Filipino Born, American Raised

I moved to the U.S. when I was 11.

Although that seems very young, I vividly remember most of my childhood. Mornings were spent climbing trees and eating fresh starfruit for breakfast. Dinner was freshly caught by fishers that morning and bought by our nanny to be served later that night.

As a child, the main theme of my culture was always respect. My little sister couldn’t call me by my first name as it was disrespectful. She had to call me Kuya, the honorary title for big brothers.

When entering a home, shoes were removed and the elderly of the household had to bless you with a ritual known as the “Mano-Po.”

When saying yes to someone of equal standing, you would say “oo.” Yet When saying yes to a person of greater respect, “opo” must be used.

When I moved to the States, respect seemed like a questionable issue. Children would just run into their neighbors’ homes without permission. Kids referred to adults by their first name and failed to use honorifics. Southerners tended to have a more respectful nature than Northerners but not to the extent of Filipinos.

As I aged, more and more cultural differences were aroused. My mom would remind that although I was raised American, I should never forget my birth home and my cultural identity. After nearly 10 years, I visited the Philippines this past summer for the first time since immigrating. That’s when I realized how Americanized I had become.

Air conditioning was limited and finicky. The internet was hardly usable. Streets were overly crowded and covered in litter. As a child, these issues didn’t matter because I lived in my own bubble of imagination. As a young adult, this was concerning. Not because it was out of my comfort zone but because in the 10 years, not much had changed. The rest of the world was globalizing at a rate faster than the Philippines was.

I had also realized that my American identity had overpowered my Filipino roots. My family found my sister and I to be more honest, and opinionated. We questioned everything from why pollution was rampant to why we were given weird looks. It was because as an American, we were more bold in our outlook.

I came to grasp that my two identities should not be polarizing, but should be complementary. I needed to keep my American experiences and apply my outspokenness to my respect for Filipino culture. Although, I am not sure entirely what the full amalgamation of my backgrounds would look like, I know that I want to use this duality to bring environmental and societal changes to my home country.

#brainstorming #intheoffice