Soccerpride,
What you said about pinoys in USA is indicative of the different path many pinoy diaspora have taken in their various adopted countries.
Pinoys in UK, Australia, Canada, Middle-East, Singapore, Japan, HK always refer to philippines as "philippines" or they use the words "sa atin" or "uwi" which are loosely translated to "back home"). The pinoys from these countries never ever would use the word island as a reference to Philippines.
But for someone unknown reason pinoys in USA call philippines PI (even 2nd, 3rd generation USA-born pinoy call philippines an "island"). To me, this is indicative of the effects of what "white america" and "american colonialism mentality" have on pinoys in USA. I can only assume that pinoys in USA, after so many generations, have accepted what USA call philippines, which is PI (used extensively during Gen. D. MacArthur's time in philippines - there is one anecdote that prior to WWII, MacArthur was travelling from Manila to Bagiuo, to inspect the barracks at Camp John Hay, he didnt realise that it was a 10hr trip by car and he commented "how long to go, will this island ever end?"
I was in Guam several years ago. I met some people belonging to the pinoy diaspora (who were 10-12th generation pinoys). Guam was used by spain as a stop-over for the Manila-Acapulco Galleon trade route in the 1600s. Spain used pinoy workers back then as laborers and stationed them in Guam - they were the "original" pinoy OFWs.
Most never ever returned to philippines and stayed there and populated Guam. Most descendants of these pinoy diaspora have never left Guam and simply refer to philippines as "mother country".
Speaking of Guam, interestingly even though it is an external American territory and comes under direct American rule, their main sports are football / soccer (for boys / men) and softball (for girls / ladies).
Guam have always been on the bottom end of the rankings as well and used to beat PHI 10-0, 15-0 etc etc. But the thing is, GUAM have always been competing in FIFA and Olympic sanctioned events since the 60s (note: they are always the easy beats and never ever progressed passed the first round) but the point is they are active in international football much longer than philippines have been. And for a small island with a small population, they have an effective small scale football league (two divisions) with grassroots recruitment....perhaps PFF should learn from this.
Also, no matter how badly they get beaten, the guam media and people always support their team, saying great game, there will be always a next time, better luck next time..etc etc. Perhaps, this is something that pinoy media in PHI and pinoy people in PHI should learn from - it is really disappointing that some pinoys have this habit of criticising the azkals just for the sake of saying something.
Interestingly too, because of the pinoy diaspora in guam, some footballer who play for guam have names in common with pinoys (ie Campos, De Los Santos, Santiago, Cruz, Guzman etc etc)...not surprising due to both guam and PHI were colonised by Spain 1500s - 1800s.
Note: guam players with pinoy heritage CANNOT represent PHI, because their last link to their pinoy ancestors from philippines was back in the 1600s - this is way past the FIFA and Olympic rule of "country of heritage" which only goes up to the grandparents of players.
So, which one is a "pinoy":
Guam players who are descendants of pinoys from 1600s or Fil-fors who are sons of pinays (who were born in philippines)....ps: local pinoys are obviously pinoys.
Ever since the azkals came to prominence, we havent played Guam since. I always think of Guam vs PHI as the "Pinoy derby".
"Do or do not. There is no try" (Master Yoda)
