Category Archives: Parents & Children

by Richard Ramos as originally posted Who or what is the Pinoy Millennial? at the Philippine Online Chronicles.

One should suppose that it is inevitable that each generation will have unique characteristics, all of which have been shaped by what has been happening in their times. If Generation X is known for its open-minded and philosophical bent (perhaps as a result of higher living standards and a reaction to the last decades of the Cold War), then what is Generation Y – The Millennials – all about?

Getting it right
The first thing that we should qualify is: what generation exactly are we talking about? Some people think of Millennials as those who were born in the 1980’s all the way to the early 2000s. However, still others think that Millennials should only be classified as those who have not experienced a life without the Internet, or were at least in on the rise of the online community. Whatever the case may be, it seems that if you’re in your early thirties or younger, then you’re probably a Millennial, if we’re going to go by age.

So, what are the big attributes of Millennials – and more importantly, Millennial Filipinos?

Is it all about “me”?
One glaring aspect – be it positive or negative – is the Millennial trait of being concentrated on the self. In the most negative of cases, you’re talking about a certain sense of entitlement, of how everything they do is designed to turn out in their favor. Even their shallowest habit – that of taking selfies at inopportune times – can be traced to these factors. With Filipinos, this can be a cultural one-two punch, as the younger generations are no doubt less community-minded, in the sense of formal institutions like the Church, Family, or Government.

On the other hand, even if they do have a narcissistic complex, they can also be very caring when it comes to their friends. Millennials definitely exhibit extreme loyalty at times to their friends – provided their friends are the same way. While parts of these closely-knit personal networks are based on a certain amount of selfishness and a need for a “custom-built” social structure, it can’t be denied that when it comes to Millennials, friends are family.

Instant everything
Millennials are not very patient. All you have to do is look at your younger cousins, brothers, and other family or clan members to realize that more and more, patience is becoming a scarce virtue. And it’s no surprise – after all, everything can be found online. Information is literally on-hand, and communication is a press of a touchscreen button away.

If you think that this is an exaggeration, think of it this way: Before the advent of the Internet or even SMS messaging, people had to call each other up to make plans to go out. This actually made people prepare well, dress up well, and basically treat being with each other as valuable time. Now that the younger ones can keep track of everybody from their mobile devices, keeping in touch isn’t a matter of being face to face: seeing them onscreen is good enough. Welcome to the instantaneous world of Millennials!

Wealth and materialism
This may be a good or bad thing, but Millennials are very much aware of the need to have the means to keep their lifestyles at a level they find comfortable. On the good side, this means that many young Millennials are preparing better for their careers, and are willing to work harder and at stranger hours then the generation before them. You need look no further than the rise of the call center industry to see how much they are willing to sacrifice many things, simply to make sure they have the resources for the lives they want to lead.

On the other end of the spectrum, Millennials can also be more susceptible to falling into questionable practices because of their needs. It’s not unheard of across the generations to see young people get into drug-dealing and prostitution, but Millennials may have a higher percentage of people who go into it willingly, and without much trauma – after all, for them, it’s just another way to earn money.

Distance
If the Gen-Xers were able to detach themselves intellectually and emotionally from older institutional and cultural patterns (hence the philosophy and need to change things), Millennials have taken this to an extreme, with many of them feeling detached or alienated from major social and institutional structures. They don’t feel like religion is addressing their concerns, and the government is just bureaucracy that gets in the way. Family is at best sympathetic, at worst another social layer they simply have to withstand.

How do you deal with Millennials?
The very first thing you have to understand if you’re not a Millennial is that they have a very different way of processing information. Millennials can process a very large amount of information, but at the same time, they don’t necessarily understand the deeper meanings or connections in the information that they have. For them, they prevent information overload by not thinking too deeply about all the information that they know. Millennials definitely know more than Non-Millennials (that must be accepted if you’re going to get anywhere with them), but when it comes down to thinking things through, Millennials may not exactly be the best generation for that.

Illumination, then, is one way to connect with them. Accept that they know more stuff than you do, and that they can access information far faster than you ever can (after all, they are the first generation to master living in a world with an online component). Make them understand, however, that your experiences and your method of thinking can give you a different insight that they may have missed. If there is anything a Millennial will like to hear, it’s a properly-given point of view.

Dealing with their emotions is probably much more complicated than normal, since by nature many Millennials (Filipino ones in particular) are suspicious of the older generation. Do you remember that thing about having intense relationships with their friends? Well, if you aren’t a friend yet, then the best you can do is be a friend to them first, until you become a person that they think of as a friend – there’s a very important distinction there. However, don’t be surprised that once the door has been opened, that it can still slam shut at the slightest provocation. For many Filipino Millennials, though they hope you won’t be like the others, they will still be jaded enough to logically think that you will revert to type as one of the “oldies.”

A final understanding
In the end, understanding the Filipino Millennial is accepting that they can be very intelligent, very profound, yet at the same time very shallow, and probably yearning for something much more than they can grasp or understand immediately. And if you really want to connect with them, you will just have to know that they really are more complicated than just being the “selfie generation.”

By Richard Leo Ramos as originally posted at the Philippine Online Chronicles.

For many Filipinos, parents are seen with a somewhat confusing dichotomy: while they are, short of one’s life partner, the most beloved of people in one’s life, they can also be the ones who can embarrass you the most, or be the ones that you would practically consider as your worst enemies – if they weren’t your parents.

Now, most people would probably argue: isn’t that similar to how parents are viewed everywhere else? Well, the truth is, Pinoy parents tend to have their own ways of doing things – things that we may not necessarily agree with, until we become parents ourselves.

Working for your education
Pinoy parents are, by nature, obsessed with making sure their kids graduate. However, this can take on many aspects, depending on the type of parent you have.

For some, it is a matter of tradition. You have those parents who want you to take up a course that – for them – will be stable. Thus, we see many people getting management degrees, and, in the recent past, nursing courses (to take advantage of the perceived need for Filipino nurses abroad). This is probably taken from the Chinese part of our heritage, where the immediate idea is that we should have the best tools for success – in this case, having the right education. Now, this sometimes works to great effect, particularly if the parents or many family members are well-known for being influential in a particular aspect of business. However, this can also cause the most amount of angst, particularly if the child’s natural inclinations tend to be very different from the “right education” as the parents see it.

Still, that hasn’t stopped Pinoy parents from working to the bone so that their children can afford to have an education that they think will be the best for their children. In fact, for many families from the lower social and economical classes, the idea of education as the inheritance holds sway.

Love it or leave it, Pinoy parents will do practically everything in their power to make sure their children will have the best education they can get.

Tough love and being spoiled – at the same time
Pinoy parents have somehow mastered the art of giving both tough love, while at the same time allowing their children to enjoy moments when they are indulged. Of course, the degree of both sides depends on many things. For example, some parents are, by nature, very strict. However, they will indulge their children on reasonable requests – if they have done something right. For others, they give their children what looks to be a very pampered lifestyle (depending on their financial capability), but with the understanding that they should also work hard to be worthy of it.

However polar those two ideas are, the fact is, both ideas rely on one thing: the way that Pinoy parents treat their children seems to revolve around a reward system for doing well. Even the most permissive and liberal Pinoy parent will always have “something else” or “something better” when their children do well.

On the good side, this parenting style can teach children that they should work hard for what they want. On the other hand, it can also horribly backfire, by also teaching them to be more materialistic and needy. It really depends on what the parents show as their values, while at the same time it also depends on what the rewards are.

In the worst-case scenario, this idea of a reward system can even be twisted such that the child will end up acting out on default, just so they can always get something to “keep them in line.”

Is this a good idea or not? Well, that depends on the execution of the idea, and how it works on the children. Needless to say, there is no way to find out, really – until the children grow up.

“You’ll take care of me when I get old!”
Before we hear all sorts of negative reactions to the title of this article section, let’s be honest. Many parents do have it in the back of their heads that their children will be the ones to help them in their old age. However, the big difference here is that how their children will help varies for each family. In my family’s case, my parents – my father, specifically – do not expect us to take care of their major financial needs. In fact, they don’t want us to worry too much about them. Yes, they do ask for some expensive gifts every now and then for their birthdays or for Christmas, but their living expenses are all their own. I know that this can be a sharp difference compared to other families, since in my partner’s case, the parents are usually helped out by the children, in that the children share in living expenses such as utilities and groceries. In the case of larger families, the older children are even expected to take care of the younger children’s tuition expenses and other such things, particularly if the parents are already near retirement age.

Some children, as expected, do not react well to this implied situation, but in truth, there should be no problem. After all, they’re your parents! Pinoy parents also inculcate the idea of the young taking care of their elders not because of self-preservation, but simply because it’s the right thing to do.

The “final word”
One very Pinoy trait when it comes to parenting is the “final word,” (isang huling salita). This simply means that at some point, once the term has been invoked, the parent’s orders or ruling on something is considered law. Yes, some children can still appeal, but short of solid evidence, a cute presentation, and a lot of cariño, the parent’s word will remain law.

This parental finality is probably a very good idea to implement, particularly if the parent follows a more liberal way of bringing up their children. It probably won’t be as effective for stricter parents because, well, in their case, everything is with finality.

Why are Pinoy parents so bipolar in the way they approach parenting?
Pinoy parents, much like the influencing cultures in the Philippines, are a mix of East and West. Because of this, they embody some very traditional ideas, while at the same time trying to keep up “with the times” and give their children a more liberal background. Sometimes it works out, and sometimes it doesn’t. However, one thing is for sure: Pinoy parents always want what is best for their children. It’s just that when it comes to execution, your mileage may vary.

“Parenting,” by Leonid Mamchenkov c/o Flickr.com

By Julie Fuertes Custodio, as originally posted at the Philippine Online Chronicles.

Please don’t get me wrong, I am not judging how the kids these days behave. This article will merely point out the things we do, in my opinion as a parent and as a teacher, that may hinder the way our children grow up the way we want them to. This will not try to compare one generation to the other in terms of which is better and will not indict “bad” parents and extol “good” ones. Having said that, let me just write down my thoughts and those of some other adults I know when the topic “Kids these days” come up.

1. Kids these days need to look up and look around more. You don’t need statistics or testimonials to know that most of today’s young people  have their heads down on the glaring and moving graphics of their electronic gadgets. Sometimes it makes us wonder if they know what is going on around them at all.
2. Kids these days are easily bored. Whether waiting for their turn at the doctor’s clinic, waiting for the food orders to arrive or waiting for the school service to come pick them up, they are bored. Parents see to it that they manage their time wisely by providing them with things that will entertain them: electronic gadgets.
3. Kids these days rely heavily and put emphasis on fast: Fast food and fast internet connection among others. Delayed gratification is something they need to learn because the truth is the truly good things in life are earned the long and hard way, with much patience and perseverance.
4. Kids these days are emotionally involved because of the technological advances including how fast and how graphically the news are delivered. Should children know in detail things that are happening elsewhere whereas they know nothing about what is happening in their own immediate environment? Should they be exposed to the violence happening around the world without understanding the impact of these things in their lives? Should we allow our children to read and watch things beyond their understanding?
5. Kids these days should learn how to form, think of and write their own opinions and not rely on what they read online. Everything is available in the internet. At the click of a button or a tap of a finger, they are able to copy and paste research work painstakingly done by others without reading and understanding the contents, oftentimes without acknowledging the author. There are a lot of cases too where they just copy and paste unverified work without checking other sources.
6. Kids these days want to work with computers. Nothing wrong with setting the mind to work using computers in the future. The question is, are there children who would want to work in the agricultural and fisheries sector, the human aspects of running a business, the face-to-face management or utilization of the hands and creativity in work-related tasks?
7. Kids these days feel empowered because they know they can get what they want easily. Parents feel they have to give the best to their children, beyond what they need.  They do not want to see their children having less than their peers, as though this would make their children mediocre or deprived.
8. Kids these days feel entitled, that is, that that the world owes them what they want and when they want it. This sense of entitlement can prove to be a fatal disappointment when things don’t go the way the children expect.  At this point, even when the children have grown to be adults, they will be having difficulties dealing with rejection, being denied the things they want to have and do because of the realization that they need to work hard and wait for the results.
9. Kids these days feel that they can handle all the challenges thrown at them because Mom and/or Dad are there for them at all times. We cannot always “clear the path” and face the adversities for the children to merrily make their way to their goals (which more often the parents have set and not the children themselves).
10. Kids these days are so dependent on the yaya to do simple tasks for them like getting them a drink of water, carrying their lunch boxes or even getting their clothes from the cabinet.

Parents should think about the long-term effects of their parenting style. Parents should guide the children to make their own decisions and choose what steps they should take to realize their dreams. Remember that you parents can’t be with them 24/7. There are a lot of life lessons and life-changing decisions that children have to make on their own in due time but if they know what to do and have been guided properly, then there is not much to fear. Parents should not be in competition with other parents or families because all children are unique in their own way. How should we deal with the kids then?

• Teach your children the proper way to “fight” their own battles using their own strategies and those that you have taught them, with you as their role models. Walk your talk because these children see you as the benchmark for the words of wisdom you lovingly throw at them.
• Let them know they are loved even if they can’t have the expensive toys or gadgets that some of their classmates or friends are enjoying.
• Teach them about responsibilities and chores and pride in the work that they have accomplished themselves.
• Teach them to appreciate the simple things like having fun without gadgets.
• Teach them that needs come first before wants, that working hard to get these things will help them realize that not everything can be had at the click of a mouse or a tap on the screen or a tantrum on the floor to get their message across. They need to learn to wait and that sometimes, the answers vary from “yes”, to “no” to “wait”.
• Be consistent with your home “rules” and “policies” and make sure they are not too  harsh nor  constricting nor too many to follow.
• Try not to live your dreams through your children by helping them cultivate their own dreams and not yours because it is their lives, their happiness that they will live with even when you are gone.
• Above all, build a strong CORE foundation for a happy and healthy future that you envision for them: a strong character and a moral fiber like an inner compass that guides them to the right path.

by Minehaha

I do not really brood about dying. But it crosses my mind, now and again. It makes sense to think about it, death being one of life’s few certainties, the others being taxes and change.

Thus have I made a living will – simply a dos-and-don’ts list for when or just in case – God forbid – I could no longer express my will as to advance health care I get to receive. (Example Do feed me by nasal tube if I temporarily couldn’t swallow my food; don’t and I mean doncha ever slash my windpipe just to ease my breathing.)

Thus have I composed my own (tentative because a bit too mushy) epitaph – “She looked for the meaning of life… and found love.”

And now I want to make sure I am making memories.  Happy, funny, delicious memories that would be the stuff of family conversations long after I’d have gone.

In other words, I want to be remembered laughing.

No, silly, I don’t mean a remembrance of laughing me or me laughing. A laughing image of me would be hard to conjure.My smile is really a smirk.And I have this annoying habit of suppressing laughter, no thanks to an early blemish on a front tooth, which though long ago corrected has left an incorrigible tendency to avoid showing teeth at all cost.

More to the point, I want my family and friends to laugh laugh laugh when they think of me.

I want to be associated with things funny and happy and quirky.

Like my penchant for getting lost.

I want them to chuckle when they say: “Remember when mom got lost when we went on pilgrimages to Antipolo, to Agoo? Remember how she spent the night in a stranger’s house in Agoo, sleeping on the floor, and then taking the first bus to Manila the next morning?” And someone would probably add, giggling: “She got lost, too, shopping in Mega Mall.” Hopefully they will forget their mom had the temerity to get angry and scold them and insist THEY were the ones who strayed.

I want them to roll on the floor laughing when they recall my fashion style that dotes on shoulder pads, blouses worn back side front, stirruped pants, buttoned up collars, passionate-red lipstick, and a fluffy “banged” hairdo. Surely, someone would remark how I’d get pikon if anyone so much as snickered at the piquancy of my wardrobe. They had no way of knowing then — had they — that they could laugh their butts off, with permission, when the time comes.

They should also remember, smiling and with matching lip-smacking, my lengua, kare-kare and embutido – rated the best in the world by a six-person, panel of tasters, never mind that they are biased and possibly intimidated by sharp looks from the cook.If I get lucky, they would also drool for my deep, dark, mmmmmoist chocolate cake, never mind that it is unevenly layered, sloppily glazed and iced and always in danger of toppling over.

I am sure they would get hysterical recalling how on one occasion, while intending to replenish kare-kare in a foodwarmer at a party held at home, I poured a bowlful of lengua instead.  Thus was born a “fusion dish” that would forever be associated exclusively with my cooking: “Karengua.”

A quick survey of my children’s memories told me they remember the mom of their youth:for unfailing Friday night pasalubongs (that could vary from hopia to belekoy to doughnuts to siopao depending on the state of her temperament and wallet);  for shopping trips that usually ended at Goldilocks;  for Christmas gifts that usually overreached her capacity to buy.

And wouldn’t they guffaw when they remember one Christmas I got remote-control cars months ahead of the holidays.  How I kept them in what I thought was the most out-of-reach hiding place.  How they discovered the toys and then stealthily played with them weeks before Christmas, with mom in the office blissfully ignorant that the surprise gifts have been prematurely found and pre-empted.

They would, of course, also remember unsavory things, like her being pikon when corrected, her tendency not to listen to explanations, and her uninspired housekeeping– but these are of course to be glossed over.

These days, I try  (and often succeed) not to impulsively vent out when I get pissed out. I put brakes on my tendency to nag, scold, criticize, complain, whine.

I have come to realize – I hope not too late — that motherhood is all about building memories. Memories not of a perfect mother, but of a fallible, all-too-human, funny-without-trying mom.

Unlimited hours. No breaks.

This video contains a powerful message which you need to watch till the end.

This is about a fake job where it was posted online and in newspapers at a company called Rehtom Inc. with the job posting: director of operations with these requirements

The requirements sounded nothing short of brutal:

• Standing up almost all the time
• Constantly exerting yourself
• Working from 135 to unlimited hours per week
• Degrees in medicine, finance and culinary arts necessary
• No vacations
• The work load goes up on Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year’s and other holidays
• No time to sleep
• Salary = $0

Even if I knew it was a fake job interview I was still caught unaware at the end.

Watch this: