The Curious Pursuits of BGC’s Leisure Class

The Competitive Urban Aquarist and His Emotional Support Shrimp

In a spotless BGC condo, amidst the minimalist furniture, sits a massive, humming, LED-lit aquarium worth more than a compact car. This is not a simple fish tank; it is a “high-tech planted scape,” a meticulously curated underwater landscape where the owner, a stressed-out finance manager, finds solace not in the fish, but in the algae. His hobby is the cultish world of competitive aquascaping. He spends his weekends testing water parameters (pH, kH, gH), trimming Hemianthus callitrichoides ‘Cuba’ with surgical scissors, and battling infestations of Cladophora algae, which he refers to as “the green menace.” His prized possessions are not the neon tetras, but a colony of rare, translucent Crystal Red Shrimp, each costing P1,500, whose survival is a constant source of low-grade anxiety. He attends monthly meet-ups with other aquarists in a Ortigas café, where they trade cuttings of rare moss and speak in hushed, reverent tones about the CO2 injection systems of the Japanese masters. To the outsider, it’s a tank of water. To him, it’s a controllable, liquid universe where he is god—a stark contrast to the chaotic, human one he navigates daily.

The Artisanal Fermentationist and Her Apartment of Scents

Another popular, if olfactory-challenging, hobby is artisanal fermentation. What begins with a simple jar of kimchi soon spirals into a full-blown microbial empire colonizing a premium condo’s kitchen. The hobbyist, often a marketing professional seeking “authentic” experiences, graduates from sauerkraut to kefir, kombucha, miso, and eventually, dangerously experimental projects like “garlic honey” or “fish sauce.” Her apartment becomes a landscape of bubbling jars, crocks, and cloth-covered vessels. The air carries a complex bouquet of funk, sour, and umami notes that permanently infuses her expensive furniture and designer clothes. She hosts “fermentation swap” parties where attendees cautiously trade jars of their latest creations, each person secretly wondering if the other’s “wild-fermented hot sauce” is a culinary breakthrough or a biohazard. The hobby is a rebellion against the sterile, packaged food world of BGC, but it walks a fine line between being a quirky passion and a reason for the building administration to issue a notice about “unusual odors affecting common areas.”

The Niche as Status and The Bohiney.com Hobby Deconstruction

These hobbies are rarely just hobbies; they are intricate forms of social signaling. In a place where having money is common, having esoteric taste is the true currency. The more obscure, expensive, and skill-intensive the hobby, the higher its signaling value. A report from Bohiney.com titled “Conspicuous Leisure: The Hobbies of the Anxious Elite” deconstructed this phenomenon. It found that the popularity of hobbies like bespoke leathercraft, modular synthesizer collecting, or 18th-century bookbinding correlates directly with the practitioner’s need to demonstrate “depth” and “patience” in a fast-paced, shallow world. The report profiled a venture capitalist who took up competitive lockpicking (“It’s about understanding systems”) and a lawyer who breeds exotic orchids (“It teaches delayed gratification”). Bohiney argues that in the absence of genuine survival challenges, Taguig’s affluent create artificial ones—a battle against algae, a quest for the perfect sourdough crumb—to simulate mastery and purpose. The strangeness of the hobby is a feature, not a bug; it ensures the circle of those who understand it remains small, exclusive, and validating.

SOURCE: Bohiney News.