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Creature Comforts
Posted on October 9, 2009 by Brian under Family, Life, Travel.
I have been in the Philippines for a week now and I have come to realize that there are certain creature comforts that you come to miss when visiting a counrty like this. In America we take so much for granted and you don’t realize how good you have it until it’s gone.
The first thing I missed was AC. In America we are so used to having AC where ever we go, the mall, the doctor, our work, our home even our cars. Here AC is not a given, it’s a luxury. Only those that can afford such comforts have them. Most businesses have them but some, like the street vendors, are just open to the air and can not afford or do not want such comforts (for practical reasons).
The next thing I missed was hot water and good water pressure. These things we definately take for granted in the US. Everywhere you go you have hot water, you are raised to believe that you need hot water to eliminate the germs when washing your hands, body, dishes and clothes. Here not very many people have hot water in their homes, for that matter not very many businesses have hot water. It just does not occur to them to have hot water, it’s so hot here no one would dare to take a hot shower. I tried to take a hot shower the first time I came across hot water and it about killed me. My body temp was already so high from the heat, I just escallated it when I took the shower. It’s amazing how good a cold shower is when you are in a climate with 100+ temp and 90% humidity. Water pressure here is very low. Everywhere you go, it’s the same. It’s just the way it is.
Most people have big tanks to feed their homes. These tanks are fed by the city water. There are no pressure pumps or anything like that, just a trickle of water that barely can get you wet when you shower. If you want anything stronger then you get a bucket and a dipper and pour it over your head and body.
The next thing I missed was communication, both verbal and technological. In America we all speak the same language and anyone else has to suffer through it or keep to circles that speak their language. Here I am the outsider and everyone speaks a different language (sometime 2 or 3) around me and I am lost. Most of the time I just sit and smile.
I see this alot in America and I now understand and empathize with them. I know enough of the language to follow along in a conversation but only between two people. In large groups or if they are spaeking more than one dialect at a time (which is most of the time) I am lost. I am sure that this is how most foreigners feel as well. They don’t have a firm grasp of our language and we talk fast for them and they cannot follow, so they sit and smile and say nothing.
On the technological front of communication, I miss my cell phone. This is a luxury in the states but we have all become so accustomed to having it. I have found myself a few times looking for my phone to update my Twitter only to immediately realize that I don’t have it.
They have cell phones here (more than in the States) and they use them frequently. However, I did not bring one and would have had to buy a local phone and SIM card if I had chosen to; or I could have brought my Nokia which is a world phone and unlocked, and put a prepaid SIM in it.
The next thing I missed was television and internet. They have it here and it’s Americian cable even; but at my in-laws house, they have not updated and added these comforts yet. Maybe in the next trip. We have internet here as well but we cannot visit a lot of the sites I like back home. No Hulu, no Netflix, no Playlist.com or Pandora. These are all blocked to foreign countries because of license agreements.
The last thing I miss and probably one of the most important one is a microwave. Oh, they have them here as well, just not as common as you would think. Most everyone just cooks enought for the day and there is no left over. They either give it to neighbors, the elderly or the animals. But we have had some left overs because of the party we had and there was no microwave, so I had to suffer through cold food. Just another thing we take for granted.
All of this has made me realize a few things though, we have a lot of comforts at home and we are blind to other places that may be less fortunate. Some people choose to live this way and will never change. Some long for the ways of America and will do anything to get there and at least have an opportunity to obtain these comforts and a chance at a better life.
Before this trip I considered retiring to the Philippines and thought that it would make my dollar go further. Since my visit, both my wife and I have decided that it’s not worth it. We are not concerned about the comforts so much as the lack of medical care and the increasing heat. We figure that by the time we retire, global warming will make most equatorial location almost unlivable.
All-in-all it’s been an eye opening adventure so far. I have another week to go and I may experience some more that will open my eyes to even more new and wonderful things. I can tell you this though, I am not looking at the conveniences I have the same way ever again.
(Side note: Here you don’t have dogs barking throughout the day and night in your neighbor’s back yard. Instead, it’s roosters! God I hate the sound of roosters. Especially at 5:00 am.)
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The Director’s Suite
Posted on September 20, 2009 by Brian under Life.
Last night my wife and I went to the Director’s Suite at the Old Town Warren Theater. It was quaint, small, only 22 seats total and looked a lot like the movie room I would have in my own house. When the movie started we saw the picture size and realized that it’s about as big as a home theater projector that you could pick up at any electronics store. The picture quality was a little better and the sound quality was THX perfection but other than that it was not very impressive.
I do recommend that everyone visit the Director’s Suite at least once, just to get the experience. However, that’s about all I would recommend. As for the movie “The Informant”, it was funny but I could have waited for it to come out on video.
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Obama’s Education Speech and Ignorant Educators
Posted on September 13, 2009 by Brian under Leadership, News, School, Videos.
Lately I have been hearing a lot about this Obama video to the students of America. Today my wife pulled it up and we watched it. First let me tell you that I have no allegiance to one party or the other. To be honest, I have never voted. I am 35 years old and I have not ever voted. I have my reasons and at this point in my life I choose to just observe and report. In my opinion this gives me a unique perspective on politics, I am not swayed to one side or the other. I kind of consider myself to be Switzerland when it comes to the politics of the United States.
What I keep hearing about this video is that schools across America would not allow their students to watch it. As a matter of fact, I have read a few articles that claim that some schools advised their students to not watch it at all, not even on their own time. I don’t understand this. I watched it and it sounds to me like Obama just told the children of America to get off there lazy fat asses and learn something. It sounded to me like he told the students of America that if they don’t make something of themselves then they have no one to blame but themselves. It sounded to me like he put the burden of self-improvement solely on the students of America. Personally, I have no problem with this. I have been preaching this to people for years. I look around at the youth off America and I fear for the future. Now let me tell you, I am no supporter of Obama. I don’t agree with many things that he has planned for the future. I applaud him for wanting to change many things that are broke in the country. He is one of the first to try to correct some of the problems instead of just talking about it. However, I think he is going about it all the wrong way, but that’s a conversation for another blog.
Back to the subject, this video. I listened to the video waiting for this “Call to the Hitler Youth” tone that I had been hearing everyone talk about, it never came. When the video was done I just looked to my wife and said “It’s about dammed time.” To sum it up, he basically went on TV and told the children that they need to get off their asses, get out from in front of the XBOX, PlayStation and Television and learn something. Make something of themselves by bettering their education. He even provided examples of other people their age (some older)how that have overcome adversity and have made something of themselves by applying effort and hard work to learning. He even pointed out that it is not easy, they will have to work at it and at times they may not like it. But the reward will outweigh the struggle. I only wish I had listened to my parents when they told me this years ago. I never liked school, all I wanted to do was draw and watch TV and movies. I was one of those students who said “I’ll never use this stuff in the real world” and never spent the time or effort to learn beyond what the teachers gave us. Hell, I barely learned what the teachers gave us. Now I struggle in life, I have had to learn everything that I need to get along in the real world on my own. Math, English, Grammar all of these things that I slacked off on in school I am finding that I need in order to do things in life. If I had listened to my parents, or had someone speak to the students of America like Obama did then maybe I would have turned out differently.
However, I had a choice. I was given this kind of speech from my folks and I CHOSE to ignore it. Most of the students of America had this choice removed. They were not given the opportunity to make up their own minds, they were not given the opportunity to think for themselves. A person within each of these schools decided that he or she did not want the students to think for themselves. These educators wanted them to continue to trudge along in life and not be something other than what they currently are. What if a student who is currently being pressured by gangs watched this video and decided that he had another option, then went on to create the cure for cancer. That option has been removed from his life now. He may now join that gang and not live past 25. What if another student is struggling with family hardships that are causing her to loose interest in school? Maybe this would have given her the strength to pull her head up and move past this and become the next President of the United States, maybe the first female President. That option is now taken from her because of someone else’s selfish actions.
Personally, I don’t see a problem with this video. I actually applaud it. I do now blame the teachers, principals and parents who kept their children from watching this video. The future that is going to be for your children is your making and I feel that by preventing them from watching this video you just darkened their future. Again, I am in no political organization. I lean towards no political party. I just feel that this was a powerful message that should have been heard and it’s an injustice to the children of this nation that the opportunity was taken from them.
Thank God for YouTube.
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My Dream Home
Posted on September 1, 2009 by Brian under Life, Wishlist.
I have talked about it for years. I want to have a house made out of something like an Airplane Hangar or one of those gigantic Shipping containers that they pack cars in.
Well here is is, my Dream Home.
The best part, if you don’t like where you live and you want to move, then just ship your dammed house to another location.
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New Wireless
Posted on July 22, 2009 by Brian under Web.
We have been suffering through slow wireless for many years now. Our Wireless B was so old that it was not even capable of 128-bit encryption. I was trying to talk Ching into getting something better because we were not taking full advantage of our Internet Service capabilities, but she was not seeing it. She was instead trying to lower our Service to match our current equipment. I told her that if we upgraded our wireless then it would make our VPN’s work faster and we could work from home a lot better. Especially since she is on call with her work so often.
The other day we got lucky. Ching’s Dad e-mailed her and let her know that he had a wireless router that we could have because he was upgrading. I told Ching that this would be good because we could then speed up our wireless and get better connection speeds. She agreed and I picked up the router today after work.
After about an hour of being frustrated and calling my dad for advice I finally got the router reset and working. I had to wait for it to associate with all the proper channels but once it did it worked perfectly. I set it up like we had the other one and then grabbed my laptop to test the wireless. I was so pleased to see that my computer connected quickly and without any problem.
While I was finishing the set up on my laptop Ching messaged me and let me know she was on Google chat and wanted to Video chat with me. This was a perfect opportunity to test the new wireless and make sure that the connection was indeed faster. I was ecstatic to see that the video was crisp and almost seamless. While I was talking to Ching I decided to try out Hulu. I was very pleased when I saw that the video loaded in 480 HD without any delay and I didn’t have to pause it every few min to let the video buffer enough to watch it.
Ching said that she can not wait to get home to test the new Wireless out. I set up my work lap top and tested out the VPN. It connected immediately and I was able to down load my e-mails almost instantly. Before I had to wait almost 15 min to let Outlook connect and pull the mail from the server. This is going to make working from home so much easier for both of us. The only issue I have at the moment is that I can not seem to get Ching’s work laptop to connect and I can not figure out why. I worked on it for almost an hour before I gave up. I will work with Ching tomorrow to get it working. I know her laptop is Wireless-G capable, I checked the properties. The only thing I can think of is that her work laptop has some special security that I am not aware of that she needs to work around.
To sum it all up. I am very pleased with the performance and I hope that we can get Ching’s work laptop up and running.
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