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Special Feature




                                          “Order ni Mrs.” (the Mrs. Commands) is a catchphrase in the advertising
                                         world. Even shallow jokes such as husbands developing “asthma” (sounds
                                         like “ask ma” –wife) syndrome after getting married, or husbands banished
                                         to sleep outside the “kulambo” (mosquito net) after displeasing the wives,
                                         portray women as having the upper-hand in the husband-wife equation.
                                         Philippine history features several women as leaders and heroic figures.
                                         Who could forget the unprecedented move of the twenty-one women of
                                         Malolos who fought for equality of education and petitioned the Spanish
                                         Governor-General for the establishment of the school for women in the
                                         late 1880s? Or the heroism of Gabriela Silang, who was hung by her
                                         enemies for leading the rebellion against Spain, began by her husband? Or
                                         the vision of Helena Benitez, who founded the Philippine Women’s
                                         University, the first Filipino university exclusively for women.


            In the Filipino story of creation, women did not
            come from men, as is the story in the Old
            Testament that a woman named Eve came from
            the ribs of a man named Adam. Instead, the
            first woman sprung full-blown from a cylinder of
            bamboo simultaneously with man.        A great
            primeval bird, pecking at a bamboo grove,
            released them from the state of non-being. Both
            man and woman stepped together into life,
            hand-in-hand, equal and bound to each other by
            a collective nature and common emergence,
            each one with a particular attribute to complete
            the other, the man called Malakas (strong) and
            the woman called Maganda (beautiful).


           The elements of legend and fact, history and
           sociology, the past and the present reveal the
           Filipino women not as competitors but as partners
           working alongside their men. Do not be fooled by    IWCPI District 380 dedicates this nascent issue of
                                                               Wheel of Service to all the kindhearted Filipino
           the mayuming (gentle) Filipino women, because
           they participate in activities that influence their  women serving the marginalized sectors of their
                                                               communities under the banner of the          Inner
           homes, communities, and social life. They take
           part in decision making, earning, and managing      Wheel Clubs of the Philippines, Inc. The District
           the income for their families. They are educated    salutes and reveres our members who succeed on
                                                               their   own   and    thrive  with   the   respect,
           and learn the same skills as men. They take
           leadership roles in revolutionary movements that    acknowledgment, love, and praise from their men
                                                               and families for all the good they do. Let us
           affect national policies and serve in private and
           public capacities to attend to the social and       celebrate us women in the IWCPI by continuing to
           economic needs of the country and impart their      support each other and acknowledging each
                                                               other’s accomplishments, ever remembering the
           perspective to the entire world. The Filipino
           women are strong and an active force in             motto that binds us together Selflessness in
                                                               Friendship. Mabuhay ang Filipina! Mabuhay ang
           Philippine society.
                                                               District 380!

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