In the AAPI community, Filipinos stick out like a sore thumb. As a Southeast Asian island nation that was colonized by Spain for 300 years, the Philippines is definitely a unique country.
Since I've started college, I'm thrown myself into Asian communities. I've attended conferences, joined organizations and I go to church with other AAPI-identifying students. Even though I love being Asian and being around other Asian people, I definitely feel a little awkward being in East Asian dominated spaces. I love it, but it's awkward.
Here are a couple of things that make me feel awkward as an Asian-identifying Filipino person in an East Asian dominated community.
1. Trying to use chopsticks.
How do I use them? They are a mystery.
I feel so awkward when I'm eating with East Asian people and I'm the only one who doesn't know how to use chopsticks properly. I'll make a bold attempt for a good three minutes before throwing those things down and resorting to using a fork and spoon.
For real though? What do y'all expect from a group of people who eat like this?
2. Wanting to try Korean skincare products, but knowing that you can't because they have whitening effects.
I really want to hop on that BB cream boat with my Korean friends. Really. Their skin looks amazing. But all the good Korean brands I want to try out use skin whitening chemicals in their products. I'm naturally brown (and I love it), so unfortunately, I'll have to skip out. (Cue tears.)
3. Being a Garcia in a room full of Chois, Lees and Changs.
I feel like this speaks for itself.
4. East Asian languages.
Reading or hearing Japanese:
Reading or hearing Korean:
Reading or hearing Chinese:
It hurts my head to look at other (East Asian) languages. Tagalog is easier to read.
I do have an appreciation for Chinese, Japanese and Korean calligraphy and language, but I'd be lying if I said that they didn't make my head spin. Japanese and Korean are smooth sounding, and I'm very partial to the Korean language. I'm not a huge fan of Chinese because of the tones, but I admire people (especially non-natives) who speak the language because it does sound really difficult.
When it comes to calligraphy, I'd say that Japanese is easiest on the eyes because it looks simpler compared to Korean and Chinese. But East Asian writing definitely makes my head hurt after looking at it for a while, especially since Filipino languages and dialects use letters instead of characters. It's not that I don't like it. I'm just not used to it.
5. Knowing that I will never seem Asian enough compared to them.
Asian-American / Pacific Islander is this huge umbrella term that we all fall under, but unfortunately, us Filipinos are generally deemed "less Asian" than our East Asian counterparts. Plenty East Asian people are also guilty of thinking this way.
Not only is this hurtful to us, but it's harmful to the rest of the Asian community. Since Filipinos (and other non-East Asian AAPIs) aren't seen as Asian or Asian enough, issues specific to our own communities tend to be ignored. The model minority myth is problematic and is definitely an AAPI issue, but it mainly applies to fair-skinned East Asians. Brown South / Southeast Asians like myself aren't expected to work as hard or be as successful as East Asians are.
I'm not saying that East Asian problems aren't important. I'm just saying that East Asian folks tend to dominate conversations in the AAPI community, and we need to make room for other groups of Asians to speak out.
Filipinos have so much more to talk about than the model minority myth. We want to talk about immigration. We want to talk about colorism. We want to talk about colonialism. We want to talk about representation.
Just hear us out. We can do this together.
