lesley arca
The
I walked through the door of the restaurant
with my parents, and immediately felt this wave of nostalgia wash over me like
a heart warming dream. The sights and sounds were so familiar: two Filipino women
at a booth eating breakfast and being cheerily "chismosa", the old
lolo reading a Philippine Weekly, giving a gentle nod hello to my mom and I,
and the man at register with the smooth, clear, pale, and Asian beautiful skin
with an accent that could only say he was "bakla."
I felt such warmth when I looked at the
signs. "Tapsilog, 3 turon for $1, buffet for $6.95." They were words
you never thought would go together, bridging a transnational gap spanning
leagues of ocean to come together in a motley array of Tagalog and English. I
stared at the large bamboo plants as I obtained three sets of the only utensils
they carried: plastic forks and spoons.
Three boys and a girl walked through the
door, grabbing a Philippine newspaper and laughing in tagalog over a breakfast
of ube, sweet sticky rice, singangag, and longanisa. I shoveled my rice over my
plate, bangus then singangag, bangus and singangag over and over while talking
about college in my oh so American English. At first, I thought the sound of my
voice echoed as a dissonant chord unaccompanied by the harmony of rich
Philippine language. But then I realized, they are American. I am American. We
all sat in a restaurant occasionally glancing at the television with the
Filipino boy rockstars while John Mayer played over the stereo system, almost
drowning out the sexy eyes of Lea Salonga's picture on the wall.
"Isang tapsilog, at saka isang..."
the cashier said while I stood there waiting to pay for the bill. One of the
boys kept glancing at me in the shy Filipino boy manner of someone mildly
intrigued yet not armed with the proper tools of ancient Spanish era Philippine
courtship, especially in the presence of my parents. A Filipino-African
American boy walked in with his mother with a deep craving for fried bananas
and breakfast. I paid in dollars, at one point said "wala" and
"thank you" to the cashier, while staring intently at the Santo Niņo
and picture of the cashier's mother on the ledge above the front counter.
The sun was out, filling the yellow painted
room like a sunrise on a halfway around the world horizon, while I stared out
of the windows onto the slushy city streets. Combined, we all wore colors of
the illuminated flag.
This is Filipino America. This is
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