I don't know if this has anything to do with it, but Filipino boys are circumcised at age 11-12. Most North Americans are cut at birth.
When in the Phils on business I was staying at a colleague's home. He had a son, I think he was 11, who didn't look too good and was walking gingerly. I asked him if he was okay and he said he didn't want to talk about it. Later, his father told me he had been circumcised the day before in Filipino tradition. I didn't pursue the conversation but I did think it unusual that they would wait until almost puberty. But I later learned this was also practiced in other cultures as a rite to manhood.
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