My Share of Politics

Politics was never a part of me while growing up. Largely because my parents were apolitical. It does not really  mean discussions about something politics in the households were nonexistent, then. There were, however, very limited - to  information that were disseminated through the radio, if not by word of mouth. My first awareness of an election was the  Macapagal-Marcos presidential election in 1965. No, I wasn't a voter that time! I waited for 16 years before I could, when voting age was still at 21.

I developed interests in political activism in college, as I moved from a far-flung village, where life is so naive and is plainly simple, to a metropolitan where the daily conundrum seems to involve politics. Even in the campus, some 'left-leaning' student organizations had their way, despite of the school's strict and highly restrictive regulations, engaging fellow students with extra-academic issues including socio-political activism. Got a few classmates and friends who were active, and had been out in the streets in rallies and demonstrations.

Not until I did my graduate work in UP-Diliman that politics slowly started rooting in my being. In the early afternoon of August 21, 1983, while we, the dormitory residents, were doing our sportsfest, news broke that Ninoy Aquino was assassinated in the Manila International Airport, on his arrival back to the Philippines. Waves and waves of demonstrations and protests were held daily following the well-staged event. And then, I found myself among so many, shouting and chanting, as we braved the heat and exhaustion, while walking from the Diliman campus down to Plaza Miranda.

I learned that as a citizen, I can't just be pathetic, indifferent or numb. I was endowed with senses of sight and hearing to see and hear how things are going around us, and the mental faculty to evaluate how the unfolding of events impact us and the generations who'll come after us. I was moved by the this question which relentlessly reverberated in the halls of UP - 'sinong kikilos kung walang kikilos, sinong kibo kung walang kikibo, kung hindi ngayon, kailan pa?'. There was my eureka moment. That I have the freedom to express what's on my mind, to be part of the voice that speaks for those who never had the chance to vent their minds.

I realized that politics is a way of life, not just only during elections. People choose individuals to lead the reins of governance who are in turn expected to protect the interests and to better the lives of the governed. But the politics we have known today has transcended way beyond the welfare of the governed, with interests permeating and funneled to personal gains and enrichment. To allow this unscrupulous practice to keep going is for the governed to do nothing!

Makibaka! Get involved!












  

Visiting Papa Cesar

        Our quick trip to the Philippines next week does not excite me at all. It's gonna be nothing short of depressing. It brings back sad memories of my most recent and equally short trip, almost two years ago, to attend my mom's funeral. Don't get me wrong, this time we're not traveling for same reason. May be close, as we‘ll visit my wife's dad, moribund on his deathbed, clinging to his dear life.

        I have always considered myself blessed, becoming a member of the Mozar family. It was an honor to have called Mama Alice to my late mother-in-law, whom I adored and loved just like my own, and Papa Cesar, the man I looked up to so highly.

         I did hear a lot about Papa Cesar, even before becoming a member to his immediate family. All the things I heard, though, can be knitted into few words - strict, disciplinarian, firm. Where a no means no - no buts, no ifs.

         Papa's strong fraternal (father) authoritative figure is something he put into practice long before becoming a father himself, this I was told. He took the responsibilities of being a father, along with his mother, at a relatively early age, when his father left them raising another family. And for this, he earned high regards and respect from everybody - his siblings, his family, his colleagues at work, the community.

         Knowing and noting what Papa was like, I took caution and gathered a lot of courage when I first came to Mainit, Surigao del Norte, to meet him with the intent of asking for his permission for me to marry her 'favorite' daughter. I anticipated a few things, not necessarily akin to the 'Meet The Parents' antics, which kept my mind guessing wildly while we're on our way aboard a passenger bus.  I learned he does not have any vices at all. And that he keeps himself busy tending to  his fighting cocks, when not at work as the principal in the local public high school. He enjoys going to local cockfight games, betting for his cock, or somebody else's, his way of unwinding during weekends. I never was a fan of cockfighting and had been to a few games just in the neighborhood, but I tried preparing myself for this possible topic for conversation.

         While in Mainit, I waited for the opportune moment when I can talk with him about my sincere intention. Back in my mind, I'd been rehearsing the lines I had to say, so many times. The day came when we were to leave town, armed with my rehearsed lines, I joined Papa while doing his usual morning routine feeding his fighting cock collection. I was about to open my mouth to deliver my lines when he, in a soft spoken voice, asked me, 'what are your plans? when are you planning to settle down?'.  Whoa! Things were made easy for me!

         I came to know more and more about Papa as the 28 or so years of being a family member came and went.  He is a man of candor, honor and few words. He is a public servant in most of his adult life, mentoring young minds on the importance of education while straightening the crookedness of the misguided few kids, all aimed at making them productive members of society. He is  a friend to many who believe in his leadership, and a foe to a few who despise him for standing firm to what is fair and just. As most people do, he lives mostly within his comfort zone.

         He is such a thoughtful father. My wife, third in the brood of five, told me she cannot forget the moments when Papa cooked adobo, packed it on empty milk tins and sent it to her when she was in college. I cannot thank him enough for his thoughtfulness, when he kindly shelled out  personal money for the installation of water pump in our humble abode, after finding out our water supply problem. This is just to name a few!  For certain, his other children would have more to say, attesting to  his thoughtfulness and loving kindness.

         Lately, as Papa's sun approaches the other end of the horizon, his age takes a toll on him. Alzheimer's slowly takes away the priceless and precious memories of his, once,  illustrious life and career. A mild stroke affects his motor and coordination functions, affecting among other things,  his gait. Then, a bacterial infection clandestinely eats the muscles on his leg - a condition called necrotizing fasciitis, causing the dismemberment of his right leg. Recurrent pneumonia makes breathing for him a chore. And right now, he's lying on his bed at home, discharged from the hospital as the attending physician ran out of treatment option for him!

        As we prepare to physically visit Papa Cesar, I had the opportunity to visit with him in the past, bringing back to the surface of my mind all the good memories of a good man and a great father. 

     Hang in there Pa, we will be there soon.

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Update: Papa breathed his last while we were still en route to the Philippines. A sad quick homecoming, yet it ended up with a happy note - the ills and pains that mortals endure are no more for him.

Mini Diary - My Trip to the Land Down Under

December 16, 2014.  Tuesday. Left house for Corpus Christi International Airport 300 pm for the first leg of our trip to Melbourne, Australia, A 6:00 pm American Air flight brought us to  Dallas-FortWorth where a gigantic Qantas Airline two-storey plane would bring us to Sydney, Australia. American Air is always known for delays, and for this were nearly missed our Aussie-bound connection. The flight to Sydney from Dallas was very long,  a little over 16  hours, cruising across the vast Pacific Ocean. Initially, just the thought of this long flight seemed an ordeal for me. But time flew so fast, specially as I was not mindful about it. After watching an inflight movie and with some sleep, not quite restful though, I woke up with just the few remaining hours of the long flight.

December 18, 2014. Thursday. Arrived in Sydney, Australia on schedule, 6:40 in the morning to be exact. Because Sydney is 17 hours ahead our local Texas time, it seemed I missed a day, December 17 that is.  We trooped to the baggage claim to pick up our checked suitcase before clearing ourselves with Australian Immigration and Customs. Our suitcase did not fly with us, it turned out, and so we had to seek lost baggage service assistance with Qantas Airlines. Wife and I were a little apprehensive if our checked baggage made it to the Dallas-Sydney connection. Having spent so much time in the baggage claim carousel, hoping that our checked luggage would show up, we missed our Sydney-Melbourne original connection. Good thing, Qantas did not have problem in booking us to the next available flight to Melbourne. So Melbourne... here we come!

My anticipation for a summer weather meeting us in Melbourne proved unrealistic. Turned out, the temperature forecast for the next days ranged similar to what we've been having in Corpus Christi. Our first night in Melbourne was capped with a nice dinner along with the lively never-ending chitchats and nice wine, with our kind and hospitable hosts - David and Zoraida Sudweeds.

December 19, 2014. Friday. Day 1. It seemed quite unusual that despite of the 17-hour difference separating Corpus Christi from Melbourne, I did not get a jet lag. Anyway, Bing and I were up early preparing for day of our vacation. Destination: Melbourne City tour.  Took the tram to explore the city. Got to tour inside the Victorian Parliament, marveling on the sparkling gold-studded ceilings. Dropped by the Rod Laver Arena, venue of the world famous Australian Open Tennis Tournament. Capping the lazy city stroll was a climb to the Memorial of Remembrance.

December 20, 2014. Saturday. Day 2. Get lag was not really that bad. Wife and I were both roused by early morning  hunger pangs as we skipped dinner last night, and retired early exhausted from the day's city tour. Today, our gracious hosts would drive us some 250 kms to the country for an overnight stay in Raymond's island upon their friends' invite. I was excited for this trip to have a close encounter with koalas on their natural habitat.

Got to Raymond Island, Paynesville, Victoria past 2 pm, and were met by the equally gracious and wonderful couple, Peter and Jill Peterson. Peter kindly gave us a tour to the island, driving us around to sites frequented by kangaroos, and where koalas take their daytime respite. The day was capped by a very nice Australian dinner with wine, and a lot of chitchats.

December 21, 2014. Sunday. Day 3. Still romanticizing in Raymond Island. As if I didn't have enough about the koalas, I was gazing at rubber trees to have a glimpse of the sleeping koalas as we walked around the Island, this time by foot following the koala trail and on the board walk. The scenery was relaxing. I would understand why many Australian retirees opted to live on the Island, including Peter and Jill. Being close to nature gives that feeling of tranquility and being in life's harmony, too remote from their once stressful metropolitan lives.

After lunch, Zoraida drove us back to Melbourne, in time for the dinner invitation of Doods (Dodong Meliton), Zoraida's younger sibling, and his wife Joy and family. It was very nice seeing them once again, The last time I saw them was a decade ago before they set foot to Australia. Likewise, it was a pleasure meeting Alda (Zoraida's sister) and husband Leo, and their children for the first time.

December 22, 2014. Monday. Day 4. Up for another out-of-city trip. Zoraits drove for about 10 hours total for us to see the spectacular The Great Ocean Road and unto the Twelve Apostles in Port Campbell, Victoria. The Great Ocean Road is a long and winding road zigzagging along the white sand covered coastline of the Southern Sea. Driving through scenic view was a wondrous treat especially to nature lovers. The same road then departs off the coastline traversing through a deep forest reserve and brought us back to another part of the ocean where land formations, originally twelve of them thus called the Twelve Apostles stood, in Port Campbell, Victoria. Apparently,  four of the 'apostles'  have seemingly been down and drowned, eroded as the ocean waves eternally keep touching their sun-kissed stratified bodies.

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We Have Come This Far....

     

Last Tuesday, April 8, my wife and I  celebrated our 27th wedding anniversary. Could hardly believe we have come this far, living and sharing our lives together! The years seemed to  have come and gone too quickly. As I tried to look back those years gone by, memories of our blissful years came rolling down my brain. And I chart them to where they are now as our marriage has come this far.

      Our household used to be a playpen of two lovely and adorable kids. Early on, our lives revolved around them, insuring that we were there for them all the time.They filled our lives as a family in ways too many:  joy, satisfaction, pride, anxiety, some rage, and tons of love. They taught us many things, among them how to care, love, share our lives with them. And they made us realize that we don't own them, instead we are just their stewards, a transit point in their journey called life. That, in due time, we had to let them fly and set them free, leaving us back to each other to the time before they came to us!

    Our kids are now out there, charting a  course as they carve their niche in this, oftentimes, harsh reality called life. Their departures left a vacuum and a wide space to ourselves. I nurtured mixed feelings, a celebratory gladness and  a sense of loss, when we walked our daughter down the aisle in their garden wedding last year. But didn't we do this 27 years ago? Ahh, the cycle of life! Living on an empty nest, that is what we are now. However, this vacuum is partly filled by a feline whose antics and ways, at times, kept our eyes at her!

     So what may have kept us come this far?

     Complacency, a little bit of it, could be a part of the norm as the years keep adding to our marriage. However, part of who we are as individuals, big or small, remains  and hopefully, will continue to be respectfully held high, rather than becoming an abject desire. For this keeps us as a person. Compromise, unconditional forgiveness, patience, deep level understanding, undying love, and sometimes, self-denial are some of the ingredients that may keep our  flame of marriage burning! This, however, is spiced up with marital spats and LQ's (lovers' quarrels), preventing humdrum to seep in into our relationship!

     Developing tolerance to certain things, is a major player for making a  compromise.  This is not to find our ways, our likes, our images in our spouse. Making some changes to meet halfway, or trying to accept things the way they are, seems no brainier! When there is so much love around! This could either be a practice of 'sweet surrender' or simply 'just do it'. As Blake Shelton, a famous country singer songwriter puts it on his song, 'I keep doing what she likes'! 


    Twenty seven years in our marriage have come and gone! We look forward to many more years together! And we'll continue to value and celebrate those years as they come, one year at a time!

    Happy anniversary my dear wife!

    
     
     

In Memoriam: Farewell My Dear Nanay

     Suddenly, I have to travel to the Philippines. I have to be in her funeral and bid my last farewell. This time, even if she could hear me no more. While my mind was wandering, clueless what awaits for me in this sudden and very long journey yet a very short trip to the Philippines, memories were rushing back to the days of my rebellious youth, when I lived with my parents. Thoughts about what  Nanay kept telling me came afloat.  Her words  I thought, were meaningless, as I trekked down the ‘teen years’ of my  life. Her words were, to me,  like a ‘broken record’ which kept playing over and over. My brain’s prefrontal lobe, obviously, was not quite in shape yet back then.

     And as I continued indulging with my self-reckoning back to that ‘glorious past’, I had to put up a fight against my lacrimal glands, holding back tears that build up from rolling down. For ‘grown up guys never cry’, so says a song!

     I was in a small plane on the first of the four legs in this journey. I was seated next to a mom, may be in her  late 30’s or early 40’s, with an unpredictably friendly  months’-old baby girl on her lap, another baby girl may be less than two years and probably a five-year old son, both sitting in front of us. The baby, obviously having cold, smiled at me when her mom sat back as I claimed my window seat. The mom, obviously had her hands full with the  kids, stopping the son to catch  wireless signal for the iphone she just switched it to airplane mode, the friendly baby mumbling something gibberish demanding for something as she played with her mom’s credit cards and driver license card. The  two-year old was busy playing Dora on her electronic gizmo. At take off, the baby started throwing  tantrum and cried so loudly. Mom was trying to appease her, making sounds every animal shown on each page of the baby book she leafed through, while at the same time trying to keep the two-year old buckled up as she was standing on her seat. I watched them as I leaned my head against the airplane window.

     The scenario reminded me of my Nanay, who had to deal with more than three kids. Personally, I found it highly unthinkable how my parents raised us. And it is even more unimaginable how my Nanay shaped and molded us.

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     How well do I know my Nanay? Not well enough, especially about her childhood life. I thought she was a child out of wedlock. Orphaned at an early age, when her single mom who raised her and  two other siblings, died. Her uncle (her mom’s brother) took custody and raised her and her sister. Perhaps, the strict and disciplinarian way the uncle raised her made her a strong woman with a keen sense of vision.

She grew up wanting in many things. Love of a family growing up as a child, formal higher education, wealth. I wondered if she ever had friends. She got married to my Tatay at age 16, during the height of the World War II. And that was when our big family started! Through the years that followed, she was held hostage in domesticity, single handedly raising kids which kept coming every two years, while Tatay was away, his  menial job took him away from home.  Just like the mom I met in the plane, who seemed a little unkempt and oblivious about herself, I thought, this was how Nanay lived her life, for so long.

     Nanay, by default, exemplified living a life of modesty and simplicity. Minimalist when it comes to material things. Her clothes could very well be outnumbered by the fingers in her hands. She brushed aside and laughed at a comment of my older sister’s high school classmate that ‘every time he saw  Nanay, she was wearing  same dress’.

     But nothingness is not all there is for Nanay.  She had big hopes and dreams for us. In her broken English, she would keep telling us not once but over and over, ‘when fortune, passes no more!. She kept teling us if we would not do good in school, we would end up porters or hire-per-day laborers. Not that she had some things against these jobs, she was just envisioning a better and more stable future for us. Nanay’s visionary crystal ball saw things differently for us. Instead of sending us down the streets begging for money or asking us to work and earn a daily wage, she sent us to school. She and Tatay had the thickest of skin, armed with courage and readiness to accept rejection as they approached many people to owe and loan money for our school needs. They both did not give up, despite of the humiliations they sometimes endured. And there were times, they got encouraging support and admiration from people who understood and believed in what they were doing.  Doing this was, so we their children would not  share the same experience they have had, their joint strategy  out to break the cycle of poverty!

     It took years before my parents became somewhat emancipated from the entrapment of nothingness. Their hardships and sacrifices somewhat paid off. They may had apparently reaped what they sowed. And for certain, they took pride, and experienced  great joy and  sense of accomplishment, for what they dreamed about us came to fruition. 

     So Nanay, as you leave us now, thank you for everything that you went through and what you did for all of us! You conquered the nothingness which entwined you, and gave it light to make the truth shine that poverty is not a hindrance to success.

   Well done, Nanay, well done! Time for you to get that eternal rest!

A Tribute to My Dearest Mother

This is a re-post of my blog posted on May 10, 2013. I am dedicating this tribute to my dearest Nanay who is currently fighting for her life in the hospital. Whatever will come next, Nanay, you have lived a life that's worth celebrating. You have fought hard enough and have won every battle a long time ago! And for this, we shall be eternally grateful.
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    There is something special and unique in being a mother. It’s all about sacrifice, taking risks, and beating  all odds in bringing a new life. It’s about giving oneself so that others will become whole. And this holds water for both biological and surrogate mothers who carried their babies to term. For motherhood is the ‘essence of a woman’. 

     ‘We owe a lot to our mothers’, this I always  stress to my students when we talk about reproduction in the Anatomy and Physiology class. And the reasons are plenty. It begins with oogenesis or egg cell formation, when oocyte prepares and accumulates a wealth of materials required to support the earliest embryonic developmental events that immediately follow after fertilization.  As such, the energy-producing mitochondria in every cell of our body all came from mom’s egg. And not to mention,  half of our DNA comes from our mom’s, too.

     But there’s a lot more to motherhood than the material legacy mothers bequeathed to their children. There is that emotional and hormonal roller-coaster ride throughout the nine-month journey called pregnancy. Early on, there is that yucky  nauseous feeling which comes with morning sickness as it occurs not only in the mornings but all day long. And there's mood swings, fatigue, headaches, constipation. As the fetus gets bigger, mom tends to suffer from shortness of breath as the baby pushes the diaphragm up and the urge to frequently urinate as the fetus presses  the urinary bladder down to the pelvic floor. And there are more changes associated with later pregnancy which  mothers had to endure: itchiness, stretch marks, muscle cramps, limb varicose and swellings, and pre-eclampsia. I remembered my wife having regular asthma attacks for almost the entire duration of her pregnancy with our first born. 

 

     Then comes the time when the expectant mother faces the ultimate challenge.  Pains, so excruciating,  come and go as labor started. The labor pains become more frequent  and more intense as  labor progresses. I spent sometime inside the delivery room when wife was giving birth to our daughter. I felt so useless when I could do nothing else but watch the wife suffering from recurrent intense pains that come with labor. And then, when necessary, the mom may undergo episiotomy if not a caesarian section  when conditions do not warrant normal baby delivery.

     But all of these seem to fade away the moment the mother sees her child for the first time. She becomes completely oblivious of the discomforts and pains she endured, as she regains her strength and shapes up her tenacity to raise the baby she just gave birth. And so her sacrifices continue.

     Let's celebrate each day as mother's day.  Let's make that special woman in our life feel so special. Hug your mom. Call her. Thank her for all what she did and she went through. For nobody is born without a mother!

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    And for our dear Nanay, should it be time for you to go, do it in peace! For after all those 87 years in your earthly sojourn, it may be time for an eternal rest!

After Yolanda

I've been receiving a lot of queries from my colleagues at work, my students and a few friends about how my family and relatives back home were affected by the super typhoon Haiyan (local code name: Yolanda). My response I always held back, as I was almost tempted to answer they were lucky. Lucky because they were being way far off the destructive path of the unwanted calamitous visitor. But I resent to use the word lucky. Why? Because there were a lot of people back home, short of being lucky, suffered the unthinkable magnitude of the destruction and wreckage that Yolanda left behind. And for the many who lost their lives, I am almost tempted to consider them lucky as well, for they don't have to endure hunger, thirst, pain, the stench, the grief of losing loved ones, looting, and yes the never ending negative publicity that's perpetuating in social media.
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The night Yolanda was supposed to hit the Philippines, I was unusually hooked to Facebook, checking updates from home every time I woke up. The periodic updating I got made me sleep calmly through the rest of the night. And then, the video footage, shown on TV and posted on FB,  as the destruction unfolded with Yolanda's landfall, not once, not twice but many times, capturing the eerie howl of the winds stronger than the equally notorious US's Katrina and Sandy, and the storm surge akin to the rushing waters in the Day After Tomorrow, had said it all. Tacloban and the surrounding areas were never the same again!
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The days that follow after Yolanda, there was seemingly lawlessness in the hardly hit areas,and looting has become a commonplace. The survivors, instinctively driven by the 'survival of the fittest' feat would do anything and everything to keep themselves (and their families)  alive. And this was while appropriate agencies (government and private) worked their way to get into the jungle of scattered broken limbs or uprooted trees, fallen power poles,  stretches of impassable roads, and broken infrastructures. But help was on the way!
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And then the blame game. Filipinos are good 'turists', good at 'turo-turo'! Finger pointing!
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It is understandable why many people felt so badly about the sluggish response of the government. They felt the pain, the grief, the agony, the hunger, the utter sense of helplessness and hopelessness of the destitute survivors. For they could be their parents, brothers, sisters, relative or friends. But let's not be quick at pointing that accusing finger as to who  is to blame! While every netizen has the right to express his concerns, views and opinions, and to ventilate his grievances or complaints, spreading accusations that could be baseless and false, and even derogatory to authorities do not help at all! Yes, it took days before government can deliver substantial relief impact to the survivors, but for a reason! There were many planes available to deliver food to the hardly-hit areas but the airport is not functional! When earthquake hit Bohol, there were no qualms or complaints about government inefficiency. Because there were no major roadblocks in their activities. Not in the Yolanda-stricken areas!
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In the days after Yolanda, I held back  posting my thoughts, opinions and observations on FB. I watched post after post. It's been one week now since the catastrophe, still a lot of netizens have nothing else but negative postings. And the posts were hateful and divisive! Granting that all the rants are true, some people have to bear the brunt consequences of their choices. Come on folks: when you point an accusing finger to a person you believed is to be blamed,  the other 3 fingers are pointing back at you. If you think that the president or politicians are to be blamed for this brouhaha, think again! For you may have elected him/them into their office. And you were a part of the problem!