Interlude #9 - Connections

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Hello everyone. Kumusta ka! Welcome to today’s episode. And it’s an interlude episode, which I have a feeling is a type of episode that is not super popular, but admittedly, I can’t verify this. FYI, Squarespace isn’t the best podcasting service if you want to be able to run analytics. Partially because you have to remember to link your analytics service to every episode, which I don’t always remember to do. Not on time, anyway. 

But that’s not the point. The point is that this podcast is… While it’s not technically about me, it’s information about Filipino culture filtered through the lens of me as the person who is discovering it. In my mind, that justifies the interlude episodes. But also, this makes it possible for me to make a very firm distinction between myself and this work. 

And that’s surprisingly important to me. I get it if that doesn’t make much sense to you. A lot of what I do when it comes to making my shows might not make sense to you. But I promise there’s a rhyme and reason to it all, even if I’m the only one who sees it. Well, sometimes… Sometimes maybe it just helps me keep everything somewhat organized. And it helps me channel certain voices or perspectives. Kind of like characters. 

Or maybe--in the case of some other details--it’s about a potentially unfounded peace of mind. On my other podcast, Miscellany Media Reviews, I’ve taken some potshots at people who didn’t necessarily wrong me but did not live up to the expectations they set for themselves or people I just didn’t mesh with. None of that is anyone’s fault, and so they shouldn’t feel put upon or attacked or called out in any way. And maybe, true, they recognize my voice. But it’s been years and without a set name they can pretend that they actually don’t know me. A lot of people did a lot of that over the years, so they have plenty of practice. 

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But part of that is not giving my name. Part of it is keeping details vague. Like how exactly I’m trying to work on that episode on Felipe Landa Jocano, a proflici Filipino anthropologist whose work is largely out of print. But I have a connection to a bookstore that is earnestly trying to hook me up, and while I would love to shout them out for doing this during a pandemic, I feel like I can’t. Because what if they can’t actually help or that comes back to bite them in some way. Or something, something, my brain is a bit overly anxious.

Anyway, something came up when I was researching Jocano that… Well, I feel like I have to talk about it. Not even just because of what this podcast is but in the context of, well, everything. Because it settled something that I did not know I had to deal with. Almost like, when you have a really bad bout of allergies that lasts for several weeks, and you forget what it was like to not have allergies. I was dealing with something and quickly forgot what it was like to not deal with that thing. And so my perception of normal adjusted accordingly. Until now. When I suddenly stopped having to deal with it.

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But I need to stop with that introduction and get on to the actual one. Felipe Landa Jocano, the country’s first and foremost Filipino anthropologist, was a young man who really had to work for his education. Born the ninth of eleventh children, his family couldn’t afford to send him to high school. So he ran off and did it on his own. He stowed away on a boat to Manila and worked a series of meager jobs to pay his way through school and was sending money back to his family all the while. Until he graduated, of course.

And then he made it to college, but an illness forced him to return home. Which… actually worked out in the long run. And I mean that genuinely because it was this time at home that turned him into the scholar we ended up needing. It was that return home that sparked his interest in folklore when he was working at the National Museum. He was cleaning out the remains of specimens during the day, and during his free time, he was writing articles for the Manila Times about the mythology surrounding animal and plant life. And that got the attention of the Department of Education who used some of that material for their textbooks.

In time, Jocano was able to get his Bachelor’s degree from the Central University of the Philippines but with grant money available to him, he pursued his PhD. At the University of Chicago. And that--dear listener--is where things got interesting. 

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Because, well, I went to the University of Chicago for a master’s degree. I graduated fairly recently, in fact. And this was partially an attempt to satiate my desire for academics, but while at the same time also kind of being done with it. I mean, there’s only so much schooling one can handle before they’re ready to at least not be a full time student anymore. And I didn’t know if I had hit that point or not. In many ways, I did want to be a professor, but there was a lot about the profession that I did not want to deal with, so it was a matter of running a true cost-benefit analysis. And those things are hard when you’re dealing with emotions and sentimentality and things that don’t have hard values attached. So that master’s degree, not a PhD mind you, was me testing the waters. At a super competitive school where--as they always said to us--fun goes to die. 

I’m not even kidding. I heard that a lot when I was there. 

But this program also gave me the ability to move to the city with training wheels on my bike. Thanks graduate student housing office. You were pretty much useless any other time. Also now, my salary is about $3,000 higher annually with this advanced degree than it would have been without. And that was a fun pay negotiation with HR.

But that’s… It’s not that that’s all I got, but that program had its faults. And it was the sort of program where you had to know what you wanted to get from it in order to really profit intellectually. Or that’s what someone I knew who had completed the program told me. But at least I came in with the right might set. It might have been a choose your own adventure, but I thought I chose a pretty good one. All in all, I thought I got a lot out of my brief time at the University of Chicago, even if it wasn’t the intended takeaway. 

However, I’ll be the first to say that, well, it never felt like home.

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And it’s not that UChicago was outwardly hostile. I mean, it kind of was. But it was in the ‘fun comes here to die’ sense. Not in the targeting certain people for being different sense. Or at least I didn’t experience that. It was never a direct attack. It was more like… Well, the question seemed to always be: what right did I have to be there? Not in a personal sense, yet again, but my program was largely seen as a way to subsidize the education of others. Whether or not that was accurate, that’s how it was treated. And when I didn’t mention the program in conversation, it was more like why don’t you have the equivalent of a six piece luggage set under your eyes. Because you know “fun comes here to die” isn’t just doing nothing. It’s pushing yourself way too hard academically. And to answer the question, I did not have a six piece luggage set under my eyes because I did not particularly enjoy my misery. I mean I used to. But not anymore, thanks counselling!

I was working hard. My grades were good, and maybe I could have gone for a PhD if I thought that was what I wanted to do. It just wasn’t what I wanted to do, and it’s a pretty intense commitment, so you better be sure. Not that anyone necessarily believed me. It’s not that anyone believed I couldn’t be effortlessly brilliant or even brilliant in a more balanced sense. But everyone had to earn their place despite already technically having their place. And I didn’t want to play that game that way.

Or that’s what I would say because that’s what I suspected. But in many ways, I can’t truly know. But I can know that there weren’t really any alumni put forward or shown off that looked like me or were Filipino themselves. And the fact that the University likes to champion diversity which made the whole thing even stranger… If I’m making sense. Like I would have expected to know about or be told about other Filipino alumni and from their experiences at UChicago I would have borrowed some legitimacy. Not that I didn’t have any of my own. It’s just nice to know you have someone behind you or figuratively ahead of you. I don’t know. The metaphor is starting to get a little crossed. 

Really, it did not change much. This not having a role model who was like me. Or so I thought. But no one likes feeling that they don’t belong. And I don’t want to fight for some sort of place where I needed or wanted to be. Or was told be. But it was weird, seeing that Jocano went there was like… Well, it felt like I finally could call that place a temporary home. Retroactively. I’m long past it, but I did have a place there. I had someone who walked that path before. I had a connection to it.

Suddenly, I almost feel nostalgic about graduate school. Which is weird and needlessly dramatic, but that’s how I felt. I knew I did have a place there. A weird kinship sort of place. Which was really just the final piece in the larger puzzle. Or it was like a really bad family reunion. I don’t know. 

(sigh) But hasn’t this entire global terribleness been a reminder of how much we need connection? To talk to each other. To feel connected to each other. Present or not.

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Ultimately, when we talk about representation, I think this is an important part of it. Representation in fiction is important, yes, but it hits at this from a different angle. It’s almost like how sleeping well and eating well are both good for your health. You can’t eat your way out of sleep deprivation and you can’t sleep away terrible food-related decisions. You need balance in both. Even if one kind of helps the other. And I think for people, you need fictional characters to latch onto and real life heroes to look up to. Admittedly, I’ve struggled to have both over the years.

But hey, like a bunch of people, I can take my issues to podcasting. Not just this one. But The Mountain’s Heart, an audio fiction show from Hugot Podcasting. Find it wherever you are currently listening to my voice.

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This show is a production of Miscellany Media Studios with music licensed from the Sounds like an Earful music supply. If you like the show, consider leaving a review or following us on Twitter @miscellanymedia or @hugotpodcasting for updates on more content like this. Thanks.

Source: Cruz, Vida 10.28.2013. "F. Landa Jocano, anthropologist and UP professor emeritus, passes away". gmanetwork.com. Diliman, Quezon City: GMA Network, Inc. Last checked 5.16.2020