This is my first post since I don't often have anything intelligent to contribute
I had the opportunity to go to Manila last week for work. I thought you guys might find the following interesting since especially (1) was surprising to me:
1. There are guns everywhere in plain view. Armed security is present in front of almost every building, even if it's just a convenience store or fast food restaurant. Places like that would have the guard armed with a handgun only. I'd say about 75% were carrying 1911s (looked new-ish, presumably Armscor manufactured), with a smattering of well worn revolvers (mostly S&W but I did see one Colt) and an occasional non-1911 semiauto (I saw one Glock, a Beretta 92 with almost no finish remaining, and a stainless 3rd gen S&W). Only a few of the guys with a semiauto actually had a magazine in the gun. I didn't get close enough to see if the revolvers were loaded but they usually had six cartridges in loops on their belt so I'm guessing maybe not. Outside of fancy hotels and malls the guards had both handguns and long guns. The long gun of choice was the pump action shotgun, either an 870 or Mossberg 500. I saw one Benelli semiauto as well. Couldn't tell if the shotguns were loaded and I didn't see any guards with a rifle.
2. "Gun culture" is visible, which was nice to see considering that most people in Asia don't have much or any ability to own a firearm. I saw a couple of cars with Glock stickers in the rear window as well as advertisements for gun stores.
3. One of my coworkers from our Manila office was nice enough to tag along with me to one of their local indoor ranges. They had a pretty nice facility, with the left half of the range being setup for what looked like IPSC/IDPA and the right half of the range setup for static targets between 5-20m. It even had an attached cafe named Kiss Kiss Bang Bang My coworker had never shot a gun before, so I rented a S&W 686 with .38spl to start and then we moved up to a H&K VP9 once she was comfortable with the revolver. We shot at 5m and I thought she did pretty well for a first timer. The group on the orange circle is mine and the rest are hers. Her grip could use a little bit of work but I didn't want to critique her too much at first since she was doing reasonably well and having a good time:
Interestingly, the VP9 (and its 15 round magazine that we shot with it) is something I cannot currently purchase from a gun store where I live (California)