I walk to work. I like walking. It takes about ten minutes. Everyday I see the tricycles ride by and they must think I’m crazy because I’d swear none of the locals walk further than an equivalent of one block (city blocks don’t really apply here on Mactan). Basically anything that takes longer than two minutes to get there is out of the story for walking.

The few times I do take a tricycle is when I’m in a real hurry or it’s raining or I’m getting back late late late at night. Tired or somewhat sick? Probably still walk.

It was on one of those late night rides that I started thinking: the usual fare between my place and the main road is 5 pesos. That’s about 10 cents. If multiple people get on the tricycle (including strangers) it’s 5 pesos per person which is how much the other passenger gave.

Because I’m a foreigner however, sometimes they try to charge me 10 pesos.

After he let the first passenger off I got to thinking. The average wage here for that type of worker is seriously 300 pesos (60 passengers) per day… on the high end. That’s a a little over six bucks. SIX BUCKS for a DAY!!

And here I am walking. I almost feel bad for doing it because they get nothing. Sometimes I think about taking a ride just to give them what small amount I can give. Maybe on this ride home though I’ll give him a little more. I knew I had a 10 peso coin in my pocket, so 10 pesos.

When we reached my place I got out and went to grab the coin from my pocket when the rider says, “20 pesos.”

And my first thought was “20 pesos?! I was going to give you more than the expected amount but now you’re saying 20 pesos. What’re you trying to pull on me?” So I gave him the the 10 pesos I knew I had and went inside.

How quickly the mind forgets and flips on itself.

All the tricycles are individualized with customized paintings or stickers applied to them. This Jollibee logo cracked me up — it looks like it’s eaten too much of his own food!

Tags: philippines, photos, travel, tricycle

This entry was posted on Tuesday, September 22nd, 2009 at 5:50 am and is somewhat related to travel. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

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