Who Are the People in our Neighborhood?

Every morning on weekdays, soon after mom and dad kiss me goodbye and speed away to work, I begin my walk around the block, with my Yaya Menchi of course. Yaya and I survey the block and observe the neighbors and their morning rituals.

I see our senior citizens enjoying their retirement and taking their brisk morning walks. I coo at the children getting ready for school and "wow" at the mom driving her twin girls to Manresa on board an electric golf cart . I throw curious glances at male construction workers flirting with "Indays" and exchanging cellphone numbers with them. I smile at all the other yayas taking their own "alaga" for a morning stroll. And last but not the least, I bid goodbye to all of the other parents rushing off to work.

I live in an international neighborhood. The neighbor on our left is a German married to a Filipina. They don't have kids but dote on a large black Rottweiler. Across us is a Korean expat married to a Filipina. They have a baby boy who hardly leaves the house. Behind us is Yuki, his Filipina mom, and Japanese dad. It's a multi-cultural, multi-racial and definitely multi-lingual neighborhood. The only thing that unites us, is our yayas who speak one language - that is - a language where their "alaga" is always "bida".

I am delighted that Yaya Menchi thinks I am the prettiest in the block, but of course, I'm the only baby girl anyway. I live in a nice and quiet neighborhood and I can't wait to explore the rest of it.

Here in this series of pictures, mom and dad have just given me their long sniffy goodbye kisses and bear hugs before they drive off to work. As soon as they disappear around the bend, I turn to my trusted escort and say, "Let's go Yaya Menchi, the subjects of Princess Carli (that's what yaya calls me but pronounced as "Pran-sis") await her.