MYSQL DB not showing uft8 on php page

[Ben Je]

Hello everyone,
I created a database and a table. I created a php page. When I visit the php page, the foreign characters change to question marks. This is what I did to troubleshoot:

1- php page contains the tag: <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8" />
2- I tested that the problem is with the mysql db by adding text directly on the php page, and it was showing correctly. So it's not the php page not uft enabled.
3- mysql db is using MyISAM utf8_general_ci
4- When I go to the table inside the db, I see the text displayed correctly.
5- When I test using the my localhost, everything works perfectly. When I add it to Bluehost server, I get the ???? instead of the actual characters.

What am I missing? Thanks!