hey welcome JJ the lonely bll in Asia topic today is we're going to talk about the eight biggest myths or lies about the Philippines stick around we'll do that next [Music] all right so welcome to my channel if you haven't been here before it's JJ the Lonely Bull in Asia in case you just stumbled on it I'm JJ I'm the Lonely Bull uh I do this channel to share my experiences with anybody who is interested in uh visiting or living in Southeast Asia and specifically in the Philippines I'm here in bonasio global City BGC in Metro Manila and that's where I live I've been here for over two years now I absolutely love it I love the Philippines I love southeast Asia so if you're like me and and you like southeast Asia you like the Philippines or you're thinking about moving here or you do live here hit that like button for me really would appreciate it if you haven't subscribed yet go ahead and hit that subscribe button too and that alert Bell that way you get notified when I post new videos so today's topic is the eight biggest myths or lies about the Philippines and make sure you stick around for number eight because it'll it'll floor you okay all right first of all um myth number one you can live like a king on less than $1,000 us a month no you can't live like a king you can live on $1,000 a month or less but you're not going to live like a king I mean I see these YouTubers all the time talking about I live on $500 a month here in the Philippines yeah maybe but are you going to have a good life I mean really um you're going to be living in like almost like a squatter's area I mean you're going to be living in the province Mo most likely you're going to be living in one of those Hollow block cinder block houses very small maybe you know 20 square met if if you're lucky if you're lucky you'll have a toilet and indoor plumbing if you're lucky you won't have to uh shower with a bucket and uh if you're lucky you'll have uh water heated for you when you do shower so that's not living like a king so if you see those videos and you see those YouTubers that keep claiming you can live on 500 a month or a th000 a month and live like a king in Southeast Asia or the Philippines that's a lie that's a myth now I suggest that it you know $2,000 a month is a is a good start I mean my my average I average about 1,700 a month in expenses that's an average so some months it'll be a little more some months it'll be a little less you know my utility bills are going to be higher this coming month because of the heat wave that's coming through so I suspect that my electric bill is going to be double maybe triple I try not to overuse my AC because I want to conserve as much money as possible but about 1700 is average you know I pay about 600 a little over $600 a month for my rent uh utilities come to about you know four or 5,000 a month um I pay about 800 a month for my Wi-Fi so those things and then you know you have obviously you have food you know you can get your groceries you can get that fairly cheap if you shop around a little bit if you like to go out to eat there's some deals here in BGC where you can get a nice meal for under 400 peso which is you know under $8 about 750 um so that's not bad but you just depends how often you want to go out to eat if you want to go have a couple of drinks and it's where you go there's some deals where you can get a bucket of beers six beers for 400 pesos so six beers for under $8 you know those are pretty good deals here in BGC but you can also go on the highend and spend as much as you want I'm here at Wolf gangs right now and a mug of beer is going to cost me about 235 peso so that's uh just under $5 about 450 probably so you can spend a lot of money here or you can be conservative but you're not going to be happy spending or living on less than a th000 a month I would say 2,000 is a nice round figure and have a nice savings account and make sure you've got that steady income 2,000 a month and you'll be happy you can you won't live like a king but you'll be happy and you'll be comfortable and you'll probably live a better life or as good a life as you would in the states or in the west all right myth number two or line number two um dating is easy in the Philippines it's easier than the West I will say that um but it's not necessarily easy I mean you can't just walk off the plane and you're going to have a girlfriend in your arms I mean I I suppose you could if you're in an ldr a longdistance relationship and uh she meets you at the airport but then the the the problem you run into there is she's automatically your girlfriend and so now you have you've run out of options so um if if that's okay with you then go for it but if you're coming out here and you want to find a a girlfriend and you want to kind of get that hit that dating scene a little bit before um don't don't have a girlfriend before you get here find one when you get here find where you want to live where you want to retire where you want to reside here in the Philippines and then look for a girl that's that you could either that's there already or you could bring in Fairly easily so but the dating scene I mean you can get on the dating sites and that's a real Hit or Miss um you know it's it's it's getting to the point where the majority of the girls on these dating sites tend to be very transactional they're looking for a sugar daddy they're looking for somebody to take care of them right away uh or they're not looking for a boyfriend they're just looking for a transaction so if you know what I mean so that's a lot that happens a lot in dating sites so your best bet would be to here's what I would do if I was to do this all over again I would have friends here in the Philippines that I could you know people I meet and befriend who have Filipina girlfriends who can introduce you to one of their friends that's probably a very good way to find a girl because if they're if they have a a foreigner boyfri friend most likely their girlfriends are looking at that saying I want a foreigner boyfriend too so there's a good opportunity um or you know you just you're at a you're at a restaurant you're at a bar you're somewhere and you meet u a girl you just say hi to them you know or you're walking walking down the sidewalk say hi to somebody if they say hi back and smile strike up a conversation you know or if if you want to go the route of oh this waitress is waiting on me I really like her I'm going to get her to the side and try to get her phone number to contact her later and maybe we can go out when she's off work that's fine too you know those are some options other than dating sites now there are some dating sites that are pretty good and and from what I understand if you pay your dating site you're going to have better luck than if you just go the free route so if that's what you want to do you know make a monthly payment till you find somebody then get off that site okay all right myth or lie number in the Philippines the food is bad all right so let me qualify this so when that blanket statement says the food is bad in the Philippines or all food is bad in the Philippines what exactly are these people that are saying that talking about are they talking about Filipino food are they talking about Western food done here in the Philippines because there are some really good restaurants here both Western and Filipino that have very good food and if you have a girlfriend that cooks uh she has um I mean she has great skills in the kitchen she can make you a very good meal now there are some Philipino foods that aren't that great you know they're full of grease they're full of salt they're full of sugar granted but there are some very very good Filipino dishes lechon which is the roast Pig very very good um lpia which is kind of like the um the egg roll almost like an egg roll um but they have different different kinds of meat inside and that's that's very very good um sisig can be very good um what else penid penid is the noodles the thin noodles very very delicious so there are some very good Philippine food uh that you can get here iino dishes that are excellent myth number four or lie number four the Philippines is dangerous well is it is it dangerous is it more dangerous than where you're from or where I'm from I don't think so I was in uh the states last year September October and I was in San Antonio on Riverwalk and I felt a little threatened there were a couple of shady people following me around kind of sketchy kind of kind of scoping me out because I had my Gimbal and my camera and I was videotaping the Riverwalk and I noticed that they were following me around and so I I knew it I was in kind of a area that wasn't very popular there weren't a lot of people around so I got out of there real quick now here in the Philippines if you go down to Southern mind now yeah that could be very dangerous there's some there's some sketchy activity going on down there and even in Manila some areas of Manila you don't want to be there certain times of night so but you just have to be aware of your surroundings and understand you know where you're at when you're there and just be careful Keep Your Head on a swivel and just stay out of those areas in those times of day or night and you'll be fine it's no worse than anywhere else in the world in fact it's probably safer BGC where I live for the last over two years it's one of the safest if not the safest areas in the entire country if not most of the world I mean I I don't feel threatened ever here so it's super safe so that's um myth number four myth number five um Filipinos are scammers or lie number five all Filipinos are scammers not true not not true at all now there are a small percentage of Filipinas that are out there to scam foreigners get them out of their money or whatever but if you're if if you're subjected to that um shame on you you you need to understand that the only reason you're scammed is because you're allowing it uh if you're sending money to a Filipina and you haven't met her yet that's a big red flag that's a big no no okay that that's a that's a major no no don't do it if you're doing it now stop if you haven't met this girl in person why are you sending her money you know because you got an ldr and you're in love with her and she says she's in love with you you don't know that she saying that to five other other guys and they're sending her money too so she's got a good thing going on and it's only a scam if you allow it to be so just be aware of that get here to the Philippines meet a girl in person before you even think about um giving her money or anything all right myth Li number six the BGC is too expensive BGC is too expensive let me bust that myth for you yes it's arguably the most expensive city in the Philippines but you can find really good deals here in BGC my condo cost me $610 us a month my budget here in BGC is about $1,700 a month some months a little higher some months a little lower but it averages about 1,700 so I'm paying 610 for a rent my utilities come to about four or 5,000 PES so a month that's electric and in water my high-speed internet is about uh 1,800 pay so a month so with groceries eating out um having drinks with friends or going on dates uh my budget average is about 1,700 a month so what I always would say is if you are making a minimum of $2,000 a month us you can live pretty much anywhere in the Philippines now you're going to live a little tighter in BGC than you would in other Province areas but you can still manage okay you just have to manage your money a little more um but it's possible you can find restaurants here where you can get a good meal for under 400 peso for a meal which is about 750 us I can get a bucket of six beers and share with my friends for 400 peso 750 for six beers so you can find those deals you can also um find uh as much as you want you can go as high as you want if you're making you know F you money you can come here to Wolf gr gangs which is where I am and you can spend 18,000 peso on a steak dinner you can spend as much as you want but you can also live a decent life on a budget year like I said 1,700 gives me lots of extra money left over each month so I can do my traveling because I love to travel to other Southeast Asian countries and I can do that okay so that's myth number six myth number seven it's impossible to date in BGC okay so I already said dating is easy that's a myth now it's impossible to date in BGC if you're I did a video about a month ago if you're an old retired expat and you're living in BGC or you come to BGC and you want to date a young beautiful Filipina you're not going to find one here in BGC not living here because the young Filipinos or the young women that live here in BGC are career professional women that are either working in a career and making good money or their family is in good money and making good money and high-end they're either Filipino that live here in BGC that are high-end high dollar earners or they're from Korea China or Japan and they're here with their family or they're here making good money so they're looking for like-minded people they're looking for guys that are closer to their age they're looking for guys that make good money and have a good career they're not looking for old expats who are retired on a fixed income of less than $2,000 so if that's what you're looking for you won't find it here now don't fear because we're in Metro Manila there are millions of people in this area there are millions of young beautiful single Filipina that would love to date a foreigner that lives in BGC you just have to go out and find them they're not in BGC they're outside of BGC they're living in toig they're living in mati they're living in pasik they're living in Pai they're living in Manila wherever they're living in the provinces you just have to find them and bring them here they would love to come here maybe they haven't seen BGC before so they're going to be they're going to think it's the best thing ever you know take them to a nice restaurant you know spend a little bit money on them uh because they're probably used to jollybee you know so bring them here give them a little taste of what BGC is like maybe you want them to live with you that's a possibility too and they're probably going to be for it as well so I know some guys that have done that they've brought Filipinos in from the province and they live with them now and they're completely happy these are older expats that are living with young Filipina in their 20s it can happen so don't give up if that's what your thing is if you want to date a young Filipina and you're an older guy retiring here or moving here there's still hope for BGC you could just bring them in okay and finally myth or lie number eight all Filipino want to move to America that's not true at all I know you might be thinking you know I want to come there I want to live in the Philippines but I'm afraid that the Filipina that I meet and want to married is want is going to want to move back to the States and get married that's not that's not the case necessarily a small major small percentage of Filipina will want to do that K1 visa and move back to your home country to get married but the majority of Filipina are family oriented and they want to stay in the Philippines and be with their family or be near their family that's just the way they're brought up and you can find a nice Filipina that wants to stay here in the Philippines and be with you and love you and you can have that perfect life here in the Philippines with your Filipina there's your eight myths hit that like button put those comments down below what do you think did I miss anything is there something I didn't come up with that you have that's a myth that need bust uh I do appreciate the likes and subscribes and until the next time if you want to know more details about coming to the Philippines check this video out here until next time AB boai live life my friend we'll talk to you soon [Music] byebye overheated can hardly sleep at night [Music] doing crazy dreaming you're the reason why [Applause]
