Filipino Thoughts
Once upon a time around March 2007 (with April creeping, creeping up)
There were about 250,000 Filipinos who helped out American forces in World War II, recruited around 1941. They were promised full veteran’s benefits. The war ended in 1945. In 1946 Congress reversed on the decision to give those benefits. Only 20,000 of them are still alive.
Representative Mike Honda of California is sponsoring the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus, a bill to grant the surviving 20,000 the benefits they were promised.
I just wanted to throw that out there for all of you to know.
I am not too sure on my family’s involvement during World War II. Both of my parents and their siblings were too young to participate (well, one aunt was at least a teenager at the time), although I remember tales told by my Dad’s brother of watching dog fights overhead on the beach by their seaside village of Mulanai (never sure of how the place was spelled) but he could have been joshing me.
On my mother’s side (which lived in the mountains of Luzon where I was eventually born- although I claim the sea as well as part of my heritage), there is Japanese blood from before the war started (although no one wants to admit it or talk about it- if you see my mom and her siblings and even some of my cousins- I am looking at you Ayn & Byron- it is very apparent that somewhere down the line there someone who originated from the land of the rising son).
I have half remembered overheard conversations from relatives that they used to hide friends and family members who were of Japanese descent (at the time, there were second or third generation Japanese-Filipinos amongst the population- not sure nowadays; although Chinese-Filipinos are still abundant; Corazon Aquino was one and so is my Uncle Fred who is Taiwanese-Filipino).
These Japanese-Filipinos had nothing to do with the war and like the ones we sent to internment camps were just victims of being in the wrong place and at the wrong time. If the half remembered overheard conversations could be trusted, I do not think one of those that were hidden had a happy ending as anyone looking Japanese was not trusted and were subject to witch hunts by the other locals.
Thinking not about the Philippines lately but of my memories of the place (there is a funny thing at Mr. Jam’s site you need to read by the way about who we fobs are and how we survive the insanity that is the world of today, mostly we use puns: http://mrjam.typepad.com/diary/wit_of_the_philippines/index.html ).
The Philippines of my memory is one of a depressed lower class, Smokey Mountain (the city that literally grew out of a garbage dump), a lively and struggling to survive middle class and the snobby upper class. Of course, there are also the Jeepneys, people selling balut at 3am, a volcano that puts Mt. Fuji to shame, being chased by dogs (not fun), endless fields of green and smog that makes Los Angeles look a mountain resort, the most beautiful beach I have ever been to, bad, corny humor, the bus ride from Manila to Baguio, the big cathedral in Baguio and the hawkers there, relatives in their early to late twenties trying so damned hard to be hip, Camp John Hay, Nanay and Tatay, the big turtle that was on their local version of Sesame Street and TV variety and game shows that are were popular then (and probably now- back then they already, at least twenty years ago, had their local versions of Idol).
It has been said by some better than me that general and pop culture here now is matching what was already there two decades ago. And with the popularity of Idol and the widening gap between classes, my friend, it is coming true.
But I do not think you can expect people selling you balut at three in the morning. Just cable guys trying to sell you cable while you are making/eating dinner.
I would not live there again; this place is too much my home. As stated on Mr. Jam’s site: [The Philippines is run with] a 24-hour comedy show [t]here called the government and a huge reserve of comedians made up mostly of politicians and bad actors.
Eventually I would like to visit again though. If only to see people who look like me, eat some palabok and to visit that one beach again.
PS: Going back full circle to World War II, Filipina activist Evangeline "Vangie" Canonizado Buell wrote that back then in Oakland (originally found liked at www.racilicious.com ), she had to wear a button that read “I AM A LOYAL FILIPINO” so she would not be harassed because she was Asian and thus, then - and now probably- mistaken as Japanese.
Oh, and “No Filipino or Dogs allowed” signs in restaurants. Laugh all you want and make Bruce Lee jokes, the sad fact is that those signs existed.
Vangie continues:
"When I was walking in San Francisco with Bill (her husband) down the street to go to the Opera, and, you know, it was a crowded street, a white man came up to me and called me all kinds of names and said, 'You shouldn't even be here,' " Buell says.
"That was only a year ago," she adds.
Nothing ever changes does it?
Sigh…and learn how America continues to hate us Asian people at http://cky-brandon-dicamillo-racist.blogspot.com/
And on a completely different topic: I got called old today because I knew what Lollapalooza was.
________________________________________________________________________
http://www.myspace.com/catterpillarboy
http://catterpillarboy.blogspot.com/
http://catterpillarboy.livejournal.com
There were about 250,000 Filipinos who helped out American forces in World War II, recruited around 1941. They were promised full veteran’s benefits. The war ended in 1945. In 1946 Congress reversed on the decision to give those benefits. Only 20,000 of them are still alive.
Representative Mike Honda of California is sponsoring the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus, a bill to grant the surviving 20,000 the benefits they were promised.
I just wanted to throw that out there for all of you to know.
I am not too sure on my family’s involvement during World War II. Both of my parents and their siblings were too young to participate (well, one aunt was at least a teenager at the time), although I remember tales told by my Dad’s brother of watching dog fights overhead on the beach by their seaside village of Mulanai (never sure of how the place was spelled) but he could have been joshing me.
On my mother’s side (which lived in the mountains of Luzon where I was eventually born- although I claim the sea as well as part of my heritage), there is Japanese blood from before the war started (although no one wants to admit it or talk about it- if you see my mom and her siblings and even some of my cousins- I am looking at you Ayn & Byron- it is very apparent that somewhere down the line there someone who originated from the land of the rising son).
I have half remembered overheard conversations from relatives that they used to hide friends and family members who were of Japanese descent (at the time, there were second or third generation Japanese-Filipinos amongst the population- not sure nowadays; although Chinese-Filipinos are still abundant; Corazon Aquino was one and so is my Uncle Fred who is Taiwanese-Filipino).
These Japanese-Filipinos had nothing to do with the war and like the ones we sent to internment camps were just victims of being in the wrong place and at the wrong time. If the half remembered overheard conversations could be trusted, I do not think one of those that were hidden had a happy ending as anyone looking Japanese was not trusted and were subject to witch hunts by the other locals.
Thinking not about the Philippines lately but of my memories of the place (there is a funny thing at Mr. Jam’s site you need to read by the way about who we fobs are and how we survive the insanity that is the world of today, mostly we use puns: http://mrjam.typepad.com/diary/wit_of_the_philippines/index.html ).
The Philippines of my memory is one of a depressed lower class, Smokey Mountain (the city that literally grew out of a garbage dump), a lively and struggling to survive middle class and the snobby upper class. Of course, there are also the Jeepneys, people selling balut at 3am, a volcano that puts Mt. Fuji to shame, being chased by dogs (not fun), endless fields of green and smog that makes Los Angeles look a mountain resort, the most beautiful beach I have ever been to, bad, corny humor, the bus ride from Manila to Baguio, the big cathedral in Baguio and the hawkers there, relatives in their early to late twenties trying so damned hard to be hip, Camp John Hay, Nanay and Tatay, the big turtle that was on their local version of Sesame Street and TV variety and game shows that are were popular then (and probably now- back then they already, at least twenty years ago, had their local versions of Idol).
It has been said by some better than me that general and pop culture here now is matching what was already there two decades ago. And with the popularity of Idol and the widening gap between classes, my friend, it is coming true.
But I do not think you can expect people selling you balut at three in the morning. Just cable guys trying to sell you cable while you are making/eating dinner.
I would not live there again; this place is too much my home. As stated on Mr. Jam’s site: [The Philippines is run with] a 24-hour comedy show [t]here called the government and a huge reserve of comedians made up mostly of politicians and bad actors.
Eventually I would like to visit again though. If only to see people who look like me, eat some palabok and to visit that one beach again.
PS: Going back full circle to World War II, Filipina activist Evangeline "Vangie" Canonizado Buell wrote that back then in Oakland (originally found liked at www.racilicious.com ), she had to wear a button that read “I AM A LOYAL FILIPINO” so she would not be harassed because she was Asian and thus, then - and now probably- mistaken as Japanese.
Oh, and “No Filipino or Dogs allowed” signs in restaurants. Laugh all you want and make Bruce Lee jokes, the sad fact is that those signs existed.
Vangie continues:
"When I was walking in San Francisco with Bill (her husband) down the street to go to the Opera, and, you know, it was a crowded street, a white man came up to me and called me all kinds of names and said, 'You shouldn't even be here,' " Buell says.
"That was only a year ago," she adds.
Nothing ever changes does it?
Sigh…and learn how America continues to hate us Asian people at http://cky-brandon-dicamillo-racist.blogspot.com/
And on a completely different topic: I got called old today because I knew what Lollapalooza was.
________________________________________________________________________
http://www.myspace.com/catterpillarboy
http://catterpillarboy.blogspot.com/
http://catterpillarboy.livejournal.com
posted by Catterpillarboy at 3:36 AM
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