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“Helping” Your Philippines Family

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Today, I’m in an ornery mood and am going to give my take on one of the most controversial and trickiest (that is if you want to stay married) issues there is in a Fil-Am marriage: how to “help” your Philippines family.

First, let’s get the basic terminology out of the way. “Help” is a euphemism for money. If your fiancee asks you whether you are willing to “help” her family, she is not talking about performing household chores when you visit her in the provinces.

I bring this subject up today because I am on a forum and a guy there is asking about it. He’s looking online for a Filipina to potentially marry and wants to shell out as little green in the process as is possible; a good fiscal conservative, I suppose. He is assured by all that some form of “help” is essential. He is adamantly against that and begins to propose strategies to avoid “helping.” Surely, he reasons, he can find a middle or upper class Pinay whose family is loaded with pesos; there must be a few single Marcos or Aquino women lying around. No, we assure him; there aren’t many attractive, young and rich women interested in a poor, aging Westerner – especially one who refuses to “help.”

Finally he decides to search for women without parents and who want no children. Yep, lots of those in the Philippines 🙂 Apparently he’s also not yet heard of lolos and ates.

I honestly don’t know how this “help” business became a Philippines-only thing. Even among Western couples, assuming you stay married long enough (and maybe that’s the problem) someday you will be “helping” some family member(s). When my maternal grandfather got cancer (I was 12) he came to live with us. My maternal grandmother had a stroke and lived in a nursing home. I was too young to know the details but I have to assume my father shelled out some cash for the care of those inlaws. In those days it was part of the deal. Few women worked and the guy paid for his family and quite possibly hers as well. And she in turn took care of everyone, including his parents. The kids stayed out of the way and learned the hard and unpleasant truth about Poligrip.

In my childhood neighborhood this was quite common. Grandparents lived with their children/grandchildren. Are we so delusional that we don’t realize who paid or at least “helped.” Today we take the elderly in less often, preferring to farm them out to assisted living centers; BTW, you all have my permission to off me with a 357 before sending me to one of those. But regardless, someone’s got to pay.

OK, this piece is getting morbid which wasn’t my intention. My intention was to tell you all to man the hell up and pay – or at least contribute.

The best way to work this all out in a Fil-Am relationship is a radical one; talk to each other about it. I won’t get into too many of the specifics of what Janet and I do and don’t do, because frankly it’s none of your damn business 🙂 but we’ve talked about it from the beginning of our marriage, continue to talk about it regularly, make decisions together, and then take action. Or sometimes choose not to take action.

I know guys who claim that they have never “helped” their Philippines family. There is a name for that kind of husband in the Philippines – a liar 🙂 OK, there’s another name for such a husband – horny. Take your pick.

I know guys who claim that they have never “helped” their Philippines family. There is a name for that kind of husband in the Philippines – a liar 🙂

I also know foolhardy guys who wildly pay for everything, wanting to improve the quality of life for their new family. Of course it’s their money and if they want to buy an aircon for every room in their family’s home, or get each of their BILs a motorbike, and each SIL an ipad, then I need to ask these fools one thing and one thing only – how do I become of member of that family?

I have known plenty of guys on both the too little and too much end of the spectrum. Eventually it hurts the marriage and they have to find a moderate solution.

The following are some of the areas of “helping” you might need to discuss. I am not going to tell you what to do or not to do (what am I crazy); I just want to list areas of consideration:
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Emergencies – I consider emergencies to involve major medical problems or funerals but it’s possible for your BIL to consider that motorcycle he wants you to buy to be an emergency. You and your wife must come to an agreement on what constitutes an emergency. I’d recommend leaving the BIL out of that discussion.

BTW, just because you agree that there is an emergency does not mean you are responsible for paying for the entire emergency. I told the story recently about Janet’s uncle’s funeral; we did contribute, but just a modest amount of the cost.

Monthly Assistance – Many couples send an allowance to help the family with recurring bills. The advantage I suppose is that sending a set amount is easy. The disadvantage is that you may not be positive how it got used. Instead of a sack of rice or two, it could be going for a motorbike payment.

Education – Many Filipinas, wanting a better life for their younger siblings or cousins, send back money for education. The good news is that private education and college in the Philippines can be quite inexpensive. OTOH, if someone mentions the term “International School,” start taking out a loan or run.

It’s not unusual for the sister married to the kano to propose the following Pay it Forward type of arrangement: “I will pay for your college and you will work and contribute to the next kid’s college.”

Misc. – Janet and I have contributed small amounts of money for a variety of things: doctors appointments, meds, school clothing and supplies, etc. The amount is generally trivial.

Of course with all this you get into the question of who pays. If your wife does not work, the answer’s simple dude – you pay. If your wife works it gets more complex; do you ask her to pay out of her paycheck or share the expense. I am of the old school way of thinking that all the money that comes in is ours jointly, regardless of whose paycheck it came from. Actually I am from the old school way of thinking that all the money that comes in is hers, but let’s not tell Janet that 🙂

BTW, if you are as lucky as me to have a really nice Philippines family (and in my modest experience most are) you will be thanked for your efforts from here until your death bed.  Everyone will remember that last year you paid for the meds, bought a school uniform, contributed a small amount to the funeral, etc. Enjoy being the hero. You don’t get those accolades very often in my culture!

 

 

 

 

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Sickness and Death in the Philippines

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Note: There’s not a lot of humor in the following piece. Next time – I promise!

Sunday morning Janet got up early to check her messages. I wasn’t surprised. Her department at work is short-handed and she sort of expected to get called in on her day off. She’s an Asst. Manager and I am very proud of her, but this crap happens all too often.

She threw on some clothes and I expected to hear that she’d gotten called in. Instead she only said, “my uncle died.”

“What? You mean the one who was sick?” Actually in my pre-awake haze I’d gotten that wrong. Another uncle’s wife had been ill and there had been several calls and drama about that over the previous week. A young woman in her early 30s she’d been going to doctors for months and they hadn’t yet solved the problem. In the end the family decided that she should travel to her parents’ home for rest and recuperation. But what to do about her three children? Her husband would come home to care for them and my mother in law volunteered to care for one of the kids, who immediately moved in with the family.

My mother in law has raised ten kids, three of whom are young and still live at home. In addition, she has two baby/toddler grandkids who live next door and spend much of their day with grandma. In fact so much of their day is spent with her that they call her “mama.” It’s common in the Philippines.

She has made it very clear that if Janet and I ever have a child and if we would like to drop off the child for a little while – oh, say six months – that would be fine with her! She’s had a lot of kids and grandkids, but no white babies with long noses yet 🙂

So it was no surprise that she took on her brother’s child so that the child’s mother could recover. Unfortunately, the woman doesn’t truly think she will recover and worries about what to do with her children after her death.

So naturally, early in the morning, I got the various family members confused. “No, not her,” Janet said. “My other uncle. Another of my mother’s brothers. You remember.” And I did remember meeting him and his being a nice guy. He too couldn’t wait until Janet had her “white baby.”

“What happened?” I asked. Take the following account with a grain of salt, because it’s third hand and told in a different language.

“His leg was hurting and they took him to the hospital in Dalaguete.” Now hospital is a misnomer here; the small town of Dalaguete, in Southern Cebu, has little more than a clinic. In the clinic, Uncle complained that the pain was greater and he could not move his leg. Though not deemed critical, the situation was serious enough that they recommended he be referred to a hospital in Cebu City.

His wife was told by friends that she ought to apologize for any arguments they had had. This is apparently a common belief in the Philippines before death, where spirits that have unresolved conflicts can’t fly free. But in her view the condition wasn’t serious enough for the apology. She and other friends and relatives sat by Uncle, who had fallen asleep, as they awaited to arrange the transfer. Unfortunately Uncle had not fallen asleep; he’d passed away in his sleep.

The family was stunned as was Janet. Her Uncle was in his latter 50s; still relatively young; younger than Janet’s geriatric husband. And he was relatively healthy.

An autopsy was performed. It showed that he’d had a wound on the affected leg and apparently an infection traveled to the brain.

Janet was devastated by the loss of her uncle. The day was spent with lots of phone conversations and Facebook messages.

And of course when a death occurs you can’t help but think of one thing – your own death.

“I changed my mind,” Janet said. “If I die you don’t have to ship my body back to the Philippines. Just cremate me.”

“Why did you decide that?”
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“It’s too expensive.”

“I’m sure I can manage. I’d call your mom and see what she wanted done. But what are you talking about? You’re 27. You’re not dying. You will at least make it till we retire in the Philippines in two years.”

“Well it’s too expensive.”

“Speaking of expensive, don’t spend much on my funeral. I don’t care – I’ll be dead.”

Of course this led to the most important question and the one that I knew was coming: should we contribute to Uncle’s funeral expenses, or more accurately, how much should we contribute?

“How much do funerals cost in the Philippines?” I asked.

“It’s very expensive. I know how much was spent for my lola’s coffin.”

I Googled it and actually found lots of information on funeral costs in the Philippines. Of course, just as in the US, you could spend nearly any amount, from 10,000P to 1,000,000P.

After some back and forth discussion I proposed a figure. Janet scrunched her nose. I wasn’t sure if that meant the figure was too little or too much. “Ask your mom how much it’s all gonna cost and then we can decide,” I said. But we certainly decided that while we were ok with contributing we were not going to pay the whole thing.

At night Janet called her mom again. After getting all the latest news Janet proposed our contribution. Her mom countered the figure – lower.

“Mom says you get a 20% discount,” Janet said and we both laughed; the first laugh of the day for Janet. In reality the amount was modest and once again showed me that for all the complaints from some expats about their Filipina’s family, I have a great one!

BTW, here’s another example of how wonderful my Filipino family is. Janet’s mom complained because her 19 year old son, now gainfully employed in Cebu City, called her 4 times to make sure she was OK. She had just lost her favorite brother and was no doubt heartbroken. But mom was amused and annoyed that the son wouldn’t leave her alone.

As with all deaths which occur suddenly, there were lots of comments all day about what a good thing it was that Uncle didn’t suffer.

My attitudes toward my own death have changed so much over the years. When I was 20 I was positive that I would “live fast and die young.” By middle age I figured I would live fairly long, not enjoy it too much and work till I died. Now at 62 I find myself at times a bit scared. I have so much to live for and don’t want to lose a moment of it!

P.S. Watching a movie Janet just leaned over and told me, “I want a baby more than ever.” We all think of our mortality in different ways. Clearly I have some work to do before I go 🙂