Wam's World

Ebay (Mis)adventures (No Thanks to Paypal)

Well, two days ago Paypal rejected my application, even though the items I won on Ebay would go either to California or Vancouver. Guess where the money's coming from is more important than where the stuff the money's paying for going. Billpoint, on the other hand, is less troublesome.

My current dilemma is how to pay for the items that won't accept Billpoint. No Paypal; money order's too expensive (Pay 30 bucks to send 10? Forget it.); cheques are risky; giving the buyer my CC number even riskier. I may have to open a dollar account. One that isn't stuck in a time deposit.

Lessons learned? Well, for one, don't bid on items right away. Put it in a watchlist first, and then see how it goes. If it gets too pricey delete it from the list, so your Ebay page won't get cluttered. It also saves you from either regret for bidding too high, or disappointment from being outbid.

Second? Until Paypal accepts applications from The Philippines pay attention only to items that go for Billpoint or Ebay Payments via Billpoint.

Third: Cheap DVDs are harder to come by than I thought.

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Speaking of lessons, my sister is learning a hard one: her son Han's Chinese assignments. All those years of studying (and forgetting) Mandarin in Saint Jude Catholic School, we Santos kids wondered when would any of it ever prove to be useful. Apparently it's when you want your kids to learn (but not forget) Chinese as well. Something like this might strengthen my resolve to either find a G.I. girlfriend or just have any future kids learn a European language, instead.