i get that all the time! especially when i'm paying by credit card. i can fully understand tagalog and might be able to speak it if need be but i was born and raised here.

i wait tables and when the filipino customer finds out that i'm filipino (because they ask), they usually think that they are entitled to some kind of discount. i don't get it.

they also like to ask me my last name and try to figure out where my family is from. i usually get a disappointed look because i have no idea where anything is in the philippines - i've never been there or have the deisre to go.

oh well...

Oh my gosh! I totally know what you're talking about with the "filipino discount". It must be some sorta unwritten rule. I got a good deal on my car brakes last year just because I am a Filipina, and the guy installing them had just moved from the Phlippines a couple of months prior. It's so weird...

Slightly related:

An actual conversation I had with a co-worker

Female Person at work: Where are you from again?
Me: Saskatchewan, Canada, originally.
Person: Oh wow! That's great. It's beautiful country up there.
Me: That it is. Where have you been?
Person: Oh I haven't visited myself, I've just seen pictures.
Me: (subdued) Oh.
Person: So, do you speak Canadian?
Me: ...what?
Person: You know, Canadian....vooly voo, common tie my shoe and all that stuff?
Me: Migod, you're serious, aren't you?
Person: Well? Say something in Canadian to me. I wanna hear it. *smiles like an idiot*
Me: Oh for the love of...Mangez la merde vous chienne folle.
Person: Wow, that sounded sexy. What did you just say?
Me: *walks away mumbling*

Canadians give everyone a discount...that's part of the reason Canada's economy is in the toilet at the moment. N'est pas?

Heh. I'm a filipino/caucasian mix, though I bear many filipino traits. I get the disappointed looks all the time from my not being able to speak Tagalog.

I, too, feel like I'm being excluded from some kind of club. And as far as the last name thing goes, I get asked that as well. I respond 'Creighton' and they kinda wince.

I really feel like I'm missing out on something huge here.

Courtney,

At least they ask with the assumption you have some kind of rich cultural background or something. It's better than people assuming you have no history or interesting background to speak of, as they often do when you're white.

Parli l'italiano?

-Adam

This reminds me of the SNL sketch when Eddie Murphy got made up as "Mr. White". He got all the free stuff from the white people and the party on the bus. Of course that doesn't really happen. ;)

Asked if you speak Canadian, lol. Sounds like some of the ignorant hicks around here. At least Fort Hays State U. has a large Asian student population to help the town from becoming a big box of crackers.

I thought tagalogs werer those peanut butter chocolate girl scout cookies?

Some one asked me once, "excuse me, but are you Euro-Trash?"

once and a while I get the "you look japanese" or "your name sounds japanese" they always look so dissapointed when I tell them I'm not.