lady bug

it is snobbishly fine and can be cheerily bouncy
suddenly it listens to no reason and then hangs limp

most days it is confident to face the bright of day
other days it hides shyly in the dark

it has to be tended as it grows sparsely
but without much thought it readies itself in the morning

most of the time it is quite a softie
in the next moment, however, it decides to be a toughie

it has a life of its own and sure gets its way
sometimes it cooperates unwittingly, to my delight

unconsciously i take it for granted,
then i take extra care when buying stuff for it

to my hair that's ever growing, ever changing
you'd taste your first cut in this place tomorrow

the last day of the year

an ode to the spring past

a maori congregation performed tribal songs praising God last sunday. it was a cold day but they wore their traditional costumes. their chants and antics moved me. i asked myself, "who am i?"

i use australian-made toiletries. i wear a shirt that's made in china. my boots are made in spain. i patronize a swiss-made watch. i drink japanese green tea and live for a monthly ramen meal. i love the italians for pasta and pizza. i hail the americans for french fries and potato chips.

i am pinoy and i am in sydney.

in 3 months, i represented different countries in asia: "have you heard of chang?", a product promoter asked me and without waiting for my answer, he looked at my face and exclaimed "of course you do, you're thai!". a friend of my boss came to the office the other day and asked, "where are you from? indonesia?" [i still wonder why people ask and not wait for answers.] then there's a tourist who requested to have her picture taken, and thanked me in mandarin afterwards. good thing i still remember "you're welcome" in mandarin. then there's this one time during a trip in hongkong when an officemate and i had difficulty getting our order of siomai dim sum across to the waiter only to find out that she was refusing to serve us pork dumplings thinking we were malaysians.

i am pinoy. tsinoy. filo. only globalised as one can possibly be.

i long to share filipino christmas songs to the community, but i can't sing. i speak fookien so poorly even my mother can't understand me. i speak english with an american accent as what the locals here say.

i am made in the philippines. i may not look it, or speak it, or eat it. but my smile is definitely it.

i am proud to be pinoy. i attribute the resiliency, the warmth, the sincerity, the kindness, that no-fuss and enduring attitude to having been made from there. [i am thinking out loud as i have been asking for a long time what sets the philippines apart?]

so what am i doing in a foreign country, you might ask. [i ask that too. so no need to apologize for it.] have i forsaken my motherland by coming here? ah, flight versus fight. i can always say that i earn dollars to fund education of children back home. or this or that. however, i don't think it really matters. what matters is knowing where i came from, continuing in growing and loving accordingly.

only time and choices will reveal who one is. and where God puts me, i'd be there. in the meantime, i don't think there is such a thing as forgetting my phillipines.