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00:04.0
And you will be paid by the Spanish government.
00:08.0
I mean it's not much.
00:10.0
I think here in Madrid you're paid 1,200 euros a month.
00:15.0
But you know, that's more than enough to...
00:17.0
What about if you're like, saan ka titira?
00:21.0
You have to find an apartment.
00:23.0
Kasi mo sa 1,200, ba't yung accommodation mo?
00:28.0
Well, as you discovered here, the cost of living in Spain is very affordable.
00:33.0
Things are actually cheaper than in Manila.
00:36.0
So my niece, my brother's daughter is here in Madrid now as a auxiliar de conversacion.
00:41.0
And she's surviving on the 1,200 salary stipend.
00:47.0
With 75-80,000 pesos per month, you can have a pretty reasonable and dignified in Madrid.
00:56.0
Well, she's sharing a large apartment with three other Filipinas.
01:02.0
So kanya-kanyang room, they share the cost of the apartment, the electricity, the Wi-Fi.
01:09.0
But it all works out.
01:11.0
And there are hundreds of Filipinos doing that here in Madrid now.
01:18.0
So it's a program that Filipinos can look into.
01:22.0
I didn't know it's that affordable in Madrid.
01:27.0
The prices here are good.
01:29.0
Yeah, with the food and transportation, I could clearly see the difference.
01:35.0
Super laki ng difference.
01:36.0
With Philippines, but definitely with other developed countries, especially Japan or Singapore.
01:41.0
Even Singapore, much more expensive than Spain.
01:44.0
Forget about U.S., right?
01:47.0
And you're talking about Madrid, right?
01:49.0
The capital, not some barrio or whatever in Spain.
01:52.0
We're talking about the capital, by the way, here, right?
01:54.0
So counterpart would be New York, Tokyo, Seoul, right?
02:00.0
Can you give us an idea of the prices?
02:02.0
Like if you want to rent a decent, let's say, studio.
02:07.0
Biglang interesantun ako.
02:13.0
The Ilocano is like, hmm.
02:15.0
Parang you might end up saving money in Spain, right?
02:19.0
Interesting, right?
02:20.0
Pa-rent ko nalang dito.
02:22.0
You get what I'm saying?
02:23.0
Like the Ilocano is already doing calculations.
02:26.0
I'll rent this one here and I'll get this one.
02:28.0
I'll put this one there.
02:29.0
No, because bro, I mean like I really love the chill life there
02:33.0
because it gives me time to do my work through the day
02:36.0
and then I have time to have coffee, sit down,
02:39.0
breathe a little bit, fresh air, walk a little bit.
02:42.0
Like things that I usually cannot do in other big cities,
02:45.0
whether it's in Taipei, in Tokyo, in Manila, or in New York, whatever.
02:48.0
Like usually, they're buying very different schedule
02:50.0
from what I had there in Madrid.
02:52.0
So, I really appreciated that.
02:53.0
Because I was still working intensively while I was there.
02:56.0
I mean, you could see from my schedule.
02:58.0
But still, it's...
03:00.0
The overall tempo and cadence of life
03:02.0
was just something that I found refreshing.
03:05.0
Parang almost nag-retreat ako.
03:07.0
Parang gano'n yung feel ko.
03:08.0
Even if we were just doing a lot of things.
03:11.0
Can you tell us a little bit about the expenses and all?
03:13.0
Sorry, especially for the more takad Ilocano styles like me, right?
03:21.0
Middle class, all right?
03:23.0
Okay, just kidding.
03:25.0
So, there is basically parity in the prices of real estate and rentals
03:30.0
in, let's say, Madrid and Makati.
03:33.0
Madrid and Manila.
03:34.0
So, if you were going to rent a place in, let's say, Makati, Salcedo Village,
03:41.0
if you were going to rent in the equivalent of Salcedo Village in Madrid,
03:46.0
If you were going to rent in a place in Cubao, in Manila,
03:51.0
if you went to the sort of equivalent, it would be the same price.
03:56.0
But then, it's a false equivalent in the sense that
03:59.0
wala naman dito ng Cubao.
04:01.0
Maganda yung area.
04:03.0
No offense to Cubao, but mas maganda yung area dito.
04:07.0
Nako, magalit yung periphera sa'yo.
04:10.0
Favorite na yung mga ako, lalo yung mga cinema dyan.
04:13.0
Yung mga huling El Bimbo, mga ganyan movies sa Cubao.
04:18.0
Cubao, Princeton, Cubao.
04:23.0
But you know what I'm saying, Richard.
04:25.0
So, the prices are the same.
04:26.0
What you get in Manila, you'll get it here in Madrid.
04:28.0
But with the added bonus.
04:30.0
Yeah, the rate is the same.
04:33.0
But if you, kunyari, you get a cheaper place outside of the centro,
04:37.0
so it's a little further away, much cheaper,
04:40.0
maybe half the price of living in the middle of Madrid.
04:43.0
But the good thing is that the transport system is so darn efficient,
04:48.0
that even if you live outside of centro,
04:50.0
you take the metro, you'll be in centro in 20 minutes.
04:53.0
Yeah, 15-20 minutes.
04:55.0
So, di ba, you can't compare.
04:58.0
But is it that the Rizal monument there,
05:01.0
is that considered a little bit outside the center, right?
05:04.0
It kind of felt like you're in the,
05:06.0
not ma'am provincia, but in central municipality.
05:09.0
It didn't feel like a capital, right?
05:11.0
Once you go down from the,
05:12.0
like how far is that from the center?
05:14.0
Or what are the price range?
05:15.0
Let's say, I want to get an apartment close to Rizal.
05:18.0
So, I wake up, I see his monument, whatever.
05:20.0
Like, what are we looking at?
05:22.0
Is it like 600 euros per month?
05:24.0
700 euros? 500 euros?
05:26.0
For a decent one-bedroom or studio?
05:29.0
Sorry, I made a mistake.
05:32.0
No, maybe it's already cheap there.
05:37.0
That's sort of like living in Caloocan.
05:39.0
I mean, the prices are so much lower
05:41.0
than living in Makati.
05:43.0
Interesting, very interesting.
05:45.0
If you want to live in the area that's farther away,
05:48.0
but it's half the price.
05:51.0
It's very affordable.
05:53.0
The other thing I noticed, amigo, is that
05:56.0
parang walang vlogger masyado sa Spain, no?
05:59.0
It's like when I was vlogging,
06:00.0
I could see when the kids were like,
06:01.0
what is this guy doing?
06:03.0
You know what I'm saying?
06:04.0
I felt so good na walang vloggers masyado doon.
06:08.0
Kasi it's so annoying.
06:10.0
I'm not going to say which countries you go,
06:12.0
aside from Philippines.
06:14.0
There are people dancing crazy and doing TikTok.
06:18.0
I'm just enjoying the view here, okay?
06:20.0
You're not even moving well.
06:22.0
Buti pa ako yung nagsasayo.
06:24.0
At least I didn't see any of those,
06:26.0
let's just say, chicanery and clown nonsense.
06:31.0
Hindi sila masyadong online social media people
06:34.0
there in Spain too, right?
06:37.0
I think meron din,
06:38.0
but maybe not as much as in the US.
06:40.0
Of course meron, yeah.
06:42.0
But definitely not the same level, diba?
06:46.0
The life is really slower.
06:48.0
Life is less social media-obsessed, right?
06:51.0
I mean, that's amazing.
06:53.0
It's a different state of being, no?
06:57.0
It's not posh in terms of living cost, right?
07:00.0
Unlike in London,
07:01.0
unlike in certain parts of Germany,
07:03.0
like Munich or Munchen, right?
07:05.0
It's really high cost, I think,
07:06.0
to get a decent studio,
07:07.0
at least 2,000 euros or something,
07:10.0
Relatively decent ones.
07:12.0
So it's a two-to-one range almost, no?
07:14.0
In Spain and some of the other countries.
07:16.0
And you're still gonna get a very high level,
07:18.0
high quality of life, diba?
07:19.0
They're all EU countries.
07:20.0
It's not like, diba?
07:22.0
So I think that's really impressive.
07:24.0
By the way, I just have a question.
07:26.0
Of course, with Hora,
07:27.0
we discussed the transformation of Spain
07:29.0
from a relatively backward,
07:31.0
feudalistic country, right?
07:33.0
Not long ago to a relatively decent,
07:36.0
I mean, obviously, Spain has a lot of problems.
07:38.0
I'm aware of that, et cetera.
07:40.0
Although I don't completely agree
07:41.0
with Jorge's libertarian economic views
07:43.0
on public debt and all.
07:45.0
I have a different stance on it,
07:47.0
It was not an economic debate.
07:50.0
But your parents were there in the 1950s, right?
07:54.0
This is the early post-war period
07:57.0
when Spain was super isolated.
07:59.0
Franco was still trying to create
08:01.0
a new order, right?
08:03.0
Are your parents also,
08:05.0
did your parents, your mom in particular,
08:06.0
did she comment about how far Spain
08:08.0
has come over the past 50, 60,
08:10.0
throughout her lifetime?
08:11.0
Because, yes, because Spain
08:12.0
was not really in a good spot, right?
08:14.0
In the 50s, pretty pobre country too, right?
08:19.0
I just want to emphasize the transformation.
08:22.0
No, but you're absolutely right.
08:24.0
In the stories of my mom,
08:25.0
when they were students here,
08:27.0
she remembers Spain as quite backward.
08:31.0
And the Philippines was way ahead.
08:33.0
And my mom used to say that, wow.
08:36.0
We had the biggest tawans
08:38.0
in the Colegio Mayor.
08:42.0
And they were the best.
08:43.0
The Filipinas were the best dressed.
08:46.0
And remember at the time,
08:49.0
the peso, dollar exchange rate
08:52.0
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
08:55.0
That was really a difference, yeah.
09:02.0
Yeah, it doesn't sound legit, right?
09:07.0
peso sounds more legit, right?
09:10.0
I'm sure exchange rate is like 1,000 to 1.
09:13.0
I'm just kidding.
09:15.0
Talaga umangat ang Spain.
09:18.0
I mean, you could say that.
09:20.0
I had some Spanish friends,
09:22.0
Spanish-Filipino friends
09:24.0
Naman na-annoyed,
09:25.0
but I sense na parang
09:27.0
they felt I'm not giving enough credit
09:29.0
to the so-called Spanish economic miracle
09:31.0
from 1954-55 until early 1970.
09:34.0
So, this is the latter decades
09:36.0
of the Francoist regime
09:37.0
where in fairness,
09:38.0
they were kind of more like Korea and Japan
09:40.0
in terms of rapid economic growth.
09:43.0
Spain was still not a super amazing place
09:45.0
even up until the 70s and 80s.
09:47.0
My understanding was
09:48.0
it's still a relatively backward country
09:49.0
compared to Germany or even France, right?
09:52.0
Yeah, Spain didn't have it easy
09:55.0
kasi after the Second World War,
09:57.0
they were devastated by the Civil War.
09:59.0
And then when the U.S. put the Marshall Plan
10:02.0
in place for the rest of Europe,
10:04.0
Spain was excluded.
10:06.0
Because they're neutral.
10:08.0
Yeah, but they were neutral,
10:09.0
but eventually the U.S. said,
10:12.0
okay, Spain can enter the Marshall Plan,
10:14.0
but Britain didn't want to.
10:16.0
And they were really worried
10:17.0
about the British public,
10:18.0
the American public,
10:19.0
because unlike Greece and Portugal,
10:26.0
which were under dictators at the time,
10:32.0
they felt that hindi acceptable si Franco
10:36.0
because of the roots of Franco's dictatorship,
10:39.0
which was supported by Nazi Germany.
10:43.0
Let's just call it what it is.
10:45.0
There was the fascist element,
10:46.0
Falangist fascist,
10:48.0
which was not the case in Greece.
10:51.0
Kasi the one in Greece and Portugal
10:52.0
was anti-communist,
10:53.0
but not necessarily,
10:55.0
they were not Axis friends, right?
10:57.0
And we know that in the case of Franco,
10:59.0
I mean, that's what the whole Guernica,
11:02.0
the painting is all about, right?
11:04.0
If I'm not mistaken,
11:05.0
German technology was used there
11:06.0
for the aerial bombing of Guernica
11:08.0
and the horrors that was, of course,
11:10.0
immortalized for proper reflection
11:14.0
by no less than Pablo Picasso.
11:15.0
And I think we spent 10, 15 minutes
11:17.0
just standing there in front of Guernica
11:20.0
and observing everything
11:21.0
and reflecting on the country, right?
11:22.0
I mean, how I wish,
11:24.0
I mean, the closest thing we have to Guernica
11:26.0
is Polarium, right?
11:27.0
Which is obviously not done for our era, right?
11:32.0
But it has a resonance, right?
11:33.0
I was thinking if I'll do a novel,
11:34.0
I think the title should be Polarium, right?
11:37.0
So I was, you get what I'm saying, right?
11:39.0
I think we spent a lot of time,
11:40.0
we don't have to go to the details
11:42.0
what we discussed
11:43.0
because it will be a totally different discussion for now.
11:45.0
I'm still giving Magellan Jr. some,
11:48.0
let's see what he's going to do
11:49.0
on the other fronts, right?
11:50.0
Without forgetting, of course,
11:51.0
the horrors of the past
11:52.0
under the Marcos regime,
11:54.0
the Flores regime.
11:55.0
Now, let's transition a little bit
11:58.0
to what do you think,
12:00.0
what is the situation of our FWs in Spain?
12:04.0
What are things that are working
12:06.0
and what are things that perhaps,
12:08.0
you know, we can do some improvement on that
12:10.0
and including, you know,
12:12.0
in terms of government intervention or help.
12:14.0
What do you think about that?
12:15.0
As a Filipino resident in Spain,
12:19.0
what are the tendencies, patterns,
12:22.0
and the goods and bads and the uglies of that?
12:27.0
Okay, well, speaking of the OFW community here,
12:30.0
you'll find the OFWs all over Spain.
12:33.0
Most of them, three-fourths,
12:35.0
there are 200,000 Filipinos here in Spain,
12:38.0
three-fourths of which you will find
12:40.0
in the Comunidad de Madrid
12:41.0
and the rest in the autonomous region of Catalonia
12:44.0
where Barcelona is.
12:45.0
The rest, you'll find them in Andalusia,
12:48.0
in the major cities of Marbella and Malaga
12:50.0
and some in Sevilla.
12:52.0
Outside of peninsular Spain,
12:53.0
you'll find them in the Canary Islands
12:55.0
and in the Balearic Islands.
12:57.0
Ibiza has 2,500 Filipinos
12:59.0
and I think you have family there also.
13:01.0
Yeah, of course, yeah.
13:02.0
And then, you know,
13:04.0
the Filipinos here came in several waves,
13:07.0
a little about the history.
13:09.0
Yeah, what are the waves?
13:12.0
Okay, well, the first...
13:14.0
Well, okay, between the 16th century
13:18.0
and the 19th century,
13:19.0
there were no Filipino migrations to Spain.
13:24.0
It was the other way, no?
13:28.0
The first wave...
13:29.0
May ban ba sa atin?
13:32.0
There's just no reason, no way.
13:33.0
It's not practical.
13:34.0
So, the first wave came in the 1860s
13:39.0
and that was the Ilustrados.
13:41.0
They were pretty much the first wave
13:43.0
of young Filipinos
13:44.0
who wanted to go there to study,
13:45.0
liberal ideas, blah, blah, blah.
13:47.0
And then, because they could afford,
13:50.0
because the Philippines economy was good then
13:52.0
because of agriculture.
13:53.0
That's the example result.
13:55.0
And then, the second wave came
13:57.0
at the end of World War II.
13:59.0
This was in 1936.
14:01.0
The bombing of Manila
14:02.0
obliterated the areas where the Spanish,
14:05.0
the Mestizarilla lived.
14:06.0
So, this was Intramuros, Malate.
14:09.0
So, after the war,
14:10.0
the survivors, the Mestizos,
14:12.0
the Spanish Filipinos left
14:14.0
en masse, went back to Spain.
14:17.0
That was the second wave.
14:18.0
The third and fourth waves
14:19.0
happened in the 60s and 80s
14:21.0
and these were composed mostly
14:23.0
of working-age Filipina women
14:26.0
who went there to work as house help.
14:28.0
So, you can say that the last wave
14:31.0
happened during the war.
14:32.0
Not just in the Middle East.
14:33.0
Not just in the Middle East.
14:34.0
There were also a lot of house help in Spain.
14:36.0
Wait, what's with Spain
14:38.0
and the house help culture?
14:40.0
Because you don't see that in,
14:42.0
I don't think, as much in Germany
14:44.0
or Nordic countries.
14:46.0
Probably not even as much
14:47.0
in France and Italy, right?
14:48.0
Is this a very Spanish thing?
14:50.0
What's going on there?
14:51.0
I don't want to be
14:52.0
Occidentalist, Orientalist,
14:54.0
whatever you want to call it, right?
14:55.0
Like, for Madrid,
14:56.0
I think Madrid has the highest per capita
14:58.0
of house help in any Western capital.
15:01.0
I mean, it's just,
15:02.0
what's going on there?
15:03.0
Is this a Spanish thing?
15:04.0
What's going on there?
15:05.0
Because there are also
15:06.0
Latin Americans, right?
15:07.0
Colombianos, whatever,
15:08.0
who also are in that industry.
15:12.0
I know about a lot of issues
15:14.0
during the pandemic time
15:15.0
because it became a big issue.
15:16.0
I think there was a BBC news
15:18.0
about an analysis about it
15:20.0
that a lot of people
15:22.0
or they felt maltreated
15:23.0
during the pandemic
15:25.0
or they would be stuck at home.
15:27.0
oh, so Madrid is kind of like
15:30.0
Interesting, right?
15:31.0
Yeah, can you tell us about that?
15:33.0
So, if you're asking why
15:34.0
there are a lot of house help here,
15:36.0
well, I think it's a function
15:40.0
if a Filipino comes here,
15:45.0
it's the language.
15:46.0
The language issue is a major thing.
15:48.0
So, when a Filipino comes here,
15:50.0
there are limited kinds of jobs
15:54.0
because usually the Filipinos
15:56.0
do not speak Spanish.
15:57.0
It's a bit of mystery
16:00.0
why we can't learn Spanish here.
16:03.0
But okay, the majority
16:05.0
of working Filipinos here,
16:09.0
work as housekeepers
16:15.0
usually work as kitchen
16:17.0
in the restaurant industry.
16:20.0
And they're relegated
16:23.0
basically because
16:24.0
they do not have enough
16:26.0
fluency in the Spanish language.
16:28.0
And given that Spain has
16:29.0
one of the lowest level
16:31.0
of bilingualism in Europe,
16:33.0
you have to speak Spanish here.
16:36.0
There are other industries
16:37.0
where there are Filipinos also
16:39.0
like the hotel industry.
16:41.0
But again, the Filipinos
16:43.0
in the hotel industry here
16:51.0
So, you see, they're not able
16:53.0
to work in the reception area.
16:57.0
There's no upward mobility
16:59.0
because of the language barrier.
17:01.0
So, that's something to look into
17:04.0
whether it's training Filipinos
17:07.0
in Manila before they come to Spain
17:09.0
to speak better Spanish
17:11.0
or having a program in place
17:14.0
Maybe it's something the embassy
17:16.0
or some NGOs can look into
17:18.0
to help the Filipino community here
17:20.0
because you teach the Filipinos
17:22.0
here to learn better Spanish,
17:24.0
to speak better Spanish,
17:25.0
you break that sort of glass ceiling
17:27.0
and the upward mobility is there.
17:30.0
You'll get better jobs
17:31.0
because we already have
17:32.0
the reputation here
17:33.0
of being hard workers,
17:37.0
Kulang nalang, it's the language.
17:42.0
And getting citizenship, right?
17:43.0
You need to have basic proficiency
17:45.0
in Spanish if you want to be
17:46.0
a citizen of Spain.
17:47.0
And once you're a citizen of Spain,
17:48.0
all sorts of benefits come
17:51.0
occupational tenure,
17:52.0
in terms of healthcare,
17:54.0
all sorts of things come.
17:58.0
I understand there are Filipinos
17:59.0
who have lived there decades
18:01.0
or at least a decade and so
18:03.0
and they're not really en route
18:07.0
because they're not comfortable
18:09.0
taking the proficiency examination.
18:11.0
That's the understanding I have.
18:13.0
What's going on there?
18:16.0
I know some Filipinos here
18:18.0
who've lived there for 25 years.
18:21.0
That's a lifetime, yeah.
18:23.0
They still do not speak fluent Spanish.
18:28.0
It's like street Espanol?
18:30.0
What's going on there?
18:32.0
I call it Espanol por la calle.
18:35.0
Espanol por la calle,
18:36.0
they learn Spanish on the street,
18:38.0
grammatically incorrect.
18:40.0
You can't hold a decent job
18:42.0
if you're speaking
18:44.0
in Pidgin Spanish.
18:48.0
In the level of Spanish
18:50.0
that you need here,
18:51.0
it's not super fluent
18:53.0
but just grammatically correct
18:55.0
and that can be addressed
18:57.0
if you're taking courses.
19:00.0
But the Instituto Cervantes
19:02.0
in Manila I've heard
19:04.0
has the most number of enrollees
19:06.0
of any Instituto Cervantes
19:11.0
Jorge was telling me
19:13.0
it had nothing to do with Spain.
19:15.0
These are folks who want to work
19:17.0
in Florida or in San Diego
19:21.0
I was like, what?
19:23.0
If you go to those areas,
19:25.0
you can completely get away
19:26.0
with no English whatsoever,
19:27.0
just speak Spanish.
19:28.0
But you cannot get away
19:29.0
with not speaking Spanish.
19:33.0
By the way, let's be very clear.
19:35.0
A lot of those areas
19:36.0
used to be controlled by Spain.
19:40.0
look at the gringos.
19:42.0
It's even called New Mexico
19:44.0
because they just grabbed
19:46.0
what was part of Mexico.
19:48.0
They didn't even bother
19:49.0
to really change the name.
19:51.0
Texas was also part
19:56.0
There's California in Mexico
19:58.0
because California
19:59.0
was really part of Mexico.
20:02.0
Yeah, you're right.
20:03.0
But I didn't know that.
20:04.0
They learned Spanish here
20:06.0
so they can work in the U.S.,
20:07.0
in Florida and those kinds of cities.
20:09.0
Did you know that?
20:11.0
I thought, of course,
20:12.0
you're going to go to Spain
20:14.0
and be an EU citizen or whatever.
20:16.0
But no, it's still America.
20:18.0
They're still using it.
20:20.0
Did you know about that?
20:22.0
What do you think about it?
20:24.0
It's interesting.
20:25.0
I had a good friend in Manila before
20:27.0
who got a job in New York.
20:31.0
with a senior side guy.
20:33.0
In his application,
20:35.0
he said that he spoke basic Spanish.
20:37.0
When he got accepted to the job,
20:41.0
I don't really speak Spanish.
20:43.0
Three weeks before he left,
20:45.0
he tapped me to teach him basic Spanish
20:48.0
because there are a lot of Latinos in New York.
20:52.0
All over the U.S.
20:53.0
The borough that he'd be working in
20:55.0
basically was a Spanish-rich area.
20:58.0
Latino-rich area.
20:59.0
So yeah, they speak Spanish
21:01.0
in the United States.
21:02.0
The United States, I think,
21:04.0
is the third biggest Spanish-speaking country
21:08.0
and one other country.
21:12.0
More Spanish speakers in the United States
21:17.0
And the birthrate of these people
21:21.0
These Spanish-speaking people.
21:23.0
And we don't even know the real numbers.
21:25.0
Because there are a lot of TNTs
21:27.0
of Latinos there.
21:30.0
I know where this is going.
21:32.0
Give it 50 years.
21:33.0
Spanish will be the number one language
21:35.0
spoken in the U.S.
21:36.0
It will be kind of like the Philippines
21:38.0
where the official language is English
21:40.0
but really not much people like it.
21:42.0
But you can get away with Spanish, right?
21:45.0
It's going crazy, right?
21:47.0
Anyway, before I say something
21:49.0
politically incorrect again,
21:50.0
I get into trouble.
21:52.0
Yeah, now let's talk about something
21:54.0
that maybe we should talk about.
21:56.0
Of course, you're a paterno.
21:57.0
So, can you tell me about
22:00.0
your understanding of history of Ilustrados?
22:03.0
Because we also had this conversation
22:05.0
And I'm glad that he also agrees with me.
22:10.0
but why should he get all the credit, right?
22:12.0
When in fact, he was part of an ecosystem, right?
22:14.0
And this ecosystem was enabled
22:17.0
or enabled in a good way, right?
22:19.0
Was facilitated, let's just say,
22:21.0
because of the contribution of many people,
22:23.0
including Pedro Paterno,
22:26.0
who I think is not only underappreciated
22:30.0
for his artistic and intellectual contribution.
22:32.0
I mean, he was a brilliant guy.
22:35.0
I think his doctoral in law, right?
22:39.0
he was also kind of a prodigy,
22:41.0
but Ninay had even footnotes.
22:44.0
I mean, he was doing it like
22:46.0
postmodern style,
22:47.0
you know, footnoted novels, right?
22:49.0
And he was a complete pioneer.
22:51.0
But more importantly,
22:52.0
I think we kind of discussed it,
22:54.0
is that he served as really the
22:59.0
I mean, like he had the
23:07.0
up-and-coming guys,
23:09.0
you know, fresh from the boat folks, right?
23:11.0
To meet the elite of Europe, right?
23:14.0
the best culturates,
23:15.0
best writers in Spain
23:17.0
would go to residence of
23:20.0
And then that's really how,
23:22.0
you know, the Ilustrados,
23:23.0
a lot of them from very humble background
23:25.0
with humble resources,
23:26.0
by European standards,
23:27.0
maybe not by faith,
23:28.0
you know, they will get to meet
23:29.0
these fantastic people.
23:30.0
And we know in the world of high art
23:32.0
and high politics,
23:33.0
connections networks is everything, right?
23:36.0
I mean, you can be the smartest guys,
23:38.0
but if you don't meet the right people,
23:40.0
you will just be an unrecognized genius, right?
23:42.0
So I think Pedro Paterno
23:44.0
made a lot of contributions.
23:45.0
I'm not saying this because you're,
23:47.0
you come from that,
23:48.0
you have that family.
23:49.0
I'm saying this because
23:50.0
I just feel we have this tendency
23:52.0
in the Philippines of giving one person
23:54.0
all of the credit.
23:55.0
When in fact, it's really an ecosystem
23:57.0
that contributed to it, right?
23:59.0
Can you tell us a little bit?
24:02.0
When you think of the Ilustrados,
24:04.0
we tend to think of Rizal,
24:07.0
Marcelo H. del Pilar,
24:08.0
but really, yeah,
24:09.0
it was a big group of people
24:11.0
and it was a community.
24:13.0
And in that community,
24:16.0
Pedro Paterno was probably
24:19.0
Unlike the others,
24:20.0
Pedro Paterno went to Spain
24:22.0
at the tender age of 14.
24:25.0
Rizal already went.
24:27.0
So Pedro Paterno went there very early.
24:33.0
really, he was sent to Spain
24:34.0
because of the way
24:35.0
things were going in Manila.
24:36.0
In fact, the year after
24:38.0
Pedro Paterno arrived in Madrid,
24:40.0
his father was implicated
24:45.0
Gomez Burgos in Zamora.
24:47.0
Right, Zamora, yeah.
24:53.0
his parents sent him here
24:55.0
also for, you know,
24:57.0
for those considerations.
24:59.0
Yeah, for safety.
25:00.0
Yeah, so let's get that very clear.
25:02.0
Pedro Paterno's father, right,
25:05.0
was seen as a revolutionary, right?
25:11.0
Yeah, so everyone knows about Paterno
25:13.0
coming from a thriving commercial family,
25:16.0
Chinese-Filipino family,
25:17.0
but they don't know that.
25:18.0
I actually also didn't know
25:19.0
about his father, right?
25:21.0
I knew about his contribution,
25:22.0
but I didn't know about the father
25:23.0
and that was a very good fact,
25:26.0
that we have to keep in mind.
25:27.0
So he was in Spain
25:29.0
also under the shadow
25:30.0
of potential harassment back home
25:31.0
because of the situation
25:32.0
of his father, right?
25:34.0
So he came from a privileged
25:36.0
and yet persecuted,
25:38.0
increasingly persecuted
25:39.0
also family, right?
25:40.0
I mean, let's just say what it was, right?
25:44.0
And then he comes to Spain,
25:45.0
he's 14-year-old,
25:46.0
what's going on there?
25:49.0
Yeah, and he studied in Spain,
25:54.0
in University of Salamanca,
25:56.0
then I think he got his doctorate.
25:57.0
Oh, Salamanca, not Madrid.
25:58.0
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
26:04.0
you know, he spent more time in Spain
26:07.0
when you think about it.
26:08.0
Yeah, because he's a 14-year-old young,
26:10.0
yeah, exactly, yeah.
26:13.0
that the other Ilustrados had arrived,
26:15.0
I mean, his now contemporaries,
26:18.0
he had already made a big network
26:21.0
of connections here
26:23.0
with important Spaniards,
26:25.0
and that was very important.
26:26.0
He was able to use his network
26:31.0
of the rest of the Ilustrados.
26:33.0
He got to introduce Rizal
26:34.0
to the different important politicians,
26:38.0
governors, royalty,
26:40.0
and you know, at the time,
26:43.0
That was capital at the time.
26:44.0
Yeah, and especially if you're petitioning, right,
26:46.0
the Supreme Court of Spain
26:47.0
or petitioning the deputados,
26:50.0
I mean, the congresses,
26:51.0
I mean, if you're just some random guy
26:54.0
from the colony showing up,
26:56.0
you won't get too far, right?
26:58.0
Probably barely through the door,
27:00.0
but now you met this guy,
27:01.0
he knows about you,
27:02.0
oh, this Rizal guy, smart guy
27:04.0
who came from Philippines,
27:05.0
you build sympathy, right?
27:07.0
I mean, lobbying is very, very important.
27:09.0
So he was almost like a consultancy firm, right?
27:11.0
He was like a lobbying firm,
27:13.0
like he was putting
27:14.0
all of these important people together.
27:16.0
Again, I'm just saying this
27:17.0
because I feel people are not appreciating
27:19.0
these things as much, right?
27:20.0
How political lobbying is so important
27:22.0
in the imperial capital,
27:23.0
just like it is nowadays
27:25.0
in Washington, D.C.
27:26.0
But what about his mind?
27:28.0
His mind, I mean,
27:29.0
he seems to be very comfortable
27:30.0
with the high culture of Spain,
27:37.0
for many people who have read it
27:39.0
are very impressed by it.
27:40.0
Like you, as objective as you can get,
27:44.0
I know you really wanna be objective about this,
27:46.0
like, what is your understanding of that?
27:48.0
Or within your family,
27:49.0
how do you talk about his art,
27:50.0
his mind, his intellect?
27:54.0
Pedro Paterno was a Renaissance man.
27:57.0
He was into anything and everything,
27:59.0
and he did it with passion.
28:01.0
He wrote many books,
28:03.0
and always when he would write a book,
28:06.0
it would be with the intention
28:08.0
of presenting the Philippines
28:11.0
in the best light.
28:13.0
You see, at the time, really,
28:17.0
the Spaniards didn't know much
28:18.0
about the Philippines,
28:19.0
and they had so many misconceptions
28:21.0
of their far-flung colony
28:23.0
in the East, in the Far East.
28:25.0
So Pedro Paterno wanted to change that,
28:27.0
to change that view
28:28.0
by writing these novels.
28:29.0
Some say they were too romanticized,
28:31.0
some say they were already
28:33.0
works of fiction.
28:34.0
Pero, you know, that's how
28:38.0
that's how you had to do things at that time.
28:40.0
If you're a pioneer, especially, right?
28:42.0
You're the first,
28:43.0
so first, planchain mo muna, diba?
28:45.0
Like, you have to get people interested,
28:48.0
to bother even about the existence
28:50.0
of the Philippines, right?
28:51.0
And then you work it from there.
28:52.0
Some would argue that, you know,
28:55.0
No Limitang Hera wouldn't have
28:57.0
made as much impact
28:58.0
or gained as much traction
29:00.0
if there was not a Nine that came before it.
29:02.0
I mean, maybe I'm stretching it,
29:04.0
but you always need a shield for a sword, right?
29:06.0
The two kind of go together, right?
29:08.0
There was a kind of a
29:10.0
symbiotic dynamic there
29:11.0
that I think is also not appreciated, right?
29:13.0
Yeah, please go ahead, yeah.
29:15.0
Yeah, when Pedro Paterno wrote Ninay,
29:18.0
he wanted to portray
29:21.0
more of a good relationship
29:24.0
between the Philippines and Spain.
29:26.0
So, Medyo, I think Pedro Paterno
29:29.0
also was surprised
29:30.0
when the No Limitang Hera
29:32.0
came out two years later
29:33.0
at how fiery it was.
29:37.0
Because it was approaching the same goal
29:40.0
through different means.
29:43.0
Pedro wanted more conservatory,
29:45.0
but Pedro knew how it was at the time.
29:52.0
I mean, his father was exiled to...
29:56.0
I mean, back then,
29:57.0
Guam was not as beautiful as it is today.
29:59.0
Let's be very clear about it.
30:00.0
It was the backwater of backwater, right?
30:03.0
So, it's not like the guy
30:05.0
was a privileged person
30:07.0
who didn't care about things back then.
30:08.0
He wanted to make people interested
30:11.0
in the Philippines to begin with,
30:13.0
and obviously, the result worked from there, right?
30:16.0
So, it's like there's a two-year gap
30:18.0
between Ninay and No Limitang Hera.
30:22.0
Was Ninay well-read in Spain?
30:24.0
Obviously, not in the Philippines
30:25.0
as much as it should,
30:26.0
but was it read in Spain?
30:27.0
I mean, given the kind of contacts he has
30:29.0
and the eloquence and erudition
30:31.0
that he had at his disposal,
30:34.0
is there any evidence
30:35.0
or what is your understanding
30:36.0
of how Ninay circulated among the Spanish elite
30:42.0
That's a good question.
30:44.0
Honestly, I do not know
30:46.0
how many books were published
30:48.0
or how well-circulated it was here,
30:51.0
but I do know that Pedro and his father
30:56.0
spoke about how to approach
31:00.0
dealing with Spain in terms of literature,
31:02.0
and they both agreed that it was wiser
31:06.0
to approach it in a more steady...
31:15.0
Maybe because of the experience
31:17.0
of Maximo Paterno and his father
31:20.0
that you can achieve the same end
31:24.0
in a more studied manner.
