We’re Happy People They Say

I was buying food at 7-11 the other night when I glanced down on a newspaper carrying an article about a recent international survey that says Filipinos rank fifth as being the happiest people on this planet. The findings made me smile — hardly surprising me at all.

Why? Here are the facts:

For us, having no money is not much of a problem. Really. As long as loved ones are around, we feel A-okay. Most of the time, mere togetherness is enough. Starving together can even be a deep, bonding experience.

You must already be aware of our supreme fondness for parties or small gatherings, and of our intense romance with the videoke. Horrific belting out for several barangays to hear could turn into volatile situations once in a while. In the spirit of fun, however, off-key singing is generally acceptable.

In spite of our country’s economic afflictions, each year there seems to be a mall sprouting, like a mushroom, at some corner of a city; Something which fosters more groupings and better camaraderie. Not to mention we probably manufacture the greatest number of cheap, most delicious assorted chips and crackers in the whole world. Oh, that last one doesn’t count, does it?

We might boast of a low suicide rate, too. The motive for taking one’s life could just be a ramification of a liaison turned dreadfully sour – which manifests of our over-the-top passionate nature as well.

Pensive, quiet gals like me are looked upon as different, or odd. Yeah yeah you’re right, I am weird. You’d feel out of place and sometimes be ridiculed (as I have been all my life) if you aren’t the boisterous, big talker type. At faculty meetings – with all of us female teachers clustered in a room – the propensity of my colleagues to endlessly babble all at the same time never ceases to amaze me. I often imagine myself grabbing something, anything around me that I could stuff into one or two of my co-teacher’s mouth, just to lessen the din.

Everyone dances here regardless of religious affiliation, political persuasion, or the contents of their refrigerator. A shrinking violet that I am, I have thought of all the number of hours I reluctantly spent practising with my siblings to prepare for our performance at every relative’s party in my pre-teen and early teenage years. Hours that could have been spent reading English classics and mastering the art of penning mushy-mushy yet wonderful tales. I swear I could have ended up giving Jane Austen a run for her money. But then, it’s also a blessing my parents instilled in their children love of dancing; even though they’ve got this one daughter who’s been marked for bashfulness all her life.

Well, it’s gratifying to broadcast now that I can finally dance sans any morsel of shyness. In front of an audience. I mean in front of my favorite and sole audience. My cat.

Indeed, we’re a bunch of happy happy people.

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In view of my penchant for strong dance beat, choreographed dancing, and fun videos, I include an old favorite of mine from 1989: Dino singing and bopping to his hit “I Like It”: one of those trip the light fantastic tunes that make me get up and dance to this day.

Yes, Filipinos Are Indeed Good At English

It behooves me why my post “On Why Filipinos Are Good In English” has garnered the most number of hits on this blog site. Are people truly wondering why and how good we are at English? I’m an ESL teacher in an English Academy here in the city capital of the Philippines. And I didn’t even major in English. I am actually a Business grad with some accounting and administrative practice under my belt that I not so proudly count as job experience. Then why, you may ask, did I end up as an English instructor? Do I have a license or even the right to teach this honorable language? The answer to that, of course, is well, I don’t have both. No license and no right at all. But I’ve got something else which can justify my current job circumstances. Passion for teaching and love of Language. Why am I saying all this? For the reason that it got me thinking as to why I am fairly good in this language. I didn’t even like studying grammar during my school years. As I mentioned before in a previous post, our grammar textbooks had been full of jargons and complicated explanations I couldn’t bother with. One thing sustained my love for English though, and that was reading. I firmly believe Western literature has made me the kind of person that I am now, in the most positive way.

My country has become the preferred destination for a certain Asian country whose citizens are more than required to learn a language they aren’t that crazy about (Why? I honestly don’t know). They bother to travel all the way here for the purpose of gaining some substantial fluency in English at a price cheaper than the real McCoy in learning it, i.e., heading to the West. Cool. It definitely helps increase employment opportunities for many of my fellowmen here. By the way, in the academy where I work, most of my co-teachers are nursing graduates who can’t find work elsewhere. There had been an oversupply of nurses here because the demand abroad suddenly diminished a few years back. The point is, every Filipino who has obtained a college degree is qualified to teach these other Asian nationals lacking on the English fronts.

For this post, I’m going to state the obvious one more time. Yes indeed, the Filipino people are good in English. The language is embedded in our culture. It’s been our way of life. We can’t claim that we are masters in this field. And I myself still have a whole lot to learn. The brand of relaxed wit most American writers possess in their prose is something that I still aim to acquire. Not to mention I’ve got a long way to go in my Advanced English studies. But boy, do I feel lucky being paid for something that is very much related to my lifelong passion. I am blessed.

On Why Filipinos Are Good In English

My students have always kept asking me, “Teacher, why are filipinos good in english?” Indeed, the Filipino people are among the best english speakers in the world. We’ve always done well in the field of Languages. That can explain why many of our provinces here have their own dialects.

We may lack the fluid sophistication of native speakers who can naturally express themselves with refreshing intangibility and a spirit of friskiness. Nonetheless, we can definitely hold our own.

The Philippines had been colonized by Spain for nearly 300 years (compared to the U.S. occupation for a mere 40 years) and yet less than 10% of our population could speak Spanish, considering the fact that in college, we were required to complete 16 units of Spanish until (thank heavens) it was scrapped 15 years ago.

The English language sustains our planet for now. There is no other language in this world that can knock it down from its throne. It sits on the top of the heap without any real competition.

We do almost everything here using english. We watch the foreign news, patronize American books and magazines. We’ve got no problem making copious use of dictionaries and thesauri. As long as we get our message across, we’re gonna do just fine.

And how we love Hollywood films. It doesn’t matter that we struggle a bit to catch up with the actors who talk too rapidly. We always manage to enjoy the whole film. And do you know how crazy we can get about American and British pop music?

I regret the fact that I failed to cut through the jargon and couldn’t combat the Gremlins of grammar when I was still in school. Eighty percent (80%) of our subjects in school are in english. In elementary school, we labored on our english subjects using mediocre Philippine grammar books that left us more confused than enlightened. But we habitually persevere and do our best to study the language real hard. All for the love of English, I believe.

Far too many college graduates who are having a hard time finding a good job end up becoming ESL instructors. If you’re reasonably schooled in the Philippines, there’s no way you can’t teach English to non-native speakers.

It doesn’t matter that we can’t pronounce a word perfectly, though we are probably known to be the most flexible earthlings on this planet. You want american accent? No problem. British accent? Umm.. sure, we’ll try.

Fluency in english is a symbol of good education and affluence in this country. It’s a reflection too of your intellect and how well you’ve done in life. It’s even mandatory for the upper class to sound like American native speakers at all times, even in the comfort of their own homes. If you are really rich, lacking in Tagalog (our national language) is a natural phenomenon. That’s just the way it is here.

 But not having english as our second language in this country is unimaginable. More than ever, it is fundamental to our lives, our success and our happiness.

Part 2 of this post can be read at the link below:

https://justmarj.wordpress.com/2012/01/10/yes-filipinos-are-indeed-good-at-english/