Foreigners, you're probably getting scammed (P3) (Manila)

FACT: Many are lazy. It's not luck (or the lack thereof) that's causing the continuous poverty here. It's the lack of initiative and stamina of people to do an honest days work. Instead of "dealing with the hand they are dealt with”, most would rather con people for a quick buck! It somehow stuck to Filipinos that you need a diploma to get a job (outdate and false!), so they do the next best thing and swindle people instead. For them, they have mouths to feed and you’re just open game. They won’t even lose a nights sleep over it, because these are people who’ve somehow convinced themselves that what they are doing is justifiable, and that you deserve to lose your money for not being smart enough to hold on to it. Besides, if it’s not obvious, disappearing in a country composed of 7,641 island is easy. And don't depend on the law enforcement here either, assuming they actually do their job and you have a chance to sue the culprit, you'll be lucky to have a day in court. The reason so little thing gets solved in court here is not because it's a costly process, but because the process is painstaking and slow. We have a "6 month rule here", meaning trials should last only 6-months. However, this rule only has a 30% compliance rate. An improvement from the previous 2%, nevertheless, expect to waste of Protected content of your life in the process of suing a person who will just get sentenced a slap on the wrist.

FACT: You’re not as smart as you think. You're probably really good at world history, economics, finance, global current events and other general topics. You've probably assumed that because there are so little people here you can talk with about Brexit, have an opinion on Tesla versus Edison, have no clue who Sergio de Mello is, and could discuss with you the issues surrounding the Brandenburg Airport; that you're smart enough to avoid getting conned. Let me put it this way, you are businessman, sitting in the Business Class of an Emirates flight that just crashed in a jungle. I'm pretty sure that while your likelihood of survival improves with your intellect, that you're more or less at equal footing as the butcher in coach who also survived the crash with you. Underestimating peoples capacity – especially peoples greed, is going to hurt you. Einstein once said,“Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid.” …that or if you judge the fish by its ability to climb a tree, then you will be fooled into thinking that the fish couldn’t out-swim you in water.

FACT: You think we favour foreigners. That may be true to some extent and it may come in handy when you need to get a "seat at the table or would like to sue someone". But can your gut handle the extent of the red tape here? How far are you willing to turn your cheek on some local practices? More importantly, how deep is your pocket that you can back-up the love that most people front you because they think they will get something out of it?