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by Richard Tenaza
Stockton FANHS has been in the limelight of late, and people have been congratulating ME for YOUR accomplishments. I guess it's a president's job to take the glory for good things that others do, and I must say that I have enjoyed it thoroughly. Problem is, I also feel guilty every time such praise is heaped upon me.
While I've been parading about as the presidential peacock, others in our ranks have taken charge of their tasks and moved us forward. Moved us forward in the footsteps of Frank Acoba, Cecil Bonzo, and, in some cases, themselves. Moved us forward in directions that were inexorably set before I had ever even heard of FANHS. To each of them, and to every other member of Stockton FANHS, I hereby express my gratitude and my admiration for your contributions. Thank you.
Our deepest thanks go to Tino and Lois Enebrad for opening their home for our December chapter meeting!
by Richard Tenaza
HARDSHIP, UNDERSTANDING, AND OUR PINOY MUSEUM
National FANHS recently approved a concept proposal from Stockton FANHS to develop a "National Pinoy Museum and Cultural Center" in Stockton. One function of the proposed museum will be to provide educational experiences that will help to unify the Filipino American community by altering the ways we perceive and behave towards ourselves, one another, and the world.
Take the concept of hardship, for example. Every generation of Filipino Americans has its own conception of hardship. Mine was largely determined by my being a member of the "Bridge Generation." We of the Bridge Generation tend to exalt our parents' generations for surviving the poverty, racism, exclusion, and exploitation they encountered after coming to America in the 1920s and 30s or earlier. Most of us hold them in awe, wondering how they gained the strength to survive, to raise children, and even to inspire and support those children to acquire higher education and succeed in modern America. The hardships we may have suffered seem small in comparison to those of our elders.
But not all Pinoys agree with us. Some believe that those earlier immigrants did not have it any harder than the post-1965 immigrants. For instance, not long ago I overheard one 70ish, university educated Pinoy who came to the US in the 1960s saying: "Damn it, I'm tired of hearing about how hard it was for those so-called Manongs and Manangs. It was hard for me too, maybe even harder than for them." A professional in the Philippines, he had had to turn to blue collar work to earn a living in California.
On another occasion a few years ago I heard a 19-year old Pinoy university student make a statement about his prosperous, Philippine-educated, physician parents which jolted me into modern Filipino America. "I admire my parents so much," he said, "for the way they struggled and overcame racism to get their licenses to practice medicine in America...I just can't imagine the hardships they suffered through."
I almost wept in frustration at the student's statement. I could not understand the "hardships" of his parents and I was sure that he and his parents could not appreciate the hardships and frustrations of my father and other Pinoy farm workers who came here in the 20s and 30s. But does it have to be that way?
The anecdotes I've just related illustrate how each of us interprets the world the only way we can, that is, through our own experiences. We can't experience everything firsthand, but we can broaden our experiences-and thereby our way of seeing the world and understanding one another-vicariously. The collections, exhibits, educational programs, and cultural activities of our future museum will provide access to vicarious experiences that will help other Americans understand Filipino Americans, and help Filipino Americans to understand one another-and themselves.
Don't wait for the museum. Create your own opportunities to learn history and personal experiences from one another, American born from Philippine born, Philippine born from American born, young from old, old from young. Do it for our future, for we are in this together.
by Richard Tenaza
Like all of you, I'm still reeling with shock from the tragedy of September 11, 2001. The blood and ashes of Americans of many national origins mixed in New York that day, Filipino Americans among them. I think new perceptions about what it means to be American, what it means to be Filipino American, and what it means to be citizens of the world will arise from the embers in Manhattan. At some later date I can begin to consolidate my own perceptions for you -- and you can consolidate yours for the rest of us -- but for now I hope the following message, written before September 11 changed our lives, will suffice.
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Let the past be a window to the present, let the present be a window to the past.
Just as the past can be the key to understanding the present, sometimes the present may serve as a window to the past. The following story presents a case in point.
One Sunday morning in October of 1995 I was jogging zigzag through the streets of downtown Taipei, Taiwan, getting my daily exercise. At one point in my meandering I turned onto a narrow side-street with a Catholic church on it and suddenly found myself surrounded by Filipino men and women. People—Filipino people—were eating, drinking, talking, and laughing in this alley in Taipei. A woman was selling dinugoan, lumpia, pancit, and soft drinks in a makeshift booth set up by the side of the street, and Filipinos were seated eating at small tables set next to it. Others were seated sideways on their motorcycles, leaning against walls, sitting on benches, perched on curbs, or just milling about the alley. And not all was so temporary: The alley even held a tiny Filipino restaurant with four walls and a door.
Finding Filipinos congregated in an alley in the heart of Taipei caught me by surprise. It stopped me in my tracks and suddenly made my Filipino identity become all important. I ceased jogging and, sweaty as I was, I started mingling and talking to people. It didn't take me long to find out that they were overseas workers, commonly referred in the Philippines as OSW's.
Many of these OSW's were working in Taipei, but many others traveled up to three hours or more by motorcycle, bus, and train to reach Taipei to attend church and congregate with other Filipinos. Most worked six days a week, and they wanted to spend their one day off with other Filipinos. Such Sunday gatherings are universal among Filipino OSW's all over the world. I was aware of it, and I'd seen it myself in Singapore, but I hadn't realized before seeing them that there were so many OSW's in Taiwan.
The Filipinos who came to America to work in the 1920s and 30s had a lot in common with today's OSW's. They were strangers in a distant land, they sent a good part of their meager earnings home to families in the Philippines, they were second class residents of the country they lived in, and their education was devalued. Educated men worked in the fields, just as today educated women OSW's work as domestic helpers.
Another trait shared between my father's generation and today's OSW's is the tendency to establish particular areas where they meet, eat, play, and shop during time off from work. Is that alley in Taipei analogous to Stockton's El Dorado Street and San Francisco's Kearny street of yesteryear? Is that little restaurant analogous to the Lafayette Lunch Counter? How close was what I felt on entering that alley to what my father felt when he went to a new town and found its Filipino neighborhood? Will that little alley in Taipei one day be the center of Taipei's Filipino Historical Neighborhood?
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©StocktonFANHS 2001