Trixie Cruz-Angeles: Don't Call It a Costume

Don't Call It a Costume

by Rose Beatrix C. Angeles

I wondered before why we insist on calling the baro't saya or the terno a national "costume." Is it because we are only really impersonating Filipinos, and that deep inside we feel we're actually Americans or Europeans or Chinese who just so happen to find themselves miraculously transported to this backwoods country where nothing seems to work, and thus we spend so much of this lifetime trying to escape this place?

However, every so often, like in August for Buwan ng Wika, we have to pretend we live in this place, instead of thinking of it as some kind of transition point - you know, like the old tradition of Limbo. So, we dress up in what we quaintly refer to as "costumes" and make a big show of "nationalism."

Read the rest of the article by Trixie Cruz-Angeles at:

http://www.pilipino.org.ph/angeles_frame39.php

To know more about Trixie Cruz Angeles, check out: I AM TRIXIE CRUZ