Living in Style

There are many forms of shelter. For animals there are trees and sometimes sheds made of wood with a straw roof, sometimes they will have a barn - wood structure with tin roof. I found it very interesting that people have some of the same gradations. In Manila streets I have seen families (or groups of people with different ages) around a lean-to. I can watch them cooking, washing, doing laundry, talking and playing by this flimsy structure.
(No picture because I was too close and didn't have permission)
In the country I have been in a "resort" shelter that is raised off the ground with cloth walls that tie together, has a hammock, a small chair and a twin mattress in it that you can rent for the day on a trip at the beach.

Keeps the rain off nicely

Are they raised because of the ocean?

They are well made, small but efficient. The bathroom facilities are shared.  When you take that concept into the family and neighborhoods around and just outside of the 'resort', there are homes and dwellings just a bit larger that look the same but need extra coverage during the rain.

I noted tarps and anchors everywhere on these dwellings

The next step up in housing is having a tin roof over your wood walls.

Corrugated tin is a very popular building item.

Painting it all is one step better

This corrugated tin is very valuable in every small town and big town or group of buildings all over the country that I have been in - country life and downtown city life - it is everywhere.

Corrugated tin makes up wall, roof material and sometime divider material too

Cement blocks with tin roof

Cement blocks are the next step in the construction status.

Entire neighbourhoods are made out of cement and tin

Then you add glass. Note that this is glass shutters. Not very many homes have panes of glass, but many have shutters with glass that can open to the breeze versus the window that just lets everything in if you don't have a curtain over it.

Another step up is to paint your cement and or roof all the same color.

Here are three buildings in different stages of status

This seems like a well to do home in the Province - cement style

Adobe, paint and or stucco is the next step. I'm not sure what the more expensive roofs are made of. I have noticed no tiles or shingles or even tar paper for that matter. I'm not really sure what the nicer flat all-one-color-and-material roofs are. I would have to be an Aikele to figure that out.

These look like they are Spanish tile far afar but they aren't really  the same heavy tile you find in California.

The well to do house and homes are painted, have siding or stucco that is painted and the roof is all one color and fairly flat. I walked around one neighborhood that had almost palatial homes. One was mostly glass, all of them were huge and looked expensive. One friend lives in one and the inside is even better than the outside. The rich are very, very rich here. They have maids, gardeners and care-takers. Little rooms are built for the help just off the laundry rooms for the maids and sometimes there is a little tiny house for the gardener too.

One area has many large, big homes and hotels, inns and such

Top of the tier homes - Glass panes, painted, straight roofs, gardens, big yards and fruit trees

Maybe I should add the high rise apartments and talk about the apartments that take up a whole floor - but then I am a country girl at heart and living in the city is still an adjustment. I watch every trip I take out of town, the homes in the country or the Province. Many of the city dwellers go to the Province for vacations and to be with family.

I know I am living in style and am one of the wealthy ones. Mainly because I have a car, running hot water, a shower, a washer and lots of room in our apartment.