Ancestry

It used to be believed, that the Negritos, a kinky-haired pygmy. Negro still found in the interiors of the Philippines, Indonesia, the Andaman Islands and Malaysia. Traveled on foot with the stegosaur and the elephant (prototype) from the Asian mainland via Borneo-Palawan land bridge to become the first man in the Philippines.

These early men are today called Austronesian, their origins traced to the Asian mainland. Their discovery of the outrigger canoe led them to make a series of sea voyages and settlements through the whole stretch of South Pacific island groups from Papua, New Guinea, the Solomon's, up to Indonesia, the Philippines, out to Hawaii. Evidence suggests that they may have also been driven to Taiwan, Japan and North Korea by fierce typhoons and strong currents.

Forces of Nature

The earth's crust is about 70 km thick and is composed of plates of varying size. Earthquakes occur depending on the amount of friction between these plates. Among the six largest plates, also called continental or tectonic plate are the Eurasian and the Pacific plate and in between squeezed the smaller Philippine plate. Strong earthquakes are fairly rare here, but they are light tremors from time to time.

One of the worst earthquakes to strike the Philippines this century was July 16 1990, measuring 7.7 on the Richter scale, the earthquake kill more than 1600 people and destroyed over 20,00 building. . The worst affected cities are Baquio, Cabanatuan, Dagupan all in northern Luzon.

Deep trenches high mountain ranges and volcanoes mark the breaking points in the earth's crust. One of the most prominent volcano chains leads from Alaska and the Aleutian Island, past the Siberian Kamchatka Peninsula, and Kuril Islands and Japan to the Philippines. The country's dormant volcano can suddenly turn dangerously active was proved the massive eruption of Mt. Pinatubo in June 1991. After 600 years of peace the volcano erupted, ejecting up to 40 km into the stratosphere huge amount of ash, mud and rocks most of which rained down on the provinces of Pampanga, Tarlac and Zambales. Nearly 900 people lost their lives as a result of the eruption. There will be more victims in the future when the accumulated detritus from the eruption. Loosened by monsoon rains.

Luzon and Northern Visayas also lie in the Typhoon belt. Violent storm can occur from June to January, although August to November is the peak months for typhoon. Typhoon causes by power failure then fire (often cause by candle blown over). Overloaded electrical points, open fires and arson are the causes of fire in the Philippines.

Geology

The Philippines Archipelago has over seven thousand Islands., Traveling the Philippines means island hopping , covering a remarkable range of the land formation; from the gigantic rice terraces of the Central Cordillera on Luzon. Throughout the chocolate hills on the island of Bohol, whose bizarre, bumpy landscape has piqued the curiosity off many an Observer.

Climate