buhay-buhay

Went to Shoprite today. So tiring! Wallet has a hole in it too. Money seems to go down the drain so fast. Just an order of food and rice already cost 3000naira. 1k pesos! Oh my gulay!

It has been sooo hot these past few days. Looking forward to the rainy seaon, esp since they are fixing the road going to the school now.

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We got ourselves a new driver now. At least he drives better than El Bruto who is a danger to himself and others when placed behind the wheels. Just needs a bit more training, but he will do.

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3 Filipina lady friends came by yesterday for a short visit. One of them is looking for a flat around here, so I went to the admin office with them. It was nice to see Filipino faces again. You don't realize how much you miss your country till you see some of your countrymen.

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Dear God, Nepa has been playing disco light again for 3 days now. Constantly turning electricity on and off throughout the day. Grrrrrr

• they say 80% of the population does not even have a bank account
• do you know how difficult it is for the locals to apply for a bank account? Not only do you have to present some identification, you need to do a couple of paper works and need to have a REFERRAL from two bank depositors. Umm.. what if you didn't know anyone who had a bank account? And countless other unnecessary questions you need to fill in the forms.
• our old steward needed to open a bank account, and she was being asked to put in her employer's name and banking information (duh? this is PERSONAL account. why the heck do they need that?)
• the deposit required to open an account is a bit too high
• if it's difficult for locals to apply, what more with expats in this country? Lucky if the companies will do the processing for them. But what if they are only working in small companies, doing domestic duties, or working on their own? I feel sorry for the amount of paper works they will need to fill in, and the deposit required to open an account.
• The transaction fee is N100.00 which is too high.
  
• the ATM card takes 2-3 weeks to be made
• you need to pay more than 500+ naira to order an ATM card. Which is big money for those who are receiving minimum income.
• There are not a lot of ATM machines around.
• And even if there were ATM machines, a lot of times, the networks are down, and you cannot use them.
• the POS is not working most of the time. So what's the use of going cashless?

Already since Dec of last year, some companies are going cashless. Refusing to accept payments made in cash. To pay for my internet connection, I needed my debit/visa card otherwise I cannot top up my load.

To pay for our electricity in the flats, we need to pay thru POS as well. There was a time last year when I forgot to check our load and we lost our electricity because we run out of balance. So here we were, rushing to the admin office only to be denied payment because we brought cash with us. We fianlly had to beg someone in Hubby's office to pay for our electricity, and just deposited the money in their account. Thank goodness the company applied a corporate account for it's employees/expats.

My point is, they can offer this cashless option to people by giving incentives. Educate the people some more of its benefits. But let us decide for ourselves whether we want to use our card or cash! Do not push it down our throats that we NEED to get an ATM/debit card otherwise we cannot do any transactions.

This is like KFC in Nigeria not having forks in their stores! Give us an option whether to use our hands or utensil for eating!!!

I thought I knew my boys very well by now. But I was surprised to see Luis' hand writing on his school notebook and I felt so happy to see this neat and beautiful handwriting. I felt bad though that I am not familiar with his work. If someone were to present samples to me, I don't think I'd be able to pick out which one was Luis' own :P I need to see more of his writing then. More! More! MORE!

The boys have been improving by leaps and bounds in their school. And I can't help but be grateful to the hardworking Nigerian teachers they have working with them.

Oh my gulay! I just feel so emotionally tired today. I think I need a holiday again. Maybe 1 year will suffice :P

Anyways they are finally fixing the bad road going to the school but it meant stopping the car quite a distance away and trekking to get the boys from school this afternoon. We will all be happy when this is over.

Oh and after 3 weeks we finally got our cable tv signal back. Woot! Ty to our Oga for having it paid for and fixed. Mucho gracias!

Chellaram Plc donated some bikes to 1004 Estate, as part of 1004's effort to provide entertainment to the tenants. It is such a great thing for them to do that, esp for tenants who don't want to own a bike but still want some exercise (aside from the swimming pools, basketball and tennis court).

The only problem I have with this is that I can't let my kids go here because the path you have to ride is part of the parking lot. And if there was some ijit driver who decides to reverse or move their car without looking at the road and with a lot of speed, then it can be dangerous for the little ones.

I have seen cars here moving at speeds you would only normally use out in the highway, not at residential areas. I have seen several accidents of cars hitting other cars in the parking lot as they were trying to park or moving away from the parking area. So yeah, I'm not ready to have my kids risk their lives surrounded by some ijits behind the wheels.

Oh and yesterday, the people were asking some of those riding the bikes to slow down! They were riding so fast that you'd think there were in some kind of race. One almost side swiped me. Jesus! Don't let monkeys behind anything that has wheels or any vehicle that moves faster than a tortoise.

But as I was saying, hehehe, the bikes are a great idea for the tenants who are looking for other forms of exercise but doesn't want to waste money buying bikes (an addition to the swimming pools, basketball & tennis court).

I just hope the tenants will take care of the bikes so they can be used for a long time.

We saw this car in the parking lot, and it looked so cute! :D I wonder what make and model it is. Looks like something from the future.