Pinoy Kasi
Different loves
By Michael Tan
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 02:54:00 12/03/2008
Filed Under: Human Interest, Books
“Why is yawning so contagious?” one of my students asked last week. It was a class in anthropological theory and the question is actually quite typical of what we anthropologists deal with: the reasons we humans are the way we are.
That question came back to me on the plane, as I was reading through “Belonging,” a wonderfully eclectic collection reflecting the subtitle: “Stories of Relationships.” The editor, Erlinda Enriquez Panlilio, notes in her introduction how humans have been on this planet for so long and yet “have not mastered the fine art of negotiating our relationships.”
Nature did give us a head start for socializing, and contagious yawning is an example. Scientists are still probing into our brain for more detailed explanations, but they pretty much agree that this you-yawn-I-yawn sequence seems to be part of the evolution of group behavior. We are one of many animal species on the planet that are social, and imitative yawning seems to be one of those unconscious mechanisms that develop with that sociality.
That’s a long introduction to saying we are actually quite social, governed to a large extent by many biological mechanisms that we may not even be aware of, from huddling to imitative yawning (and, have you noticed, coughing?) and empathy, which includes sharing other people’s feelings of happiness, sadness, tension.
Some animal species, insects in particular, have more complex “societies” than our own, with a strict “caste” system and division of labor. I put “societies” in quotes because it is only humans who transcend the “social-ness” imposed by biology. We can retreat and choose to be alone, enjoying our solitary existence, but often enough, we return back to society, finding ways to bond with particular people.
Society gives us rules, saying we must bond with people like parents and siblings, but humans can choose to limit the relationships we build, sometimes even exploring relationships with people that our society identifies as “enemies.” Still another complication is people who choose not just to be asocial but antisocial, thriving on quarrels and conflicts.
“Belonging” gives us insights into how Filipino society structures our relationships. There are 24 contributors on all kinds of relationships. Not surprisingly, spouses and lovers account for most of the contributions (Joi Barrios, Libay Linsangan Cantor, Jhoanna Lynn Cruz, Rina Jimenez-David, Sarge Lacuesta, Danton Remoto and Linda Panlilio herself), followed by relationships between parents and children, including adoptive ones, one ninong and a stepmother (Marily Ysip Orosa, Rowena T. Torrevillas, Xin Mei, Alfred A. Yuson, Ricardo M. de Ungria and Rina David’s fellow Philippine Daily Inquirer columnist).
Siblings come next (Myrna Almario Adriano, Simeon Dumdum Jr., Monina D. Enage and Rica E. Villalon), followed by sibling-like best friends (Ma. Cristina Olbes), sisters in a religious order (Sr. Mary John Mananzan), a grandson and his grandparents (Ed Maranan), a teacher and her students (Edith L. Tiempo), a student and his teacher (Gemino Abad), and, perhaps the most easygoing yet intensive relationship, a human and her dog (Alya B. Honasan).
All the accounts are first-person, except for one: that of a dancing instructor, as retold by Dean Francis Alfar. The DI’s story is one of the earliest, leaving me feeling a bit like I was reading showbiz gossip, but then in a way, all the stories are really the authors gossiping about themselves, in different moods. Most are celebratory but not in an unrealistic way. Some of the stories are unsettling, reflecting Linda Panlilio’s observation about how difficult relationships can be. It’s important to read, and to know, about the pain that comes with many relationships, and how even the most serious efforts to keep relationships alive may, in the end, fail. Read, for example, Sr. Mary John Mananzan’s “Sisters in Christ,” which shatters the myth of the placid, uneventful convent life.
Auditory feasts
You’ll find that while each contributor focuses on one particular relationship, the essays are about many other people as well. You can’t talk about Filipino parenting, for example, without referring as well to a “cast” of thousands: spouses and lovers and grandparents and vast networks of friends.
The many characters that permeate the stories mean a “noisy” book, an auditory feast. There’s a lot of pleasant chatter in the stories, including the religious in Sr. Mary John’s story. I felt like I was sitting next to Ed Maranan as he shared snatches of conversations with his grandparents. Linda Panlilio’s essay, on the other hand, is not just about her husband but a whole clan, and you can practically hear them as they move in and out of the stories. Readers will be treated to the joyful chaotic din of reunions as well as collective angst, as in Xin Mei’s description of inter-ethnic (Chinese and Filipino) relationships, amid the clatter of mahjong.
Xin Mei’s story is one of several that remind us of the ambivalence, often bordering on prejudice, that society has about some kinds of relationships, as I encountered for adoptive parenting. There are also two contributions focusing on lesbian and gay relationships, the difficulties made lighter in Danton Remoto’s “Love and All its Chuvaness,” with its entertaining (and self-gossipy) accounts of motley boyfriends, from a baker (which upset his father, who fumes about the class background of a “panadero,” or bread maker) to doctors and lawyers.
I’m tempted to assign some of the stories in “Belonging” to my anthropology classes to get students to dissect Filipino culture. For starters, there are only nine males among the contributors, and two used poetry to bare their souls. It is amazing how long the shadow of culture is, including the difficulties males have with disclosure.
“Belonging” does show how our relationships can challenge the norms. The best example, I felt, came with fellow columnist Rina Jimenez David’s “A Marriage of Equals,” describing how an already gender-friendly husband (he actually knew how to cook, and to iron clothes, which Rina didn’t when they married) continued with his odyssey of gender awareness.
The book is an easy read but it’s bound to get you thinking about your own relationships. Don’t look for success formulas here. We are not ants governed by instinct. We are too wonderfully different, with so many different loves and different ways of loving, to kowtow to biology alone, much less to society’s prescriptions and proscriptions. “Belonging” offers us glimpses, fleeting yet fulfilling, into the ways we navigate those relationships, all too often clumsily but also, often enough, masters of our intertwined destinies.
“Belonging” is published by Anvil and should be available in the bookstores by now.
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