i lifted this from www.maveangazetteonline.blogspot.com, my children's school's online school paper. bea wrote this poem for her little bro elmo after he was reprimanded by his father for being too roly-poly.
Elmo
ni Beatrice Adeline Tulagan
Nag-iingay ka, iyon kasi ang dahilan.
Ilang beses nang sinabihan ay wala pa rin.
Sa sobrang kulit mo, nakatikim ka tuloy ng todo.
Wala na ang tawang nakaplaster sa mukha mo.
Sinundan kita, sa kwartong madilim.
Nakadapa ka sa kama, patuloy pa ring humihikbi.
Nagtatago sa kumot, basa na rin ang unang yakap mo.
Ayaw na ayaw kong nakikita kang ganito.
Linapitan kita, sinubukang lambingin;
Nang sa gayo’y mapawi ko man lamang ang sakit.
Pero tila nahihiya ka, patuloy na lumalayo.
Sana’y alam mong ako’y andito.
Binulungan kita, sinubukang patahanin.
Ngunit malayo pa rin talaga ang tingin.
Hinalikan ko ang noo mo, paalis na rin ako.
Ang mapag-isa, siguro’y yun talaga ang gusto mo.
Maya-maya, kakatok ka na sa aking kwarto.
Sisilip kang bahagya, mag-aayang manuod.
Kalungkutan ay bakas pa rin sa mukha mo.
Pero ngingiti ka, dahil alam mong ikaw ang bunso ko.
Friday, October 30, 2009
Thursday, October 29, 2009
It's never okay
delivered at the round-table conference between media and stakeholders on the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child
Sulo Hotel, 29 Oct 2009
Good morning everyone. Thank you for having me here. I am here because I represent media by virtue of my job. But I am also a stakeholder, because I am a parent.
When we hear the phrase “violence against children,” some images come to mind automatically. Bruises and scars and the helpless looks on the victims' eyes. Sometimes the lifeless body of a child. Violence is a horrible thing by itself, but when perpetuated against children, it becomes even more detestable. The stories we hear are unbelievable, especially when the perpetrators of the violence – physical, sexual, emotional or psychological, or some or all of them at the same time -- are those persons who are supposed to take care of these children: parents, relatives, teachers, anybody with ascendancy.
This we know through the most compelling stories we see on television or read about in the newspapers. From the looks of it, society is united in condemning these heartless, insane and violent abusers. These are extreme cases. We agree that these children must be given safe haven and that the abusers must be put away in jail. And we will work towards enabling the victims to put the pieces of their life together.
Indeed there is no problem when violence is so extreme that it becomes a public affair.
But media has been less noisy about the subject of corporal punishment, especially in the context of the home. It is something that is private and may be even more sensitive than the dynamics of husband and wife relations. In a marriage, each partner is supposed to be on the same level or to complement the other one, at least ideally. Neither is supposed to be more influential or powerful than the other. Again, ideally. That's partnership. Marriage in the twenty first century.
But when you talk about parents and children, the unequal relationship is there at the outset. Who are we to challenge it? I am the parent and I am clearly in charge. Nobody is going to tell me how I am supposed to raise my child. The assumption here, of course, is that all parents love their children, all have their best intentions in mind, and that parents are not monsters all the time.
Sadly, between the intentions and actual words and actions, an ocean of a difference can lie.
We are all products of different manners of upbringing. Different generations, customs, individual quirks. There are families that solve their problems by yelling at each other. Some are more diplomatic. I suppose most of us are somewhere in between. There are also families that punish their children in various ways, spanking, slapping, depriving them of food or other basic needs, as well as cursing them or uttering words that are meant to humiliate, belittle, degrade them. There are countless nuances and variations. But you get the idea. All in the name of discipline.
Because of our backgrounds and maybe own experiences, we may think that nothing is wrong with these. We may have been subjected to them ourselves and look, we didn't turn out so bad. Several weeks ago I attended a forum organized by this same group that explored the issue of corporal punishment and some initiatives at the House of Representatives.
The biggest hurdle is the resistance of parents to a perceived intrusion by the State into their turf. No matter how the bill is crafted so that it is constructive instead of punitive, parents will feel threatened especially if they are not causing their children any dark bruises, long scars. They know better. They love their children.
But experts tell us that this kind of violence, prolonged and silently borne, may have very serious consequences on the lives of the children. The effects may be physiological, mental and behavioral. The worst thing is that they may be long-term and irreversible. Ms. Fonacier-Fellizar’s paper ends with this warning. What will happen to an angsty generation who will either fold up before authority figures or rebel against them? Either reaction is not beneficial in nation building and in the exercise of raising responsible adults.
This is an important thing that should not be lost in the debate caused by wounded parental pride. Given the resistance, I believe media could help not by dwelling on the negative but in pushing for a positive, constructive way to change this mindset among parents – and among children, too, that it's okay to be harmed. In the previous forum that I mentioned, there was a discussion on positive discipline, along with basic principles and a framework. I think it's worth pushing in a long-haul effort to enlighten a new generation of parents. There is media, of course, but there can also be parent-teacher seminars in schools, peer counseling and many other ways. Nothing beats a positive approach to anything.
Another form of violence against children is what happens in conflict zones. We don't hear, see or read about them in media for obvious reasons. They are just too far away. It is just too difficult to reach out to them and hear their stories of loss and displacement. Yet the sufferings are there. Unfortunately, media's role here is very limited. We do not have the power to stop the senseless wars. We can only tell the stories when we can. And remind everybody that just because this does not occur in Imperial Manila, they are not there. Because they are. And these suffering children who cannot even go outside to play or have parents to go home to have as much a right to a secure and comfortable life as much as your child, or mine.
**
After violence against children, there is also violence BY children. In as much as we do not want our children to be hurt, we also do not want them to be the ones inflicting the hurt on others.
Why else would we frown on games involving virtual battles, especially the graphic ones where the splattering of blood is depicted? Why else would we get so worked up on the existence of bullies either in the school or in the home? And how about the child soldiers recruited by the Abu Sayyaf, the MILF or the New People's Army? Teenagers are ideal recruits for these organizations because they are innocent and trusting like children but have the strength and stamina of adults. They are most likely poor, separated from their families, displaced from their homes and have limited access to education and other basic social services. They are so malleable they have no qualms inflicting harm on others. They have nothing to lose.
Violence by children may or may not be the effect of his or her own experience of abuse. In all of these cases, having children who perpetuate violence is equally disturbing. What kind of adults will they grow up to be? What ever happened to their being the nation's hope?
Media's primary role is to drive home the point that violence against children and by children is never okay. It is not something to bear or to suffer. It is not just undesirable but totally unacceptable. We have to remind the public of this every chance we get.
Sulo Hotel, 29 Oct 2009
Good morning everyone. Thank you for having me here. I am here because I represent media by virtue of my job. But I am also a stakeholder, because I am a parent.
When we hear the phrase “violence against children,” some images come to mind automatically. Bruises and scars and the helpless looks on the victims' eyes. Sometimes the lifeless body of a child. Violence is a horrible thing by itself, but when perpetuated against children, it becomes even more detestable. The stories we hear are unbelievable, especially when the perpetrators of the violence – physical, sexual, emotional or psychological, or some or all of them at the same time -- are those persons who are supposed to take care of these children: parents, relatives, teachers, anybody with ascendancy.
This we know through the most compelling stories we see on television or read about in the newspapers. From the looks of it, society is united in condemning these heartless, insane and violent abusers. These are extreme cases. We agree that these children must be given safe haven and that the abusers must be put away in jail. And we will work towards enabling the victims to put the pieces of their life together.
Indeed there is no problem when violence is so extreme that it becomes a public affair.
But media has been less noisy about the subject of corporal punishment, especially in the context of the home. It is something that is private and may be even more sensitive than the dynamics of husband and wife relations. In a marriage, each partner is supposed to be on the same level or to complement the other one, at least ideally. Neither is supposed to be more influential or powerful than the other. Again, ideally. That's partnership. Marriage in the twenty first century.
But when you talk about parents and children, the unequal relationship is there at the outset. Who are we to challenge it? I am the parent and I am clearly in charge. Nobody is going to tell me how I am supposed to raise my child. The assumption here, of course, is that all parents love their children, all have their best intentions in mind, and that parents are not monsters all the time.
Sadly, between the intentions and actual words and actions, an ocean of a difference can lie.
We are all products of different manners of upbringing. Different generations, customs, individual quirks. There are families that solve their problems by yelling at each other. Some are more diplomatic. I suppose most of us are somewhere in between. There are also families that punish their children in various ways, spanking, slapping, depriving them of food or other basic needs, as well as cursing them or uttering words that are meant to humiliate, belittle, degrade them. There are countless nuances and variations. But you get the idea. All in the name of discipline.
Because of our backgrounds and maybe own experiences, we may think that nothing is wrong with these. We may have been subjected to them ourselves and look, we didn't turn out so bad. Several weeks ago I attended a forum organized by this same group that explored the issue of corporal punishment and some initiatives at the House of Representatives.
The biggest hurdle is the resistance of parents to a perceived intrusion by the State into their turf. No matter how the bill is crafted so that it is constructive instead of punitive, parents will feel threatened especially if they are not causing their children any dark bruises, long scars. They know better. They love their children.
But experts tell us that this kind of violence, prolonged and silently borne, may have very serious consequences on the lives of the children. The effects may be physiological, mental and behavioral. The worst thing is that they may be long-term and irreversible. Ms. Fonacier-Fellizar’s paper ends with this warning. What will happen to an angsty generation who will either fold up before authority figures or rebel against them? Either reaction is not beneficial in nation building and in the exercise of raising responsible adults.
This is an important thing that should not be lost in the debate caused by wounded parental pride. Given the resistance, I believe media could help not by dwelling on the negative but in pushing for a positive, constructive way to change this mindset among parents – and among children, too, that it's okay to be harmed. In the previous forum that I mentioned, there was a discussion on positive discipline, along with basic principles and a framework. I think it's worth pushing in a long-haul effort to enlighten a new generation of parents. There is media, of course, but there can also be parent-teacher seminars in schools, peer counseling and many other ways. Nothing beats a positive approach to anything.
Another form of violence against children is what happens in conflict zones. We don't hear, see or read about them in media for obvious reasons. They are just too far away. It is just too difficult to reach out to them and hear their stories of loss and displacement. Yet the sufferings are there. Unfortunately, media's role here is very limited. We do not have the power to stop the senseless wars. We can only tell the stories when we can. And remind everybody that just because this does not occur in Imperial Manila, they are not there. Because they are. And these suffering children who cannot even go outside to play or have parents to go home to have as much a right to a secure and comfortable life as much as your child, or mine.
**
After violence against children, there is also violence BY children. In as much as we do not want our children to be hurt, we also do not want them to be the ones inflicting the hurt on others.
Why else would we frown on games involving virtual battles, especially the graphic ones where the splattering of blood is depicted? Why else would we get so worked up on the existence of bullies either in the school or in the home? And how about the child soldiers recruited by the Abu Sayyaf, the MILF or the New People's Army? Teenagers are ideal recruits for these organizations because they are innocent and trusting like children but have the strength and stamina of adults. They are most likely poor, separated from their families, displaced from their homes and have limited access to education and other basic social services. They are so malleable they have no qualms inflicting harm on others. They have nothing to lose.
Violence by children may or may not be the effect of his or her own experience of abuse. In all of these cases, having children who perpetuate violence is equally disturbing. What kind of adults will they grow up to be? What ever happened to their being the nation's hope?
Media's primary role is to drive home the point that violence against children and by children is never okay. It is not something to bear or to suffer. It is not just undesirable but totally unacceptable. We have to remind the public of this every chance we get.
Sunday, October 25, 2009
Teachers and heroes
published 26 Oct 2009, Manila Standard Today
One of the faces I was really pleased to see during my high school reunion last month was that of Mrs. Priscilla Tañedo Catanauan, my adviser and English teacher during my freshman year. I had not seen nor heard from Ma'am Precy since the day I graduated from high school sixteen years ago. She had transferred from the school I attended to Kalayaan National High School, in the more remote part of Kalookan City.
But it was a reunion and everybody was busy catching up with everybody else, so outside of the hasty hellos and what-have-you -been-up-tos, there was no opportunity for longer talk. Too bad, really, because even as I noticed that my former teacher had visibly gained some years, what struck me more was that while watching our program, Ma'am Precy had the same quiet presence that allowed you to be just who you were. She was accepting, encouraging; never judging, never harsh. A subsequent online exchange proved to be an instructive exercise.
Isabela-born Catanauan is a graduate of St. Paul University in Tuguegarao (major in general science,minor in English) and has been teaching for the past 23 years. She spent two years at La Salette of Roxas and a good eleven years at the RVM-run Our Lady of Grace Academy before deciding to transfer to Kalayaan. She transferred for personal reasons; her children were then in their formative years and she felt she needed to spend more time with them. The public system required teachers to spend only six hours at school, which freed up more time for Catanauan. While she handled English classes in OLGA, she taught science subjects in the public high school. After a few years, she became science department head.
The transfer gave Catanauan the opportunity to observe similarities and differences between the private and the public systems. “In terms of service and commitment, there is no remarkable difference in teaching in a private and a public school,” she says. “In the private school where students are functionally literate, a teacher needs to give beyond what they already know, a teacher must be at least ten books ahead of them, a lot of preparation and teaching strategies are to be employed. In the public school where most of the students are deprived and less privileged, both economically and socially, a teacher faces the great task of bringing out the best in them and the most of what they know.”
As overseer of science instruction in the school, Catanauan is presently challenged by the introduction of the concept of climate change to her students. Especially now, after the devastation wrought by recent storms Ondoy and Pepeng, the young are more receptive to the idea that it is climate change that is responsible for extreme weather conditions. Faulty practices, like improper disposal of waste and a general apathy towards the environment, make the problem worse. She hopes these would make students more aware of their role and at the same time prepare them for calamities that may strike in the future.
Now that's real learning, which Catanauan believes cannot be measured solely by raw scores obtained in examinations. She evaluates her students by the improvements they make over time – and in all aspects, not just the grade.
Outside of the classroom, Catanauan has even more daunting challenges. A typical day starts at 4:30 in the morning when she has to prepare the needs of her husband George, a jeepney operator/ driver/ mechanic, as well as that of her children. At ten o'clock she reports to school and carries out her duties until 7 in the evening. Like any working mother, Catanauan constantly tries to give more of herself to her loved ones but always feels guilty that she is not doing enough. Fortunately her children have seen through this juggling act and learned to appreciate their mother's calling. In fact, she has set such a good example that two of her children are themselves professional teachers and two are studying to become teachers (another two are still in grade school). Some passions, after all, do run in the family.
Catanauan says she has never considered any other profession and cannot imagine herself being in another field. Success, she says, is achieving one's goals righteously. She is happy that she is able to live her dream of interacting with the youth and inspiring them.
Still, she aspires to do more. “I want to be an instrument in improving lives,” Much needs to be done to achieve quality education – not just for those who can afford it, but for all. She is a witness to the deterioration of the education system in the country. “Every Filipino deserves an equal opportunity for quality education.” Sadly, genuine commitment and quality service rendered by teachers like her are not enough to make this happen.
“Many students cannot cope with the minimum learning competencies set for their level. Lack of classrooms and teachers resulting to big class size, inadequate facilities, limited instructional time and poor teacher preparation are factors that result to the deterioration of education. To solve this problem,there is a need to align teachers to teach their major subject. There should be continuous training and retraining of teachers. Adequate facilities and classrooms should be provided.”
Well, accessibility of education is a common advocacy among candidates for next year's elections. Let's see who among these wannabes, local and national alike, are sincere and serious in making a difference.
**
October 5 was set aside by the United Nations Education, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) as World Teachers' Day. Here in the country, the day was supposed to mark the culmination of month-long activities in the Teachers Month Campaign by organizations led by the Metrobank Foundation. The devastation brought by Ondoy and Pepeng, however, has caused the campaign to be extended until October 31. Difficult times have a way of bringing out the heroes in people, the foundation says, and teachers easily come to mind when we talk about heroes.
In the meantime, Catanauan's view of heroism has got nothing to do with being great or famous. “It is doing things no matter how simple they are to improve other people's lives. It is the act of forgetting oneself for the welfare of others.” Amen – how can we say we are a nation so in want of heroes?
Precy says she is driven by her commitment to her work and her love for her family. Her life is not comfortable nor luxurious, yet she considers herself successful. Her living trophies are former students who have eventually succeeded in their chosen careers – and her children who are turning out just fine.
Ma'am Precy says she looks forward to going back to her hometown after retirement, enjoying the comfort of family she has so assiduously built and nurtured side by side with her vocation. She is excited to care for more grandchildren (she has one already). She will look back to whether she has become an instrument indeed.
But even now we see she has taught her children and mothered her students well. That day may yet be far away, but her students – past and present, myself included – already know the answer.
**
Readers' reactions:
Dear Ms. Adelle,
I would like to thank you for featuring our dearest Ma'am Precy in your opinion page dated Oct.25, 2009. The teachers here at Kalayaan National High School were very happy upon reading your article about her - being a teacher and a committed mother. I have knwon Ma'am Prezy way back 1995 but I got the chance to know her well when we became co-teachers in KNHS 1998. I become an avid fan of her because of her qualities. Later, we bacome friends. True enough, Ma'am Prescy is very accepting, never harsh, she's so sincere. More than that, she is very humble, intelligent .and kind. But there is one quality that Ma'am Precy that I really adore and that is she can make you laugh out of her jokes.
More power to you Ms.Adelle and to Manila Standard Newspaper. God bless!
Very truly yours,
Mrs. Wilhelmina D. Tarnate
**
Dear Adelle,
I enjoy reading your column which I found most interesting, but the
big turn-off for me is when so-called climate change (formerly “global
warming”) is incorporated into a rather interesting piece.
In today's column, you mentioned “…Catanauan is presently challenged
by the introduction of the concept of climate change to her students.
Especially now, after the devastation wrought by recent storms Ondoy
and Pepeng, the young are more receptive to the idea that it is
climate change that is responsible for extreme weather conditions.”
The teacher's intention might be benign, but it is appalling to think
that impressionable skulls of young children full of mush are being
brain-washed with an insane notion without any foundation at all.
The climate change connection to Ondoy and Pepeng has no basis
whatsoever. I consider the regurgitation by Philippine media of Al
Gore’s global-warming-money-venture- scheme as junk science without
any factual basis but only enriches Al Gore's bank account.
Best regards,
Gil Torres
One of the faces I was really pleased to see during my high school reunion last month was that of Mrs. Priscilla Tañedo Catanauan, my adviser and English teacher during my freshman year. I had not seen nor heard from Ma'am Precy since the day I graduated from high school sixteen years ago. She had transferred from the school I attended to Kalayaan National High School, in the more remote part of Kalookan City.
But it was a reunion and everybody was busy catching up with everybody else, so outside of the hasty hellos and what-have-you -been-up-tos, there was no opportunity for longer talk. Too bad, really, because even as I noticed that my former teacher had visibly gained some years, what struck me more was that while watching our program, Ma'am Precy had the same quiet presence that allowed you to be just who you were. She was accepting, encouraging; never judging, never harsh. A subsequent online exchange proved to be an instructive exercise.
Isabela-born Catanauan is a graduate of St. Paul University in Tuguegarao (major in general science,minor in English) and has been teaching for the past 23 years. She spent two years at La Salette of Roxas and a good eleven years at the RVM-run Our Lady of Grace Academy before deciding to transfer to Kalayaan. She transferred for personal reasons; her children were then in their formative years and she felt she needed to spend more time with them. The public system required teachers to spend only six hours at school, which freed up more time for Catanauan. While she handled English classes in OLGA, she taught science subjects in the public high school. After a few years, she became science department head.
The transfer gave Catanauan the opportunity to observe similarities and differences between the private and the public systems. “In terms of service and commitment, there is no remarkable difference in teaching in a private and a public school,” she says. “In the private school where students are functionally literate, a teacher needs to give beyond what they already know, a teacher must be at least ten books ahead of them, a lot of preparation and teaching strategies are to be employed. In the public school where most of the students are deprived and less privileged, both economically and socially, a teacher faces the great task of bringing out the best in them and the most of what they know.”
As overseer of science instruction in the school, Catanauan is presently challenged by the introduction of the concept of climate change to her students. Especially now, after the devastation wrought by recent storms Ondoy and Pepeng, the young are more receptive to the idea that it is climate change that is responsible for extreme weather conditions. Faulty practices, like improper disposal of waste and a general apathy towards the environment, make the problem worse. She hopes these would make students more aware of their role and at the same time prepare them for calamities that may strike in the future.
Now that's real learning, which Catanauan believes cannot be measured solely by raw scores obtained in examinations. She evaluates her students by the improvements they make over time – and in all aspects, not just the grade.
Outside of the classroom, Catanauan has even more daunting challenges. A typical day starts at 4:30 in the morning when she has to prepare the needs of her husband George, a jeepney operator/ driver/ mechanic, as well as that of her children. At ten o'clock she reports to school and carries out her duties until 7 in the evening. Like any working mother, Catanauan constantly tries to give more of herself to her loved ones but always feels guilty that she is not doing enough. Fortunately her children have seen through this juggling act and learned to appreciate their mother's calling. In fact, she has set such a good example that two of her children are themselves professional teachers and two are studying to become teachers (another two are still in grade school). Some passions, after all, do run in the family.
Catanauan says she has never considered any other profession and cannot imagine herself being in another field. Success, she says, is achieving one's goals righteously. She is happy that she is able to live her dream of interacting with the youth and inspiring them.
Still, she aspires to do more. “I want to be an instrument in improving lives,” Much needs to be done to achieve quality education – not just for those who can afford it, but for all. She is a witness to the deterioration of the education system in the country. “Every Filipino deserves an equal opportunity for quality education.” Sadly, genuine commitment and quality service rendered by teachers like her are not enough to make this happen.
“Many students cannot cope with the minimum learning competencies set for their level. Lack of classrooms and teachers resulting to big class size, inadequate facilities, limited instructional time and poor teacher preparation are factors that result to the deterioration of education. To solve this problem,there is a need to align teachers to teach their major subject. There should be continuous training and retraining of teachers. Adequate facilities and classrooms should be provided.”
Well, accessibility of education is a common advocacy among candidates for next year's elections. Let's see who among these wannabes, local and national alike, are sincere and serious in making a difference.
**
October 5 was set aside by the United Nations Education, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) as World Teachers' Day. Here in the country, the day was supposed to mark the culmination of month-long activities in the Teachers Month Campaign by organizations led by the Metrobank Foundation. The devastation brought by Ondoy and Pepeng, however, has caused the campaign to be extended until October 31. Difficult times have a way of bringing out the heroes in people, the foundation says, and teachers easily come to mind when we talk about heroes.
In the meantime, Catanauan's view of heroism has got nothing to do with being great or famous. “It is doing things no matter how simple they are to improve other people's lives. It is the act of forgetting oneself for the welfare of others.” Amen – how can we say we are a nation so in want of heroes?
Precy says she is driven by her commitment to her work and her love for her family. Her life is not comfortable nor luxurious, yet she considers herself successful. Her living trophies are former students who have eventually succeeded in their chosen careers – and her children who are turning out just fine.
Ma'am Precy says she looks forward to going back to her hometown after retirement, enjoying the comfort of family she has so assiduously built and nurtured side by side with her vocation. She is excited to care for more grandchildren (she has one already). She will look back to whether she has become an instrument indeed.
But even now we see she has taught her children and mothered her students well. That day may yet be far away, but her students – past and present, myself included – already know the answer.
**
Readers' reactions:
Dear Ms. Adelle,
I would like to thank you for featuring our dearest Ma'am Precy in your opinion page dated Oct.25, 2009. The teachers here at Kalayaan National High School were very happy upon reading your article about her - being a teacher and a committed mother. I have knwon Ma'am Prezy way back 1995 but I got the chance to know her well when we became co-teachers in KNHS 1998. I become an avid fan of her because of her qualities. Later, we bacome friends. True enough, Ma'am Prescy is very accepting, never harsh, she's so sincere. More than that, she is very humble, intelligent .and kind. But there is one quality that Ma'am Precy that I really adore and that is she can make you laugh out of her jokes.
More power to you Ms.Adelle and to Manila Standard Newspaper. God bless!
Very truly yours,
Mrs. Wilhelmina D. Tarnate
**
Dear Adelle,
I enjoy reading your column which I found most interesting, but the
big turn-off for me is when so-called climate change (formerly “global
warming”) is incorporated into a rather interesting piece.
In today's column, you mentioned “…Catanauan is presently challenged
by the introduction of the concept of climate change to her students.
Especially now, after the devastation wrought by recent storms Ondoy
and Pepeng, the young are more receptive to the idea that it is
climate change that is responsible for extreme weather conditions.”
The teacher's intention might be benign, but it is appalling to think
that impressionable skulls of young children full of mush are being
brain-washed with an insane notion without any foundation at all.
The climate change connection to Ondoy and Pepeng has no basis
whatsoever. I consider the regurgitation by Philippine media of Al
Gore’s global-warming-money-venture- scheme as junk science without
any factual basis but only enriches Al Gore's bank account.
Best regards,
Gil Torres
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
An ethical question
How next door to happiness lives sorrow
- R. Kelly
Gotham City
I saw an indie film last week (I wrote about it separately in my newspaper column) which had some scene taken inside a prison compound. I've also been following a show, Locked Up Abroad at the National Geographic Channel, where people narrate the circumstances of their landing in jail in a foreign country. Last Monday's episode was shot in the Laguna provincial jail even as the story was supposed to be set in Bali, Indonesia. The inmates were even talking in Filipino. I suppose the NatGeo people thought their first-world audience would not be able to tell the difference between Bahasa and Tagalog.
I digress. I am especially attentive of jails because I've actually been in one -- at the men's prison facility of the Quezon City Police Department. It's quite near Edsa, at the foot of the Kamuning flyover, on the right side if you are headed south.
February 2005. I was a freshman at the UP College of Law. My legal ethics teacher broke the class up into groups. My group was tasked to explore inmates' access to legal advise. See, inmates in city jails are just charged but not yet convicted. They were on trial or awaiting verdict. They either had no money for bail or were locked up for non-bailable offenses. The statistics are lost on me now but I know that some of the men there could be free, albeit temporarily, for a few thousand pesos...if only their families could raise the amount. The same story applies even to those who had been wrongly accused. I mean, how were we to know?
The men suffer the squalid conditions prisons in third-world countries are known for. There are too many people in too few square inches of space. It is not an exaggeration to say that these guys take turns sleeping, or else they would all have to do it standing up. The inmates subsist on very spartan meals.
Maybe to provide some comfort, the compound has specific sections for specific gangs, usually determined by the inmates' province of origin. Regionalism is nowhere as alive as it is here. There are attempts to make the place livable. There was a basketball court where inmates pass the time. Some quarters also have sari-sari stores. The enterprising ones sell coffee,sugar, laundry powder,biscuits. Talk about underground commerce.
And the smell! It is a potent mixture of grime and sweat and human waste and garbage and enclosure. Of course, one tries not to cover one's nose – lest one offend the men. Shirtless and tattooed and menacing and so dangerously close,they could have done anything to Nikki (my groupmate) and me.
Yup, Nikki and I were right there inside the prison, not just looking into it. We roamed the cells, with only two prison guards to make sure we are not touched nor taken hostage by the inmates. I was deathly afraid of this possibility and I tried to calm myself by thinking these guys may not be as desperate as they would be if they were convicted already. Still, I stayed close to the policeman. The men followed us with their eyes; Nikki and I tried not to meet them. It was an all-male compound. What else could they be thinking?
We were led upstairs. More prisoners, I expected, crowded into less spacious quarters. But no, on the third (or was it fourth) floor of the compound, one can actually feel the wind on one's face. There were railings, yes, but they could also pass for windows. There were cots, folding beds. Orocan drawers to organize the inmates' clothes and personal effects. Electric fans. Television sets.
None of the people on the privileged floor were Filipinos. They were Chinese, charged with trafficking drugs, who did not even speak English (or so they claimed).
As everywhere, some are more equal than others at the Quezon City Jail.
I think about this experience now and I cringe at how I could have taken it all so nonchalantly at the time. (Nikki was even giggling because the officer whom we interviewed was named Colonel Panti.) Maybe because I was evaluating the experience as nothing more than a means to make the grade. How shall we present all this to the class? What medium should our group use? What ethical issues may be raised? Would Ma'am Jardaleza be impressed or has she heard it all before?
I know. I am guilty of belated reaction. That in itself is an ethical question. Where has my social conscience been for the past four and a half years? Why have I kept silent?
The truth is, I might have kept these memories carefully tucked away in a corner of my brain. It is, after all, an inconvenient knowledge; it is easier to refuse to let them haunt me. I probably would not have remembered had I not seen those scenes on tv and in the film.
And I realize that now that I am in media, through this blog and the more traditional newspaper, I actually have a voice. I now wonder whether writing abut these things can actually make a difference. To the deplorable jail conditions. To the inclination to lock up an innocent man just to be able to say a case is closed. To the snail-paced procedures in our legal system, where one day or one week does not mean much to lawyers and judges but mean the world to the inmates' families. To the disparity in living conditions between the haves and the have nots, even in a controlled facility such as prison.
It is a curse to be born poor and ignorant in this country. But the greater curse is to feel so strongly about certain things and be scared that one day that passion is going to be extinguished by the acceptance that the evils you rile against are just so formidable. So formidable that you give up.
- R. Kelly
Gotham City
I saw an indie film last week (I wrote about it separately in my newspaper column) which had some scene taken inside a prison compound. I've also been following a show, Locked Up Abroad at the National Geographic Channel, where people narrate the circumstances of their landing in jail in a foreign country. Last Monday's episode was shot in the Laguna provincial jail even as the story was supposed to be set in Bali, Indonesia. The inmates were even talking in Filipino. I suppose the NatGeo people thought their first-world audience would not be able to tell the difference between Bahasa and Tagalog.
I digress. I am especially attentive of jails because I've actually been in one -- at the men's prison facility of the Quezon City Police Department. It's quite near Edsa, at the foot of the Kamuning flyover, on the right side if you are headed south.
February 2005. I was a freshman at the UP College of Law. My legal ethics teacher broke the class up into groups. My group was tasked to explore inmates' access to legal advise. See, inmates in city jails are just charged but not yet convicted. They were on trial or awaiting verdict. They either had no money for bail or were locked up for non-bailable offenses. The statistics are lost on me now but I know that some of the men there could be free, albeit temporarily, for a few thousand pesos...if only their families could raise the amount. The same story applies even to those who had been wrongly accused. I mean, how were we to know?
The men suffer the squalid conditions prisons in third-world countries are known for. There are too many people in too few square inches of space. It is not an exaggeration to say that these guys take turns sleeping, or else they would all have to do it standing up. The inmates subsist on very spartan meals.
Maybe to provide some comfort, the compound has specific sections for specific gangs, usually determined by the inmates' province of origin. Regionalism is nowhere as alive as it is here. There are attempts to make the place livable. There was a basketball court where inmates pass the time. Some quarters also have sari-sari stores. The enterprising ones sell coffee,sugar, laundry powder,biscuits. Talk about underground commerce.
And the smell! It is a potent mixture of grime and sweat and human waste and garbage and enclosure. Of course, one tries not to cover one's nose – lest one offend the men. Shirtless and tattooed and menacing and so dangerously close,they could have done anything to Nikki (my groupmate) and me.
Yup, Nikki and I were right there inside the prison, not just looking into it. We roamed the cells, with only two prison guards to make sure we are not touched nor taken hostage by the inmates. I was deathly afraid of this possibility and I tried to calm myself by thinking these guys may not be as desperate as they would be if they were convicted already. Still, I stayed close to the policeman. The men followed us with their eyes; Nikki and I tried not to meet them. It was an all-male compound. What else could they be thinking?
We were led upstairs. More prisoners, I expected, crowded into less spacious quarters. But no, on the third (or was it fourth) floor of the compound, one can actually feel the wind on one's face. There were railings, yes, but they could also pass for windows. There were cots, folding beds. Orocan drawers to organize the inmates' clothes and personal effects. Electric fans. Television sets.
None of the people on the privileged floor were Filipinos. They were Chinese, charged with trafficking drugs, who did not even speak English (or so they claimed).
As everywhere, some are more equal than others at the Quezon City Jail.
I think about this experience now and I cringe at how I could have taken it all so nonchalantly at the time. (Nikki was even giggling because the officer whom we interviewed was named Colonel Panti.) Maybe because I was evaluating the experience as nothing more than a means to make the grade. How shall we present all this to the class? What medium should our group use? What ethical issues may be raised? Would Ma'am Jardaleza be impressed or has she heard it all before?
I know. I am guilty of belated reaction. That in itself is an ethical question. Where has my social conscience been for the past four and a half years? Why have I kept silent?
The truth is, I might have kept these memories carefully tucked away in a corner of my brain. It is, after all, an inconvenient knowledge; it is easier to refuse to let them haunt me. I probably would not have remembered had I not seen those scenes on tv and in the film.
And I realize that now that I am in media, through this blog and the more traditional newspaper, I actually have a voice. I now wonder whether writing abut these things can actually make a difference. To the deplorable jail conditions. To the inclination to lock up an innocent man just to be able to say a case is closed. To the snail-paced procedures in our legal system, where one day or one week does not mean much to lawyers and judges but mean the world to the inmates' families. To the disparity in living conditions between the haves and the have nots, even in a controlled facility such as prison.
It is a curse to be born poor and ignorant in this country. But the greater curse is to feel so strongly about certain things and be scared that one day that passion is going to be extinguished by the acceptance that the evils you rile against are just so formidable. So formidable that you give up.
The Revisionist
Three weeks ago I finished a novel called The Revisionist by one Helen Schulman. (I had meant to write a few lines about it but something always seemed to come up.) It is the story of David Hershleder, a Jewish neurosurgeon in America who unwittingly chooses his realities to suit his convenience – until he is thrown out of the house by his wife Itty. Until he comes into contact with an old friend who writes an article about a Holocaust denier. Until this denier makes an about turn and embraces what really happened.
It turns out that David has been so detached from his family. It turns out, too,tha this mother, a Holocaust survivor from the death camps, put her head inside an oven to kill herself. This happened on the night she begged him to keep her company because after so many years she was finally ready to talk. What was so special about her that she survived while others did not? But David refused and went back to his dorm.
These things are revealed only in the latter part of the novel. in the beginning, David succeeds to tell us only about the part of himself that he wishes others to know.
Would I have been a revisionist? A denier? There are things in my past I would love to zap out of my memory. Horrible things. Disdainful things. Things I should not have done. Characters I should not have met, even associated with. Circumstances I should not have flung myself into. Sometimes one gets the feeling one would give anything for a clean slate.
But a clean slate is a lie. We only have a clean slate when we are born. After that, everything we say and do cannot be undone. Nothing in real life can give us a feeling quite like the “Undo Changes” we click on before saving particular version of a file in our computer.
Live with that? We would not have been the same persons anyway. And only if we have learned to accept everything that we did (or still do) as an essential component of who we are today can we become truly at peace with who we can be. The past is cast in stone. The future is rife with possibilities. And it is still in our hands.
That's actually easier said than done.
It turns out that David has been so detached from his family. It turns out, too,tha this mother, a Holocaust survivor from the death camps, put her head inside an oven to kill herself. This happened on the night she begged him to keep her company because after so many years she was finally ready to talk. What was so special about her that she survived while others did not? But David refused and went back to his dorm.
These things are revealed only in the latter part of the novel. in the beginning, David succeeds to tell us only about the part of himself that he wishes others to know.
Would I have been a revisionist? A denier? There are things in my past I would love to zap out of my memory. Horrible things. Disdainful things. Things I should not have done. Characters I should not have met, even associated with. Circumstances I should not have flung myself into. Sometimes one gets the feeling one would give anything for a clean slate.
But a clean slate is a lie. We only have a clean slate when we are born. After that, everything we say and do cannot be undone. Nothing in real life can give us a feeling quite like the “Undo Changes” we click on before saving particular version of a file in our computer.
Live with that? We would not have been the same persons anyway. And only if we have learned to accept everything that we did (or still do) as an essential component of who we are today can we become truly at peace with who we can be. The past is cast in stone. The future is rife with possibilities. And it is still in our hands.
That's actually easier said than done.
Fortune and misfortune
Between the moment of inspiration and the execution of whatever it is one has been inspired to do is the danger of losing steam.
I am no stranger to this. How many times have I been seized with the zeal to write something,only to put off the task, claiming to find a better time, until the zeal is one day gone?
Sometimes one wakes up feeling the idea is not as relevant after all.
Sometimes one becomes convinced it is too broad, or too narrow, or that no one would like to read it.
I can think of a few other tragedies for a writer.
The solution is to know the perfect moment to stop brewing and actually start writing. It does not have to be an opus. It is not a writer's job to declare her work as such – or not.
Tonight it dawned on me that my October blogs contain only the pieces I have published in my column. What has happened to me? Have I become less zealous? Less inspired?
Lazier, I suppose. It has been said that when God hands you a gift, he also hands you a whip. My writing is a gift but it is not a piece of cake.
Not many people live their lives feeling that they re doing what it was they were meant to do. This is my good fortune. I must not squander it.
I am no stranger to this. How many times have I been seized with the zeal to write something,only to put off the task, claiming to find a better time, until the zeal is one day gone?
Sometimes one wakes up feeling the idea is not as relevant after all.
Sometimes one becomes convinced it is too broad, or too narrow, or that no one would like to read it.
I can think of a few other tragedies for a writer.
The solution is to know the perfect moment to stop brewing and actually start writing. It does not have to be an opus. It is not a writer's job to declare her work as such – or not.
Tonight it dawned on me that my October blogs contain only the pieces I have published in my column. What has happened to me? Have I become less zealous? Less inspired?
Lazier, I suppose. It has been said that when God hands you a gift, he also hands you a whip. My writing is a gift but it is not a piece of cake.
Not many people live their lives feeling that they re doing what it was they were meant to do. This is my good fortune. I must not squander it.
Monday, October 19, 2009
Moving images
published 19 Oct 2009, Manila Standard Today
It is perfectly natural to ask: Why hold a festival in an environment of tragedy and loss? But it is equally perfectly easy to come up with an answer: This is not just any other festival. It is, after all, the Cinemanila International Film Festival.
The event, which kicked off last Thursday at the Market! Market! in Taguig City, seeks to do more than showcase nearly 100 films from 30 countries in the span of 10 days —although that is not by any means a small achievement. The festival, according to its Web site, seeks to continue the legacy of the late Filipino director Lino Brocka, who pushed for the creation of films uniquely Filipino yet able to play to the international market. (Cinemanila used to be the name of Brocka’s independent outfit that produced classics such as Mortal and Tinimbang Ka Ngunit Kulang).
This year’s theme, “Moving forward with moving images,” is a message so apt for the times the country is in. Director Tikoy Aguiluz, who founded the festival in 1999, says Opening Night may as well be called Thanksgiving Night. “The filmmaker is down from the ivory tower. The filmmaker is also a citizen.”
It is the same citizen who follows Lola Sepa and her eight-year-old grandson as they utter a prayer at the Quiapo church, walk against strong winds and rain to a spot by the side of a bridge. They light a candle (the old woman got it on the sixth try) by the corner; this is the exact place where the woman’s son is killed the previous night. The son was stabbed after resisting a thief’s attempt to get his cell phone.
So go the first few scenes of Lola, the latest offering of Brillante Mendoza —who bagged the Best Director Award at this year’s Palm D’Or International Film Festival in Cannes, France for his film Kinatay (The Execution of P). The screening of Lola opened Cinemanila; the film is the Philippines’ entry to this year’s Venice Film Festival.
Lola Sepa tries to raise the money for her son’s funeral expenses. The white-haired, bedraggled old woman, played by veteran actress Anita Linda, takes us to the narrow and chaotic streets of Manila and into her home in Sitio Ilog, which can only be reached by paddling through murky waters. Immediately one associates these scenes with the real-life images of flooded barangays in Marikina, Pasig, Pangasinan and other areas brought about by recent storms.
When the eight-thousand-peso coffin is brought by boat to Lola Sepa’s modest home, it has to be titled steeply in order to make it to the platform and to the very narrow entrance to the shanty. Here the viewer cannot help squinting, half expecting the corpse to slide out of the coffin and plunge into the water. The rest of the film shows the realities of old age and poverty: Sepa pawns her ATM and looks like a corpse in the ID photo, passes urine outside a comfort room under repair in the justice hall and occasionally loses her temper with her playful grandsons who live with her.
Mendoza, after all,has made a name for himself portraying the real—the awkward, the unrehearsed, the imperfect.
There is another Lola in the film,Lola Puring, whose grandson Mateo is in jail for the killing of Sepa’s son. She is advised that the offense is non-bailable and that they should just ask the family of the deceased for a settlement. Lola Puring sells bananas and vegetables on a kariton for a living and takes care of an invalid son at home, Another grandson helps her. To raise the settlement money, Puring resorts to pawning her television set, cheating her customers and visiting relatives who give her fresh eggs and more vegetables, which she tries to sell on the way home. And then she visits the wake of the man her grandson has killed and speaks to Sepa’s daughter, who is more open to the idea of a settlement than her mother is.
Finally Sepa is able to bury her dead, after which she relents and decided to take Puring up on her offer. Puring gives Sepa P50,000 to drop charges against her grandson. The money is bundled up in a handkerchief that Puring secures in her pocket with several safety pins. The exchange takes place in a crowded and noisy eatery that doubles as a bingo place. Face to face at last, the two Lolas make small talk—about food they can and cannot eat, about diseases that threaten them and which have claimed their loved ones’ lives. The suit against Mateo is dismissed.
The last scene shows the two old women propped up by their family—Sepa is assisted by her daughter and Puring is helped by her grandson, the vendor—on their way out of the courthouse and going to separate directions. But they must first let pass a convoy of luxury vehicles, escorted by motorcycles at the front and the rear, before they can cross the street.
“Feel-good” is definitely not an adjective to describe the films showing in the festival. When I interviewed Mendoza just after winning in Cannes (Brillante’s darkness, June 1), he said he would considered himself successful if he sees his films haunting—living in—the audience long after they leave the cinema.
Cinemanila’s closing film, “Himpapawid,” which will be shown on Sunday, Oct. 25, is likely going to be just as haunting. It is the story of “a lone deranged hijacker pushed to the edge of insanity as he struggles with the oppression of surviving in modern society,” says one synopsis. The film is inspired by the true story of the hijacking, made by “a desperate man from the countryside,” of a Philippine Airlines flight from Davao to Manila in May 2000. Red is a Cannes awardee himself for his short film Anino (Shadows) in 2000 and is considered both a pioneer of the modern Filipino independent cinema movement and mentor/ inspiration to aspiring filmmakers.
Between Lola and Himpapawid are nine days of a mix of international movies, local digital creations, short films from the young and from Southeast Asia, both for competitions or exhibitions. Just as we Filipinos are eager to share what is ours to the rest of the world, filmmakers from other parts of the world have their own stories to tell. The circumstances may be different but in the end, the range and depth of emotions we humans are capable of feeling are the same.
In the awarding ceremonies to be held on Friday, Oct. 23, the trophy that would be handed out is the image of the Bulol designed by National Artist Napoleon Abueva. The Bulol is a diety that represents good harvest—not necessarily in material things, but an abundance of good quality films.
If you want to expand your world, be moved and bothered, or if you simply want a break from the trite and unrealistic plots of commercial entertainment, get out of your comfort zone and take part in the festival. For screening schedules and other information, go to www.cinemanila.org.
adellechua@gmail.com
It is perfectly natural to ask: Why hold a festival in an environment of tragedy and loss? But it is equally perfectly easy to come up with an answer: This is not just any other festival. It is, after all, the Cinemanila International Film Festival.
The event, which kicked off last Thursday at the Market! Market! in Taguig City, seeks to do more than showcase nearly 100 films from 30 countries in the span of 10 days —although that is not by any means a small achievement. The festival, according to its Web site, seeks to continue the legacy of the late Filipino director Lino Brocka, who pushed for the creation of films uniquely Filipino yet able to play to the international market. (Cinemanila used to be the name of Brocka’s independent outfit that produced classics such as Mortal and Tinimbang Ka Ngunit Kulang).
This year’s theme, “Moving forward with moving images,” is a message so apt for the times the country is in. Director Tikoy Aguiluz, who founded the festival in 1999, says Opening Night may as well be called Thanksgiving Night. “The filmmaker is down from the ivory tower. The filmmaker is also a citizen.”
It is the same citizen who follows Lola Sepa and her eight-year-old grandson as they utter a prayer at the Quiapo church, walk against strong winds and rain to a spot by the side of a bridge. They light a candle (the old woman got it on the sixth try) by the corner; this is the exact place where the woman’s son is killed the previous night. The son was stabbed after resisting a thief’s attempt to get his cell phone.
So go the first few scenes of Lola, the latest offering of Brillante Mendoza —who bagged the Best Director Award at this year’s Palm D’Or International Film Festival in Cannes, France for his film Kinatay (The Execution of P). The screening of Lola opened Cinemanila; the film is the Philippines’ entry to this year’s Venice Film Festival.
Lola Sepa tries to raise the money for her son’s funeral expenses. The white-haired, bedraggled old woman, played by veteran actress Anita Linda, takes us to the narrow and chaotic streets of Manila and into her home in Sitio Ilog, which can only be reached by paddling through murky waters. Immediately one associates these scenes with the real-life images of flooded barangays in Marikina, Pasig, Pangasinan and other areas brought about by recent storms.
When the eight-thousand-peso coffin is brought by boat to Lola Sepa’s modest home, it has to be titled steeply in order to make it to the platform and to the very narrow entrance to the shanty. Here the viewer cannot help squinting, half expecting the corpse to slide out of the coffin and plunge into the water. The rest of the film shows the realities of old age and poverty: Sepa pawns her ATM and looks like a corpse in the ID photo, passes urine outside a comfort room under repair in the justice hall and occasionally loses her temper with her playful grandsons who live with her.
Mendoza, after all,has made a name for himself portraying the real—the awkward, the unrehearsed, the imperfect.
There is another Lola in the film,Lola Puring, whose grandson Mateo is in jail for the killing of Sepa’s son. She is advised that the offense is non-bailable and that they should just ask the family of the deceased for a settlement. Lola Puring sells bananas and vegetables on a kariton for a living and takes care of an invalid son at home, Another grandson helps her. To raise the settlement money, Puring resorts to pawning her television set, cheating her customers and visiting relatives who give her fresh eggs and more vegetables, which she tries to sell on the way home. And then she visits the wake of the man her grandson has killed and speaks to Sepa’s daughter, who is more open to the idea of a settlement than her mother is.
Finally Sepa is able to bury her dead, after which she relents and decided to take Puring up on her offer. Puring gives Sepa P50,000 to drop charges against her grandson. The money is bundled up in a handkerchief that Puring secures in her pocket with several safety pins. The exchange takes place in a crowded and noisy eatery that doubles as a bingo place. Face to face at last, the two Lolas make small talk—about food they can and cannot eat, about diseases that threaten them and which have claimed their loved ones’ lives. The suit against Mateo is dismissed.
The last scene shows the two old women propped up by their family—Sepa is assisted by her daughter and Puring is helped by her grandson, the vendor—on their way out of the courthouse and going to separate directions. But they must first let pass a convoy of luxury vehicles, escorted by motorcycles at the front and the rear, before they can cross the street.
“Feel-good” is definitely not an adjective to describe the films showing in the festival. When I interviewed Mendoza just after winning in Cannes (Brillante’s darkness, June 1), he said he would considered himself successful if he sees his films haunting—living in—the audience long after they leave the cinema.
Cinemanila’s closing film, “Himpapawid,” which will be shown on Sunday, Oct. 25, is likely going to be just as haunting. It is the story of “a lone deranged hijacker pushed to the edge of insanity as he struggles with the oppression of surviving in modern society,” says one synopsis. The film is inspired by the true story of the hijacking, made by “a desperate man from the countryside,” of a Philippine Airlines flight from Davao to Manila in May 2000. Red is a Cannes awardee himself for his short film Anino (Shadows) in 2000 and is considered both a pioneer of the modern Filipino independent cinema movement and mentor/ inspiration to aspiring filmmakers.
Between Lola and Himpapawid are nine days of a mix of international movies, local digital creations, short films from the young and from Southeast Asia, both for competitions or exhibitions. Just as we Filipinos are eager to share what is ours to the rest of the world, filmmakers from other parts of the world have their own stories to tell. The circumstances may be different but in the end, the range and depth of emotions we humans are capable of feeling are the same.
In the awarding ceremonies to be held on Friday, Oct. 23, the trophy that would be handed out is the image of the Bulol designed by National Artist Napoleon Abueva. The Bulol is a diety that represents good harvest—not necessarily in material things, but an abundance of good quality films.
If you want to expand your world, be moved and bothered, or if you simply want a break from the trite and unrealistic plots of commercial entertainment, get out of your comfort zone and take part in the festival. For screening schedules and other information, go to www.cinemanila.org.
adellechua@gmail.com
Thursday, October 15, 2009
Doublespeak
published 12 Oct 2009, Manila Standard Today
What do the Jesus is Lord Movement, the Iglesia Ni Cristo, the Office of Muslim Affairs, the Council of Christian Bishops of the Philippines, the Philippine Council of Evangelical Churches, the Philippines for Jesus Movement, the United Church of Christ in the Philippines, the International Bible Society, the Christian and Missionary Alliance Churches of the Philippines, the Living Epistle Christian Family, the Baptist Conference of the Philippines and some Catholic INDIVIDUALS have in common?
These churches, religious groups and people are members of the Interfaith Partnership for the Promotion of Responsible Parenthood,a group that envisions an abundant and healthy life for each Filipino family.
This is the same group that held a forum Friday to urge Congress to immediately pass House Bill 5043, also known as the Reproductive Health and Population Development Act.
There’s only a few more days until Congress goes on recess. Upon their return, lawmakers will resume budget hearings. The deadline for the filing of certificates of candidacy for the May 2010 elections will also come to pass. And then Christmas and New Year holidays will be upon us. After that, everybody will be on election mode. The urgency with which House Speaker Prospero Nograles spoke of the bill to his colleagues has come and gone. There are those who believe somebody received a phone call from someone, so that’s it. In short, there is not much time—or hope.
But hope is a virtue, and the interfaith council is supposedly composed of men and women of prayer. Catholicism may be the predominant religion in the country but certainly no group can claim monopoly of piety and good intentions.
One can always accept arguments for or against issues based on religious and moral convictions. Everybody has the right to his own opinion. But it’s sickening to see how the hierarchy of a single denomination dangles its apparently almighty persuasive powers (on its flock) to politicians whose minds are already on campaigning—and winning.
It’s even more sickening how these would-be candidates compromise their personal beliefs and fold up to threats made by some Church leaders. These politicians base their decisions on what would be good for them and disregard what their constituents—whom they are supposed to represent in the first place—feel and think.
The country’s overpopulation is just one of many ills. There is poverty, lack of education, poor healthcare, environmental degradation, joblessness. There’s misgovernance, loss of dignity, a breakdown in values. These problems do not come in neat, separate boxes. Often they overlap, causing and being affected by each other. The controversial bill is by no means the answer to all of these. But its passage would send the right message. Its emphasis, not per se in using this or that method of contraception, but in giving Filipino families the chance to make informed choices, is truly empowering.
And so when we say that the Church is against the reproductive health bill,we just may be committing a mistake. The fact is that many other Churches do support it.
Ustadz Ahmad Barcelon, for instance, an Imam who claims he speaks for all the Muslims in the country, says he supports the bill because there is nothing in it, nor in its objectives, that violates the Koran. “We are taught to protect the self and the family,” he says, and the bill seeks to do just that. They also frown upon brothers who sire children but are unable to support them. “They are uneducated, and misled.”
In fact, the bill is many times over more significant than changing the Constitution, says Mr. Barcelon. Sadly, our lawmakers and other powers-that-be have other priorities. “We should act now,” he says. “It may be too late tomorrow.”
Bishop Rodrigo Tano, chairman of the interfaith group’s Board of Trustees and chairman of the Philippine Association of Bible and Theological Schools, read the group’s resolution that urges members of Congress to pass the bill “upholding the transcendent and infinite dignity and worth of the human person and abundant life for every Filipino.”
***
Actually,the forum was not limited to the controversial bill. One of the speakers, American Jeri Gunderson, who has been living in the Philippines since 1987, talked about how we subject women and the family to unbelievable stresses. Gunderson runs Shiphrah Birthing Home in Taytay, Rizal, where at least 500 babies are born every year. A midwife, she also holds a masters degree in community development and is now shooting for her PhD. She is a minister, a counselor, a “kapatid” to the many poor women she comes in contact with every day. Gunderson may be a foreigner, she says, but she’s “in the trenches with them all.”
Gunderson’s work in the birthing home enables her to witness firsthand how women in general sacrifice to keep the family together. She comes into contact with women about to deliver their ninth, or twelfth, children and learns that these mothers don’t like being unable to provide for these children. The fact is that they don’t believe they have a choice, even if it was their own body involved. Where is the dignity if the woman allows herself to be “used” by her partner and then give birth in the most inhumane way possible? And indeed, being in the delivery ward of some public hospitals is like being in a meat shop, and the air is full of verbal abuse from the overworked, underpaid hospital staff. Thus the experience of bringing forth children into the world does not become the glorious event it should be. Gunderson hopes that the birthing home (“I do not own it; it owns me!”) makes even a slight difference.
Reproductive health, then, stops being a legislative and a political issue but an intimate matter between husband and wife, or if there is no such level of connection, between the woman and her counselor. Gunderson is so passionate about her message that she talks on, throwing occasional Tagalog words into her discourse, despite a brownout—in the dark and without a mic. She would have talked away even if the generator has not been switched on... and the audience would have remained captive, anyway.
She is riled and so must we be. We say the woman is the light of the home and the heartbeat of the family. But in most families, the pressure on the woman is just too daunting. “It is she who somehow has to make it work, make the money stretch, make relationships work. It is she whom society holds responsible for inconvenient or unwanted pregnancy. She is to be accountable for her eggs while men are held to little account for how they distribute their sperm. She is at once to be the paragon of virtue while at the same time held suspect by societies as the latent whore,” Gunderson says.
The doublespeak extends to how the family is viewed—and treated. We all say the family, the basic unit of society, must be protected at all costs. But what does a chauvinistic society do? It implicitly allows the violation of marital vows by not seeing an occasional one-night stand as a threat to the family. “Mostly monogamous” seems okay. And what does an economically driven community push families into doing? Breadwinners (fathers and mothers both) are rewarded for spending so much time at work, being away even from each other and leaving the children in the company of the hired help. Those who cannot even find work opportunities here go abroad and become absentee spouses and parents. Even schools and churches exert demands that sometimes take precious time away from family members.
And yet we say that’s just the way it is. But is it how they should be? Maybe it would serve us all well if we just do as we say.
adellechua@gmail.com
What do the Jesus is Lord Movement, the Iglesia Ni Cristo, the Office of Muslim Affairs, the Council of Christian Bishops of the Philippines, the Philippine Council of Evangelical Churches, the Philippines for Jesus Movement, the United Church of Christ in the Philippines, the International Bible Society, the Christian and Missionary Alliance Churches of the Philippines, the Living Epistle Christian Family, the Baptist Conference of the Philippines and some Catholic INDIVIDUALS have in common?
These churches, religious groups and people are members of the Interfaith Partnership for the Promotion of Responsible Parenthood,a group that envisions an abundant and healthy life for each Filipino family.
This is the same group that held a forum Friday to urge Congress to immediately pass House Bill 5043, also known as the Reproductive Health and Population Development Act.
There’s only a few more days until Congress goes on recess. Upon their return, lawmakers will resume budget hearings. The deadline for the filing of certificates of candidacy for the May 2010 elections will also come to pass. And then Christmas and New Year holidays will be upon us. After that, everybody will be on election mode. The urgency with which House Speaker Prospero Nograles spoke of the bill to his colleagues has come and gone. There are those who believe somebody received a phone call from someone, so that’s it. In short, there is not much time—or hope.
But hope is a virtue, and the interfaith council is supposedly composed of men and women of prayer. Catholicism may be the predominant religion in the country but certainly no group can claim monopoly of piety and good intentions.
One can always accept arguments for or against issues based on religious and moral convictions. Everybody has the right to his own opinion. But it’s sickening to see how the hierarchy of a single denomination dangles its apparently almighty persuasive powers (on its flock) to politicians whose minds are already on campaigning—and winning.
It’s even more sickening how these would-be candidates compromise their personal beliefs and fold up to threats made by some Church leaders. These politicians base their decisions on what would be good for them and disregard what their constituents—whom they are supposed to represent in the first place—feel and think.
The country’s overpopulation is just one of many ills. There is poverty, lack of education, poor healthcare, environmental degradation, joblessness. There’s misgovernance, loss of dignity, a breakdown in values. These problems do not come in neat, separate boxes. Often they overlap, causing and being affected by each other. The controversial bill is by no means the answer to all of these. But its passage would send the right message. Its emphasis, not per se in using this or that method of contraception, but in giving Filipino families the chance to make informed choices, is truly empowering.
And so when we say that the Church is against the reproductive health bill,we just may be committing a mistake. The fact is that many other Churches do support it.
Ustadz Ahmad Barcelon, for instance, an Imam who claims he speaks for all the Muslims in the country, says he supports the bill because there is nothing in it, nor in its objectives, that violates the Koran. “We are taught to protect the self and the family,” he says, and the bill seeks to do just that. They also frown upon brothers who sire children but are unable to support them. “They are uneducated, and misled.”
In fact, the bill is many times over more significant than changing the Constitution, says Mr. Barcelon. Sadly, our lawmakers and other powers-that-be have other priorities. “We should act now,” he says. “It may be too late tomorrow.”
Bishop Rodrigo Tano, chairman of the interfaith group’s Board of Trustees and chairman of the Philippine Association of Bible and Theological Schools, read the group’s resolution that urges members of Congress to pass the bill “upholding the transcendent and infinite dignity and worth of the human person and abundant life for every Filipino.”
***
Actually,the forum was not limited to the controversial bill. One of the speakers, American Jeri Gunderson, who has been living in the Philippines since 1987, talked about how we subject women and the family to unbelievable stresses. Gunderson runs Shiphrah Birthing Home in Taytay, Rizal, where at least 500 babies are born every year. A midwife, she also holds a masters degree in community development and is now shooting for her PhD. She is a minister, a counselor, a “kapatid” to the many poor women she comes in contact with every day. Gunderson may be a foreigner, she says, but she’s “in the trenches with them all.”
Gunderson’s work in the birthing home enables her to witness firsthand how women in general sacrifice to keep the family together. She comes into contact with women about to deliver their ninth, or twelfth, children and learns that these mothers don’t like being unable to provide for these children. The fact is that they don’t believe they have a choice, even if it was their own body involved. Where is the dignity if the woman allows herself to be “used” by her partner and then give birth in the most inhumane way possible? And indeed, being in the delivery ward of some public hospitals is like being in a meat shop, and the air is full of verbal abuse from the overworked, underpaid hospital staff. Thus the experience of bringing forth children into the world does not become the glorious event it should be. Gunderson hopes that the birthing home (“I do not own it; it owns me!”) makes even a slight difference.
Reproductive health, then, stops being a legislative and a political issue but an intimate matter between husband and wife, or if there is no such level of connection, between the woman and her counselor. Gunderson is so passionate about her message that she talks on, throwing occasional Tagalog words into her discourse, despite a brownout—in the dark and without a mic. She would have talked away even if the generator has not been switched on... and the audience would have remained captive, anyway.
She is riled and so must we be. We say the woman is the light of the home and the heartbeat of the family. But in most families, the pressure on the woman is just too daunting. “It is she who somehow has to make it work, make the money stretch, make relationships work. It is she whom society holds responsible for inconvenient or unwanted pregnancy. She is to be accountable for her eggs while men are held to little account for how they distribute their sperm. She is at once to be the paragon of virtue while at the same time held suspect by societies as the latent whore,” Gunderson says.
The doublespeak extends to how the family is viewed—and treated. We all say the family, the basic unit of society, must be protected at all costs. But what does a chauvinistic society do? It implicitly allows the violation of marital vows by not seeing an occasional one-night stand as a threat to the family. “Mostly monogamous” seems okay. And what does an economically driven community push families into doing? Breadwinners (fathers and mothers both) are rewarded for spending so much time at work, being away even from each other and leaving the children in the company of the hired help. Those who cannot even find work opportunities here go abroad and become absentee spouses and parents. Even schools and churches exert demands that sometimes take precious time away from family members.
And yet we say that’s just the way it is. But is it how they should be? Maybe it would serve us all well if we just do as we say.
adellechua@gmail.com
Wednesday, October 14, 2009
The high ground
published Manila Standard Today, Sept. 26, 2009
am supposed to publish the second and last installment of my piece about stem cells today. The article quotes from an online interview with an expert on adult stem cells.
But Ondoy came. The storm battered Metro Manila and surrounding provinces last Saturday. Everybody is still reeling, feeling washed away. Lives and property were lost or damaged. How can anything be more compelling than this?
I live in Valenzuela. It’s that northernmost tip of the metro that has become notorious for flooding. Fortunately, my apartment stands on relatively higher ground. Thus, my Ondoy stories are decidedly lamer than those of many. Other people’s experiences are worth telling a thousand times over.
As they have been told already, no doubt. Pictures, videos, interviews all say this latest howler took everybody by surprise and caused a carnage besides. On my way to the newsroom Sunday afternoon, I saw the extent of the devastation. I did not pass through flooded areas. I passed through roads previously flooded but had been cleared. Entire fast food outlets and convenience stores were closed, turned upside down. There was mud everywhere. On some walls, there were marks of how high the water came up.
All these dawned on me too late. Early Saturday, self-absorbed me relished the coziness the rains provided. I bonded with the children, caught up with housework and indulged on sleep. It was my day-off, after all. I was even humming as I prepared lomi for dinner. Only later did I realize that my family could have had it worse. If that’s not good fortune, and a random one at that, I don’t know what is.
One cannot help being amazed at the extent of the damage Ondoy has caused in the metro. None of this has happened before. Most disturbing were the accounts of how quickly the water rose and engulfed streets, seeped into the ground floors of homes —and never stopped rising until the rain stopped.
In a disaster like this, not only lives and properties are put to risk. There is also much disruption of operations, business and otherwise. For example, telecommunication lines are bogged down. Internet connection becomes a rare and precious commodity. We lose the security in other electronic transactions that we otherwise take for granted.
It may take a while before science tells us exactly why this happened now when it never did before. For today and the next few days, the focus would be accounting for the dead and the missing, getting rid of the flood waters, providing relief to those displaced and restoring everything to its pre-Ondoy state.
In the meantime, we see the same old stories on television—government officials giving us updates, giant networks conducting fund-raisers and round-the-clock coverages of rescue and relief operations.
Presidential aspirant Gilbert Teodoro, who happens to be Secretary of Defense and Chairman of the National Disaster Coordinating Council, has a golden opportunity to endear himself to the public. Remember his advocacy campaigns on disaster preparedness, which aired during a Manny Pacquiao fight? This is the perfect time to know whether anybody ever took those pieces of advice to heart—or whether they were mere propaganda material.
Then again, Teodoro’s good—or ill—fortune, depending on the perceived efficacy of his campaign, should be the least of our concerns. Who cares about politics when goods you have toiled for over the years have been washed away? Who cares which character is being interviewed on television when loved ones are missing, injured or even dead?
Sadly, however, the national knee-jerk reaction is to act like pitiful victims and then curse the government for being slow, ill-equipped and inadequate. There is such disconnect between the people on the one hand and their political leaders on the other. If anything goes wrong—as everything does in the face of disasters, natural or otherwise—the impulse is to slam the government for not doing enough. And why not? These politicians promise the moon and the stars to their gullible constituents during campaigns.
If we are to breed a new generation of enlightened Filipinos, we should remind the masses that recovery and development do not rest on one person alone—however brilliant or charismatic he or she is, however rich the parentage. Government must be eventually seen as an enabler, not just a rescuer.
People should be enabled enough so that they would know how to anticipate disasters and devise a plan on how to deal with these events. They must be informed that climate change has upped the ante of the occurrence and the ferocity of these disasters. They must be equipped to help themselves and help others instead of expecting—demanding—to be helped all the time. Of course, getting this message across may take many years, even a generation. But now is always a good time to start.
The rains would stop, the waters would subside and the world as we know it, altered by our loss, would go on. May these lessons stay, though, so we won’t act so surprised and lost anymore when disaster strikes next time around.
adellechua@gmail.com
am supposed to publish the second and last installment of my piece about stem cells today. The article quotes from an online interview with an expert on adult stem cells.
But Ondoy came. The storm battered Metro Manila and surrounding provinces last Saturday. Everybody is still reeling, feeling washed away. Lives and property were lost or damaged. How can anything be more compelling than this?
I live in Valenzuela. It’s that northernmost tip of the metro that has become notorious for flooding. Fortunately, my apartment stands on relatively higher ground. Thus, my Ondoy stories are decidedly lamer than those of many. Other people’s experiences are worth telling a thousand times over.
As they have been told already, no doubt. Pictures, videos, interviews all say this latest howler took everybody by surprise and caused a carnage besides. On my way to the newsroom Sunday afternoon, I saw the extent of the devastation. I did not pass through flooded areas. I passed through roads previously flooded but had been cleared. Entire fast food outlets and convenience stores were closed, turned upside down. There was mud everywhere. On some walls, there were marks of how high the water came up.
All these dawned on me too late. Early Saturday, self-absorbed me relished the coziness the rains provided. I bonded with the children, caught up with housework and indulged on sleep. It was my day-off, after all. I was even humming as I prepared lomi for dinner. Only later did I realize that my family could have had it worse. If that’s not good fortune, and a random one at that, I don’t know what is.
One cannot help being amazed at the extent of the damage Ondoy has caused in the metro. None of this has happened before. Most disturbing were the accounts of how quickly the water rose and engulfed streets, seeped into the ground floors of homes —and never stopped rising until the rain stopped.
In a disaster like this, not only lives and properties are put to risk. There is also much disruption of operations, business and otherwise. For example, telecommunication lines are bogged down. Internet connection becomes a rare and precious commodity. We lose the security in other electronic transactions that we otherwise take for granted.
It may take a while before science tells us exactly why this happened now when it never did before. For today and the next few days, the focus would be accounting for the dead and the missing, getting rid of the flood waters, providing relief to those displaced and restoring everything to its pre-Ondoy state.
In the meantime, we see the same old stories on television—government officials giving us updates, giant networks conducting fund-raisers and round-the-clock coverages of rescue and relief operations.
Presidential aspirant Gilbert Teodoro, who happens to be Secretary of Defense and Chairman of the National Disaster Coordinating Council, has a golden opportunity to endear himself to the public. Remember his advocacy campaigns on disaster preparedness, which aired during a Manny Pacquiao fight? This is the perfect time to know whether anybody ever took those pieces of advice to heart—or whether they were mere propaganda material.
Then again, Teodoro’s good—or ill—fortune, depending on the perceived efficacy of his campaign, should be the least of our concerns. Who cares about politics when goods you have toiled for over the years have been washed away? Who cares which character is being interviewed on television when loved ones are missing, injured or even dead?
Sadly, however, the national knee-jerk reaction is to act like pitiful victims and then curse the government for being slow, ill-equipped and inadequate. There is such disconnect between the people on the one hand and their political leaders on the other. If anything goes wrong—as everything does in the face of disasters, natural or otherwise—the impulse is to slam the government for not doing enough. And why not? These politicians promise the moon and the stars to their gullible constituents during campaigns.
If we are to breed a new generation of enlightened Filipinos, we should remind the masses that recovery and development do not rest on one person alone—however brilliant or charismatic he or she is, however rich the parentage. Government must be eventually seen as an enabler, not just a rescuer.
People should be enabled enough so that they would know how to anticipate disasters and devise a plan on how to deal with these events. They must be informed that climate change has upped the ante of the occurrence and the ferocity of these disasters. They must be equipped to help themselves and help others instead of expecting—demanding—to be helped all the time. Of course, getting this message across may take many years, even a generation. But now is always a good time to start.
The rains would stop, the waters would subside and the world as we know it, altered by our loss, would go on. May these lessons stay, though, so we won’t act so surprised and lost anymore when disaster strikes next time around.
adellechua@gmail.com
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