QUOTE : But politics has no space in Rob’s mind right now or ever. Neither do his migrant roots nor does the Philippines, with which his parents maintain a sentimental bond and to which, while he was growing up, they tried to endear him, speaking to him in a mix of Tagalog and Bicolano, of which he remembers not a word, except Mabuhay and magayon, salamat, too, and taking him as often as they could on vacations to famous Philippine beaches, fiestas, and other sites, including Christmas in Manila.