My FILIPINO-American Boy
I haven’t been posting here as often as I had hoped to — but inspiration hit me when I stopped by Filipina Moms today and I saw Mom2Amara’s post “Ako si Mom2Amara“.
I migrated to the US seven years ago when I married by better half — giving up family and career in the Philippines to raise one of my own here. After two miscarraiges, we were blessed with our now three-year-old son, Salvador Angelo II (Angel). I was fortunate enough to have had my Mom here to assist me in caring for Angel until he turned three this May, and together, we tried our best to speak to him in Tagalog, while my husband concentrated more on speaking with him in English.
By the time my Mom returned to Manila in June this year, Angel was able to understand commands in Tagalog, and he was conversant enough to reply to simple questions or commands. I even had to train him to say “No, thanks” as opposed to saying “Ayaw na” because his teachers in daycare wouldn’t know what “Ayaw” meant. He distinguished between his two grandmothers by calling my mom “Grandma,” and Alan’s mom, “Lola”. His favorite food is his beloved “kanin-rice”, and one word you will hear him uttering every so often is “Sama” (baby talk for “I’m going with you”).
I had started teaching him Tagalog as a baby, trying to teach him to count and teaching him body parts like “mata” (eyes), “kamay” (hand), “daliri” (fingers), even singing to him such nursery rhymes like “Sampung mga daliri” (Ten fingers) and “Leron-leron Sinta” (whose translation escapes me because it is more of an expression akin to “La la my love”.)
Unlike Mom2Amara, I am fortunate enough to have actually learned how to formally speak, write and read Tagalog in school like Alan, and although Alan has been here for the last 20 years and his own Tagalog-English translations are getting rusty, you would know he grew up in Manila when he starts speaking in the vernacular.
I have often written about how I find it sad that we Filipinos seem to continue to struggle with being bilingual, falling prey to the supposed better state of being fluent and steeped in English. We fail to see that we grew up being bilingual, and as such were better off than most who were confined to their own language. I cannot help but admire the Koreans who talk to their young kids in their native tongue, and I tell myself that I hope I can succeed in teaching Angel not only to understand Tagalog but to speak it, and speak it fluently I hope.
Living by the personal mantra that anything can be learned — just as I discovered I actually had the talent to cook and I started learning only when I was left to fend for myself and Alan here in New York — I hope I can learn to teach him to speak the language beyond token phrases and lines. I often slip and end up talking to him in English — but as much as possible, I am talking to him in Tagalog.
I hope to one day introduce him to the colorful folklore of his Mom and Dad’s native country, the different slang terms we grew up with, and I hope to see him enjoying the Filipino movies his Dad and I watch from time to time. I want him to be able to carry a conversation out in Tagalog with the slightest hint of his being from New York — a tall order, I know, but something which I hope to do. I want him to grow up being proud of his Filipino heritage. For all the flak that we get as a damaged culture as others would term it, I am proud to be Filipino, even in this land where I am just one of many shades in a raindbow of nations and cultures.
