Foreigner Stuck in Manila for 7 Months After Taxi Driver Steals His Passport and Money

Not so sure about that now in Manila, takes a lot of work to get a replacement these days, although I would expect the embassy should issue an emergency travel document.

If this guy was completely broke he would be dead in 7 months, he's obviously making something from begging or whatever, but he does look a bit close to the end though.

Biggest danger is between arrival at the airport and the journey either home or to your hotel, that's when you have all your assets on you including credit cards and so on, for me I have all required details and contact numbers on internet storage, at the worst I would need to beg enough to get 30 minutes in an internet cafe and things would get sorted, plus I have friends over there so I would have some local support as well (Ana and I rescued one of my young friends over there from a nasty situation some years ago, his dad in the UK would return the favour if I got in a bad way).

I've had a Danish guy come up to me and try to beg his fare to Makati from Malate, this was just outside SM near Harrison Plaza, he was quite menacing and about 4 inches taller than me and I'm not short, you would be surprised at the range of very dodgy characters to be found on the streets of Manila.

Or the guy happens to be a complete di*kh**d and lost everything after he paid the bar fine

(P.S. not condoning that practice in the slightest)

Only recently, bars have been rarely mentioned on this site during all of its existence.

It would be foolish to pretend that we don't know what goes on in the less salubrious bits of the cities, I have stated on here before that I have visited such an establishment and found it painfully dull, I have though had them fully explained to me.

That's why people think something is up with this guy, if he can fly there every couple of months then he has income, if he has income he most probably has a bank account, if he has an account he should be able to contact the bank and get some funds to get him the hell out of there, whole thing makes no sense.

Quite possibly!

However the way he looks does suggest one of several unpleasant possibilities, with starvation being probably the most likely.

In that vein I've seen plenty of western gays wandering around Malate, hand in hand with a young Filipino man, HIV could be a possibility with him living out his last few months in a pretend tragic fantasy, could also be just a guy with cancer living in the Phils who's playing for sympathy but hiding the real problem. who knows, people do strange things.

This is going to sound weird, but I think I know this guy... Sort of. And I might be wrong.

Years ago, around 2002 and 2006 I used to live in the Fallowfield area of Manchester, it was and still is a student area and had the busiest bus route in Europe.

Anyway, there was this Canadian man who used to get on the buses every evening and beg for money. He told a story about how he had been robbed of his passport, beaten up and had his money stolen and he needs money to get to the Canadian Embassy in London, make some phone calls (or what have you). His story would change, but he was well known to people who traveled on those buses a lot (I used to finish work at 10pm those days).

Because of the Student lifestyle, there were always lots of young people going home from work, nights out and stuff. Those were his targets, but it was fun when someone would pipe up and say "Wow, you must be really unlucky mate, this is the 3rd time this week you got mugged".

I'm pretty sure it is him, though the man I remember had a bit more hair and was a little stockier (though still slim build). But similar eyes.

Who knows. Perhaps he moved to South East Asia to pick the Expats who would be more forgiving and of locals thinking he can pay them back?