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THE PARIAN

When the Spaniards settled in the islands, more Chinese came, and served as the backbone of the Spanish colonial economy. Because of their growing numbers, the Spaniards both needed and feared them, which led to the persecution and harassment including large-scale massacres. The Chinese, or Sangley as the Spaniards called them, were separated into quarters called the Parian where they lived, worked, and made better lives for themselves as laborers, merchants and artisans.

LIFE AND ECONOMY IN THE 1800s

For the Chinese, this was a time of opportunity, innovation, and adaptation. Spain’s decision to develop the Philippines economically, its liberalized immigration policies, and the deteriorating economic and political situation in Fujian and elsewhere in South China encouraged a much greater overseas migration flow of Chinese than before.

A Chinese population of 5,000 to 6,000 in the early 19th century Philippines quickly expanded from the 1850s onward to around 100,000. A law in 1839 lifted the travel ban and allowed the Chinese to reside anywhere in the Philippines regardless of occupation. The Chinese thus created a network that linked international trade with local enterprise.

Major Chinese import-export merchants in Manila (and later in key trading cities like Iloilo and Cebu) were linked to their agents at various sites around the country. The major merchant, known at the time as a cabecilla, provided imported or other goods to his agents around the country. The agents distributed these regionally to local retailers, the sari-sari store.

Also known as the Bahay na Bato, the typical mestizo house – the area’s storekeeper keeps his sari-sari store and tool shed on the ground floor, and the family residence on the upper floor.

In the early 20th century, the American colonial government nationalized identities in the Philippines. The “mestizo” and “indio” ethnic classifications were subsumed under the classification “Filipino.” Under the new system, the “Chinese” became effectively an “alien” citizen. A mestizo whose father was classified as “Chinese” assumed the same classification of his father but could choose to become either “Chinese” or “Filipino” upon reaching the age of maturity. For pragmatic reasons, many chose to become “Filipino.” In time, Chinese mestizos became distanced from their “Chinese-ness” and more identified with their “Filipino-ness.”

The arrival of the Americans gave the Chinese more opportunities for growth. They distributed American goods all over the country, and procured cheap native products and raw materials for Western markets. In the darkest hour of the Japanese occupation, they fought side by side with Filipinos for freedom.

These economic adaptation and developments would blaze the trail for greater and more rapid growth during the American occupation.

On July 7, 1937 the Sino-Japanese War broke out in China with the infamous Lu Kou Chiao (Marco Polo Bridge) incident. The Chinese in the Philippines sympathized with war efforts in China and the entire community was mobilized to send aid to China and boycott Japanese goods. Community organizations moved as one to support China’s resistance to Japanese occupation.

Because of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on December 8, 1941, war was brought to the Philippines, an American territory. On the first day of war, all the Japanese in the Philippines were sent to internment camps.

As the Japanese took over businesses, factories became idle and the economy was subjected to severe financial strain. Many Chinese migrated to rural areas where Filipinos helped protect and conceal them in their own homes. When found out, however, these Chinese barrio residents were massacred.

The most infamous of these massacres was carried out on February 24, 1945 in San Pablo, Laguna. Around 6,000 Filipino and Chinese males between 15 and 50 were gathered, and the Chinese, 650 in all, were picked out. All were bayoneted and thrown into trenches that they themselves had dug. Several wounded survivors were taken to a local hospital, only to be killed the following day. Some of the badly wounded crawled to their homes with the help of Filipinos. In Los Baños, all the Chinese found in town were executed because of increased guerrilla activities in Laguna and the liberation of American war prisoners from the Los Baños internment camp.

CHRISTIANITY FOR THE HEATHENS

The Spanish colonization of Manila was meant to be a stepping stone towards the evangelization of millions of heathens in China. Thus, the Dominican friars, especially those in Binondo Church, quickly learned the Chinese language from the Chinese. It was no accident that among the first three books printed in Manila in 1593, two were in Chinese and Spanish. Lorenzo Ruiz, our first Filipino Saint, was baptized in Binondo Church. His father was pure Chinese.

Mother Ignacia del Espiritu Santo, founder of the first Beaterio of the Virgin Mary was born to a Chinese father and an indio mother. Typical of the mestiza families in early Spanish occupation, both Lorenzo Ruiz and Mother Ignacia were raised as Malays by their Filipina mothers.

Most mestizos during the Spanish were raised Catholic, and also practiced some Chinese religious customs. Many mestizos grew up in households where local, Catholic, Hispanic, and Chinese customs were practiced together.

WHAT THE TSINOYS BELIEVE TODAY

In a pluralistic Philippine society, Catholic masses and Buddhist rites in one event is not an isolated practice.

For example, at the wake for former Philippine President Corazon Aquino at the Manila Cathedral in August 2009, a funeral mass officiated by His Eminence Cardinal Gaudencio Rosales was conducted side by side with a Buddhist service. Tsinoys of all ages performed the rite of Three Bows, showing great respect to the country’s beloved leader.

Is it Buddist? Taoist? It is important to distinguish Chinese religion as a broader category from either Buddhism or Taoism. Long before the latter two developed as religious traditions, there was already a Chinese religious sense that included the veneration of ancestors and divination.

Taoism has absorbed the Virgin Mary, Sto Nino, and many Buddhist bodhisattvas that they gave new names to. For example, in Chinese Buddhism, the formal name of Guanyin is Guan Shi Yin Pusa (观世音菩萨), but in Taoism or folk religion, she is simply Kwan Nim Ma 观音妈.

Over time, Chinese religion became the amalgamation of Buddhism, Taoism, and Confucianism, to the extent that some call it the Three Religions (三教) taken as one. Under Chinese religion are a plethora of folk practices which do not necessarily belong to any one of the three religions.

In the Philippines, Catholicism and Chinese religion can be practiced together: the (三教) can become (综合教) mixed religions.