dA aLL tiMe BiGGesT-@$$ LiST oF WaYs yA Kno YoU'Re FiLiPInO . . .

OOoOOoo. . . dIs iS fO n-E oF u OuTz dEr wHO mIgHT EvER qUeStioN wHeThER oR NoT Ur rEaLLy PiNOy. . . iT'S maDe Up oF a FeW otHeR LiSTs PluS maH OwN aDDitIonS . . .

• MANNERISMS AND PERSONALITY TRAITS
  1. You point with your lips.
  2. You eat using your hands - and have it down to a technique.
  3. Your other piece of luggage is a balikbayan box.
  4. You nod your head upwauds to greet someone.
  5. You put your foot up on your chair and rest your elbow on your knees while eating.
  6. You use a rock to scrub yourself in the bath or shower.
  7. You have to kiss your relatives on the cheek as soon as you enter the room.
  8. You’re standing next to eight big boxes at the airport.
  9. You collect items from hotels or restaurants for “souvenir’s sake”.
  10. Your house has a distinctive aroma.
  11. You smile for no reason.
  12. You flirt by having a foolish grin on your face while raising your eyebrows repeatedly.
  13. You go to a department store and try to bargain the prices.
  14. Your use an umbrella for shade on hot summer days.
  15. You scratch your head when you don’t know the answer.
  16. You never eat the last morsel of food on the table.
  17. You go bowling.
  18. You play pusoy and mahjong.
  19. You find dried-up morsels of rice stuck to your shirt.
  20. You prefer to sit in the shade instead of basking in the sun.
  21. You add and unwarranted “H” to you name, i.e., Jhun, Bhoy, Rhon, Mhike.
  22. You put your hands together in front of you as if to make a path and say “Excuse, Excuse” when you pass in between people or in front of the TV
  23. You fire a gun like crazy on New Year’s Eve.
  24. You go to the streets just for fun for the Coup D’Etat just for the hell of it.
  25. Your middle name is you mom’s maiden name.
  26. You like everything that’s imported or stateside.
  27. You check labels on clothes to see where it’s made.
  28. You hang your clothes out to dry.
  29. You are perfectly comfortable in a squatting position with your elbows resting on you knees.
  30. You consistently arrive 30 minutes late for everything.
  31. You always offer food to all your visitors.
  32. You think someone is a fan of “Ate Vi” if they flash a victory sign.
  33. You say that everyone you know is either your aunt/uncle/ cousin/etc. . .
  34. You answer the phone and someone asks, “Philippines calling por [your name], will you accept the charges?”.
  35. You start speaking your language to somebody and you catch yourself doing so when they look at you with a blank stare. . . or vice versa.
  36. You make it a point to wear fancy clothes and jewelry when you go to the Philippines.
  37. You turned your garage into a welding shop so you can make wrought iron gates.
  38. You have wrought iron gates for a fence or on your front door.
  39. You burn your trash in your backyard.
  40. You put a sign in you restaurant saying, “No undershirts and sandals”.
  41. You’re in Europe for the first time and you think all Westerners smell.
  42. You put your arm on the other person’s shoulder if he or she is a close friend of yours.
  43. You’re a man who wears a comasita with everything regardless of the weather or the dress etiquette.
  44. You’re a man who prefers to bagut his balbas than shave.
  45. You work like a dog as an OCW and are still willing to pay outrageous sums for “Made in the USA” clothes.
  46. You dare to come up with an explanation for everything because you don’t want to say “I don’t know”.
  47. You can sustain (even like) Filipino jokes.
  48. You enjoy telling jokes about being Filipino.
  49. You relish food by sharing the same fork when eating with friends.
  50. You call a waiter in a restaurant “Boss” or “Brad”
  51. Your waiter gives you food you didn’t order or more food than you ordered . . . .you’re among Filipinos.
  52. You are hesitant to buy a Coke because it costs $0.50 X 20 pesos.
  53. You are stumped when asked what kinds of bread are in the deli.
  54. You go out drinking with your friends and share the same glass.
  55. You have power failures everyday at the same time that you can set your watch to.
  56. You spend 75% of your time playing basketball and only basketball.
  57. You use a bolo knife to cut your grass.
  58. You are asked, “How was your weekend?” and you actually answer by telling them what you did that weekend.
  59. You are stumped when asked, “How are you doing?”.
  60. You burp when you are busog.
  61. You laugh when you see someone slip.
  62. You make para on a bus.
  63. Kung may tabo sa kanilang mga kubeta, Pilipino ka.
  64. You do mano po to your elders in a house you are about to enter.
  65. You are chismosa.
  66. You say, “Sugarol, babaero at tumador”.
  67. You are pakialamero.
  68. You smoke in your house.
  69. You have a very good sense of maniana habit.
  70. You wash your clothes by hand.
  71. Your house smells like moth balls.
  72. You can cut your toenails with a pair of scissors.
  73. You’re the plan passenger with the biggest hand-carry luggage.
• VOCABULARY
  1. You say “comfort room” instead of “bathroom”.
  2. You say “for take out” instead of “to go”.
  3. You “open” or “close” the lights or TV.
  4. You ask for “colgate” instead of “toothpaste”.
  5. You ask for a “pentel pen” or a “ball pen” instead of just “pen”
  6. You refer to the refrigerator as the “ref” or “pridyider”.
  7. You say “kodakan” instead of “take a picture”.
  8. Your order “McDonalds” instead of “hamburger” which you pronounce “ham-boor-jer”.
  9. You say “Ha?” instead of “What?”.
  10. You say “Hoy” to get someone’s attention.
  11. You answer when someone yells “Hoy!”.
  12. You turn around when someone says “psst”.
  13. You precede anything pluralized with “mga”. . .
  14. You say “cutex” instead of nail polish.
  15. You have a tendency to start your sentences with the word “Hoy” and end with the word “Naman”
  16. You say “ano” this and “ano” that.
  17. You say “for a while” instead of “please hold” on the telephone.
  18. You say “he” when you mean “she” and vice versa.
  19. You say “aray” instead of “ouch”.
  20. Your sneeze sounds like “Ahh-ching” instead of “Ahh-choo”.
  21. You often say “Bulaga!” when you want to scare someone
  22. You write “Filipino” but pronounce it as “Pilipino”.
  23. You drop the ph/f sound for a word and your words sound like “guper” instead of “gopher”.
  24. You says things backwards like “towelpaper” instead of “papertowel”.
  25. Your prefer to make acronyms for phrases such as OA for overacting, DOM for dirty old man, and TNT for, well, you know.
  26. You say “air con” instead of “a/c” or “air conditioner”.
  27. You pronounce the following words: “hippopo-TA-mus”, “com-FOR-table”, “bro-CO-li”, and “Montgo-marry Ward”.
  28. You say “brown-out” instead of “black out”.
  29. You say “Oy” instead of “oops”.
  30. You start with the word “actually” when you’re trying to explain something.
  31. You refer to kerosene as “white gas”.
  32. You say, “Chok-o-late”.
  33. You say “Boose” for bus.
  34. You say “bitch” for beach
  35. You say “pliers” for fliers.
  36. You pronounce the word “already” as “olreydi”.
  37. Your nickname is “boy,” “boyette,” or “jun”
• HOME FURNISHINGS
  1. You have a “Weapons of Moroland” shield hanging on your living room wall.
  2. You use walis tambo and walis tingting” as opposed to a conventional broom.
  3. You own a karaoke system.
  4. You own an out-of-tune piano which no one ever plays.
  5. You have a portrait of the Last Supper hanging on you dining room wall.
  6. You have two to three pairs of tsinelas” at your doorstep.
  7. You have a “tabo” in your bathroom.
  8. Your house is cluttered with burloloys.
  9. You have a rose garden.
  10. You have one of those “Footsteps in the Sand” posters in your room.
  11. You display a big laughing Buddha for good luck.
  12. You also display one of those frogs with a coin in its mouth for good luck (which faces the door in the daytime to keep out “evil” and bring in “good” and faces inside at night to protect those inside and disperse the good luck).
  13. You have a shrine to the Santo Nino in your living room and/or at the top of your stairs.
  14. You own a “Barrel Man” (schwing!” from Baguio City.
  15. You have a parol during the holidays.
  16. Your cover your living room furniture with bedsheets or vinyl covers even if you do not have pets or very young children.
  17. Your lampshades still have the plastic covers on them.
  18. You have plastic runners to cover the carpets in your house.
  19. You refer to your VCR as “Beytamax” even if it’s a VHS.
  20. You own a rice dispenser.
  21. You own a turbo broiler.
  22. You own lamp with oil that drips down to the strings.
  23. You have a giant wooden spoon and fork hanging in the dining room.
  24. You own capiz shell chandeliers, lamps, or placemats.
  25. You have a pair of wooden Tinikling dancers on your wall.
  26. You buy a karaoke system before a stereo and a TV.
  27. Your “walking doll” is still new even though it was bought over fifteen years ago because your mom put it in a china cabinet.
  28. You cover your sofa with bright red and green blankets
  29. You nail all photographs on your walls in the living room.
• AUTOMOBILES
  1. You own a Mercedes Benz and call it a “chedeng”.
  2. You have a fake banana display attached to your car window.
  3. You own a huge van conversion.
  4. Your car chirps like a bird or plays a tune when it’s in reverse.
  5. You a rosary on your car rear view mirror.
  6. You have a jeep (or any other vehicle) with your family name written on the back of it.
  7. You have a ruler sticking out of your gas tank to measure how much gas you have.
  8. Your car horn can make three or more different sounds.
  9. You have those air fresheners in a bottle.
  10. You have one of those miniature “jeepnies”.
  11. If you even know what jeepnies are!!!
  12. You have a little Santo Nino on the dashboard.
  13. You dirve a Mercedes Benz with maroon seat covers.
  14. “One jeep only”.
• FAMILY
  1. You have aunts and uncles named “Baby”, “Girlie”, or “Boy”.
  2. You were raised believing that every Filipino is an aunt, uncle, cousin, etc. . .
  3. Your dad or your uncle was in the navy (or brother, cousin, self . . .)
  4. Your mom or your sister is a nurse (or aunt, cousin, self . . .)
  5. You get smelling kisses from your grandma.
  6. Your parents call each other Mommy and Daddy.
  7. You have a family member that has a nickname that repeats itself, i.e., “Deng-Deng”, “Ling-Ling”, “Jong-Jong”.
  8. Your grandmother smiles and her teeth are all red because of “nga-nga”.
• FOOD
  1. You put hot-dogs in your spaghetti.
  2. You consider dilis the Filipino equivalent for French fries.
  3. You think eating chocolate rice pudding and dried fish is a great morning meal.
  4. You order breakfast items like tapsilog, longsilog, and tocilog.
  5. You smoke “Blue Seal” and eat “Tasty” bread.
  6. You instinctively grab a toothpick after a meal.
  7. You order a “softdrink” instead of a “soda”.
  8. You dip bread in your morning coffee.
  9. You refer to seasonings and all other forms of monosodium glutamate as “Ajinomoto”.
  10. Your cupboards are full of corned beef, spam, and vienna sausages.
  11. You have a jar of bagoong on your pridyider door.
  12. You appreciate a fresh hot pot of rice.
  13. Your bring your baon to work everyday.
  14. Your baon is usually something over rice.
  15. Goldilocks means more to you than just a character in a fairy tale.
  16. You wash and re-use plastic utensils and Styrofoam cups.
  17. You eat purple yam-flavored ice cream.
  18. You know that “chocolate meat” isn’t really made with chocolate.
  19. You think half-hatched duck eggs are a delicacy.
  20. You have an ice-shaver for making halo-halo.
  21. You re-use patic bottles as water containers and store them in the prigyider.
  22. Your favorite candy is Choc-Nut.
  23. Your ice cold beer really has ice cubes in it.
  24. You eat balut (or even know what it is!) and wash it down with beer to bulk up.
  25. Your cloth tablecloths have telltale “tuyo circles on them”.
  26. You gotta have a bottle of Jufran handy.
  27. You use your fingers to measure the water when cooking rice.
  28. Your neighbors complain about the smell of tuyo on Sunday mornings.
  29. You fry Spam and hotdogs and eat them with rice.
  30. You eat rice for breakfast, lunch, AND dinner.
  31. You have frozen lumpia in the freezer.
  32. You put a bowl of patis on the table for dipping and somebody remarks about farting at the dinner table.
  33. You have a cartful of corned beef when there is a sale.
  34. You own both a rice cooker and an air pot.
  35. Your biggest frying pan is shaped like a wok but isn’t a wok.
  36. You prefer Thousand Island dressing above all other salad dressings.
  37. You order the langunisa meal on a PAL Balikbayan flight.
  38. You like peanut butter with chocolate.

AiiGHt sO dAT's Da WhoLe LiST . . . iF yA gOts n-E-MoRe i sHOulD aDD, jUSt eMaIl mEeH -n- i'LL pUt eM Up, K. . . .

NoW iF yA nEEd a LiL rEfERenCe tO LeT yA kNoW jUsT hOW fiLiPiNO yA ARe:

JuST iN CaSe uR wOnDErIn, DiS PutET sCoREd WaY uP iN dA sEcOnD CatEgOrY . . . heE, HEe, HeE. . . NoW whAt 4 aLL yAz WhO DouBTeD mY DoWnNeSS -n- fLYnESs. . . Hee, hEe, heE