Baby Flow

Children are oftentimes more coherent than adults. Peep this baby freestyling in the UK. He's a beast. The gestures, the facial expressions, his hand resting on homie's soldier. I tell you, the boy is making all types of perfect sense. It's our adult sensibilities that can't grasp his perfection.

I.CAN'T.STOP.WATCHING.

Babaylan: Filipinos and the Call of the Indigenous

From the Introduction of Babaylan: Filipinos and the Call of the Indigenous:

"How? How do I retrieve my own memories of indigenous knowledge and indigenous spirituality when colonialism has robbed us of the language with which to speak of the knowledge we still feel in our bodies and in the depths of our Loob? When what we have is the language of the West and the language of a theology that is the language of the West and the language of a theology that is difficult to translate? When we aim to be understood by transnational and diasporic peoples whose engagement with the world is also determined by discourses not of their own making?

...our spirits have need of nurtures, mythic and symbolic, rooted in the soils and souls of primal cultures so that we might have an amulet against pathological forgetting forced on us by modernity...." -Leny Mendoza Strobel

Rediscovering NY: New York Style

Seriously? I just spent way too many hours of my life catching up on entries in The Sartorialist and then following the blogger, Scott Schuman's love life with partner Garance Dore. Did I really just do that? Ah, whatever.

Now that I'm done judging myself...reading both blogs made me think a lot about personal style, where it comes from, how to carry it out, etc. It makes me remember times in Boston when I looked in the mirror and changed my outfit because it was just too much for New England. These folks can't handle this, yet here in NY, I'm quite the tame fashion plate. I guess that means I'm not really a plate -maybe a saucer.

But seriously, here one can do so many things with their personal fashion. In so many ways, it's possible to be many things and still belong. What a gift.

For this, I am grateful.

Her Wild American Self

I'm finishing up a set of short stories by M. Evelina Galang called Her Wild American Self. The book came out in 1996. Part of me wonders why I didn't read this earlier. I guess I was a bit young to read it in '96. I do have a vague memory of seeing the cover and not being ready for it. In any case, I'm glad I found it at Arkipelago Books when I did. The stories about Filipino American families and Filipina American women in particular are honest -sometimes painful, sometimes sweet and always familiar.

One of my favorite paragraphs in the book is from the story "Lectures on How You Never Lived Back Home." In the first lines of the story, Galang writes:

You grew up hearing two languages -one you can pull apart, name, slap a series of rules to, twist like clay-dough in a child's hand -the other you cannot explain, you listen and you know. It is a language you understand intuitively -like being able to read the sunrise, the strips of pink and orange, the clumps of uneven clouds, a thin patch of grey and the moon and somehow, without thinking twice, you know what kind of day it will be. You understand like this because you are the first born. First generation. First American. First cousin. First hope.

How does she know me so well? How does she know what it feels like? What I can do? What it sounds like? Did she write this for me?

Yes, yes. I think she did.

Re-Discovering NY: Pedestrian Protection

I spend a lot of my time driving...too much time driving, actually. Today, as I was running errands in Harlem for work. I was in such a rush and traffic on 125th was not moving (I didn't expect it to, just saying. And yes, I know, who the heck takes 125th when they're in a hurry?). As I approached the intersection of Adam Clayton Powell, the light turned yellow and I decided to try to make it. Alas, I got stuck in the middle of the intersection because of some pedestrians and a too slow moving car.

After a few seconds, I noticed the broad back of a young man in red standing directly in front of my car. He had his arms out like a crossing guard and was motioning for people to walk. To his left a young woman stood in front of a truck, similarly, with her arms held out as if to block oncoming traffic from careening into the pedestrians. Though the truck and I in the middle of the intersection managed to garner harried honks from the cars being blocked from crossing, I had to smile at the two civilian crossing guards protecting pedestrians with their bodies.

It's little things like that that make me really miss living in a city, close to other people, where I can watch, listen and constantly learn. They also really make me appreciate how communities continue to creatively adjust and strategize around ways to protect our people.

Faces -Flashbacks

Everyone has triggers -sights, sounds, smells that bring them back to a different time and place. They may have lived it, they may not have, but those triggers take them somewhere else. Up until recently, faces weren't a usual trigger for me, but today at Mass, I was unassumingly looking around when the face of a Filipino man smacked me between the eyes and reminded me of home. It's been a while since I've had so visceral a reminder.

What's funny is, I've known this man almost my whole life. He is the father of a girl from my grade school. While we weren't close, her family was always around so I was very surprised when his face threw me across the world into a hot, muggy, open air Church where the old women were wearing veils and Church uniforms and the men Church vests or barongs. He threw me so far back I had to catch my breath and squint my eyes so as not to let tears fall.

What is this connection? I still can't figure it out. Is this what happens when somebody moves to another place, even if it's only for four months? It sticks with you? Sticks to your ribs and pulsates in your mind, waiting to flash through you like an electric shock? I can't figure it out, but all I know is that it's there and it's strong.

*On a complete side note -What is up with girls and women in Church wearing no clothes?! If they're not the shortest shorts in the world, they're the tightest pants ever or something inappropriately see through!!! And it's not just young girls, it's older women too. Whhhyyyy?!?!?! smh.

Diwata by Barbara Jane Reyes

Next on my list of poetry to read is Diwata by Barbara Jane Reyes. If this portion of a poem is any indication of what the rest of the book is like, I'm finished!

"She was born with fins and fishtail,

A quick blade slicing water.

She was her father's mermaid child.

A river demon, elders said.

...She lit oak pyers and bade the wind

A whispered requiem."

-Barbara Jane Reyes

Third Culture Kids

It's a constant thought in our minds -home, home and home. Yes, I wrote 'home' three times, but I don't mean the same place with that one word. So many of my people consider themselves to be multi-cultural, multi-lingual with a 'double-consciousness' or maybe a multi-consciousness. Recently, my girls and I connected over an article in McCombs Today about a man who considers himself to be a "Third Culture Kid" -with a Togolese father, a Black Texan mother and born in Coite de Ivoire. While some of us disagreed over whether the title was too broad or too limiting, one of the major factors in what brought us together as friends is that shared experience of having many different homes and having to learn how to navigate multiple realities, oftentimes, simultaneously.

While it is certainly a gift in so many ways, it can also be extremely challenging. Sometimes your spirit gets mixed up and you wonder to yourself if you're just falling for the supposed greener grass on the other side of the fence (or world) or if you're legitimately homesick. Either way, the feeling is real. Though I've been back home in New York for a number of months now, I'm still surprised to find that I'll feel strong pangs of homesickness for the Philippines. One day, I felt it particularly deeply and had to write more. This is for all my Third Culture Kids!

~

May 14, 2011

I look out the window as we pass conifers and desiduous trees native to the Northeastern United States finally beginning to bud after a long, cold winter that I had the great luck of missing. As the winter thawed and I found myself back in a world full of frozen, bronzed spirits and surrounded by pure artifice, I thought that the buds of spring would re-energize me and bring me closer to the endless summer that I had left behind.

There are days when it works. When I can breathe in next to a body of water and feel my spirit shudder in anticipation. There are days when it doesn’t. The leaves look tight and rigid to me, as if they are bracing themselves for their impending death in the fall. The branches and trunks, too stiff, too straight, too thin to make my heart beat harder. They stand far from one another –isolated and almost awkwardly misplaced.

Unfairly, I compare those sharp, pale leaves to the expansive, bawdy green of home. The branches that grow endlessly and the trunks that bend under the weight of its fruit. I romantically remember how those trees and leaves disappear into themselves, never letting you see where he ends and she begins, mated restfully until a breeze causes him to turn here and her to shift just there.

I wonder why I torture myself with such comparisons and remind myself that after all, I was born here! Mama wasn’t even pregnant with me when she left home. That I could understand. If I was conceived in the humidity of February and forced to fly to JFK while being jostled in my liquor amnii, I might understand my spirit’s longing to lift itself from my body and visit for a little bit. I almost wish it would, in the darkness of my sleep -just leave and catch its fill of home so this void wouldn’t continue to punch me mercilessly at the most inopportune moments. Fly through the muddy terraces and warm waters for hours only to burst back into my body with my first waking breaths.

Sometimes I urge my spirit to leave while I’m awake. Leave my body in a trance while you collect the remnants of a place I miss so acutely. I won’t mind.

What is calling me home? Who is calling me home? I can’t see their faces. It is my own? Is it simply myself? Will I always feel broken in two when I look out the window? Places that were once so familiar, places that defined me are now secondary identifications of where I came from. Does my ancestry supersede my circumstance? Will I ever just be able to simply exist?

Do I want to?

A bird shrilly calls, crickets chirp and I feel my blood lift in response. At night, I lie awake, straining to hear the bird sing. I know this creature for some reason. It sings alone, reminding me of home, reminding me of myself. Besides the regularly scheduled trains passing, it is the only sound I hear at night. All should be sleeping, but this bird sings as though its breast is sweating under the heat of a noontime sun. It reminds me that somewhere, far from here, it’s daylight. Somewhere far from here, birds and people sing and sweat under the noontime sun. While I sleep, someone calls and my spirit flies to meet itself where dreams and reality merge into one.

Rediscovering New York: Ricky's Crack Coffee

Every weekend and some weekdays I have the great opportunity to visit a tiny hole in the wall called Ricky's Restaurant: Sabor Latino. This lovely establishment can be found on 156th and Broadway in Washington Heights, a mere one block from the 157th stop on the 1 train.

Sorry, it's not the best photo of Ricky's. It's because

I was holding a steaming cup of "Ricky's Crack Coffee"

while trying to shoot. I def burned myself and stained my new shirt.

Oli took me there for the first time after telling me all about the fly and friendly women that served food behind the counter. In addition to gorgeous Dominican women...and men for that matter, in the cafe is the small but essential cafe con leche served at Ricky's. Olivia and I like to call it "Ricky's Crack Coffee." It's just soooooo good and soooo addictive. Anytime I'm in the vicinity of Ricky's, and anytime I'm not, I find myself wandering over to pay the $1 for a small cup of Heaven on earth.

And as if that wasn't enough, the food there is just bomb -simple but tasty Dominican fare for anywhere from $4-12 for a plate or combo. If ever you find yourself around that 157th stop, definitely drop by Ricky's, perch yourself on a stool and get ready to order in Spanish. Yum!

Rediscovering New York: Palisades Parkway Sunocos

Everybody who takes the Palisades Parkway to and from the city stops at the Sunocos right next to the GW Bridge. This evening when I stopped for gas, I saw the most bittersweet sight at the gas station -all these older brown men pumping gas for folks while laughing and joking with one another in their neon yellow Sunoco jackets. Lots of them were Latino, West Indian or West African and while it was somewhat sad to see these older men pumping gas in the cold weather, it was just a heartwarming sight to see their laughing and joyful camaraderie. The folks always make something out of nothing. Always.

Unclench, Unwind, Breath Deep

Since arriving in New York, I've tried (not always successfully) to maintain the calm, relaxed state of being that I constantly found myself in in the Philippines. I was rarely wound too tight while I was there. Admittedly, much of this is because I was not working and did not have to surround myself by other people or live up to other people's expectations but my own. As my time in New York has gone on, I've found myself clenched tight more often than I would like and my forehead in my wrinkle inducing frown. Today, I realized that if I didn't consciously address the clench, I'd make it a habit. I'd make it part of my everyday.

Don't get me wrong. I love New York. I am sooooo happy here, but there's no denying the reality of the New York rush -folks speed on the freeway, people push on the subway and rush by on the sidewalk passing hundreds of people and looking into the eyes of none.

So for all those moments when I find myself burrowed deep in the negativity of the culture of the GRIND, I'm just gonna UNCLENCH, UNWIND and BREATH DEEP. If you're lucky, I might even add a smile to that.

Rediscovering New York

Despite the inhumane weather conditions, there are moments when it strikes me hard that I am home in NY and I become immensely grateful. Whether it be seeing two brown men chatting on 174th, watching some fly women walking down Stanton in leather jackets and 4 inch heels, getting stressed about because there are too many shows and too many events to see, riding the subway next to a gorgeous baby, or driving by the Sprain Brook everyday to work, it all makes me smile.

In some ways, it all seems so familiar while being brand new. After nine years away from my hometown, I'm rediscovering New York, so look out for the new posts about another semester in the Re-Education of Ms. Fu-Daddy.

Eating Pinoy Food Tutorial

This Mikey Bustos is too funny.

I really love, "Soooaappp allreeeadddyy!" during the fight over the dishes. How many times have you done that?!

Immigraniada -Gogol Bordello

So crazy, but so ill at the same time!!

"To hell with your double standards...we comin' rougher every time!"

Gogol Bordello "Immigraniada" from Isaiah Seret on Vimeo.

Lisa Ono -Dahil Sayo

Wow. This version of Dahil Sayo is pretty dope if you like Bossa Nova. Love it.

Brownies in Rockland

Amen! I walk around the grocery in my hometown and there are so many more brown people here. It is so comforting. Growing up being one of the few Filipinos, Indians, or Haitians in school, it's nice to see more brown folks in the Rock. Woohoo!

Visualization for Stress Relief

"This technique uses your imagination, a great resource when it comes to reducing stress.

1. Sit or lie down in a comfortable position.
2. Imagine a pleasant, peaceful scene, such as a lush forest or a sandy beach. Picture yourself in this setting.
3. Focus on the scene for a set amount of time, then gradually return to your other activities."

Diwang Pinay -Spirit of the Filipina

When I heard about the production of Diwang Pinay, I was unsure of whether I wanted to attend. Would I want to see something about Filipinos overseas workers here after coming back? Would it be watered down compared to my last four months or would it be too much? Did I want to deal with either of those outcomes?

Ends up I didn't have to deal with either of those possibilities because it was perfect for my reentry to the us. I'm no critic but I felt and learned so much from the show which was brief but laden with the density of truth, love and struggle.

Each of the seven scenes focused on common themes experienced by real Pinay domestic workers living and working here in ny. The actors taught us about the struggle of raising other people's children, the interchanging monotony and rush of tasks, abuse, being away from one's family for years at a time, economic struggles, and coping mechanisms.

The play was powerfully created and produced using the stories and voices of the actresses themselves many OFW's for at least 5 years. because of the way it was created and produced. These were the stories of real women working in ny and they wrote the play themselves through a process that empowered them to have a voice.

So often I've seen the lines of OFW's in the airport and my heart always wrenches at the sight of modern day manongs and manangs who still have to make it work away from family, in a foreign place with so few resources. Diwang Pinay allowed us to hear intimately those voices on the OFW line and the voices of those who never or rarely even make it to that line.

In the last scene, the writers came to the front to share messages written to their families, mostly to their children. The room was filled with the tears and sobs of both the actresses and the audience who felt the separation, "the distance" as Geologic says "between our souls and our hearts."

I'm so grateful I was moved to go, even though I was uncertain of how it would make me feel. It's the little things that can keep us connected and it's the little things that will keep us apart. Diwang Pinay was definitely a bridge to home for which I am so thankful!

Sensual Dissonance aka Withdrawal

“As the expressive and sentient landscape slowly faded behind my more exclusively human concerns, threatening to become littler more than an illusion or fantasy, I began to feel –particularly in my chest and abdomen –as though I were being cut off from vital sources of nourishment. I was indeed re-acclimating to my own culture, becoming more attuned to its styles of discourse and interaction, yet my bodily senses seemed to be losing their acuteness, becoming less awake to subtle changes and patterns….

There [Nepal] the air was a thick and richly textured presence, filled with invisible, but nonetheless tactile, olfactory, and audible influences. In the United States, however, the air seemed thin and void of substance or influence…Hence, in America I found myself lingering near wood fires and even garbage dumps –much to the dismay of my friends –for only such an intensity of smells served to remind my body of its immersion in an enveloping medium, and with this experience of being immersed in a world of influences came a host of body memories from my year among the shamans and village people of rural Asia.” –Abram, The Spell of the Sensuous

~

There’s a painting of a beautiful sunset where a person sits on the boat by the shadows of the trees at my friend’s new apartment. The colors are familiar –orange, gold, purple, blue, and pink. I stare at it, letting every part of me travel to those moments where I was the one sitting in that boat, watching the sun, surrounded by warmth, water, and spirits. I breathe in deeply and catch a whiff of the thick island air, half praying that the spirits I encountered will manifest themselves so that I can just remember.

Just let me remember.

A siren squeals loudly outside and a cold gush of air sweeps over me through the window I’m sitting next to and I’m back in New York.

~

Every part of my body wants to remember the Philippines. Every minute back here in the States, I’m afraid I’ll forget it all. I’m afraid that the old images of things that I love will overcrowd the things that I love from my most recent home. I’ve kept myself inside for the past 3 days, subconsciously afraid that overexposure will make me leave it all behind completely. My heart warms at the sight of the New York skyline, but I foolishly fight the warmth I feel, thinking it will make me forget the bundok, the bukid, the dagat, the ilog…lahat –everything.

Like Abram, my nose itches to smell the scents of diesel mixed with heat, dust, and burning garbage of the city or the warm, gentle air of the waters or the clean, crisp air of the mountains. Walking down 139^th, I catch a quick scent of something burning. The familiarity excites me for a brief moment until the cold hits my nostrils with a shock.

My skin roars at the cold –cracked and itchy, screaming for moisture and the natural oil produced by the heat of the islands that kept my sin safe and protected. Granted, I’m not dusty like I was in the PI, but that’s what tabos are for. My hands reach for warm waters to dip into while my toes wiggle in winter boots, desirous of the freedom of tsinellas.

My ears strain for the sounds of birds, crickets, frogs thrumming in the day and the night and the constant chatter of Tagalog. I liked listening to people talk, trying to figure out what they’re saying and being happy when I could get the gist of it. I liked hearing the women gossip and the men guffaw. It always made me smile. Instead, I hear sirens, trucks, and loud voices bantering in English. I guess that’s all right too.

Meanwhile, my tongue trips over both English and Tagalog. I find myself eagerly chatting with my parents about what I experienced in the Philippines and what needs to be done at the house, but shying away from too much unnecessary chatter with other folks, afraid that falling back into my old gregariousness will signal a clutter in the mental space that I had just spent four months clearing. The space for Tagalog is even more limited now that I’m back home. I want to drop Tagalog into my sentences with friends, the Starbucks girl, the waiter at Queen Sheeba, but I can’t. I mean, I could, but you know…it wouldn’t make sense.

My eyes get tired from the screen -staring at photos from my journey over and over again. They long for the bright, burning sun and the green of plants and trees that I would wake up to. I look for Filipino faces all around me, but there are few. Instead, I’m met with the sight of snow, bare trees, and gray pavement. The connection to earth blocked by the concrete weights. Driving into Harlem, I’m shocked to process the sight of other brown people, not just Filipinos –Dominican flags, Black faces, Central Americans. "Oh my GOD!! A Black person!!" I scream at Leigh while she shakes her head at my weirdness. (I probably saw like 8 while I was in the PI. And yes, I was counting.) When’s the last time I saw a Latino…not on Facebook?

~

I look back at the painting longing to let myself be transported again. But it takes so much energy and I’m here now. I can’t always wish for there when I’m meant to be here, now can I?

Anyway, it’s all stored in my cellular memory. Any day now, it will all come back to me.

Day 55 -Family First: Our Barangay Lifestyle

Even though Christmas and New Year’s have passed, it is still holiday season here in the Philippines. We go through til the Feast of the Three Kings. All the time I have been spending with extended family makes me think of the Filipino American community back in the States and the upbringing that we experienced together. While I can’t say it was purely Pinoy, for sure, there were many remnants of the Pinoy lifestyle brought to life throughout my childhood –the Barangay being one of them.

I’ve been reading about Pinoy culture and history while here and have come to a better understanding of the word “Barangay,” through my research. I was first introduced to the word in 2003, when I studied here. At that time, I understood it to mean community or neighborhood. Lots of small neighborhoods are named Barangay this or that, have a barangay captain and even a barangay council who represent the interests of the community.

This year, I came up against a more formal definition of a Barangay and its etymology. A barangay is the smallest political or social unit here in the PI. It comes from the word “Balangay” which was a boat used to travel with a whole clan and/or kin. People used the word “kabangka,” meaning ‘from the same boat’ to describe relationships with family or clan members. In Luis H. Francia’s book A History of the Philippines: From Indios to Bravos to Filipinos, he describes how the history of the balangay impacted the way Filipinos operated. He says, “Blood ties were thus of the utmost importance for they guaranteed fealty to the barangay…the barangay was essentially an extended family, a gathering of a particular clan” (33). Family came before any other ties because of the shared experiences and loyalty promised to the leader and to one another –not so different from the modern day Philippines and some Filipino American communities in the States.

The concepts of ownership and public space were also impacted by Barangay culture. Francia argues that land ownership was irrelevant saying, “Every member of the barangay was a shareholder theoretically and could derive profit from land use” (32). This is very different from the life we are used to in the States and the modern Philippines where ownership means so much to us whether or not we have strong family ties. This idea of shared space extended into what Westerners call the public and private spheres –the government vs. home, the work place vs. home, etc. In barangays, the distinction between these spaces did not exist in the same way that we think of it in the States:

“Made up of kinship ties, the barangay did not constitute a system independent from its inhabitants...a barangay had no public buildings for government or community affairs, no castles or town halls. The datu’s (chief’s) residence would have been the largest building and the center of the barangay. The idea of what passed for ‘public’ was really the private world write larger” (34-35).

In the States and modern day Philippines there are clear and purposeful distinctions between government, political, or communal interests and life in the private home sphere. These oftentimes opposing Eastern and Western views of space and relationships were always things that my peers, my family, and I had to negotiate on an everyday level. It wasn’t always something we were hyper aware of though. We didn’t go around thinking, “Oh, I really have to negotiate this bi-cultural lifestyle that is occurring in my life,” since assimilation and acculturation can happen so quietly today. The impacts were subtle yet defining at the same time. It was more than food and language that was different from the other American families around us. It was our way of being with one another –a way of life that manifested itself in the way we treat(ed) one another back at home.

Similar to the Filipinos of long ago, you might say that my family was part of a barangay in Queens when they arrived here. Queens was and still is a center of Filipino immigrants. Drive down Queens Blvd. and you will see restaurants advertising longsilog, tapsilog, menudo and other Pinoy foods. My parents landed there with other folks they knew, my father following a job and his older brother from Manila to New York City. While there were many groups of Filipinos there, my family stuck with a few of the same people –almost as if they were “kabangka.” When some of these families, including my uncle’s, started to move up North to a suburb of New York City, my family followed moving to a house about five minutes away from my cousins’ house. I even lived with my cousins for a bit while my parents settled the move from Queens to the burbs.

Our families created another small barangay in our tiny town. We celebrated together, prayed together, mourned together. Sundays, we would see one another at Church, the majority of us children singing in the folk choir while our parents directed or played instruments for the group. Afterwards, we would all play tennis and eat at the local park. Parents and older kids would rotate on the tennis courts while other kids were listening to music, playing at the park, biking, rollerblading, or entertaining ourselves in some other way. About once a month, we had Block Rosary where a statue of Mary jumped from house to house in the county. Our families would pray the rosary together, end the prayer with a unified, “Good evening,” and then of course, grub.

Family Parties at Our House

Even if we weren’t related by blood, everybody was Tito or Tita. At get togethers we had to greet each elder. Even if there were as many as 30 lolos, lolas, aunts and uncles, we had to make sure every adult was greeted properly. You can imagine how crazy weddings and funerals are with all the greeting! Holidays were always together. It was pretty weird to even consider going to a non-family member’s house for Christmas, Easter, or New Year’s. Even in college up to now, I never even pretend like I’m going to party outside the family for New Year’s and it was rarely something I even wanted to do since being with the family was so much fun!

Tina's Bridal Shower -Jam Packed with Fam

~

My cousins were my best friends. While so many kids at school were playing over their friends’ houses, we were playing at our cousins’ houses. We went on trips together to Florida, Rhode Island, and Wildwood together. A large group of us went to Catholic school for seven or more years together. Some of us even shared the same classrooms and homeroom teachers. We followed one another’s footsteps and once the first generation had gone through St. Paul’s and Albertus Magnus High School, the teachers knew who was coming up and what to expect. In those moments of otherness, when a kid would make fun of our food, say that we were dirty, or not invite us to their parties even though the whole class would be invited I always had my cousins. After a while, my otherness didn’t matter as much and while we eventually made friends with many of the white kids in our classes, the drama that often occurred in social circles passed over our heads because we just didn’t care. Granted, we had our own drama in our own circle, but it rarely got aired out in public the way some of the other kids’ crap did.

Together Forever

1997

1998 or 1999

2009

My family was my safe, home space. I grew up in a diverse New York firmly believing that everybody should assimilate and not segregate themselves into cultural/racial groups, little acknowledging the safety and confidence that I ended up having because of my barangay. After I read Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria by Beverly Tatum in college, I finally realized the value of having a place where my culture was understood, accepted and practiced. It didn’t/doesn’t have to be my whole life, but it was and still is a legitimate space and foundation for who I was, am, and will be.

~

Now that I'm here, I see exactly where our Filipino American barangays came from. Here, everybody takes care of one another. While I don't have many friends, I have my family on both sides. We go on trips together. Eat meals together. Celebrate holidays together. Pray together.

Fullons at Coco's Wedding

I listen to stories about the Castros and how the cousins spent summers together in the province with their Lolo, my great grandfather. They can name small intricacies about one another from childhood that nobody else will ever know -Lolo's strict schedule, Mom's clumsiness

Castro Cousins with Lola Pat

Castro Cousins with Lolo Joy

Castro Cousins 2009

Castro Reunion 2009

Dad's family is similar, recounting the days when they spent summers at their Lola's in Iloilo all together. Even today, they value the little time they are able to spend together. When my aunt said she was thinking about not coming to the wedding in Manila, my uncle who rarely talks said, "Huh? Why?" So, up to Manila she came!

Fullon Cousins in Iloilo

I watch all of my aunts and uncles and realize how much the family meant to them, how good it was for them to be around cousins their age and to know that there were aunts and uncles in addition to their parents who were supporting them. That's why we are the way we are -like brothers and sisters with our cousins. Tons of unconditional love, different as we may be.

My parents brought that with them to the States and I'm thankful.

~

Barangays have their weaknesses, though –infighting, grudges that last for years, heavy chismis, and other downfalls of the human condition. Sometimes, if not handled thoughtfully, community becomes so important that individuality is bruised and stunted. For me, the concept of the barangay is not necessarily the culprit, but our weaknesses as humans are at fault for breakdowns in both the barangay and the individual –pretty common for most social structures out there, I suppose. Acknowledging that though I still have to say that the barangay played and still plays a powerful role in my life. I always know I have a home to go back to. I always know that I have people supporting me and praying for me.

I hope this little girl can make her barangay proud, help it grow, and serve its people the way it serve(d) me.