A Mere "Formality"

I've never heard of the Commission on Filipinos Overseas (CFO) until I had to attend a CFO seminar, which is a requirement for Filipinos who want to live abroad with their foreign partner. Apparently, this certificate helps you clear Philippine Immigration (among other required documents, a shitload really), so rather than risk being offloaded on the day of my flight, I decided to go to a seminar and get it over with.

If you were born in the Philippines, and then subsequently went to school and worked (but also drive a car or a motorbike in the Philippines, or vote or collect your retirement pension in the Philippines), most probably you're already well acquainted with the country's "love" of red tape. Applying for your driver's license, tax identification number, PRC ID, voter's ID, and NBI clearance (or that infamous PhilSys National ID), etc., will subject you to a painful experience akin to having your toenails ripped off -- okay, maybe I'm exaggerating, but not that much.

So on the day of my seminar, when I was seated in the large waiting area of the CFO office in Manila, I had to internalize the country's "love of red tape," something I had to unfortunately tick off the list, just to fight my growing impatience at being forced to waste my time AND money (to pay for the CFO fee -- after all, if there's anything that the Philippine government loves more than red tape, it's collecting taxpayers' money).

I also decided to find out what this government office was. A quick Google search on my phone told me that the agency "is responsible for promoting and upholding the interests of Filipino emigrants and Filipino permanent residents in countries other than the Philippines. It is also "responsible for preserving and strengthening ties with Filipino communities outside the Philippines." The CFO is distinct from the Overseas Workers Welfare Association (OWWA), which is tasked with taking care of OFWs.

I quickly learned, too, from the muffled conversations around me that the bulk of the seminar covers cases of domestic violence abroad, and what to do and who to contact in case of abuse suffered from a foreign spouse.

A group of around 20 people were herded from the waiting area by an usher into a small room furnished with plastic chairs, a water cooler with a stack of Styrofoam cups and small cartons of teabags and sachets of instant coffee, and a flat-screen TV. We were told to wait. As I sat in that room, I noticed that I was the only guy. And I realized: majority of the people in the larger waiting area had been women -- there were probably a maximum of fewer than 10 guys there, if that.

The women -- mostly young girls, really, in their late teens, but a few in their early 20s -- continued their muffled chatter, probably to ease a bit of the nervousness. A lot of the girls were headed to Europe, some to the US and Canada, quite a few to Japan and Korea. Majority of them met their partners online, through social media like Facebook or Instagram, or through dating apps. 

There was a nervousness in the air, sure, but you could also hear the excitement in the girls' voices. They were speaking in hushed tones, but they were also all smiles, cracking jokes about how hard it must be to learn another foreign language -- and deeming those who were bound for English-speaking countries lucky.

The nervousness stemmed, I found out (chismoso, lol) from a one-on-one interview immediately after the seminar, an interview that if you failed --  according to one of the girls -- could deny you the CFO certificate. The girls evidently did their homework, and I felt ashamed that up until that moment I only felt disdain at the entire process.

Finally, a woman in a Navy blue power suit and a CFO badge walked into the room and addressed everyone. She told us we'd have to stay for a little more than four hours, which was the entire duration of the seminar and interview. I was expecting groans from the girls, but they greeted the bad news -- at least it was bad news to me; Diana was waiting for me in the lobby, and I didn't want her to stay there for hours -- with nods and smiles. Again, they obviously did their homework.

I was expecting the woman in the power suit to turn on the TV so we could get on with the seminar (the room didn't have a door, and we'd already seen other rooms showing some pre-recorded presentation), when I heard my name called. "Mr. Mark Lorenzana," Power Suit said, and ushered me outside the room to a line of small cubicles with office chairs where other attendees were already being interviewed.

As we sat down to the interview, I realized that I wouldn't be needing the seminar anymore. The woman was friendly, and asked me how long Diana and I knew each other. I told her we met in 2007, as coworkers in a company in Cebu, and that I've already visited Mexico as a tourist several times before deciding to settle down there. She jotted down the information on a form, stood up and shook my hand, and told me to stop by the front desk on my way out of the office for instructions on how to print my certificate. 

She was already walking away when I asked her why I didn't need to join the seminar. "Oh, for you this is only a formality." 

"But why do the girls--"

"It's our job to protect them," she interrupted, and hurried off -- after all, she still had a roomful of people to attend to, or "protect."

I didn't know if the other men -- all 10 of them or fewer, in a government office of a few hundred women hoping to leave the country and meet their future husbands -- had to go through the seminar. I suspected, though, that like me, for them the whole exercise was "just a formality."

The only thing for me to do was to talk to the front-desk receptionist, collect Diana at the lobby, and then grab some food at the Shakey's pizza place across the street.