Colonial Dumping Syndrome

- To drool over stuff whose enjoyment stems not from its perceived necessity to remain physically or mentally viable but rather from a bizarre obsession with brand, signature, origin and class connotations.

Girlfriend and I always find ourselves literally in each other’s throats every time we are out to stock up the fridge, the cellar or the wardrobe:

“I reckon this will be great. It has baking soda and it promises shiny white teeth. And uhhmm, it also is dead cheap", to which she’d say, "don’t believe anything that’s printed on the packet, silly. We’ve always used Colgate.”

Background info: Those who grew up in the Philippines know that the stuff you clean your teeth with is not a toothpaste but a colgate. A carbonated drink is not a soda pop but a coke. Imported American branded products are more superior to generic local ones.

“Oh, wow. The nanotech textile on this cool Gap shirt ensures that it will be stain-free forever. This is NASA stuff. Only astronauts wear this type of kit.”

“Well. You don’t drink red wine and don’t tell me you’re going to wear that stupid shirt forever, she quipped. Where is it made from? To which I lost all the energy to even look: Uh-oh. It’s made in the Philippines.”

This should never be confused with IMSCF [ I’m Spanish Chinese Filipino ] Syndrome. A supposed phenomenon of identity crisis amongst overseas Filipinos resulting in a unique form of institutionalised ethnic forgery .

This is purely physiologic in the sense that people who suffer from this affliction often have a low blood sugar from hyperventilation, hyperexcitedness, and weakness every time he sees anything shiny, metallic and small. Especially if it is visible from a window of an Apple Store.

People who have this syndrome also need to have small frequent trips to cafés, preferably Starbucks and little treats of simple sugars which again, preferably Hershey’s or Ben & Jerry’s.

New York City. Somewhere in Fifth Ave. Capital of capitalism and crass materialism.

People with severe cases need expensive holidays.

I wanna go to Peru. I want to see the Nazca lines. The lines are geometrical figures, trapezoids, triangles and animal figures etched on the rocky Peruvian mountains thought to be the remains of an ancient giant extraterrestrial airport. But nah, she will not have any of that crap:



“Christmas shopping is best value in New York.”

I was tempted to suggest Angkor Wat in Cambodia. We could spend a few weeks there en route to the Philippines. I heard it is quite interesting and probably much cheaper of which she would probably say:

“I had enough of these trapezoidal, triangular monuments of gods or aliens and all these boring star gate theories.”

I'm sure, she would.

I’m getting my intestinal tract gashed if she won’t.

Also. Next time you hear stories of children dying from salmonella from surplus milk products dumped to the third world or people from a cracked heart valve, be very scared. This is a more evil form of dumping syndrome.

* Cautionary Advice: Without understanding the finer nuances of this author's amateurish attempt at humour there is a bit of concern that he may be taken in earnest that would altogether defeat the purpose of this ( tongue-in-cheek ) banter. The girlie's words are intentionally hyperbolized to evoke sardonic wit and not a blatant representation of her values or character. She is inherently down to earth and not a vacuous evil reactionary of stiff bourgeois upbringing. And we are not always at each other's throats, really.