Chapter Author
Contact Graeme
Journalists, students, potential clients or anyone else email.......
graeme@datasecurityexpert.co.uk
Something private to say?
PGP public key
graeme@datasecurityexpert.co.uk
Something private to say?
PGP public key
Whining about long waits for white goods, high delivery fees or a lot of stairs to navigate? Try getting a new fridge/freezer to a jungle house with no roads in the Philippines!
- Details
- Category: Blog
Now let’s shift 11,000 KMs to a house outside of a town which can barely be described as a village in Southeast Luzon (Philippines). If you live on the concrete road, it is fine but what happens if you are 1 KM+ inside a jungle? Firstly, you head to an appliance store in the nearby small town or city, select a new fridge/freezer, pay them £15 to deliver it from the warehouse in the city and leave it at a relations house who lives on a slim road.
So far this does not sound too bad right? Yes, however the road ends here with no professional path to the house and you need to cross two rivers!
The story of extreme sacrifices of the “Martinez” & “Cortez” families and why migrant workers move abroad from the developing world for a “better” life
- Details
- Category: Private Thoughts
The answer of course starts where they are from. The family sizes are large, 4-9 siblings are not uncommon. Most of the workers come from rural villages where jobs are scarce or poorly paid. Overpopulation plays a big part: India has 1.3 billion people, and The Philippines has at least 100 million people. Insane corruption/cronyism/nepotism comes into play where you may need contacts or money to “buy” a job. Having travelled to many 3rd world places and re-visiting them, I do not see them improving quickly - corruption is a cancer. Lastly is obvious gender and age discrimination which may exist in the United Kingdom, but it is seldomly shown on job ads.
Let’s look at the last reason above. I took the below photo on a recent trip to East Luzon, Philippines and I spotted a similar ad on a shop in North Luzon (Vigan to be precise). It seems if you are 29 years and one day old you suddenly become stupid! Many people did not ever finish high school let alone college or university. Many jobs require a high school or college diploma to work as a cashier in a petrol station. Clearly such a job does not require such education. This means if you are 30 or 40 plus in The Philippines it is tough to get a job and many just go abroad.
Bosnia and Herzegovina
- Details
- Category: Travel Reviews
What comes to mind when you mention Bosnia and Herzegovina? The Eurovision song contest, war of the nineties, assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand and maybe Mostar bridge. It is rare you will meet anyone who has been there. The country has a small population of 3.5 million, is rather poor, is not in the European Union, has different religious/ethnic groups and has only a tiny access to the Adriatic Sea in its south.
Bosnia is not an all in one resort kind of place and as said above it barely has access to the sea. Unlike my past review of Slovenia it is less developed and is cheaper than EU member states. Taken from Wikipedia, this explains how it is divided: Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina (FBiH), the Republika Srpska (RS) and one condominium named the Brčko District.
So, what is there to see? castles, Ottoman architecture, waterfalls, pilgrimage sites, war remains, communist remains, bunkers, bridges, rivers and abandoned buildings. A big mix of things to do and it houses all major mono theistic religions.
Page 1 of 63