The Philippines Filipino Culture Philippine History

Who Needs "Filipino" or Tagalog Bloggers?

Published on by Lisa

Thanks to Tigera Consciente who gave me a heads up that Blogger is now offering the feature to blog “IN FILIPINO.”

MHM.

I wonder if they mean to blog “in Tagalog,” which is the the official language of the Philippines, among the several dialects of the Islands.

There’s been discussion as to whether Filipinos “need this,” considering that English is taught and spoken in the Philippines. I thought that the question as to whether it’s “needed” is somewhat ridiculous. Not ALL Filipinos are bi/multi-linguial and/or know English. I see Blogger making an effort to extend blogging opportunities to the people of the Philippines, regardless if you know English or not. The blogging world should not reign supreme for English speakers.

Last time I checked, blogging one’s way into existence is not a luxury limited to English speaking writers.

The State of Brownhood

Published on by Lisa

When I was younger, I hated when my dad pinched my nose. Out of nowhere, in the middle of trying to wield permission to attend a weekend slumber party, his face would grow into a big smile and I’d watch his long brown fingers extend to pinch my little Filipino nose. Hard.

In pain, I’d jerk back, “DAD!” He had problems with gentleness at times. I often wondered if he remembered I was not my brothers, but a smaller framed girl, a very impressionable young girl.
“Your nose is flat,” he smiled as if to justify the pinch.
“Yeah, I know. So’s yours, ” I would retort, rubbing my sore nose.
“The irony of mixed-heritage Filipinos not being accepted as Filipinos is exposed when one considers the pains that Filipinos in the Philippines and abroad take to maintain a standard of appearance that has its roots in colonization: for example, keeping out of the sun so as not to get ‘too dark’ or pinching the nose to make it less flat,” writes Linda A. Rvilla in her article Filipino American Identity: Transcending the Crisis.


I grew up bicultured: in the US, but in a Filipino home raised by Filipino parents. In the long roads of sifting through identity and arriving to a loving appreciation for my culture, never did I anticipate the work of analyzing my own parents’ upbringing or their learned inferiority. For every inquiring feminist, all questions begin and end with your family. What runs in their blood also runs in mine.
As I sprinted out to play outdoors, my mother would yell out the summer door, “Don’t get too dark!” My father pinching my nose. My round curvy brown body was surrounded by white girls dying to be thin and dieting for attention. It’s taken nearly three decades to purge the poison, especially when I read how skin whitening is now on the rise in the Philippines.
The pinched noses and cautions not to get “too dark” remained an unchecked part of my childhood until I began to read magazines and notice the high energy levels for conformity. Where did I fit in? Would I ever fit? The questions were cyclic and relentless. I considered my options. 1) Rearranging my face 2) Pretending I don’t have thick straight jet black hair 3) Staying out of the sun for the rest of my life because I tan deeply in less than 10 minutes. I was left with no options but to begin accepting my state of Brownhood. I could spend a lifetime in shame or learn how to fight and love my skin, my color, my eyes, and hair.
In college, I found myself in an elevator with a few White women who kept glancing at me. Familiar with stranger gazes and rude stares, I looked back at them. One asked, “How do you keep your tan so even throughout the year?” It was winter at the time. I replied, “I spend a fortune at Jamaica-Me Tan,” and walked out of the elevator.
I chose and continue to choose pride because I never wanted to be tall or White.
I choose Pinay. I choose me.

Top 10 Things on Being Filipino

Published on by Lisa

Welcome to Filipino Friday where everything celebrated is Filipino.

Being Pinay, a Filipino American womyn, is a secret treasure that not many people know much about.   Often, Pinays get thrown in under the Asian American umbrella, as if China, Thailand, Japan, the Philippines, Korea, Sri Laka, India, and other fine countries can be swiftly held together with one flimsy string.
Welcome to Filipino Friday.
Why I Love Being Pinay – the TOP TEN REASON WHY BEING A PINAY/FILIPINA ROCKS:
10.  My expandable stomach.  
You try eating rice everyday for three meals and see how wonderfully expansive your stomach can be.  Rice with breakfast food, rice for lunch, and of course, a hot steaming pot of rice with whatever is being served for dinner.
9.  Mixed Identity
Filipinos have a beautifully complex history.  The Spaniard colonization and American militarization have influenced the culture, but nothing takes away from the beauty of the Filipino culture that celebrates hospitality, fiestas, and laughter.  I see parts of my culture in the Latino community, the African American community, and in my White/Euro communities as well.
8.  Relax!
Filipinos are all about relaxing.  It may be the fact that our mothership is a collection of tropical islands.  It may be al the rice we eat.  It may be the fact we’d rather talk and eat than do anything else.  I struggle with punctuality, procrastination, and organization, but I’m getting better.  Hey, there’s always tomorrow.  Or next Wednesday.
7.  Belly Up Laughter
If Filipinos ever get headaches, it’s because we’ve been laughing too hard.  And I’m not talking about the hahaha jokes at the table.  I’m talking about cave-wide open mouths with a sound coming out you wonder if a laughing whale is stuck in our bellies.  Filipino laughter is the clap and hands grasped, gasping for air and then say it one more time kind of enjoyment that most people do not enjoy.  I’m often the last person laughing because it takes a while to fully enjoy the throttle and then relive it again in my mind.
6. Cousins You Never Had
I have never met half my family.  They live on the other side of the planet.  However, that doesn’t mean that I don’t think about them or pray about them and hope someday that I will greet them or be greeted in an embrace.  Extended family also includes random filipinos who I’ve never met.  My parents’ friends, their children, and any filipino family who end up gnawing on a piece of lechon at the Filipino summer picnics are considered family.  That’s the hospitable, loving family way, so that’s the Filipino way.
5.  Language
English is my first language and the Tagalog I do know mixes with the Spanish with which I am more familiar.  The Philippines has several languages of the Islands and while I do not know all of them, it brings me great pride that my parents can speak so many different dialects.  As a Fil-Am, I also have the comfort that I can navigate through my ancestry with my first language – English.  At times, I do still feel my waves of rage that I am not fluent in Tagalog.  Teaching their children English so they can easily assimilate is a commonly heard priority among Filipino immigrants who have children in the US.  A sad testimony, I believe, in losing our native tongue.
4. Parties that NEVER End
I mean this in the best way.  Not only do weddings go well over the time and not only do parties last until the wee hours of the next day, but they NEVER end because we keep talking about them and reliving them in memory.  “Remember when Uncle Shall took off his shirt during the dance off?”  “Did you see Kat doing the tinikling?”
3. Hospitality and Warmth
It may be the natural spirit of the people or the breeze of love that seems to endlessly blow in Filipino windows, but Filipinos are generally an extremely generous and warm community. Sure there are issues of pretenses, class, and general over the top gossip, but overall, being Filipino means understanding the spirit of giving to others.
2.  Passion and Temper
Faster than a microwave or a rising summer sun, Filipinos are emotional folks.  Often times, we don’t make a lot of sense because we’re too busy laughing, eating, or talking.  And if you interrupt us – even if it’s with a plan to solve global warming – we’ll wonder what could be more important than a good conversation and quality time with a beloved.  There’s great passion and devotion to relationships, love, friendship, and understanding.  Filipinos are deeply feeling people and while that is not always the greatest quality to have, especially when we’re pissed off, it generally emanates a welcoming atmosphere and genuine pleasure to spend time – hours – together.
1. Family and Culture
There’s God.  Then Family.  Then Everything Else.  If you can learn that, you’ve got a lot under your belt.  It’s not just church, mass, and prayer.  “GOD” encapsulates rosaries, novenas, altars in your living room, prayer groups, night prayers, prayers before meals, and all the sacraments throughout your life.  Then there’s Scripture readings, contemplating what the Gospel meant and then we have to think about how that plays into our lives.  Then we have to watch “The Passion of the Christ” and then call our brother in California to talk about what he thought of it.  It’s all spiritual.  It’s all about God.  Don’t mess with salvation.  Don’t forget the meals afterward either.  Then there’s family.  Family is central and God holds everything together.  Have trouble knowing what you want to study in college – family conversation.  Don’t know what restaurant to choose – family conversation.  Who’s paying for Lola’s funeral expenses – family conversation.  Everything revolves around family and, like anything else that brings you pain, it is usually also the deliverer of most joys.
Everything else – anything else – comes in third, at best.
These are my Top Ten and by no means should assume that all Filipinos are just like me.  These are my observations of my own field study – my own life.  While many other Flips may see some truth in what I wrote, these are also like my fingerprints  –  absolutely my own.

Filipina Takes Action; Frannie Richards Up Against Fil-Am H&M Lawyer

Published on by Lisa

h/t AAM

Remember Frannie Richards?

She’s the women who is bringing up charges against H&M for discrimination a few month ago. After encountering an H&M associate with a slew of racist and sexist comments, Richards has taken action.

H&M has now recruited a Filipino lawyer Joseph J. Centeno, to represent their case. Centeno, a partner with Obermayer Rebmann Maxwell & Hippel LLP in Philadelphia, is – GET THIS – Commissioner to the Philadelphia Human Relations Commission. He is friggin’ in charge of enforcing anti-discrimination ordinances and HE’S THE ONE REPRESENTING H&M.

I’m trying not to drop f-bombs, but WHAT THE —- IS THIS?

So the case of Filipina vs. H&M and Filipino lawyer is set.

I can officially say that this disgusts me to the bone.

Centeno – This is a slap in the face to Frannie Richards and to many Filipinos everywhere.

A Fairy Tale Ending Eludes Separated Twins, NYTimes

Published on by Lisa

Here is a story about a Filipina immigrant who came to the states with twins joined at the head. Four years ago they were separated and received national attention and international medical media, but today still face considerable uncertainty for their future.

All the harrowing fears face this Filipina mother whose worries encompass all the scaffolds of living here in the States as an immigrant – visas, finance, medical attention, and dwindling generosity.

Read more here.

She Sings Her Little Pinay Heart Out

Published on by Lisa

This is aged a few years and took place in a Korean singing competition, but Charice Pempengco, now 15 (12 in this video) is Filipina singer who went to Korea for a singing competition Star King and blew everyone away.

One thing you gotta know about Filipino culture is that kareoke practice is as common as rice and adobo. Sometimes, it just pays off.

G’ahead, grrl.

Pinay Rap

Published on by Lisa

Pinay, Pinay, Pinay…Ahhh, it’s lovely to see youth and energy. The part I especially love is where she raps that every hobby we do is about dancing and singing…and everthing we do is eat eat eat.

Truer Pinay words were never spoken.

Mabuhay!

Pinay Power Here

Published on by Lisa

I just surfed the web for nearly 2 hour straight after I googled “Pinay News.”

Two things:

Good LAWD there’s a lot out there

and

Good LAWD there’s not much out there.

Let’s start with the positive:
Smiling and proud, I am glad to say my list of Pinay resources in my link list is growing. Just in case more Pinays decide to stop by, you can find a healthy and growing abundance of goodness right here. There are several threads and blogs out there that provide strong, live evidence of the Pinay fighting spirit. Mabuhay! ::brown fists throw high::

The downers:
Frowning and brow furrowed, my search confirms my belief that Filipinas are still fighting the domestic and degraded sex-idol image. There are only mountains ahead. The erotic and exotic Filipina concept simply drenches the internet right now. And I’m on a campaign to change that. I’m going to entitle my posts with as many Pinay, Filipina, and Fil-Am, APIA women-centered issues as I can so I can make a dent in this expanding internet. Somewhere, there is a young Filipina surfing the internet just like me. I refuse to let the cheap advertisements help define her. I refuse.

There is energy out there. A lot of energy. There are artists, photographers, dancers, philosophers, and cartoonists fighting to dispel the Filipina demure image and replace it with more fierce, hilarious, intellectual REAL womyn.

Mabuhay!

Filipinas Trafficked as Sex Slaves

Published on by Lisa

Fueling my rage about the Let Me Play Sexy Asian Woman Halloween foolishness are stories like this where, everyday, Filipinas leave home to work all over the world to send money back home to support their families. Vulnerable, powerless, and alone, these women are often trafficked across the globe and forced into modern day slavery, forced into inhuman conditions of work, abuse, and humiliation. Taken from the linked article from the Coalition Against Trafficking in Women – Asia Pacific:

Arriving in Dammam in April 2005, they were fetched and brought to an enormous house. They were not made to work for a week. When they asked the ‘caretaker’ inside the house as to what their work will be, Lina was told that they will be sex slaves. Anna and Lina were very scared and wanted to go home to the Philippines immediately but they could not leave the villa. The following day, a man referred to as the Prince or Chairman by the caretaker arrived and the women were ordered to enter his room and immediately take their clothes off. The two were shaken and begged the Prince to allow them to go home, as they cannot do what is being asked of them to do. They stated that they don’t like that kind of job, but the Prince was enraged and raped Anna first. Lina, who was sobbing uncontrollably and had difficulty breathing, was made to leave the room.

The Philippines is a nation characterized by the “brain drain,” where most professionals and the skilled, educated workers leave their homeland to earn a better wage elsewhere. However, the Philippines is also a nation that experiences a “care drain.” This phrase was adopted by Barbara Ehrenreich and Arlie Russel Hochschild in their book, “Global Woman: Nannies, Maids, and Sex Workers in the New Economy,” to describe the trend of third world women taking care of other children and leaving their own. Filipino women can be found all over the world taking domestic jobs to earn wages for their own families they leave behind. In this mass exodus of women, many Filipinas are captured in faux employment contracts and end up in foreign lands, trafficked across seas to work as sex slaves; raped and tortured for undetermined amounts of time.

2nd Edition of Asian American Women…

Published on by Lisa

Thanks to BFP for the this:

2ND EDITION OF ASIAN AMERICAN WOMEN ISSUES, CONCERNS, AND RESPONSIVE
HUMAN AND CIVIL RIGHTS ADVOCACY

Announcing the second edition of
Asian American Women: Issues, Concerns, and Responsive Human and Civil
Rights Advocacy

by NAPAWF Founding Sister, Lora Jo Foo
Published by iUniverse

Asian American Women: Issues, Concerns, and Responsive Human and Civil
Rights Advocacy reveals the struggles of Asian American women at the bottom
of the socio-economic ladder where hunger, illness, homelessness, sweatshop
labor and even involuntary servitude are everyday realities. The health and
lives of Asian American women of all socio-economic classes are endangered
due to prevalent, but inaccurate stereotypes which hide the appalling level
of human and civil rights violations against them. The book captures their
suffering and also the fighting spirit of Asian American women who have
waged social and economic justice campaigns and founded organizations to
right the wrongs against them.

We encourage you, fellow sisters, to meet with your chapters and discuss
your thoughts and ideas about the issues the book raises. Several of the
chapters of this second edition were updated by women activists and
advocates around the country. We encourage you to invite these courageous
women to your meetings so that they may share their experiences and help
facilitate active and productive discussion.

To thank you for your hard work and commitment to the movement, current paid
NAPAWF members may purchase the book at a discounted rate. Supplies are
limited so order your copy today! To place an order, please visit our
g%2FutviTF5Oj8> online store or email
aawbook@napawf.org. If
you aren’t a current paid member, sign up today so you can take advantage of
this special discount!
Paperback: $19.95 $15.00 NAPAWF Members Only!
Hardcover: $29.95 $25.00 NAPAWF Members Only!