Guinness World Record for Birth of Nine Babies

Halima Cissé made history when she gave birth to nine healthy babies five girls and four boys setting a Guinness World Record for the most surviving children born at once.

Delivered via C-section in Morocco, the birth was nothing short of a medical miracle and even more astounding because it happened naturally, without fertility treatments.

Today, all nine little ones are thriving, growing strong and joyful under the love and care of their remarkable mother.

Meanwhile, From My History Readings This Week:

Here are some of the usual hispanophobic rants we hear regarding the Spanish word INDIO:

1. "They treated us as indios!"

2. "You will always be an indio to the Spaniards!"

3. "We're nothing more than indios to them, that is why we revolted!"

But a cursory Internet probing will reveal that indio is not pejorative, not even during the Spanish times. Indio in Spanish simply means NATIVE. It is synonymous to NATIVO and NATURAL. In Tagálog, it means TAÁL.

EXAMPLE

Español – Yo soy indio/nativo/natural de Parañaque.

English – I am a native of Parañaque.

Tagálog – Acó ay taál na taga-Parañaque.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with the word.

José Rizal himself proudly used that word. In 1889, he and painter Juan Luna attended the "Exposition Universelle" (Paris Exposition) and was able to watch Buffalo Bill's vaudeville Wild West shows which featured romanticized stereotypes of cowboys vs Native American Indians. This inspired him to form the all-male Filipino club "Los Indios Bravos" (The Brave Natives/Indians) while in Europe.

When you further dig into its etymology, the Real Academia Española will reveal that indio actually means a native of India which later on was also applied to the natives of the lands they conquered in the Américas.

1. adj. Natural de la India, país de Asia. U. t. c. s.

2. adj. Perteneciente o relativo a la India o a los indios.

3. Dicho de una persona: De alguno de los pueblos o razas indígenas de América.

How did that happen? We have Christopher Columbus to blame.

During his time, the planet was quite "small". That is to say, the West's knowledge of the planet was still primitive. Many parts of the world were terra incognita (unexplored). The West, however, did know about the Orient, including the East Indies where the archipelago which was to become our country is located. But the former corresponded and traded with the latter only through eastward routes. Westward voyages were a complete mystery. Until Columbus came along.

When he ventured into the East in 1492 by following the much-feared westward route, he landed on an island which he called San Salvador (now part of the Bahamas). In the mistaken belief that he had reached the East Indies, he called the natives there as indios. This error is also the reason why the Caribbean Islands are sometimes called the West Indies.

In succeeding ventures, all the natives that the West encountered living in what they called the New World (the Américas) and elsewhere (Islas Filipinas) were termed as indios.

But how did it become pejorative? Indio was pejorative only to the insular Spaniard, i.e, the Spaniard born in our country. In the late 19th century, there was already a cold war brewing between the insular (the first to call themselves as Filipinos) and the peninsular. The peninsular, or those Spaniards born in Spain, looked down on the insular as inferior, calling him an indio instead of as fellow Spaniard.

Indio was derogatory to the archipelago-born Spaniard rather than to the "indio" himself.