Yesterday, me and a few friends went for a night out at Gateway.  For one, it’s Jamie’s birthday.  For two, me and Erik have literally been hustling Cheryl twice over to NAIA only to realize that her flight was scheduled for 1 AM; apparently, airports use a 24-hour notation.  For three, we all wished we were at the Incubus concert, but lo and behold, they came a few days ahead of payday.

Since it was a coffee session that ended up with five of us drinking three buckets of beer, I find that coffee is not exactly something I’d be drinking a lot of while I’m here.  If there’s any place built for the massive consumption of brewed coffee, it’s definitely my hometown of Baguio City.  Manila, in contrast, is a place built for the massive consumption of cold drinks.

My “optimism” and “perkiness” irritates Che a bit: I’m not the kind of person who would cheer someone up, whether it’s a missed flight, a second prostate, a third nipple, or the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse.  I blame this all on energy drinks: Extra Joss, Sting, Cobra, Bacchus, V-On.  Not without side-effects, though: save for being a happy jackass, I threw up my lunch this afternoon.  I called up a friend, who said that I only have my happy sachets and bottles of “energy” to blame for hurling out a Crispy Chicken Burger and bringing me a step closer to a stomach ulcer.

“So what do you recommend?” I asked.

“Stay off the caffeine and drink some damn water,” he replied.  “Better yet, buy a sports drink.”

Freaking hell, I hate MiniStop.

As you may have already guessed, this entry is all about trains.  This entry runs on two beliefs:

1. That “enema” is a good metaphor for the Metro Rail Transit (MRT), and;
2. If a man makes a negative remark (even in passing) about the opposite sex, he is automatically a “sexist chauvinist pig.”

The MRT is the most convenient way for me to get anywhere: by “anywhere,” I mean stations between North Avenue and Shaw.  In a previous entry, I described the MRT as such:

The Metro Rail Transit, or what I call the mechanical enema of Manila’s public transport system, is meant for people who are already familiar with it.  The MRT is one fast piece of shit, but it’s still pretty much a piece of shit when it comes to passenger comfort and convenience.

Let’s start with Point #1.  Me and my new workmates were discussing the possibility of writing about enemas awhile back, then it hit me: I hit the nail right on the head when I described the MRT as “enema.”  The MRT was supposed to cleanse the congested bowels (metaphorically) of the Metro Manila transport system, but it effectively became the bowels (figuratively) of the Metro Manila transport system.  It’s mechanical enema: it’s hard going in, and it’s a bit hard going out.  Holding it in is different from expelling it.  To get in is torture: to get out is relief.

Not that I’ve had an enema before, but this feeling was explained very thoroughly and in graphic detail by my dad, who had an enema before his urologist examined his prostate.  No offense, Dad.

*     *     *

Which brings me to Point #2: any critique, constructive or otherwise, will be perceived of by a closed-minded feminist bitch (not beeyotch, not biatch, I definitely mean “bitch”) that I’m an enemy to womynkind.  What I observed is that a crowded cab in the MRT is not necessarily caused by the volume of passengers, but ladies cramming themselves into the rear passenger cabs.

The problem is rather obvious at this point: the front cabs of the MRT are designated for the elderly, children, and female passengers.  We male passengers ride at the back cabs.  An elementary school analogy would suffice: woman = front, man = back.  Now before you start wrongfully accusing me of being a deluded civil rights activist who demands equal opportunity for marginalized men, this is a simple issue of comfort.  The other day, I was crammed into the MRT (as usual) when this woman beside me started muttering about how crowded it was and why the men weren’t yielding their seat to her.

Like… yeah, right.  The back cabs of an MRT, my lady friends, are a man’s world.  This is where sexist and gay-sounding figures of speech like, “Man-to-man” and “It’s a man thing” apply.  Chivalry died with Launcelot and Guenevere.  Deal with it, and go ride out front.

“Chauvinist sexist pig?”  Well, oink to you too.

In that classic poem, entitled “Dulce et Decorum Est,” Wilfred Owen writes:

My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori.

He’s right: 20-odd years after the death of Ninoy Aquino, we surely wouldn’t tell the young people of this country (in my case, anyone under 22) that they, Filipinos, are worth dying for.  Much less that it is sweet and fitting to die for the Fatherland (or the Motherland, whichever the case may be).  That evocative phrase, “Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori,” seems to be more of an exception than the rule.  Not “death” per se, but to risk it all because we have a country.

Dying for your country is a cliché: nobody in his or her right mind would face truncheon or water cannon to save the Philippines.  I mean, even Jun Lozada wouldn’t die for the country: it’s worth taking a risk for his rather ubiquitous and ambiguous sense of “bayan,” but it’s definitely not worth the risk to die.  What more for ordinary people?  Heck, I wouldn’t die for this country, either.  I would allow myself to be mortally wounded for the Philippines’ sake, at least.  But die?  I don’t think so.

I guess I can’t blame people for having second thoughts about joining a rally or having “no opinion” on matters that concern the nation.  It’s not that people are not concerned about the nation, or that the nation is not concerned about the nation.  Wilfred Owen wrote “Dulce et Decorum Est” because he wanted to show the people a message, that seeing is different from believing.  As long as we have this false pretense that EDSA or rallies are the solution to the worsening political crisis, we only serve to glorify the situation, making “great martyrs” out of EDSA veterans and making “reluctant heroes” out of Jun Lozada

When pressed for solutions, even an activist like myself is lost.  To begin with, I don’t know of a single solution to this impasse than we can all agree with.  I make distinctions between “armed struggle” and “parliamentary struggle” that I don’t know what struggle should be invoked now.  Make no mistake about it: I won’t be the first - heck, I won’t be found anywhere - in that line of magnanimous folk who would shake hands with the President (no innuendo intended) and say, “All is forgiven, let’s move on.”  ButI wouldn’t be the first - heck, I won’t be found anywhere - in that line of seasonably and fashionably magnanimous politicians who demand the President’s resignation, then support it afterwards.

What is the solution to the problem?  I honestly do not know.  Besides, this is not a math equation that is accomplished by factoring out elements, or invoking ambiguous, vague clauses like “distributive property of multiplication over addition.”  Our nation is not crippled: it is ardent for some desperate glory.

And it sure needs that reassurance that the old Lie is true: Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori.

* - written as a response to Ranne Posadas’ entry, “I Watched a Movie While Patriots Sing and Dance to the Tune of Truth in the Nation’s Central Business District,” cross-posted at Sayote Republic

   I just came from my “lecture” at UP Baguio, where I got Best Thesis honors along with Rosanna, Cherry, and Danileen.  Somehow, the eager young minds of tomorrow really enjoyed my “presentation,” which came across more like the random rantings of a man who has spent too much time in an office cubicle.

   I enjoyed being around familiar ground and familiar people: Prof. Liezl Astudillo, Dr. Mark Calano, Dr. Ray Rovillos, Dr. Lorelei Mendoza, and young scholars working on their thesis proposals for Social Sciences 199.  I appreciated the receptiveness of my audience, some of whom were inspired to do study on virtual environments.

   During my presentation, I had to defend my post-structuralist take on Friendster.com, if only because there is still a lot of resistance against a “nothing outside-the-text” perspective in textual analysis.  One of the more interesting questions came from a young lady who asked if I was unduly influenced by that very perspective.  I wasn’t looking for “the truth” in my research as much as I was looking for patterns.  Another interesting question came from a young man who wanted to know how I analyzed 417 Friendster Profiles: I told him that it was a matter of staying up until the wee hours of the morning reading each and every single one of them.

   But it was nice to be back in UP Baguio, for a change.

   February 29, 2008.  I was on my way to my boarding house in Diliman from work when I saw streamers and flags waving along Welcome Rotonda.  I was expecting some of my kind: people who have had it up to here with GMA, people who want the truth out of the NBN-ZTE deal among other things.  Maybe, against my parents’ wishes, I could alight from the jeepney and join them.

   I finally saw “Kongreso ng Mamamayan:” that group responsible for those full-blown broadsheet ads against Rodolfo “Jun” Lozada.  I didn’t mind it at all, until I saw a truck by the National Food Authority parked right then and there.  I couldn’t use my camera phone, since was in a bad position to take pictures.  Not to insinuate, but what would an NFA truck be doing in the rally lines of a supposedly-independent civil society group?  Why would styrofoam containers of food be distributed from that NFA truck?  I don’t really know.

   “Truth,” as it seems, is a nuanced expression: there is no “absolute truth,” there are only versions of it.  It sounds postmodern, but I don’t think postmodernity could even be an excuse for what’s going on in the Philippines today.  Truth, in this case, is not relative to what Jun Lozada is saying or what the government is not saying.  There is only one truth to what happened in that deal, and we don’t know it.  That’s why we’re demanding the truth.

   Here’s what bothers me: they were free to express their views at Welcome Rotonda of all places.  Reports have shown that the military and the police prevented the entry of convoys and rallyists into the Metro Manila area during the Makati rally that same day.  I don’t cry out a double-standard: I cry out that somebody out there - and I don’t know who that somebody is - is hiding the truth.

   Or something like it, maybe.  A friend of mine says that we’re better off having a corrupt leader in GMA than having none.  I had to disagree: whoever says that we have to settle for corrupt leaders, anyway?  Still another friend of mine says that we’re better off having versions of truth than having the stone-cold truth about the NBN-ZTE deal.  I had to disagree: doesn’t the truth set us free?

   Since a lot of people seem to suffer from a certain “truthophobia,” here’s an open letter I wrote in Friendster some days back:

Regardless of how true or genuine Jun Lozada is, I don’t think he is the point of the issue of why GMA should resign. He’s like vetsin: he’s giving me a perfectly good reason why GMA should resign.

Machiavelli writes: “In the end, what concerns us is the result.” The result is, after the promise of a “Strong Republic” and a more responsive democracy, GMA has failed us. GMA should resign because as a leader, she’s a failure. In her term as President, she has divided the House of Representatives and the Senate like it was her cake. She has divided the nation like it was pizza: nowadays, it’s either you’re for GMA or you’re against GMA. Things have ceased to be a question if you’re for democracy or not, or if you’re for the Philippines or not. They say that when you give a monkey a brain, it will think that it is at the center of the universe. Connect the dots.

Some “Strong Republic” that is.

Pao says that “A nation with a corrupt leader is better than a nation without a leader.” I beg to disagree: a nation deserves the best leader, period. There is no compromise when it comes to the welfare of the people. There is no compromise when we seek for justice, for accountability, for
transparency, and for the best damn leader who will lead us. It’s years off our lives, dammit! It’s our welfare at stake! A nation without a leader is not a nation. The corrupt leader we have now must be replaced.

Why should we even settle for corrupt leaders anyway? Have we no pride? Have we lost a sense of entitlement? Do we go to the polling booth or to EDSA just to find the least corrupt leader, the lesser of x-number of evils, second best when the best just isn’t good enough when we’re back to being strangers yadda yadda yadda? I don’t think so. We deserve more than that. We are entitled to that. It’s our vote, it’s our country, it’s our future.

Which begs the question: “Who will replace her?” GMA is not irreplaceable. Give me a reason why GMA should stay: give me a reason that extolls her virtues as a great leader who should rightfully lead this nation. By rightfully, I mean that nobody will contest her legitimacy, that people are appreciative of her Presidency.

That’s the whole point while we anti- GMA people contest her administration. It’s illegitimate. It’s something we abhor. It’s something we don’t deserve. It’s a future that we are not willing to live or confront even in a parallel universe. She cheated in May 2004. She cheated us of our past, our present, our future, and most of all, our common good. She cheated us out of the spirit of EDSA II when we who were there said, “No, anyone but Gloria.”

Surely, “replacements” will be out there. Good term: “replacement.” When my charger broke down yesterday, I bought a new one. When the President of my country breaks down, when my
President ceases to work for my welfare and for my own good as a Filipino, I’ll go find myself a new one.

Yes, it is definitely sensible to put our country in a compromising solution. Some of us already did. Because we know no compromise. Because we stand up and say, “This is what we deserve. This is what we want. This is what we demand. We know no compromise.” I salute Pao: he had the courage to stand up for something even if I don’t necessarily believe in his opinion.

But you who would stay silent and apathetic to the concerns plaguing your country and would rather resign yourselves to “doom;” you who shut up because you “don’t have an opinion;” you who remain in “neutral ground” and sit on the fence not caring for the welfare of your land; you should resign your own citizenship and heritage and go straight to hell, where there is a lot of room for people like you.

Apathy is treachery: treachery is the lowest circle of hell. 

   First of all: it’s great to be back here in Baguio.

   Last night, before I left for Baguio, me and my friend Erik were having a couple of cold ones at Tomatokick in Maginhawa.  Over random discussions of life and work, he asked me about my Manila experience.

   I’m reminded of Scott Adams’ preface to his best-selling book, “The Dilbert Principle:” you can sum up just about everything you learn in your life in bullet-points.  While it’s not my first run around the block in Manila, it is my first time to live there independently and to go to unfamiliar-going-on-extremely-familiar places.  If anything, probinsyanos like myself would be confused in Manila, to the point that they put themselves in harm’s way.  So for this long-overdue X-List, I am listing down 10 things that a Manila first-timer should never, ever, do.

*     *     *

1.  Jaywalk.  While I agree that the MMDA (to some, Manila’s equivalent to the Gestapo) would put their blue-and-pink overpasses (reminiscent of Kotex and Modess) on the worst of places, pedestrian overpasses are your best friends, especially when it comes to Manila’s chaotic roadways.  Jaywalking is very tempting for people who want to save a few steps and a few minutes to get to bus stops and to MRT stations, but it’s not worth your life.  Accidents resulting from jaywalking are one of the leading causes of death in Metro Manila.

2.  Hail a cab.  There are only three good reasons to hail a taxi in Manila: 1) you can afford it; 2) you know your way around, and; 3) you carry heavy luggage.  Taxi fares in Manila are prohibitively expensive: my trip from the MiniStop across SM North EDSA to my boarding house in UP Diliman cost me P70.  There’s no way in hell I will pay that much to get from my house in Teachers’ Camp to as far away as Wangal, La Trinidad.  I qualified for all three good reasons to hail a taxi: I had enough money, I knew how to get from EDSA to UP, and I was carrying heavy luggage.  It’s not that Manila taxi drivers are dishonest, it’s just that they just know too many “shortcuts” that you’re better off taking a jeepney to wherever you’re going.

3.  Take shortcuts through malls.  In theory, malls are “shortcuts” to get somewhere: in my case, from my office in Ortigas Center, the theory is to cut through SM Megamall to get to Ortigas Station or cut through Shangri-La to get to Shaw Station.  This is a completely stupid idea: malls are designed to get you lost in a maze of stores, food courts, and kiosks until you buy something.  Only with the purchase of a Happy Meal, prepaid load, or a personalized shirt will the epiphany get to you that the shortcut is actually around the mall.

4.  Rely on the “kanto” system for directions.  A “kanto,” or a street corner, is one of the most confusing terms in the Manila lexicon.  To many, a kanto would be just your average street corner.  But take a look at a road map of Metro Manila and you’ll get my point: everything in Manila is a kanto.  When asking for directions, always ask for the nearest landmark, not the nearest kanto.  This landmark may be a store, a building, a McDonald’s, a 7-Eleven, or a police outpost.  I take this cue from Erik: “Ped Xing” and “Railroad Xing” is not a landmark, but a common street sign.

5.  Show your cellphone.  This is a constant reminder I take from my landlady and security guards.  I use a Nokia 6300, but as I have observed, almost every Manila resident would use a Nokia 3310.  The reason being is that you can never underestimate pickpockets who would rob you of your diamond-encrusted Swarokski crystal-studded underpants without you even knowing it.  The best thing to do is to secure your pocket, keep your earphones inside your shirt, and do texting in well-lighted areas where you’re extremely sure nobody will rob you blind.

6.  Ignore the disabled, the old, and the young who seek alms.  Charity and empathy is something I feel is lost in Manila.  Remember that the reason why many of us are here is to look for opportunities and for a better life, and the same is true for them.  Never mind that they are dirty, lice-infested, or are nuisances on the sidewalks.  You can’t blame The System everytime a pathetic scene like this greets you in the morning.  Even a peso of alms will get them a step into making it for one more day in this world.

7.  Pay the jeepney, tricycle, or bus driver P100 or more in the morning.  The phrase, “Barya lang po sa umaga,” is not a request: it is a demand.  Even at 6:30 AM, conductors and drivers refuse to break bills bigger than a P20.  I suggest that you keep a jar of coins for loose change whenever you need money for alms and fare.  Sometimes, tricycle drivers can be mightily annoyed with people who give them a P100 in the afternoon.  Besides, you don’t have to wait for change.

8.  Take the MRT.  The Metro Rail Transit, or what I call the mechanical enema of Manila’s public transport system, is meant for people who are already familiar with it.  The MRT is one fast piece of shit, but it’s still pretty much a piece of shit when it comes to passenger comfort and convenience.  Ladies who wish to take the MRT should go ahead and ride out on the front cabs, but men should be prepared for near-suffocation, sweaty underarms, and random shoving.  Here’s when you should get rid of your Arthurian sensibilities: if you really have to shove your way in, by all means do so.  But if you don’t, take the bus.  But if you’re new to Manila, you’re better off avoiding the MRT altogether.

9.  Take “malapit lang” seriously.  Manila is a time-space warp: “malayo” (far) and “malapit” (near) are studies in the arbitrariness of linguistic terms.  A rule of thumb is that if you can walk from any point “A” to any point “B” within seven minutes or a cigarette, then it is “malapit.”  “Malayo” will qualify for everything beyond that measurement.  This is why Philcoa is not “malapit” from UP Campus, why my office is not “malapit sa” SM Megamall, and why TriNoma, though just beside SM North, is “malayo” from the latter.

10.  Call Manila “Manila.”  Remember that the term “Manila” is a vernacular for probinsyano’s like myself who couldn’t care if we’re in Pasig or in Quezon City or in Caloocan or in Mandaluyong.  So be specific about where you are.

   Or if you’re like me, just call the Metro.

   It is week one of my life here in Manila.  I’m off to Baguio tonight to deliver a presentation on Monday, and I figure that there’s still time to squeeze some thoughts on my first week in this place.

   Manila has always been called the “land of dreams.”  To some degree, everyone here’s a Dick Whittington: thinking that the pavement is made out of gold, that life here is easy.  It hasn’t been easy for the week that I’ve been here, and I don’t think it will be any easier soon.  I’m an urban probinsyano from the North: the Cordilleran Ilocano who, for a time, believed that in this land of skyscrapers and the hustle-bustle of public transport is hope.  There is hope all right: hope for people like myself who are not as naïve as to come here thinking that opportunity is everywhere, if you just know where to look.

   It’s not that simple.  Surviving in Manila is all about looking: Manila is a land of opportunities, all right, but you have to look for them.  Manileños have a term for it: “diskarte.”  “Diskarte” is all about the kind of healthy, necessary paranoia necessary to survive even a day here.

   I can’t help but compare things to my commute in MRTs.  Push and shove: while I still ride in relative convenience in an MRT bright and early, I can’t do that at the crack of dusk in Shaw or in Ortigas.  I have to push, shove, and make every bit of “diskarte” to even board an MRT.  It’s the same thing with everywhere here: affordable places to eat, shortcuts to work, and taking the only the paid 30-minute break to eat, to smoke, and look out from your office window to stare out at this “land of opportunities.”

   Yes, in about 270 kilometers, two stopovers, and a bus ride, I would be over back in my comfort zone in Baguio reveling in a world without blue-and-pink pedestrian overpasses and the funny picture of Bayani Fernando gracing MRT foundations with his “That’s My Boy” pose.  Back to at least three days of being dependent on my parents for everything, not worrying about budgeting money or worrying about waking up bright and early.  Back to comfortable familiarity, to ordinariness, to everything that made 22 years of my life.

   But even that can’t last forever.  To use an old Hotdog song, I’ll keep coming back to Manila, no place in the world like Manila, a place which, at least for now, I have to call home.