Week 4 Blog

Louie Vital

Philippines Study Abroad

Week 4- Resistance and Reflection

Last week we were tourists. We visited Boracay, Bohol and Cebu! It was beautiful but there were many stories behind tourism.

“We love to hear foreigners call our country a paradise on earth, and we never stop to think that it is a paradise only for them but not for millions of our countrymen.” (Constantino, 1982, p. 185)

Destruction in Bohol

The chocolate hills of Bohol were beautiful but the broken buildings and hills revealed signs of last year’s devastating earthquake. It reminded me of the destruction caused by Typhoon Glenda. At a presentation from Migrante International, I learned that natural disasters like the Bohol earthquake and Typhoon Glenda, are one of the reasons 5000 people leave the Philippines everyday. I find it ironic. It’s almost as if tourism is overly emphasized in order to hide the atrocities of the country such as poverty, corrupt government and natural disasters.

I think this contributes to the hyper-consumerist culture that pervades the Philippines. Also, because of this persistent, not-so-subtle push at tourism and consumerism, some people overlook the true passion behind the countrymen.

When we visited the Lapu-Lapu Shrine in Cebu, I met a volunteer tour guide named Abraham. He is 43 years old with two young children. When he isn’t helping his cousin run a local restaurant, he is always giving tours at the shrine. He told me that some people treat him disrespectfully and push him away because they assume Abraham is forcing a tour upon them in order to demand money at the end. What they don’t understand is that Abraham gives tours out of his love and passion for the shrine. His tours are not for profit.

While Abraham takes a lot of pride that the slaying of Magellan occurred on his homeland. But in a different part of Cebu, people were celebrating the cross that Magellan brought. It is interesting how feeling towards the colonizers can vary even within such close proximity.

In Mactan, the people were so proud of Lapu-Lapu for slaying Magellan. As a sign to pay homage to Magellan for bringing their saving religion, Magellan’s cross is showered with candles.

One thing I noticed at the Basilica is that people would touch the statues of the saints then touch their necks and chest like the physical contact was a protective holy perfume. There was a statue of Jesus lying down encased in a plexiglass box. I noticed fingerprint marks from the masses of people who touched the box to get close to the statue. I watched a man add his fingerprint to the collection and apply the perfume. How can Magellan be praised and simultaneously demonized? After the tour Abraham said he was going to bring his family to church for evening mass. People at the shrine practice the religion without much thought to very colonizer they demonize.

The colonizer intended to save the colonized through education and religion. This is reminiscent of how Americans wanted to “save” the Muslim Moros from other “oppressive” tribes.  (Abinales, 2002, p. 93) Abinales describes how a oppressive third party intervenes to justify their own actions. This is also similar to how the Americans wanted to free Moros from the control of “Chinese middlemen” (Abinales, 2002, p. 98) Under the guise of "hero" the colonizer is able to colonize without much resistance.

Works Cited

Abinales, P. (2002) An American colonial state: Authority and structure in Southern Mindanao. In A.V. Shaw & L.H Francia, Vestiges of war. (pp. 89-117). New York: New York
Press.

Constantino, R. (1982). Miseducation of Filipinos. In I In A.V. Shaw & L.H Francia, Vestiges of war. (pp. 177-192). New York: New York Press.

Ontal, R.G., (2002). Fagen and other ghosts: African-Americans and the Philippine-American war. In A.V. Shaw & L.H Francia, Vestiges of war. (pp. 118-133). New York: New York Press.