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Eating Chickenjoy at the cemetery in honor of my lola


My lola, Mama Etang, had a glass eye. On Halloween in our California suburb, Mamang would take her glass eye out, and greet American trick-or-treaters with her post-World-War-II-injured, empty eye socket. I think she did this because she wanted to keep the candy for herself. She was always eating candy.

My lola and me. Laurel Fantauzzo
Mamang never mentioned the day after Halloween to me. All Saint’s Day passes with little fanfare in Thousand Oaks, California, if you don’t count all the pain from Halloween sugar and alcohol hangovers. Few think seriously of visiting their dead loved ones on All Saints’ Day, interred as they are in the neatly pressed plots at the cemetery scores of miles away. Mamang did mention her love for fried chicken to me, frequently. It was my job to drive her to our local grocery store, Albertson’s, for their weekly $5.99, five-piece, fried chicken special. When I discovered her astronomical blood pressure—“High blood!" she’d cry, during a dizzy spell—I tried to buy her rotisserie chicken instead. She relented once, then grimaced, and put down the healthy roast wing I’d handed her. “Don’t you buy this again," she said. Perhaps that’s why I chose my Fulbright research grant topic in the Philippines: “Jolli Meals: The Rise of Filipino Fast Food." I’ve been reading about the rise of Jollibee, the history of burger joints in Manila, and talking to food entrepreneurs, anthropologists, and fast-food fans. Perhaps it’s my roundabout way of honoring Mamang’s tastes. But I didn’t have my research topic in mind on November 1, the Filipino All Saint’s holiday. I had heard that November 1 in Manila was, as more than one Filipino put it to me, “a big deal." I wanted to see what that meant. And anyway, the Fulbright’s mission is cultural exchange; placing Americans with specialized research projects in unfamiliar settings, with the aim of fostering some sense of international connection. As a Filipina Italian American (Italiapina?), my entire life has often felt like a series of cultural exchanges. My Fulbright batchmate, Nicole, is Filipina German American (Germanpina? Hm.), and relates to my sense of maneuvering Metro Manila with a mixed-race face. What better cultural exchange, we thought, than to visit Manila North Cemetery, the biggest burial ground in the city, on November 1? We went with few expectations, carrying only our cameras. When we approached the cemetery entrance, I was surprised, nonetheless, by the soldiers manning a checkpoint, forcing attendees to surrender their knives, firearms, belts, and metal forks. I was surprised that we were joining a million (a million!) Filipinos visiting their loved ones at Manila North Cemetery that day alone. I was surprised, too, that the energy on All Saint’s Day wasn’t mournful. It felt as if all of Manila were simply bringing food, flowers, and candles to hang out with the people they loved, who just happened to have died. It’s not like this in the States, when subsequent visits to the graves of people you know tend to be quiet, solemn, and, gradually, less frequent.
On its busiest day of the year, Manila North Cemetery reminded two Filipina-Americans of Disneyland. Laurel Fantauzzo
Still, there was something familiar to me about the mass of humanity making its slow way down the winding paths of the cemetery. The brightly lit tents, the loud music. The discarded food wrappers. The stands selling imported hats and t-shirts. The exhausted, crying children. The small, swinging Angry Birds lanterns, lighting the faces of their vendors neon. Nicole and I looked at each other; she, too, had been raised in Southern California, after all, even closer to the place we were both thinking of. “This," she said, “reminds me of Disneyland." Disneyland, if Disneyland were cut through, too, with stark and tragic class differences. There were the wealthy family mausoleums with working generators, where fans and even refrigerators stayed running through the night. There were the high-rise graves populated by the middle and working class. And there were the informal settlers who lived at the cemetery year round, sleeping on the cement tops of graves, selling cigarettes and drinks from makeshift sari-sari stores topping old, long-abandoned tombstones. And then, suddenly, my research topic returned. A gleeful Mang Inasal delivery crew walked through the crowd, asking All Saints’ Day celebrants if they wanted to order grilled chicken. I grinned in disbelief, next, at the KFC kiosk. Slices warmed under glass at the Pizza Hut stand. I could imagine the national news, in the U.S., if fast food companies were to set up a kiosk at a populous cemetery; the outrage that would ensue, the sheepish mea culpa the corporations would issue. Fast food, I realized—like Filipino class difference—is now so deeply entrenched in the Philippines experience, it is inescapable even in death. But why escape the Jollibee tent? If there is anything I’ve learned about Jollibee in particular, it’s that every Filipino has a relationship to it. The poorest aspire to it, or even scavenge leftovers. Working class families look forward to it as a once-yearly birthday or holiday treat. White-collar folks go for a fast, familiar meal. The wealthy eat Jollibee whenever they want, or actively avoid it. All Filipinos I’ve spoken to have their own particular Jollibee order. I looked at the tent, stocked with ready-to-go Styrofoam containers. Here was the subject of the proposal that had allowed me to travel to the Philippines in the first place. Here was Jollibee.
A meal to honor a grandmother. Laurel Fantauzzo
And here I was, in my grandmother’s country without my grandmother. Mamang died this February, at age 96. After a lifetime of wartime, migration, and poverty, she was ready to eat whatever she wanted, and then she was ready to rest. If there was anyone’s grave I wanted to hang out at, this All Saint’s Day, I wanted to hang out at hers. But she was buried in San Pedro, California. At Manila North Cemetery, Jollibee had the food I would have brought to my grandmother: fried chicken. So Nicole and I sat at the Jollibee tent, and ate Chickenjoy. Laurel Fantauzzo is currently a Master of Fine Arts candidate at the University of Iowa's Nonfiction Writing Program. She is also a contributing writer with GMA News Online.
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