Dear Mrs Arroyo: An open letter on our wacko maids

Thank you very much, Mrs Arroyo, for the heads up on all those loco maids the Philippines has been sending out all these years and for your newfound zeal to rid the world of them and your assurance that as long as presidential blood runs in your veins, you will never again let any luka-luka and baliw work for a God-fearing household in the First World.

Thank you, indeed, for making the world a safer place. Now, everyone can sleep soundly knowing that when they have a Filipino maid in their employ, they can work her to death without paying her a whiff, beat her to a pulp, molest her and basically strip her of her humanity and treat her worse than they would a stray dog, and she’d still come through the day singing, smiling and shouting, “Mabuhay, y’all!”

I mean, aren’t you, Mrs Arroyo, setting up a Committee for the Systematic Weeding Out of Wacko Maids? Man, you guys do not disappoint.

Can I just make one suggestion here? Why not take it to the next level? Maybe you can work out some kind of certification or classification of our maids and get this approved by the International Organisation of Standardisation. Then you’ll have something like – Super Inday: ISO 9000-certified.

Now, that’s quality assurance for you. I can almost hear it: Oh, look, hon, a Filipino maid. Let’s get one. This one has a seal of sanity on her.

Or, maybe we in the media are just not getting it right – as you and your spritely spokescreatures like to say, we’re probably just missing the context and blowing this thing out of proportion.

But I swear this guy from the foreign office, Esteban Conejos, has been clear in saying there is a need to make psychiatric testing mandatory for all domestic helpers leaving for jobs abroad. And he has some numbers to back him up. He says seven out of 10 Filipino maids on death row in the Middle East have had a history of mental illness. Man, seven wackos out of 10! Seventy freaking per cent!

I get it where Mr Conjeos is coming from. He believes he can get the numbers down by screening those thousands of maids leaving the Philippines each month and taking out the loonies before they get a chance to board a plane and things get really out of hand and they snap at the wrong place at the wrong time. He believes only the strong in mind and body gets to leave, so we’d stop getting all that shit about a Filipino maid slitting the throat of dirty ol’ Grampa who’s been raping her repeatedly for months.

Mr Conejos gets it. He feels our pain.

Here’s a guy, with the mental fortitude he thinks all maids must possess, who probably won’t mind being hit with a rolling pin on his head, back and calf every day and being kicked senseless while he sleeps on a dog bed.

Here’s a guy who’ll be perfectly all right feeding on three-day-old food, while the family dog gets chicken nuggets and fresh fruits. Heck, chain him to a kitchen sink or hit him with a water bottle on the mouth. Just mind over matter, right, Mr Conejos?

What’ll he do if he gets fed up? Why, the sane thing to do – and he is a sane man – is to just run off to the embassy and get a free ticket back home. Forget about filing a criminal or civil complaint. Forget about suing the motherfuckers. Forget about everything and just move on. Mind over matter.

So, hats off to you, Mr Conejos. You’re the dawg, man!

One thing I don’t get, though, is if we begin certifying our maids as 100 per cent sane, then what’ll happen to that uber-effective defence our embassies always use to get pardons for those on death row: that, oops, they just “lost it” when they did the deed?

But then, maybe it’s for the best.

So, come on guys, stop badgering the government with these things and advocacies that just get in the way of the little soirees and tete-a-tetes of its diplomatic missions. Setting up support services that will empower maids to fight for their rights? Now, that’s just asking too much.

Yours until Obama becomes president,

Pininggapura

PS –

Oh, our hats off to you, Mrs Arroyo and Mr Conejos, for the image boost you’ve given OFWs like me, Ares, Muloy and The Talented Mr ManF. Now, maybe my toxic boss will start going easy on me if I stop bathing and start murmuring something like “Crispin? Basilio?” while in the office. She may start thinking: Wait a minute, this may be a loco Filipino I have here. I’d better stay out of his way and leave him be. This guy may be capable of nasty things that’ll make Hannibal Lecter look like Bambie.

Kung bakit ako nangibang-bayan

Isinulat ko ito bago ako nagkaroon ng pagkakataong makapag-trabaho sa Singapore. Foreshadowing. Inaamin ko, sumuko na din ako.

PARA sa isang motoristang naipit sa trapiko, nakakairita naman talaga ang makakita ng isang convoy ng mga pribadong sasakyan na, sa tulong ng ilang police escorts, ay nagsusumiksik at nambabraso ng iba pang mga sasakyan gayong napakasikip na nga ng kalsada.

Higit nga bang mahalaga ang oras ng kung sino mang mga Ponsyo Pilatong ito kung ihahambing sa panahon nating mga hoi polloi?

Naalala ko tuloy ang essay ng nobelistang si F. Sionil Jose, ang Bakit Mahirap Tayong Mga Pilipino? Ayon sa kanya, mahirap tayo dahil mahirap tayo. Nasa kultura natin ang kahirapan. Bukod sa karamihan sa ati’y tamad, masyado rin tayong mahangin.

Kung susuriin natin, ang ugat ng ating katamaran at kayabangan ay ang paniniwala natin na, sa labas ng pamilya, hindi na natin sagutin ang ibang tao, lalo pa ang sarili nating bansa. Kanya-kanya – iyan ang pilosopiya ng karamihan sa atin. Madalas, wala tayong pakialam kahit sino pa ang masagasaan; ang mahalaga’y nakalamang tayo, nakaungos tayo.

Kaya naman bigyan mo lamang ng isang medyo mataas na katungkulan sa gobyerno o kaya’y kaunting kayamanan ang isang Pilipino at ang isa sa mga una nitong gagawin ay magdawit ng ilang police escorts at magparada sa kalye at ipagsigawan sa ibang tao na, “Hoy, mga peon, importante ako!”

***

Minsan, sa sobrang pagkainis, binuntutan ko ang isang convoy ng mga sasakyan na papuntang Greenhills sa kahabaan ng Ortigas Ave.

Wala naman silang police escort, pero lahat ng mga pawang naglalakihang sasakyan na nasa convoy ay may mga wang-wang na ginagamit ng mga ito upang harangin, giliran at singitan ang iba pang mga sasakyan.

Kumanan sila sa Connecticut, pumasok sa Greenhills at tumigil sa pangunang entrada ng shopping mall. Gaya ng inaasahan ko, isa na namang langaw na mataas ang lipad ang nanggulang ng kanyang kapwa. Ang lulan ng pinakamagarang sasakyan sa convoy ay isang kilalang beautician na napagalaman ko ay may beauty salon sa Greenhills. Dadalawin lamang pala niya ang kanyang negosyo.

***

Bakit nga ba tayo ganito?

Ang madalas na hatol naming mga magkakabarkada habang nasa malalim na impluwensya ni San Miguel ay dahil marahil sa walang yugto sa ating kasaysayan na tayo’y naging isang tunay na bansa na hinulma ng ilang taong pakikibaka para sa tunay na kalayaan.

Malabnaw ang ating pagka-Pilipino kaya marami sa atin ang wala talagang malasakit sa sarili nating bansa. Pamilya, oo. Bansa, medyo.

Madalas, mas nanaiisin pa nating ma-asimila na lamang ng ibang bansa.

Sa loob ng tatlong taon, naging isang bayan ng mga migrante ang Pilipinas. Ayon sa estatistika mula sa gobyerno, kasalukuyang nakakalat sa kulang-kulang 192 bansa at teritoryo ang mahigit 7.76 milyong Pilipino. Mahigit 2.87 milyon ang tuluyang naninirahan na sa labas ng Pilipinas at sumasaludo sa ibang bandila.

Isa sa bawat limang Pilipino naman na nandito sa Pilipinas ang nais nang magalsa-balutan. Ang nakakabahala pa dito ay kulang-kulang kalahati sa mga batang ang edad ay 10 hanggang 12 ay nagnanais na sa ibang bansa na lamang makapagtrabaho.

Hindi ko sila masisisi. Tuwing makakita ako ng isang convoy ng mga pribadong sasakyan, hindi ko mapigilang maisip na lumayag na rin at manirahan sa isang bansa na kung saan ang tunog ng isang sirena ay nangangahulugan ng isang totoong emerhensiya.

Housemates from hell

August last year was a particularly bad time to be looking for a flat in Singapore. Property prices were going through the roof and, with them, rents. A four-room flat that would’ve cost just S$900 a month in rent a few months back was already going for $1,400.

Still, I was lucky. I went to Singapore with a “live-in” partner in tow – the talented Mr ManF. The company hired us at about the same time and gave us a relocation allowance of S$10,000 each. Between us, we had S$20,000 to spend on finding a flat, furnishing it and generally finding a place to park our assess in after a hard day at the office.

So, we wound up getting a pretty decent five-room flat for $1,700 a month in Woodlands.

The place is just 45 minutes from the office by train, 30 minutes by cab, and five minutes to the nearest MRT station. There’s a small mall across the street that has everything in it: a wet market, a grocery, two 24-hour convenience stores, ATMs, a 24-hour payment centre, two coffeeshops, two salons, an optical shop and a dental office.

Our unit is on the 11th floor and has an unobstructed view of the Seletar expressway. The owners, a retired couple moving to Australia, left most of their furniture with us: sofas, a dining set, a 29-inch TV, air-conditioners, beds and working tables for each of the three rooms, a heavy-duty washing machine and dryer, a stainless steel ref with a big freezer and drapes for the windows. (Pity, the guy took with him his glass-encased scale model of the battleship Yamato; that would’ve have made a really cool divider.)

It was a great deal, we thought. When we began telling people where we lived, though, we got something like this:

“What?” they’d blurt out with the look of incredulity you’d normally see in someone talking to a person who just tore to pieces a winning lottery ticket. “Woodlands? Why so far?”

For someone who’d lived through Manila’s monstrous traffic jams and apocalyptic floods, 45 minutes to anywhere is a walk in the park. Here on the other hand, 45 minutes to anywhere may as well be an eternity. It’s like living in Fairview, Quezon City and working in Amadeo, Cavite.

So, since most of our friends are living on the other side of the island, they’ve been avoiding our place like we had the bubonic plague. We’ve hosted at least two parties where only one or two of the people we invited showed up, even with promises of a lavish feast of adobo, nilagang baka, and a hefty mix of diced manggang hilaw, bagoong, sibuyas and kaunting sili.

Still, I really can’t complain. It could’ve been worse. I get along well with my "mate", although he likes walking around the flat wearing only his skimpy shorts with those preposterous Spongebob Squarepants and Superman prints.

A number of Pinoys working here, on the other hand, have to live with "housemates from hell". These are creatures that spring out naturally from an arrangement inherent in having to share space with someone you really don’t know well but have to get along with. Kailangang makisama.

The arrangement is usually cordial at the beginning. Then, some misunderstandings occur over mundane things like an uncollected tissue paper lying on the floor. These little things pile up as each day goes by into huge mounds of discontent until all those pent-up emotions explode into a full-blown conflict that can only be resolved if one side yields the territory.

It starts out usually as a gentle reminder:

"Uy, mare, paki-tanggal naman ang mga nilabhan mo sa washing machine bago ka lumabas ng bahay. Salamat, ha. Ingat."

After a month and a half, though, it escalates into something like this:

"Eh, letse naman! Tatlong araw nang naka-tengga ang mga damit mo sa washing machine, eh. Hindi na tuloy ako makapaglaba. Ilang beses na kitang sinabihan. Lumayas ka na nga dito at maghanap ng mga kasama na kasing burara mo!

Here’s a list I grabbed from www.pinoysg.com of a few petty things that normally lead to an i'll-never-again-talk-to-you-til-the-day-I-die feud among Pinoy housemates here:

* Strands of black, curly hair gathering on bathroom floors – and even on kitchen sinks – that later manifests itself into a furry, gooey creature;

* Locking oneself up inside the toilet for an eternity and not giving way even when a housemate is clearly in a bowel-busting, poise-threatening predicament;

* “Paranormal” housemates straight from The Sixth Sense who keep insisting they see dead people;

* Swiping someone else’s food from the fridge without asking the person who toiled through the night, investing blood, sweat and tears into his special delicacy of scrambled eggs and bacon;

* Leaving the lights and heater on through the night;

* Leaving the doors open;

* Waiting for the garbage to pile up, hoping perhaps Oscar the Grouch would pop out of it suddenly to spew some expletives; and,

* Using groceries and supplies like they were manna from heaven and not bothering to restock them.

I, of course, realise that these occur not exclusively here. We see these things happening among people who share a dorm in a university or a bedspace in some apartment in Sta. Mesa. The big difference, though, is that for most OFWs like us, it's rarely an option to just pack up our bags and head home to mummy and crash in our old rooms while we find a more suitable place. For most us, it's one more hell we'll just have to live through.

http://pininggapura.wordpress.com/
http://supermouseandtheroborats.blogspot.com/
pininggapura@gmail.com