Holidays in the Philippines

   I have been trying to organize my photos into categories so that I can put up blogs by topic: Transportation, Farming, Shopping and Food, Fishing and Local Industries, and so on.  But I'm having a hard time getting all the photos I want of any one topic put together - - sometimes I'm just not ready with the camera when the opportunity comes up.  So maybe the photo selections will be a little bit more random.

   Christmas

in this area is not remarkably different from in the U.S. except for a few things. 
1) Less commercial activity - not all the hoopla of Christmas Sales etc.  We are rural enough here that our small-businesses and the District Market vendors pretty much keep business- as- usual, and the major shopping at San Jose is 40 miles away so we don't have the constant media-blitz of "special sales" that seems to be everywhere in the U.S.
2) Simpler decorations-  Businesses and homes put up cardboard cutouts and streamers, and a few of the wealthier homes have strings of Christmas lights.  Not as elaborate around here as in the U.S.  Noticed more decorations in San Jose; Christmas trees in Malls, salespeople wearing Santa hats and reindeer horns.

3) Lots of carolers-  every evening for a couple weeks, we had several groups of carolers, mostly enthusiastic impromptu "singers" with gourd-rattles and sticks-drumming-tin cans, but several times with guitars, etc.  Some gratuity is hoped- for but not required.  Mostly local traditional carols, mixed with a few familiar U.S. Christmas songs.  Almost always everything sung in 4- count time (we're used to hearing "Silent Night" in 3-count, and "O Holy Night" in 6-count, for example).

  But, Christmas Day was mostly the same. Lots of special cooking, and people going to various relatives' and visiting.  All-in-all a restful and enjoyable day.

  New Year

was most notable because EVERYBODY stays up; most years, lately, I've gone to bed at my regular time. There is some not-quite-superstition that what happens on New Year's Day sets the direction for the year, and maybe for your life.  Some people make it a point to eat spaghetti or pancit:  long noodles = long life, prosperity (pancit is like meat and vegetable stir-fry added to almost any type of long noodle, often "chow mein" or "ramen").  There are a HUGE number of personal fireworks, bottle-rockets,  and other home-made noise-makers (5 or 6 tin cans splinted together into a "gun-barrel" with slats of bamboo and duct-tape; the end of the last can has a pin- hole punched in it; a few drops of alcohol are dripped thru the hole, the barrel is shaken for a few seconds, then a cigarette lighter is held to the hole; makes a BANG! not unlike a small-gauge shotgun).  One of our nearby neighbors treated us to 2 days of Karaoke singing.

Brief Photo Gallery

Some of the orchids grown from grafts, see first blog-post.

Tabasco bushes grow several places on our lot.  Each bush has
hundreds of  inch-and-a-half peppers.  Each pepper is powerful
enough to move an 80,000 pound truck about 10 miles.

How many cats in this photo?  I think 6 but hard to tell. There are 8 around
 here somewhere, and we never see a rodent of any kind.



The row of  8 coconut shell "bowls" as it looks BEFORE and AFTER.

The row of bowls, DURING.

OLD Question: Why did the calf go around the cow?  (To get to the udder side.)

As I've been working on this for a couple days, I've picked up a few more photo's - not enough yet for a TRANSPORTATION issue,but maybe for a short "farming" or "Home Depot" gallery.  But for right now I'll quit for awhile.