Seeking general info on life in Dumaguete

Hi, Everyone,
My name is Mark, I'm new to the forum, and I'm a Kano married to a Filipina. We are currently living in Iloilo, but looking for a better place. Dumaguete has been recommended to me many times and I'd like to know more about the place.

The most important thing to us (aside from things like not getting kidnapped) is noise. Without going into the war stories, Guimaras and Iloilo have been really bad for us. Sound systems 600-1,000m away can wake you up at 3am, and it is not a fiesta. Just some neanderthal on drugs listening to loud music. The local government here seems to turn a blind eye to it, and some of the worst offenders are barangay officials or city employees.

We really want a peaceful place. I can take vehicle noise, dogs, and chickens to a point, but booming sound systems are awful and we want out. I don't want to leave the Philippines though.

Question: does Dumaguete exercise and control at all over noise from stereos, and does it make any difference? Is there an ordinance? Also, what is the countryside like there in terms of noise? Here, the countryside is the place where it is the worst. A guy will put a 60,000phph 4x8 foot sound system in front of his 50,000php house, facing away from it, and send his sound for several km across the rice fields. Not an exaggeration.

Any advice you can give me or any info on how Dunaguete handles things like this is much appreciated!

Mark

 

Welcome to DI Mark But.......... have to say, we got ordinances for many many things here and no one takes any notice. So you will in a way maybe, moving from one noise source to another.

Loud music is the bane of most of our lives here and I have to say all over the Philippines. Dumaguete is a great place to live for many reasons but I am afraid that Noise Volume is a national problem not just a Town to Town or locality issue. the Locals will tell you, We can do what we want.

Have a trawl through the forums and you will see we have discussed this issue many times.

I don't want to appear negative but music/karaoke noise levels is something we Foreigners can never seem to do anything about. Anywhere!
I hope things work out for you and I am sure you will get some , more answers on this Thread.

JP

 

We have noisy chickens and cows, karaoke, but most of all loud bikes and pedicabs. Choose your vocationally carefully.

 

Suggest you rent for at least 6 months, and when you find a house you want to buy then start by checking with the neighbors about noise issues in the hood. Then start checking by the proposed property at night to get a better feel for what happens after dinner and towards sleep time.

There is an eleven pm bylaw for noise but is ignored by all. Choose your new place carefully, there are gated communities that do police noise issues themselves, look around and you will find a peaceful area....

 

Mark! if you go to search, top right of page and punch in Noise Volume you will get some fairly recent Threads and Posts on the things we have discussed here and some possible answers.
I guess by now you will already get the impression that we too here in Dumaguete suffer your dilemma

Happy Hunting and hope that the somewhat negative answers you may get, do not deter you from at least Giving it a try

JP

 

I figured it would be a matter of degree with annoying noise being found pretty much everywhere, but how bad is it? Do you have stuff like this going on?


This had to have been way over 100Db. I called the cops three times on this guy. Two days later he had one set up like this within 100m of a primary school during classes. The landowner who allowed it is a barangay officer.


Here's one from the countryside in Guimaras.

I plan on dealing with videoke, chickens and whatever by just buying 2 or more hectares of land somewhere. What really worries me though are the enormous systems like in the videos above. I've seen them put out tremendous noise at 3am from (according to Google Earth) over 1,000m away. It's the really excessive ones I'm worried about. It does seem to be an issue of local culture. Panay has horrible problems with this, but I get the impression that most places are not as bad. How is Dumaguete compared to these videos?

 

i always found it good spend a few nights in the area I am looking at moving to for a longer term. You can not see the noise or roosters or many other potential problems during the day. Everyone that lives in a place, will most like endorse their own choice of living area. Make you own judgement s after doing some "boots on the ground" research.

 

Hi Mark. It has all been said by the other guys. Noise in Phil, is an accepted way of life for Filipinos. When I first arrived here, the answer to all my whinging and complaining about anything, was - " this is the Philippines ". I no longer whinge and complain, waste of energy and oxygen. Previous to my first arrival here, I did whinge and complain about crowds, traffic and noise in Oz, BUT, never again will I do that there.......ha ha ha ha ha..........I welcome all those things in Oz, now.............lol....:D

 

We looked for a long time and hit gold 2 klm from rob.mall , we found a good stand alone house at the end of dead end 300 meter long rough road no bikes no peddy cabs good people around us (not a long nose in sight) yes there is fighting cocks but not close , the thingo i have that stops barking dogs fixed the small problem we had there. M8 take your time go back at night if you can and ask around you will soon get some idea how things are aroundthe sight. Yes come and jpin the 10 thousnd of us allready here , room for one more lol GOOD LUCK
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