What Are Filipinos Like?

Nothing is as difficult as self-appraisal and to answer question in the little of this article. I thought it best to start by asking it. With no particular pattern in mind, I asked a number of foreign friends to give me their impression of the Filipino. I was told that we are friendly, good-natured, loyal, idealistic, sentimental, socially gracious (even the lower classes), un willing to accept responsibility, lacking in self-reliance, less hard working than the Chinese, more intelligent than the Malay, imitative but less so than the Japanese religious but not so mystical as the Indians, and in general, the most adaptable of all the races in the Orient.

A Spaniard thought we were very like the Spanish: an American thought we were not American enough. A Frenchman remarked we were the only people in Asia with a sense of humor at least only ones who could laugh at themselves, which when one thinks of it, was probably the pretties compliment of all.