Being Filipino in Honolulu

I was not given the traditional Hawaiian lei when I set foot for the first time at the Honolulu International Airport late in August 2006, but I brightened up when I heard the taxi driver, speaking in a familiar accent, asking me where I came from.

“Are you Filipino?” I shot back. “No, sir, I am Ilocano,” he replied, glancing at me with a smile in his rearview mirror. I smiled back, amused at the reply.

I thought it was my first and last encounter with Ilocanos. I was mistaken. It did not take long for me to realize that Ilocanos comprise the majority of Filipino immigrants in Honolulu. Most of them are in Filipino-dominated communities like Kalihi (where I stayed) and Waipahu.

To my pleasant surprise, I found them in supermarkets, in fast-food chains, and in department stores—always willing to help a fellow Ilocano who was still learning the Hawaiian way of life. I also had very pleasant dealings with Ilocanos in government offices and in churches. I would learn later that roughly 30 percent of the Catholic clergy in the Diocese of Honolulu (covering the whole of Hawaii) are Filipinos, most of whom are Ilocanos on a “loan” agreement with the Archdiocese of Nueva Segovia (Vigan).

But it was among the ordinary Ilocanos in the streets, two of them in particular, that I found inspiration to counteract my longing for home.

My first meeting with  Manong  Julio was at the bus stop. But he was not waiting for the bus like me; he was rummaging through the garbage bin, in search of empty plastic bottles and soda cans.

He looked much older than his age, which he claimed to be 60. His face and skin were dark from long exposure to the sun. His salt-and-pepper hair was more salty than peppery. But he did not look at all like the garbage scavengers I knew back in the Philippines. He was clean-shaven and dressed neatly in a T-shirt with collar, denim pants, and branded rubber shoes.

Manong  Julio was alone when he first arrived in Honolulu. When he obtained his US citizenship some years back, he petitioned for his wife and their three minor children. Left behind in their hometown of Bangued in Abra were their four other children who were past the cutoff age when his petition was approved.

At first,  Manong  Julio lived with his brother’s family. He had reached only the sixth grade in the Philippines, and the only job he qualified for was as a helper in his brother’s landscaping business—trimming hedges, mowing lawns, etc.

When we met, he was still working in that landscaping company together with his eldest son who was putting himself through college. With his salary and his wife’s income from selling fruits in the market plus the additional income from the recyclables that he was collecting daily after work and during his days off,  Manong  Julio was able to send a maximum of $300 a month to his other children back in the Philippines.

Manang  Rosing’s Ilocano accent gave her away when, one late afternoon at the bus stop, she replied to my question on whether the bus going to the valley had gone by. “Yes, serr,” she said. Too tired to walk five blocks or so to my apartment and faced with the prospect of just sitting there for another 40 minutes, I engaged her in conversation.

Probably also in her 60s,  Manang  Rosing said she hailed from Ilocos Norte in northern Philippines. She came to Honolulu early in 2006 after spending some three years in South Carolina with a daughter who had petitioned for her to come to America, to care for her daughter’s children with a promise of remuneration. She had agreed, seeing an opportunity to work and help her other children in the Philippines.

But her intended financial assistance to her other children did not materialize. She narrated to me how she had slaved away, caring for her grandchildren and doing all the chores for her daughter’s household—in exchange for leftover food and hand-me-down clothes. Her ordeal ended when a close friend from Honolulu convinced her to come over and gave her a job as cleaning lady.

At the time of our meeting,  Manang  Rosing was renting a room at her friend’s house and cleaning five days a week for various clients. On her days off, she would harvest vegetables from her friend’s backyard and sell these on the sidewalks in Chinatown for $1 or $2 per bundle. At the end of the month, she would hie off to the remittance center and send $100 or $200 to her children in the Philippines. “Narigat  ti  biyag  ditoy  ading  ko,  ngem  nasiyaat  met  (Life is hard here, my brother, but I’m happy),” she said.

I stayed in Honolulu for some nine months. And during that period I had the opportunity of hearing again what Salvador, the taxi driver, said when I asked him if he was Filipino: “No, sir, I am Ilocano.”

Come to think of it now, Salvador and the others actually meant that they spoke Ilocano, not Filipino or Tagalog. Thus, I do not think they meant to deny their Filipino roots or nationality, as others have concluded.

You see, I have never met a group of Filipinos in America who are more Filipino in their values, culture, and love for family than the Ilocanos of Honolulu.

Danilo G. Mendiola, 72, has retired from corporate work and is now doing volunteer church work in his parish in Quezon City. He was raised by Tagalog-speaking parents but learned Ilocano while growing up in San Jose, Nueva Ecija. He lived in Honolulu from August 2006 to May 2007 as a CPE Chaplain resident with the Pacific Health Ministry.