The Great White Tribe in FilipiniaGilbert, Paul T. (Paul Thomas)
History
The Great White Tribe in Filipinia
Gilbert, Paul T. (Paul Thomas)
Philippines -- Social life and customs
How would you like it, not to have a Fourth of July celebration,
or a Christmas stocking, or a turkey on Thanksgiving-day? The
little children of the Philippines would be afraid of one of our
firecrackers--they would think it was another kind of "boom-boom"
that killed men. A life-sized turkey in the Philippines would
be a curiosity, the chickens and the horses and the people are
so small. The little boys and girls do not wear stockings, even
around Christmas-time, and Santa Claus would look in vain for any
chimneys over there. The candy, if the ants did not get at it first,
would melt and run down to the toes and heels of Christmas stockings
long before the little claimants were awake. Of course, they do not
have plum-puddings, pumpkin-pies, and apples. All the season round,
bananas take the place of apples, cherries, strawberries, and peaches;
and boiled rice is the only kind of pumpkin-pie they have.
The fathers and mothers of the little Brownie boys and girls are very
ignorant. Most of them can not even write their names, and if you
asked them when the family birthdays came they would have to go and
ask the padre. Once, when I was living at the convent, a girl-mother,
who had walked in from a town ten miles away, came up to register
the birth of a new baby in the padre's book. She stood before the
priest embarrassed, digging her brown toes into a big crack in the
floor. "At what time was the baby born?" was asked. "I do not know,"
she answered, "but it was about the time the chickens were awake."
It is a lucky baby that can get goat's milk to drink. Their mothers,
living for the most part on dried fish and rice, are never strong
enough to give them a good start in life. It is a common sight to see
the tiny litter decorated with bright bits of paper and a half-dozen
lighted candles, with its little, waxen image of a child, waiting
without the church door till the padre comes to say the funeral
services.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account