Dave Overton

I live in the Philippines. I love gadgets. Living in the Philippines means that gadget's release dates are delayed. For example, I have been waiting since July 31, 2009 (Asia release) for an iPhone 3GS. Well, technically my wife has been waiting since her phone broke. However, I gave her my iPhone 3G. So in summary, we are both waiting. The other issue is that when gadgets do get here, they cost a lot more than what I can find online. So the other night at dinner, I was talking with a friend in town and he mentioned a service that will allow me to ship orders from websites, like amazon and deliver to their US address then they will ship it here, at a much cheaper rate than if you shipped it directly. Shipping directly has always equaled high custom fees, since they calculate the total value including the shipping charges. One time, I ordered a book on Amazon for $9.99 and paid twice that price to ship it here, only to pay three times the total price to customs. Ouch! Shipping directly, even from stores here does not work well either. I ordered Snow Leopard on 8/27, from the Apple Store Philippines site. The site said it would be here in 1-2 business days from shipment. It shipped from Singapore on 8/28. However, rather than shipping straight to Cebu, it took a detour to Hong Kong, and for whatever reason decided to just take a holiday there since 8/29. I still don't have it, and don't know when I will get that copy at this point.

Well, I am still waiting for my Snow Leopard order to arrive. The site told me it would be 1-2 business days after shipment...that was 4 business days ago. The shipment went from Singapore to Hong Kong, and has mysteriously been in Hong Kong waiting for me since 8/29. Anyway, I was able to get a copy at work that was sent from Singapore with a colleague. Overall, the biggest draw back has been the applications that don't work, or only partially work. One of my first casualties was a tweak that I use for terminal: Visor, second was Quicksilver. I have a solution to get Visor up soon, and already have Quicksilver up. The good news is that I now have free space again on my hard drive! Update: Snow Leopard order has arrived now, 9/4/2009. I'm just glad it left Hong Kong.