I COME from an upper-class family in Manila. Pursuing my education abroad, I have always had the luxury of returning home twice a year. I have lived in five countries and visited more than 22. After trotting the globe a fair bit, I have learned to love the Philippines for much more than what I originally missed it for?the food. I love it for the beauty of its land, its ever chaotic present, and its resilient people. There is clearly no other like it.

Many times, I have felt that peculiar, overwhelming surge of nationalism: while dancing the ?Tinikling? in front of 3,000 people at the Royal Theater in Victoria B.C., serving as cultural ambassador of the Philippines to a United World College, talking about the great 16th? 8th century Manila Galleon Trade, seeing Manny Pacquiao win various boxing titles. I have even even bragged about Imelda Marcos? infamous collection of 3,000 pairs of shoes. I am furious at common Philippine stereotypes abroad, and I get mad at foreigners who skip my country while going on a ?Southeast Asian tour.? I love my country dearly and boast about its mangoes and beaches on a regular basis.

But every time I am surrounded by hundreds of OFWs at the pick-up belt at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport, I know that my love for my motherland is a luxury. I know that if I were not the privileged young and idealistic person that I was brought up to be, I would have found it quite difficult to love the Philippines.

I don?t blame people for thinking that the Philippines is a hopeless case. Sinking deeper and deeper into crisis and debt, our Third World inefficiencies (long queues, corrupt leaders, massive flooding, garbage landslides, sunken ferries) are undoubtedly frustrating. There was nothing liberating about the recent hostage crisis at the Luneta and its bloody outcome. At the airport almost two years ago, I cringed at Gloria Macapagal Arroyo?s chin-up pose/faraway look, with the optimistic Ramdam ang Kaunlaran logo printed at the bottom as I imagined the First Gentleman gambling the country?s wealth ($680,000) on his first night in Las Vegas.

Before the global financial crisis, the nation?s youth were preoccupied with taking up caregiving courses in hopes of leaving the country to earn any other stronger currency. Meeting young people my age in Mindanao in 2006, the only person I talked to who wasn?t enrolled in nursing was taking up computer science. Some 3,000 Filipinos leave every day to work abroad, joining 8 million others. A physical therapy assistant in New York told me once that my bachelor of arts double-major was a ?course ng mayaman.? It is true. For most of the Third World, money is essentially linked to happiness. There is no money in art history or foreign languages, and I sometimes wonder if my rich hippie friends in Portland, Oregon, simply convinced me that self-fulfilment is more important than financial reward.

Centuries of subjugation?not only by our infamous colonizers but our own leaders who have always prioritized their egos over the country?s welfare?have made it possible for us to develop such an intense inferior complex. Why is it that we always look outwards and never inwards?

We take for granted this rich archipelago of islands that countless land-locked countries would envy. We take for granted that our country is one of only 27 mega-diverse countries. We take for granted a rich cultural history that could well provide us with a vision for the future.

The same pride that the Filipinos have in our ability to speak English well also spells our downfall. We do not love our own tongue. Upper and middle-class babies? first words are often in English. People fail to realize that our ?mongrel tongue? is a natural linguistic process that has bred a unique, competent, complex, beautiful-sounding language that reflects the nation?s history. What other powerful tool can unite us but language? I scoffed at Linggo ng Wika and folk dance practice for years while as was studying in all-girls Catholic school in Pasig. Today, I wish I could say that my Filipino formal writing is of the highest caliber, and that I knew more than just that one dance I had to learn from a videotape recording.

Every time somebody asks me if I would ever go back to the Philippines after I finish my studies, I cringe inside. Always being put on the spot by family, friends and emigration-hungry folk, my response is always a yes. I have always considered it a luxury to be able to say so.

Andrea Liamzon, 23, is a market researcher at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City.