The Philippines: What I Hate, What I Love, What I Think

(I realize that this is somewhat disorganized. Sorry! :)

The Philippines: What I Hate, What I Love, What I Think

“I am a Filipino. Inheritor of a glorious past, hostage to an uncertain future.” - Carlos P. Romulo

I have lived in this country for approximately sixteen years and eight months. During all those years of alternating passive and active existence, I have often pondered upon what’s in this country that makes it special. And, adversely, what makes it dreadful. The way I see it, the Philippines is a lot like a diamond with two facets.

Let’s do a little backtracking.

The Philippines has constantly been under the rule of some foreigner or the other. Spaniards had control the longest, then the Japanese, then the Americans.

Some good did come out of all those years of foreign occupation... It showed how much we value our freedom. Remember Magellan and the Battle of Mactan? Or the Muslims and how they defended Mindanao? Or Gat Jose Rizal? Or Andres Bonifacio and all the heroes in the history lessons you probably slept through? Carlos Romulo had it right on: we are the inheritors of a glorious past.

The bad thing about the long state of coercion is that it took us a pretty long time to figure out how we want to do things. I’m not even sure if we actually figured that out already.

Today, we are still influenced by both those who once had us in the clutches of their empires and those who never did.

“Because it was under Spanish rule for 333 years and under U.S. tutelage for a further 48 years, the Philippines has many cultural affinities with the West.” (Britannica Encyclopedia)

Some might argue that we are still under the Spaniards because of our religion. We depend on the Japanese and the Chinese for supplies and investments, and on the Indians for oil.

We rely on the Americans for ideas and trends--and I believe that this is the worst of all. Most, if not all, Philippine contests, movies and game shows are patterned after the Westerners’. I don’t think that Filipinos are incapable of creating original expressions in the entertainment business... It’s just that the producers are scared to invest in something that is not tried and tested to sell. Decades after the American occupation and they still hold more of us than we realize. I wonder why the entertainment industry thinks so highly of American ideas that they actually copy them. Examples? Who wants to be a Millionaire, Deal or No Deal, Philippine Idol, and a whole lot more.

I love how we are able to interact with people from all over the world so readily. I hate how we tend to assimilate ourselves too much and lose ourselves in the process.

I praise the creativity of the Filipinos. Some of the greatest minds and the most unique talents are right here. Some of the most idealistic too. The problem is that the idealists are thrown into an environment where judgment is clouded by decades of imposed thinking. It's hard, when one breaks out of the cocoon to find that the cocoon is actually inside a cage. The people of the Philippines are a mixture of a lot of different races. We have the Malays, the Chinese, the Spaniards, the Japanese, the Americans, the Indians, the Europeans, and many others. An interesting thing is that most of us think that a certain “look” is Filipino. But a Filipino with the correct attributes may pass for a Vietnamese or a Malaysian. Sometimes hard to tell us apart from those who inhabit the countries around us.

One experience I had is when I was standing in an airport, waiting for my flight. For lack of better things to do, I, as usual, observed everyone around me. I tried to tell apart those who were natives of this country, and those who weren’t. Of course it was obvious if they were Caucasians with white skin, or if they were Africans with dark skin. But otherwise, I couldn’t really tell for sure.

I think what’s bad about this is that it makes it harder to get a sense of individuality in a world that revolves on physical traits. Other than that, it’s just an amusing past time to guess who’s from here and who’s just visiting. Looks are pretty much what they’re called... “looks...” That’s all there is to them. But I’ll discuss that in a different article since the idea alone warrants about a page or two.

Next point. Our democratic government.

What’s good: freedom and all that jazz. We are able to live in an environment where it’s alright to speak up. We exist in a country that has no apartheid or caste system, where both men and women have the right to vote.

What’s bad: abuse and corruption. I suppose every country has that... But that’s not a reason to have it. I mean, if everybody had cancer, would it then be alright to have it? Sure, that would give us a lot of people to empathize with, but we'd all suffer and perish from it. It's no secret that a lot of our officials are corrupt... But that doesn't stop them either.

I don’t know when the Philippine government reached the peak of corruption; I don’t have enough knowledge of political tides as of the moment. All I know is that we are on the list of the world’s most corrupt countries, and I know that that’s not a good thing.

Wait, we all know that, right? Even those who are corrupting the government system. But what prevents this from being eradicated? Greed, that old, old sin that was the downfall of the greatest civilizations. I’ll leave the connection unsaid.

Another point is the economic state of our country. I understand figures just as much as the next person so I won’t include those here.

”In many ways Filipino society is composed of paradoxes, perhaps the most apparent being the great extremes of wealth and poverty in the nation. The Philippines is a country of rich resources, but it is in the process of developing its full potentialities.”

Look at Japan. They don’t have half as much as the resources we have, and look at how well they’re doing. It is the great irony of the Filipino nation. The most accurate image I can think of is the beggar sitting on top of a pile of gold. The beggar knows it’s there, he just doesn’t know how to use it. Our country is fraught with natural resources. But they are too often ignored.

“Statistics don’t put food on the table.” I think that was a newspaper headline shortly after PGMA declared some increase in the GNP. I applaud whoever said that... That was a very elegant way to put it.

Another thing I see as something both good and bad about this country is “hospitality.” All the foreign visitors comment on how warm they’re received and things like that. “Hospitality” and all its splendor is usually reserved for guests, right? That’s why we let them use the nicest things and we try our best to please them. But I just wonder why we don’t reserve the same warmth toward people who are not guests. People who are around us everyday. We pride ourselves on hospitality and graciousness, and yet we bicker with our neighbors every few minutes.

That brings me to the devoutness of some Filipinos. Church every Sunday is a must for all Catholics in this country. For others, they hear mass on a different date. I am not well acquainted with all the practices, but I do know that most Filipinos never miss a holy date. Yet some of these devout people are the ones we hear gossiping and swearing in public vehicles. Some of them are the corrupt officials mentioned earlier. Some of them cheat on their wives and steal from their companies. Yet they are those who are present at their altar every week. Of course, there are those who abide by the rules. Those who are truly, in being and not by name, devoutly religious. They are the people we are meant to emulate.

One thing I cannot deny about the Filipino race is that we are happy. It is not uncommon for strangers to smile at one another. Even though we are poor, even though we are on top of the list of the most corrupt countries, we are also on top of the most cheerful ones. There’s always a profound sense of humor that permeates all corners of this landscape we call home.

I think that Filipinos have a love-hate relationship with the Philippines. We always complain about how this country sucks. How we don’t want to be Filipinos anymore. But when a foreigner makes a rude comment about our country, we come together as a nation to defend our dignity. I also think that that's one of the best things about this country.

As I said earlier, the Philippines is a diamond with two facets. One good, the other bad. But the diamond that is our nation is a diamond in the rough. It is in throes of metamorphosis even in the 20th century. The good thing about this is that we still have a chance to change the direction we're heading off to. Our diamond may emerge shattered and broken in the face of adversity... But it may also rise to become what it has always been destined to be: a shining, pristine symbol of a proud nation.