Best Of Both Worlds

If there is a young man who has it all, it is my young friend, Jame.

Born of German and Filipino parentage, he physically cuts a very striking figure indeed and, if stories (both his own and from others) are to be believed, he is very popular with the girls who, as most Pinays, are generally captivated by any form of Caucasian good looks.

The fact that there is Filipino blood is mixed in with the foreign merely serves to whet their appetites and so by all indications, this young man would probably have no problem getting all the female companionship he desires, that is, if he get them past the eagle eyes of his German father who fidgets and worries all day long that he has been precisely successful in doing just that.

The fact is, I have known Jame since he was a boy and he is, by any standards, a well-mannered, affable, friendly and conscientious young man who is probably the least to get into any kind of trouble of the amorous kind. The father worries though because his antics and escapades with the female species in his youth and bachelorhood are the stuff of legends and he, like all former philanderers are constantly haunted by the fear that his past may return to bedevil them through his offspring.

In my view, he may be worrying too much and for no reason at all. Jame will probably go through the perils, minefields and shoals of young adulthood with relative ease and with the minimum of scars both physical and mental. And with his father using his vast experience and accumulated wisdom to shepherd him through all that, there is really very little need for concern anyway.

German efficiency, industry and durability coupled with the Filipino's innate good heart, friendliness and warmth, this young man straddles the huge divide between two diverse cultures and carries this burden with grace. And he is in every sense lucky because, unlike many of the less fortunate of his kind, he has managed to gain and possess not the worst but the best of two worlds.