Living in Bogo City

Bogo is a wonderful little city in Northern Cebu Province. It has a bit of an identity crisis. For the last couple of years the status of Bogo being a city or just another municipality has been a case before the supreme court. It matters to the people of Bogo (Bogohanons) because it determines how much money the city gets from the Philippines national government. Either way, Bogo City or Bogo Town is a nice place to live.

Bogo City is in the central part of the Philippines. It is about 120Km or 80 miles north of Cebu City. A port city on the Bay of Bogo, it

Location of Bogo within Cebu Province

is known for some of the best fish in the country. To get to Bogo, most people would fly to Cebu City and take a bus up Highway 1 also known as the National Highway. The trip takes about two and a half hours by bus. A little less if you travel by car.

I think of Bogo as a fishing village. There are also farms all around the area. Mostly sugar cane is what I see growing. Sometimes one will see corn growing in the fields. I don’t see a lot of rice fields but I’d be surprised if there are not some around.

There is a mall but it is really hard for a Westerner to think of it as a mall. Giasnano has a decent size store there with two floors of shopping. The bottom floor is mostly for groceries. The second floor has an assortment of goods, clothing, sporting, costume jewelry and the like. There are a handful of shops in the hallway leading to Gaisano. Fewer than 10 shops. It is probably closer to five. None of the shops really stand out in my memory. The local Jollibee is also located there. There is another restaurant there but I don’t recall the name.

There are several colleges in Bogo City. The streets are full of kids in uniform. Seems to be many more girls in uniform than boys. There are a lot of pretty college girls walking the streets of Bogo. Most start college here at the age of 16. They are usually shy and giggly.

Most Filipino here are rather poor but not all. Mayor Martinez is certainly not poor. There is some old money in Bogo and thus some rich Filipino. I don’t get out much so I don’t know very many, rich nor poor.

There are quite a few expats here. There seems to be quite a few German and Dutch speaking expats here. Many expats hang out at Tambayan. I went there once but didn’t stay long. It is a great place to drink beer if you’re in to that. The only appeal to me is that it is a nice place to go girl watching. It is in the heart of downtown. Expats mostly sit at tables in front of the restaurant. It is very hot there and just didn’t cause me to want to stay long. The one time I went, I found myself headed to the Pizza Pub soon after.

The Pizza Pub has aircon and that is its major appeal to me. They have some wonderful sausage called Cheese Hungarian but it is a bit expensive. I have forgotten the price but I’ve become accustomed to eating out for P300. The Cheese Hungarian is not a meal. It is just one long piece of sausage stuff with cheese. The Pizza is okay but I don’t care for it too much. It certainly is not as good as Pizza Hut. We have no Pizza Hut in Bogo. There is no McDonald’s and no Kentucky Friend Chicken.

There is one other pizza place that is part of Pards Hangout. Pard’s is a disco on the wharf in Bogo City. I have been to the disco several times. I have never tried their pizza. I’d like to. There is no air conditioning there though, so I don’t go very often. It has been many years since I made an attempt at dancing. Even in my twenties it was hard on my body. I got some pretty nasty shin splints from it back then. I’m not exactly the picture of grace and even if my body could withstand the pounding, I can’t imagine that my dancing would be a very pretty site.

There are two wharfs in Bogo. One is in the heart of they city it is known as Pantalan. It is small with several decent sized boats moored there. You’ll also see pump boats coming and going, mostly taking passengers to and from Leyte. One can see Leyte from the wharf.

I have never been to the other wharf. I would like to see it but I have not. I walked out that way two years ago but didn’t really know where it was. We turned back before we got there. Now I know we almost made it the entire way. I walked about three miles that day. I’m not in the shape that I can do that now. In fact, it was too much for me then. It took me a couple of days to recover from that. I went beyond my limit. Larger ferries carry people from Bogo to Leyte from that wharf. I can hear the ships horn blowing just before it departs. The ferry runs twice a day. That wharf area is called Polambato

My favorite place to go in Bogo is a BBQ situated on the Bay of Bogo. It is adjacent to the Pantalan wharf. Two people can eat there for around P300 and that’s for both of them. I usually get pork chops and that is probably the most expensive thing there. It is open air. There is usually, but not always a nice breeze. There are several booths to choose from. I always go to the very last one if it is open. They will usually open it for me if it isn’t. The breeze is better there.

Crime in Bogo is infrequent. Oh there is petty theft. We’ve even had cloths stolen off the line. Violent crime is rare. It does happen but not very often. There are political battles but those remain mostly between those political families and close allies. It is mostly legal and verbal battles but sometimes it does heat up. The mayor seems to have a good grip on what goes on in Bogo.

I know an expat that was living in a boat docked at the wharf a while back. He and several others were living there for a short time. The mayor personally paid them a visit. I’m sure to sniff out any potential problems. Greg, my friend, said the guy was very nice and they had no problems. I’ve lost touch with Greg. Last I heard, he was working with a group that held classes teaching English.

There is only one problem that frequent Bogo City. Brownouts happen far too often. We had one today. It started at 7:30 and lasted past noon. Once the lights came back on, my Internet connection died. We are told that it will be down until Monday. So, I’m going to have a couple of boring days. I’ve been thinking of buying a Kindle to help pass the time of the brownouts. I think I’ll go ahead and do that next month.

Reports in the press indicate that there will be no more brownouts and new power plants come online. A new one came online in the past few weeks. Still, we’ve had three long brownouts since then. So I no longer believe it. The brownouts will not stop any time soon.

My Internet connection is decent. I have DSL with a download speed of 2Mbps. The upload rate is abysmal. Try to download a torrent and the Globe, my Internet provider, kicks in throttling so it creeps along at a very slow rate.

Lately, when we loose power, it is followed with loss of water too. This time, I reminded Jessie to fill our bucket with water. I was barely awake. Water went out about 9Pm. It probably will be back soon. Jessie said she saw water pipes along the road when she was out. So they must be upgrading water service. Perhaps that is related to the water outages. The water outages have been recent and are not city wide. I’ve asked others here and they have not lost water. Once again, I’m the lucky one.

Bogo City won the “Cleanest and Greenest” city of the Philippines three years in a row. I am not sure that we won that honor this last year. I didn’t see any press reports. It is possible that I missed it. Bogo City is a pretty place with lots of flowers growing along the road. Yes, the buildings and many homes are often old and lacking paint. That doesn’t take away from the beauty of the Philippines at all to me.

Living in Bogo is a quiet, safe, simple life. It is a great place for kids to grow up. If you’re looking for Western type schooling, I think that might be limited. I’m sure there are good schools here but if they are up to Western standards, I really can’t say.