Two Asian gentlemen

Ruiz is a Filipino Spaniard – part of the thinnest and toppest of the thin top colonial crusts; on his father’s side his Spanish roots go back to 1870’s; on his mothers to seventeen hundreds. The family are in the usual: sugar and palm oil; a small airline operation. His education was English, and now that his parents have passed away, English is his first language – he speaks it with his Filipino Japanese wife and his brother who had emigrated to the US; yet, his accent has remained very strong – if one can call the delicate Spanish lisp strong, that is.

For all his parchment whiteness, Ruiz is an Asian gentleman: he dresses impeccably (never a t-shirt on him) and has the generous and polite, but slightly aloof, manner of a pakka sahib. The way you put that girl in place last night was very well done, he says about the friendly manner in which I have called to order an unruly servant: an act of cultural virtuosity missed by all the Europeans at the table. We’re sitting at an outdoor café, watching people go by. Look at dees, he says, and shakes his head at a bare-chested European man; and at deese girls, he adds. I hate tattoos. My grandfather used to brand his cattle, I say. Presaisly, he answers. Ruiz does not pick up girls in bars, either.