Reputations

A JAPANESE journalist from Tokyo told me this story: Her father was in the diplomatic service and they moved a lot when she was a kid. She herself grew up in New York, coming back to Japan only when she was 13. Her first language was English, which she speaks to this day with an American accent. She had a hard time speaking Japanese when they moved back to Japan. Though it was the language spoken at home even when they lived in New York, she didn't pick it up that well. So she had to learn the language almost from scratch when she came back. Even now, she says, she sometimes gropes for the right word in Japanese.

But that is not her story. Her story is that when she was in Greece many years ago, an American woman heard her talking in English, and seeing that she was Japanese came up to her and wondered if she could fix her (the American woman's) camera. She was taken aback but swiftly regained her composure. She figured with no small amount of amusement that Japanese honor was at stake. Who knows, if she failed to fix it she would constitute living proof that Japanese technological expertise was on the decline. Yes, it was a Japanese camera, a Canon. For some reason, its carrier presumed it carried a warranty for substitute parts and repair guaranteed by every Japanese citizen.

My friend bravely took on the daunting task. To her relief, the problem turned out to be a simple one. The spool of film had gotten unhooked from the spindle and wouldn't roll. She made a big show about analyzing the situation, with judicious shakes and nods of the head, and as though with strenuous effort slid the roll of film back in place. She gave back the camera to the American tourist with a bow and a few words of broken English. The tourist after a few clicks of the camera was deeply impressed and thanked her profusely.

When my friend told this story to her American friends, they were deeply embarrassed and apologized profusely for their compatriot. She laughed contentedly.

Filipinos have their own reputations abroad, some good, some bad. I still remember the editor of an Arab newspaper telling me that in some parts of Saudi Arabia, cops have started taking bribes on the street. They rarely did that before, but it had spread like an epidemic over the last few years. The source of the virus appeared to be the Filipinos, a thriving community, who had applied their enormous persuasive skills to making the traffic cops look the other way, or the opposite direction of Mecca.

Last week, an official of the EU Commission told me how he found it so easy to deal with Filipinos. Filipinos, he said, were talented, trustworthy and easy to get along with. He himself had had a Filipino maid for some time. He met her in Hong Kong where he and his family had lived for many years, and his family became so dependent on her they brought her along to Japan when they moved there. Which proved to be a considerable social leap upward for the maid. My friend went on to pepper his story with unsavory comments about how Hong Kong was treating the Filipino maids, confining their social engagements to a tiny square where they flocked on Sundays.

I told my friend that the Filipino reputation abroad for being quality service providers wasn't exactly a huge source of pride for the country. He started to apologize, but I said it was completely all right. The export of human labor, which has probably overtaken agricultural products as the country's chief trade item, was the one thing that was keeping the Philippines afloat. No maids, no caretakers, no nurses, no Juan de la Cruz.

Everyone to a man or woman spoke of the many virtues of the Filipinos, and not entirely out of politeness. That went with much head-shaking questions about what was ailing the country. To have such a people with such enviable capabilities but to have fallen to such unenviable straits, it did not make sense. I confessed I did not know the answers, although I suspected the fact that all those talents were being put at the service of the world rather than (directly) of the country might be one of them, if it wasn't the source of the predicament itself.

The artistic talents of Filipinos particularly got rave reviews. It wasn't just in popular music Filipinos excelled in, it was in graphic arts as well. One Singaporean editor told me his paper had several Filipino cartoonists and illustrators, and the quality of their work had brought his paper much prestige and many awards. He wouldn't part with them for all the world, he said, though he wouldn't say that to them or they might immediately ask for a raise. Other Singaporean newspapers had Filipinos as well. I said I knew a couple of them, though most of the graphic artists I knew were in Hong Kong.

There was one other quality Filipinos had, my Singaporean friend said emphatically, addressing himself to the men and women in our company over sake in a dive in Fukuoka on a cold night. It was that, man or woman, Filipinos were exceptionally charming. They laughed a lot, and made friends easily. If you don't watch out, he told the others, you'd lose your boyfriends or girlfriends to them. Or you'd end up being their boyfriend or girlfriend. One Filipino man in fact became the subject of a recent scandal in Singapore, as two well-known Singaporean women fought for his affections.

Filipinos are very articulate as well, one Thai woman told me. You notice, she said, that they're the ones who're very active in conferences, along with the Indians.

Good question: Given the talent, what in God's name has happened to us? The only thing worse than being poor all your life is being rich once and now being abjectly miserable. That's the thing that truly cuts to the quick.

~ Conrado De Quiros, 16 April 2004