FILIPINO HOSPITALITY is legendary, even if perhaps more selective in its selection. There is a supreme effort for the host to make the visitors enjoy their visit, even hosting the stay at the residence — isn’t that what the guest room is for?
With foreign guests visit, especially relatives who live abroad, there is the tendency to go beyond simply making them feel welcome. There is the need to overwhelm them with experiences. This behavior is more pronounced when the hosts themselves have been welcomed abroad by these visitors. The effort to reciprocate is almost obligatory.
With the regularity of a nurse checking the blood pressure of a patient in intensive care, we ask the guest we are treating out that question which is supposed to reflect how we are rated as a host — “Are you enjoying?” This query is repeated between courses in a restaurant or at every stop on an out-of-town trip. Filipino English causes the transitive verb (to enjoy) which requires a direct object to dangle intransitively. Enjoyment, after all, needs to have an object of desire. (Are you enjoying the oysters?)
Intransitive verbs, like “swim” or “sleep” do not need to have an object. One can correctly ask her guest — are you sleeping?
Still, this dangling transitive verb conveys what a Filipino host is truly concerned with — not a particular experience, but the guest’s state of mind. The question is asked repeatedly to check if the feeling of utter delight is sustained. Hesitation, on the part of the guest who has answered this question enthusiastically in the last 20 minutes, is viewed as a sign of the host’s inadequacy. (Or maybe it’s jet lag?)
The menu of activities to offer depends on how long the guests are staying, the number of hosts (other close relatives) offering to attend to them, and the interests of these visitors. Do they like karaoke, binge eating of lechon, beaches with white sand, a less hectic schedule with plenty of rest in between outings like malling?
The question of enjoyment comes fast and furious during mealtimes, at least five in one day. (You should try this chicharon. It has clingy fat attached to the skin.) As the guest is masticating a meal of chewy pork innards cooked in its own blood, all eyes are turned on him for facial clues. (Was that a grin or a smirk?)
The thoughtful guest needs a collection of superlatives at hand to respond to the host’s repeated question on the state of enjoyment. It is not enough to give a simple nod to a question which requires imagination and a bit of poetry.
Here are some acceptable responses:
This is the best beach resort I’ve ever been to. It beats Honolulu.
Is this what they mean when they say “jackpot”? (Okay, that needs some work.)
Are you sure your house has not been featured in Architectural Digest? Look at how your indoor garden highlights the homey ambience of the place. And that mosaic-tiled pool looks so inviting.
Pinch me to prove this is not a dream.
For food only, and not to be used when being introduced to a person, sound effects can be employed… mmmmmm, ngawwww, oh… mama, mama, mama. These verbal punctuations can be accompanied by body shivering and fluttery eyelids, maybe a tongue sticking out. (So, you liked the bangus belly?)
It is a social offense in this part of the world to show annoyance with the question, “Are you enjoying?” Or the variant, “Did you enjoy?” Not to be used as responses are the following: Hey, you asked me that already… Can’t you see I’m trying to eat here… Yes, yes, yes, are you happy now… Uh, it’s okay.
When the question no longer comes up, it is an unmistakable sign that a guest has overstayed his welcome and is starting to irritate the hosts. Hospitality turns first to annoyance and then contempt, and finally into mild revulsion. Behind the guest’s back, the hosts then exchange nasty snipes at the expense of the unwary guest who is ironically happy to be finally left alone. The host wonders, sometimes aloud, “When is he leaving?”
At this point, the guest may finally be looking forward to going home… and finally enjoying himself.
Tony Samson is chairman and CEO of TOUCH xda.
