^I've been there once. It's alright, big, can spend multiple hours to go through it all. Would recommend ppl to check it out. Lots of different animals/species. They were building something new and renovating a lot when I was there (August '10)

Transportation back can be a bit awkward. Think we waited over 1hr for a trike. And taxi driver wanted 600 or so to wait, then 400 for the ride to Marikina. Funny biz

I'm looking to check out Ocean Park. Worth it?
Also looking for review of 100 Islands, prob going there next.

PITOM - awesome write up.... any live poker in sabang?

Does anyone feel threatened by the extremist groups in the Philippines? I would love to travel there sometime in the next few years to live short-long termish but the US travel warnings seem a bit severe. Any thoughts on this from people who have lived there recently?

^main concern living in Metro Manila IMO is getting killed in traffic: Drivers falling asleep, reckless driving, or cars falling apart. Scary stuff rarely happens. I'll let someone with more knowledge discuss the rebel groups and their actual level of threat.

I've felt slightly uncomfortable 3 times in the year I've stayed here, and those were all in shady areas.


TL,DR
I kind of want to share my last time though, because I'm unsure of whether this was some kind of weird scam attempt or not.

So I'm walking in Mabini chatting with a friend. We're looking for some bar to visit and minding our own business. It's around 11PM and the street is rather empty.
All of a sudden I feel someone bumping into me. I turn to look around, and there's this 65+ guy with a blind/ruined eye furiously staring at me and breathing heavily. I look at the ground and it seems.. on the street the rice he was carrying is all spilled. As he's mumbling "putang ina mo" and some other voodoo tagalog in a demonic voice I'm trying to assess the situation.

I've heard stories about people carrying ie. a TV and bumping into you, dropping it to the ground and breaking it, to try extract some php notes with a few threats if required and what not. Obviously the TV is already broken and it's a scam.
But some older guy with rice? This didn't make a whole lot of sense. Neither did it make sense that he was SO pissed off. Like he's just putting all his resentment against the world into play and putting all blame on me. Street wasn't even busy. It felt like he was acting but I wasn't sure.

I estimated the rice to be in the range of 1-1.5kg at most, so I said "sorry sir, I'll help you cover that..just wait" went in my pocket and slipped him a p100, probably covering the worth of it by 100%. He reluctantly accepts the money but then proceeds to say "It's 280!!" in an angry voice. I reply back "no it's not", turn around and keep walking.

And I feel even humble for giving him something, I mean, you gonna carry stuff around then, well, hold on to it.

Guy didn't follow or stab me, and situation was over. But damn was that a fierce look in his eye.

Weird rip off or random situation?




Cliffs:
-Old poor looking guy bumps into me in mabini and drops all his rice
-acts like I killed his only child
-I give 100
-Old guy is getting more angry
-Ermita still is the nuts for weird stuff

I went to 100 islands during holy week with my GF. I do not recommend to go there alone, being 2 is fine but a group of 3-5 people seems optimal imo.
Make sure you have 1 whole day at the islands, nothing more, nothing less.

Transportation
Best way is to take a air-con bus from either Cubao or Pasig, Five-star and Victory line goes to Alaminos which is the city next to 100 islands. The bus is around 400p per person.
The drive is around 6 hours and the bus doesn't stop that often so you don't save much time by going there with a private driver. Taxis wont go there since there's no LPG gas available in the province.
Once you arrive to Alaminos you take a trike (5-8min) to the pier where the resorts are, I think the ride is 50p for 2.

Accommodation
We stayed at a resort along the pier area at Vislas de las Islas. Got good room with twin double beds for 2k.

It was holy week and we didn't book anything in advance but still there was several resorts and rooms to choose from (we turned down 2 other resorts next door due to low standard or wrong type of room). So I recommend to just go there and check out the different options.
Its possible to spend the night on Quezon or Governor's island but we didn't try this.


Vislas de las Islas

Island transportation
Our resort had a island package for both of us for 1500 total. This included boat tour around all the interesting islands. Bat island was cool. Once you've seen all islands you decide which island you want to spend the day at.
We picked Quezon island since there was plenty of people on it.


Bat island


Quezon island

Island food
The most common way is to bring your own food to the island. The selection of food on the islands is very limited and expensive. They do sell cold beer tho so no need to bring that.

There are plenty of BBQ setups so you only need to bring charcoal and a lighter (paper, cardboards etc is next to the BBQ setup). Our island package included charcoal and lighter so we had it sorted. The boat driver will be your personal assistant and sort your fire and cook the food for you if you want. I recommend you to let him sort the fire but you cook the food yourself, at least our assistant overcooked everything before I took over and cooked the rest.

For food we went to the wet market in Alaminos in the morning and got some fresh fish, veggies and spices. I also recommend to buy a cooling box for 100p (don't buy the smallest or it will break from the weight), fill it with ice (10p) with your fish in between to keep it fresh. Everything can be bought at the wet market. The ice place and cooling box place is just at the entrance of the wet market.

Island activities
The island package included snorkelling kits so I spent some time in the water, decent scenery. There wasn't much else to do apart from eating your food and drink. You have to take your boat back to the resort before it gets dark which is around 6pm.

100% scam.

Hundred Islands looks baller, I'm definitely adding it to my list of places to visit.

always down for anything

Wow great write about it. Will def visit.

Packages/setup/island hopping/price seems similar to the ones on Palawan.
I'll make sure to bring other people along so we can drink a little.

2k/room seems a bit expensive, then again you had 2 large beds.

I'll also check the map to see if we can do some travel combos if visit-worthy places are nearby.

Ok, I was probably thinking like 65% at the time. However, if it was somehow sincere I'd hate to see the guy be unable to feed his family that night because of some carelessness. Proper streetsmart play in this situation, just ignore and keep walking? Ask how much he paid for it, then when he asks for something like 500 snapcall?

I think Tension was probably the wrong word. I haven't seen any fights break out or anything like that. Its more along the lines of expats being angry that they come in early and take the girls. The funniest thing I saw was a friend of mine was talking with a girl had bought her a ladies drink. All of a sudden this Korean dude just wanders over taps the girl on the shoulder and goes in broken English "You You Barfine Now Let go" Girl just gets up and goes with him. I've never laughed at someone some hard over anything.

This is referring purely to working girls. I'm not saying this is strictly true in 100% of cases but it's close to that. There is a reason that a girl is working in a bar be it supporting the family, supporting a baby, supporting her boyfriend's redhorse habit etc...

Ideally they do have the dream of finding a rich handsome foreigner who is going to whisk them away to a life of luxury. If you don't pay and start feeding them false hopes then she is going to either fall in love or pretend to pretty damn fast.

Before you know it she has moved into your hotel room and all of a sudden her Aunt becomes ill and needs P7000. Before you know it your either forking over the money or you have a girl who can cry on demand.

There are exceptions for freebies it and that is if you know someone else is paying for it.

I'm move involved in a day time drinking bar so my memories of most nights are a little hazy. So will try and think of things that I can remember.

Things that come to mind are

seeing a Swedish girl getting licked out on stage by a 9 out of 10 bar girl.

An 18 yo Finnish girl whos dad retired here started sleeping around. After about 3 weeks she started full on freelancing and charging people.

Two German guys barfined an entire Bar including mama-sans.

A guy getting shot

Countless men cheating on wives

Some Canadian guy going on a rampage down Sabang beach. Then getting the beating of his life from a bunch of locals.

Ty. Erm there used to be a regular expats p500 rebuy that we had going weekly. Super turbo structure usually between 8-15 people sometimes more. First prize usually around 12k. Standard was awful and etiquette non existent more for fun than anything else.

There is a cash game that has cropped up lately. But its kinda kept on the quiet. Blinds are usually 20/40 and most people buyin for 2000ish but it can get deeper later on. Mix of rich locals, expats and tourists depending whos in town.

ty, always love hearing about the crazy nightlife out here in PI. I'm happily in a relationship now but there are so many temptations out here. Kid in a candy store man...

Right got an interesting situation coming up at the start of July. A friend of mine is coming over from Aus for a work conference which is being held at the Shangri-La in Cebu. The plan is to have a night in Manila (saturday) then we are flying down to Cebu the next day.

For Manila we are probably getting a table in Republiq. Its only going to be a small group but am pretty sure we are going to be going a little wild. What sort of prices are we looking for different bottles and drinks? Seeing as a table can seat 15 is it worth it to bring some girls along or will there be plenty of bottle whores inside?

So Cebu

My friends conference is a two day affair but it doesn't start till the wed/thur. So plan is to do some things around Cebu on the monday/tues. Pretty sure we are going to want to go golfing. Any recommendations on a course not looking for high end as we are both pretty ****ty.

I'm not going to be staying at the Shangri-la for the fact that $200 a night could be put to much better uses. So any decent hotels in Cebu. Looking to be more central so I can mess around in the malls all day and try and meet up with some DIA/tagged girls.

Any recommendations for nightclubs that get busy on a weeknight?

Baguio is relatively close and the only option I can think of.

I'm probably going to Cebu for 2 weeks. Does anyone here know about the cash game action in Cebu: stakes, rake, softness?

Read a bit of the thread, interested in living in Philippines for 1-3 months. Not sure which city.

Prioirities;
1- beatable cash games
2- hot/easy girls
3- low cost of living

Cebu? Manila? Other?

i was in davao recently, only for about a week so i can't say how it was long term, but i really liked it, i always felt very safe and there's a lot of security guards everywhere at almost every shop. davao has one of the lowest crime rates in the country. samal island is a short ferry trip away and it is super beautiful. all the food i had i loved, albeit it was mostly fast food type stuff that is all through the country :P there are big malls there too for all your shopping needs. i did a lot of fun touristy things while i was there too, such as wakeboarding, scuba diving, "zorb" ball, went to the crocodile park, zipline and others. not sure about the nightlife as i was with gf but ive heard its decent. internet is really fast and seems to be stable, im not sure the exact speeds but it felt like at least 1mb/s type speed.

you should go to davao man, buck the trend of everyone going to manila, it has all the same things a city like manila has except without the crazy traffic and less hustle and bustle. thats what everyone in davao that i spoke to likes about it, they are really proud of their city (manila is nice too though). some countries (such as mine, australia) have travel warnings which say not to go to mindanao but this is not true, specifically the north western parts of mindanao are where the possible dangerous areas are and its a long way from davao. but yea i wouldnt recommend travelling to cotaboto or zamboanga without a good reason :P

Security Guard in Davao outside my hotel



A bit into the countryside



McSpaghetti



Davao Task Force security guard outside the airport



Jolis



Highlands resort on samal island



Same place

Just bought my ticket... Should be arriving this Sunday night in Manila.

I am bringing my iPhone, is there a certain company i should sign up with? can signups be anonymous? is it prepay, or is contract mandatory? i just want to use it for a short time.

Make sure that your iPhone is unlocked before you arrive. You can usually call your operator if it is and tell them to unlock it since you're going abroad.

When you arrive, go to any mall and buy a pre-paid package from either globe, smart or sun, 100% anonymous.

Forgive me fro not trawling the entire 140+ pages but i'd like to ask about any decent hotels in Makati, anyone know St. Giles Hotel? Looks ok newish clean reasonable price.

Any and all recommendations much appreciated, i've been to AC a few times but never Manila.

Being a monger I am told Bergous st. is the place to go, true?

Thanks

I live in Cebu (Mactan Island). These are the poker rooms I know about:

Waterfront Lahug Casino, All In Poker Room
Waterfront Mactan Casino
Metro Poker Club, Mandaue
Diamond Poker Club, next to Cebu Convention Center (near Ayala)
Oriental Sports Poker Room, Parkmall

The action ranges from (pesos - $1USD = around 43 pesos) 10/20 to 100/200, frequently the 100/200 games have an automatic straddle. The higher action games are more likely at Waterfront Lahug and Oriental Sports Poker Room, Metro and Diamond are mostly 10/20 with a sprinkling of 25/50, Waterfront Mactan is mostly 25/50 and 50/100 both with auto straddles sometimes.

Rake is a bitch. 10% of the pot is the standard if I remember right, don't remember when it gets capped. The games are super soft, just look for the wealthy Asian tourists (similar to the scene at Hyatt in Manila).

It's been a while since I've frequented the live scene, but I'd start at Lahug.

Burgos st. is a bit overpriced imo, LDs are usually P290. I would also try out EDSA entertainment complex, its like a mall with girly bars and much cheaper than Burgos.

TYVM.

The info i got was to head for rhodes or maybe it is spelt rodes, i dont know, anyway I was told bar-fine there is 1500P include chick just have to tip in morning, and on Wednesday its 200P all you can drink. True?

Hey guys!

I've been to the Philipines 2 years ago and stayed in Manila for 2 months to play poker. I visited Cebu and Boracay during that time.

I have some questions tho

1) I will be coming over in late June - probably 29th from Osaka to Manila. Does anyone would like to go to Naga City/Camarines Sur ?
I would like to stay for couple of days @ CWC

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LQrCr...eature=related

If anyone is interested post or PM!

2) Can anyone mention some other places in the Philipines with some nightlife besides Boracay?

3) Any good hotels in Manila at reasonable price ? I've been staying @ Burgos before @ makati palace and citadel inn but I want to stay somewhere else for a change! (tho in Makati preferable)

Thx!!!

I'm moving to Cebu next week. Anyone have any advice on finding housing? Current genius plan is to pick up a rando girl off a dating site or something and have her help me while I stay in a hotel or month to month lease, lol.

I've been looking online, but I have no frame of reference to evaluate the prices and I've read that all the online listings are ripoffs and I should look in the local papers. I'm probably targetting somewhere relatively urban since I need good internet and I want to be free to explore without long transport times.