I’m Not Filipino, But I Am
A blunt encounter with oneself can be a loaded experience, one with beautiful moments of clarity and clouded questions of purpose. In this piece, Mae Verano, 2015 Kaya Fellow*, shares her journey of self-discovery two weeks into this past summer’s fellowship.
She asks a fundamental question: How do you balance individual growth with collective progress? Put yourself in her shoes and challenge yourself to go deep.
By Mae Verano
On our first weekend together, our fellowship cohort visited a community of the Aeta, the oldest indigenous community in the Philippines, in the mountains of Dinalupihan. One of the friends we made was Kikay, an Aeta woman who graduated from university and became a teacher in her own community. Despite language barriers, we were able to have an entire conversation on the importance of integrating one’s culture and identity into education and personal development. During that conversation, she said something that will become the foundation of my next six weeks:
“Before you can go where you want to go, you must return to where you come from.”
For some, this fellowship has become an opportunity to return home and see the Philippines through a critical lens. Many of us fellows are Fil-Ams returning to the Philippines for the first time after many years of living in the States. These past two weeks have been one long existential crisis, and hidden between all of our new insights and shared experiences are the questions at the root of our collective identity. Questions that both fracture us apart as youth of the diaspora, and that reconnect us as Filipinos.
These past two weeks have been one long existential crisis; and hidden between all of our new insights and shared experiences are the questions at the root of our collective identity.
For myself personally, my thoughts are running rampant after this past weekend. On Friday, all of the fellows had the opportunity to sit down with Dean Tony La Viña of the Ateneo School of Government to have a crash course in Philippine History. We started with pre-Spanish colonization, went on to discuss Rizal and Bonifacio, and continued through Marcos and Aquino until we were discussing political candidates in the upcoming elections. The next day, a few of us had the chance to meet students from the Ateneo de Manila and talk about the differences between Filipino and Fil-Am college students. We then ended our second week at a 4th of July event for U.S. alumni.
After a marathon of a weekend, I am forced to come to terms with how my personal diaspora story has shaped (read as warped) my own perspective of the Philippines. The people I talk to, what we talk about, and even what language I’m speaking in, all stem from the fact that I am a Filipino-American experiencing the Philippines from an American perspective.
I am a Filipino-American experiencing the Philippines from an American perspective.
For example, in American history textbooks, the Philippines is usually only mentioned in a short paragraph or two. The conversation about the U.S.-Philippines relationship is limited solely to the fact that there was a Philippine-American War and that U.S. soldiers were part of the Bataan Death March under Japanese occupation during WWII. There is no mention about the American war tactics used on Filipinos, such as the water cure to gather information, or how thousands of Filipinos died alongside the few hundred Americans in Bataan. There is no talk about the devastation that was Manila during World War II, or the fact that American naval bases remained in Subic Bay until 1992, 46 years after the Philippines had gained independence from the United States.
These are all things I just recently learned during this fellowship; but for the students from Ateneo, this is just basic Philippine history. Lia, one of the students from Ateneo, was surprised, even shocked, to find out how little Filipino-Americans know about a history that they are born out of. I want to use this time to learn about myself and learn the history my parents never taught me, but I wonder:
How can I make this experience one where I’m not just taking for my own personal growth, but I’m also giving back in a non-patronizing way?
So, what is my place in all of this? As I stood in the middle of a room full of U.S. alumni on the 4th of July, I wondered what was I celebrating: American Independence Day or Philippine Republic Day? Is it possible to celebrate both? My skin and my face may say I’m Filipino, but even in a sea of people that look just like me, I know that I am still a foreigner. When Kikay said “you must return to where you come from,” where is that place for Filipino-Americans? Does that place even exist?
My skin and my face may say I’m Filipino, but even in a sea of people that look just like me, I know that I am still a foreigner.
As I move forward with this fellowship, I want to be critical about my own identity-building and how it relates to the rest of my time here. Too often, we see pictures of college students on immersion trips, getting a small glimpse of a different life, and using those few weeks as this “coming-of-age” experience that lead to non-profit work that may or may not be sustainable. They perform service, then pick up and leave the country having formed “life-changing” memories. As every day passes, I question, am I like one of those students? Is it different because this is my parent’s home and the people here look like me? Does the fact that I’m Filipino and that this experience is in the Philippines really make a difference?
This fellowship has already been and will continue to be a formative experience in relation to my Filipino identity. There is no doubt about that. In just two weeks, I have already learned more Filipino history and Tagalog than I have in my 19 years of existing. I have been challenged and pushed out of my comfort zone more times than I can count, and my existential crises never end.
But at the same time, my presence in this country is one born out of privilege. My family was able to immigrate to California and build a good life. I have lived in the United States my entire life and my education at Brown University was the reason I was able to find Kaya Collaborative in the first place. I grapple with this idea of give-and-take each day, wondering if I’m taking too much time for my personal growth and if I’m giving back in a way that is responsible.
But at the same time, my presence in this country is one born out of privilege.
At end of the day, I joined Kaya Co. for its passion to promote sustainable, community-driven change in the Philippines. All the identity formation and self-discovery are just perks that have come along the way. No matter how much I learn about myself in the process, I have to remember that my purpose here is to support the Filipino people, a community I don’t know I can consider myself a part of.
*The 2016 Kaya Co. Fellowship Application is now live! Learn more and apply at http://kayaco.org/fellowship.
Mae Verano, a junior at Brown University, seeks to apply a critical lens into her community work. She interned for HABI Education Lab as part of her fellowship, where she cultivated design thinking tools to foster mindful explorations into the intersection of diaspora and social impact.
Originally published at kayaco.org on July 7, 2015.
