BANANACUE
REPUBLIC
Vol II, No. 04
Jan 26, 2005

 
  
 by Leoncio Olobia

Table of
Contents

ARCHIVE:
2004
2005

Website:
Leoncio

So Many Things Unwanted


Recent correspondence with my old friends prompted me to write something about it. I do not know where to begin because they all pile up in my brain and won't simply be digested like any information. The impact is so heavy that I need to deal with them before I explode.

Comfort and enjoyment. These things have long been alienated to every Filipino since the dawn of history. If you think the richest have only enjoyed the comforts in life, you might consider in awe that they, too, are imprisoned with failed marriages, mismanaged portfolios resulting in massive losses, or unhealthy life when diseases favors them.

While a lot of suffering is blamed on the rich, I am here to defend whatever amount of pride left in humanity which also includes the rich people. Political activists are very strong about insinuating progressive people because they are restless, sorry for themselves and they cannot accept the fact that their own suffering is a result of their own manufactured failures. It is not affluence that delivers us to stagnation. It is a fallacy. Let us leave them alone. They, too, deserve respect for their earned status. It is not for them to be mocked at only because they have finer things in life.

In Tacloban, for example, Chinese businessmen have long been dominating the market. While some Filipino counterparts are slowly rising, the abundance of Chinese-owned stores is still greatly felt. In this scenario, the intellectual class has a way of jeering and bantering Chinese people because all they see is that they are stealing what is left for the locals. They further claim these people are very tight with kin relations because wealth should not get out of the family circle. Even more, they are branded as uncultured, tribal and very clannish so that the whole Tacloban remains untouched.

While these propaganda continue to sink in our minds, there is further weakening of the senses when our own failures cannot just be attributed to our own kind and that things can be alleviated when we stop bantering those who have achieved. Indeed, when individual struggles are perceived to be self-inflicted, acceptance motivates the person to be more than a receptacle. It is not Chinese dominance that we are angry about, it is our own self-indulged failure that we hate to accept because we are not true to ourselves.  We blame others for anything unwanted. We cannot simply teach ourselves to be more responsible and accept sad realities.

Aside from pointing everything to the rich, those in power also experience the agony. When rice is scarce, the government is always blamed because someone has instigated a foulplay. When reforms are not in place, managers bear the brunt of ignominy because they are not sensitive enough to deal with the problems. Yes, this list goes on and on. How many times can we thwart everything to other people?

In this process of fault-finding, all the things we hear are endless promises because sometimes they cannot sincerely commit to reformation when in the first place they didn't do anything wrong. It is always a standard bias against higher people to be labeled as culprits. When can we end this cycle? Can't we find solutions instead?

Wouldn't life be enjoyed more when we melt hatred and instead do some actions? Actions that don't impose pain to others? When our values are designed to make us what we want to be in life, then there is less interfering and fault-finding. Of course, it is not easy to realize such an existence. But when do we begin to throw away so many things unwanted?

Posted 01/26/05.  Send your comment to bananacue_republic@yahoo.com

"Political activists are very strong about insinuating progressive people because they are restless, sorry for themselves and they cannot accept the fact that their own suffering is a result of their own manufactured failures. It is not affluence that delivers us to stagnation..."