Isubli ing makislap nang leguan ning balen Bakulud

Disclaimer:  Most of the events cited here, apart from being personal knowledge, were mostly from my readings during my graduate program in Public Management, which I never finished, from 2004 to 2015.  No supplemental honest-to-goodness research work was undertaken to enrich the factual bases of this articles.  All the photos are mine,  except for one that I grabbed from my brother's FB account.

Our illegally quarried 2.6-hectare farmland.

Will the wanton quarrying contribute any to the comprehensive rehabilitation of my  hometown, Bacolor, from the crippling devastation it suffered from two intertwined natural hazards, i.e., the eruption of Mount Pinatubo in 1991 and the resultant lahar flows in the succeeding five years?

Will Bacolor be like the immortal bird Phoenix that will acquire new life by rising from its ashes?

Before we proceed, let's get to know my hometown first.

Bacolor prides an illustrious past.  From 1698 to 1904, it was the capital of Pampanga.  In addition, it became the capital of the Philippines, albeit briefly, from 6 October 1762 to 30 May 1764.  This was when the British colonial forces occupied Manila and the nearby port of Cavite during the Seven Years' War.  Spain initially opted to be neutral but subsequently sided with France as it became apparent that the successive British victories will endanger its lucrative colonial exploits if these are unchallenged.

The Bacolor LGU claims this is farmland scrapping;

this obviously is quarrying and it was done without

our permission.  That's my brother in the middle

showing the extent of quarrying.

Spanish Governor General Simon de Anda was forced to flee Manila to avoid capture by the British.  And where else would he seek refuge other than the province that sustained them and their occupation of Manila and provided the wherewithal, including soldiers--who have not heard of the Voluntarios de Macabebe, the forerunner of the Macabebe Scouts?--in subjugating and controlling not just the rest of Luzon but its other overseas exploitative ventures, too.  During this nearly two-year interregnum,  de Anda held court at the Pampanga Casa Real which is where the Bacolor Elementary School now stands.  It was here where de Anda planned and directed operations to retake Manila and, at the same time, oversaw the administration of the rest of the Philippine islands.

The confluence of these events, coupled with the ethnicity, industry, and resiliency of the "taga pampang", made the Capampangan race dominant in our nation's evolving history.  Bacolor was unquestionably politically, economically, and socially pivotal in this evolution.  It was the primus inter pares among the Capampangan towns, which included municipalities that are now geopolitically parts of Bulacan, Nueva Ecija, Tarlac, and Bataan.

Succession of double whammies

But, an abrupt fortune shift happened at the dawning of the 20th century.  San Fernando was declared as the new provincial capital by the American colonizers in 1904 and the economic and political development gravitated away from Bacolor.  With this declaration, Bacolor was by-passed by the Philippine National Railway.  A third town, Mexico, also vied for the privilege but San Fernando was the compromise to break the impasse.  Its stature as the center of Capampangan literature and the moniker "Athens of Pampanga" was all that was left for this once illustrious town.

This was the first significant double whammy that the town would suffer.  Its replacement as the provincial capital and being by-passed by the national railway system inhibited it from grabbing a lion's share of the socio-political and economic windfall that the American imperialist dispensation would usher in the country.  A missed opportunity that could have cemented its prominence and importance, especially in Central Luzon, that the City of San Fernando now enjoys.

The great equalizer

How many times have I heard and read that COVID-19 is THE great equalizer.  I’ve repeatedly heard this not just from politicians but also from, of all people, news readers and anchors of radio and TV programs.  I expected the latter to know much better than the former — except one famous news reader who adroitly dabbled in politics, captured the second highest post of the land, came out soiled all over but is so nauseatingly self-righteous and still has the gall to project himself immaculate.

ctto: Queuing for relief goods after Ondoy

This is not the first time though that a hazard has been called great equalizer.  I heard it first in 1991 when it was associated with Mount Pinatubo eruption and the resultant more destructive yearly onslaught of lahar.  Then, it was almost in everyone’s mouth in September 2009 when Typhoon Ondoy (Tropical Cyclone Ketsana) combined with enhanced southwest monsoon to inundate Metro Manila and 23 provinces in record-breaking floods.  In November 2013, it was again the buzzword when Typhoon Yolanda (Tropical Cyclone Haiyan) hit Tacloban and surrounding nearby provinces.   It was one of the most, if not the most, powerful tropical cyclones ever recorded and the deadliest in the country, killing more than 6,000.

I will not fault anyone if they will fall for this fallacy the first time they’ve heard it.  But, I will not be as pardoning if they will repeatedly take this hook, line and sinker without having second thoughts after seeing contrary observable evidences.  The recently captured long queues of daily wage earners in the various quarantine check points in the Metro should have made everyone doubt the veracity of this claim; these are irrefutable evidence against this erroneous belief.

ctto: Resourcefulness to escape

 For people, like this old man, who are assured of their salaries and wages, no convincing is needed to make them stay at home.  A number, in fact, were just too happy to submit as this will give them respite from the daily grind and anxiety of their works.  But not all can acquiesce to the Enhanced Community Quarantine (ECQ). 

Those who are unsure where to get their next food on their tables will certainly insist in going out to eke out a living.  Even if they want to, they cannot just stay at home. This is a no-win situation for them — they face either the devil or the deep blue sea — so to speak.  They simply have to be out to scour for food for their families. 

It should be noted too that even in ordinary times, these people can hardly put decent and healthy meals on their tables. 

ctto: A year after Yolanda

So, is COVID-19 THE great equalizer?  Obviously, it is not.  This situation, like previous emergencies, hazards and disasters, only further highlighted the great divide between the rich and the poor.  While the middle class and the elite can stay at home and can still indulge in some luxuries, the poor cannot. 

In fact, as events now unfold, the poor have been further disadvantaged as they become the favourite whipping boys, the escape goats, in the current efforts to control the spread of the virus.  Over and above previous class-based biases, they now come to personify disobedience and hard-headedness in our government’s war against COVID-19.    

Unwittingly, the government contributed a lot to the development of this perception.  When the Duterte administration targeted the poorest of the poor as the beneficiaries of its Social Amelioration Program (SAP), it did not only put a wedge between poorest and the other poor but also with the middle class, especially ones who were deprived of their sources of income after the imposition of the ECQ.   In times of crisis, the poor and a bigger section of the middle class are normally natural allies.

ctto:  A scene you'll never see in Forbes Park

and nearby Dasmarinas Village

The initial antagonism among the middle class towards the poor was reinforced further as initial recipients of the government amelioration program were caught gambling, drinking and even buying drugs not long after receiving their money.    These however are just a minority and were not the norm.   It was blown out of proportion by the “jealous” and “selfish” section of the middle class, who were disqualified to receive the first wave of amelioration assistance, through their social media posts.  The “unthinking” section of established media, in turn, took them as slant to sell their news stories.

 Although it was not by designed, may be, the bickering among the poor and the not-so-poor middle class has enabled the government to shift public focus away from its sloppy implementation of the ECQ.  It can always point to the poor who insist in going out as the culprit for the continued rise in the number of Filipinos getting infected.

ctto: Different story if these are Ducatis,

Harleys, BMWs and the like.

Many, however, failed to realize that in COVID-19, as in other emergency and disaster situations, the response actions are highly dependent on the preparedness and prevention and mitigation interventions that have to be undertaken before it was declared a pandemic.  True, the government did not have the luxury of time to prepare.  But this is government’s own creation as it failed to read correctly the situation.  This was the reason for the lost of much needed time to undertake even just the most basic preparedness and prevention and mitigation measures.  These, in turn, are the take-offs and building blocks of better response actions.

ctto:  Life goes on.

Early and correct reading of the situation could have accorded the government the much needed time to plan the ECQ as one of the prevention and mitigation measures.  It could have done so with other prevention and mitigation measures, like identification and equipping hospitals and isolation areas to be used, the procurement of PPEs, face masks and testing kits, etc.  The government could have also used this to undertake preparedness measures like systematic and massive information dissemination, training and capacitating not only health care professionals but, more importantly, the real front liners at the grassroots, the barangay governments that will implement equally important response actions outside from those to be undertaken by the health professionals.     

          Given this backdrop, COVID-19 will never be THE great equalizer. There will never be equalizers, much less great, in highly stratified societies, like the Philippines.  The poor will always be the whipping and weeping boys. (30)

Old man rider

It was some kind of a death wish.  “Passing on at sixty” (https://raulgalangsarmiento.blogspot.com/2014/04/passing-on-at-sixty.html) was written not long after my father died.  After nearly seven (7) years of looking after my parents — their full-time caregiver — I came to realize that living too long isn’t at all that lovely; it’s mawkishly worthless.  In fact, at that time, I think you’re a masochist to entertain such an idea.

ctto: No one can doubt KTM Adventure

off-road capability.

In those years, my mom was suffering from Alzheimer’s Disease and in her last two years was bed-ridden after she broke her pelvis when she accidentally slipped while vacationing in my sister’s house.  Imagine, aside from being her son, I was sometimes her father, Rufo; older brother, Rustico; and, in rare instances, her former municipal councilor younger brother, Roberto.  Aside from Alzheimer’s, she was also diabetic.

          My father though was lucid until the day he died; seven months after my mother’s death and a two-week battle against stroke-induced mild ruptured brain aneurysm.  But in those seven years, he was practically shackled by arthritis.  He sometimes can’t almost rise from his bed for simple basic natural functions, like going to the toilet to pee.  I’d seen how he agonized just to get out of his bed to sit at his favorite spot in their house’s veranda whenever his infirmity strikes.

This was the backdrop that prompted that blog.  I was, at the same time, at a crossroad, too.  My wife and the elder of my two daughters wanted me to retire instead re-entering the workforce at 54 years old.  This thought bothered me no end:  What if I live the ripe age of 91 years old, as my parents did, afflicted and burdened by the same infirmities and disorders and, most importantly, financially dependent on my wife and daughters.  How can I then enjoy and live my life to the fullest?

ctto: RE Himalayan: British brute 

made in India

A couple of months back, I just turned sixty.  No, I am not retired and still very much alive.  I’m earning my own keeps as a government employee.  My take home pay is less than half of what my wife and daughters each received but this accorded me to indulge in simple luxuries.  I can even pick the tab whenever my wife and I go out for our favorite hot brews during our off-days.   

Enter this life in the midst of COVID-19.  (I am suddenly reminded that I have yet to read in full Colombian Nobel prize winning author Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s novel “Love in the Time of Cholera”.)  And there's the posts of millennials in social media that said “life is short”.

This led me to another blog I wrote, “Bucket list” (https://raulgalangsarmiento.blogspot.com/2016/10/bucket-list.html).   Life is now indeed short for this old man.  And rightfully, I should make the most out of it, i.e., if ever I’ll come out victorious from COVID-19.

That blog reminded me how can I make the most out of this life.  I certainly don’t entertain retirement, yet.  In fact, if I can pursue one of my bucket lists, I can be more productive in my job and the government will be more assured that it won’t be shortchanged because of my age.  Not only that, I can, at the same time, simultaneously pursue other late-life interests that will further sweeten my life. 

ctto:  Yamaha Serow 250 has all the 

specs I need. 

Coming up second in my hastily prepared lists is a 250-cc enduro motorcycle — also known, if I am correct, as dual sport or adventure bike.  My preference then is either a Kawasaki or a Yamaha.  That still stays.  The egoist in me, though, would love to have a 450-cc KTM enduro or even settle for a 500-cc Royal Enfield Classic Chrome.  I would today opt for a KTM 390 Adventure or Royal Enfield Himalayan.  Any of the two will perfectly fit in my plans, albeit prevent me from using some of my meager financial resources to pursue other interests.

An enduro bike would fit to a Tee the job I now have at the education department.  This bike would be handy in monitoring schools struck by hazards as the designated Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Coordinator.  I can easily visit flooded schools by taking alternative routes which my current ride, a compact SUV, cannot.  Or, effortlessly trek winding roads to be at the schools of our Ayta brothers and sisters, which were hit hardest by a recent tremblor.

 Moreover, an enduro bike would be my ideal La Poderosa — the 500-cc Norton motorcycle that medical student, Ernesto “Che” Guevara and his biochemist buddy, Alberto Granado, used for their (hedonist) continental trek that unintentionally exposed them to the injustices perpetrated against indigenous peasants and to the pervasive poverty in rural South America — to photo-document the socio-economic changes in rural Pampanga.  Unlike Che, this old man will never be radicalized by the things he’ll see but this though will either validate or quash his notions when he was a radical young social activist.

ctto:  Kawasaki KLX 230 has the specs
               and within my budget

        Given this perspective, KTM 390 Adventure or a Royal Enfield Himalayan, or, even a BMW G 310 GS, will therefore never fit my purpose.  A European adventure bike will certainly feed my ego but it can never outperform the more reliable and better adapted Japanese enduro.  The former would also cost at least  a hundred grand more that can be used to buy a decent DSLR camera for my photo-documentation.

The COVID-19 menace has certainly steeled my resolve to pursue these late-life wishes.   Wishes that would not only sweeten my few remaining years on earth but would certainly make life more exciting. A well-spent life it would be indeed!

So, watch out for the Old Man Rider with a camera out there in rural Pampanga after we successfully stabilized the COVID-19 situation.  The Old Man Rider will certainly be in the midst of preparedness and prevention and mitigation initiatives of Capampangan schools to completely tame the virus.  (30)

Gullible lot

A Facebook shout out kept ringing in my partially deaf left ear these past few weeks.  I’ve decided to expound on this in the hope the ringing would stop.   

It’s actually a rather lengthy shout out.  In it, I stated that a post that a few of my FB friends had reposted, thus, I’ve repeatedly seen and read for a couple of weeks, was all a crap.  The said post claimed that “the rich stays rich by spending like poor. The poor stays poor by spending like rich”.  Initially, I did not pay attention to it but repeatedly seeing and reading is another story.

That statement is, to me, the most anti-poor of all the craps I’ve heard and read, so far.  What I can’t believe was, it was reposted by friends who most likely came from poor families, like me.  Well, we may no longer be poor—they as teachers and me as a non-teaching personnel in the education department, we’re middle class; lower middle class to be precise.  What added to my disbelief is how easily they appeared to have fallen for such crap. 

For one, we’ve mostly spent more than four years in universities.  Thus, we’re supposed to know better.

But unlike me—I’d spent 13 years, inclusive of my leaves of absence, to earn my 4-year undergraduate degree—they either have finished their Master’s, if not their PhDs, or have earned more post-graduate units.

What’s more puzzling? Well, most likely these people, like me, can trace their class origin from either the peasant or the working class.  How easy it is for them to betray their class origin? 

Well, that’s pardonable.  Unlike me, they were never exposed to left ideologies, thus, they never developed their class consciousness.  More so, they never learned and acquired better socio-economic and political tools of analysis.  Of course, others would assert that prior actual and concrete immersion in the harsh realities of the Philippine society is the BETTER TEACHER than the intellectual debates and discussions in colleges and universities to see the situation differently, understand it and not gullibly fall prey to such crap.

Do they really believe that the likes of the Sys, the Villars, the Gokongweis, the Zobels, the Razons, the Tan Caktiongs, the Tans, and the Angs, or even just the Ramoses, the Estradas, the Macapagal-Arroyos, the Aquinos, and the Dutertes, can spend, buy things, like us?  Or, even the likes of the usually pretentious nouveau riche?

 No matter how hard I try to stretch my imagination, I cannot conjure up a picture of any member of the eight (8) richest families in the country or any member of the presidential families queuing and buying and eating cheap NFA rice.  What more, brave the wet, often time slippery and stinky, markets to buy the cheapest fish and meat cuts?  The “nouveau poor”, on the other hand, would most likely opt to save the minimum jeepney fares and go to street corner talipapas where said saved fares could be an additional gram of fish, meat or vegetable to bring home.

If I can’t imagine the middle class, like us, shifting through the trash from fast food chains’ kitchens for food that our families can eat, the more that I cannot the rich?  But as the situation worsens, expect this despicably dehumanizing adaptive measure of the dirt-poor to be adopted too by the not-so-poor among the poor just to survive.

Why am I making a lot of fuzz—okay, ranting too much—on this?

This, often times, angry—and now sinister—old man believes that this is mind-conditioning.  By who?

Who else but the rich and their cohorts.  Why?

The rich wants the poor to think that it’s them that caused their own wretchedness.  And the various social media that the former have practically created and controlled come in handy to help spread this misinformation and many other lies.

And as the poor that comprises the majority that occupies the base of the socio-demographic pyramid believes that they are to blame for their sorry lot, the prevailing status quo will remain unshaken and will last longer than the pyramids that ancient Egyptians and Mayans had built centuries ago.  

The reign and domination of the 1% over the 99% will remain entrenched as long as the gullible poor and their class-allies are not awakened from their lethargic gullibility and slumber and take all misinformation and lies they read and hear hook, line and sinker. (30)

take the money and run

“Magsasalita ako laban sa katiwalian at pagsasamantala

Hindi ko gagamitin ang aking panunungkulan

Sa sarili kong kapakanan

Hindi ako hihingi o tatanggap ng suhol”

Every Monday morning, without fail all government workers would recite “Panunumpa ng Kawani ng Gobyerno” during their weekly morning rituals.  (In our case, even if it rains, we’ll have our flag ceremonies indoor.)  The inclusion of the recitation of this pledge, I just learned, was first observed in 1995.  It was a reform mechanism aimed at reorienting the work attitude of government officials and employees by constantly reminding them of how they must conduct themselves as public servants to bring about a more responsive, efficient and commitment public service” (DepEd Order No. 15, s. 1995).

If only this oath has been taken seriously to heart, President Rodrigo Duterte—and, of course, all other presidents after Fidel V. Ramos—would have been deprived of one of his two winning campaign promises of ridding the bureaucracy of graft and corruption.  The other, of course, is eliminating criminality and freeing the country from the clutches of illegal drugs whose proliferation now appears intertwined with graft and corruption.

I voted for him solely on the merit of that promise.  I was among the millions that were neck deep in exasperation with crime and corruption and opted to forego my usual stringent selection process of looking and analyzing the candidates’ political platforms, or what could have passed as ones.  I totally agreed with a professor of a local university—in Angeles City—that any candidate can just commission a good undergraduate political science student to come up with his/her political platform.  But, at the rate election promises are customarily treated, these political platforms will end up in trash bins as soon as the candidates are elected into office—if not much earlier as soon as they’re made public.

Without these two issues and how he conveyed them to the people, President Duterte would have not captured the imagination of the masses and catapulted him to the country’s highest political post.  Most likely, he’ll just be a mere footnote in rural politics known for his unconventional, but relatively effective, approach in keeping peace and order in Davao City.

With more or less 10,000 lives, practically all poor, prematurely snuffed out gangland style, there seems to be no end in sight for this social malaise.  Yes, it’s true, there was “relative calm” early on during the “Operation Tokhang", but Duterte himself unashamedly, albeit reluctantly, admitted that he cannot lick this malaise even at the end of his term.

 Which brings me to his pronouncement during the 37^th Principal Training and Development and National Board Conference Program in Davao City last 5 May 2018 where he said, “I was the only one carrying the message that was appropriate at that time: corruption, drugs.  I won’t hold back on that, my God.  If you are into corruption, just leave.  I’ll give you time.  For those into it now, in government, published or otherwise, may you have the sense just to tender your resignation”.  (Philippine Star, May 7, 2018).  But, did the erring public servants heeded and took seriously his declaration “to just leave their posts quietly, as he stressed that he would not let up his anticorruption campaign”.

More than a month after his “plea to leave” was announced, no families of government workers have yet to be shown on national television anguishing over the death of what to them were their morally upright and innocent relatives.  What we saw were a few corruption-tainted under and assistant secretaries terminated—but who had the gall to claim they voluntarily resigned—and a couple or two more being asked to tender their courtesy resignations.  Unlike the poor suspected drug pushers, no public servant has yet to be sent to Kingdom Come on mere suspicion.

Is this fair?

Obviously, not.  This only highlights further the divide between the haves and the have nots.  The poor have nots are summarily executed and waylaid gangland style in dimly lit street corners. The haves government officials, on the other hand, are rewarded with time to savor the loots and fruits of criminal adventurisms.

This leaves the old man to believe that Duterte’s justice is no different from others before him.  The promised change evidently does not hold true with this one.  Had it been different and, more importantly, if he really walks the talk, he would also be grieving the loss of his vice mayor-son—who’s implicated over the attempted mind-boggling six-billion shabu smuggling.

With this ambivalent early unfolding of events as backdrop, will the people in government who are into corruption cringe in fear and heed his plea?  Will this put a stop to bureaucratic graft and corruption, even if only momentarily, like what his “Operation Tokhang” did to the drug trade?

What this this old sad man is sure of is, that like the drug menace, the president will not be able to lick graft and corruption in government.  His kid’s glove treatment of high-profile corrupt public servants will never deter and will hardly dent the brazenness of others to follow their lucratively criminal adventurisms. (30)

bucket list

Had it not been for the movie of the same title, I would not have known, even vaguely, what a bucket list is.  The movie starred two of my most favorite actors, Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman, who met in a cancer ward, were initially at odds with each other until they found out they shared a lot in common.  That’s when they decided to pursue things, a bucket list, they still have to do before they step into the Great Beyond.

The question is, do I have one?  

I don’t.

Why?  More likely, it’s the anti-bourgeois in me—a carryover of my social activist days—why I haven’t got one.  I can’t imagine myself delving on something that I consider so crass and so bourgeois.

But, if forced to have one now, what would be in it?

I can’t come up with ten no matter how hard I’ll try.

But without making an effort, the first thing that came to mind was an academic degree from the University of the Philippines.  I’d spent seven years, from 1976 to 1983, inclusive of my leaves of absence (LOAs), at the University of Philippines at Los Baňos but did not earn my undergraduate diploma in Agriculture.  I opted to discontinue my studies when it was clear that I can never finish my academic program within the prescribed Maximum Residency Requirement of the UP System.  My sight was pointed elsewhere then, or was nowhere the more appropriate term?

It was never a big disappointment, but for my parents, it was, especially for my father.  With my failure, he lost, what I believed, was his biggest bragging right—an offspring with a UP diploma—over his peers.  Until his death, he always boasted, whenever he had the chance among those who cared to listen, that I studied in UP but never added that my undergraduate diploma was from the Gregorio Araneta University Foundation.     

I suspect I’m in self-denial for this, I believe, occupies a niche in my deeper psyche.  That’s why it popped up first when I tried to come up with my list.  This probably is the same reason why I keep on applying for readmission and enrolling at the UP Open University for my Master of Public Management program only to be either absent without leave (AWOL) or apply for LOA in the middle of the school term.

One thing I’m very sure of, this will end up in my bucket till I gasp my last breath.

Next would probably be a 250-cc Enduro motorcycle.  A Kawasaki or a Yamaha would be great, but a KTM, 450-cc, would be super.   Although not an Enduro, I might settle for a 500-cc Royal Enfield Classic Chrome.   The first two Japanese brands are practical choices. The Europeans are purely to feed my ego.

Ever since I was nine years old my ride has always been an owner-type jeep.  Yes, I started driving at nine!  There were no police in the barrio where I grew up and started driving and had a father who wouldn’t bar me from tinkering with our jeepneys.  But, every now and then, when I was in my late teens and early twenties, I would drive around with my friends and our girlfriends in one of our Sarao passenger jeepneys. 

When I oversaw the implementation of a community-based disaster management project in landslide-ravaged Dingalan in Aurora province in 2005, I was charmed by the practicality and versatility of an Enduro motorcycle, a 125-cc Kawasaki.  I was able to go to the remotest mountainous villages of Dingalan in no time using trails blazed by loggers in earlier times.

Even if I now can drive around in my wife’s sub-compact SUV, this will still be in my list.  An Enduro motorcycle, aside from being a practical ride to monitor the more than 550 public elementary and secondary schools under threat from various hazards and disasters in Pampanga, is indispensable to my other wish; which is to see every nook and cranny of rural Pampanga and Central Luzon.  It’ll be my La Poderosa to live up my own version of “Motorcycle Diaries”, following what Che Guevara did before he embarked on a revolutionary career.  With or without a pillion rider, I’m going to do this, i.e. if I have my Enduro.

One of the last two that I could think of is to travel and see our neighboring Southeast Asian countries; Vietnam and Cambodia.  Add Timor Leste, the other predominantly Catholic country in the region.  And it’s never acknowledged that it’s more Catholic than the Philippines.  Although colonized by the Portuguese and not by the Spaniards, I want to see what we have in common culturally as a people. 

Vietnam has always been an enigma; I want to know what is it about the place and its people that enabled them to spring back to life, so to speak, after the devastation caused by imperialist greed.  First, the country was dragged into the second Imperialist War (World War II) when it was “handed over” to the Japanese by the French government when Nazi Germany had partial control over France.  Adroitly playing up their cards with anti-fascist capitalist bloc, they defeated the Japanese imperial forces.  After the Japanese, they took on the returning French colonialists anew. But before they could completely humiliate the French in defeat, the Americans, in the guise of keeping the Free World safe from the “Communist menace” came into the picture. 

The White Monkeys—in contrast to us Brown Monkeys—did not expect the Vietnamese people to be as hard as nail and were forced to humiliatingly admit defeat in 1975.  It was to me the greatest victory of the underdogs; THE country that had just emerged as the greatest capitalist victor and the undisputed capitalist kingpin had been soundly beaten by the ragtag but deeply committed army of Ho Chi Minh.  There must be something about the Vietnamese people not only to withstand three successive imperialist wars but, more importantly, spring back to life with heads unbowed from the rubbles of wars.

The temples are the reason why I want to be in Cambodia, as well as the devastation brought about, this time, by communist insanity.  I want to see how the people are doing after enduring the excesses of the brutal Pol Pot regime.

The last in my list, which is the most surreal, is having a son!  After the birth of my second daughter, it’s common to hear comments from friends and acquaintances that I should have a third child, a son.  They told me that I’m squandering my lineage (lahi) if I don’t sire a son as my lahi will cease as soon as my two daughters marry and discard their SARMIENTO family name. 

My wife was all for the idea of a third child but it was me that reacted strongly against it.  I told our friends and acquaintances that it’s not that easy to raise children.  Bringing a child into this world is the easiest part—pleasurable, in fact—but ensuring that they can ably join and compete in the rat race is the hardest. 

Raising rat race-ready offspring, in this day and age, will toll heavily on your pockets.

With our current situation, my wife and I are practically left on our own as our grown up daughters are busy building their own lives, it’s inevitable not to think of that third child.  True, we’re more stable financially, especially with my recent employment and my wife’s successive promotions in the education department.

But my wife’s child bearing years had long been over.  Even if we wanted to, we can never have that son.

That son could of course be our first grandchild.  The elder of our two daughters had just gotten married and if their plans won’t miscarry, we’ll have our first grandchild next year.  But our apo can never be our “full-time” third child.  At the most, he’ll stay with us only on weekdays when his parents are in Metro Manila to work. But once he’s of school age, or even earlier, he’ll surely live permanently with his parents.  And we’ll end up where we are right now.

That son will definitely be in the bucket too in the end.

I enjoyed making up my list.  It actually served a purpose:  it made me to look back and assess how I lived my life so far.  And, in a way, it helps me to realize what I can still do to optimally enjoy my remaining years before I finally hang my bucket upside down.  (30)

disaster and marriage

 My first born got married last June 11.  She and her husband arranged everything and made sure that we, as parents, won’t be bothered by any preparation.  All they required was our presence.  That was a far cry from the usual weddings my generation observed when parents practically arranged everything—from the wedding rites up to the reception—and shouldered all the expenses.  

 Actually, I hate ceremonies and the attendant formalities. 

That was principally the reason why I and my wife had a very unconventional wedding.   It was very selfish of me to deprive my wife her once in a lifetime walk down the aisle simply because I did not want to inconvenient our parents for a relationship that I was not sure, at that time, will really last. 

So, we came casually clad for our Catholic Church rites; no flowers, no flowing white dress for my bride.   We also did not bother to prepare a post wedding reception.

Where it not for my sister and her boyfriend, now her husband, we could have gone straight home from the Mexico parish church after the ceremony.  Thanks to them, we had a token celebratory lunch in one of the restaurants that were beginning to mushroom along the Olongapo-Gapan Road in San Fernando in 1987.  By we, I mean, just 12 people.  My parents, my sister, her boyfriend and her best friend, my mother’s youngest sister and her daughter, who acted as our ninang (godmother) and our female candle, veil and cord sponsor, respectively.  One of my father’s younger brothers was there too as our ninong (godfather), and his wife and my vice president-friend in the student council as male candle, veil and cord sponsor.  My wife’s family did not make it for reason I now can’t remember.

Although spared from the preparation, the only catch for me and my wife was to prepare for a brief—a minute long we were told—message during the post reception program.  What worried me, my wife too I supposed,  was what to tell our daughter and her husband in front of nearly 150 of their guests.  No matter how hard I tried the days before, no idea came to my mind.  I was therefore becoming more desperate as the minutes rapidly slipped away during the reception and still nada!  I was resigned to just say “Thank You” to all the guests for sharing their time with us on this momentous occasion.

But in the nick of time, the rescue came in the form of my son-in-law’s uncle, a professor at the University of Santo Tomas.  If he can compare marriage to driving a car, why can't I relate it with disaster risk reduction and management?  DRRM, being my current preoccupation!

Come to think of it, marriage can become forever if you do something similar to the four thematic areas of DRRM—prevention and mitigation, preparedness, response and recovery and rehabilitation.  This new perspective requires us to be proactive and anticipatory; that’s why the change from mere disaster management to disaster risk reduction and management.  You can’t manage disaster; it’s the disaster risks that you can by reducing them to avert the disasters from happening.

In old school disaster management, actions were undertaken only as soon as the disaster struck.  That’s when save and rescue and evacuation operations commenced, followed by relief distribution, and lastly, by rehabilitation.

But as our understanding of disasters deepens, we now focus on what can be done to lessen the chances of, if not completely avert, disasters from occurring.  Modern disaster management necessitates increasing the capacities of the people and their communities, on the one hand, and decreasing their vulnerabilities to hazards, on the other.  This two-pronged approach to disaster management is expected to substantially lessen disaster risks.

As in DRRM, we therefore have to put premium on the pre-separation/pre-break up stage of our married lives.

The operative word here is PROACTIVE.  To be one, newlyweds should anticipate the pitfalls that they’ll encounter on their way to FOREVER. 

As in DRRM, newlyweds should start building (emotional) structures and creating memories (knowledge and capacities) that will strengthen their relationships as soon as the wedding bells had quieted down.  They can take off from the structures and memories that were started way back when they were just lovers; the same structures and memories that principally moved them to take the plunge, so to speak.  These will comprise their mitigation and preparedness measures.

In DRRM, physical structures like rip-raps and levees will contain and, in some cases totally wipe out, the ill effects of floods.  Building infrastructures that complied with standards that were adopted in response to earlier disasters will also bring about better prevention and mitigation. 

In marriage, these may include real and other properties that will force couples to think twice before deciding to break up their unions because of the legal and financial complications associated with the dissolution of marriage itself and the division of conjugal properties.  Of course, the most important of these “physical structures and conjugal properties” are the children!  Your offspring will make dissolving your marriage not only financially draining but, most importantly, emotionally depleting as well.

In this time and age, of course, this old man doesn’t encourage couples to have lots of children. 

Preparedness measures in DRRM, on the other hand, include development of knowledge and capacities to effectively anticipate, respond to, and recover from, the impacts of likely, imminent or current hazard events or conditions.  In marriage, these include the created and resultant memories that like the emotional structures will contribute to making the couples keep their unions intact.

We should however avoid breaking up our marriage at all cost; save and rescue efforts may not suffice and will surely not be as effective as our efforts to save and rehabilitate lives in DRRM.

Granting that our “save and rescue efforts” proved successful, the “build back better” principle that currently guides efforts in DRRM reconstruction and rehabilitation thematic area is harder to accomplish in a broken marriage.  Just like a priceless glass figurine, you can never restore your marriage to its previous spotless, much less bring to a higher and better, state.

Well, this is just this old man naughty afterthought, if these are indeed true in marriage, does it mean that better emotional structures and shared memories with the third party were created in a union that ended in separation or divorce?  (30)