You spend a lot of time while travelling staring out of the window of your bus, train or other, less comfortable transportation, so when you see something written in English it’s a pleasant surprise. I always feel like it might give me some insight into the place I’m passing through.

These three signs are all from the Philippines. I wonder what they reveal about the people who live there.

I saw this one outside a remote village school on Negros. Despite all the houses nearby being little more than ramshackle lean-tos ith ragged cloth or plastic sheeting for doors, the school was carefully painted, planted with shrubs, had cut grass and home-made, wooden toys in the schoolyard. Clearly someone had taken enormous pains to give the kids in that village somewhere pleasant to learn in. Then I saw the sign.

These signs were all along the road leading to a high school elsewhere on Negros. Clearly the locals are trying to keep drugs out of their school. And why let the truth stand in the way of a good cause.

This was on a wall in Dumaguete. I have no idea what the words mean. And I really hope that image next to the scissors is a pointing finger.