Singing, Screaming and Crying

There are three things you can always depend on when watching Filipino television: you will always see and unfortunately always hear very bad singing, some screaming and lots of crying. Sometimes it's happening all at the same time. A few months ago, my mother made a very big mistake. She decided to order not one but TWO Filipino channels from our digital cable provider. She had very good intentions. My father, who is in ill health and unable to leave the house, was addicted to QVC and HSN. And as a result of this addiction, we have a shitload of crap in the house. So my mom's "great" idea was to get him addicted to Filipino television and how well did she succeed. We no longer have deliveries of crap, but now we have noise pollution and it's in stereo. My father will have his bedroom TV on with one Filipino channel while he has the other Filipino channel on in the kitchen. And of course, the volume is very loud. Filipinos L-O-V-E to sing whether they have any talent or not. They have no shame because I honestly think they ALL really believe they can sing. My relatives certainly think they can. Almost all of their households have karaoke machines. On every Christmas Eve growing up, my cousins, siblings and I were all shoved onto a makeshift stage with a stage light beaming down on us, microphone in hand and was forced to sing Christmas carols, Stacy Lattisaw's Love on a Two Way Street, the theme song from Ice Castles or any other god awful song from the '70s or '80s. Thank goodness my parents realized early on that my siblings and I really lacked the talent.

Now getting back to Filipino television. I got used to the screaming and crying on the filipino soap operas, but the singing on so called "talent" shows or even by Filipino "stars"- it's just so bad. And on many occassions, my father would call me into his bedroom or the kitchen and tell me to watch this Filipino and hear how well he or she sings. One time, I actually volunteered to walk over to check the TV out because I honestly thought the girl singing was part of a comedy act. Surely, this couldn't be real. But it was.

Last evening, after coming home from a night out, the same routine occurred. This time it was my mom who called me into the bedroom to check out the latest Filipino "star." I was tired and just wanted to appease her, so I watched and to my great surprise, there was actually a great filipina singer. This time the singing came from a talented 15 year old girl named Charice Pempengco, the screaming was from the audience and the crying came from Oprah Winfrey.

So, Charice Pempengco, you show the world and all those pina girls back home what a real Filipino singer sounds like.

Charice on Oprah (video removed from You Tube for copyright infringement)
And check her out again on Oprah this Tuesday, 9/9.

Charice on Korea's Star King