A New Experience: Food & Shopping

This is a special edition about food and shopping.

Eating 

Eating is very efficient. You use a spoon in your right hand and a fork in the left above your plate at all times.  The spoon doubles as a knife. There are no knives.  

Many local restaurants keep the silverware in a rack full of very hot water. So when you take your utensils, you are assured of them being clean. 

Typical Meal

Typical meal consists of rice (usually covered with crushed garlic), fried pork or chicken and a fried egg with yoke uncooked. For breakfast they often substitute a hot dog in place of the meat. The hot dogs are soaked in red dye so that they are red on the surface and part way in.  

One specialty is a Soapia, which is a soft  spongee rice roll with a sweet pork filling and a sesame sauce packet.  They can sit on your shelf un-refrigeratored for days and very good. 7 Eleven keeps them in a steam cabinet for 40 pecos ($.90) The more you pay, the more filling you get.

Eggs

All eggs are straight from the farm and still have natures coating on them so they don't need to be refrigerated.  You buy then on shelves at the grocery or in the public markets. Yes, they continue to incubate in the heat so we wash ours and put in the refrigerator to stop the growth. You can buy "salted eggs" which are cooked in salted water and dyed red...so ready to eat hard boiled. One of the local delicacies are eggs after the embryo has begun to form into a baby chicken. They boil and enjoy. No, we have not tried nor will we try eating these.

Public Markets

Every town has a public market where all the vendors sell their stuff.  In Cabanatuan there is the main one and a couple of farmer's markets as well. Many people do not have refrigerators so they need to shop the markets every couple days for fresh food.

We strolled a very rural public market in Palayan and was amazed to find that the bakery booth practiced full western sanitation.  The bread was raising in plexiglass enclosures to keep the flies off. They baked it in the booth and moved the finished cookies and breads into plexiglass display counters, again enclosed to keep the bugs out.  We bought some cookies and the clerk used disposable plastic gloves to pick up our cookies and put in a plastic bag. The cookies were very good.

Humidity vs Food vs Conservation

The food industry has adapted to the high humidity and lack of refrigeration. Sauces and food comes in tin foil pouches. (Spaghetti sauce is sweet.) Milk is packed in boxes that don't need refrigeration. Breads and cookies come packaged in small sealed sub packs. Baked goods recipes are modified to last longer in the heat. Baked goods typically are not raised so they don't have the airy texture America loves. Also, items aren't sugar sweet. Sister Dansie is missing the huge cinnamon rolls from the Maverick stores. However, the Coconut Macaroons from Goldilocks bakery are the best in the entire world.

Everyone is conservation conscience. You put all your wet garbage in a plastic bag and hand it on the gate so the cats and dogs don't tear it up. Dry waste goes in plastic bags or many people reuse the large bags rice comes in.  The garbage truck has 2-3 guys inside who are sorting as they go removing plastic bottles, metal, etc.  Napkins are 1/4 size. All paper is super thin, even writing paper in notebooks.  Plastic cups are so thin that you need to double up to be able to pickup the glass. You put usable stuff on the ground by the garbage and someone will pick it up.  We put an old 2 burner cooktop that didn't work at one missionary apartment outside by their gate and a trike pulled up and asked for it within seconds.

Malls

Malls come in all sizes and shapes.  The largest are the SM City Malls built by a Chinese company. These are a mixture of SM grocery store, SM department store, dozens of high end clothing, Ace Hardware and dozens of restaurants. Shakey's pizza, Pancake House, McDonalds, Etc.  One of Sister Dansie's favorites is North West Pacific Mall anchored by Robinsons grocery, Robinsons Department Store and Bodega grocery store at the other end.  In between is an interesting collection of high end shops (guess, etc) and flee market down the middle and tucked into every corner. If we are at the south end of town late afternoon, we'll stop in SM for an early dinner. Our favorite restaurants are  Geary's (local food. We went with the Whittings and total bill for 4 people was $26), Kenny Rodgers, French Bakery and Yellow Cab Pizza (Small pizza is $9 so not a great bargain.)  All of the fast food chains feature deep fried chicken with rice or spaghetti. Burger King does have an authentic Whopper and McDonalds keeps the Big Mac true to form....along with all the chicken, rice and spaghetti.

Ice Cream

We have not found any ice cream that compares to Gelato or Tillamonk Mud Slide. McDonald's soft ice cream is a world formula.  All the local brands are lacking cream or even milk so we're not buying much ice cream....except Magnum Bars are imported from someplace good.

Malls Are the Community Center

Every weekend, the malls are full of people coming to AC and hang out. They stage elaborate events every weekend, like school performing groups, dance recitals and a lot of talent contests sponsored by schools.  Last weekend SM City Mall have a combination drink mixing and fruit carvings sponsored by the hospitality/tourism university. Always the music is mega-loud with the bass maxed out.  

Movies

The movie theaters are only in the Malls in the larger cities. No stand alone theaters. They run the sound so loud that Sister Dansie takes ear plugs to the movies. (Senior Missionaries have liberal privileges.) The sound might be 5:1 but video projectors are pretty poor resolution. Since the theaters are 4-6 screens, movies seldom stay beyond 1 week.  We saw "Sully" 2 days before it opened in the US! Popcorn come in plain, garlic, nacho, cheese and quasi carmel.  No buttered!

Electronics

Everyone has a smart phone but always the least expensive and fancy cases. About 2% of the electronic stores sell computers.  Audio gear is minimal and usually elaborate boom boxes or retro looking speakers next to your flat screen TV.  The Mall have dedicated areas for phone stores.  "Cyberzone" in SM city and "Cluster Shops" in Robinsons.  We're not sure how they all stay in business when most sell only phone accessories and "load cards." Iphones and tablets are pretty scarce. Most people buy "load cards" for 50-500 Pecos.  You load the credit in your account and then buy the package you want with your credits.  Most packages are 1-3 days for a weekend of texting and surfing.  Elder Dansie buys 30 days of unlimited texting to all networks and 180 minutes of talk time for 250 pecos ($5.50) and a Surf Max 30 day package of 800 Mb/day for 900 Pecos ($20.)  Everyone communicates by text and many people don't buy any voice time.Just text and social networks (separate from general surfing.)  I've yet to find locals who have or use email. 

You can't get a "postpaid" account unless you have 2 forms of picture ID and prove that you are a resident for at least one year. Then it costs more than the $25 / month load packages. So while food and housing is very affordable, electronics is about the same or more as in the US. An iPhone 6 would cost about $900 USD in the Philippines.

Guards

Every store has a security guard or two or three....even seven eleven.  They open the doors and are also very polite to we senior missionaries.  They all wear the exact same uniform spotlessly clean and pressed. The guards at banks are usually one outside and 2 inside and carry shotguns with no stock. Since this is a cash society, the money trucks look more steel boxes on wheels. Stores have package check and all purses and bags are inspected.  Many mall entrances have a separate male and female line with male and female security who check your bags and you for suicide vests.  The SM malls parking entrances check under your car with mirrors and inside the trunk.  You often pay when you enter to park and have to surrender your ticket when you leave.  Once day we lost the ticket and they didn't know what to do.  We got out and searched the car for 5 minutes, holding up the traffic until they finally gave up and let us out shaking their heads at the Americans.

White is the New Look

"White" is the new look in the Philippines. All the spas and salons feature a variety of skin lightening and hair straightening. All the local advertising features very light skinned models.  Even personal care products like soap, shampoo and creams advertising whitening formulas.