X-OFW: The Reason Of My Coming Home (For Good)

Before I went abroad to work as a caregiver, I had a plan of using the opportunity to be my stepping-stone of going to another country, like, UK, U.S., Canada, or Italy where I will have the chance of becoming a citizen and ensure that my life and my family will become prosperous.

While I was there, SOMEONE showed me the other way; I should go home and try to make a difference that might influence the others to do the same.

Before becoming an X-OFW, I have been in the dilemma of deciding whether I go home or jump off to another country. Like the others, I went abroad to prepare for my children.  However, things changed when I was there; all of a sudden, I decided to go home against all the negative comments from my friends and Kababayans who were telling me, “I will regret it!”  “What will you do in the Philippines?” Nevertheless, I did not listen. I believed my reason for going home is strong enough and it is the right thing to do.

Few things influenced my decision.

During my first few months in Israel, I learned the thinking of my fellow OFWs.  Of the 20 people I spoke with, there was only one person who talked about going home for her family; all the rests were talking on going to another country. But, what jolted me was many of them had their parents worked or still working abroad!

What? Is this mean there is an abroad syndrome – I mean – a cycle had been created that children of OFW parents are sure to follow their parents' footsteps?  Wow, that was not my dream when I went there.  I went abroad thinking my children should not be thinking about abroad; I want them to stay with their family, and when they think of going overseas, it should be as tourists and not as someone like me going there begging for work.

Another thing was many of us OFWs were crying because we were treated like not humans. Because of this, some were forced to forget the good moral values instilled by the parents by answering back - a no, no in the Filipino culture. Some of us just cry and let the tears wash off the pains in our hearts.  For me I used my pen to jot down the pains which resulted for my first song “Hinagpis sa Abroad” or “Care-givers’ Woes.”

More things forced me to think on what I should do to not end up a “Yes sir, yes ma’m” the rest of my life without seeing my children growing up.  That was the time I went to the book stores scheming books thinking I could find the formula to solve my problem.  There I found Poor dad, Rich dad book by Robert Kiyosaki.

The book influenced me to think differently in order to be with my family.  I thought to myself, that if I would go to another country, that means I have to sacrifice my family.  I have to be like the others who watched their children growing up in pictures. (Yup, the song growing up in Pictures by the Alabama also made me think about how hard it was to be away from your children) I did not follow exactly what the book advised about going into business, but there were lessons the book talked about which made me to decide to stop sacrificing too much just to get what I wanted in life.

Before finding the book of Kiyosaki, I witnessed the family closeness of my employers. 

During Sabbath, when I was invited to the table of my employer, I envied the happiness they have every time they were in front of their table eating together as a family.  The father telling stories about their cultures, and the lessons they could learn, and the children telling their ideas and opinions. During those times, how I wished I could go home immediately and do the same.

Another person who influenced me to decide to go home was my best friend Izzy -the last person whom the Lord made me to take care of for a few years to learn more about the reality of life. 

I saw the closeness of his family: The real essence of having a family; the importance of being together; the importance of a father being there with his children; they need him when they are afraid, and they need him as their hero to emulate.

 I had thought, “Should I leave my children to chance that they will emulate Jose Rizal (My country’s national hero) or Robin Padilla of the Philippine movies, or the bad boys (“Mandurukot -pickpockets, robbers, and addicts) on the streets of my place, Baguio City?"

Izzy (as most people knew him) told me how his parents mold them to become self-reliant and to work hard while at the same time to be religious.  Their parents started from nothing, and only the good parenting they received was the only thing they inherited.  With that, all of them ended up successful in their endeavors.  When he got married, he was still a poor boy, and he told me how much he worked as a teacher, and then switched to become a real estate broker.  He did not leave his family(wife and children)to become successful.

These things made me think, that it is not the money that I am going to make will make my children become well off in life, but the good parenting they will receive from me as their father.

I learned, that Jose Rizal’s belief that the young ones are the future of a country will never be true if the parents are not there to teach them how to become the future.  In my opinion, “The parents are the future of the country” because they are the ones to teach the children all the knowledge and wisdom to become good human beings and citizens of the country. The parents are the examples the children have to imitate.  The good lessons they will learn from their parents will make them the future of the country, but how will that be when parents are not there for them – physically?

When I got married, I thought I would better my father - at least – as father to my children.  I will do my best to teach my children the things I did not learn from my father.  Because I knew that if only my father worked harder in doing his job as a father to me, I might be somebody up there now, and who knows, the next president of my country. 

On the contrary, when the good Lord given me the chance to do what I was thinking to do, where was I?  Ten years went by like only ten Christmas days in successions. My children are already in their teens, and in few years, I will be a grandfather!

Wow, a grandfather!  Without even knowing how it feels like a father?
 

My children, too, will grow up without even knowing how it felt having a father!  Accordingly, will they know to become parents when their time comes?

With all these things bothered me, I decided to come home and become a real father as I wished. 

While we need material things, I believed it is not worth the sacrifices we do away from our family.  No matter how much we do to try to communicate with them (Thanks to the advancement of technology. We can see them now in the internet and talk to them like we are next to each other – if we are lucky they want to communicate with us – the games in FB are too much a competition) still, the emotion and affection are not completely felt by both parents and the child. 

I saw how much these Kababayans working very hard to earn dollars.  Day and night, days off, and holidays, they go find a part time just to have more dollars to send to their beloved children, and extended families to show they are good sisters or brothers to them – or else…! 

I saw how much loneliness is driving many Kababayans to become lost off the way, and how many families were broken?

I saw how many died without seeing their beloved ones because they believed they could overcome the disease that took their energy.

I saw how many of them did not go home to see their husband, child, father, or mother who died because of fear they would lost their job, or for other reasons, and for “Practicality’s” sake.

I saw how many of us stayed there for years, but life stayed the same.   Okay, the house is no longer made up of cogon and now looks like a palace, but where are the occupants?  That’s the problem the house will never become a home, because the families are not complete, and will never be.

Yeah, I saw them going to churches, but seems, some churches are not filled up with the Lord’s Spirit that is why many of their flocks are going astray; anyway, the LORD IS LOVE, so they will be forgiven!

There is so much to sacrifice Kabayan, yet, no one is doing something to stop the cycle; in the contrary, it is being encouraged (by calling us the unsung heroes and super maids)  that we leave our family, never mind the children, as long as we can send home more dollars.