Grant you still in the philippines ? Big battles happening the army vs rebels.
I got back the end of January.
I swear the massacres and ambushes down south have some sort of political choreography. The chief rebels or whatever are regularly interviewed on TV, but the troops can't find them.
When I went to the Philippines in 1985 I was shown a university complex that had been shut down, ( under martial law , by Marcos), because it had been taken over by Muslims. Today you see hijabs all over the place on Luzon and many towns have mosques. There are seats in the Philippine government reserved for Muslims and very little conflict that I was able to see. The Philippines is still dominantly Roman Catholic, but nearly all religions are present and the country does seem multicultural. Not everything is between the Government and "rebels". Some of the violence in the south is between Muslim tribes. There are so many Badjaos north of Mindanao these days because they were kicked out by the Tausugs, who continue to oppress them.
The situation down there is actually quite complex:
http://cpcabrisbane.org/Kasama/2005/V19 ... urante.htm