PhilFAQS

Here’s a little news item I my dear wife pointed out to me this afternoon:

The biggest law firm in the country allegedly fell victim to a multi-million-peso scam.

Sources in other law firms told abs-cbnNEWS.com/Newsbreak that Sycip Salazar Hernandez Gatmaitan, one of the leading local law firms, was duped by a foreign client into advancing P50 million for a deal that would supposedly bring around P100 million to the firm’s earnings.

The law firm was reportedly promised five percent of its client’s $50 million-claim. However, in order to get their cut, the firm was first asked to advance P50 million…. read the full Philippine scam report article here

Once again, it would seem that an expereinced, educated attorney in a high-level management position fell victim to exactly what I wrote about recently regarding the key to virtually all scams, Philippine or elsewhere … getting money that really wasn’t his .. or his firm’s.

photo credit: woodleywonderworks

Just advance us x amount of money and you too will benefit from money which was never yours in the first place.

The article goes on to outline a number of famous scams from recent Philippine history.  Note the common theme … advance us some money and you’ll get more than you know is yours … a special deal for you to get ahead … insider information only.  In plice terminology this is know as the advance-fee fraud scheme

Once agin I’ll maintain what I’ve often said, and what many notorous ‘confince men’ have said in the past … you can’t scam an honest man.  If it is too good to be true … it is likely that it is.

Well for those of you who hate posts about making a living in the Philippines, especially making a living in the Philippines on line, or supplemented by the online world, this will likely be another post you don’t enjoy.  Sorry about that, I write when I’m “in the mood” and this is what I’m “Moody”  about today.

If you think I’m somewhat unidimensional from the impression you have of me, you ought to see the view from inside my head … it’s absolutely flat as a billiard table from inside here at times.

It’s really hard for me to believe how many people make a living without the power of the ‘Net in today’s world, and it’s even more of a surprise to see those who succeed do so in spite of their on-line efforts rather than becuase of them.

If you feel you’ll never be doing anything to make money online in your life, that’s ok, read along, becuase for sure you’ll run into a friend or relative here in the Philippines who does want to and I’m going to reveal a couple of elemental truths that everyone can use.

I’ve been having a discussion with several online associates about the importance of responding to people on the web, and I recently had a prime example when someone whose site I had featured in a write up here on PhilFAQS months ago left me a comment.

Now the fact it took that person months to respond is neither here nor there.  I’m not writing because my nose is out of joint about not getting instant gratification.  I wrote about a lot of people and sites who never respond … that’s almost the norm … and the fact it is almost the norm is what today’s message is about.

Here’s the bottom line suggestion I have for anyone interested in people, money or both: (more…)

I’ve been more or less regularly publishing a Questions and Answers post every Thursday here at PhilFAQS, the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQS) about the Philippines blog. Took Thanksgiving Thursday off, so it’s certainly time to get back into the swing of things.

I saw a good one from “queeniebee”, a regular reader here and on Bob’s flagship Philippines Magazine publication, Live in the Philippines. It’s one I have seen many times since I have been interested in living here in the Philippines and then made the move, so I really appreciate Queenie bringing it to my attention again.

——————————————————————————–
Just How Important is Your Network of Expat Friends?
——————————————————————————–

Actually I paraphrased that a bit just to make an easier to read heading, here’s a quote from queeniebee’s comment I saw this morning on Bob’s magazine:

… I know that you have a broad network of ex-pat friends and people that you have a lot in common with.from many different countries. I know that a lot of it is work related and the nature of your life, but how do you think it would be different if you did not have this network of friends and contacts?…

That’s really a good question and one I have seen so often in so many forms that it deserves a fairly long answer.
(more…)

Of course, as I have mentioned before here living in the Philippines the issue of income always seems to come up.  Also literallythousands of searches per year wind up here as people look for the answer to “How to earn a liivng in the Philippines” or, very often in my case here, “How can an Internet cafe earn money in the Philippines”?

It’s no secret that I don’t think much of the standard “Internet cafe” model in today’s business world.  (by the way you often get a blank look when you talk about Internet cafes here, many Filipinos refer to them as ‘Computer shops” even if the sign on the door says ‘Internet cafe”.

The reason I don’t think much of the ’standard Internet cafe’ model … where clients at random come in and pay for the use of a workstation and connection by the hour is that I feel the margins are way too small.  You absolutley can set up a shop today and barring any major mistake you’ll make money, but the money is such a pittance you’d be better off to leave it in time deposits at rates that don’t even equal inflation.  Why work hard, spend tons of hours on something and end up with less money overall than you started with?

But I do think you can make money with the ‘computers on line’ model here in the Philippines.  In some cases I think you can make a lot of money.  One idea I talked about reently is being a “latchkey Kid” monitor for cleints back in the US. Another would be providing almost any kind of monitoring service for a business function … I’ll write more on this idea soon.

But here’s an interesting outsourcing Philippines article I came across a couple, days ago that is at least a good topic for discussion … outsourcing blogging to the Philippines:

… A lot things you do for your blog is (sic) nothing but a waste of your time. Some of these things, while necessary, certainly does not generate more income for you. The solution: outsource!

While you can outsource to just about anyone, the trend today is to outsource to the Philippines. Why the Philippines and not India or some other country?

According to Replace Yourself, an outsourcing guide by John Jonas, here’s why:

1. Philippinos speak and write good English, are are easy to instruct
2. It’s relatively cheaper to outsource to Philippines compared to most other English-speaking countries
3. They value foreign employers and are happy to work for a Caucasian boss

I think the selling point is that it’s easy to tell them what you want and with a little training, get them up to speed with your working style and work rate. Plus, communication is key and generally speaking it’s easier to understand Philippinos than a lot of other people….

Personally I have a couple issues with the statements … especially on getting Filipinos to take instruction … it’s not that people won’t take instruction here, it’s that the concept of what you want contrasts so strongly with what they think you want that life may prove quite frustrationg, but that’s all a matter of degree.

The article is written from the standpoint of an American or other Westerner developing the concept of outsourcing and throwing out feelers to find a source overseas, saving money and even more importantly, time.

Seems to me to be an intresting concept from a different viewpoint .. what if you, the person who wants to make money in the Philipines … prepared yourself to ‘catch’ those feelers.  Something like an ‘Articles on Demand’ operation, using a non-profitable “computer shop” as your base of operations?  Worth a thought I think.

Just a quick post to give a big shoutout and a thank you to you, the faithful reader.  It really means alot to me that so many people have stuck with me here through thick and thin.  I jst did some statistics chacking and came across a pretty amazing (to me, anyway) “factoid”.

Readership here at www.philfaqs.com. the site where we try to answer all the FAQS (Frequently Asked Questons) about living in the Philippines is up 1,371.05% percent over this time last year.  Wow!  Thank you, each and everry one of you.

A big special vote of thanks to my freind Bob and the staff at the excellent Living in the Philippines Web Magazine.  Bob was cracious enough to inbvuite me to write a column there aned beleive me, that’s when my readership here really took off.  If you aren’t familiar with Bob’s site, it’s highly recommended.

Here’s hoping we can together continue these kind of gains as I move into my fourth year of publishing this blog and my third year of living in the Philippines full time.

Don’t bother digging out your Tagalog or Bisayan dictionaries, those word are in Japanese .. or precisely, Nihongi Nihongo (thanks, Paul) , the official language of Japan … Japan, like the Philippines actually has an abundance of languages, Nihongo is the one foreigners are most likely to learn.

During the years I worked in Japan I got quite familiar with the term in the title, it is the "polite" and "respectful" form of "Forgive Me".  In Japan, especially in the business world, it’s quite easy to breach etiquette and upset someone in a company or government agency, but the correct thing to do it to write them a Gomen Nasia letter and, like magic, the slate is wiped clean and all is forgiven.

I’ve been making too many changes around here … some caused by technical considerations, other due to my own lack of foresight or planning.  "Hindi dahilan", I have no excuse.  I promise to leave things alone now as long as possible.  this is my Gomen Nasai letter to all my faithful readers.

On the plus side, I think you’ll like the new look.  I still need a tool to "collapse" the listing of the pages in the left-hand column.  I took all the advertising banners off as I feel they took up too much space, cluttered things to the readers eye and just looked too tacky.  I may or may not add a banner or two that interests me, but I promise to keep it down "below the fold" so the everyday reader doesn’t have to see it every time.  I will keep a Google or other textual ad in the individual post page mainly because I find items that are of great interest to many readers show up there, based on the content of each post. 

One of the most difficult issues in running a site like this is organization.  There’s already a lot of information and it’s hard to organize it in a format that works for everyone.  So I have taken the next best route.  Multiple ways of organization.  use the one that suits you best, and do let me know if you have suggestions for even better ways to organize.

Keyword Search:   In the top right corner there is a simple search box.  Type in any keyword that describes something you are looking for and the site will return a list of post excerpts that contain that word.  There may be more than one page, depending on how common the word you search for is, check the page links at the bottom of the page to see if there are more search results.

Main Site Pages: Along the top of the header of each page, just above the pictures is a "Main Site Menu" bar.  Notice that these menu selections are ‘live’, they have sub menu items below some entries which you’ll see if you "hover" (hold your mouse over the letters in the word).  This gets you to information like my contact data, advertising information, site policies and disclaimers and an "Archives" page that has every single word ever written here organized by data and post title.  There are also independent "Subject pages" for important clusters of articles that will give you a one-line menu to get to articles by title.  This is a second primary way to try to find what you are looking for.

Category Browse: Each article that gets published here is assigned to one or more categories.  This is probably an area I am really weak in … I have too many categories and my thought process for category assignment has been, shall we say … eclectic.  That’s a near-term project, clean up the categories.  The category selection tool is a drop down, it shows you how many individual posts are in each category.  When you choose one of the categories you’ll get a page (or pages) of excerpts of posts that are assigned in the category you requested.  By design, so posts "fit" more than one category, so if you are looking for something by this method, don’t be afraid to try a similar category if your first browse doesn’t find you what you want.  Method number three.

Monthly Archive Browse:  When you now approximately when you read about something you want to reference again, this is the place for you.  Instead of looking through years of article listings on the main "Archives" page, you can just come here and select what you want to see by month and year.  This may also return a list longer than one page, so be sure to check the links at the bottom of the page to see if there are more articles to browse.  Major Method number four.

All Pages Menu:  Last but certainly not least we have the "master list" of all the pages in the site.  This is the one I mentioned wanting to "collapse" like the categories and archives selections.  No matter what happens in that regard, the location is going to stay the same.  Method number Five to find your way … is there anything I have forgotten?

This post will stay in the database for future reference, and it will also go on it’s own special page in the main page bar for permanent reference.  Happy Reading and browsing.

A few weeks back I mentioned a number of ways to get yourself set up on line in the Philippines so that you could call the US or friends and family back home could call you for very little or even zero cost.

One of the faithful here, Marshall who hails from California bought a solution I had not mentioned and today he took the time to have a test conversation with me via my "Skype Out" service and his new "MagicJack" VOIP system.

You know the first time I heard of the MagicJack I got the idea this was one of those "too good to be true" Internet scam sort of offerings but now that I have had a report from someone who has purchased and used it, and I have dialed into their system and talked over it myself (on a Sunday morning, my time, when my ‘net usually runs pretty slow", I think I can say this is a good deal.  That’s right, friends, handy-andy, jim-dandy, two-toned, steam-heated, chrome-plated De-Lux telephone plug-in gizmo! Guaranteed not to rust, bust, collect dust, erode, corrode, or explode! Further warranted not to rend, rip, burst or tear asunder!

Seriously, at about $40 for the device and your first year of service, $20 a year there after and 100% free calls this gizmo is hard to beat.  I’m going to order one and have it sent to me in the next Alabaman box … I like my Skype service but this one seems better, faster and cheaper, despite their somewhat "hype-Sy" looking web site.  Recommended

OK, if you didn’t know it, it’s Saturday morning here and I got with the program and decided to make some changes. I liked all the lovely views on the old theme, but it was taking way too long to load. This new theme/new look will be much faster and hopefully more readable.

I’ve added many more posts, compressed, to the front page so you cna find things and navigate easie.

rOn the left side I have the list of dedicated pages covering various subjects and a drop down list to find items by category. Or use the “Search Box”. Or leave me a comment via my secure, spam-free “Contact” page or call me on 1-719-966-4295 04 63-919231-5625. I really want to hear your thoughts, positive or negative, about the new look.

I also want to welcome two new sponsor who have come aboard here at PhilFAQS. Gorilla Mobile. If you are in the US you can call the Philippines for only 9 cents a minute. I have been on top of the rates for years and this is the best I have seen. There’s no deposit, no changing mobile carriers and you get a Free Trial with Five Dollars Free just for trying … don’t know how much more risk free you can get than that… check them out.

If you are planning a trip here, don’t forget your passport! And don’t forget, also, the passport must have 6 months remaining before expiration Upon Arrival!

As par of the current US policy of “make them pay” for feeling secure, the US State Department is taking forever … months … to issue or renew passports. As we recently found out, this is partially becuase Condeliza’s “no bid” contractors are busy searching for celebrity tidbits rather than doing their job.

If you need passport action NOW, just visit

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Yes, there’s a fee and the whole situation with the State department makes me mad, but hey, getting mad gets you nowhere … take action and save your trip!

Citizenship … actually the legal term is nationality, but few use it outside immigration court … is always an object of interest ’round here. 

A few days ago I got a query regarding my article on Henry Sy.  My reader wanted to know how Henry Sy, who was born in China of non-Filipino parent, could be a property owner here in the Philippines.  A good question.  And from me, the best answer you are going to get is … Henry Sy is listed in all major references as a Filipino.  I do not see many details on how he became a Filipino … after all he came to this country in the 1930’s, and his parents were already "landed immigrants" at that time.  Henry married Felicidad Tan, also a legal Chinese immigrant and both became legal Philippine citizens (and devout Catholics, by the way) in the period immediately following World War II.

It’s important to remember that the citizenship laws have changed a lot in the Philippines over the past 100 plus years.  there have been no less than 6 Constitutions, all of which had important things to say about Philippe citizenship and land ownership … and at least five of which would have governed Henry Sy’s  life in the Philippines to date.  If you follow the news you’ll know that significant constitutional changes may be in the offing … but who really knows?

For those who want to be real students of these issues, here’s the list of former and present Philippine Constitutions.

1987 Constitution  — Present day. Also known as the Aquino Constitution implemented at the end of Marco’s power.

1986 Provisional "Freedom" Constitution — Last ditch attempt of Marcos to remain in power.

1973 Constitution — Implemented by Marcos and supporters to allow Marcos to become de facto dictator

1943 Constitution — Engineered by the Japanese occupiers, set stage for first decades of Filipino independence

1935 Constitution — Commonwealth nation status, signed by Manuel Quezon and Franklin Roosevelt.

1899 Constitution — Drafted and signed at the Barasoain Church, Malolos, Bulacan.  formalized the First Philippine Republic  and a direct precursor to the hostilities of the War of Philippine Independence or the Philippine Insurrection, depending on which side of the political fence you sat.

So now that know even more than you wanted to know about the background of Philippine citizenship, here’s the factoid of the day to remember.  It’s not ancie4nt history, it’s very important as I see a lot of folks making statements or decisions about themselves of their children based on misunderstanding of how the present day laws work.

US citizenship is based primarily upon the principle of jus solis  (Latin for "right of the soil").  Although there are important exemptions, in general you are a US citizen if you are born in the US, no matter what the nationality of your parents.  Thus, if you are an American citizen and you bring a foreign spouse to the US and have children, your children are almost without question, US citizens.  Of the soil.

However, if you are a US citizen and you have a child in a foreign land, that child also has the right of US citizenship, even though he or she is not born "of the soil".  That’s because the US also follows another very common legal principle, Jus sanguinis (Latin for "right of blood"). 

A US citizen who acknowledges a child legally confers upon that child the right of US nationality, regardless of where the child is born.  The child is a US citizen with essentially all rights and privileges of a US citizen born on US soil with the major exceptions that s/he cannot be elected President of the US and can not pass on US citizenship to his/her children unless s/he spends some period of time within the US.

Thus you can see that we US citizens have the best of both worlds.  Our children are US citizens no matter where born, and if we are married to a foreign national whose own country recognizes jus sanguinis the child can likely be a citizen of that country too.

It’s also important to note that those constitutions I laid out for you above have essentially no provisions for jus solis. In virtually all respects the Philippines does not recognize any form of jus solis.  One can not become a Filipino based on being born in the Philippines.

It’s important to note that although many nations accept multiple nationality (Dual Citizenship) some do not … so whether or not a child should claim all the birthrights he or she has becomes a personal decision.

I’ve decided to start a new section here at PhilFAQS where I will host or post links to useful podcasts and videos pertaining to the Philippines and living in the Philippines.

Just navigate over to the page at the left “Podcasts and Videos” and select what you would like to see/hear.

First up is an audio podcast of the very first, the original, the one and only Bob and Dave show, recorded by my good friend Bob Martin … MindanaoBob at www.liveinthephilippines.com

Bob and I hope to make a series of these podcasts, discussing different aspects of living in the Philippines and I feel it’s a great idea.

For those not familiar with ‘podcasts’ (another silly ‘net-speak word like ‘blog’), podcasts are audio files originally designed to be downloaded into Apple iPods. But they are not unique to iPods at all. You can listen to them on your computer by simply right clicking on the link and selecting “Open With” your favorite audio player.

You can also do what I recommend myself, right click, select “Sace As”, download to your hard drive and burn the file(s) to a CD for listening to on long boring drives.

Whatever you choice, enjoy and send feedback either to me or to Bob … we want to know about topics that will interest you.

You can also email me at davestarr 9at) gmail (dot) com , text me on 09191-231-5625 or call me on Skype at davestarr/Xingr21.

Since there’s currently only one offering on the new page, here’s a direct link to my recent interview with Bob, Vol 1, Number 1

Enjoy

Just a quick note to let everyone know I’m alive … it’s been quite a week so far and it isn’t even halfway gone, is it?

Been very busy with family and a lot of other interesting things, some of which you’ll read about right here soon.

I just wanted to say thanks to everyone reading here and especially to those who have taken the time to subscribe to the RSS feed for this site. For ages I have had some kind of a disconnect between me and FeedBurner, the current web-wide standard for collecting, serving and keeping statistics on feeds and now it’s fixed, thank the Good Lord. I actually have subscribers … wow.

If you haven’t yet become a subscriber, it would be a great honor to me if you’d do so now … I’ll be writing more as time goes by, and you won’t miss a thing.

Recently my friend Bob posted this message of caution and thoughtfulness:  Take Time To Avoid The Pitfalls.  the pitfalls Bob was talking about center mainly around the common mistakes we expats tend to make when we decide to move to the Philippines.  You really should read Bob’s post, I was going to excerpt from it but it tells a story with every sentence, so read it for yourself, you’ll be glad you did. 

here’s what I was going to respond to Bob regarding this article … it got long (of course ;-)), so I made it an entry here.

I really hope that many who are browsing the web with their Philippine retirement dream clouding their vision take the time to actually _read_ your advice. Bob.  I often steer clear of folks asking for advice anymore because when you tell them the straight story they just don’t want to hear it.  A favorite expression I learned years ago is, don’t ask the question if you don’t want to hear the answer.

I’m not anti-Philippines or Filipino.  Far from it.  I came here by choice and I’m here living just fine and have no plans to go anywhere else.  But I am a realist.

1.  Living near your wife’s family can be a really explosive issue.  We live very close to my in-laws and it is not posing a problem at all … but were I starting over I would not.  And it can be really bad.  A lot of smarter people told me not to, I did anyway, and they were more right than I.

2.  Buying/Building a House: The number one thing I have heard for more than 8 years now is "I’m going to build a house.  I know how to do it better than those Filipino builders and besides, a house is an investment".  DO NOT DO THIS!  First of all, you frequently can not, legally.  Secondly, the Philippines is full of distressed homes like the one you described … people sunk their life savings into their "dream’ and then their life changed and it became a nightmare.  The property laws are horrible … China and the Philippines are the only two countries I know if where you can not get title insurance.  I wrote up some other thoughts here:
http://philfaqs.com/them-thats-living-there/land-ownership/owning-your-own-home/  If you are building a bahay kubo … a weekend retreat … something solely built with your discretionary money … not your monthly living expense money, go forth and do.  But be assured that 99% of the time every penny you put in the house is gone … you had better want the house for the rest of your life, because your chances of selling it at a profit when you want to are slim.

3. Renting here is not at all like renting in the US.  The landlord is essentially responsible for nothing but collecting the rent … and many try to insist on the dubious practice of demanding 12 months of post-dated checks in advance.  A rental home is essentially a do it yourself project.  Accept it, or pay the price in your blood pressure readings.  In my first year in a not bad rental home I have spent roughly the same as I paid in rent in improvements/repairs that make our life comfortable.  This makes the ‘cheap rent" a lot less cheap … and I have a "good" landlord, the house was clean and in good repair when we moved in … many for sale and rental homes I have looked at are in horrible shape.

4.  It is NOT cheap to live here.  Food makes up a much larger percentage of the budget than it does in the US.  Electricity is the second-highest price in the world.  When you find US items in the store … say like the coffee you like to drink … it will be double the US price.  For those over 65 factor in also that Medicare can not be used overseas.  You have paid for it all your life and will continue paying if you opt for Part B … and it is all for naught.  Prescription drugs tend to be much pricier than their US counterparts and are frequently not available.  Many US prescription pain pills, for example are not legal for sale here.  Many cardio meds are not available.  Hospitals are cash businesses, you won’t be admitted without a deposit, you (or your child) won’t be released until the bill is paid.

Okay, enough.  Yes, I do still enjoy living here, but be forewarned that your plans may well go awry … and the biggest pitfall I have seen foreigners fall into … thinking you are smart. 

You know a lot about life in your home country.  You can’t come here and think you know the same things about life here … most of the time I feel about 16yo’s old, continually having to ask my spouse, my family, neighbors, etc. "what do I do now"?  For those who like that "stupid" word?  Go right ahead and use it.  I’ve been called stupid by some pretty smart people.

After you’ve been here a while and learned how much you don’t know, you’ll realize we all start out stupid.  The smart ones learn, the stubborn ones cry.

Just yesterday I posted on the current price of gas and contrasted it with some US prices. …. if you don’t want to go back and look, the gas and diesel here was a few cents per gallon cheaper than in most of the US.

My freind Matt Cutts has been posting recently on the new Everex "green" PC Wal*Mart is featuring in the US .. #199 for a pretty well equipped desktop, minus monitor but with a full-fledged non-Windows operating system.

Today Matt, who lives in California posted this picture:

That’s right, if the person before him at the pump had filled their tank with super premium their bill would have equaled, within pennies, the price of a brand new desktop computer.

I often hestitate to make price comparisons and caution other expats also … even after a year out of the US we don’t know the cost of things … one new computer (and don’t expect to see any new computers that cheap in the Philippines) equals just one tank of gas (don’t expect to see gasoline costing that much in the Philippines).

Wow!  I think they call what I’m suffering "sticker shock" or in car dealer terms, being "out of the market".

Here’s a little update on the article about voltage/frequency standards and using your current computers and appliances in the Philippines. Most laptops are multi-voltage but it is surprising how many laptop power supplies (the big “wart” in your power cord) go bad and how easy it is to lose a cable … thus making a perfectly serviceable unit useless.

And when your laptop or camera battery dies .. what do you do? Throw the otherwise good device away? Certainly that has been my only choice in the past.

Here’s a company I have found which has batteries, cords and accessories for almost any device … and they do ship to the Philippines. This is not an affiliate link … I have no business relationship with this company … but I could have used them about a thousand times in the past, so others may well find them useful as well.

Power Up! http://www.laptopsforless.com/

Another month has fallen off my calendar pages … already more than half of 2007 has gone by … I can’t believe how much fun I’ve been having since I made the big move here.

In the month of June we’ve gotten things back on track a little bit better, especially with new Guest Blogger Arvin Santiago.  Arvin’s lifelong Philippine resident and has had experience in starting and running several Philippine businesses … he write well and he knows whereof he speaks.  Hope we’ll see more of Arvin as we roll on into July.

http://philfaqs.com/phils-business/real-world-business-running-an-internet-cafe-part-1/

http://philfaqs.com/phils-business/real-world-business-running-an-internet-cafe-part-2/

http://philfaqs.com/phils-business/real-world-business-running-an-internet-cafe-part-3/

http://philfaqs.com/phils-business/real-world-business-running-an-internet-cafe-part-4/

http://philfaqs.com/phils-business/real-world-business-running-an-internet-cafe-part-5/

The other posts for June were:

http://philfaqs.com/phils-education/top-ten-skills-_not_-to-go-to-school-for-part-1/

http://philfaqs.com/phils-education/top-ten-skills-_not_-to-go-to-school-for-part-2/

Webmaster’s Note:

I’ve been seeing queries for the list of approved VA (UA Veterans’ Administration) schools in the Philippines.  Be careful of any such lists you find.  The last word I have from the VA office in Manila.  For a variety of reasons the list of approved VA schools in the Philippines is not published on-line.  Don’t rely on outdated lists you may see, especially if the list is shown to you by a school you are considering.  Go to the source, first.

VA Regional Office:
1131 Roxas Blvd.
Manila, Philippines
Telefax: 011-632-521-5056
Internet Contact:   Select (Compensation & Pension Benefits) / Philippines

Moving ON

Here`are some of the articles on the current editorial burner.  If you want to learn about other living in the Philippines subjects, drop me a line at email or in the comments block.

permit for sari sari store

computer schools in phils

art school in the philippines

$900 airline ticket from san francisco to manila

pag ibig in phils

list of approved va schools philippines

land ownership in the phils