What Makes Me Filipino?

So, what makes a Filipino a Filipino? What makes one qualify for being a Filipino? Here's what I think (note: this is not one of those "You'll know you're Filipino when you have karaoke in your living room and a huge wooden spoon and fork hanging on your dining room wall..anyone can have those. Ugh):

• one must have Filipino ancestry/blood
• one must identify being a Filipino
• has to have been to the Philippines and actually lived there for at least a month
  
• must know the culture and traditions
  
• and who's a Filipino who doesn't speak Tagalog/Filipino?
  

If a self-proclaimed "Filipino" lacks one or more of the above, I'm not happy to say this but it makes him/her less of a Filipino. Let me explain each bullet:

One must have Filipino ancestry/blood. Well, duh. Being Filipino is all about having Filipino blood-relatives who talk in cute Filipino accents and have grandmothers who are hella religious and cooks good adobo! Aiite, case closed. Next,

One must identify being a Filipino. This one's pretty obvious too. If you don't consider yourself Filipino, yet you look like one, you act like one, and your parents are freaking Filipino, then what are you, even though you were born outside of the Republic of the Philippines? You must at least acknowledge the fact that you belong to the cute brown People race called Filipinos.

Has to have been to the Philippines and actually lived there for at least a month. Here's one word: immersion. One has to experience living in the Philippines and know how their people has lived while they were living so luxuriously in a totally different country.

Must know the culture. Of course, you can't be Filipino if you don't know at least a small part of your culture. Dances, the simple "mano po" stuff, food, etc..You can't miss that if you're living with or around Filipinos.

and who's a Filipino who doesn't speak Tagalog/Filipino? Frankly speaking, yes, I actually think Filipinos who were born in countries outside of the Philippines who don't speak their mother tongue is less of a Filipino. It's sad because I see a lot of non-Filipinos out there who are struggling to learn my mother tongue, yet I also see actual Filipinos (who were born outside the Philippines) who don't even BOTHER to learn the language (and I'm talking about the general Filipino language. Not Ilocano or Bisaya or whatnot).

With all of that said, does this give you a clear idea of what a Filipino is? Maybe, maybe not. You may argue against me or you may agree with me, it DOES matter.