In The Beginning...

       So what makes these fellow Filipinoes compete to step at their fellow Filipinoes?  Where they chase around bosses and kiss their asses with all their charms and what-not?  Where they tend to boast every little thing they have (or even don't have but fantasizes on having) just to make you feel they're better than you?  It's frustration.

       Its not about "crab mentality" or any of those sickening traits pinoys have.  It's just that they can't take the Korean people's abuse any much longer.  But they can't do anything about it.  So where or who's the outlet?  It's the new guy.  Just another innocent pinoy who just arrived in this forsaken country.



       Fresh from the Philippines, I was used to being friends with almost everyone.  Regardless of how some so-called friends treat me back then, I am keen to find new friends when I arrived here in South Korea.  I aimed to please, so much, that I'm doomed to become gullible.  The fool that I was.

       First days on the first company that I work for, each pinoy started flashing their self-acclaimed titles.
"I'm the boss in this department."
"I'm in charge of assigning people."
"I'm the guy the boss talks to when it comes to foreigners."
"I'm the pioneer of foreign workers in this company."
"I speak the best Korean amongst all pinoys."
"My words are as good as the boss's orders."
"I'm the best worker."
"I'm the most all-around."
"I'm the most in-demand 'cause I've been through all the departments."
Seriously?  In the beginning, my eyes twinkle.  I thought I'm surrounded by superior Filipinoes who became experts on their fields.  I thought I'm in the good crowd and I was comfortable to be guided by them.

       In the end, all their claims are worth nothing.  Some of them get fired.  Some of them quit because the boss just didn't care.  Some of them sent to other departments for being incompetent.  All of them are just plain fucks.

       In the earlier years I've lived as a brownie here though, I slowly realized why these people became such.  A lot of them are just naturally insecure.  But some of them just had no other outlets.  Korean bosses, officials, or even just an ordinary fellow worker, as long as we're foreigners, we were looked down on... and treated so bad.  So bad, it'll drive the kindest person on earth to a suicidal maniac.  But since we're poor, we have no other place to go, we could only keep on bearing it.  So what to do?  Nothing but petty, cheap, and stupid, things.  Things that would make you feel just a bit better than someone else.  No matter the cost, it'll make you feel better.  Enough to face another emotional and psychological abuse of the day.