The 30 alumni and alumnae of Brent School, in the Philippine mountain city of Baguio, were in for some cultural shocks. Having traveled 7,000 or 8,000 miles to celebrate the 75th anniversary of a school most of them had not seen for more than 40 years, they found something quite different from the tight little American island they had once known.
The old buildings were still there, still painted cream and green, and pine trees still cover much of the campus. But new buildings accommodate a student body that has more than tripled in size. More than 50 of the students and many of the faculty and staff are Filipinos, a radical departure from the past. Once a week, as required by national law, the entire student body Lines up to witness the raising of the Philippine flag and to sing in Tagalog the national anthem, Pambansang Awit.
At an anniversary performance in the school gym, half the musical program consisted of Philippine songs and dances. At the dedication of the new media center, the guest speaker was the Philippine Minister of Education. Responding to him, Headmaster Peter Caleb said, "We are proud to be part of the Republic of the Philippines." This would never have been said 40 years ago—and only partly because the Republic did not then exist. Although Brent students felt affection for the Filipino houseboys and, indeed, the Filipino people, no one dreamed that any of them might actually enroll. This was an American school in the Philippines, not a Philippine school.
The old school was the most determinedly American institution the alumni had ever known. Founded by the Episcopal Church in 1909, it had not accepted Filipino students before World War II, and no Filipinos were on its faculty. Americans may have prided themselves on a benign colonial policy, but not that benign. Almost all the 100 students used to be Americans, the sons and daughters of Army and Navy officers, Government officials and businessmen who had some how landed in the Philippines.
Philippine influences on the school were few. Filipino cooks and houseboys took care of the 40 boarders, the school played some Filipino teams in basketball and baseball, and a few native items occasionally invaded the staunchly American menu. Mangoes were popular. Pechay, the odorous Philippine cabbage, was despised. But because students, under the eye of a faculty member at each table, were expected to eat everything on their plates, it was difficult to avoid. One boy, more imaginative and more opposed to pechay than most, went to unusual lengths. Learning that pechay was on the night's menu, he took a hair from the longest-haired girl in school, worked it into his plate while the teacher was not looking and then pretended to discover it. "Look at this, sir!" he announced, grasping the end of the hair and then slowly and endlessly drawing it out of the hated vegetable. That night his entire table was excused from having to eat pechay.