Totally Random

When a French Polynesian man (who's got an Asian last name) meets a Filipina, then gets married in the US, then gives a Hawaiian name to his baby, now lives in the Philippines, it can get really crazy.

We've got quiet a lot of funny experiences in our lives with regards to this matter.

I don't know 'bout others, but for me it is still kind of weird that our passports are all different. Some people think it's cool, it's actually not all the time. It makes me go nuts to keep track of all the documentation. All this immigration and visa and citizenship stuff - they are just not my thing. But I had to make it 'my thing' or else our family would just probably end up being deported every now and then. It's when you have to assure you have the US version, and Filipino version, and French version of each and everyone's birth certificates, marriage certificate, and all that. Nah-uh! not cool!

Even simple socializing to new faces can make things really confusing:

"I'm Shereene. Shereene Mou Tham."

"Where did you get your last name?"

"Ahm, that's my husband's last name."

"Oh! your husband is Thai?"

"Nope"

"Vietnamese?"

"Nope."

"Chinese?" 

"Nope! He's Tahitian."

"Wow. Tahitian. What is that?"

"Ok, nevermind. He is a French national."

"Oh I see! And your baby's name?"

"Keahi."

"Is that a french name?"

"Nope. It's Hawaiian."

"?"

"We had him in Hawaii. We got married there.  We both studied there. We met there."

"Ah cool! So why did you guys come back here in the Philippines?"

So when that point comes. I almost just want to scream and say, "As far as I know I have all the rights to be back in my home country.", or maybe say, "It's a thing called inter-cultural marriage. Something, you might not want to talk about right now.", or maybe just walk away and say, "Nice meeting you!"

It's really crazy. But it's fun. I like how Garry looks so much like most Filipinos. So we usually overhear French tourists conversations and they all would not even think that Garry actually understands all of it. Happens all the time, and most of the time it really cracks us up.

The best part is all 3 of us can walk around without getting weird stares, because we don't look like we're from different races. Not unless Garry starts talking in English, then people looks at him from head to toe and be like, "Gosh! This Filipino is so show off to be speaking in English!" He gets it all the time too. Haha. Poor guy.

Anyway, I just wanted to share something on my blog, and this is what I thought off. :-D