hello to my 4 am rant. might delete it later.
I don't usually rant about emotions or life openly. find it kinda cringy but here I am.
What I mean by the title is better explained by the story.
Im not filipino. I am a foreigner in my late-20s from Europe. I live in Asia, and it starts to suffocate me here after a year. But coming back is not an option I want to take yet. I have never been to the Philippines, but from the people I met who are Filipino and countless PH boosting videos, I started to feel that the Philippines and espetialy IloIlo could be some sort of escape for me.
detailed story.
It all starts with a girl… like all good white boys stories in asia start, haha.
3 years ago I met a Chinese girl at my job in Europe. long story short we started to date after a few months. Then it was her time to go back to Asia. I always wanted to travel and I got to a point that I can do my work remotely so I quit my job, left my friends, family and my whole life and moved to Asia. We both started to do digital nomading together. lived in China, Taiwan, Thailand for a bit and am now in Vietnam. Well, more like living expat life than nomading (constantly travelling)
After moving here, I started to realise a few things that I thought I was ready for but it turned out I'm not. I have nobody here :D duh….Not all but most of my gf friends are not the most welcoming people. When I visited my gf hometown for the first time to say hi they barely even said hi :D Some of them completely ignored me hahaha. With my gf family, it was better. They are really nice but definitely not as warm/welcoming as I expected. But that's all right. But with that came a problem and that is that without my gf im completely left alone with nobody. digital nomads fluctuate between countries a lot so it's hard to build any deeper connections, and a lot of the nomads including me, start to feel pretty lonely after some time.
We chose to live in vietnam cuz its the cheapest and offers amazing quality for a few bucks. but huge downsides to Vietnam. People. Ima be straight and sorry but out of all the all asian countries I have been to, Viet people are the most toxic, rude, cold, unwelcoming people i ever met. My gf completely hated them after some time, so she wanted to leave elsewhere.
So socialising is not easy here. I was thinking if I am not the wierd one but most expats i met feel same. but there is still a chance the only im the wierd one.
And As it goes unfortunately with relationships sometimes...we gradually went to a break-up point after few years.
And I am left completely alone. No need to cry about it, I can handle it. But the environment I'm living in and the lack of people make it really suffocating.
And here it comes to the Philippines and iloilo
I have been hearing everywhere how nice warm and welcoming Filipinos are. That they are the only ones that will bring you to their circles/communities and make you part of it. Obviously, I also heard some bad things and that living in ph have slot of downsides compared to the rest of Asia.
But for some reason, as I watched all these videos and eventually got to Iloilo, I started spending all my lonely nights imagining my life there. When I was out with other nomads I kept thinking of moving there hahaha cringe I know. But it is true. I was constantly looking at condo options in Iloilo, groceries, different communities language etc. this was already while i was still w my gf. I was sudgesting a lot to go there together but she didnt like the idea so…And with the naive hope, I started to see moving or trying iloilo ane philipines as a necessary change of environment and an escape. The fact that u guys have a few European buildings makes it even better for me to feel closer to home hahaha.
dont worry i know reality might be diferent and thats okey i just welcome some change.
So yeah, I have been thinking of going there. I know all the good and bad things to prepare for. And I know the downsides. half of the people my age will see me as a passport bro for just going to ph :D and part as a walking wallet and in between there will be some genuine people. That's what I have been told at least 🤣
And why not go back to my country?
I love my country, and after travelling parts of the world, I see it as the number one country. People, jobs, relationships..everything is amazing there.
But since I am already in Asia, I might as well try different places if not for the experience. Plus I got some work-related business in Singapore once in a while.
So yeahs, that's my rant. Probably I might to Iloilo this year but I damn sure keep thinking about it. maybe looking for the right time or impulse.
so if i do i hope this extremely cringy sucking up to you filipinos post i just made wont make me change my mind 💀🤣🤣