I was in the house of a friend lately and I noticed that the pictures in the family room have been changed. The former portraits were gone and the new ones were all of young ones –hockey teams, a child’s birthday party, a young girl by a Christmas tree. They were all about two to ten year olds “Ah” I thought, “they are all her grandchildren.” Of course, my friend is now a senior.
Newspapers and other forms of media often discuss the issue of the Canadian ageing society. Every year, the number of seniors’ increases and the government is concerned about the increasing need to provide for the care of the aged.
Nursing homes all have waiting lists and retirement places are found to be often inadequate in meeting the needs of their residents.
Most of the early Filipino immigrants to Canada who came in the sixties and seventies have already joined this group of the aged in Canada.
It is interesting to look back and see how they have fared from those early years of settling in a new country to the present.
Seniors have played a significant role in the history of Filipino immigration to Canada. The early large group of Filipino immigration to this country in the 1960’s and 1970’s was composed of young female nurses and other health-care givers, who, mostly came from the United States and were recruited to work in Canada after a few years’ stay in the neighbouring country.
Those young women in their prime either sponsored their fiancées from the Philippines to come to Canada, went home to their country of origin for a while to get married and then came back to Canada, or married men from other countries right here. They started their young families.
The need for someone to look after the new additions to the family became a concern at a time when there were very few day care centres. A new wave of immigrants made up of parents of these new settlers in the country arrived mainly to assist in baby-sitting. Couples and sometimes just middle aged or women in their sixties, were sponsored by their children to assist the struggling families to look after their children and their homes while fathers and mothers were at work.
Those years were difficult for the older generation who came to this country. Most of the time they were left within the four walls of the homes of their children, with the babies or toddlers. They did not have relatives or friends to communicate with at the beginning. They were neither familiar with their surroundings nor aware of agencies that might help them. Their only contacts were the parents of the children that they cared for. They were not used to the harsh winters.
Even caring for the young ones left for them to look after was different to what they were used to in their country of origin. They were dependent financially on their children and were not consulted in making decisions for the family. This older generation used to be the decision makers in their homes. In the new setting they lived in, they were just followers, executors of the rules and instructions given by the younger generation that brought them to this country.
Not for very long conflicts arose. Older grandchildren did not want to obey their caregivers. They did not like some of the traditions that they were asked to observe, like kissing the hands of elders, using words of respect in addressing their grandparents and following rules that they feel inhibit their freedom. The sad part was that most of the time, their parents sided with them when confrontations about their behaviours were held. The older generation felt helpless and hopeless.
The problems were even more serious and complicated if the husband was not of Filipino origin. The older generation felt more alienated.
Eventually the issues became the concern of Filipino community organizations. Workshops were held meeting parents and children in dialogues to help develop better communications with considerations on the rationalizations of both sides. Grandparents started to attend week-end meetings and socials wherein their expertise in cooking and other talents were appreciated.
Senior groups began to be formed wherein leadership skills and other abilities were recognized and put into use. This older generation started to get acclimatized to the Canadian environment and began to be more tolerant about childhood, upbringing which somehow did not agree with certain Filipino traditions. They also started to receive their old-age pensions or social benefits that helped them become financially independent.
Later on when the children these “old folks” were taking care of became old enough not to need baby-sitters, their grandparents started to lead independent lives. Some of them especially the males went back to the Philippines during the winters in Canada. Others lived independently, mostly in government subsidized housings, while a number continue to stay with the families of their married children. A considerable number of that group had passed away.
At present those young immigrants of the sixties and seventies are grandparents themselves. But they are living a lifestyle quite different from what their parents who took care of their children had. They are mostly financially independent with pensions after having worked for three or more decades in Canada. They have their own homes which are often “empty nests” by now. They baby sit their grandchildren but very few do it full time. ’’I told my son that I am through taking care of kids’’, I heard one of them say ’’I shall do it once in a while but not always’’.
Most of them have kept the friends of their good old days whom they meet for socials and nights out. Many of them have acquired the Canadian lifestyle of entertainment, holidays and theatres.
Like their parents with whom they had conflicts in bringing up their children, they also complain about their own children, the second generation Canadians who were born brought up and educated in Canada. You would think I have no knowledge at all in bringing up children, one of them complained. ’’She leaves me a schedule of what to do and not to do with her baby. I sometimes feel like screaming when her children would not obey me. They are monsters.’’
Let us not forget that these seniors are first generation Canadians. They were brought up in the Philippines. While they have lived in Canada for three to four decades, they still have in them, some of the Filipino traditions. Many of them still find the approach to courtship and live-in arrangements of the young generation at present unacceptable. Many of them find it distressing that they seem not to have a say anymore on what their offsprings would like to do in the future or where they would live.
The cycle has come full round and is being repeated. The remnants of the upbringing in the old country of origin remains. How much is being transmitted to the upcoming generation? Time will tell. ****
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