Where The Bloody Hell Are We?

... off to Tarlac!

Over the years when Tim and I were together, we had jumped from callcenter to callcenter, feeling fatigue over the repetitiveness of the job. A year ago, my very close friend, Amarie, messaged me about a perfect job opportunity in the province.

Tim, Me and Amarie. This is one of Amarie's last few days in Manila

Amarie was my colleague in the Philippine Women's University in Tarlac, and we've kept close touch with each other even after we parted ways. She worked in Manila for a while but found the atmosphere too stressful so she went back to the province where she could earn a mediocre amount of money but be with her daughter.

Ate, she says, there's a school that is newly built in the province, they want to apply for an International School and they're looking for specifically UP, UST, La Salle, Ateneo graduates, and Native Speaker teachers! The pay is big!

So Tim and I went to the province, interviewed, and passed. The pay is going to compete with the rates of those in public school, the school administrator promised, as they want to hire the best that the province had to offer.

Goodbye, Makati, Hello Tarlac!

The Tarlac House

And so we packed all our things, and transferred our whole life in this quaint little province that I consider my hometown. My parents set Tim and I up at their vacant apartment units. The school was an hour's drive away from home, but what the heck, for what we will be earning, filling up the tank won't hurt us at all.

But life, as we discover, is not as nice as everyone wants it to be. We would soon find out that the rates that they promised us were, a. not as big as we expected it to be, and b. not the work that they promised us to have. The company withheld that the pay was not what was published in their job placements, and they withheld it for too long, that we only knew how much we were going to get paid after the school year has started and we were going to receive our first pay.

The school that literally changed our lives

The school was very good though. It looked nice, it has a swimming pool, there's very few students inside one classroom, and the teachers are all very friendly. It was excruciating but we had to bear it because we did not have a way out there, we were stuck. We had no savings, I waged a war against my last employer, we had bills to pay, and nowhere else to go. We had to stay.


In addition to all the money problems, Amarie resigned because of some problems with the management. The head during our time was a very strict Korean boss who would not listen to anything that we would say/ suggest for the betterment of the students. He also eventually resigned. Tim, our resident American, was ironically not given English class to teach and was put in the MAPEH (Music, Arts, Physical Education and Health) department and taught Art History, PE and swimming to junior high school students. He found that he loved teaching and he fell in love with the students as well.

Tim's parents would send us boxes full of goodies that Tim eats (very picky eater) and rations, and we would save a lot of money. There was always something in the box for me as well. I guess he gets his generosity from his parents. Admit it, not a lot of parents would think about the children's boyfriend/ girlfriend when sending them packages. We would be able to save a little, catch up on some underpaid bills, and then there are some instances that the pantry would be empty, and we would have to do grocery shopping that hurt us a little bit. We would only have date nights once a paycheck. When we were in Manila, we did it every weekends. It was a life that we both separately were not used to, but we had to and were able to make do with.

A full pantry was worth taking pictures of

Some months later, Tim proposed (different blog post, will insert hyperlink later), and we started planning for the wedding.

So Tarlac wedding it was.

And that's why I started this blog. I have searched far and wide for Tarlac suppliers and there were just so few that I can see online. I hope this blog can help future brides and husbands to be.

PS.
Tim and I are moving back to Manila for a better job opportunity (crossing fingers) but we've already put the downpayment on the venue. So in addition to Tarlac wedding things, I'm also going to write everything in between, and their province rates.

PPS.
The school administrator who deceived  hired us has been demoted, so if you find yourself looking at this same exact looking school, give it a chance, the new lady is very nice and uhum qualified.