We were watching the American Independence Day celebrations at the Hollywood Bowl in California, 3 cousins, 3 sibling and I, when the question hit me. It was right around the time John Fogerty (used to be of Credence Clearwater Revival) sang "Rolling on the River" when it hit: Is this or is this not Heaven?
I have only been in America for just over a month so I certainly cannot answer this question with a high measure of certainty. Even so, there's a lot to be said for first impressions. So what do I think?
America is a do-it-yourself culture. You either do it yourself or seek expensive help from a Mexican. 2 salient if controversial points emerge from that observation. The first has to do with the availability of tools and material kits to fix everything from plumbing to floors. This is do-it-yourself (DIY) heaven. But one must have a bit of aptitude for mechanics to do-anything-yourself well and so it is not surprising that some do-it-yourself projects end up in more skillful hands. The Mexicans are like most of us Filipinos. The colloquial term is "all-around". They do carpentry, masonry work, fix cars, etc.
But terms like "Mexican" or "Latino" cannot help but remind us of the issue of race. Is there a consciousness to race here? One can sense it although people do not really talk about it openly. Which is just as well. Racial tension is seems almost inevitable in a place where immigrants slowly begin to represent the majority of Americans. Spanish is spoken all over aside from English. At Hollywood Bowl I observed Asians, especially Filipinos, were everywhere. They spoke mainly Tagalog though Bisayan is also common. Only in a single isolated incident with my sister's neighbor did I encounter racial bias here. But then this "ugly" neighbor can hardly be considered representative of the culture itself.
Thus, in a sense, although racial sensitivity has not disappeared here, this is a kind of racial Heaven where prejudice is simply considered unacceptable and even illegal. People do consider themselves primarily American but this does not mean they do not try as best they can to root themselves to a home culture. Thus, there are Filipino neighborhood associations which celebrate the common fiestas from back home. Filipinos trade recipe for Filipino dishes although they are not at all averse to eating steak cooked the way Americans like it, which is grilled just so.
But, of course, the main issue to resolving the question, Is it or is it not Heaven? will have to do with the issue of lifestyle. Who has the better lifestyle? The Filipino in his home country or the one working abroad?
Californian Filipinos work very hard. Sometimes they do Sunday shifts. But they also make more money than they could in the home-country. Suddenly, a house and cars and electronics for entertainment suddenly become affordable, not just affordable. they are also a necessity. There is a lot of motive to work harder here. American culture places a greater value to time and productivity. You can make more by working harder, and so this is definitely a working-person's heaven.
But the pace of life is also as fast as traffic on the freeways, nothing below 55 miles an hour. 65 on the average. Californians do not have a well developed public transportation system. So they do spend quite a lot of time driving themselves to and from somewhere. Places and kin are ordinarily far from each other. And so it is much lonelier here definitely than back home. It is such a loneliness as would strike the first-visitor like a slap of cold air. I imagine I would have to be absolutely motivated by something to survive here more than a short month. So how do the expatriate Filipinos deal with it? Some live alone in big houses. They do have friends but most of the time there is only work.
I suppose you could get used to it. After staying here long enough developing your own network of support and social interaction this could become home to you. And if I cannot imagine myself staying longer here than I did, I suppose that could be because home was somewhere else, indeed, the place from where I came from and to where I must return.
In the end Heaven is a purely personal and relative concept of place. Heaven is where we feel most at home.
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