tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32344376082950176552012-01-28T00:56:19.758-08:00A year of work, basketball, romance, and other disasters in the PhilippinesBill Finkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07894959370896172812noreply@blogger.comBlogger261100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3234437608295017655.post-15777895098722713242008-01-30T14:56:00.000-08:002008-01-30T15:46:04.998-08:00

As the header of this blog mentions, Dunked in Manila covers the year I worked in the Philippines. While I often considered my work at IBM to be an inconvenience between games of basketball and trips to beaches or bars, somehow I managed to fulfill the duties of my AIESEC internship. My confusing first day at work is summarized here. In my role of market analyst, my challenge was to make

Bill Finkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07894959370896172812noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3234437608295017655.post-37791462031751759182007-12-31T15:25:00.000-08:002007-12-31T16:10:07.915-08:00

Since it's 12/31, I should mention that New Year's Eve in the Philippines is a fun, and always explosive event. Tons of San Miguel beer, many parties, great food, family gatherings, and lots and lots of fireworks. Both official city celebrations and thousands of people on the streets launch fireworks in the sky and/or at each other. The smoke is so thick from the fireworks that the lack of

Bill Finkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07894959370896172812noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3234437608295017655.post-32247346495028400232007-12-31T10:24:00.000-08:002007-12-31T10:38:51.128-08:00

I recently published a Philippine travel story in the San Francisco Chronicle. I detailed exotic beaches, luxury hotels, kayaking, diving, hiking, rare river dolphins, history, politics, and gave travel tips. But what did all the readers write in about? The squirrel. My story talks about my seeing a recently discovered species of white squirrel on a remote island, and for some reason people

Bill Finkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07894959370896172812noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3234437608295017655.post-41046154702422465842007-11-13T16:16:00.000-08:002007-11-13T17:06:15.259-08:00

Someone needs to come up with a coffee table book based solely on backboards as seen in the Philippines. They're a pretty good summary of the country, scenery, and people, because after all, life is basketball, right?Fancy net with beads braided into it, palm tree above, as seen on the resort island of Miniloc, Palawan Fish drying on tarps on the basketball court, near Taytay. Often the

Bill Finkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07894959370896172812noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3234437608295017655.post-40212412837252277672007-10-30T12:00:00.000-07:002007-10-30T12:44:30.930-07:00

Ok, not much to do with basketball, but just had my eco-toursim article on Palawan island published in the prestigious Expat Magazine in Manila. If you squint, you can see the dolphin hopping out of the water in the screen shot of my article to the left. I think dolphins probably could be trained to play some sort of water-basketball. And sure enough, a quick search on youtube shows this is true

Bill Finkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07894959370896172812noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3234437608295017655.post-63718856718985442142007-09-13T23:17:00.000-07:002007-09-13T23:33:33.773-07:00

When I first went to the Philippines, I had "open zipper syndrome." That is to say so many people stared at me when I walked down the street, I kept looking down to see if my fly was open. It was just that sometimes I forgot I was a walking freak show, a white guy strolling through neighborhoods that tourists never visited. I tried to act normal, act like a local, but like Joe Pesci in My Cousin

Bill Finkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07894959370896172812noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3234437608295017655.post-52777394512199545032007-09-11T18:56:00.000-07:002007-09-11T19:35:44.712-07:00

On my recent trip to Manila, I grabbed a couple drinks with a Dutch AIESEC trainee, just to see if his life was as crazy as mine had been. My earlier posts detail the AIESEC organization that sent me to the Philippines for my one-year assignment. Our merry band of international students and recent grads got into all sorts of trouble back then, and I imagined it probably wasn't too different

Bill Finkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07894959370896172812noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3234437608295017655.post-42234813369054116682007-08-26T22:25:00.000-07:002007-08-26T23:06:22.325-07:00

Rarely does one get to see strippers and nuns hanging out in the same venue. Not to mention dancing transvestites, cows, and a rogue bottle of ethyl alcohol doing a jig. Yes, it's professional basketball in the Philippines, and everyone comes out (no pun intended) to see the action.Unlike the U.S., where teams have city affiliation, Philippine teams are pretty much all based in Manila. They have

Bill Finkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07894959370896172812noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3234437608295017655.post-86576782849533741172007-08-20T17:17:00.000-07:002007-08-20T17:37:41.518-07:00

This just in: Basketball is banned in Manila! The national sport is doomed!! No, actually the headline refers to a recent ban on street games which block traffic. Good luck with that one. Having just returned from Manila, I can attest they have a lot bigger problems with traffic than a few street games. Still, the article is pretty funny, especially the quote from the mayor which reminds people

Bill Finkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07894959370896172812noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3234437608295017655.post-68219943338827833742007-08-16T16:30:00.000-07:002007-08-16T16:48:07.819-07:00

On my recent Philippine trip I visited what has to be the world's weirdest African wildlife sanctuary: Ferdinand Marco's former game preserve on Calauit Island. There giraffes and zebras wander the Philippine countryside, sharing their habitat with local animals including deer, monkeys, some weird porcupine species, and really big spiders. The giraffe on the left is munching a mango. Apparently

Bill Finkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07894959370896172812noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3234437608295017655.post-52806604307789171262007-08-12T22:13:00.000-07:002007-08-12T22:33:09.664-07:00

Is there really a market for a book about a clueless American learning about a foreign culture via basketball?As I was wondering about the potential of my own book, I spotted this new entry into the rapidly expanding genre: Away Games--My Season of Misadventures in Czech Semi-Pro basketball. Nice.It's not due out 'till November, but I'll be sure to snag a copy when it hits the bookstores, it

Bill Finkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07894959370896172812noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3234437608295017655.post-1917479491487512862007-08-09T15:34:00.000-07:002007-08-09T16:05:28.055-07:00

It's good to know I'm not the only American writer with an odd fascination with Philippine basketball. On my recent Manila trip, I met up with Rafe Bartholomew, like me, an American working on a Filipino basketball-themed book. Except rather than accidentally tumbling into the subject (and the country) like I did, he actually intentionally applied for a Fulbright Scholarship to go to the

Bill Finkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07894959370896172812noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3234437608295017655.post-83782292094164241242007-08-07T09:15:00.001-07:002007-08-07T10:16:36.624-07:00

Long blogging absence, but I'm just back from nearly a month in the Philippines, in which I gathered some local color for my book, researched a travel article for the SF Chronicle, and went to see game 4 of the PBA pro basketball championships in Araneta Colisseum, the venue for the famous "Thrilla in Manila" Ali-Frazier boxing match in 1975.The game was another "thrilla" between the Alaska Aces

Bill Finkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07894959370896172812noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3234437608295017655.post-67779633275571883842007-06-29T11:51:00.000-07:002007-06-29T12:55:47.821-07:00

My basketball story "The Politics of Pickup in Manila" is appearing in this month's issue of Expat Magazine in the Philippines. The page has a nice layout with a few of my photos, including this view of me holding a basketball in front of a coconut tree with a hoop attached to it (the tree, not my chest). You probably can't see it in the photo, but my chest has a big rash and some cuts, as I had

Bill Finkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07894959370896172812noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3234437608295017655.post-85454420866415127322007-06-09T10:52:00.000-07:002007-06-09T11:32:37.674-07:00

I've had a few people suggest to me that I novelize my story, turn my Philippine experience into fiction, or at least one of those "based on fact" things. That way I could manipulate the story however I wanted, throw in some extra drama, whatever it might take to sell a few more copies.A couple years ago I met Marc Salzman, author of Iron and Silk, which is a "year abroad" story in China framed

Bill Finkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07894959370896172812noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3234437608295017655.post-19175803287472334872007-05-23T14:23:00.000-07:002007-05-23T15:15:51.694-07:00

It's a bit ironic, and somewhat par for the course, that the Philippines selected a national sport in which it has little chance in succeeding internationally, (1954 world championship bronze aside). In basketball, it's good to be quick, agile, and practiced at the skills of shooting, dribbling, and passing. Which many Filipinos are. However it's better to be tall, and quick, agile, and

Bill Finkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07894959370896172812noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3234437608295017655.post-48202707322515051062007-05-22T00:14:00.000-07:002007-05-22T00:33:01.222-07:00

I always tell people if Olympic basketball was played on a 15-foot tall rim, and all the players had to wear flip-flops, the Philippines would win the gold medal every time.Across the country I would regularly see extraordinary performances by little barefoot kids on concrete courts who would run circles around my plodding efforts to keep hold of the basketball. As a side note, the Philippines

Bill Finkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07894959370896172812noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3234437608295017655.post-2694137014734569192007-05-21T23:12:00.000-07:002007-05-22T00:13:33.498-07:00

The Philippines is a country of extremes. You have the ultra-rich living in walled compounds, while the poor survive in the filth of shanty towns. The country has the beauty of white sand beaches, but also the toxic rivers and open sewage of Manila.As a clueless American guy just out of college, women in the Philippnes represented the same set of extremes to me. They were either the prostitutes

Bill Finkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07894959370896172812noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3234437608295017655.post-7431131548722163252007-05-16T11:08:00.000-07:002007-05-16T11:26:34.864-07:00

When I played in a basketball league in Manila, it seemed like every game I was elbowed, pushed and shoved without the referees calling a foul. When I complained, the refs basically said "it's ok, you're bigger than them, deal with it." One day I lost my temper, flipped some guy on the floor, and a big shoving match broke out, with people screaming at me in Tagalog and Chinese. I didn't think it

Bill Finkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07894959370896172812noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3234437608295017655.post-14149130644725664082007-05-10T09:47:00.001-07:002007-05-10T10:59:05.274-07:00

I've had a couple questions about publishing a non-fiction book set in 1990-1991. Do the issues and storylines of my story still matter? Haven't the Philippines and the world situation completely changed since then? Who cares about what happened to some dude 17 years ago?Although downtown Makati is almost unrecognizable from back in the day, with new skyscrapers, restaurants, and malls, other

Bill Finkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07894959370896172812noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3234437608295017655.post-39110204837602342962007-05-07T12:30:00.000-07:002007-05-07T12:59:51.953-07:00

The running theme in my Dunked in Manila book is the use of sports as a window into a foreign culture. I found the more I immersed myself in basketball in the Philippines, the better I understood life off the court. I've enjoyed reading about the sports-travel-culture connection in a number of good books, including one on hoops (Big Game, Small World) one on soccer in Italy (The Miracle of Castel

Bill Finkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07894959370896172812noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3234437608295017655.post-68261172945306309942007-05-07T12:19:00.000-07:002007-05-07T12:26:36.903-07:00

I dug in my bag for my hat. A couple local college students were scheduled to meet me upon arrival at Manila airport. To be certain they’d recognize me, I had faxed ahead that I would be wearing a baseball cap from my hometown Chicago Bulls. Hat on head, brim bent to a sporty angle, I charged out the doors and into my new life.It began with a blast of hot, humid air and a scene from Beatlemania

Bill Finkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07894959370896172812noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3234437608295017655.post-35708984298622288852007-05-03T18:48:00.000-07:002007-05-03T19:24:29.762-07:00

I was surprised to discover basketball was the national sport of the Philippines. It seemed like every telephone pole, every palm tree had a basketball backboard attached. Games were everywhere. As a clueless foreigner, it was my entry into their culture. How could I join?While standing at the edge of a basketball court watching the game in progress, I pondered the politics of pickup in Manila.

Bill Finkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07894959370896172812noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3234437608295017655.post-89309922014874927862007-05-03T09:46:00.000-07:002007-05-07T13:35:16.835-07:00

The Philippine capital of Manila was the infamous home of a massive steaming garbage dump nicknamed "Smoky Mountain." Until it closed several years ago, hundreds of families lived on and around the dump, surviving on food scraps, trying to make a few pesos repairing and reselling refuse.During my yearlong stay in Manila, I joined the "Junior Rotarians," a student-run charitable offshoot of the

Bill Finkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07894959370896172812noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3234437608295017655.post-54349696546579966272007-04-23T19:33:00.000-07:002007-04-23T19:58:46.902-07:00

So what is the status of the book?In basketball lingo, I'm setting up to take a shot. It's no layup or dunk, but I think I have a good angle at scoring.I've written about 75,000 words of text (about 200 pages), I have a formal book propoal that I'm getting ready to send out to literary agents. I met a bunch of them at the ASJA national conference last week. Some seemed quite interested in the

Bill Finkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07894959370896172812noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3234437608295017655.post-32722749719359168792007-04-23T18:03:00.000-07:002007-04-23T19:21:07.960-07:00

I went to Manila on a one year internship through an international business club called AIESEC, which is a French acronym meaning something along the lines of "please send me somewhere cool to get a job." (Actually, it stands for Association Internationale des Etudiants en Sciences Economiques et Commerciales). Prior to graduating from the University of Michigan with a degree in Japanese Studies

Bill Finkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07894959370896172812noreply@blogger.com0