Tag Archives: filipino

Step over someone, shorten their life span.

Context: 

D is a 20 year old college student living in Los Angeles, California who was originally from the Philippines. 

This conversation took place in my room as a group of my friends were hanging out and I brought up if they knew any folklore or proverbs that they wanted to share. The informant said they remembered another one and then forgot it so they had to wait a second before it came back to them. 

Text: 

D: My mom was like if you step over people, they’re gonna die like you’re gonna shorten their life. It’s like a Filipino superstition. 

Reflection: 

This superstition is interesting because a lot of the superstitions I know are extreme while this one shortens your life versus immediately causing death. Additionally, it seems like a scenario that would not come up very easily as the person would have to be physically lying on the ground and not try to prevent you from stepping over them. I wanted to see what the origin was as my friend had only heard about it from their mom without explanation, but I couldn’t find any more information on the superstition. It could also be another superstition that is meant as a preventative measure by parents to prevent their children from doing something dangerous.

Aguinalduhan

“So basically, aguinalduhan is a gathering we do in our church every year on the last Sunday before Christmas where all of the adults go into, like, a parking lot and bring bulk snacks and toys and stuff like from Costco… Like those 28-pack chips or candy boxes.  They all sit in a big circle with their big packages of food and snacks.  Then the kids all line up outside the circle in order from youngest to oldest until you’re like 20 years old and it’s like a long line of trick or treaters that get older as you go… the funniest part is that we’ll usually bully our oldest cousins out of the line once they get to be around 22 or 23 because at that point, like, they’re just being greedy.  But then what ends up happening is that they have a kid a couple years later and get to go to the front of the line when their kid is the youngest out of all of us.”

Background: The informant is a 19-year old college student who was raised a Christian in a church that was led and run by his extended family members.

Context: This tradition was shared with me over FaceTime.

I experienced aguinalduhan annually with the informant when we were children, and it was a cyclical tradition that marked the end of another year.  Participants in the tradition slowly made their way to the back of the line as new lives began entering through the front.  As an adult, many of our older cousins are now the ones bringing the goodies (like Oreo snack packs, fruit snacks, Caprisuns) to hand out to all of the younger cousins.

According to limited information available about the idea of “Aguinaldohan” online, our church’s tradition stemmed from a custom named after the first President of the Philippines, Emilio Aguinaldo, where people gave back to the needy during Christmastime.  This version is definitely more sanitized and family-friendly, and serves as a way for everyone to get together and see how we’ve grown throughout the years.

Authentically Filipino

“I always tell you that the true way to test if you’re American or Pilipino is to pinch you.  If you yell “ouch!,” you’re American; if you yell “aray!,” you’re still Filipino.”

Background: The informant is a 48 year-old Filipina immigrant whose daughter experienced childhood in the Philippines but adolescence in the United States.  Therefore, she often tackled issues of her child becoming “Americanized” and losing her identity as a Filipino.  This piece is a joke, but it highlights issues of what an individual with multiple cultural identities “is” at its core. “Aray” is the instinctive Filipino equivalent of saying “ouch” when one feels pain.

Context: This piece is something that has been told to me often growing up, but for the collection project the informant shared this with me at the dinner table in our home.

This is something my mom always told me as I spent more time in the United States and constantly faced scrutiny for “losing” my Filipino culture.  We choose to pinch people to get their reaction in order to catch them at a time where they are not expecting your presence or to feel pain.  Therefore, their reaction is authentic and they don’t have the time to mask their behavior to go one way or another.  It’s indicative of how Filipino-Americans need to be tested to see if they are “Filipino” enough, as being “whitewashed” is something that many young adults get taunted about.  Anyone who was only raised in the United States or in the Philippines would have no need to see whether they are more one or the other; this is applicable only to the community of individuals who have both (if not more) ethnicities as parts of their identities.  It, unfortunately, promotes the idea that one has to be what the person is at their core, and they cannot coexist at the deepest level in one’s identity due to the binary nature of one’s reaction to being pinched.

Tree People of the Philippines – Dwende

Text and Context

DA (informant) – We have the dwende in the Philippines (I think a lot of cultures have them, even Guam). They’re kinda like dwarves and they live in anthills, tree stumps, stuff like that, which is why growing up we were taught to ask for permission before entering the woods.
My mom told me my brother got really sick to the point that they had to go to the hospital, but they couldn’t tell what was up. Apparently he peed on a tree stump and it pissed off the dwende living under it and it cursed him. He was fine in the end though. (laughs)
Interviewer – How were you supposed to ask permission to enter? And what might happen if you didn’t? Similar to what your brother experienced?
DA – You would say, “Tabi tabi po” which basically means “excuse me.” And yeah, it’s so you don’t get cursed in case you happen to disturb their home by stepping on them or something.
Interviewer – Is there anything you can do to lift the curses of the dwende?
DA – Yeah! Witch doctors (in the Philippines: albularyo, in Guam: suruhanu). First they see what’s causing whatever you’re feeling. Usually with melted candle wax and a bowl of water: they let it drip and the hardened wax would form into who caused it. And they tell you what to do based on that. But I don’t really know much about this part.
DA – I remember whenever I got sick as a kid, my mom and my grandma would bring me to an albularyo. She would do this ritual with candles over my head, but I don’t remember much.

Analysis

The informant was telling me about where they had grown up, including the Philippines and Guam, spurred on by an art project that drew upon magical creatures.
The dwende are little tree spirits who, if you disrespect, will cause harm to you, but if you are polite to them, they will leave you alone. I have heard similar stories of the tomten from my own Swedish heritage, who could cause trouble if the inhabitants of the house did not leave them offerings or respect the coexisting tompte.
Belief in the dwende demands respect and politeness for nature, as a dwende could be under any tree one passes. Dwende curses could be lifted by healers who had mastered traditional remedies and were also deeply woven into the traditional Filipino culture. There is a particular saying that can grant you access to these spaces without harm, which lets the dwende you mean no harm to them.

Vicks as a Cold Remedy

Background information: My mom is a second-generation Filipino-American, meaning she was born here in the US. Her parents immigrated from the Philippines when they were both relatively young, and my mom’s family grew up with a lot of relatives in San Francisco, CA. 

Mom: When you guys were young and you would get sick, I always made sure to put Vicks on your chest and back. You take a lot of Vicks and cover your chest and back with a layer of it and then put face cloths over it. It seals it and it helps you work through congestion and breathing. It clears out your sinuses so it gets easier to breathe. And then you also put Vicks on your feet and put socks over it.

Me: Why on your feet?

Mom: It helps to…suck the sickness out from your feet. The socks help seal it too.

Me: Why did you do this for us?

Mom: My mom always did it for us, and I know my grandma did too. I remember being sick and my grandma seeing me and asking my mom “Did you do this? Did you do that?” always talking about using enough Vicks on us (laughs). I think a lot of Filipino moms know about this one. Your lola knows about it too.

This medical practice is definitely something very specific to Filipino families, as I remember asking my friends if they knew about putting Vicks on their feet, and very rarely did people know what I was talking about. As a child, even though it was uncomfortable, I knew that Vicks would help me get well again because my mom and grandma felt so strongly about doing it as soon as I showed any signs of having a cold. Despite this being a practice of folklore that families pass down on their own, it feels like an “official” medical practice just because I’m so used to doing it.