan to go home, and as we passed in front of their place, I gave them the finger. I don’t like being “the bad American” but that was totally ridiculous. In addition to posting this story here, I will also be posting it to my Hive. You can read the information I have there, which is more than what I post here. I like to write poems (even though I’m still pretty raw at it) and I post them there. Some of my poems are considered pretty dark, but I don’t mean to do the things I write about. It’s just something that comes out while I’m in a writing mood. You can check it out at https://peakd.com/@ninong7 if you want to. My phone has been giving me problems. It’s a cheap phone anyway, but the screen has decided to come off. Turns out it’s coming off because the battery is swollen and it’s pushing against it. Today Nening brought it downtown to the repair shop. He fixed the screen and replaced the battery all for P500 (about $10). I’m thinking of buying a better phone. I think my current one is a Real Me 5. I’m thinking of upgrading to a Real Me 9, which is a good phone, just not at the top of their line anymore. That means it will be less expensive, so I don’t have to worry about having to have an arm, leg and pint of blood to get a better, more modern phone. I still do not use it much, but I’d like for it to be reliable when I do use it. Nening says she will take this phone when I get my new one. Okay, no problem. If she doesn’t have one, I’ll be happy to give her this one. After all, she’s the one that keeps my household flowing. Without her things around here would be in a big mess. This blog is now a lot more visible to the world. Unfortunately, that also means I get a lot more spam messages. Every day I have spam messages to delete. I don’t see a difference in my Google Ads though. I wonder what else I should be doing to get people to read my posts and click on my ads? I complain but I don’t post very much either. Maybe if I was posting more, more people would read and then more people will click on my ads. I’m going to close for now, but I wanted to tell you that I “should” have a big surprise for you. For those that have been reading my post for quite a while, this might be more of a big deal to you than the newbies, but it should interest all. I really hope I follow through with it this time. I really, really need to. Salamat Y’all HIVE HIVE HIVE HIVE HIVE HIVE HIVE HIVE
I’m still here in the Philippines and still trying to save enough money to head to Texas for a little while. I really need to see my parents soon. My dad is 89 now and my mom 86. They still would like for me to come back for good, but I just don’t think that is going to happen with the economy of the US right now. It’s so much easier and less expensive to live here. I’ve finally found a way to save a little bit of money, if unexpected things would stop coming up. I haven’t been back in a few years (I can’t even remember how many years it has been, 4, 5 or 6 years).
This feature picture is a picture of me holding our Meat Feast sandwich. This is a whole sandwich (P900) but you can get half for P500. I’m thinking soon we will be offering it in thirds (P350).
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