Twighlight Zone

When living abroad one is likely to encounter many odd customs and other cultural peculiarities, but as far as the Philippines go I had been under the impression that I had seen it all.  My wife and I recently made a trip to the town of Iloilo on the west side of Panay island and there I realized that I had not seen it all yet.

The Philippines are such a unique and cool place to live because it is such an odd mix of culture.  It is definitely Asia but about the only thing that gives it away as Asian-aside from the obvious Asian blood in the inhabitants, is the addiction to rice that is uniquely Asian.  Other than these obvious giveaways you might be confused about what part of the world you are in.  The truth is that the Philippines have much more in common with Colombia or Mexico than they do with Asia.  The island nation's separation from the Asian continent had allowed the population to develop uniquely before the Spanish showed up, but after the Spanish arrived any trace of their Asian heritage was intentionally eliminated.  If you were to ask a Filipino about their culture before the Spanish changed everything, they almost certainly would draw a blank.  About the only thing they have left of their thousands of years old culture is the food.

The catholic church has absolute control of anything they want within the Philippines and they use their power to keep the people ignorant and breeding.  Basically a well oiled machine cranking out babies that will eventually pay tithe unquestioningly.










As  my wife and I were getting our groceries the other night in Iloilo the loud speaker began playing some religious babble about the virgin and blah blah blah.  Not exactly crazy, but it would be unique by most standards I think.  If it had stopped there it would really not have hardly even registered as anything on my desensitized travelers radar.  But as I approach the front of the store I realized that the entire mall was frozen, every head bowed, eyes closed.  Then in unison a thousand-plus people started doing hail Marry's where they stood.  They didn't stop at ten and I am not sure if they went beyond twenty but it took them a while and effectively shut down the entire mall. 

That was the second weirdest thing I have ever seen in the Philippines (as far as cultural oddities).  The first weirdest thing was my neighbor keeping her dead gramma in the living room for three weeks with the body on display while the family and friends got drunk and had a three week BBQ.  That is just standard operating procedure over here when someone kicks the bucket, there is much wailing and gnashing of teeth.