LXXXV. Toe Video. August 26, 2021

>driving Lyft

>pick up this Filipina lady

>sweet lady, about my age

>I ask if she speaks Tagalog, since that is about the only thing I know about the Philippines

>she does not

>she says she is from a remote area where they speak a dialect

>when her parents came to this country

>they taught her English and the home dialect

>not Tagalog 

>even though they could speak it

>she says “My daughter is ten and she loves TikTok. She said ‘Mama, we should do TikTok because you can make MONEY if more than ten thousand people subscribe’”

>I did not know this, and said so

>she says “It’s just like Facebook; get ten thousand likes and they start paying you,

>”so we do TikToks, and I mostly do things about the Philippines, like food and stuff from the countryside

>”and we did things around the house with family 

>”and we have a cute dog, so we did one with the dog

>”but we never got close to ten thousand subscribers.

>”and there was this one time

>”it’s the funniest thing, might be TMI

>”but I did this one where, like, I showed how people in the Philippines cure an ingrown toenail.

>”it was only five seconds, and it was just my foot, but you know it has six million views?”

>she shows me her phone and says “Look! It’s 6.5 million now! But not even one subscriber, so no money. It’s crazy; it don’t make sense.”

>to my credit I didn’t tell her