Christmas is Coming

"Nobody can conceive or imagine all the wonders there are unseen and unseeable in the world." -veteran newsman Francis Pharcellus Church, answering the famous question posed by certain girl named Virgina if Santa Claus exists.

Christmas is definitely around the corner. I still can't feel it in the air but the Christmas feeling is already there. TV networks already announce a nightly countdown of Christmas eve. What I love about Christmas is the spirit of giving. Christmas forces you to be generous, to go beyond your usual budget, just so could buy a knick knack or two for your loved one. I also used to love the season when I was a child. I believed as (avowed by my parents) of Santa Claus' existence. I patiently waited for my Christmas socks (an ordinary one at that) to be filled with a surprise holiday delight from good old Santa. I don't recall when or how I discovered that it was my parents after all who refurbished that socks each night, but I do recall being hugely disappointed. In a sense, it was the beginning of the end of my childhood. You definitely know one is way past childhood if he no longer believes that an old fat man from a far far away cold region somewhere on top of the Earth actually goes to one's house to deliver those delightful packages. But I have a secret to tell, in my heart of hearts, I still in Santa Claus. (Yes, Virginia there is a Santa Claus!)

Remember, the immortal editorial written in response to a certain girl named Virginia? She asked the innocent question of whether Santa Claus existed and the editor resoundingly answered, "Yes, he does." Santa Claus exists the same way we believe that God or JC exist. They exist because we believe and we believe without even seeing. We believe because we feel and know in our hearts that all those that stand for the ideals of goodness, love and humanity do exist in this world. We believe because we are perpetually hopeful. A world without hope is a world without love. One is contingent upon the other and this hope is manifested in a child's innocent belief that even those unimaginable do exist.

(The actual editorial, including a picture of the editorial clipping can be read through this website: http://www.newseum.org/yesvirginia/)

I will carry on this tradition with my child. I would have her believe that Santa Claus and all other unimaginable things still exist in this world. I would let her stay in her innocence and childlike imagination for as long as she wants. I would nurture her dreams and sense of wonder of the world. I would let her fly. That is what is Christmas is all about and that is the greatest gift I could ever ever give her.

A Reading of "The Reader" by Bernhard Schlink

The good part of Saturday and late afternoon of Sunday I spent reading this book. I got it at my newest favorite bookstore, the Booksale at MOA, for only Php110 bucks. I knew about this book a couple of years back as I saw Oprah recommending it in her show. I remember wanting to read it but never got the chance as I couldn't get myself hold of a copy. Then I saw it at the MOA this weekend, instantly recognized it, read the first few sentences and decided that it is worth the buy.

The prose is very easy to follow. The work is almost non-literary by nature because of the simplicity of the lines. Basically, the story is about Michael Berg and her illicit relationship with a much older woman, in fact more than half her age, Hanna Schmitz. A sexual relationship began when a 15-year old Michael visited a 36-year old Schmitz in her apartment purportedly to thank her for an earlier favor. Over the course of months to follow, Michael regularly visits Schmitz in her apartment until one day she left without a trace and a goobye.

Their relationship can be likened to that of a slave and master. Young Michael worshipped Schmitz like a Grecian goddess. He constantly yearned for the physical connection that she offered through their sexual encounters, but she refused to give him the emotional connection usually found in equal partnerships. He was blinded by his love for her and revolved his life depending on her work schedule. If her shift ends in the morning, Michael will be at her apartment at lunch time and if her work ends in the afternoon, he will come to her around dinner time. Schmitz never acknowledged him as person and dominated their shortlived affair by the power she had over his sexuality.

When she left, he was devastated. He recovered and resumed his daily routine, but he never really got over her in his entire lifetime. Of his memory of her, he says, "But at a certain point the memory of her stopped accompanying me wherever I went. She stayed behind, the way a city stays behind as a train pulls out of the station. It's there, somewhere behind you, and you could go back and make sure of it. But why should you?" However, his relationships with other women always paled in comparison with the ideal "Hanna." Michael always thought they didn't move, or smell a certain way and was perpetually looking for the image of his young love in his later romantic relationships.

Michael remains unhappy for most of his life. He maintains a subtle veneer of self-confidence bordering on arrogance but inside, he experiences a deep-seated unhappiness. He muses, "Why? Why does what was beautiful suddenly shatter in hindsight because it concealed dark truth? Why does the memory of years of happy marriage turn to gall when our partner is revealed to have had a lover all those years? Because such a situation makes it impossible to be happy? But we were happy! Sometimes the memory of happiness cannot stay true because it ended unhappily. Because happiness is only real if it lasts forever?"

Michael meets his lover again in a court trial. He instantly recognizes her but has no feelings left for her. Hanna Schmitz spent her time away from him working as an SS woman guard for the Third Reich. She stands accused of murdering labor camp prisoners by not allowing them to get out of a burning chapel. He attends daily the trial meetings but doesn't make an effort to communicate to her. He discovers Hanna's lifelong secret that could save her from a certain death verdict. Frau Hanna Schmitz is an illiterate. She cannot read nor write and would rather die unjustly to keep this shameful secret from the prying world. Thus, he realizes the reason behind her insistence of him reading aloud great works of literature during their trysts.

He wants to save Hanna but doesnt want to superimpose his will upon her choice of silence and shame over her knowledge disability. But in the end, he chooses to save her by telling the judge the truth of her condition and so she receives a lighter sentence, that of a lifetime imprisonment. This was his own version of revenge over Hanna's powerplay all throughout their doomed relationship, he says, "I couldn't make myself visit Hanna. But neither could I endure doing nothing....But I wasn't really concerned with justice. I couldn't leave Hanna the way she was, or wanted to be. I had to meddle with her, have some kind of influence and effect on her, if not directly then indirectly."

So in the end he has his revenge (or so he thought). He continues to have a relationship with Hanna by sending her cassette tapes of his readings of the works of great German literary writers. But he never sends her any personal greetings or messages. He doesnt want to give her a place in his life and instead provides a niche to contain their continued relationship. Just like the time she refused to acknowlege him and relegates his presence as a mere convenience or nuisance that one has to no choice but to deal with, he gives her his time and space at a distance. He doesn't really make a real connection with her.

Then, a day before Hanna Schmitz finally gets released after staying in prison for eighteen years, she commits suicide. She leaves a suicide note and specific instructions of her will to Michael but never addresses him in first person, "And tell him I say hello to him." In the end, she gets back the upperhand and control that she used to wield over him when he was still a fifteen year old pubescent kid.

I love this book. I would definitely rate it among the top ten percentile of my over-all favorite books. With parts of it being philosophical, I could imagine Sartre or Camus writing this although the real author is actually a professor and a practicing judge. What I love about it is its clarity, with words are almost naked and crystal clear in thoughts and nuances. Written and told in a first-person narrative, Michael Berg's life and thoughts progresses lucidly and unassumingly. And just like the main protagonist in the story, you will fall in love with the book's quiet and unassuming clear writing. Definitely a must read book for me.

Changes at the Office

(An ideal career cycle: 1. assessing self 2. exploring options 3. developing skills 4. marketimg self 5.performing. I feel the need to go back to stage one to really know which way to go next.)

Our new Indian boss has arrived. He looks decent and nice. So far. However, everything I hear about Indians expats are on the negative side. I really don't know what this new leadership will bring. Aside from this, we will have a new Pinay boss officially titled as Operations Manager. I used to whine a lot about the utter "mismanagement" by my previous boss but these new changes seem daunting. I just don't know what to expect.

I really ought to get myself a new job. I feel now that my end is near for this company. One year and counting, I haven't gotten myself to the point where I can honestly say that I even "like" my job. This is not me. Several critiques regarding my work ethics has been raised by suspicious co-workers. I am really not like this. I know myself to be honest, dedicated and even at times sincerely "hard-working". Maybe my heart is really not into this line of work and that is why no matter how hard I try, the passion is just not there. I feel that for me to truly love my work I should be able to identify myself with what I do. I cannot be estranged with my job. "Love your work and you will never have to work again for the rest of your life." Oh how I wish I could be in this state right now.

Business as Usual

(PGMA visits and shops at Glorietta 2, the site of the deadly bombing, just 4 days after the incident.)

To project that malls are perfectly safe to visit these days, PGMA dropped by to inspect and shop at the Glorietta shopping mall complex yesterday 23 Oct 2007. The message the government strongly and loudly wants to bring forth is that it is "business as usual." Meanwhile, the underlying and real message of this brave act is this, "mindless middle-class herd, go back to your senseless shopping and window-shopping, please."

Funny, but this scene reminds me of the time when Thaksin Shinatwara, erstwhile Prime Minister of Thailand (he was unexpectedly booted out by the military) forced his ministers to eat fried chickens when the predominantly Buddhist country was ravaged by the bird flu virus. During that period, Thaksin didn't want to admit that Thailand was hit by the dreaded bird disease despite suspicious massive death of chickens in their countryside. He was adamant that the chickens died by some other disease aside and not the fatal bird flu strain. So to prove his point, he made a show of eating fried chickens publicly together with his government ministers. However, a few weeks or months later, he did admit the truth. Thailand was indeed hit by the bird flu virus, and subsequent human deaths were reported as a result of the deadly bird strain. What was going on the head of those ministers when they willingly smiled at cameras and muched those potentially life-threathening fried chickens? I can only wonder. I reckon they were forced by Thaksin to chomp those crispy fried chickens and didn't much have of a choice given that their jobs were on the line but still, what could have they been thinking?

I, myself, dropped by at the Glorietta the day PGMA arrived there. Forced by the relentless rain to the take the FX taxi bound to Landmark, I found the Glorietta mall virtually empty. The usually jampacked restaurants had only a few diners here and there. People are still obviously scared over what happened and cannot be fooled by assurances that everything is fine and dandy again. Around this time, teeming with eager early Christmas shoppers, the Glorietta shopping mall complex is almost always filled to the brim. But now, the place is unusually cold and desolate-looking. It still has a pungent smell which is perhaps caused by the unexpexted blast. Things will never be the same again. Business will never be the same as usual. No matter the amount of cajoling from government officials, including the president, I will never ever forget what took place on that unfortunate Friday afternoon. The lapse of security measures means that Glorietta can be targeted again and again. Although it is highly unlikely that it will be a target again anytime soon as the principle of "lightning not striking the same area twice" generally applies, still it is "better to be safe than sorry."

Deconstructing Harry Potter

(JK Rowling, which rhymes with bowling and not howling, the only billionaire author in the world who earned her riches through her widely successful Harry Potter series. It is so hard to believe that she used to live off government support before her tumultuous public acclaim.)

Let me start off by saying that I love the Harry Potter (HP) series. My friend Les was adamant I read the book way back in college. She generously lent me the first three HP books and midway through the third book of the series, I was definitely hooked. I was practically begging for her to give the fourth book as soon as I finished the third one. Curiously, the HP books had the same effect on my non-reading sister. I nonchalantly advised her to read the first book saying she might enjoy reading it despite her engineering background. Soon, she got addicted just like me and even bought her own copies of the book just so she could read and re-read it again.

I often say that my favorite book in the series is the second one. I find the second one the funniest and most charming of all. Harry, at this stage, is still a fresh and hopeful young 14-year old boy still in love and at awe with his new environment. As the series continues, Harry grows up, becomes accustomed to his wizarding world and shows his darker mature side. As most book critics would say the entire series is a "bildungsroman" of the main character, Harry Potter. As such, the first book, which serves an introduction to the entire seven-book series, is the shortest book of all. I daresay the best-written book in the series is the third one as it provides the best mystery of all. All of the seven books is basically a whodunnit mystery novel with a heightening climax from chapter to chapter. The HP books are simply "unput-downable" and you will end up staying awake all night as you rush to know how it will end. Highly controversial from the beginning because of its sorcery and witchcraft theme, the HP series breaks all of the record for the most number of book sold at the fastest possible time. We should all thank the book's author, JK Rowling, for making reading such a cool thing for children and even adults to do again. Children the world over would line-up the bookstores every time a new book in the series is up again. Personally, I find the series amazing because it is craftily written for the enjoyment of children and adults alike, and everything about the plot is highly original and creative. JK Rowling transports us to a new world, both childlike and magical, which is something beyond our imagination. She brings to life new characters and gives a new twist and look to ordinary things we take for granted. I for one believe that the HP series will the stand the test of time and will be adjudged as one of best books or series in the years to come. In fact, when my own daughter, nicknamed JK, (her name stands for those initials, plus I am such an incorrigible fan) starts reading, we will read together the entire HP series.

The last and highly anticipated book of the series came out in the mid quarter of this year. It was a bittersweet moment for most fans. They wanted and longed for the book's ending and yet they were reluctant to let it go. JK Rowling was clear from the beginning that she will end the series at Book 7 and yet I for one simply wanted her to go on. I wanted her to write about Harry Potter from his babyhood upto his dying day. Heck, if she could write about Harry for eternity, I would still be interested to read it one book at a time. I was lucky enough to get a bootlegged soft copy of the last book before it officially hit the bookstores. As such, I was able to read the book before fellow book addicts got their legitimate hard-bound pricey copies.

More recently, the last book, HP7, again gained headline news as JK Rowling surprisingly outed the reverent and almost godly figure of Albus Dumblebore in her book signing trip to New York. Answering an inquiry from a child fan on whether Dumbledore will ever find true love, JK Rowling simply said, "Dumbledore is gay." This answer elicited gasps and applause from a stupefied audience. I don't know what to make out of this recent relevation. It just reminds me of the time it was rumored that my fave Sesame muppets of all time, Ernie and Bert, are actually gay lovers. It was said that the producers of the show were prepared to sacrifice one character by letting it die on national tv as a result of the sexually transmitted HIV virus. (WTF!) Accordingly, they wanted to promote sexual education and gay rights to the conciousness of young children. While being politically correct, all I could think of at that point was, why can't they just keep my childhood favorite character innocent and childlike. So when I heard about this recent outing of Dumbledore, all I could think of is why can't she just let me keep this all-knowing and all-powerful godly image of this well-loved character.

Firstly, unlike others who doubted or sensed that Dumbledore's character might be gay because of his apparent lack of love interest in the series, I never once thought of Dumbledore as gay. My idea of him resembles that of St. Thomas Aquinas, John Paul II and most priests in general. Just because they lack an obvious lady love doesn't mean they are gay. That is not to say that all priests aren't gay because sadly, controversies have erupted over sexual indiscretions of Catholic gay priests. I thought of Dumbledore in this highest regard, his apparent lack of love interest was justfied in my mind by his Socratic love of wisdom and truth. Naturally, he wouldn't have time to think about human love as he was thoroughly engaged in his quiet and passionate love of wisdom and universal ideals. So all the while this noble version of Dumblebore was apparently incorrect. Maybe he is the same wise and venerable character I loved but his uncharacteristic lack of a romantic lady love was not all due to his scholarly quest for wisdom, but simply because of his sexual orientation.

I love JK Rowling and the HP series just the same. All literary works stands to be constructed, deconsructed and reconstructed to the author's and reader's content. In fact, in literary criticism, it is a rule of the thumb that the author must never interpret his own work, otherwise, he/she will unwittingly limit the reading of the work in one voice or light only. I am sure JK Rowling chose to stay quiet about Dumbledore's real idendity for a good reason. Revealing him as an openly gay character might attract unneccesary attention to the book and offend the sensibilities of her young audience. Although I know Dumbledore's sexual preference should not affect his noble status in the book, I still can't bring myself to reconcile this perfect scholar idea I had of Dumbledore to the outed "real" Dumbledore. It's almost the same as discovering for the first time that Sir Ian McKellen, who resembles Dumbledore's character in appearance and personality and plays Gandalf, the noble wizard role in another literary gem, Lord Of the Rings series, is actually gay in real life. I just dont get it.

I am not homophobic. I am consciously respectful of other people's ethnic, racial, and sexual differences. (I even have a lesbian friend.) I almost always practice political, religious and gender neutrality. It's just that when you suddenly find out somebody you thought of as the epitome of manhood and saintliness is gay, of course, my normal reaction is that of shock and fear even. Perhaps its the same as the people in the olden times suddenly finding out that the world is round and not flat as previously believed. They set their ship to sail forever fearful of falling off the edges only to find out that they won't fall at all. So your whole world and outlook suddenly turns upside down, inside out. You experience a sense vertigo as you no longer know which is which. I guess the world is really like that, its not a simple matter of seeing white as white and black as black. We live in a gray gay world indeed.

Dark Friday: Glorietta 2 Bombing

(A human face of the tragedy: Jeanne de Gracia, among the 11 dead of the G2 bombing last Friday. Lest we forget. )

“But soon we shall die and all memory of those five will have left the earth, and we ourselves shall be loved for a while and forgotten. But the love will have been enough; all those impulses of love return to the love that made them. Even memory is not necessary for love. There is a land of the living and a land of the dead and the bridge is love, the only survival, the only meaning.”

Tony Blair, speaking at the memorial service for the victims of the 9/11 tragedy, quoted a passage from “The Bridge of San Luis Rey.”

Last Friday, 19 October 2007, a portion of Glorietta 2 was unceremoniously bombed leaving at present 11 dead and 110 others wounded or injured. I was at the office when I first heard about the news, just minutes after the bombing occured. At first, sketchy reports of a possible LPG explosion from a groundfloor G2 Luk Yuen Restaurant was said to have caused the blast. I felt no sense of alarm at this point. Some 20-30 minutes later, intial photos from the blast were already blogged online. At this point, it became clearer that this was not an ordinary accident. 8 people were immediately reported as dead and 40 others as injured. The photos of the bombing showed extensive damage of properties. Cars were upturned, windows and glasses shattered and rubbles were everywhere. Clearly, Glorietta 2 was intentionally bombed.

I pass by this shopping complex on a daily basis. I take the passenger FX taxi on the lower ground level of the MRT Ayala line. For Php 30 per ride, this FX taxi will take me directly a block away from parent's house in Villamor. Incidentally, this same MRT line was bombed two years ago in what is now tagged as Valentine's Day Bombing as it happened exactly on the day of hearts. This terrorist act was actually a three simultaneous bombing attacks that occured on three separate citiies of Manila, Davao and Gen. Santos. The Al-Qaeda linked Abu Sayyaf ragtag group claimed responsibility for the attack that was said to be their "Valentine's gift to President Gloria Arroyo." Ironically, about the same number of people were among the casualties in this tripartite bombing attacks. 11 people were killed and about 90 others wounded when separate buses in Manila and Davao exploded coupled by the shopping mall blast in Gen. Santos. Prior to this, one more notable bombing incident that will be forever etched in memory is the Rizal Day Bombing which occured on a national holiday, the 30th of December 2000 or more populary known as Jose Rizal's death anniversary. On that fateful day, 22 lives were lost, around 100 wounded in a five-fold attack in various locations in Metro Manila, the most deadly of which is the LRT bombing that took place at the Blumentritt station.

I will never forget this incident simply because I used the LRT back then on an almost daily basis as well. It was the easiest, fastest and cheapest route for me as college (UST) student. I only had to suffer the indignity of being squished and cramped in the train cab for about half an hour but at least it will save me from two hours of traffic in terms of travel time as opposed to the traditional jeepney ride. I had a good deal. Unfortunately, 3 million others thought of the same idea so I had to ride with almost the same number of people daily. The mental picture that would come to mind is that of a fish trapped in a can of sardines. Stuck as if almost glued to somebody else's body, I no longer cared which body part touches another sensitive body part of mine. All I wanted was a (fucking) ride home. This was the same thought that crossed the mind of the teeming masses who rode the LRT train that unfortunate day. All they wanted was a bleeping ride home. A ride home that never got them home (unless home in this case is meant as heavenly home.) I could easily have been on that tragic train ride with them.

I remember crying on that day as I cannot forget the innocent boy whose body was badly burned as a direct result of the bombing. He became the face of the nameless and faceless other victims of that gruesome act. He was visited by then President Joseph Estrada and was given and promised all sorts of help to mitigate the effect of his young life's tragedy. I also remember being angry at Estrada simply because he was the president. I held him accountable for what happened and ironically enough, like the current state of PGMA, was in deep political crisis at that time. I deeply wonder if there is any link between these two seemingly random events. It must be recalled that previous administration, namely that of deposed dictator Marcos' regime, was credited for being personally responsible for dubious communist attacks in the metropolis before carrying out the dreaded Martial Law decree. It was done in the past and so it is not completely beyond logic to think and hypothesize that it could be done again. If truth be told, PGMA stands much to gain with this recent bombing as the country's attention is diverted from the on-going political crisis. Just before this atrocious incident, the bribe-giving aka gift-sharing debacle that happened right inside the supposedly majestic halls of Malacanan Palace was hugging the newspapers spotlight.

Justly or unjustly so, many Filipinos believe that PGMA has something to do with this G2 bombing incident. Oppositionist Senator and one time coup d e tat plotter, former Naval Lt. Sg. Antonio Trillanes IV was quick to point an accusing finger at National Security Adviser Norberto Gonzales and AFP Chief of Staff Hermogenes Esperon as the perpetrators of the crime. The accused two were equally quick to react by calling for an investigation of Trillanes over his allegations. Incidentally, despite being duly elected as Senator of this land by a mandate of more than 11 million untampered votes, Trillanes at this point is still languishing in jail for his political crime of dethroning an (illegal) president. They call to investigate Trillanes when he is clearly beyond the bounds of possible suspects, what with him being already in jail, and as such waste their efforts on finding out who the real perpetrators are. A certain Sheik Omar of the Rajah Solaiman Revolutionary Movement had promptly claimed responsibility over the attack but security analysts were fast to dismiss such claims as they questioned the authenticity of the voice of Omar during the on-air radio interview as well as the capacity of the said group to launch an attack.

Personally, the timing of the attack is highly suspect. The aim is clearly is not to create a catastrophic number of casualty but to plainly and coldly send a message. The attack occured at around 2 pm, way beyond the usual lunchtime of workers in the Makati area. If the perpertrators simple plan is to wreak havoc as big as possible, they could have planted the bomb at around 5 or 6pm, which is the peak time for passersby and mallgoers in Glorietta. Instead of just having 11 people dead, they could easily have more than 100 dead if acted upon a this precise time. Take the Bali Bombing that occured in Indonesia on 12 Oct 2002 for example. This bombing incident instantly killed more than 200 people, most of whom are foreigners and injured the same number of people. In this case, the motive was plain and simple, and that is to kill as many as possible. And so the suicide bombers acted out their plan at the most opportune time and at the best possible location for maximum impact and damage. It doesn't take intensive logistical intelligence to know that G2 or the entire of Glorietta mall is jampacked around after office hours. However, either by a stroke of pure luck or cunning evil genius, they opted to plant the bomb at the time when it had the least possible impact, at an hour way past lunchtime. One really good question now is this, "Why choose this dead hour to plan a bombing attack if your motive is only to kill as many as possible?"

Currently, the possible theory being raised by police officials is that the blast was purely an accident, saying there is a "high level of certainty" that the explosion was caused "by the presence of certain structures underground." Accordingly, toxic combination of methane gases located in the underground level of G2 accidentally leaked and caused the massive explosion. I am not buying this. UP Chemical Engineering experts are not buying it either and thus cautioned the police for laying out such unfounded theories that might beffudle the public. If I were to believe this version of events, then I might as well say that George W. Bush waged a war against Iraq because of their hidden Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD). The amount of rubbish that our officials would want us take as gospel truth is unbelievable. Having worked for the military institution before, I very well know that it is within their means to twist the truth for the sake of "national security." Not everybody deserves to know the truth, especially if it will only cause national pandemonium. So they most probably conclude that it is for country's best interest for the masses to continually litter our superfluous malls for its apparent economic benefit. Better to tell the public a softer version of the events than to admit and subseqently explain a bombing attack that was successfully launched right under their noses.

The bombing of Super Ferry 14 last February 27, 2004 is a clear example of such a deception. It is now officially dubbed as the "the Philippines' worst terrorist attack and the world's deadliest terrorist attack at sea", killing 63 people instantly with 53 others missing and presumed dead. Initially, the deadly explosion was passed off as an accident caused by a faulty gas leak. However, 8 months later, PGMA admitted on October 11, 2004 that the bombing was indeed a terrorist attack. But by then, the Super Ferry bombing attack hardly made any impact on public consciousness. The time they acknowledged it wasn't the case, the public already forgot what the news was even all about. So it wasn't difficult for them to make excuses as to how such an attack was not prevented by "intelligence information." When they revealed the attack as a glaring breach of national security, the public simply no longer cared. Is this a brilliant coincidence, a mere happenstance that conveniently saved our security officials from public condemnation over their faulty intelligence gathering and information? I don't think so.

Everytime confronted by a unexpected tragedy flat on the face, I am always reminded of how fleeting life truly is. You can never really know when your "end" will be. You can just be strolling by the mall idly passing away your time and for all you know it would be the last minutes of your life. Such is what happened to the victims of the G2 bombing incident. Sadly, the metropolis is no longer a safe place to live in. The bombing incidents that happened in the last five years or so could have easily taken away my life just like that. I would have been robbed of my life, of my youth and of every potentiality I could ever become with hardly a blink of an eye. I must always remember this---to savor every breath I take, to enjoy every moment I make and to live my life the fullest possible way I can.

World Hunger

"The pain of life overrides the joy to the point that joy does not exist."

These were the last words of Kevin Carter, the famed ill-fated photojournalist who took this Pulitzer award winning picture of a malnourished Sudanese girl being stalked a hungry vulture. At that time, majority of the population in Sudan were experiencing extreme hunger because of a bitter civil war. In an interview, Carter said the girl was walking her way towards a food camp and later resumed her travel after taking this brief respite. He shooed away the vulture afterwards. Reportedly, after taking this photo, "he sat under a tree for a long time, smoking cigarettes and crying." Carter committed suicide two months after receiving his award.

The picture of this dying girl is simply heart and gut-wrenching. It was taken 14 years ago by Kevin Carter, a South African photojournalist who was most probably haunted by the girl's image so much so that it contributed to his suicide. More than a decade had passed and yet this picture still evokes the same amount of emotion as if it were taken yesterday. Now that I am a mother I cannot help but visualize the face of my own baby in that child's face. Carter was condemned for being a mere spectator in this instance. He was ridiculed for not actively helping the child and for choosing to just take this stark image. But how many of us can honestly say that we would have done otherwise? That we would not have turned a blind eye and instead be moved to action given the same circumstance?

Not everybody knows this, myself included, but there is an event called as World Food Day celebrated last Oct 16. Accordingly, at present times, "some 854 million people, or about one in seven, lack sufficient food." If you put it this way, in cold mathematical and logical terms, it fails to have the same agonizing effect as evinced by one girl's dying image. This little girl represents the "50,000 people dying every day because of extreme poverty." It is appalling to think that in this modern day and age of technology and advancement, literally millions are still dying out there for the want of proper food. In the Philippines alone, it is reported that 17% of Filipinos live in extreme poverty. That figure sounds and looks innocuous and doesn't seem reflective of the child beggars I see dangerously plying the streets of the metro on a daily basis.

There is no stopgap solution to world hunger or local hunger for that matter. It is not simply a matter of giving away excess food and money to the needy. The Philippine government's solution to the country's own hunger problem is to allocate a Php 1 billion peso fund to finance temporary feeding centers and projects for the extremely impoverished sector of the society. But this barely scratches the surface of the problem. Like terrorism, communism and other ideological conflicts this world is currently experiencing, the problem of hunger is deeply rooted and cannot be resolved overnight. But unlike ideological, political and philosophical issues, the problem of poverty speaks to us in a universal language, one that cuts through cultural differences and demands our immediate attention and action regardless of our race, religion and skin color. Hunger knows no boundaries. Hunger is the same for all, it is one of humanity's great equalizer, just like death.

We are touched by this dying girl's image because it speaks to us in this universal language. It is the same language that reminds us all of our humanity. It speaks to our hearts and awakens our soul. We remember that we are human because we all grieve and cry over this. We grieve and cry for the little girl, but we grieve and cry also for ourselves.