The Profundity of Thinking Small

Edilberto M. Alegre

Retail sales outlets in the Philippines range from the tingi-tingi (piecemeal, selling
one object at a time, e.g. not one pack of cigarette but one stick) vendors at busy urban
street corners, to plush department stores in Makati and Mandaluyong. The range
immediately reflects the buying capacity of the Filipinos, and eventually the despairing
disparity of income distribution in the country. When price rises, re-packing activity rises
too. Continuous and unbridled inflation creates smaller and smaller repacks. Garlic is
now sold by clove; cooking oil, soy sauce vinegar and almost all cooking ingredients in
p1-packs. It’s like the shrinking pan de sal- inflation reduces the size of the good for
sale, because the peso buys less, the peso earners must buy less: oil for one cooking
dish, thread for sewing one seam, milk for one cup of coffee.

         There are, however, goods which cannot reduced in size or quantity. Slippers and
shoes must always be sold in pairs, shirts, pants, shorts and socks cannot be re-packed
as half-shirts, a “pant”, a “short”, or a sock. Nor can watches and glasses and shoes.
Unlike cooking ingredients they cannot be reduced beyond what they now are.

         The sizes of machinery vary, but cannot be halves, and most be sold as units,
computer comes in units, even when they have reduces to notebook size. So do audio
visual equipment and cars.

          In the presentation or packaging of a product, therefore, two factors are at work:

(1) the buying capacity of the customers, and (2) the nature of the product. Mentholated
candies (in street-retail one brand name, Halls, serves as generic name) can be and are
retailed by the piece. Small gains are good enough. A sale is a sale. The idea is to
reduce all goods to their minimum unit/amount: a clove of garlic, a dab of cooking oil,
one airmail envelope, one banana on stick, one ballpen, one sheet of paper, one unit of
a sweepstakes ticket.

          We reduce objects to the barest essential – the minimum unit which still
embodies its true nature, i.e. what is in its smallest size. That is littlest though it be, its
integrity, (as garlic, as cooking oil, as envelope, etc.) is intact. This is why pants and
shoes must be sold in pairs, and ballpens, Walkmans and refrigerators as units, not as
halves.

         Thinking small is thinking bare-bone, basic basal, essential. There is a

magnificence to it—a clean-ness and neat-ness. One pushes to the barest, and in the
process does away with clutter. Does away with excess, in fact. Does away with the
need for the storage space. As is, where is only when and what is needed. Poverty
disallows excess. Poverty necessitates dealing only with what is necessary.

          Since November 1989 I have been living out of my backpack, which is now
medium-sized. At first I pampered myself with books and magazines, pads of paper and
pens of varied sizes and color, an umbrella, a two-week supply of clothes it was difficult
to more about. What with notebooks, cameras, walkman, films and audiotapes, it was
as if we’re not on research fieldtrips. I was burdened by my own needs, much of it for
comfort.

           Gradually, I learn how to think small, how to think bare-bone essential. First, the
clothes: three days’ change is more the enough, in the topic one changes daily. Then
the writing materials: notepad, one yellow pad and two pens– that’s enough. I only
travel from four to six weeks at a time. Besides, writing materials are available in any
sizable town. For reading – just one book and discardable magazine. For listening, just
six tapes of Bach and four of Max Suburban. Two cameras, one a back-up, and films as
needed.

            From the Muslims I have learned to use a wrap-around-the-head (tubao, for

neatness and protection), and a wrap around-the-body (malong)—of very light cotton.
The malong functions as pajamas, bedsheets or trousers. I now travel with lightly
packed rucksack and a camera bag, I am down to the barest essentials. I have learned
to think small. I have liberated myself from the clutter of unnecessary.
            Thinking small assumes the infinity of supply – and demand. One buys only the
small amount of garlic, onions, tomatoes, vegetable and fish or meat which would be
needed and will be consumed today. Tomorrow is tomorrow’s problem.

            What are the benefits of going to market daily? Freshness of the ingredients.
The joy of not knowing beforehand what one will eat that day. The elation that comes
with surprise. And practice in improvisation. Nothing is fixed, except the amount for daily
marketing, which one matches with what is available. If one is skillful, one has delicious
meals. Little children are taken to the market to learn early the improvisation know how,
often mistakenly thought to be a genetically-endowed talent.

            Where is the joy in having a set menu for the entire week? It may be efficient,
but it is joyless. Seldom do we encounter surprise in our quotidian lives; that is why we
feel that we are trudging. Chores become drudgery when they no longer contain small
surprises. To think big is to make a grocery list for the week and fill up the refrigerator
with many goodies. Certainly once-a-week grocery shopping consumes less time than
does daily shopping.

            But what is “saved” time spent for? To earn more money so one can purchase
more goodies– to be kept cold in a second refrigerator. Our lives are sad and empty
because we are not like that ‘saved’ time. Time is not to be saved, for essentially there
is no way of keeping it. There are no deposits for time.