‘A joy pill:’ Christmas boxes with shoes and Spam connect Sacramento to Philippines

When Jinky Dolar’s husband, Danielo, went back to the Philippines more than a decade ago, he was met with a surprise: Several of his family and friends were wearing the military t-shirts he thought he’d lost months ago.

Bewildered, he asked them: How did his favorite t-shirts end up in their closets thousands of miles away from Sacramento?

“My husband still will not forgive me for this,” Jinky said, laughing. “He still continues to tell our friends when he sees his clothes (on them).”

Unbeknownst to him, Jinky, a senior account executive for the Asian-language network Crossings TV, scooped up Danielo’s shirts into balikbayan boxes, gift boxes sent from Filipinos living overseas to family and friends in the Philippines. All Danielo knew was his clothes disappeared.

Balikbayan is a Tagalog word referring to any Filipino who returns to the Philippines after spending time away. Sending balikbayan boxes is a year-round Filipino tradition — over 7 million were sent in 2016 alone, according to some estimates. The number spikes dramatically at Christmas, as celebrations start in September in the Philippines and are drawn out for four elaborate, extravagant months.

Most balikbayan boxes are sent through courier services like LBC, Atlas and Starkargo, and shipping can cost anywhere from $40 to $80. Most people will go for the largest size — up to 24-by-24-by-24 inches — shoving all of their gifts into a tight, Tetris-like formation to be shipped duty-free to loved ones’ doorsteps.

“There’s an art to packing the balikbayan box,” said Vince Sales, arts programmer for the Philippine National Day Association.

“You cannot go home and not have pasalubong (Tagalog for gifts or souvenirs),” said Christy Serrato, founder of Pair Anything. “To me, that balikbayan box is like a symbol of that pasalubong. You can’t go home without it.”

But the historical roots of these boxes are much more complicated. They’re a direct result of state-sponsored labor export policies of the 1970s, which flung thousands of Filipino workers out across the world in an effort to combat high unemployment rates in the Philippines. And the boxes inherently represent attempts to bridge the distance that prevents families from seeing each other in person for months and years.

During a year that’s seen the Philippines hit particularly hard by the COVID-19 pandemic and a harsh typhoon season, the gift boxes have taken on new meaning for many Filipino Americans in Sacramento. While there’s a limit to the relief balikbayan boxes can offer, many said they’re using their boxes not just as gifts, but also as aid packages for community members struggling to make ends meet.

“This is a way to … (impart) to your loved ones … that while you now are building a new home in America, you don’t forget the motherland, and you don’t forget your family,” Sales said.

What goes into a balikbayan box?

A long history of U.S. colonization in the Philippines created an appetite for American-brand goods, no matter how mundane. Back in the 1980s, it was common to fill boxes with household items like Dove soap and shampoo, or cleaning supplies.

Those things might still be thrown in, but these days it’s more about the food — the biscuits, dried noodles, even vitamins. Chocolates such as Kit Kats and Hershey bars are common, especially in bulk.

“Guess who buys the candy after Halloween?” said Elena Mangahas, a volunteer at Stockton’s Filipino American National Historical Society Museum. “It’s just in time to send half-price candies … to throw in a box and send to the Philippines. Merry Christmas!”

Clothing is another big item, which many donate from their own closets, or nice perfumes from brand names like Dolce & Gabbana. Nike shoes are a particularly popular request from teenagers. Some slide photos of family members in America between items.

But the golden goose of any balikbayan box is Spam. Cans and cans of it, a prominent ingredient in many Filipino dishes, but one that’s considerably more expensive in the Philippines.

“The funny thing about Spam is they will not eat right away. They’ll display it,” said Murray Navarro, president of the United Federation of Filipino American Educators’ Sacramento chapter. “It’s precious, it’s coming from America, that’s how they look at it. … The bad thing is … when I go home, I’ll be looking at those goodies, and sometimes they’re expired!”

In an increasingly globalized world, it’s become easier to get American goods in the Philippines. But the novelty of getting a package all the way from America never dies. For Sales’ relatives, it’s even a sensory experience — they’ve told him on many occasions the boxes smell “like America” — which apparently, to them, means apples.

“Maybe it’s how they imagine the U.S. to be,” Sales mused.

For many relatives in the Philippines, getting a box is an affirmation their family members are doing well overseas and have wealth they want to share with the rest of the family.

But it’s not always an accurate depiction, said Sacramento State professor Marie Mallare-Jimenez — even those who are struggling to make ends meet will feel pressured to send gifts home. Sometimes, this means relatives in the Philippines can get the wrong idea about America’s job prospects, or take its promises of economic success for granted.

“They think that America is like picking off dollars on the tree,” Navarro laughed. “It’s like, ‘No that’s my hard-earned money, you have to value them. That’s what I earned from my sweat and frustration.’”

That hustle is part of Filipino culture, said Wayne Jopanda, associate director and a co-founder of the Bulosan Center for Filipino Studies at UC Davis. Many Filipinos also feel culturally bound to provide for one another.

“Even through struggles, even though distance … it’s a long history of us being scrappy and fighting for what we can get, and making sure we can share the wealth,” Jopanda said.

A deeper history

Filipinos have been sending mail and care packages back and forth since they first arrived in the U.S. in the 1920s, according to Mangahas. But balikbayan boxes as they’re known today weren’t popularized until the 1980s, after thousands of Filipinos left the country due to then-President Ferdinand Marcos’ policies.

Unemployment was high, and Marcos’ policies forced Filipinos to leave and find work around the world. As of 2018, 10 million Filipinos worked overseas while the country’s population was about 106.7 million.

The evolution of balikbayan boxes into today’s slick, efficient system is inextricable from the rise of Filipino migrant labor, Jopanda said. It’s also part and parcel of the cultural shift that led to “racialized, commodified” ideas of Filipinos overseas as just laborers and tools for profit, he said.

“It ties back to the Philippines government, and how they like to commodify how we’re seen. Workers are just trying to make money,” Jopanda said. “A box ... becomes a replacement … a type of love language in a lot of our communities, to provide that love and resources back to our community in the homeland.”

Balikbayan boxes were further embedded into Filipino culture through an official government initiative that enticed overseas workers to return home as tourists, pouring their newly earned money into the Philippines to stimulate their economy. These travel programs offered discounted airfares for flights through then-government-owned Philippines Airlines. There were also hotel discounts, leaning into the concept of coming home to pull business in.

In 1987, the Filipino government declared balikbayan boxes exempt from taxes and duty fees, corresponding with the rise of door-to-door courier services like LBC that continue to dominate the market. It’s a reminder of the complicated nature of balikbayan boxes, their intermingling symbolism as pieces in a government-sponsored economic initiative and one of the few ways Filipinos can stay connected over thousands of miles.

“On one hand, there was a (government) plan. On the other hand, it’s an organic movement,” Mangahas said. “The wave of immigration drove pretty much that kind of a need. It emerged as an industry.”

Joy and sadness, hand-in-hand

It’s easy to be cynical about the boxes and what they stand for, Jopanda said, given their roots in the Philippines’ often painful history of labor migration. But they’re also a genuinely meaningful bridge of connection for many Filipinos spread across the globe, he said, tied to a real desire to reunite in any way possible.

“You know, what I anticipate most in sending the box over to my family is the reaction,” Sales said. “Everyone’s excited to see what’s in the box. There’s a whole kind of, like, family gathering that happens … when a balikbayan box arrives.”

“(That happy reaction is) priceless to me compared to what I send them, because they still connect with me through those goods,” Navarro said.

It’s a way for Navarro’s family to reinforce their bonds, he said, to remind them that he will look out for his family back home no matter how old everyone gets or how spread out they become.

“What we’re holding up in this whole scheme … is really the preservation of our culture, the culture of giving, caring and sharing what you’ve got,” Mangahas said. “That’s a very cultural serotonin. It’s a joy pill for most Filipinos. You never really meet someone who is unhappy about a box that is bound for the Philippines.”

In normal, non-COVID years, the Philippine Airlines counter at San Francisco International Airport would be flooded with boxes, which many Filipinos returning home use in lieu of luggage. This summer, instead of going back, Sales sent a box filled with practical goods like baby clothes and money for his nephew, who has two babies and lost his casino job due to COVID-19 closures.

He’s sending another in a few weeks filled with personal protective equipment. Others reported sending additional boxes this year to community organizations in the Philippines filled with school books and essentials like rice.

“I think, more than anything, this is the time to send boxes,” Mallare-Jimenez said.

There’s a certain element of sadness bound up in the joy of balikbayan boxes, especially this year, when every box that crosses the ocean is another reminder of our own inability to make that trip. But if anything, this year has underscored the tradition’s ability to persevere, to defy distance and a pandemic.

“It’s just the reality of being so distant and trying to find ways to connect and build connection and community,” Jopanda said. “It can never replace actually being able to see and hold each other and laugh and tell stories … but it’s the closest thing we can do right now.”

This story was originally published December 16, 2020 at 5:00 AM.