Aedan Roberts
Final Reflection
I’ve learned so
much in the last 5 weeks that I have no idea where to start. I did this program
because I wanted my first experience outside of the United States to be
profound and critically reflective. I wanted to learn what it meant to be white
and American. I’m not sure if I accomplished those goals, it’s going to take
months, maybe years to decompress this experience and grasp the impact that it
has made on me, but I know that I am a hell of a lot farther along in my journey
toward self-cognizance. I’m so overwhelmed right now that it’s hurting my brain
to try to make sense of any of these experiences, I’ll try my best to impart a
few lessons I learned
 |
| Borocay |
A) Well first of all I
learned to love the Philippines. I came here with virtually no knowledge
whatsoever about Filipino culture, history, or identity. Every detail of what I
have experienced, down to the last flake of the shredded Tapsilog I’m eating
right now, is a completely new. Filipino-Americans truly are
an “invisible
minority.” As a white man I never had to notice this, I never had to think much
about how Japanese, Indian, and Vietnamese restaurants are on every corner yet
I’d never once tasted a Filipino dish. Being here has made me realize how much
I was missing. I learned to love this jaw-dropping natural environment. The
waves in Boracay, the coral reef in Cebu, the cave in Sagada, the chocolate hills
in Bohol, and most of all the rice terraces. Being in Batad was a near
religious experience for me– I will never forget how it felt to be in a place
so beautiful and I’m truly honored to have had the opportunity. I learned to
love the food, which was extremely easy. I am not exaggerating when I say that
the best food I’ve ever eaten has been here. The adobo at Tita Pichi’s house,
the milkfish Master Ray cooked for the Budo fight, the Rodic’s Tapsilog I’m
eating right now, all blew my mind. I learned to love the language. I’d never
heard a word of Tagalog before I came and, although I haven’t really picked up
on any thing beyond “salamat po” and “magandang umaga,” I adore the way it
sounds and even the way it looks on those gargantuan Jollibee billboards that
tower above the manila traffic. And I learned to love the people. From Tita and
her husband to the students at the TCU arnis competition to the cab driver who
took my drunk ass home last night I have never met people who were so genuinely
hospitable, genuinely excited to get to know me and to share their culture (of
course, part of that excitement comes from the fact of my skin color, but I’ll
get to that later.) It’s safe to say that the Philippines is no longer
invisible, at least for me. It is a million million things, rich and vibrant
and proud. When I get back to Seattle the first thing I’m going to hunt for
sinigang in Beacon hill, I’m going to hangout with Marijo at FASA meetings, and
most of all I’m going to educate everyone I know about this beautiful,
beautiful place and make the Philippines a little less invisible for them too.
 |
| Batad |
I
learned quite a bit about mis-education and colonial mentality. Not just
learned– I could have read the course material at home. I saw it and felt it. I
may have come here completely ignorant about Filipino culture, but I came
pretty woke about how oppression works– colonial mentality wasn’t an entirely
new concept, but I’ve never been somewhere where it is so visible. There were
moments, almost every day, of extreme discomfort for me when I was forced to
confront the reality of the oppressive structures that I benefit from and
participate in perpetuating. Perhaps the greatest example is the way I was
treated. Growing up in a city where people of my race are the numerical
majority, I’m not used to sticking out. It’s safe to say I’ve never gotten so
much attention– every where I go people stare at me, whisper about me in
excited Tagalog, try to talk to me, ask for a picture. And Filipina women
absolutely swoon. It doesn’t feel good. I have a lot of anxiety, and I’m not a
person who likes being the center of attention under any circumstance, so I’ve
been more or less constantly uncomfortable whenever I’m in public. My nerves
finally reached a bursting point at PWU, when 100 Filipina girls all wanted
pictures at the same time. I ran to the bathroom, panicking, the reality of the
situation strangling me until I was gasping for air. I know that they swoon
because their education has been poisoned by my culture. They’re excited for a
picture because their minds are in a prison that my country built, they’ve been
conditioned to believe that America is a flawless dream to aspire to, that
White is the standard of excellence and the standard of beauty. I remembered
what the man said at the embassy– that the United States government is still
actively vomiting American cultural propaganda all over the islands as an act
of “Goodwill.” I remembered the readings and all of the thousands murdered and
millions converted but I also remembered the portrait of Taft, the enormous
Augustinian church, I remembered all the ways that history has been revised
again and again to make sure that it remains a perfect, linear progression from
savage to civilized, from Black to White. I’m still recovering, still trying to
catch my breath. Perhaps I always will be.
The
only moment that trumped PWU in terms of poignant existential terror was our
visit with the “Ati tribe” along the river in Bohol. To see that group of
people perform for us the spectacle that they knew tourists wanted was
absolutely heartbreaking. My people, people who’s blood is European blood, came
here and destroyed these cultures and replaced them with our own empty,
soulless structures and forms. We plundered the resources and used our numbers
and rules to exploit the people living here until the only way for them to make
money is to act out our fantasy of the culture we want them to have. That’s
beyond historical revisionism, it’s reality revisionism. I’ve never been so
uncomfortable with my own identity, never wanted so badly to exit the body I
was born into. I had a moment, right before we left, when I caught the eyes of
a man who looked like he was my age. In that moment it was clear he knew that I
saw what was really going on. It’s impossible to describe, the best I’ve done
is with the poem I read during my presentation. I’ll just include it right
here, it encapsulates a lot of how this experience has affected me:
We saw each other
20 is the same
but nightmare hung
in the gap between
us, like my Hawaiian
drying on the rack
20 is the same
like brothers like
twin brothers like
we could never be because
I stole our common ground
His eyes hit
me, broke my nose
full of resentment,
humiliation, but
perhaps full of
pride because he knew
under the synthetic loin cloth
and the dollar bill
Pinoy still has meaning
He knew that I merely obscured his humanity
when I crushed mine to
dust, as his eyes crushed
the capillaries, let the
thick, benevolent
poison drip down my
esophagus
made me taste my DNA
made me choke as
the synthetic teardrops
danced to the tune of
“Country Roads”
No apology
to dissolve the
nightmare
in the gap
No way forward
but to parasail back
to that empty place
where I belong
country roads
take me home
B) I was not expecting
our group to be this dysfunctional or this dramatic, but in a way I’m glad it
was. Not only is this the first time I’ve been in a country where I’m a racial
minority, this might be the first class I’ve ever taken in which there are more
students of color than not. Come to think of it, this might only be the second
time in all 15 years of schooling that my teacher hasn’t been white. Seriously,
we’re looking like a UW admissions brochure out here. Not only do we have
cultural and ethnic differences, we are diverse in almost every way imaginable.
The range of ages, economic backgrounds, majors, and life experiences are incredible.
And we all came for different reasons, ranging from Marijo, who is very
involved in FASA and came to learn about her identity and culture in order to
bring the knowledge back to the Fil-Am community at UW, to me, who has no
personal connection to this country whatsoever and just picked this program
because it’s part of the CHID requirements and the course material sounded
interesting. The only thing that seemed to have been in common was
exceptionally developed critical consciousness and genuine thirst for
knowledge. My point is: how could a group so diverse live in such close
quarters, discussing material this powerful and personal, without conflict
arising? Especially when there happen to be a few enormous personalities
(myself included) and no shortage of burning passion. It’s been an emotional
rollercoaster, for sure, especially for me. I said in our first group meeting
that I have a mood disorder, and the instability of this environment and this
group has made my already regular mood swings spike to incredible highs and
lows– more than once I had to spend a whole day calming down alone in my room.
But I have learned
so much from the people on this trip. So much. There are people here who have
suffered more than I could ever know or understand, and they’ve pulled
themselves out of it stronger than ever. It’s absolutely inspiring, and it’s
put my own problems in perspective, helped me learn to be grateful for all that
I have going for me (which is A LOT.) It’s been such an honor to hear their
stories and have a space to reflect on my own. Lasting friendships were
definitely formed. I stand by what Anthony said, this really does feel like a
family, I have so much love for everyone who was in this program. On top of
that, everyone is so real, and so down to dig deep into the problems in the
world that I swear I’ve had some of the most intellectually stimulating
conversations of my life. The spontaneous Socratic seminars we had in the van
driving around the cordilleras were more engaging and informative than any I’ve
had in some stuffy classroom in the states. Intense academic discussions spring
up everywhere here. Thanks to the honesty of my classmates, almost all of them
having endured more systemic oppression than me, I feel like I have a much
deeper and more complex understanding of what race and colonialism actually
are, how they affect actual lives, and how I have benefited at the expense of
those lives.
And figuring out
how to keep everyone together, especially after the emotional explosion that
happened during the mis-education discussion last week, has taught me powerful
life lessons I could never learn from a book. I was so anxious and
uncomfortable and angry after that day that I felt like I couldn’t even talk to
anyone. I hated myself and this whole experience and I just wanted to go home.
But I learned how to patch wounds, I learned how to forgive and admit fault.
Coco and I talked in Borocay, we shared what was going on in our heads, and
suddenly the problem was gone because I understood what happened, I understood
her and figured out how to love her for who she is. That couldn’t have happened
if things hadn’t hit such a low point. I’ll never forget that.
All in all, Third,
thank you so much for this experience. It has changed my life completely, in
ways that I won’t begin to understand until I step off the plane in Seattle. I
have learned so much here, too much to write out in 6 pages (or is it like 7 at
this point?) And I am a better human being now because of it. Thank you.
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