In the Philippines, one can say that a person like myself is an anomaly. Case in point: I’m relatively well-off and can afford to buy video games as a luxury item. To be more specific, almost a third of all Filipinos live below the poverty line, but I do not.

There has always been an undercurrent of restlessness in my mind because of that: I know I’m blessed, but I tend to not take advantage of my good fortune as often as would be thought of. Because of this, I try to avoid watching shows that have a tendency to hit close to the heart so that I don’t feel a sense of guilt pervading my everyday life.

I avoided my usual predilection towards watching Philippine variety game shows tonight, and as a result, I’m writing this now to arrange my thoughts in a more orderly manner.

There’s a show called Willing Willie (not the English definition of “willing,” mind you, but a deliberate misspelling of “willing-wili,” an adjective that means “to be amused.”), frontlined by Willie Revillame, which is basically a televised variety show and game show rolled into one whose contestants and participants are part of the lower income brackets.

I normally avoid this show because of my above-mentioned hesitancy towards thinking about my blessings and my state in life. You see, certain segments really tug at the heartstrings because, as an unspoken rule, just about everybody wins in Willing Willie. By simply being there, you get gift packs, and lucky contestants are given money just for participating or performing their talents for the audience. Sometimes, people win because the host simply makes it so (for instance, an old lady gets the chance to participate in an oversized ring-toss game, and Willie will catch the ring in mid-air and place it in a 10,000 peso spike).

How do you make a game where everyone wins amusing? By letting people tell the stories of their lives, and of their situations in life.

The real reason why I wanted to write this today is because the story of this one father really gnawed at my soul. You see, his twin sons (who are nicknamed Pula and Puti, or Red and White) found out that Willing Willie’s future theme for a specific contest segment was to have twins or triplets be part of the contest. They asked to be a part of the show, and their father did everything in his power to make their wish come true.

The twins are actually part of a brood of seven, and the father single-handedly has to raise them, seeing as his wife died some years prior. He can barely afford to buy food for his family, and education for the kids isn’t even an option at this point as they are simply living from day to day, sometimes succeeding, sometimes failing. He had to beg a clothes seller near his house so they would have good clothes to wear to the show, and probably had to skip making fares as a pedicab driver and goods transporter to get the two to the show.

By the end of the family’s tale, just about everyone was in tears, including myself (hell, I’m tearing up while writing this) and after the kids presented their dance, Willie gave them 20,000 pesos just for participating, to which the father, in tears, thanked Willie and the crew and was happy because his kids didn’t have to sift through trash for Christmas.

I won’t tell you about the outcome of the competition they were in because the competition isn’t the point. In fact, I’m not sure this write-up has a point. I know the money won’t last, and no real change comes as a result of a temporary boost in funds, but there is joy and hope and tears and a respite from pain for some people when they become a part of a show like that, and sometimes, I think Christmas is all about forgetting sadness for a short while.

The only thing that Willing Willie does to trump Christmas, I think, is that the joy-giving is somewhat sustainable on a six-day-a-week basis, with advertising revenue and whatnot.

In any event, don’t worry. This isn’t the Christmas post. Just a sharing of thoughts. Cheers.

This probably isn’t going to be a very popular post, since it’s Philippine-specific and all, but I thought to write about it because it’s just a really nice, friendly show to watch as opposed to what I normally see from American television.

The show I’m talking about, Pepito Manaloto,  is being touted as a “reality sitcom” hybrid, with the character story getting interspersed with videotaped survey questions from actual individuals on the street.

The story follows the life of the Pepito Manaloto and his family, a humble sort as most stories of this type start out.  Pepito is primarily concerned with trying to provide for his wife and son, and an unexpected victory for him follows. He picks the winning numbers for the national lottery, and becomes the sole winner of 700 million pesos (a little under $15, 750,000).

In a sort of deus ex machina situation to make Pepito’s life more complicated and easier at the same time, Pepito, by virtue of being the world’s nicest guy, also saves a semi-conscious woman from a car crash and takes her to the hospital (I believe he did it on foot, too).  The woman, whose name is Maricar,  is actually a financial advisor for the Philippines’ rich folk. She finds Pepito after his anonymous rescue of her and pledges to be his financial advisor. Along the way, Maricar tries to introduce Pepito and his family to the world of the rich as well as the concept of elevators and escalators.

I watched this evening’s episode along with the family, and found myself intrigued at the cultural nuances involved in this. For the most part, the episode today tried to answer the question, How would a poor person use his riches to clothe himself? Maricar took them to an upscale shopping mall to introduce them to the world of the rich, and Pepito and his family met the culture of the rich head on, with their elevators and escalators.

In an exaggerated parody of the poor man, Pepito apparently has never heard of escalators or elevators, and that they’re free transportation to higher floors. Personally it seems preposterous to me that he never would have rode on one in his life, but it still seems possible for such to happen in the Philippines, so I accepted it as such.

Moving on, Pepito and his family, now going it alone in the mall, get acquainted with the buying and selling of high priced goods. By the end of it, they find out the following:

1. Haggling of any sort does not work in malls.

2. Upscale malls are hella expensive if you’re coming from a spendthrift background.

3. Some Americans can speak the local language too, so don’t talk as if they don’t know you’re talking about them.

In the end, the Manaloto family decides to spend their money the only way they know how: by heading to the tiangge (bazaar) and buying clothes of all sorts  for under $ 4. With a giant wad of cash in Pepito’s pocket (he doesn’t have a wallet, mind you), they manage to come out with tons of clothes, all the while conserving money and probably spending less than the actual amount it would have cost to buy a dress in an upscale store. In fact, it’s highly possible that the most expensive single item they purchased was a pair of sandals for Pepito, who left his slippers outside the elevator as he didn’t want to get the elevator dirty.

If you’re bilingual and know Tagalog and English, you may want to check out Pepito Manaloto. It’s a funny, wholesome tv show that I hope will stay for quite a while on the airwaves.

FYI: Manaloto is a portmanteau of Manalo (to win) and Lotto (lottery). How apt!