Phiippines Poor Society

             I often went to shanty areas or displaced areas because of my work. I get to see those poor people have their own way of survival despite of having no descent work at all. On the other hand, some has their descent small assorted merchandise store, but how do they get their first initial capital to put up such small store? There is this Indian national that gives them their initial capital called as “bombay” where payment for the money they lend is on daily basis. Those “bombays” collects partial payment everyday until it is paid fully and then renew another credit for the store owners for a little expansion of the little business. This business is only sufficient enough for their food and for their children to go to school on a daily basis. Some of their neighbors often gets merchandise using credit list or “utang” in Tagalog and only pays only when they have money to pay.

              Another way of survival is from the unknown help of utility company like Electric and Cable channel company. What they do in Electric company is that they tapped illegally and then supply power to those houses without power and collects monthly payment without having no obligation to pay to the Electric company. That is what they also do to the Cable channel company by using octopus connection and same collection as from electric company. These are illegal connections where at some point is being disconnected upon discovery of those utility companies but is connected again when those utility men leaves. But there are also some who uses legal power meters who install sub meters to every houses who wants power which usually ranges from one to ten houses and collects monthly payments higher than what utility companies collects.

               Another one is using dramatic act which usually involved children and the most popular is dirty beggars act. Most men do it alone but women is accompanied by one or two children, but children do it in groups. Men acts like a paralyzed dirty beggars while women have their children breastfeed in the streets in dirty costume of course and children uses different techniques like aboarding to some jeepneys and rubs the shoes of the passengers with dirty rags and then beg for money. Some children has their improvised drums and sings while aboarding on the jeepneys door and then beg for money. This act is also uses by those children who trained by some criminal groups to snatch some valuable things to the passengers as they companion sings or capturing the attention of those poor passengers. 

                 The worst thing of survival they did is doing some criminal acts that gives headaches to our law enforcers. The most common are snatchers and hold uppers but happens on different environment where snatching happens to a crowded area and hold upping in areas where no people at all. But hold uppers now also attacked to some passenger vehicle to collect more valuables than hold upping a single man alone. These acts are only few and the space is not enough to enumerate them all.