Banana Q: a Filipino-Flavored Podcast

We interview Reuben, who talks about the methods he used to learn more about our national language, Tagalog, and shares the deeper words and interesting tidbits of history that he came across while doing his research.

Why do we want to be attractive? What is considered attractive in the Philippines and why is it not what the average Filipino looks like? What is colonial mentality? And on a related note, what is the criteria for picking the most beautiful woman in the universe?

What are some faux pas (embarrassing acts) that you can commit in the Philippines? How can you recover from them?

How do you know if you're having a job burnout? What are its possible causes and consequences? How do you handle it?

What usually happens in Pinoy parties? How early should you show up? What should you bring? What food and activities can you expect? What should you do so as not to be branded as a killjoy and never be invited again?

Change is coming... we have an important announcement to make. But before that, we discuss the most common types of change we encounter and give tips on how to deal with them.

How did Marimar change Philippine TV history? Did you fall for Angelo or Eduardo on Pangako Sayo? How did John Lloyd Cruz and Bea Alonzo become a love team? Ride on the nostalgia train along da riles as we discuss TV tropes of popular comedy, love, action, drama, and fantasy shows with matching sing-along theme songs. TV shows mentioned: Marimar, Mara Clara, Home Along da Riles, Palibhasa Lalake,...

What Pinoy expressions can you teach non Filipinos? Mabuhay? Kamusta? Nah, too boring! We share unusual ones like 'ay kabayo!' and 'bahala na si Batman' then explain how to use them and dig into their origins.

We interview Arlo (host of Typitalks with Arlo podcast) about what life is like as an overseas Filipino worker in Switzerland. He talks about how he landed a job as an architect in Basel, and refutes rumors about Swiss people, Swiss life, and certain Swiss scenes from the Kdrama Crash Landing On You. Check out Arlo's podcast: https://anchor.fm/typitalkswitharlo

We discuss what elections in the Philippines is like, including political parties, campaign strategies, and election day unscrupulous practices. We share some of the most bizarre nuisance candidates and end on what we would do if we were president of the Philippines.

We share problems that Filipinos face when traveling due to our weak spending power and passport. We also talk about what to expect when traveling with Filipinos such as kuripot habits, hospitable OFW hosts everywhere in the world, and culture shock.

We talk about things we wished we knew before we left the Philippines in our 20s with a time travel twist. We discuss lessons we learned and how we would have lived things differently had we known then what we know now.

We share facts about climate change including causes and actions being done, as well as what we can personally do to help.

We give tips on how to survive a zombie apocalypse based on zombie shows and movies.

We talk about why we think most Filipinos don't like to read books. We share how we fell in love with reading, what are its benefits, why it's so difficult to read now, and how to get into the habit of reading books.

We interview Eliza Victoria, a Filipino author who wrote Wounded Little Gods and After Lambana. She talks about her writing process from how she comes up with her ideas to how to get published. She answers the question on whether you earn a lot from being an author in the Philippines. https://elizavictoria.com/

We talk about the history of the bucket list and go through popular items that people have on theirs. We share what we have achieved ourselves, as well as what activities would actually make us kick the bucket while trying to do it.

We talk about notorious real life swindlers on these shows - Tinder Swindler, Inventing Anna, Fyre: The Greatest Party That Never Happened, The Dropout, The Wolf of Wall Street, and Catch Me If You Can.

We discuss the famous people we idolized, why we adored them, and how we expressed our admiration in the past versus the present. We also talk about celebrity encounters.

If the show Squid Game was set in the Philippines, what would the games be? We talk about traditional childhood games that we played while growing up. Note: there are spoilers for the Netflix show.

Divorce is not allowed in the Philippines but there is currently a bill proposing its legalization, so we thought it would be interesting to debate its merits. We take opposing sides and present our arguments which include domestic violence, religion, and effects on children.

We talk about what goes on in traditional Roman Catholic weddings in the Philippines and compare them to those of other religions and cultures. Dee gives tips on how to write a maid of honor speech.

We chat with Franck and Kring, a French and Filipino couple who met through online dating in New Zealand. We discuss cultural differences in dating between the French and Filipinos and whether online dating is considered taboo in each culture before diving into its perks and pitfalls. We discuss: serial killers, gold diggers, catfishers and scammers.   Links: The Greener Side Podcast | Instagram |...

We talk about why a lot of Filipinos are bad at saving. Rey explains investing basics (long term deposits, bonds, stocks) in layman's terms that can be understood by the average Juan, sharing what works for him personally with no agenda except to answer a listener's question. COLFinancial is our broker. This episode is not sponsored by them nor Jollibee.

We interview Penny, a US-based Filipino mother of three. She talks about childcare, school, after-school activities, forms of discipline, and whether her kids know how to speak Tagalog. We compare American parenting style to what we experienced from our own parents while growing up in the Philippines. Also discussed: the challenges of pandemic home-schooling.