Mama Blanca’s Memoir by Teresa de la Parra was about the childhood memories of Blanca Nieves in their plantation with her parents, sisters, and caretakers. I personally found this reading quite easy and relatable to follow. Since Blanca Nieves mostly talked about her memories as a child, this made me reflect on my own memories in relation to my own family, but as well as the Philippines’ traditions, structures, cultures, and ways that are very similar to this texts era.

For those of you who don’t know, Philippines was colonized by the Spaniards for more than 300 years, therefore most of our traditions, culture, and language were incorporated from their ways. Some aspect of this is the hierarchical structure of families and the society as a whole. In the text Blanca Nieves mentioned that their father was the head of the family, and the one they’re extremely scared of. Similarly in the Philippines, our country is also very patriarchal, although it’s slowly recognizing the importance of equality, most households, especially those who live in the rural areas, are very patriarchal where the father of the house gets the final say on important matters regarding the home.
One other example of hierarchy that I’ve noticed in the text, that are similar and still very present in the Philippines today is the well defined lines between social classes. Most rich homes in the Philippines still have their designated maids, caretakers, cooks, gardeners, farmers, drivers, etc., just like how Blanca Nieves and her family has Evelyn as their main caregiver, Candelaria as their cook, Vicente Cochocho as their “everything” man, and so on. Right now though, most Filipinos are on the same household structure as Blanca Nieves’ family after they sold their plantation, where they only have one caregiver, who looks after the children and also does the cooking and cleaning around the house.

There were other similarities, like how servants used to call their boss “Don”, and how children were expected to behave when there are visitors, but by reading the text, it brought back my own memories from my home country. It reminded me of the similarities in our history, but also in our familial and society structure. Reading Mama Blanca’s Memoirs, in a way, kind of took me on a little trip back home. Maybe not necessarily during my generation, but through the history of my country through the home of Blanca Nieves.

How about you, did you make any personal connection with the text as well?