Pros and Cons of Being a Foreigner

Sometimes I complain that being seen as a foreigner rather than just someone, and in some cases as a money milking cow, is insulting. There are not many places where foreigners are treated like normal people, like in Malaysia. In other places it has its advantages and disadvantages.


Anybody who travels knows this, if you look like a tourist with a camera hanging over your belly, you are inviting the local establishments to overcharge you. It is true that this cannot be generalized and I have even experienced taxi drivers who would still take the normal way even when I had all my tourist gear on me but unfortunately this is a rarity, a nice surprise.

In India, sometimes it was so disturbing that I gave up all my western outfit pretty early and went around barefoot like a local traveling person. Of course, they would know I was a westerner but their expectations were clearly lower. Speaking a few words of the local language also helps but I recommend that if you want to ask “how much?”, first you learn the numbers. I have seen the local five turn into the English “ten” very easily.

On the positive side, being a foreigner makes people feel you are their guest. You may ask the road and have someone guide you all the way to where you wanted to go. Or you may be taking a crowded shared mini-van and they empty the front seat only for you. Sometimes some people give you the feeling that it would be a big crime for them if they leave you stranded without that red string you are looking for and they go and find it for you.

You are also allowed to ignore the local moral rules to a certain extent. As long as your personal sense of respect permits it, you can do things the locals would never do out of fear of being criticized by their fellow citizens. You can kiss your partner where no locals does it and mostly, people around you would take it as “that’s the way it is in their country” (of course, there may be some old ladies around who wouldn’t like it at all and give you a terrible frown). You can jump on a moving bus or get off at the red lights, use the exit to enter places, forget to tip and sing aloud if you like. It’s not that I do all these things but I realize sometimes that just being who I am is already too much in some local standards. Funny enough this applies to my “home” city where I’m still seen as a foreigner anyway.


The other day we were out at night and felt thirsty. We stopped by a 7-Eleven and I got a bottle of beer and asked them to open it. Somehow they were not equipped to do that but the security guard did it for me. I sat there having a donut and drinking my beer when the cashier turned up with a little plastic bag and asked me if he can put my bottle in it. He said it’s not permitted to drink liquor there! I told him I could go out but he insisted I don’t mind as long as it’s in a plastic (as if I would put a bottle of coke in a plastic bag). Realizing that I’m the only privileged person having a beer in a 7-Eleven I felt like a colonial master (it was night, I was half drunk, I excused myself in the morning).

Here in the Philippines they see me as a “Cano” (from Americano) and I let it be. Thinking how American people usually act (I make a terrible generalization using the disrespectful loud tourist stereotype) I feel I do not need to stress myself too much about the local customs. But I do respect these people (honestly they are really great) and try to learn being respectful. I don’t feel I’m being overcharged here because they are not so used to tourists anyway (the few foreigners around seem to be rather living here). I’m just happy to be the guest of these very kind people and I do my best.