Be it ever so humble and all, I never left the house yesterday. My landlord, Alicia, came up from Manila to collect the rent and have me sign a new lease on the house. So, this will be the Rite Spot for me for another year. Happy to be here! Alicia brought her sister and son along and we gave them all a good feeding before they headed back home. I had set things up to eat on the roof, but just before the food was served, it started raining again. So, we all retreated downstairs and enjoyed our meal in the dining room.
After my guests had departed and I’d completed my chores (blogging and napping), I decided to spend the remains of the day at home.
So, that’s how I spent the day. Here’s how I spent the money:
- Income: 365,000 pesos (my monthly pension deposit)
- Rent: 38,000 pesos
- Caregiver/Domestic Helper salary: 26,000 pesos
- Swan’s allowance: 16,000 pesos
- Charity: 12,000 (the monthly allotment for the Mountain Mama family I support)
- Total October 1 expenditures: 92,000 pesos
On to the memories. I inadvertently came across a 2006 post titled “A Clean Well-Lighted Place” that nicely captures the life I was living in Itaewon all those years ago. I was shocked to recall that there was a time in my life when I wasn’t going to bed at nine p.m. That night ended with dinner at McDonald’s at three in the morning. And lots of fun and adventure that led me there. Wow.
Today’s YouTube video from the Filipina Pea is a follow-up story about the jobless folks she set up with a business. I admire the effort. Time will tell if it is successful, but at least she provided an opportunity for these folks to help themselves. Long-time readers may recall that I helped my ex-girlfriend Marissa open a food business. It failed after a few months, but I have no regrets.
Humor time:
That one just reminded me of this old video of a Korean woman teaching how to say “Coke” in English.
Anyway, it’s time to move on with my Wednesday evening plans. I don’t really have any, but I’m sure whatever I do will involve cold beverages—other than Coke.
Total October 1 expenditures: 92,000 pesos
So, somewhere in the neighborhood of $1600 for a single day? Yikes. I’ll be curious to see what the whole month adds up to. And where the $$$ goes.
However, it occurs to me that, if you can access your bank records (and why couldn’t you?), you can look at your expenditures from January 1 to September 30 of this year and arrive at a monthly average. The expenditures, as seen in your records, might not be itemized as precisely as you’d like, but you ought to be able to recognize items that are always in ballpark-similar amounts: feedings, groceries, rent, etc. You might not have to go through this daily calculation. The answers might already lie hidden in your receipts.
All my transactions done via my Korean debit card (i.e., most of them) are recorded and accessible online. I might not know what specific groceries I’d bought, but I can always see how much I’d spent on groceries in general.
“If I can’t have her, no one will.”
Except for this one last, delicious meal.
Enjoy yet more drinking.
I track expenses, not so much because I need to budget, but just to see overall trends. I use something called Moneydance, which I like because it is a one time purchase. None of this subscription crap where you have to pay every month.
I am sure you could do the same thing with an Excel spreadsheet or something similar.
I think it is a good exercise to do even though you really do not have to budget.
Brian, I have an app on my phone where I can log my spending. When I first moved here, I monitored how much I spent on different things to establish the framework for a budget, but it is not something that I strictly adhere to. I’m tracking this month mostly out of curiosity; I don’t anticipate any lifestyle changes as a result.
Kev, the first of the month has the big items like rent and salaries, so that’s a one-off.
The only place I use my credit card is at Royal. Very few local businesses accept plastic payment. I withdraw cash weekly from an ATM and pay for everything out-of-pocket. So, my bank statements will show my grocery bill and ATM transactions but no details on where the cash was spent.