logo large jihatsu eco farm

Topics

house remote mountains

Typical Struggles We Have from Living in an Isolated Home

Our house is alone. There are no neighbors, no people, and no cemented road. It takes us 30-40 minutes to go to the town proper. The dirt road leading into our house becomes muddy and not safe for driving cars or motors when the rainy season comes. When my family from the city visits here, they’re always amazed at how isolated we are. I can admit that it’s nice being far away from civilization, but there are typical struggles we have from living in an isolated house. Here’s some:

1. Buying Groceries Is Tiring

My husband, motorcycling across the river. Taken by Isobelle.

 We have to use our motorcycle on the rough road, and pass through two rivers before landing at the town proper where we buy our food! It’s crazy, but we manage to do it. Sometimes we don’t have any food anymore and would have to resort to eating whatever veggies we have in our land or buy instant noodles at a small sari-sari store in the nearby village. 

When the rivers overflow because of the rain, there is no way of getting out using a vehicle. There’ve been times where we ate instant noodles or pancit canton for 3 days because the rain didn’t stop.

2. Signal Is Weak

Messaging can be impossible. We installed a signal booster, but still, we have weak internet and unstable signal. Sometimes we would go weeks without talking to friends or family and that can be peaceful, but other times when we do need help from friends or family, we got to hike to a nearby mountain to reach a 2-3 bar signal. 

Fun story: I scheduled my embassy appointment while I was sitting on top of a mountain, reaching my arm in the air! 😛

Yep, that’s what people do here. 

3. Government Transactions Are A Hassle

Doing government transactions is a big adjustment we need to make, especially if both my husband and I are required to be in the transaction. We have to ask someone to take care of our chickens, dog, and guard our house before we schedule anything. The drive to the city is also 2-3 hours away, and sometimes even longer.

4. Address of the House is impossible to find

Where we are located using Google Earth.

One government worker once asked me to please fill up my complete street number and street name. I told him I don’t have any! It’s because our land is made up of 1 hectare, and our Baranggay doesn’t have road names as well. We find a person in our barangay by either asking people where they live or going to the barangay Hall. Fun, right? 

 So if you guys want to come to our land, just ask where Puti (white) lives. That’s the nickname of my foreign husband. 😛

5. No Meralco or Maynilad

We only use water from the river and have solar panels on our roofs. The road here hasn’t been constructed and there are no poles to use for electric wires, internet and TV cables, etc. Although the nearby village already has electric wires, we live so isolated from them that we rely on our own resources. 

6. Carry Your Own Gas

We use an LPG Gas tank for cooking and when that runs out we have to buy a new one from the town proper and then carry it from the dirt road to our house! It can be very tiring, and sometimes we break our backs. Thankfully, we only have to do this every six months.

 These are the struggles we have from living in an isolated house, but I would never want to live anywhere else! I am so grateful that I get to live with nature, and whatever struggles my family has, I know we’ll always get through it. 

If you like this post, please share it on social media:

Share on facebook
Share on reddit
Share on twitter
Share on pinterest

Author

Related posts

Leave a Comment