Why do I have lots of things

“You’re a tiny person and yet you have lots of things”

That’s the message my future cousin-in-law send me when I started sending my stuff to their place temporarily until I get another job and an apartment of my own. I’m getting shy already sending my stuff and I’m not done yet. Auntie keeps on poking me already with my things especially my clothes because it’s a lot. According to them, it’s more than whatever they have in combined.

Well, I have an explanation as to why over the years I accumulated lots of stuff. But take note, I’m shifting a whole house and not just a room into one room that I have to share even. I believe, anyone will make their room or in my case, a house into a home, something that they can say it’s their home or personal space even if it is just a temporary space for months or years. It’s innate to us to make the space our personal space. When you do this, you buy things or collect things to make it homey and a functional home. Even if you are alone, it’s still a house that you are making a home. And that is my case.

My apartment was provided by the company. Pieces of furniture and appliances were provided. They also included a set of dinnerware, spoons & forks, rice cooker, microwave, gas stove, pressure cooker, kettle, pot & pan, colander, knives, chopping board and ladle. That’s all! And so, through the years, I accumulated additional stuff to make my home more functional especially in the kitchen since I do the cooking and baking. I bought a local wok, frying pans one big and one small, wooden ladle for the nonstick pans, peeler, additional colander and mixing bowls, baking pans and molds, wine glasses, tea cups, whisk, food storage boxes and tiffin boxes (I love tiffin boxes) and other things. I also received a food processor and an electric oven. Through the years, I saved glass bottles and ice cream boxes to use as containers and food storage boxes. That’s how my kitchen stuff grew.



My house was bare and plain, the company provided a hideous curtains and bed sheets. So, I started buying bed sheets, I had 5 sets but gave the other 2 sets to my maid. The bed sheets sold here are flat sheet and 2 pillowcases, so I brought my old abel blanket from manila with me. And, bought new curtains also, I have 3 sets. And, I have a bolster and my stuffed toys Happy Gilmore (bear), Wallygator (alligator), Kiwi (koala), sputnik (turtle), Minnie mouse and Po. I also have cushion covers because my sofa set is plain and boring. I started buying house decorations locally and some from my trips in Cambodia, Kolkata, hongkong and mostly from Philippines. And, since Christmas is not a big thing here, I brought my Christmas decorations from manila. The walls are bare so I decided to hang pictures of my family, I bought frames and had my favorite pictures printed. And so that’s how I accumulated more stuff – the goal of making my house a home.



I also brought with me my arts supplies and materials, my photo album and scrapbooking materials, and that’s a lot of things already. I brought them with me because I intend to spend my free time doing scrapbooking. But of course, my planned life changes after meeting H, so the scrapbooking was halted and most of my time was spend cooking or baking or netsurfing or spending time with H. And, I bought books to read also – photography, fiction, arts, Bangla lessons. And so, my book collection grew.

And the best of all the best: clothes and shoes and accessories. That’s like a million dollar question to them why do I have at least 4 luggages of clothes when auntie has salwarkamizes and sarees that can be counted with her fingers and toes only. She keeps on poking me to give away my clothes. Something that I don’t have the heart to do so. I already discarded some of my clothes, the old ones that are 4 years old already and the others that H doesn’t like on me. Still, I have more clothes than theirs combined. My salwarkamizes and sarees alone are one luggage, but they don’t want me to give them away since most of it is their gifts to me. So, how about my western clothes? I really don’t want to give them all away because 1) good western clothes are not available here. I bought all my clothes from manila every time I go home, and in 4 ½ years of working here, I already went home 12 times, 2) all of it will be new again once I start working with a new company, and 3) not everyone wears western clothes here, so where am I giving it away?



How did I accumulate lots of clothes? In manila, I don’t have a maid. I wash my clothes and that’s every weekend, so I need to have extra clothes to last me for another week. With this in mind, I assume I will need to do the same thing here. But here, almost everyone can afford to have a maid and the maid washes the clothes every day. There’s a less chance for them to run out of clothes because the maid is washing the clothes everyday anyway, and sad to say, others repeat their clothes too the following day even without washing it.  I’m a designer and a working lady; I just need to be presentable all the time. I have to be dressed according to the occasion. And back in grade school, we learned the grouping of our clothes. There’s a proper clothes to wear on specific occasions. We have
1) pambahay or house dress/clothes
2) pantulog or sleepwear
3) panlabas or clothes for going out

And under the “clothes for going out” we categorized it again as office wear, party wear or casual wear. And then we have our summer clothes or cold weather clothes. I have my winter clothes here. So, I accumulated more clothes according to needs and occasions. I wear my western clothes to office, I wear fatau, shawl and jeans whenever travelling for official business, I wear salwarkamizes whenever I go to villages or visit other Bengali or dignitaries and I wear sarees whenever I attend Bengali weddings. And yes, even my salwarkamizes are coded, I have sets for casual outing and I have sets that are for office wear, something that a regular Bengali woman will not have because what I noticed here, they wear their salwarkamizes both for office wear, casual wear and sometimes party wear. They wear the same shalwarkamizes for summer, rainy or winter. It seems like they don’t have the “clothing group”. But, I know my colleagues have lots of clothes too because I’ve been to their houses. Yeah, I have lots of clothes but I believe it’s normal, only that, it’s not usual for auntie.