A Migration Story from the Philippines
The Ati-Atihan Festival is celebrated yearly in the Province of Aklan. The festival is a celebration of the Feast of the Santo Niño, the Holy Infant Jesus. Masks like Anna's are worn during the festival and there is a big contest at the end to determine who's was the best.
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Anna did eventually adjust to the differences in the U.S., those unspoken norms and slang terms that we like to throw around so much. However, not everyone sees Anna as a U.S. citizen. When asked if she ever experiences discrimination here in the U.S. because of her status as an immigrant, Anna had this to say: “All the time! Yeah, all the time. Um, and I can’t even give you a specific point, but it’s sort of like, I know that it matters. It’s been easier in certain places. I was in San Francisco and it was just okay. I think people are a little but more tolerant of seeing different people. In L.A. it was fine. There is a big Filipino community. I won’t get mistaken for being Vietnamese, Thai, or Fiji. It’s sort of like a lot of questions. Like, “Where are you from?”, and stuff like that. That’s the question I get asked, especially after having moved to Arizona. It’s a question that I’ve learned not to really answer. I just sort of ask back “What do you mean?” Because I think that it’s such a loaded question. Like, I would consider that, well I am Filipino American. I mean I was born in the Philippines, but I was raised here. I feel that I'm actually a little bit more comfortable living here cause I’m more used to the lifestyle. So yeah, when I get asked, ‘Where are you from?’ I don’t answer it. I ask, ’What do you mean?’ Then you get to really see what people are asking. I would get questions of like, ‘How did you get here?’ Especially with immigration being such a political hotbed in AZ. You know people wonder, what was the pathway in which you came here (legal vs. illegal). Moving here I realized early on that this is a place where race really matters. Like it matters a lot more than it did in the Philippines. But here it just seems like it matters to a point that it can become discriminatory. I mean, back in the Philippines your ethnicity mattered there and the region where you came from mattered, but not to the point that you become excluded from certain things. Or that it becomes a determining factor for how you have access to certain resources. I think that’s the biggest lesson I’ve learned here.”
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Ati-Atihan Festival Mask |
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