I am a Filipino.
I was baptized a Catholic, as most Filipinos are, and yet I rarely practice my religious duties, well...religiously, just like most Catholic Filipinos. I have a face which is distinctly oriental, even if my eyes don't have the slant of the Chinese, or Koreans, or Japanese. My name sounds like a mixture of American slang, German phonetics, and French ancestry. It would be a far cry from any distinctly Asian-sounding name. I smoke locally-made Marlboros, and I sing to the tunes of mostly American songs while I groove to European dance music. From my collared shirt down to my leather shoes, I subscribe to fashion which appears fairly urban contemporary, and pretty much pedestrian, given the tropical climate of the city I live in ( which means that, whereas in any other clime, people would have to wear different sets of clothes relevant to the season, Filipinos in Metro Manila could be said to generally wear summer clothing all throughout the year ).
I live the urban life. My work demands that I commute by passenger vehicles, just like millions of other working Filipinos in Metro Manila. Oh yes, that means people mostly get around by public transport--by jeepney ( a World War II-model jeep locally modified to accommodate more than 20 passengers ), by bus, train, or tricycle ( another World War II-type of motorcycle and passenger-cab fusion which would remind you of chase scenes in the movie Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade ). The only Manilans who have cars normally belong to the upper-middle classes and the still higher classes. To put it more simply, privately-owned cars are a luxury here in my country. Typical urban Filipino families in Manila would have no car of their own.
Yes, as the reader may have guessed, the standard of living in Metro Manila is urban Third World. Which means that, however cheaper the goods and services may be over here compared to Tokyo or Amsterdam, around 20 million workers in Metro Manila never earn enough to acquire them. The situation can be better comprehended by thinking of it this way: a Filipina maid working in Hong Kong or Singapore would earn higher income in a month than would a public school teacher in Metro Manila. In similar fashion, even suavely cosmopolitan computer professionals over here earn a pittance compared to Filipinos who take on blue-collar jobs ( like plumbing ) in Australia. This is exactly why Filipinos are mostly perceived as undereducated laborers in the countries around the world where they are found, because many of them perform the "dirty jobs". And yet, it would not at all be surprising, upon more careful inspection, to find out that the Filipino nurse taking orders from the Canadian doctor might have been a doctor himself in the Philippines once before. Or that the office clerk pushing 40 in an American trading firm performing the most menial of office-supply inventories was a bigshot bank manager back home.
Filipinos want the good life, of course. And by "good life", the Filipino simply seeks a First-World standard of living, pretty much what people in the First World take for granted. Three square meals a day, for example, and include burgers with that, or fries ( chips ). A home with a television set and refrigerator, at least, and don't forget cheap electricity and a constant supply of tapwater, please. A telephone line, too , if you may, and perhaps, if one is very lucky, maybe even a personal computer to boot. And a car, even if it's been through one or two previous owners. All of these are easily within reach of even the most menial worker in a First World country, while over here, in the Philippines, the cheapest brand new car would be something no nurse, or a police officer, or perhaps even a college professor could afford. So, many Filipinos yearn to go and work overseas, thinking that, over there, any kind of job can give you a First World life. Even if it means becoming household help. It is a desperation so prevalent among my countrymen that millions of Filipinos have already spread around the world in search of jobs. Who knows? I might become one of them in the near future. Which is why I keep musing about entering an English pub some day, probably to apply for a bartending gig.
So, is this what being a Filipino is all about? You are born here, in the Philippines, then you grow up and find some work in another country. You might raise a family wherever you find yourself in. Pretty soon, you're not just a Filipino anymore. You're either Filipino-American, or Filipino-Canadian, or Filipino- German, or Filipino-Japanese, or Filipino-Russian, or Filipino-Australian, or Filipino-Korean...and so on. It seems that to be simply Filipino, without any dash and foreign country after that one word, has no relevance anymore.
Filipinos hate being simply...Filipino. We hate that we are born brown, and a bit smaller in stature compared to Caucasians. We hate that the weather in our country has to be so hot all the time, with no possibility of snowfall. We hate that we speak a native language that seems to sound so unsophisticated and so painful to the ears that we have to speak English most of the time. We hate that most of our fellow Filipinos seem to be always so poor and so very lacking in everything ( they don't even have enough money to buy the proper shoes, for goodness' sakes ) that we would rather physically keep away from them as often as possible. We hate so many things about ourselves it surprises me that we could even look at our own faces in the mirror. In other words, there is no perfect, ideal Filipino. There is only the perfect, ideal, Filipino-American, or Filipino-Brazilian, or Filipino-whatever.
It makes me think about Singapore, where Singaporeans seem to be perfectly fine with being simply Singaporean, even though the country they live in is so small that there's no possibility of finding anything over there as interesting as a mountain range you can hike on, or a coral reef you can explore ( things which we have by the dozen in the Philippines ).
It makes me think about trying to find out what being a Filipino really means, and if there's still some significance to it. I mean, doesn't being Japanese mean a lot to a Japanese? Or being American mean a lot to, well...an American? If a Filipino calls himself a Filipino, what does it mean? Does it mean that that particular Filipino has to live by ideals? The same way that Japanese seem to live by the ideals of politeness, courtesy, and business-savvy? The same way that Americans seem to live by their ideals of always being in the lead, and being the richest people in the world?
Which is why this blog, and the many more which will follow this one, will hopefully make sense of what being a Filipino is, by simply reflecting one typical Filipino's experiences and impressions on life in the Philippines--my own.
This is how a Filipino decides to blog.
