Insert Your Face Here
Laying against the thick twisted rope between the stubby wooden posts hammered into the lean bridge was Nicnic in her dark cyclist attire that stuck out from the glistening sea and mangrove trees. After she took one good photograph and one impressive human-drone video for us, we decided to bring her along on our land tour around Boracay. “No service or talent fee, just tip!”
The first stop was Bulabog Beach. It’s a lowkey place for first-world hipsters to laze at millennial beach-side restaurants with packages to sail-surf or dive. Nicnic propped us up at this secluded part of the beach with logarithmic coconut trees that turned out to be perfect studio equipment for our photo shoot.
She sat us down and directed our every limb, “Heart sign… Finger heart… Arms crossed… Look there… Leg like this…” The photos turned out neat.
Moving onto the next destination, our trike was inching up the island’s mountainside at a sluggish pace. It didn’t help that the roads were torn and in ruins alike the abandoned concrete buildings we drove past. The flora had a likeness for tall people. Only at my height, you were able to see the branches pointing towards the coast, creating a natural wooden picture frame wherever you go. The clouds seemed to cover the edge of the island, swallowing its own tears, saving face knowing that the sun was watching.
At the apex, a group of kids on a makeshift cart surrounded by their private security of mountain dogs were trying to figure out how to ride down the mountainside while using a dangling plank as extra seats for their rollercoaster. I’ll never get to know of their anticipated launch since we fled as soon as we took pictures with the same old poses, but I could imagine they flew.
It was golden hour, the sun brushed and painted the world in an intense orange, hoarding the contrasting blue for itself in the sky. Along the strip of beach, subjects overtook the sand as far as the eye can see. Despite the overwhelming and incoherent chatter layered on top of the foaming waves, peace could be defined and music transcribed. My spell was quickly broken as it was our turn to take our templated pictures with this famous rock in the middle of the beach.
There’s a time and place to take pictures or videos, but one must taste rather than indulge in them. The latter takes away from the moment of the human experience that people will never get back. I wish I could’ve sat in relation with the beach, the rollercoaster engineers, and the sunset, but instead a picture took me away and stuffed me inside its own world. Pictures can take away context of experience, it replaces a thousand words with some, and tells its own story and truth which could deviate from reality. On rare occasions, pictures are cheap, a poor man’s experience. Human experience is expensive, just like the tip.
Manila Memorial Park
Piercing through the barriers of the highways, beautiful and unique architectured mausoleums seemingly built for royalty stand tall, reaching the heavens for those with wealth resting in peace. Strolling into the gates, there’s misses taking pictures of one of the many wandering cats on the side of the paved narrow street. Cruising deeper into the cemetery, dozens of cars and motorcycles are parked alongside blue roofed canopies huddling families shoulder to shoulder around their loved ones on the other side. Joggers are fiddling while some are taking their walking lap drenched in sweat.
Stepping out of the car with roses in hand, I couldn’t help but to wonder what these families were talking about. It felt like they were catching up their past with the present, teasing one another from the laughter, and reminiscing–gazing past each other during the silence.
I was hesitant to walk on top of the neatly trimmed and uniform grass that had softly defined burial outlines elevated centimeters from the ground.
My family friend told me, “They’re already dead, they wouldn’t mind.”
Shaded under the great mahogony tree is where my grandma sleeps. I never knew her well along with the mysterious relatives that recently left lively daisies opposite of each other around her tombstone.
Placing my roses down, creating a red and yellow floral trifecta, I was wondering what we could’ve talked about on this breezy and mild day. Looking around at the other families and groups of people sitting in circles in their pop-up chairs laughing and speaking warmth into the air, I figured our conversations wouldn’t be so different.
Intersection of Appearance and Language
Whenever I’m out and about in the Philippines, everyone that engages me speaks in Tagalog. I’m not native here, but I sure do look like it most of the time! Whenever this happens, I like to use my broken Tagalog with my limited vocabulary and oblivious American accent to practice. Most of the time, they never understand me except for this one time I ordered coconut water.
“Magkano ang cold buko, po?”
“150 pesos. May coins, sir?”
“Opo.”
I handed them 150 pesos and enjoyed my freshly open, sliced, and ice cold coconut water. It’s probably my most favorite Tagalog interaction despite it being so short.
On the way to a hangout, I was looking for taxis around the area so I could avoid taking angkas (motorcycle taxi) despite how exhilarating it is. I didn’t want to smell like gasoline or the streets just like last time–although it was unavoidable, my clothes were poorly washed because all the businesses including the laundromats were closed for the holidays.
I hailed a taxi, opened the door, and spoke in plain English detailing where I wanted to go and how much it cost to go to SM Manila. The driver looked up to his car’s grey interior roof contemplating a price.
After a few seconds of thought, he blurted out “500 pesos,” for a 20 minute ride.
Tara!
There’s been two occurrences where I’ve been backpacking in the Philippines. After a long day in Cebu, I stopped by this McDonalds to grab a bite. As I was ordering through the kiosk, two ladies were behind me talking in perfect American English.
They were super close behind me and said, “Mabaho na ito” and switched back to their English conversation as if nothing happened.
I of course understand Tagalog and let out a huge sigh. I already know man.
I have no right to bargain for a service that I want in the Philippines when I could afford the foreigner tax. Why would I bargain with someone who’s providing me a service and needs my money more than myself? I was observing this western woman in the province demanding her trike ride cost 200 pesos rather than 300 pesos. Seriously, you’re bargaining for 1 dollar? You can’t be stingy when your own country’s money makes you rich, especially when you’re not from here and are reliant on the natives of the country for basic needs such as food, transportation, and housing.
Multiple times, people correctly assume that I’m a foreigner, but falsely assume that I don’t understand Tagalog at all. They can talk about how big and frizzy my hair is from being untreated, how smelly I am from my 6 hour walk, or how stupid I was for trying to speak Tagalog. I just thought its funny how they think a brown boy doesn’t know game. The moment I speak English or wear something as simple as a backpack, I get outed as an outsider. I’m American first and Filipino second, despite how Filipino I look.
However, I met up with some random people from Twitter in the Philippines and we talked in English for hours! It was cathartic to finally feel understood in a country where I don’t really belong. It’s not a surprise nowadays that the younger generation of Filipinos can speak perfect English, better than me, and some with American accents.
One day, I wish to revisit the Philippines with passable Tagalog to be able to negotiate taxi prices, talk back, and call a stranger kuya.
A Love Letter to Downtown Manilla
I still remember how excited I was when my friend offered to introduce you to me. You sounded interesting at first glance and I realized no one really talks about you on the other side of the world. I had to meet you!
We took the LRT–skin-to-skin amongst clusters of passengers–to Doroteo Jose Station and started our journey aimlessly walking in your bustling concrete jungle. There’s not a single street where an open parking spot exists or where an electric line isn’t tangled into another creating a spider web.
Seemingly, out of the thousands of shops in the same street block, we arrived at this restaurant called Old Saigon that had the best and most authentic Vietnamese coffee in the Philippines. It hit the exact bold and bittersweet notes that I’d find in San Jose’s and Orange County’s Little Saigon.
I didn’t know you were Chinese and had the oldest Chinatown in the world until we walked into Binondo. It was the most packed city block I’ve seen that wasn’t in one of the hundreds of malls that exist in the country. The food there must’ve been so good! The line for one restaurant was wrapping around the street and the other vendors nearby looked stressed dealing with the never ending influx of customers.
Crossing one of the bridges, we came across your Central Post Office that unfortunately burnt down in 2023. No matter how cooked you were, I admired your unique Roman and Greek inspired architecture resembling The Pantheon that isn’t found anywhere else on the same scale in the Philippines.
Strolling on the riverwalk, you had literal hole-in-the-wall restaurants that overlooked the river, Binondo, and its ongoing condo developments. The stores had no doors, but arch openings that you could hit your head on. We passed by Fort Santiago following its walls which mirrored the white neoclassical guardrails and black lamp posts. The fort walls looked climbable enough to skip the entrance fee. The riverwalk was a needed bliss and peace from the crowded Binondo streets and its accumulation of small Nazareno parades.
I also didn’t know you were Spanish too, what are you really? We walked on your neat brick roads that connect to the San Agustin Church which has been standing for half a millennium through the bombings of World War II. Over the crowd by the monolithic main entrance was an ongoing wedding. The groom and bride were standing in the middle of the red aisle, enveloped by elegance and inexplicable craftsmanship I’ve never seen before in America. Explaining it in full detail would take too long, a picture or seeing it with a pair of eyes would suffice to transfer the information of its beauty.
By the time we got to Rizal Park, the clouds blindfolded the sun and shaded the thousands of the park’s visitors. Hundreds of people were lining up to get into the national museums that surrounded the North side of the park which captured the same neoclassical architecture as the late Central Post Office, but this time having more resemblance with the Capitol building in Washington D.C.. Families and friends were picnicking in the middle of the open fields underneath the waving Filipino flag, right next to where Jose Rizal got executed by firing squad many years ago.
Downtown Manilla, you have so much beauty. I could talk about my visit to the posh and haunted Manila Hotel for a free glass of water, the relaxing stroll on the Grandstand’s avenue, the unsuspected pleasantness of the indigent environment of the Bay Beach, the random brutalist building that has 14 pillars keeping the whole tower intact, or the most regular angkas from Downtown–but I would rather keep those experiences between you, me, and others that enjoy you too.
I hope the next time I visit you, the government will realize your beauty and invest money into your revitalization. I could imagine how much more comfortable and bigger your rail trains could be. I could imagine how popular your cheap yet tasty generational restaurants could get. I could see the completion of your laid brick roads by the Agustin church. I could imagine more friendly football games happening on your fields across the Grandstand in Rizal Park. I could imagine more people–Filipinos and tourists–loving you the same way I did when I fell for you at first glance.
Music
Megumi Acorda is my second favorite band, they have such a pensive yet revitalizing sound through their melancholic melodies. It helps that they’re from the Philippines! I really hoped that they had a show during my visit. It would’ve been one of the best days of my life. Every cat I saw on the street reminded me of a Task Kitty that could probably save me.
I was listening to Binibini by the Rainmakers, Yolly Samson, and Hotdog and got called “backwards” by my parents. These are bangers, I don’t know what else you want me to listen to? I don’t mind playing Kyleaux, that kid has so much swag and talent, but too new for my parents. Or maybe The Axel Pinpin Propaganda Machine, but it’s too loud for them.
Noticing
I can’t say much as an outsider or provide solutions in a space that I don’t know the ins and outs of, but I can still notice.
There’s too many malls and not enough recreational spaces for Filipinos. I understand that malls now serve as a third space for people to spend their free-time in, but dozens of more Rizal Parks would feel much better. What is there to do in a mall other than to buy, eat, and walk? It’s hard to do anything else in spaces that are designed to make you do those three things, it’s hard to get bored.
I was disappointed in the limited number of libraries in the Philippines. I’ve only visited the Cebu Library which was therapeutic, especially after a week-long hiatus of focused reading. Three hours instantaneously passed in there, it was the quietest place I’ve been in the Philippines other than my hotel room. I wondered, what if the Philippines had Ayala quality libraries or parks that existed outside of the mall. How nice would that be? Imagine a simple and humble Dolores Park or a gigantic Newport Beach Library, but in the Philippines?