Tag Archives: filipino

Philippine Debut

Text: 

On her 18th birthday, a Filipino girl is usually expected to have a debut ball.

Context:

The informant is my maternal grandmother, who was born and raised in the Philippines, and still continues to live there. She celebrated her debut in 1956. For her, the ceremony was a special and important occasion that allowed her to celebrate her birthday with friends and family members in a grand and unforgettable manner.

Analysis:

In Filipino culture, the debut represents a coming of age ritual. Since the age of adulthood for Filipino girls is 18, the debut is held on their 18th birthday. The debut holds a significance similar to the Quincenera (age 16)  for Mexican and other Latin American cultures as well as the sweet sixteen for some North American cultures. As in most coming of age rituals, the celebration marks the crossing of the threshold between childhood and adulthood, and in this specific case, childhood to womanhood. After the debut, the debut celebrant is recognized by her society as an adult woman.

Mangkukulam

It’s definitely something that Filipinos, like would tell people about, um, because it’s like, witchcraft was a really big thing in the Philippines, or it still is a really big thing in the Philippines, so people who are like mangkukulam like are, people who like put hexes or curses on you, and like, sometimes these people are like shapeshifters or like, have like made deals with the devil and stuff, so. Still, there are like, there are people who will be like don’t go near her she’s like, a mangkukulam and it’s mostly people who are like clinically insane and like, have attacked people but like, literally like, entities who use their energies towards evil intentions, like karmic energy, things like that.

Background: My informant, as is their family, is Filipino, and they speak Tagalog often with their parents and siblings. They recall their family telling them this story, as well as TV shows in the Philippines that dramatized creatures of Filipino Legend, as well as other Filipino supernatural events.

Context: This piece was collected in an in-person conversation in my apartment.

My thoughts: Based on the accused mangkukulam usually being a woman, this legend may have a similar function as North American legends concerning witches; that being, to demonize and punish women who don’t fit into the patriarchal role set out for them.

Kinakain Ng Mata

There’s like, “kinakain ng mata” Directly translated it’s like “you eat with your eyes,” um, which means like you order too much food for yourself and you just never finish it, it’s like what they tell people, like what they tell kids who like waste their food or like, just, don’t know their limits, for portions.

Background: My informant, as is their family, is Filipino, and they speak Tagalog often with their parents and siblings.

Context: This piece was collected in an in-person conversation in my apartment.

My thoughts: This expression reflects a cultural emphasis on the conservation of resources, especially food. It condemns food waste and reprimands making hasty decisions without thinking them through.

Pito-pito

Background: Informant was born in the Philippines, on the island of Cebu, to a Filipino mom and a white dad. He sent his childhood in Yap, in Micronesia, but spent a lot of time in the Philippines as a child as well and is fluent in Cebuano, a Bisayan language and grew up playing games with his mother, who was born and raised in Cebu. The following is a children’s game that the informant played as a child, which was then passed down to me when I was a child. We spoke about this game over the phone.

Pito-pito ubod

Kan-on pulos budbud

Sud-an pulos utan

Piesta’s kadagatan!

Transliteration:

Seven-seven small fish

Rice all sticky rice cake

Viand all vegetable soup

Fiesta at the beach

Translation:

Seven small fish

Rice for sticky rice cake

Main course for vegetable broth

Fiesta at the beach

Informant: Pito-pito means seven, and ubod is a small fish. 

Kan-on is rice… ka-on is food, and kan-on is “that which you eat,” which also means food which is kind of silly, but it also refers to rice. Kan-on pulos budbud is “rice for sticky rice-cake.”

Sud-an, when you eat, you always have kan-on (the rise, the base), and sud-an is “the thing which you eat with your rice,” so sud-an could be anything. For example, teriyaki chicken or adobo is both sud-an with rice, which is the kan-on. There’s usually a connotation or implication that there is vegetables. But, sud-an pulos utan is “main course for vegetable broth or soup.”

All the phrases are silly and backwards, really… it doesn’t make sense grammatically. The second and third stanzas would be grammatically correct if they were flipped.

Budbud para kan-on

Utan para sud-an

Piesta’s kada gatan is a fiesta at the beach. Pista’s is really just the “filipinization” if you will of the Spanish word fiestas.

The whole thing is really just silly, but someone would hold out their hand and the other person would put their pointer finger in the center of the other person’s hand. The person with their hand outstretched would sing the lines as slowly or quickly as you want, you can play with the tempo on the first couple lines and then when the line “piesta’s kada gatan!” Is said, the person singing would close their hand while the second person tries to pull their finger away so their finger isn’t trapped.

Thoughts: I remember playing this game as a child, and this is the first I heard of the meaning behind it. I find it interesting that it’s all food-based lyrics, though it’s not entirely surprising as Filipino culture is centered so much around food, but it’s funny that even in a children’s game that’s fairly nonsensical with no relation between the lyrics and the actions, food still is still at the focal point.

Aswang

Text:

MA: “In Filipino lore there’s this thing called the Aswang, but it’s basically like a Filipino vampire. And, I don’t know if I’m confusing this with something else, but this is the story that I was told, that like, they’re kind of like vampires but they’re, I believe, can be connected to trees. They fly and they’re only half a body or something like that. But the big thing is, the thing that scarred me as a child, is that they prey on pregnant women. So, what they’ll do is fly to people’s windows, and they have really long tongues, so their tongues will go and go through a woman’s belly button and suck out the baby. And that’s what it feeds on.”

Context:

The informant is a 20-year-old college student who is from Orange County, California and of Filipino descent. She says that the Aswang is a popular legend among Filipino people. MA’s maternal grandmother and aunt are interested in the supernatural and say that they can see ghosts, so she thinks that they told her this story. She is not sure what message the story is intended to convey, but she thinks that it may be meant to warn children against staying out late, warn pregnant women against engaging in any behaviors that may endanger their unborn child, like sleeping on their stomachs, she said, or to explain miscarriage.

Analysis:

Legendary monsters often represent cultural fears, provide explanations for tragedies which people can’t understand, or maintain the status quo by illustrating horrific repercussions of defying cultural norms. Just as folklorists have interpreted the legend of La Llorona both as a reflection of societal views about motherhood and female morality and as a way to teach children to be cautious around bodies of water, the Aswang can be interpreted as sending messages about gender norms and safety. I think the legend conveys ideas about women and children, by virtue of the monster preying on fetuses, being vulnerable. It promotes a kind of sheltered or cautious existence for these groups, since this monster, perhaps a representative of men or malicious adult figures, victimizes them. The legend could also be intended to impart ideas about sexual morality. One could interpret the Aswang’s mode of attack as representing sex, and its devouring of women’s unborn children as punishment for female promiscuity. I also agree with MA that this legend may have been used to explain miscarriage.

For another description of the Aswang, consult page 250 of the following source:

Nadeau, Kathleen. “Aswang and Other Kinds of Witches: A Comparative Analysis.” Philippine Quarterly of Culture and Society, vol. 39, no. 3/4, 2011, pp. 250–266., https://www.jstor.org/stable/23719118. Accessed 28 Apr. 2022.