PHILIPPINES

The famous Chocolate Hills located in Bohol?

In 1986, Quezon City occur People Power Revolution of the Philippines ?
One of the popular songs of the Philippines is the love song Dahil Sa Iyo. Literally translated it means Because
of you

The main hub of the Philippine Airlines is Ninoy Aquino International Airport
The national animal of the Philippines is Carabao
Adobo is the most popular Filipino dish.
The barong Tagalog is an embroidered formal garment of the Philippines.
The balintawak is the traditional Filipino costume for women.
The first southeast Asia’s country to declare its independence from a western Colonial power and become the
first republic in Asia is the Philippines
Facts about the Philippines archipelago
1. The Republic of the Philippines is the world’s second largest archipelago made up of over 7,100 islands. The
country is divided into three key geographical areas. Luzon is the large island to the north on which the capital
city Manila is located. Mindanao is the large island to the south. The Visayas are the group of islands lying
between them in the middle. The Philippine’s flag has three stars on it to symbolize these three sections of the
country.

2. The Philippine islands are surrounded by the Philippine, South China, Celebes, and Sulu Seas as well as the
Luzon straight. This provides them with 36, 289 kilometers (22,540 miles) of coastline that includes natural
harbors, beautiful coves, and spectacular sandy white beaches. The country has the fifth largest coastline of any
country in the world. Taiwan is directly to the north of the Philippines.

The Philippines on the map

3. Located on the western edge of the Pacific’s Ring of Fire, the Philippines has hundreds of volcanoes and an
average of 20 earthquakes per day (most so faint they can’t be felt). The three most active volcanoes are Mount
Pinatubo, the Taal Volcano, and the Mayon Volcano.

Historical facts about the Philippines

4. The Negritos were the area’s earliest inhabitants in prehistoric times (and still live in nomadic tribes in the
tropical forests today). Exchanges of peoples with Chinese, Indian, Malay and Islamic states then occurred.

5. Spanish colonization began with Ferdinand Magellan in 1521 and in 1543 Spanish explorer de Villalabos
names the archipelago for the crown prince (later King Philip II) of Spain. The Philippines remained a Spanish
colony for over 300 years.

6. As part of the settlement of the Spanish-American war, Spain cedes the Philippines to the United States in
1898. The U.S. begins to incorporate the islands’ Muslim areas by force.

7. Japan seizes the Philippines in 1941 at the beginning of World War II; U.S. forces retake the islands in 1944.
The islands are granted their full independence in 1946 (the first Southeast Asian country to gain independence
after the war) and renamed the Republic of the Philippines. The U.S. military is awarded bases on the island in
1947.

8. President Ferdinand Marcos is elected in 1965 and declares martial law seven years later. He lives lavishly
while the people live in poverty. He is ousted in 1986 by the “people power” revolt over a stolen election.

9. Several presidents come and go, some through coups amid corruption allegations. Movie actor turned
President Joseph Estrada is ousted in 2001 by a military–backed uprising of the people and sentenced to life in
prison but later pardoned.

10. Abu Sayyaf Muslim extremists take 20 hostages and troops comb the jungles in the southern island of Basil
for them in 2001. In 2002 the Filipino and U.S. armies hold joint counter-terrorism exercises near the
stronghold of this same Al-Qaeda-linked group.

11. In September 2009 the Army captures a leading figure in the MILF and in November a group of people on
Mindanao are attacked, killing 57. The massacre shocks the country. February 2010 the army captures the Aby
Sayyaf leader of the kidnapping and murder of Christian missionaries in 2001. A former provincial governor
and 195 more people are charged with murder for the Mindanao massacre. President Benigno Aquino is elected.

Flag of the Philippines

The National flag of the Philippines. Image source – CIA
12. In the southern Philippines in 2015, hundreds of Muslim rebels register to vote in the 2016 elections under
the peace treaty signed to end 40 years of conflict. In October, a typhoon hits the northern Philippines, killing
59 and causing extensive damage to fisheries and farms.

13. In 2016, an international tribunal rules that claims China made in 2012 to the Scarborough Shoal reef off the
coast of the Philippines in the South China Sea (with its significant gas and oil resources) has no legal basis.

Culture
14. Filipino culture has been influenced by both the East and the West with significant influences by Spain and
the U.S. also. It owes much to its Malay heritage as well. There are an enormous 184 individual languages
spoken in the Philippines but Filipino (Tagalog) and English are the country’s official languages.

15. From their Austronesian ancestors Filipinos are their famous “bayanihan”; a warm spirit of camaraderie and
kinship they exhibit as a culture. From the Chinese comes their close emphasis on family ties and support. Their
Catholic religion comes from the Spaniards who brought their Christian faith with them in the 1500s.

16. Though officially the Philippines are a secular state, Christianity is the dominant faith and over 80 percent
of the population is Catholic. Traditional district festivals (barrio fiestas) that commemorate patron saints’ feast
days are common. The Moraines and Sinology fiestas are two of the better-known community celebrations and
they include music and dancing as well as feasting.

17. Traditional Philippine folk dances like the “sigil” and the “tinkling” (featuring clashing bamboo poles and
jumping patterns) are being preserved by the Bayanihan Philippine National Folk Dance Company. Filipinos
still dress up and wear their national costumes of special occasions, with women dressed in a “tern” (a long
dress with flared skirt and butterfly sleeves) and men wearing slacks and a “barong tagalong”, which is a special
shirt with sleeves made out of pineapple pulp.

18. As of the 2000 census, 28 percent of the country’s population was Tagalog, 12 percent were Cebuano, and
Ilocano, Visayas, Bicol, and Hiligaynon were all less than ten percent each. Another 25 percent of the
population can be broken down into more than ten non-tribal and indigenous people groups.

19. The national dish of the Philippines may well be the adobo, a stew of port or chicken cooked with soy sauce,
vinegar, garlic, bay leaf and peppercorns. “Adobo” means sauce in Spanish but the Filipino version was
indigenous to the islands long before the arrival of Magellan. Other popular dishes include singing, halo-halo,
lumpier, fish sauce and milkfish.

20. Meals are typically eaten three or four times each day. Besides breakfast, lunch and dinner a family might
have “merienda” which is a late afternoon dessert or snack time. Rice is important in the Filipino diet and may
be eaten at every meal.

21. Children go for six years to elementary school and then for four years to high school for their mandatory
education. The University of Santo Tomas in Manila was founded in 1611 and the University of San Carlos in
1595, making them both older than Harvard University, which was not opened until 1636. Most of the students
in the Philippines’ universities are female; they earn two-thirds of all master’s degrees awarded and most all of
the doctorates.

22. The Filipinos celebrate secular holidays as well as Christian, Chinese and Muslim ones. Some notable ones
are the Day of Valor, in which Boy Scouts re-enact and honor those on the Bataan Death March; Independence
Day on June 12 and National Heroes Day on August 30, in addition to all the religious holidays.

23. Christmas season in the Philippines starts in September and ends with the Feast of the Three Kings in
January. Christmas feasts (Noche Buena) are said to compare to American’s Thanksgiving dinner.

24. Basketball is the Filipinos’ most popular sport but cockfighting (or sabong) is also quite popular
(particularly with men). Sabong existed in the islands before the Spanish arrived. The Philippines own Manny
Pacquiao is currently regarded as the world’s best boxer and when his bouts are on television, crime drops to
almost zero in the cities.
25. Social media is important to Filipinos. The Philippines is now considered the text capital of the world. With
more than 450 million SMS messages sent by the residents daily, they surpass the daily texts sent in Europe and
the U.S. combined.

Facts about Filipinos

26. On July 27, 2014, the birth of a baby girl made the population of the Philippines officially become 100
million. The Philippians was the twelfth country in the world to reach this number.

27. Half of the Philippines population is estimated to live on the island of Luzon. The population is densest in
the city of Manila.

28. As of 2007, there were an estimated 12 million native Filipinos living and working overseas. The money
sent home by these people accounts for approximately 11 percent of the economy of the Philippines.

29. The Philippines supplies the rest of the world with approximately 25 percent of all the overseas nurses that
are available worldwide.

30. The Philippines struggles with human trafficking. It has the fourth largest number of children who are
prostituted in the world. There are an estimated 375,000 girls and women in the sex trades. They range in age
between 15 and 20, with some as young as 11 years old.

Facts for Kids

31. The national symbol of the Republic of the Philippines is the national bird of the country, the monkey-eating
eagle (or Philippine eagle). This is the largest of all the eagles with a wingspan of almost seven feet wide.
Because this eagle is critically endangered, killing one is punishable by 12 years in prison as well as a heavy
fine. It is estimated there are only 180 to 500 of these eagles remaining.

32. The only place in the world where skunks are found other than America is Indonesia and the Philippines,
where they are called stink badgers.

33. In June of 1991, Mount Pinatubo erupted and sent up a mushroom cloud of ash twenty five miles high. The
effects of this destructive eruption were felt throughout the world as 20 million tons of toxic sulfur dioxide
remained in the earth’s atmosphere for more than a year, lowering its temperature by a degree for the same
amount of time. There were 184 people injured and over 847 people killed when it erupted and more than a
million people left homeless.

34. It is the only country in the world whose flag is flown upside down when the country is at war.

35. There are no large predator animals in the Philippines except for snakes (cobras and pythons), birds of prey
(like the monkey-eating eagle), and salt water crocodiles.

Interesting and unusual facts

36. On these volcanic islands, mineral deposits are abundant but remain largely untapped presently. The
Philippines is believed to have one of the largest copper deposits in the world and the second- largest gold
deposits after South Africa. It also has a supply of chromite, zinc and nickel. The country is, however, the
world’s second-largest geothermal energy producer (after the U.S.).

37. The Philippines is one of the world’s ten most biologically megadiverse countries due to its huge and
diverse range of flora and fauna, including more than 170 species of birds and 100 species of mammals not
found to exist anywhere else on earth so far. (Megadiverse indicates a country that harbors a high number of
endemic species.) This country has one of the highest rates of discovery in the world; sixteen new mammal
species have been discovered in the last decade.

38. The Philippines’ waters are an important part of the Coral Triangle. The Sulu Sea’s Tubbataha Reef is a
1993 World Heritage Site. It sustains the cultivation of seaweeds, crabs and pearls. Seven of the world’s eight
giant clam species are found in the country’s waters. The most expensive and rarest seashell in the world is
from the Philippines. The Conus gloriamus sold at auction for around $5,000.

39. One acute problem found in the country is deforestation, making the Philippines both a megadiversity
country as well as a biodiversity hotspot for global conservation. (A hotspot has a critical need to conserve
endangered and threaten species.)
40. The rice terraces of the Cordillleras remain has they were in pre-colonial times and are considered by the
Filipinos to be the eighth wonder of the world. They were built over 2,000 years ago and are a UNESCO World
Heritage Site today.

41. Before the discovery of an underground river in Mexico, Palawan’s Puerto Princesa Subterranean River in
the Philippines was the longest underground waterway in the world. It is five miles (over eight kilometers) long.
Mexico’s is over six miles long.

42. Not only is the country home to the longest snake in the world, it is also the world’s longest reptile. The
Reticulated Python can grow to be as much as almost 29 feet in total length.

43. The Philippines’ capital city of Manila gets its name from the Nilad, a tree with star-shaped white flowers
sometimes called the Indigo tree because it yields blue dye.

44. American soldiers can back from World War II with a new word in their vernacular: “boondocks”. If you
live out in the “boonies”, you are isolated from others. The Word actually is based on a Filipino Tagalog word
that means “mountain” – bundok.

45. After World War II, the Jeeps American GIs drove in the Philippines were left behind and converted into
the Philippine Jeepney for carrying multiple passengers. Today’s 2nd and 3rd generation Jeepneys include air
conditioning and closely resemble colorful mini-buses.

46. Three of the ten largest shopping malls in the entire world are located in the Philippine islands. They are SM
Mall of Asia, SM North Edsa, and SM Megamall.

47. Filipino Pedro Flores introduced the modern form of the yo-yo as a popular toy but it actually had its
beginning as an ancient studded hunting weapon attached to a long rope. The name is from the Ilocano language
and means “come back”.

48. Filipino Dr. Abelardo Aguilar invented the antibiotic erythromycin in 1949. When he sent a sample to the
Eli Lilly pharmaceutical company (his employer), they quickly patented it. It is used for people who are allergic
to penicillin and has saved millions of peoples’ lives.

49. In 1975 Filipino Roberto del Rosario patented the “Sing Along System”, the first working karaoke machine.
The Japanese later translated the name to “karaoke”, meaning “singing without accompaniment”.

50. Ferdinand Marcos, the country’s first elected president, died two decades ago yet hasn’t been properly
buried yet. He is “on ice” while officials decide if he should be buried with other past presidents and the
Philippines’ heroes in the cemetery reserved specifically for them or not.