Spoon in the cup

Jinkee Pacquiao can now afford many fine things ordinary Filipino women can only dream of. She can rub elbows with celebrities and her face is getting quite recognizable on tv. But deep down inside, Jinkee is still the simple unaffected woman from the province.

In a report filed by Dyan Castillejo for ANC, Manny was shown being interviewed in his bedroom in LA, still hurting from his fight with Antonio Margarito, pain not readily discernible from just watching the live tv feed from Texas.

In the room was Jinkee, off to one side, trying to be unobstrusive. She had a cup of coffee in her hand. In the cup was a teaspoon. Then she took a sip, a thumb crooked around the spoon to keep it from getting into her eye.

It was then I realized that, no matter how rich you may become, if you were not raised in privilege, the delicate tastes you acquire with wealth will always give way to your natural self in some private unguarded moment.

So there was Jinkee, loveable in her unaffected Filipina self, drinking coffee the way most ordinary Filipinos would probably drink theirs in the privacy of their homes — with a spoon in the cup, held at bay by a thumb to spare the eye.

This is so Filipino in practice. In fact, the practice has given rise to the joke that coffee can sometimes cause blindness, in reference to the spoon in the cup that can quite possibly jab and injure your eye if you are not careful.

The practice of keeping the spoon in the cup is one of the things that supposedly are distinctly Filipino. Another dead giveaway is stirring a cup of coffee with great sound effects. If you happen to sit beside someone who does that, he or she is probably Filipino.

There is probably a list of these distinctive characteristics circulating somewhere. But if you have forgotten some of them, or in the surprising likelihood that you have not come across them, here are a few examples:

If there is a doormat before the front door that says "welcome" you are most likely standing before a Filipino home. The likelihood becomes more certain if, beside the door, there is a sign that says "Home Sweet Home."

If on the wall in the dining room there is a picture of "The Last Supper," you are in a Filipino home. More so if there is a pair of oversized wood carvings of a spoon and fork nailed to the wall.

The living room should be identifiable as that of a Filipino home if you find the following items: A flip-over paper calendar tacked to the wall, photos of family members in graduation garb, framed diplomas, a wall rag depicting wild horses.

When in a store and you hear someone addressing any female employee as "Miss" that someone is in all likelihood a Filipino. And once again, the likelihood becomes more certain if that someone calls out to somebody thus: "Pssst!"

If you are still in doubt, go over to that someone and try to ask directions from him or her. If he or she points out the direction to you by pouting and pointing his or her mouth, then you are in the company of a compatriot.

At the airport, any person you find who seems surrounded by a disproportionate and inordinate number of bags or boxes, that person is probably a Filipino, saddled with the "padala" of friends he or she cannot refuse.

When boarding time comes and you see the boarding gate being crushed by a crowd that does not seem to know how to form a line, the flight they are boarding is probably bound for the Philippines.