Philippines backlog cont.
So what did I do for a month in a half in the Philippines?
*I was introduced to single ladies, teachers, nurses, students. At parties (since it was coming on Fiesta time at the end of January)and every possible occasion. One day I went with my father to Laoag thinking we were going to repair the AC in his car. I was pissed to find myself lunching with my father, a niece in her mid-twenties, and 6 of her women friends and classmates in physical therapy. I think only about half of the girls were actually available. After a while I wasn't sure if this was for my benefit or my dad's (although I can't imagine his grand niece pimping out her girlfriends to a man old enough to be their grandfather. On our way back I told my dad if he pulls something like that again I'm leaving (to my horror he repeated what I said to relatives). [Filipinos are obsessed with relationships--on the PI version of Deal or No Deal hosted by the Chris Aquino, the daughter of the former president, the hostess during Q and A delves deep into the contestants' personal lives: Asked of men and women who either look too fay or too tomboyish for their gender: are you gay, and if so do you have a boy/girl friend (one contestant a butch watchperson, replied she had a "special" friend. Of one contestant who had nine children the hostess asked him if they were all by the same woman). Apparently Filipinos didn't inherit american's squeamishness at too much information.--Anyway after 3 weeks or so, probably because everyone was so busy preparing for the town Fiesta, they left me alone, and I couldn't help feeling like a lost cause.
*Otherwise I observed a life of convalescence, I slept in the same downstairs den as my parent's and their helper, so I was privy to my parent's late night screaming fits (which apparently happened frequently because everyone is so godamned blasse about it: my cousin's wife said "they fight Like cats and dogs, I guess that's how they show their love," she said half-jokingly.
*I was introduced to single ladies, teachers, nurses, students. At parties (since it was coming on Fiesta time at the end of January)and every possible occasion. One day I went with my father to Laoag thinking we were going to repair the AC in his car. I was pissed to find myself lunching with my father, a niece in her mid-twenties, and 6 of her women friends and classmates in physical therapy. I think only about half of the girls were actually available. After a while I wasn't sure if this was for my benefit or my dad's (although I can't imagine his grand niece pimping out her girlfriends to a man old enough to be their grandfather. On our way back I told my dad if he pulls something like that again I'm leaving (to my horror he repeated what I said to relatives). [Filipinos are obsessed with relationships--on the PI version of Deal or No Deal hosted by the Chris Aquino, the daughter of the former president, the hostess during Q and A delves deep into the contestants' personal lives: Asked of men and women who either look too fay or too tomboyish for their gender: are you gay, and if so do you have a boy/girl friend (one contestant a butch watchperson, replied she had a "special" friend. Of one contestant who had nine children the hostess asked him if they were all by the same woman). Apparently Filipinos didn't inherit american's squeamishness at too much information.--Anyway after 3 weeks or so, probably because everyone was so busy preparing for the town Fiesta, they left me alone, and I couldn't help feeling like a lost cause.
*Otherwise I observed a life of convalescence, I slept in the same downstairs den as my parent's and their helper, so I was privy to my parent's late night screaming fits (which apparently happened frequently because everyone is so godamned blasse about it: my cousin's wife said "they fight Like cats and dogs, I guess that's how they show their love," she said half-jokingly.
posted by JGLuzifer at 8:49 PM
1 Comments:
oh man. the whole shopped around thing - you were like a fine piece of beef they were displaying. what did you talk about to those girls? And when I read the line about screaming fits, I thought it was your dad having night terrors - your parents arguing seemed more benign after that. Do they argue more than than you remember growing up?
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