The Full Filipino

The Full Filipino

It started at around 4:00am, an apprentice rooster (tandang) tries to outdo his rivals by clapping his wings - at least an hour before dawn – preparatory to stretching his scrawny neck as if for the chopping block before delivering a raucous, though strangled cry. A veteran follows suit, but as if to put the record straight, delivers a powerful and practised crow. Which brings forth the first dog, not to outdone, yapping with demented fervour about nothing in particular before a grumble from inside the house silences its vapid efforts.

The first motorcycles soon explode into life, throttling down the national road, helmetless riders shivering in the predawn chill, despite full jeans, jacket and crikey – even shoes! Tricycles ply their trade among housewives heading for the marketplace (palengke) to buy fresh produce for the daily cooking (many houses have no fridge). The tricycle is 100% draughthorse. The average 125 or 150cc machine screams its heart out weaving in and out of pedestrians, bicycles, motorcycles, trucks, buses and the occasional car.  Its load could be anything from a single occupant to five or six school children, half a dozen 50kg sacks of rice or an entire family with the weekly supermarket shopping.

So it wasn’t out of place for a neighbour to be knocking at 6:30am (isn’t everyone up by 5:00?) to retrieve umbrellas very thoughtfully provided the previous evening out of consideration of our needs. Fortunately I was up, showered and groomed for the day though shirtless I realized upon reaching the gate.

A shudder of recognition rattles through my body as I momentarily reflect upon legions of brazen, beer-gutted and shirtless white men strutting about every Philippine tourist resort, their efforts to improve a suntan rewarded by pink and reddish flesh spilling over their sweaty shorts. Perhaps a trilby cheerfully perched high on the balding pate – a harking back to the days of yore or another trophy, like the beautiful young Filipinas who swallow their principles, to attend the carnal appetites of greying white males? Cathy cheerfully collected umbrellas to counter the gentle morning rain.

The family were scattered throughout the house in great disarray. Heather luxuriously stretched out on the lounge-room floor while the girls are nestled top-to-tail on a single mattress in an adjoining room. The house is cool and airy with plenty of natural light, viewpoints and ventilation. Although addressing the laneway, it simultaneously faces one side and the rear with a large, high-roofed open area accessed through double doors from the dining and entertainment rooms. Upstairs and overlooking the laneway, timber windows glazed with fine shell-work have been open overnight, while rear and side-facing louver windows complete the cross ventilation design.

Only the heat and the morning cry, ‘Tao, tao!’ (Soya drink vendor) remind you that this is the Philippines rather than Sydney inner city ultra-chic (their place is sooo minimal!). Unless of course you linger at the shell windows where looking down and to the left of the house, glistening Filipinos clad in shorts or dresses unselfconsciously bath/shower under a constant flow from a deep spring or chatter happily as householders and washing ladies conduct their sudsy business.

Time for a quick shop before breakfast, but the pandesal have almost sold out (I buy the last four pieces). I return to find the family yawning sleepily, stretching or canoodling. What’s for breakfast? This morning the girls are eating left-over spaghetti with sweet bread rolls (pandesal) while the adults scoff several monggo (pastries stuffed with pork) washed down with three-in-one (coffee, milk-powder and sugar). A few bananas finish the meal.

Normally we’d then proceed to our school-work (magaaral) but this morning there’s a problem – actually about a thousand problems - in the form of kuto (headlice and nits). Dad’s imminently practical solution to ’have it off/end of problem’ is countered by mum’s suggestion to find some kuto experts to remove them. Dad is highly sceptical and who would argue? Beneath the magnifier the situation resembles a fertile portion of the Hanging Gardens of Babylon - nits clustered like ripe grapes - festooning the hair with something in excess of a thousand eggs. ‘Netty’s hair has been populated by an entire barangay (town) of kuto’, quips Cathy shaking her head. However, kuto experts are duely summoned along with a manicurist for good measure.

Cathy has come to cook lugaw (a delicious rice dish cooked with chicken, onion, garlic, ginger, spices and glutinous rice). As we begin the delousing task, the first 20-odd adult lice tumble to the floor. ‘What do we do with them mum?’ Mhiki innocently asks. ‘Kill them, kill them all – crush them!’ comes the reply between gritted teeth. I have a fleeting vision of a Nazi general screaming orders to an assembly of startled officers as the realization that Soviet forces have managed to encircle Stalingrad dawns). Nep is quietly amused and mischievously suggests that millions rather than thousands, might be the order of the day. As the body count rises, the enormity of the task becomes clear. Soon there are over 60 twitching carcasses. Ants arrive to begin disassembling body parts to cart across the tiles for later storage and consumption. Nothing gets wasted in the Philippines.

After Cathy has conducted a lesson on the finer points of lugaw preparation and leaves there’s a soft knock at the door. Heather ushers in a lady with a small handbag. Mistaking her for the kuto queen, she begins to display regiments of nits and the morning’s massacre of moaning lice. Unperturbed, our visitor opens her bag to reveal nail trimmers and polishes of various shades and hues – it’s the manicurist!  Who ever needs to leave the house to be a tourist in the Philippines?

Mhiki’s the first customer, receiving a ‘Hello Kitty’ design in pink, white, yellow and black. Cathy arrives back and wonders why the nit-pickers haven’t arrived. It transpires that they are having a nap, after a full morning of cooking, washing and cleaning at their homes. Cathy rouses them from their rest to attend the house of Tita Aida and the Australian tourists. All three arrive, one lady apologising laughingly that she’s forgotten her teeth. The two ladies set to work –their eyes widen as they examine battalions of itlong ng kuto (nits) adorning Netty’s hair.

Fortunately Heather has prepared the groundwork under instruction from Cathy - first wash out the baby oil used this morning with shampoo, rinse, then apply nit shampoo and leave for ten minutes. Like many consumables, the chemical cocktail is a veritable alphabet of frightening substances best handled with lead gauntlets and a disposable suit, so it’s no surprise that the headlice are reduced to gaggle of gibbering idiots. At this point many stagger drunkenly about in a chemically induced stupor like New Years eve revellers at sunrise on Bondi Beach. Easy pickings for the hawkish predations of the kuto ladies, who disdainfully dispatch the wretched survivors and even now are managing to remove two to three nits at a time.  Hatchlings are swept up in the carnage, as Netty’s t-shirt becomes a graveyard of crushed eggs and dismembered bodies. Stalingrad 1945.

At this point dad enters the room to find Netty attended like some middle-eastern princess. Cathy has joined the fray as the ladies fondle her hair, the manicurist deftly cleans, trims, buffs, and prepares Netty’s nails for a sunflower design in maroon, yellow and white. So this is what comes of ignoring your parents’ advice it seems. 

We’d sternly instructed her to keep her hair tied back, to avoid catching nits while visiting a group home where their presence is as assured as the sunrise. Needles to say the opportunity to enjoy the attentions of a bevy of boy admirers, proved more attractive than boring old parent talk and consequently her hair had trawled the territory for nits. Fortunately her attitude is contrite as dad asks her to recite from memory a passage from Proverbs 1:8:

 ‘Listen my child to your father’s instruction and do not forsake your mothers teaching. They will become a garland to grace your head and a chain to adorn your neck.’ Better that than a garland of headlice comments dad, heading away from the toilette of Nefertiti, to attend to the washing-up.

Heather has a plain golden-orange lacquer applied, after her nails have been adeptly fashioned - cuticles trimmed and the hard skin adjoining the nail removed to perfection. Even dad has his first sally into the feminine mystique, receiving the full nail treatment plan/hold the polish. The manicurist has repeatedly painted around each nail with a pink antiseptic-come-setting compound. This later raises the eyebrows of several conservative gents as dad ventures forth to procure more load for our pay-as-you-go internet gadget. A pair of pink fluffy slippers outside the local RSL being the Aussie equivalent.

At this juncture, Heather exits for the palenke with Mhickles in tow, leaving dad to supervise the mopping-up operation and to start to record the day’s events. Come six, it’s time to attend the evening’s festive meal at the home of Nep, Cathy and Bel. In the short stroll to house the contrast to the Australian street scene at 6:00 pm is stark. Rather than cloistered in their houses, glued to the televisual tedium, Filipinos are on the street, playing, chatting, strolling (like passegatta in any provincial Italian town) – forgetting their workaday troubles and cares. A few children getting stroppy before hapunan (dinner) are brought swiftly into line and the game continues.

Nep is squatting at a barbeque grilling marinated chicken, pork and hot-dogs while the finishing touches are applied to pork dumplings and stuffed bangus (milkfish). A rooster, having managed to tie himself to the tree with his own leg-rope looks confusedly about – perhaps wondering if the white meat is family. Cheesy hot-dogs, dim-sims, two varieties of Lumpia (one stuffed with green chillies) Filipino salad (cucumber, tomato, tofu, mango and salted egg), and pandesal joins Heather’s contribution of a traditional salad with dressing. Bananas, rice and soft drinks complete the banquet. As the children are served, they quickly disappear towards the entertainment room, while the adults begin to sample the delicious offerings. Conversation turns toward the differences between Australia and the Philippines.  Yes, we also have corruption in our country, but (Alan Bond aside) our corrupt businessmen or government officials are generally stripped of their assets, gaoled and publicly humiliated (Bond went to gaol, but had his assets hidden from view – bringing them out years later to give his daughter a multi-million dollar wedding).

Corruption in the Philippines is of a completely different order. The late President Ferdinand Marcos, holds a place in the Guiness Book of Records for the largest theft in history. The fabled Marcos wealth reportedly consists of billions of dollars and tons of gold bullion deposited in as many as 51 bank accounts in Switzerland. Government lawyers claimed that Marcos had used dummy foundations to hoard his wealth. Former First Lady Imelda Marcos has 800,000 ounces of gold in unfrozen accounts in Switzerland. Imelda Marcos is currently a serving Senator in the Republic of the Philippines and has reinstated a host of her cronies. Tragic.

Walking home the air is a comfortable temperature. Life in the street continues unabated, though the population has shifted, as children are replaced by an older generation relaxing, socializing, eating street food. Some young men are playing instruments (an acoustic guitar and an improvised drum-kit) and singing. Much later lying awake there’s still action outside, though it’s starting to wind-up. Not surprising, as it all starts again in about 5 hours…

                      From left Mhiki, Kuto lady #1, Netty (aka Nefertiti), Kuto lady #2, Cathy and Manicurist (back to camera).