Are we insensitive or do white people feel entitled?
aka
Are we humble or are white people too proud?
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Are we comfortably mature or are white people whiny and childish?
There were three incidents which made me ask these.
1st: We were lined up in front of Landmark Makati's grocery side waiting for a taxi along with a slew of other families and people. My mother, nephew and I were patiently in line. Other people were not but members of their family were lined up for them. Those people who were not in line were waiting at the sides whilst guarding the bags of groceries they purchased. The line was moving slow. In front of us were two white males animatedly talking to each other. My mother and I were all paying attention to how slow the line moved due to the scarcity of available taxis when a cab finally did arrive. Us who were in the middle of the line watched hungrily as a man who was in front of the line opened the cab door and called his family who was waiting outside the line to enter the vehicle. To which one of the two white males loudly protested at this perceived injustice and literally pointed his fingers at the family members hauling their grocery bags towards the cab.
"They're not in line!" First white male said.
"They're not in line!" He repeated.
The second white male sensibly responded, "I think they're together."
"They're not in line, we're lined up here waiting like everyone else."
First white male's protestations was further piqued when the family members entering the cab smiled quietly but good-naturedly at them the same way other people in line also were.
So were we.
Second white male tried to pacify his friend by insisting "I think they're together. They were just waiting outside the line."
That didn't stop first white male though nor did he try to understand what was going on, nor did any of us cared to explain.
Us: If these guys are looking forward to be beaten up, they should take this attitude to a Manila alley and get stark raving mad not in front of middle class shoppers but amidst a group of drunk male videoke revelers. That way he'll not only see injustice, he'll feel it.
2nd: I was at SM Makati buying a bag of flavored nuts. I was at the cashier putting the change in my wallet making sure to distance myself from the register because my transaction has been completed so I was at the far edge of the counter. Though I was still there, the space for the cashier was open for anyone to freely come up to - yet this old white dude with his brown female companion decided to stand behind me. So the cashier called on him to come up and go around me. He then loudly replied: "But she's still here."
I proceeded to close my wallet and take my nuts with me and left.
Me: "I am not going to enable your sense of entitlement by ushering you towards the cashier. This is Manila. This is not the deep South. Not that we aren't polite to tell you that you could proceed ahead, we're just being real by allowing you to find out for yourself what you need to do. What, you want me to bring out a blackboard and draw an arrow towards where you're supposed to walk so you can get to the cashier? What are you, 5 years old?"
3rd: Just this week, I was at Glorietta. I was thirsty so I proceeded to go to the second floor of the mall to buy a watermelon shake at Big Chill. Walking towards it I saw a white woman leaning by the railing and looking at the list of Big Chill's fruit shakes. When I approached the Big Chill cashier and ordered a regular-sized shake, the white woman approached the other end of the stall and spoke to the other Big Chill staffer who was preparing the shake. The staff didn't reply or say anything to her as the staff was busy preparing my order. In the corner of my eye I saw the white woman stay for a micro-second more waiting for the staff's non-reply. And then she left.
Me: Admittedly, I felt guilty by not looking at her or acknowledging her presence or her thirst for a fruit shake. But, I also didn't expect her to leave that fast seemingly hurt that she wasn't paid attention to by the staff who was busy doing her job or who probably didn't hear her or who probably - like her - is as fearful of speaking with a foreigner lest their conversation get lost in translation.
All these reminded me of the below clip. I found this Simpsons scene funny maybe because it's true.
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