Chip Tsao, Cheap Chow

Below is the full article, "The War At Home", written by Chip Tsao for HK Magazine. The original article has been removed from the magazine's official website. Read it and weep.

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The War At Home

March 27th, 2009

The Russians sank a Hong Kong freighter last month, killing the seven Chinese seamen on board. We can live with that—Lenin and Stalin were once the ideological mentors of all Chinese people. The Japanese planted a flag on Diàoyú Island. That’s no big problem—we Hong Kong Chinese love Japanese cartoons, Hello Kitty, and shopping in Shinjuku, let alone our round-the-clock obsession with karaoke.

But hold on—even the Filipinos? Manila has just claimed sovereignty over the scattered rocks in the South China Sea called the Spratly Islands, complete with a blatant threat from its congress to send gunboats to the South China Sea to defend the islands from China if necessary. This is beyond reproach. The reason: there are more than 130,000 Filipina maids working as $3,580-a-month cheap labor in Hong Kong. As a nation of servants, you don’t flex your muscles at your master, from whom you earn most of your bread and butter.

As a patriotic Chinese man, the news has made my blood boil. I summoned Louisa, my domestic assistant who holds a degree in international politics from the University of Manila, hung a map on the wall, and gave her a harsh lecture. I sternly warned her that if she wants her wages increased next year, she had better tell every one of her compatriots in Statue Square on Sunday that the entirety of the Spratly Islands belongs to China.

Grimly, I told her that if war breaks out between the Philippines and China, I would have to end her employment and send her straight home, because I would not risk the crime of treason for sponsoring an enemy of the state by paying her to wash my toilet and clean my windows 16 hours a day. With that money, she would pay taxes to her government, and they would fund a navy to invade our motherland and deeply hurt my feelings.

Oh yes. The government of the Philippines would certainly be wrong if they think we Chinese are prepared to swallow their insult and sit back and lose a Falkland Islands War in the Far East. They may have Barack Obama and the hawkish American military behind them, but we have a hostage in each of our homes in the Mid-Levels or higher. Some of my friends told me they have already declared a state of emergency at home. Their maids have been made to shout “China, Madam/Sir” loudly whenever they hear the word “Spratly.” They say the indoctrination is working as wonderfully as when we used to shout, “Long live Chairman Mao!” at the sight of a portrait of our Great Leader during the Cultural Revolution. I’m not sure if that’s going a bit too far, at least for the time being.

Chip Tsao is a best-selling author and columnist. A former reporter for the BBC, his columns have also appeared in Apple Daily, Next Magazine and CUP Magazine, among others.

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The article is supposed to be funny but as Ms. Kitty Go aptly puts it, it's "a lame attempt at humour which some may classify as irony, hyperbole, parody or satire. "

If we use Mr. Chao's reasoning, we can say that the taxes that go to the Chinese government every time we buy something "Made in China" or visit their country, definitely contribute to China's ongoing bullying activities against the Philippines and even against the US in the South China Sea. So, maybe we should think twice before buying Chinese products or before going anywhere in China.

Mr. Chao totally got it wrong when he wrote, "we have a hostage in each of our homes in the Mid-Levels or higher."

They are the ones in hostage because I highly doubt if they will be able to function well without their Filipina "servants". As Jessica Zafra once said, we can easily achieve world domination if all the Filipino domestic helpers around the world will go on a simultaneous strike. Imagine all the foreign ambassadors and dignitaries not showing up for work because they have to do their house chores. Even US President Barack Obama is at the mercy of his Filipina chef. Isang patak ka lang!

If Mr. Chip Tsao and his fellow "Mid-level" communist bigots continue to threaten their helpers, then they should not wonder why their breakfast tastes funny in the morning.

Note: It's bad enough to have Chip Tsao demeaning the entire Filipino nation. It's worse to have a fellow Filipino, and a grandson of a former President at that, brushing the issue off by stating that “all the crap about that HK columnist comes from Pinoys who wouldn't know satire sarcasm or irony if it slapped them on the face.” Yeah right, Mr. Quezon!