Inappropriate
Visiting the Philippines or living there, I get to see what seems not too normal or downright inappropriate. Here are a few of them:
…waiting in line to pay for groceries at SM (ShoeMart) Supermarket for up to an hour on weekends (not so unusual, depending on the time) and up to 5 hours during big holidays like Christmas or New Year’s Eve. You would think that the SM management would do something to improve this festering problem. I had to go to the Customer Service booth to get them to activate more cashiers and baggers. And this is on a Friday about 2 PM. Filipinos just take this abuse. WHY freakin’ WHY? I detest going to SM. If I can help it, I avoid it like the plague. More customers should complain. We should write to their management or the newspapers or voice our opinions about this problem on the radio. It is the only way we can call their attention. The squeaky wheel gets the oil, so to speak. And if you can, go buy somewhere else like Walter Mart Supermarket or Shop-Wise (I’m not in any way connected with any of these stores, mind you), until this problem is addressed. I’m glad they built Tri-Noma opposite SM North. Consumers usually win when there is competition.
…guys wearing ski caps and jacket in the hottest of seasons. What is even weirder is I do not see them sweat. If I wear them, I will be sweating like a pig and my head would be itching something fierce. Americans are probably laughing their ass off when they see these guys. I know what they are trying to achieve - to look cool, ironically, but those items would only achieve the opposite….Ang porma mo, pare! Ya, man!
…fat or obese girls/women who wear body-hugging apparel. Maybe you think that such an act is "having a backbone" or exercising your right to flaunt your bad shape (which is another story good for another day). Perhaps. But it is also my right to voice what I think of such a display of bodily fat. Girls, you look ridiculous, gross, and the sight of you hurts my eyes. This is nothing against fat women in general. I just think that there are ways to dress up without being scandalous.
…taxi passengers who do not see the need to close the door (even for safety reasons) after they get off the cab. The poor cabbie has to stop the taxi so he can run around his car to close the open door(s). Inconsiderate boobs!!! Should we, perhaps, force passengers to go to a taxi-riding training so people learn the proper cab-riding etiquette? C’mon! It’s not rocket science. I don’t get that!
…gay boys/guys who assume that one (the older dude) of the two guys eating or walking together, specially if one of the guys is young or good-looking, is gay. They assume the worse. These gayboys want company in their misery I guess. You see them (the gayboys) whispering to each other (then giggling) when a couple of guys are walking by together and seeming to have a lot of fun. It must be penis-envy. Coz they sure ain’t got one. Aren’t there any decent gay Pinoy boys out there? It’s a crying shame! Pinay lizzies behave so much better in public - they usually just show affection to each other without a care about what other people around them are up to. That’s the way to behave. Take a page from your female counterparts, girly men!
…gay guys who make a spectacle of themselves by being loud, obnoxious and wearing loud & outrageous or very feminine clothes.
…gay guys who patronize or hire callboys or pick up boys who are too young to be their nephews.
…Pinoys who try hard to speak English and think they sound "cool". I don’t know what they’re trying to prove - that they are superior???!! No one hurts my ears worse than them. If you need to speak the American way, learn it from me..hehe…or anyone who has lived in the US for years and is completely integrated into the American mainstream, not some OFWs or temporary workers who have lived in the US for only 5 years or less. I may commit grammatical atrocities when I write or speak, but rarely do I sound like someone who is alien to the English language with a heavy accent. I can switch from Tagalog, Tag-lish and American English with ease. Get to know me better, perhaps, and you will get to talk like a Yank. Atenistas, Bedans, UP studes, LaSallites & other studes from other schools sound just as awful when they speak in English, even when they appear on TV. Bad English professors? They try to imitate what they see on the screen (movies, computer) and do a pretty bad job at it. And you expect to work at a call center or be a CEO? UGHHHH!!!!
…Pinoys who do not respond back when you greet them with:
"Have a nice day!"
"Thanks for coming."
"How are you today?"
They do not even look at or acknowledge you. To me that is the height of rudeness. If I am your boss-to-be and I say any of the above to you, you better respond back with some semblance of intelligence or I will not hire your ass. Darn, that boils me.
…Pinoys who complain a lot about how bad the economy is, as if they know anything about the economy. I call them "clueless armchair quarterback" or experts in their own mind. Never mind the fact that when they were growing up (I’m referring to adult Pinoys) they did not totally apply themselves towards getting a good education. Were you at the pool hall or the moviehouse or at the mall or the park or a boyfriend’s/girlfriends house when you should be in school? Did you study hard and did not take going to school for granted? If you did, you would have a job by now. The president created 1 MILLION jobs due to her economic and fiscal policies. No other presidents before GMA have achieved that. So before you whine, get your facts straight. Or better still, look at yourself in the mirror. There is such a thing as "personal responsibility or personal accountability". When you want to blame someone, take a look in the mirror.
…bossy Pinoy bosses who think their underlings are their personal maids. It takes breeding to be magnanimous, respectful, considerate & classy. Pinoys under this category are usually social-climbing bitches and have low-class breeding. If you are one of them, show some class! One day what you do to others will come back to bite your ass. BTW, do you expect your employee (at a car delearship) to buy a prospective client coffee out of his own pocket? Talk about being cheap! And the poor chap had to do this to every client they have had in the past perhaps until they met me. The dealership now has their own coffee maker. I just hope I had something to do with it.
…no refund policy when you buy anything from any stores in the Philippines. I often ask myself why this is the standing policy. In the US, you can return any store- or online-bought merchandise as long as you have the receipt, no questions asked. This is abuse of the Filipino consumers and whining politicians should take care of business by creating legislations protecting consumers, instead of trying to impeach the president. In the past I had bought sub-standard products and I wanted to return them for a full refund but I was forced to exchange the item only for equal value or higher.
…there are no gift certificates being sold at any department stores in the Philippines. Why is that? Is that such a new concept totally alien to Filipinos?
…gift receipts are not issued when you buy a gift for someone, so the recipient has the option to return the merchandise for a different size or get another merchandise that he/she wants instead.
…male and female prostitution in malls and coffee houses. Is this becoz these are the places where gayboys and "pokpoks" hang out? Which gives me an idea for a t-shirt design (and they should sell these at malls & coffee houses). Emblazoned on the tshirt: Not for hire…or Not for pick up. Or…This bitch is not a pokpok. I also noticed when you are waiting for someone at a mall (Gateway, Ali Mall, Farmer’s Market, Harrison Plaze & others), some gay dude will try to start a conversation with you and eventually would try to pick you up. Or some pokpok would come up to you and offer you her menu of services. EWWWW! Those of you who hang out at coffee houses, like Starbucks, becoz you think they are the places to be seen, beware. People might typecast you as either a gay dude ISO a one-night stand, a low-class "pokpok" or a callboy looking for a client. If you’re just there for the coffee, I just like to let you know their coffee is over-priced and try to get it at Dunkin Donuts or 7-11 or some cheap convenience store.
…mall/store security guards inspecting bags of regular shoppers or frisking them for hidden weapons but not Americans or rich matronly ladies. When you see that happen, refuse to be inspected unless they inspect the rich matronly lady or the Yank in front of you. I did that and the security guards complied. Know your rights, people. The Philippines is your country and you should not be treated like second-class citizens, poor or not. The laws/store policies should apply evenly regardless of social status.
…Pinoys who think they know the meaning of the word "upscale". I know someone in one of the Yahoogroups who got mad at me for voicing my opinion about radio ratings, particularly those gotten by RX, the Monster Radio. She kept pointing out to me that RX is the number one upscale POP radio station in the country, according to ratings. What a spin! I guess another radio station can tout that they are the number one pop radio station in the country catering to 12 year-olds, or the number one most eclectic radio station for parapelegics. It is hard to put some sense into her head or to even ask her to accept reason since she obviously knows the word "upscale". Keep telling yourself that, girl. ;-))
…how so many Pinoys just about copy everything from other cultures (specially from America) instead of creating our own.
…how we, as a people, know very little about the lives of our forefathers to no fault of our own. Thanks to our Spanish conquerors, carriers of our spoken historical records, our rich oral traditions, were killed or persecuted one by one. The showing of our culture during that time were considered voodoo or work of the devil by them. Up to this time, we haven’t fully recovered our lost historical "libraries." According to Kampanya para sa Kamalayan sa Kasaysayan in its website, they claim that our ancestors were favorite trading partners of our fellow Asians, including Arabs, becoz of our well-known honesty & zeal as a people. Our forefathers’ honesty was so well known far and wide that the barter system operated upon the "honor system" where our trading partners would demand neither receipts nor detailed accounting of the transactions becoz they trusted the Filipinos. Present-day Pinoys may find it difficult to reconcile this honorable image of our ancestors with what we see of our people today. We still have to study a lot about our real past, specially about the thousands upon thousands of years that our ancestors lived in peace & harmony among themselves & with their neighbors. We need that knowledge to keep us from amplifying the insults heaped upon us and negative traits our people have developed throughout the years.
Nowadays, you will meet Pinoys who will cheat or scam you, pick your pocket, rob you blind, from all walks of life. From the balut vendors, or the fish vendors you patronize everytime you go to the open market, to the job recruiters charging you for services not yet rendered & then running away with your money, to the bribe-taking government employee sitting behind the desk, to the rich enterpreneurs selling you inferior products or services. I mean what happened to us? When I do an honest deed in the US, I make sure that the Americans know that I am Pinoy so they know that there are still some honest Pinoys out there that they don’t hear about. Let’s bring back the "honor system," people!
…how so many of our people are so hung up on status symbols. You see that syndrome when they buy electronic gadgets and high-ticket items like cars and clothes. Some people really don’t need to buy a P28-grand cellphone but they do to keep up with the Joneses. I used to go to an upscale cyber cafe where people would just go there to show off their laptops. They look at each other to see who can outdo who. That game is so tired, superficial and so 10 years ago. Or maybe I’m just jealous. Whatever happened to the concept of "living within your means." The best things in life, after all, are free.
…the national media’s pre-occupation on politics and it’s single-sided view against PGMA. I have yet to read ANYTHING that is highly critical of the opposition. And what’s worse, when the Opposition says anything irresponsible, erroneous, inaccurate, or unsupported, and outright lies, the media doesn’t take them to task and instead cuddles them. That reminds me, I need the services of a TV tech to remove ABS-CBN from our TV set. By the way, in a recent media conference attended to by media people from Asia and around the world, Singapore criticized our news media for its narrow-mindedness. SURPRISE! In Singapore, news about killings, and other violent crimes, and other negative news items are not allowed to be published. The result, Singapore has a very disciplined (thanks to their caning & other laws) population with one of the lowest crime rates in the world, has no unemployment, no homelessness, has a vibrant and thriving economy (considered First World), and considered one of the cleanest countries in the world. Also, none of the political squabblings or wranglings as we know them here persist as their politicians are more concerned with how to keep the country’s economy moving forward. If I may say so, it also has some form of benevolent dictatorship system. Perhaps that’s what we need. The Philippines, under PGMA, is studying their system. The first step should be is to make it mandatory for Senators and Congressmen to wear a gag and blinders while they are in that august House. Using a whip would be a nice touch really but perhaps not necessary. But still….
…the unabashed use of
sugar and oil. Ever get sick of going to any food courts? Besides
seeing the same recipes in almost every food stalls, or eating
semi-spoiled food, or food repeatedly reheated again and again, I
cannot, for the life of me, like foods swimming in oil or fat and/or in
which sugar is used extensively or unnecessarily. An example of such a
gastronomical
abomination is spaghetti, Filipino style (in sweet tomato sauce). Sweet
pasta sauce? YUCK! Sometimes I get confused whether to
treat the pasta dish as dessert or as a meal entree. The real Italian
sauce is not sweet. Not even the commercial brands like Prego. Here,
the store-bought brands are almost all sweetened. It should be tangy,
sour, and tomato-ey, if nothing
else. Is it any wonder why so many Filipinos are diabetic or have high
blood pressure even though they are skinny?
I will add more to this list later.
