Hellobee

When we told Mr. Bee’s mom that we wanted to move to El Nido, she took care of everything for us. She fixed up a two-bedroom house on the back half of her property that had been damaged badly by typhoons, and did an amazing job within two months’ time. She furnished the house and added lots of great touches like an office for us, and a playhouse for the kids! She even managed to wire the office with internet – no small feat on this island where broadband is hard to come by. It’s all about the relationships here: you have to know who to ask, and have a good enough relationship that they will drop everything and help you.

Our two-bedroom house here is actually about the same size as the 3-bedroom apartment we had in New York, so it’s a good size for our family. We miss the third bedroom and it’s hard having the kids share a room because they keep each other up talking, but most nights we put one kid to bed in our bedroom and then we move them to their own bed after they’re asleep.

That said, life is very different in El Nido versus our old life in New York. It’s probably easiest to just show you, so let’s go ahead and start this home tour!

As you enter, there are two ponds full of little fish. Charlie and Olive love to fish here. One turtle also lives in each pond, and tons of frogs as well.

Mr. Bee’s parents’ resort is on the other oceanfront half of the property, and we’re the only house on this side of the property. The land goes up the mountain, but is largely undeveloped. There is a small Palawan crocodile (maybe 5 feet long) that we spotted last week just beyond our house!

This is our house! To the left you see our outdoor washer nook. The door on the right leads to our office, which Mr. Bee’s mom had added onto the house once we decided to move here. The kids do come in and out throughout the entire day while we’re working, but I’m so thankful for a nice dedicated space to work.

The entire house was constructed by Mr. Bee’s parents’ on staff carpenters, and every piece of furniture in this house was handmade. Filipinos remove their shoes before entering a home like other Asian countries do, and every house has those mats at door entrances.

This is definitely not what a typical home in El Nido looks like as we have many modern conveniences that locals don’t, including tiles, while most floors here are concrete.

I used command hooks to hang our hats by the door.

Every carpenter has his own style, so furniture made by two different carpenters never looks the same.

The kids never had a tv in America, so they love having one here.

Those are high chairs for the kids. Since everything is made with wood, it’s very sturdy and heavy.

Many of you were curious what our kitchen looked like. The white shelves were already here, but you can never have enough storage so we hired a carpenter to add an extra shelf below it and the shelf beside the window, though we still have to paint them white. We don’t use the lower cabinets because they’re unfinished inside.

I bought all the spices in Manila, and little luxuries like ziploc bags and a saran wrap box with the cutting blade on it. Only plain rolls of saran wrap are available locally.

We just went to the market so our shelves were full! Produce is not refrigerated here. You can see mung beans, tomatoes, eggplants, carrots, peppers, potatoes…

…garlic, ginger, onion, chili peppers, radish, green beans, okra, bananas, and mangoes.

This is the filtered water we buy in town to drink. And our carpenter built that stool so Charlie and Olive could reach the kitchen sink.

Almost everything glass, metal, decorative, etc. has to be purchased in the island capital or Manila so I bought all of our cooking tools on recent trips there.

A rice cooker is definitely a luxury, but warm rice is so good!

This is our stovetop that’s powered by a propane tank under the sink. We refill it regularly for 800 pesos ($17) as gas is not available in homes. I do miss having an oven as we used to roast and bake most of our food.

Between the living room and the bedrooms, there is a middle room.

We turned this into a desk area for the kids, and had our carpenter build the desk and hanging shelf. The shelf on the right is our charging station and holds toiletries.

We need to have chairs made for the kids, but our carpenter is doing some work for Mr. Bee’s mom right now.

Drawing supplies were one of the few things we brought in abundance because both kids love drawing.

This is the kids’ room! Sign courtesy of Charlie.

We brought our Bright Lab Lights with us because they were Olive’s nightlight back in Brooklyn, and we wanted the kids to have something familiar with them when they slept. But we blew a fuse with our white noise machine (too powerful) and they broke, so I was so happy when I found these string lights in town!

The green striped blankets were the only lightweight blankets I could find in Puerto Princesa (locals use flat sheets as blankets here because it is so warm), and luckily green is Charlie’s favorite color! I also picked up white sheets and pillowcases there, which I think always make a room look brighter.

We had our carpenter build this bookcase between the kids’ beds. Because books are so heavy, we only brought a couple per child and one of our first priorities was replenishing our library. I was lucky to find a used bookstore in Puerto Princesa and purchased a bunch of books that actually came from elementary schools and libraries in California!

The thatched wall on Olive’s side of the room is a common design element in homes here.

I found this hand woven tapestry in town for $6. Pink and purple are Olive’s favorite colors.

This is the other side of the room. On the top left is a lock box where we store important documents, and on the shelves are our linens and the kids’ clothes.

Since the kids spend so much time in here drawing, reading, and playing, I wanted to make it a nice space for them.

This is our bedroom. Most sheets come in crazy tropical prints, so I was glad to find this fun Marimekko-inspired print that adds a bright pop of color to the room.

We have air conditioning in the bedrooms but not the living room, so this air circulator helps push the cool air into the living room. But it still is hot in there!

Having less things means whenever we lose something, it’s usually easy to find!

While the rest of the house looks pretty much like houses in other parts of the world, the bathroom takes a little getting used to. These type of bathrooms with unenclosed showers, toilets in the same room and a drain in the floor are common throughout Asia. We have hot showers powered by electricity, but locals bathe with cold water from a faucet and a bucket — Mr. Bee and I did this too when we first visited 10 years ago, but we warmed water and put them in thermoses to mix with the cold water. That’s why there’s a faucet and bucket in here and no sink.

Olive was really struggling with using the toilet because the bathroom floors are always wet. She has some sensory issues and refuses to step into the bathroom without wearing the slippers that we keep in there, but those often get wet as well. We’d have to place her on the toilet because she wouldn’t go on her own. It got to the point where she was having regular accidents because she didn’t want to go in the bathroom. I totally understand how she feels because I have the same sensory issues with the wet floor, which is why I keep the slippers in there. I also have pretty severe anxiety about germs and don’t like standing in shower water that touches the toilet. We finally remedied Olive’s wet floor problem by getting her a little potty outside the bathroom for now. Sometimes it’s hard to decide when you just need to tough it out and live like a local vs. accept the fact that we’re used to a very different life and every change is not going to be easy.

There was no place to put shampoo, so our carpenter built us this little shelf.

You’ve seen the inside of the house, now here’s a glimpse of the outside! This is our semi-manual washer. You have to plug the hose into it to provide water. The machine washes the clothes in the compartment on the left side. Then you have to rinse the clothes by hand in the big tub. Then put the clothes back into the right compartment for the spin cycle. I can only imagine how much more difficult it is to wash all your laundry by hand, which is what all the locals do.

This house is where Mr. Bee’s parents used to raise turkeys, but they got rid of them because turkeys are large birds that are rare in El Nido, so locals kept stealing them.

Mr. Bee’s mom had this playhouse constructed once we made the decision to move here. Her carpenters work fast!

We have a hammock and the kids’ Legos in here.

When we visited 2 years ago, she had this other playhouse, slide and swings built for the kids. She had to draw diagrams and explain how to make the slide and swings because her carpenters had never seen them before. The only playgrounds that exist in El Nido are ones in public schools.

Right now this area looks like a construction yard because they’re building a house for the staff that live on site, so soon we’ll have some neighbors!

Finally here is our office! I am so thankful for internet and electricity and air conditioning and that we’re still able to work all the way from here.

Over the course of 6 days our carpenter built 2 kitchen shelves, a stool, a desk and a shelf above it, a bookcase in the kids’ room, an office bookcase, curtain rod holders for the bedrooms, a bathroom shelf, in addition to tons of little fixes around the house. It was amazing!

I still want to add little touches that make the house feel more like ours, but that’ll have to wait until my next trip to the island capital. We just appreciate having such a great place to live on this beautiful island.

I hope you enjoyed this little glimpse into our home!