Manila Days: Growing Up in the Postcolony
Manila Days braids three voices — a child living her days in present tense, the grown woman looking back, and a mother’s fifteen years of letters kept in a “Decade Box.” Between them, the book asks what it costs to love a country you were brought to without asking, and whether you can ever honestly say “we.” These questions are meant to open conversation, not close it; follow whichever ones your group can’t stop arguing about.
1. What scenes most vividly brought Manila to life for you?
2. How did Kerry’s understanding of “Orange Jesus” change as she grew up?
3. Which people in Kerry’s memoir did you feel drawn to, recognize yourself in, or want to know better?
4. What does the kalaw come to represent—or awaken—in Kerry’s life?
5. How does the Poethig family’s attempt at a “fraternal” rather than paternalistic mission compare with the missionary family in The Poisonwood Bible? What do the two books reveal about good intentions, unequal power, and the limits of solidarity?
6. What does Kerry’s “kano-pinoy” identity make possible, and what does it conceal?
7. During the First Quarter Storm and the onset of martial law, Kerry is both endangered and protected by being American. How does her passport function as an “anchor” and a “hook”?
8. What question would you most like to ask Kerry Poethig?