I send my mother 1.5 million pesos monthly for my postpartum wife. Coming home early, I found my wife eating spoiled rice with fish heads. Furious, I confronted my mom, who sneered, “She doesn’t deserve better.” Then, I checked the family safe and found…

at the other end of the line. Her tone was perpetually brisk, heavily laced with a subtle, prickly indignation that I had dared to verify her competence. “Hue has already consumed her lunch,” she would snap over the static. Or, “I’ve spent the morning simmering a medicinal chicken stew.” Often, it was a hushed, “She is finally resting; I will not allow continue reading …