Menu
Pinay Power:
By Aby Yap
We’re no Supergirls, Wonder Women, or Darnas. But how do Pinays ever manage to get what we want—well, well (a la Maleficent)—nearly every time?
This Women’s Month, we’ll let you in on our badass tricks in no particular order because though you’ll already know that these exist, there’s nothing else you can do but surrender to our whims and wishes. Mwahahaha. After all, we are and will always be the Diskarte Divas.
In this dark age of MRT with the fare hike, frequent breakdowns, shortened trips, epic queues, maddening commuters etc., what’s a girl got to do to go places sans the traffic mess? Be either sporty or chubby. So with eyes on the goal, the train entrance, we box out the other passengers and hurl our bags in between the doors until we get in. Or, we play a preggy role—stomach out, chest in—so we can sit comfortably until North Avenue. Don’t judge us.
Is it our long, shiny black hair; our kayumangging-kaligatan skin; or our warm and friendly smile that makes us totally irresistible? Hah, we can soften the will of even the toughest Divisoria salesman by throwing just one pa-cute/pleading look with matching “Kuya, wala na bang tawad?” And voila, we’re offered not just huge discounts but tons of freebies and sometimes the guy’s mobile number, too! If it’s not a haba ng hair moment, we don’t know what is.
You say you love us to the moon/sun/stars and back. Then show it to us through tangible means! Chop wood, wash the dishes, prepare breakfast, drive us to each and every mall and back—do everything to win our sweet “Yes.” While you already had us at “Hello,” it’s still very much kilig to see you exert so much effort just to convince us that we’re for keeps. Because you don’t easily let go of anything/anyone you’ve worked hard for.
Late for our shopping date? Broke your promise to buy us Chocnut? Squeezed our love handles, which you thoughtlessly called bilbil, despite knowing that we haven’t eaten rice for a week? Prepare for That Thing Called Tampo. Hell hath no fury like a woman who’s napikon or sinumpong. We’ll give you the cold shoulder until you give us lambing—lots and lots of it—through flowers, chocolates, a life-sized Baymax stuffed toy, a daily tribute to our gorgeousness etc.
The so-called Mommy Method, this one uses the extreme power of the wide-open mouth aka bunganga (with the larynx’s aid, of course). Depending on the gravity of your offence or the urgency of the woman’s demands, the bunganga can talk non-stop for hours at 50 decibels and for sure will break your eardrums. So there’s no other choice but to own up to your mistakes with all your heart or provide everything that her heart desires, pronto!, in exchange for your sanity.
If Da Vinci had one, we also have ours. Like (a) “Ewan” for “Yes” that we’re just painfully shy to say to your face, (b) “Okay” when everything isn’t and you even have the nerve to ask us if it’s okay, and (c) “Wala” for when we’re both aware that there’s indeed an issue between us. Let’s play mind games until you come kneeling and weeping before us because you can no longer fathom how our genius brains work.
Picture Bella Flores’ piercing eyes then arched eyebrows. Feels like you already want to stab your heart with a butcher knife? That’s how terrifying the “Makuha ka sa tingin at sa taas ng kilay” device is. We don’t need to utter any words, scream at the top of our lungs, or scrape a blackboard with half-inch long fingernails to tell you we mean serious business. So, you better hide under your mother’s saya or confess your sins. Now.
Sugar and spice, and everything nice: that’s what we’re made of or what we can turn ourselves into, tee-hee. Some might accuse us of shamelessly longing to replace Jose Rizal’s monument in Rizal Park. But this martyrdom scheme takes years to be perfected. We’re targeting men’s conscience, FYI. So, we need to drill into them what they’ll be missing—free massages, home-cooked meals, surprise love letters etc.—should they start thinking of looking at another female human.
Don’t try us. We can pull off a Kris Aquino stunt and unfollow everyone, including you, on Instagram. We’ll post every little fight we have, each #hugot we can dig up on our Facebook walls for all of our mutual friends to see. We’ll even create memes using your ugly pictures and bleeding Cupids because you’re breaking our hearts. You’ll never want to see your newsfeeds again. That is, if you can even survive being social media pariahs.
Remember: we go to the CR by packs. Friends or strangers, we share funny and sad stories with each other in the comfort of that smelly room. So, don’t ever make the mistake of betraying us and being caught by one of our girlfriends. Filipinas all over the world unite, especially when it comes to stories of unhappily ever afters. We’ll hound you until you’re found. And in your home, we’ll play Pusong Bato at full volume—it will haunt you forever.
Input your search keywords and press Enter.