Anatomy of the Filipina: Foreigner Connection

Nowadays, you cannot go around town without bumping into one or two pairings of an elderly Caucasian and a Filipina girl. I say girl because most of them are just in their late teens or early twenties. And this is true to most part of the Philippines at present.

The ever growing phenomena of a provincial young “pinay” being carried off to the mother land of her alien boyfriend or husband has been around for centuries. This was made possible by the now obsolete pen pal writing and matchmaking of relatives abroad. In this day and age of high technology and the wide reaches of the internet, statistics multiply daily. These long distance affairs are carried out thru e-mails, chats and phone calls. Next, the American or Australian or European boyfriend would come over for a visit. These would then culminate in a grand wedding (by local standards) attended by all the brides’ relatives and no one from the groom’s family. A happy ending? Not for all, I’m afraid. Most of these lasses end up taking care of their geriatric husbands for most of their young adulthood, trapped in unhappy marriages. Others are even more unlucky, ending up with physically and psychologically abusive husbands. Sadly, these often go undocumented. Only the worst cases like Filipina brides entered into the sex trade by their non-Filipino husbands or murdered for insurance get reported in the news.

There is nothing wrong with an interracial relationship or marriage per se, it’s the obvious discrepancies of the couples that make observers wonder if these pairs are getting involved for the wrong reasons. Petite, wide-eyed, innocent gals as young as 18 years old clinging to hulking Caucasians, or it could be the other way around, the girls leading gray haired retirees on canes as they go around local malls and parks. People wonder if these pairs are genuinely in love with each other or are together for their own selfish agenda. Girls who should be in college but can’t afford to are instead embarking on young marriages. They have more difficulty making the relationship work because of the cultural differences and various adjustments they have to make in their new worlds. Instead of enjoying their youth with family and friends, they are forced to venture into unknown futures in the hope of forging out a better life. The reality that poverty is making our nation’s future – the youth, turn a blind eye to the dangers of marrying men they barely know and heading off to strange shores is sad. They would rather take their chances than die of hunger in this third world country of ours.