The Filipino culture is rich with superstitions about anything and everything. Filipino Americans cannot escape this reality as adept to assimilating to a new environment as we are. Superstition is practically interwoven into our consciousness whether we like it or not. Growing up, it was just as important to learn not to prop my chin on my hand as to learn proper table manners. Why? Because supposedly this action is akin to awaiting bad luck to happen. There were others, such as do not sing while you are cooking or you will end up widowed (at least that is the version I heard), or do not move around changing places in the table while eating, you will change husbands, or in other words divorce and marry a number of times. The latter a no-no in Filipino culture since most Filipinos still look down upon divorce. One of my favorite and least understood is the one when you open an umbrella indoors, a centipede (which I assume is the equivalent of an alupihan) will fall down from the ceiling.
A few weeks ago we attended a baptism and even the Filipino priest made mention of that strange superstition of how the parents and the newly christened child should rush out of the church ahead of the others. I am still befuddled about the whole significance of this action, but I do remember my mom urging us out of the church with our firstborn on his baptism. We ran like mad for the door leaving our puzzled friends behind.
Most of these seem laughable and founded on the most ludicrous notions, but I recently found out that their roots were at least interesting. According to Dr. Sonia M. Zaide, author of The Philippines: A Unique Nation,, one country that was very influential on Filipinos superstitions was India. She made mention of a few such superstitions: 1) as mentioned above though a variation, a maiden who sings while cooking will marry a widower, 2) a pregnant lady eating twin bananas will give birth to twins, and 3) (the most commonly heard) when one dreams of teeth falling out that means a loved one will die.
I have no doubt that China would be another culture that greatly added to the list of Filipino superstitions. Remember wearing polka dots and filling up your pockets with coins during the New Year? I also met a Peruvian doctor a while back who was horrified to see me dumping my purse on the floor. "Pick it up, " she exclaimed. "Or you'll go poor!" For a minute there, I thought I heard my mom uttering those prophetic warnings. Since Peru is miles away from the Philippines, I therefore concluded that this superstition is Spanish in origin, our common conquering denominator.
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