The Philippines: In Summation

As you may be able to gather from our last several posts, we've become something of experts on the Philippines: we've ridden atop a Jeepney, we've eaten balut...well, that's pretty much it, but that should count for something, surely.

This was our second experience traveling in a developing nation (though I do so hate using terms like that), and I have to say, it went much more smoothly than our time in Bali.  We still grapple with the guilt of being so much more privileged than everyone around us, of course; to put it most succinctly, this means that we would feel outraged and ripped off when we were being charged double or triple the local rate for a meal or transportation, then feel dumb when we realized that it was only a matter of about $4, then feel guilty when we realized that that much money could well be a day's wages for the merchant in question.  After our time in the Philippines, we are better at dealing with haggling (barely), with beggars (somewhat), and with exotic toilets (if necessary).  We did go a bit overboard with spending, sadly...with everything so very cheap, it's easy to spend much more than you mean to.  BRIGHT SIDE: WE ARE CLOSE TO NO LONGER HAVING MORE MONEY THAN GOOD SENSE.

The Philippines are clearly a very special place, and I don't think we've seen the last of them.  I mean, we still have about 695 more islands to visit.

In summation:

People -- Awesome!
Food -- Meh
Sights -- Beautiful if poorly located
Transportation -- Thrill-a-minute
Beaches -- Please!
Poverty -- High
Urchins -- Yes
Would Visit Again? -- Hell yeah