[Note: Between Good Friday and May 18th, would you believe that in my ultrasmall circle of friends and acquaintances no less than six (6) compatriots have reached Aotearoa shores? Happy birthdays to dear friends Stephanie Chan-Lam (9th June) and Marivic Ching – Chua (6th June) ! ]
YOU’RE STRANGELY familiar with anecdotes like this. You’re
fresh off the boat, new in town looking for a place to crash, and hopefully
Asians of the same persuasion to share some rice with. Lo and behold, you find a few kabayan right there at the bus stop, who insist on taking you home, no sense wasting bus fare /
per diem if you’re just passing through on your way to your new employer (hopefully), and you meet the clan. Before you know it, you’re being interviewed : strict
Catholic? married? separated? Kids? Last job back home? Allergies? Any
criminal record that the
NBI clearance didn’t quite cover?
Barely 20 minutes into your overnight stay, and you can’t wait to leave. You hate to admit it, but you would gladly have paid hotel rates just to avoid the relentless intrusion on your life. From a stranger, to a stranger no less. BUT, that’s
Pinoy for you.
Sad but true. Pinoys and Pinoy culture simply don’t embrace the concept of
personal space among co-workers, contemporaries and townmates. Why should countrymen randomly encountered be any different? It’s not uncommon to ask people you hardly know the most intimate details of their private lives all in the name of small talk, animated discussion or comparing notes, Which is all very good, except that I wouldn’t want to declare at dinner to a family of eight, excluding toddlers, and babies, my nocturnal habits (
dodgy), sleep patterns (
erratic), was I married in church (
nosey aren’t we?) and how often do I do the nasty (
lately, as often as we’re not both bone-tired, which is next to never 😉 ).
I’m probably exaggerating, but we Pinoys are first second and last, owing to our inquisitive and helpful nature a nosey lot and it’s this trait of ours that sometimes turns off the (personal) space conscious, anally private (sorry for the term) and guarded individuals, even among our very own kabarangay. I’m happy to say despite my checkered past that I don’t count myself as onion-skinned, but just the same I’m sensitive to the noseyness among our brown brother (and sister) hood.
GOSSIPY. And as you might’ve guessed, related to Negative Trait Number One is Trait Number Two, which is the penchant of Pinoys to gossip about fellow Pinoys, and the lower the level (vices, indiscretions and misfortunes), the juicier. It wouldn’t be so deplorable if
Philippine society weren’t so hypocritical, but there you go I said it, we spout platitudes about clean and honest government, but wink at the
pork-barrel soliciting, electioneering and nepotistic congressman who donates funds for our multipurpose barangay and karaoke hall. We support the cardinal who rails against womanizing but silently admire Enteng Kabisote on his 25th live-in partner.
Our social and professional circles, by chance or otherwise, are influenced by these double standards as accurately as art imitates life. How can we not
do as the Romans do when we as Romans watch, listen to and talk about our celebrated, most beautiful Romans in civilized conversations, and gossip about them at the gutter later?
It’s certainly no wonder then that as we take along our work habits of punctuality, improvisation, team spirit and all-around industriousness on our way to distant shores, the complementary personal habits of
mañana, blind loyalty and idle gossip hook up for the free ride. We often tell ourselves that you can’t divorce one side of the Pinoy character from the other, that you have to take the good and the bad.
That may be so, but there’s nothing to stop us from improving ourselves and
shifting our paradigm. Yes, we can tweak the Pinoy stereotype, and yes we can change the way others see us. If we take the effort to leave the peculiarly Pinoy bad habits that are particularly hard to break back home, even if it’s just once a day, then we just might, in our generation, begin to see a sea change in the only set of perceptions that will ever really matter to us, the perception of Pinoys by the rest of the planet. Good luck and
mabuhay to all of us in doing so
kabayan!
Thanks for reading!
great entry Noel. Keep it up!
thanks Nizy! you have an AWESOME blog, and you DO look like Angel Locsin! 🙂