Tikoy turon

Recently I noticed a dessert fusing Filipino and Chinese sweets being sold at a mall: the tikoy turon.

This example of the intertwined Philippine and Chinese cultures was rolled out even as we bickered with our giant neighbor.

Even if I’m only a hilaw or half-baked Tsinoy, unable to speak Hokkien except the most basic and the cuss words, my maternal relatives are fluent in Hokkien and Mandarin, and we have relatives in both China and Taiwan. I admit feeling conflicted at times over the maritime conflict.

Regardless of our maritime dispute with China, Filipinos – and not just the Tsinoys – as usual celebrated the Lunar New Year yesterday, the start of the Year of the Fire Horse.

A report said that in relation to the Lunar New Year, even the sari-sari or neighborhood convenience stores saw brisk sales in hopia and Asian noodles – the latter traditionally associated with long life.

Even if it’s not the Lunar New Year, all sorts of items for good luck adorn many homes where the Pinoy household members have no Chinese ancestry. The good luck charms – many of them quite pricey – were surely good for the sellers.

Pinoys also check out the supposed lucky colors for the year, although I can’t remember the basics ever changing: red, gold and green. You can’t go wrong with them.

Then there are the supposed lucky food items – also very lucky for the fruit vendors, fishmongers (whole fish suggested) and noodle makers. There’s disagreement on serving fowl so I usually prepare pata tim, but I won’t say no to roast duck.

Our dispute with Beijing has affected tourism, trade and investments. But it will take far worse to keep Pinoys from enjoying Chinese cuisine, and sharing tikoy with family and friends during the “Chinese New Year” – an event celebrated under different names in other Asian countries.

It’s a testament to our worsening maritime dispute that Pinoys now make a point to refer to the non-working holiday as the Lunar New Year, not the Chinese New Year.

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For a long time, Filipinos had a largely benign view of China: great food, all things made for luck, celebratory fireworks, products more affordable than those of comparable quality from other countries. And for those with the means to travel, spectacular places to visit all over China.

That benign view started being replaced with concern and distrust when the Chinese built huts that it claimed were merely fishermen’s shelters on the aptly named Mischief Reef off Palawan. Those huts, spotted by the Philippine military for the first time in February 1995 on Mischief or Panganiban Reef, are now Chinese military facilities sitting on an artificial island.

Since then Pinoy distrust has progressively plumbed new depths as the maritime dispute dominated bilateral ties. In recent years, China has consistently ranked as the country most distrusted by Filipinos in all surveys including the latest one.

I don’t know if ordinary Chinese care about this, or if they have the same distrust of Filipinos. A Chinese official once told me that their citizens “don’t care, really” about the Philippines. He’s proficient in English, but maybe something still got lost in translation, and what he meant was that there is low awareness of our country among his compatriots.

A reflection of the deterioration of ties is the plunge in tourist arrivals from China. While the maritime dispute is a factor here, Chinese officials and Philippine travel agents say other elements are at play. Foremost of these is the concern of prospective Chinese tourists for their personal safety in the Philippines, where kidnapping of Chinese nationals by their Chinese compatriots belonging to crime gangs have been reported on the mainland.

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China prospered by opening its arms to the world and playing by international rules. The world happily bought everything Chinese and invested heavily in China, even at the risk of endangering domestic industries. People joked that God made the world; everything else is made in China.

Today, however, several of its major trading partners are accusing China of economic coercion and moving to diversify supply sources and reduce their dependence on the Chinese market. Foreign businesses are decamping from the mainland and relocating to other countries notably Vietnam (we’re trailing our Southeast Asian neighbors again in this area).

That recent statement from the Chinese embassy in its ongoing word war with the Senate, about strained bilateral ties endangering the jobs of many Filipinos, may be true, but it prompted the Department of Foreign Affairs to describe it as “coercive.”

With the start of the Year of the Fire Horse, perhaps both sides can take a break from the exchange of harsh words. Top officials can’t be calling for friendly talks while lower ranking officials continue to hurl insults at each other.

Neither the Philippines nor China is going to disappear from the face of the Earth anytime soon. We have no choice but to co-exist.

This year, as the Philippines chairs the ASEAN summit and related meetings, there’s an opportunity to pursue improved relations with our giant neighbor without conceding on sovereignty issues. But the effort has to be mutual, and sincere on both sides.

Perhaps the bickering officials can sit down to a “healthy dialogue” while sharing tikoy turon.