ExpectoRants:

dedicated to former Martial Law victims

It’s no secret. The only way to survive this cruel world is to forgive. Even Beyonce Knowles, one third of the group formerly known as Destiny’s Child (wrong grammar) knows that. Forgive and forgive and forgive and forgive. Easier said than done, of course. But if you can do that, you will no doubt survive. Trouble is, forgiving may be easy; it is forgetting that is kinda hard and complicated. Have you forgiven the sins committed against you? You ought to have, if only for your own sake or your heartbeat and your blood pressure. But it doesn’t mean you ought to really forget. Forgiving is so short, forgetting even shorter (and stupid.) It is repairing wrong that is so long. Bad intertextuality perhaps, but of course I stole that from Neruda.

***

Homegrown dictatorship has been replaced by an even more merciless enemy – subhuman poverty due to decades of patronage politics and its monstrous twin spawns, institutional graft and corruption and gross social injustice. To all decision-makers, all high-ranking government officials, taste a real-life game of Survivor (episode title: Unbelievable Insensitivity) with the ff. exercises:

1. Find scraps to sell from the garbage dump.
2. Take the PNR train.
3. Eat sardines everyday. Try noodles for variety and soy sauce for some flavor.
4. Live along the railroad tracks.
5. Commute using the jeepney (don’t take the FX/shuttle pls.!) in these areas:

From Pasay Taft and through the labyrinth of Pasay Rotunda, try making it to Magallanes Village alive.
From Ayala Alabang, try making it unscathed to Better Living by way of the hellish Bicutan, Taguig Interchange.
From any point, go to Deparo in Novaliches without going crazy. Go through the wringer that is the public market (which, come to think of it, occupied the entire road before the advent of Bayani Fernando!).
Use the overpass under the Magallanes Cloverleaf any time of the day. Weave your way to the Magallanes MRT station without pissing off speeding motorists and without getting yourself almost killed either by being sideswiped by a truck or being run over by an oncoming train.
(SnNEPs, help me here with more examples. Baclaran has improved. Anything else?)