Blessing of Vehicles - Is this practice unique to Philippine culture?

I noticed in our parish church here in Houston that only Filipinos are having their new vehicles blessed. Our parish community is multi-national (Filipinos, Vietnamese, Hispanics, and of course, Americans) but I have yet to see non-Filipino families requesting for car blessing.

So is this just a Filipino thing?

It is probably unique to our culture. When this is performed in the parking lot of our church (which is Catholic) I notice that other churchgoers, apparently of various racial backgrounds, gather around in a large crowd with those wondering, puzzled looks in their eyes, as if they've never seen this before. From that I surmise that other nationalities probably do not perform this ceremony. I have asked other people and we have the same observation, but then we could all be wrong.

I am not sure if it is only Filipino thing but my wife got all the cars blessed when she came here to the US

no,Greeks do it too.They also place icons in the car to protect the car from harm.

my husband and i were just talking about that a couple of days ago! he (a kano) finds it very weird.. but i'd still wanna do that if/when we get a new car :)

When we got our house blessed it was co-incidence that we have a brand new car too. So, I got it blessed too. I'm from norther Ca. It was good that the priest was pinoy too.

maybe its a filipino culture but i haven't seen any other do that thing.

No it isn't.

For this is a Catholic practice and we all know that many Filipinos are Roman Catholics. And as earlier noted by an answerer it is also practiced by the Greeks, because this practice is also done by the Greek Orthodox (Catholic) Sect as well as by all the other Catholic sects.

And as you well know Catholics bless many things, such as new boats, any type of new land and water vehicle, any new business, new house, new building, new structure and just about anything.

You can check it out at this link by a Catholic organization based in Des Moines, Iowa, USA:
http://www.ncrlc.com/6BRR_web/Blessings-...

And this is because the Roman Catholic Religion's inherent liturgical background or structure. And its adherents just follow this centuries old tradition handed down to them.

I think that this is mainly practised by Filipino's and there is no harm in it.
With the condition of some of the jeepney's, taxi's and buses and the way that they are driven a bit of "divine" help is required and essential (in the Philippines).

it is cheaper than a tuneup.

i have to say that it is a catholic(universal) thing to do. this sacramental is one of the devotion of the church and might be practiced more by filipinos. aside from hanging a religious icon over my rearview mirror, i carry a small bottle of holy water. just in case.

Any church can do that ours did , for this poor family we got a car for . I think it's nice