I know, I was deeply embarassed by that thread.
I came across a very funny website through some random googling I often do in order to find out about things I never would have otherwise. At the risk of offending GS, here is:-
http://www.mangossubic.com/only_in_the_philippines2.htmhttp://www.mangossubic.com/only_in_the_philippines3.htmhttp://www.mangossubic.com/only_in_the_philippines1.htmHere's just a small sample thereof:- "Thanks to Spain's decision a century and a half ago to restrict its colony's choice of surnames to a basket of generic Spanish names -- and the Philippines' lumbering, underfunded bureaucracy -- Filipinos find it harder and harder to tell each other apart, particularly in the phone book.
Mel Martinez, a gym instructor, winces as he remembers the long months he spent trying to get cellphone service. "Some other guy with the same name hadn't been paying his bills, so I couldn't get a line," he says. In the end, he decided to just use prepaid phone cards -- less of a hassle, he figured. Efforts to get bank loans and passports can become surreal experiences. Thousands of Filipinos walk around with certificates from the National Bureau of Investigation, the Philippines equivalent of the FBI, to prove they aren't wanted for kidnapping or murder, because someone with the same name is."
I hope all the incidents reported are real, the original website seems bona fide, but there is a tendency for people to post masses of urban legends or jokes on the web and make them seem as though they happened in real life.
