The following nonfiction piece is part of the anthology Filipinotown: Voices from Los Angeles, edited by Carlene Sobrino Bonnivier, Gerald C. Gubatan, and Gregory Villanueva. This collection of essays about Los Angeles in California was released earlier this year and is now in its second edition (with teachers' guide). Thanks to the editors for including my work. The book is available at Amazon.com.
The
Truth About Filipino Old Timers
Cecilia
Manguerra Brainard
The very first O.T. (Filipino Old Timer) I heard about
was the man who returned to Cebu to marry my mother’s friend, a spinster
advanced in years. During afternoon meriendas,
I overheard the development of this alliance.
A crusty lady set in her ways, my mother’s friend refused
to migrate to America and the newlyweds lived in her seaside town. It was a
poor place which relied only on the sea’s yield and he quickly grew sick of
eating fish and rice. He longed for steaks, broccoli, and asparagus; he wanted
them both to go to the United States. She adamantly said no and finally he
returned to America alone.
I got the idea that O.T.’s were displaced human beings
after seeing another O.T. in a travel agency. A quiet man with skin like
stretched leather, he stood solemnly while his relatives made arrangements for
his quick return to the U.S. His children had bought him a round-trip ticket
from the U.S. to the Philippines and back. He had not been home in over forty
years; it had been his dream to return. But after just a few days in his
hometown, he became very unhappy and wanted to leave.
When I was a graduate student at UCLA, I became scared
when an O.T. began trailing me. I was shopping in Westwood Village, and later
he even rode my bus. I managed to lose him, but I sometimes wondered why he did
that. That summer when I lived with my friend and her uncle, an O.T. – the one
married to an ex-nun – I was also puzzled when he followed my friend and me
everywhere. I would discover years later that these men, who had generally been
isolated from Filipino women, took pleasure in just looking at and being with
Filipinas.
After seeing more of California, I made a mental picture
of where these Old Timers worked – on the farms of Salinas; in the canneries of
Monterey, perhaps in the Portola Sardine Factory. I imagined Temple Street
before the freeways, the raunchy bars and restaurants where they hung out. I knew there were few places where these men could socialize in during the 1940s. Sometime, somewhere, I had seen a poster saying: No Dogs and No Filipinos Allowed.
I created a stereotype of them, and I pitied these old
men who had labored under California’s scorching sun, who were not allowed to
marry white women, who had only one another and their card games and their whisky.
It was Tony who wrecked this mental picture.
My husband, son, and I used to live in an apartment in Los Angeles, where Tony, an O.T., lived in one of the downstairs apartments. I felt sorry
for Tony. He was a small man who wore floppy fedoras, loose coats and baggy
pants. I compared him with the elderly in the Philippines who were surrounded
by abundant children and grandchildren. I remembered having to kiss the hands
of my grandfather and granduncles to greet them. I projected everything I knew
about O.T.’s on Tony and I almost wept when I told my husband about him.
My husband said Tony seemed fine, that he had seen him
exit from a bar down the street. Of course, I retorted, the poor man is
so miserable, he’s driven to drink. I adopted Tony as a mental relative of
sorts; after all, we were both strangers in a strange land.
I never spoke to him because he was a very private man
who came and went without any fuss.
There were, however, occasional strange sounds that came from his
apartment. Once, on the way to the laundry room, I walked by his bathroom and
heard what seemed to be an animal in great agony. I thought nothing of it.
When Christmas came, I gave him a box of See’s candies.
“I thought you’re Vietnamese married to a G.I.,” he said. The very next day he
came knocking and handed me a larger box of See’s candies with an enormous red
bow and plastic flowers. He didn’t say anything; he just gave me the box and
left.
As the months passed, Tony continued coming and going as
before, and I continued entertaining this vision of him as a pathetic old man.
But in the summer, I had to change my view of Tony and about O.T.’s in general.
One night there was a terrible commotion from Tony’s
apartment. My husband and I peeped out our window and saw the manager with two
policemen in front of Tony’s place. I was sure they had found him dead or hurt.
In the morning we hurried to the manager to find out what
had happened. “Oh,” she said – she was a German lady, large with red
hair—“nothing to worry about. This happened before.” Our eyebrows shot up
questioningly and she explained that Tony had girlfriends who sometimes moved
into his apartment. “The giggling and goings-on coming from that place!” she
added. Tony apparently wanted his current girlfriend to move out but she
refused, thus the hassle.
It took me a while to absorb her words. My husband
laughed but I stood there thoroughly puzzled. I had all these ideas about Old
Timers, about Tony, I had to rethink things.
Now when I see Old Timers huddled over their card games,
my first instinct is still a wave of sympathy, but I just think of Tony and I
chuckle and wish them a good hand.
-end-
Read also
The Turkish Seamstress in Ubec
Tags: Filipino, Filipino American, Philippines, Philippine American, immigrants, old timers, old men, Flips
Tags: Filipino, Filipino American, Philippines, Philippine American, immigrants, old timers, old men, Flips
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