Week Thirty Two: 10.13.18 Part III

Part III

  In this country it is very hard to work and go to school. Something I also noticed was that people judge a lot here. Why? In America people judge all the time. But we’re taught that it doesn’t matter what they think. It matters if you’re happy. Here, what other people think controls what you do. And I learned when I was junior high (Grade 6 to 8) that living that way is stressful so I stopped caring about other peoples’ opinions and it gave me control over my life. I was able to determine my own happiness.

  Now I’ve gone off on a tangent. Sorry everyone. To answer another question… I don’t know who will be the one to take care of my Inang after my Uncle Krilo but the other purpose of the position is ‘who will take care of the family house’?

  The concept of a family house is really neat. In America, the family house is my Auntie Loca’s house. Everyone goes there to stay. I think the house before hers was my parents’ house when we lived on Grape Creek Road. One day, I hope to buy that area again. I have dreams about it. I don’t know why. But because of the dreams, it makes me want to buy the land.

  Overall, I want everyone to know that despite all my complaining today I’ve learned a lot since I’ve come to this country. However, I, myself, cannot act fully like them. I wish that I could but some things that they do I’ve trained myself not to do because it sets off my anxiety or my depression or it is flat out too stressful.

  Many people here look up to me because of my individualistic nature. I had to learn how to live with minimal guidance. Luckily my moral compass points in a just direction so I haven’t turned out to be on the bad side of the human population. I try to guide the people who ask me for guidance. But I also have to take in the cultural differences. I usually tell the person, “The American response would be…” vs “the Filipino response would be…”

  It’s hard for me to care about what strangers think of me. I care about what people think only when they are interactive in my life. And even when they state their opinion, I don’t live by it. I tell them that I respect their opinions but I’m going to do what I feel is right.

  People here care about what others think so much, it makes me wonder how they deal with the stress of letting others control their life. I stopped letting the person who were controlling my life have that authority by the age fourteen. I was so worried about what they thought, what they wanted, and how they wanted me to live that I was not happy with myself.

  Here, as long as the family is happy then everyone’s happy. And that’s not true. But I can’t change the people here. I don’t want to. I try to understand why they live the way they live and right now the main goal that I have is to learn the languages. When I’m writing like this I can think in perfect English. However, my spelling does go on an adventure because of the way I have to think on a daily basest.

  In person, my English has changed to try and adapt to the people here. I try to make myself understandable but not everyone does that for the people around them. I want to thank you guys for listening. I’ve said a lot today. I’m going to be posting this in three parts to try and spread out my notifications. I don’t like making people read too much when they’re trying to ‘checkup on me’ so if you’ve made it to the third post, congratulations.

  I know that many people read these because I see the amount of ‘reads’ on my blog and it makes me happy. Thank you all for caring about me. All of you want to see me succeed on my journey and I’m going to try my best. Even though I’m stressed, I know that I can push through it because of the amount of support I get from back home.

  I haven’t been posting pictures and I’m sorry about that. I’m going to do my best to keep you all updated and the reason why I’ve split this into three parts is because I need to post consistently. I’ve started to write on my laptop and I will transfer the post to my blog after I transfer it to my flash drive. Once I’ve done that, whenever I’m at a computer shop(Internet Café), I try to schedule post.

  As of right now, I have 5 post waiting to be scheduled. I also want to post my essays because I think they’re important enough for you all to read. Everything that I write about is a rough draft to the question ‘how am I going to improve the education system’ and I feel that all of you should read over them. I’d like to hear suggestion or remarks. Anything from y’all.

  I do know that many of you want me to do vlogs. And if I do eventually get around to it. I will keep them at a 5 to 10 minute average because it will allow me to post more. Although, it is difficult to post video because of how long it takes to upload these things. I can make videos and they’ll sit there. When I finally get around to them they take an hour if not longer to upload and it’s dreadful to sit there and wait for the file to upload.

  People have asked me if I have a youtube and I do. But I don’t use it. I think what I should do is have a topic for 5 minutes and tell y’all about it as much as I can. I don’t know how that’ll work but I do want to try. I’ve had to touch back up on my Wattpad so for those of you who have a Wattpad please follow me and I’ll follow you back as long as you tell me that you’ve followed me.

  Continue to tag me and message me. Please, if I don’t answer after a week, message me again because I have to use my messenger every day and many messages go unseen if I’m talking to more than one group or more than one person. I receive at least 20 different threads a day. 20. So just remember, I’m not ignoring you, I’m flooded with messages. Message me again to push your notification to the top. Tag me in anything funny, anything interesting. I don’t care what it is.

  I miss everyone. I’ll be home between semesters for sure. I love you guys. Thank you for listening. This is part 3 of 3. If you want to read Part 1 (here is the link) and if you want to read Part 2 (Here is the link).

DJ/CHO/NAR

Week Thirty One: 10.13.18 Part II

Part II

  Mom always has to complain about something. Whether it’s my dirty room, or if it’s something even more abstract… That’s how she shows that she cares. And it took me a very long time to understand how to function with the way she speaks. Many people think that I’m rude to my parents.

  I won’t deny it. I treat them pretty roughly but we’re not close and when we are together… Well, my mother is going deaf. She can’t hear me when I say something, so she’ll make me repeat it, around the third or fourth time, I’m shouting and then she gets upset because she can tell I’m yelling. But she heard me.

  It has always been a constant battle with my mother. And it took someone else to figure out why my mother and I have never been able to sync. I knew that mom and I had a culture barrier. But I didn’t know how to fix it and I didn’t know how to approach it. Until Volour laid it out for me. I was so annoyed. It took him a moment to see the culture effect on me and how it reflects on the ways my mother acts.

  Anyway, so the first position of taking care of Inang was designated to my Uncle Krilo. My mother is the financially ‘responsible’ one, and lastly, my Uncle Toto is the one who is considered the highest authority. This position as ‘highest authority’ cannot be given to a female. My family in San Emilio is very old fashion so men are ‘the most responsible’. When the truth is, you cannot be given the ability to be responsible. That is something that is learned. My Uncle Toto has pouted in front of me. I don’t think he’s done that in front of many people. I found it amusing.

  This grown man, about to becoming one of the financial responsible people in the family was pouting. I asked my uncle what I needed to do. And he sat there! He was fed up with what had not happened yet. He was stressed. It got to the point where I told him, “Alright. I’ll be right back.” And I proceeded to do what I needed to do without him.

  That act, usually is considered very rude in my family. I did not allow him to choice what I was going to do next. Instead, I saw how he was acting and acted on my own. I got the files I needed and returned to my uncle. He was surprised. Oh, she… got things done. Yes! Yes I did.

  My Uncle Toto and I have not be able to sync much. He reminds me of my mother. And he’s strict. I can handle him being strict. But. I can’t handle his unpredictable way of acting. He has a habit of inserting himself into people’s schedule and expect them to make him the first priority and I can’t do that all the time. I try to adjust to him but sometimes the fact is, people can’t stop what they are doing in the middle of doing whatever it is. Some can, but it depends on what they are schedule to do at that time.

  This next generation of responsibility is falling into my hands. At first, I did not think that I was considered one of the people in power but the truth, I’m my mother in this case. I’m the next person in the generation to take over that spot as of right now. I get the money from my mother and disperse it where she wants it to go. The next person who should be in this position is my eldest sister. However, I am the one who is physically in the Philippines which is why the responsibility falls into my hands.

  My cousin Malikai is the next person chosen to be in authority. However, he has never had to finance himself. He has never had a job. And he doesn’t know how to prioritize. I’ve asked him to get something done for me because I have to depend on him. However, he has not followed through. And at this point, I’m going to assume it will not get done.

  When I first got here I didn’t like my cousin. He is closer to my mother than I will ever be. He might as well be her son. I don’t feel that connection with my mother. I felt jealous. But I don’t feel that way anymore. The whole point of these positions in the family is to get as many people over to the U.S or get them overseas so that they can give back.

  Another thing I should mention is that if a person is gay or lesbian (mainly gay so for the guys)… They are not allowed to have one of these positions. The most responsible cousin I have is gay. And he has a degree, he knows what it’s like to work, he makes his own money… He is the one I consider to try and get to America because he has earned it.

  The next person who is supposed to get to the U.S after my Uncle Toto is my cousin Malikai. However… I’m going to let my mother deal with that because I see how my family acts here and I don’t like it. I like that we all eat together. I like that I have a family. But what I don’t like is to most of my family members, I’m not a person. I’m a coin purse.

  This is something that I’m not supposed to do but if my mother says that I need to give to a person, I don’t always. I don’t always because I know their habits. I know what will happen to that money. It’s like magic. To these people, they don’t know how to invest in their future with their money. They don’t know how to save…. These people are not financially literate.

  If it was up to me, I would teach them how to be financially literate. I didn’t learn how to be financially literate from my mom. I learned my eldest sister. She was the one who taught me how to finance. It’s simple really. When you get your money, you put the bills first, and you make a goal for a backup. That way, after you’ve hit your backup plan amount, and you’re able to pay your bills, the rest can be invested in something else. But not everyone gets that.

I try to keep each post to a one thousand word average so this is part two or three. If you did not read part one the link is here (link). Thank you all for tuning it. You’ll hear from me soon.

DJ/Cho/Nar