Why I’m Not Totally Convinced of Today’s Nationalism

Nationalism nowadays is a trend. This is apparent by the t-shirts with art-ified Philippine flags, Jose Rizal, and fish ball prints. It is obvious by the way the Filipino people bemoaned Jessica Sanchez’s failure to be the next American Idol, and Pacman’s lose against Timothy Bradley despite apparently dominating the 12-round bout. This is obvious by Twitter hashtags #proudtobepinoy and posts on the wonders of the Philippines last June 12.


Sure, okay, let’s say you say you’re proud. I’m not totally convinced, though.


Like I said: a trend. Not unlike flair jean and those atrocious butterfly clips that every popular girl wore when I was in elementary (the horror).


People nowadays seem to wear their nationality like they wear those clips: you love the Philippines just because you’re wearing a nationalistic shirt, or you’re sporting painful fingers because you were on an online debate for hours, arguing against Bradley’s suspicious victory.


This is not to say these are superficial, worthless evidences of Nationalism. Merely, that I am not convinced by them.


We lack the action to back the words

Manila is noisy, full of pickpockets, and sleazy people. Traffic is hell. Many places smell literally like crap. You look down from a plane, and you see more slums than civilized suburbs. The government is mostly a legion of corrupt bastards who do almost nil for the people. The Philippines is a poor country, where a lot of people live off food from garbage. We’ve heard all the complaints, and when it is spoken by a brown-skinned, black-haired Pinoy, most Filipinos would tend to nod their heads in silent agreement.


But when a dude coming from another country complains mildly about our beloved nation, all hell breaks loose. Twitter and Facebook wars commence, hate-mails are sent, death threats float around the poor idiot’s head for daring to besmirch our beloved country’s name. “How DARE he say that he hates it when prostitutes run after him, offering the many heavens of sex for dollars? Racist idiot.”


I am against racism, but the truth isn’t racist. Manila is noisy, full of pickpockets, and sleazy people. The government is mostly a legion of corrupt bastards who almost do nil for the people. The Philippines is a poor country, and a lot of people do live off food from garbage. You can start sending me death threats, but if you’ve been around, if you’re not looking through the world with rose-colored glasses, you won’t be able to disagree with me.


So: It’s ok when Filipinos criticize the Philippines, but when a foreigner does, we go ballistic.


What is more appalling is that we are pretty much aware that our faults and flaws are blatantly observable, yet we do absolutely nothing about it. We complain that the country is dirty and smelly, but we still throw our crap everywhere without any consideration that it is our crap that that causes the dirt and the smell.


We complain too much, get self-righteously infuriated when non-Pinoys complain about us, but we stand in the sidelines doing NOTHING to better the situation. To summarize, we bastardize logic.


We still prefer the Twilight Saga over Philippine books



Of course literature are interesting and well-made. I must admit that I am a fan of several authors including J.K. Rowling, Stephen King, and Neil Gaiman. Foreign literature is interesting and well-made, but this does NOT mean that Filipino-created ones are inferior. I refuse to believe this, and anyone who has actually taken time to read them would most certainly agree with me.


Why is it, then, that people would only pick up a Filipino book (and grudgingly so) if they are threatened with Failure by their Filipino teachers if they fail to submit a book report? Seriously, I used to translate stories written in English just for me to fulfill this then particularly arduous requirement. According to a bulk of my students, Filipinos don’t read Filipinos because of several things, and the most innocent of which may be the lack of advertisement and exposure. After all, Hollywood has the alleged hot and sexy Rob Pattinson for the Twilight series, and when some thirteen year old reads the books, he or she has the image of this apparent piece of hunk tattooed on her mind. Whereas, there isn’t really a poster boy for stuff like Dekada ’70, or Bata, Bata…Paano Ka Ginawa. Unless, of course, you count Governor Vilma Santos.





Other reasons, however, include finding works written by foreign authors to be refreshing, because plots are very original, and the culture intertwined with the story is interesting. Suuure, a vampire who falls in love with a human and makes little vampire babies with her is indeed a novel plot. And who would want to read about the bacunaoa and our own babaylan if we have literature about being "irrevocably in love" with a dude with "incandescent chest" and "scintillating arms" to devour?


Seriously, though. What was the last piece of Filipino literature you’ve read just for fun?


We Want Miriam Defensor Santiago Off the ICC, etc.

Some people don’t have anything better to do with their lives apart from protesting that Miriam Defensor Santiago – THE Miriam Defensor-Santiago, the most academically-ready politician today, A+ student of the University of the Philippines, and more Filipina than Jessica Sanchez could ever hope to be in terms of blood- off the International Criminal Court. Why? Because she got pissed at a member of the prosecution during Former CJ Corona’s impeachment trial –and rightly so.

The dude was covering his ears because his team was being berated by the senator for being dunderheads and wasting the people’s time and money. Such childish antics should get him voted off the prosecution panel. Luckily, he had the decency of resigning.

Crab mentality has all but left our system. It seems as if Filipino talents need to prove themselves in the international field before we actually acknowledge them. And even then, we still find nasty, sometimes irrelevant, things to say about them. I mean, who cares if Charice Pempengco still has baby fats and opted to sport short, spiky blond hair? Does her fashion sense affect her ability to hit the high notes?

On dates and doubts, on questions and answers

We just celebrated the emancipation of the Philippines last June 12. We displayed Philippine flags in our homes, schools and workplaces, and many social media people put up Facebook status messages, used nationalistic Twitter hashtags, and even wrote blog posts about being a proud, independent nation. But it seems that, despite the freedom we are apparently enjoying now, we are still prisoners of our apathy and the lack of true pride for our culture.

With these things still very much alive in our society, are we really as free as we thought we are?#

Of Apologies and Quotes

Yes. I am no longer part of Rachell Allen Reviewers, USA for reasons that, because of ethics, I’d rather not divulge in this oh-so-public blog. I do have ethics, you know, despite my freakishly blunt blog and my ability to say “vagina” without flinching.
My leaving was a quick but painful process. There were no tears, but there were certainly heavy hearts – not because I was leaving, but because I was attempting to, I reckon. I wanted a proper good bye, but circumstances had other ideas. Again, explaining this is not something my blog is for.

I know I owe the people who’ve become my friends an apology for upping and leaving without telling them. You see, I do not like drama, my coping mechanism screws up upon thoughts of tears and sugary words (I’m sure they’ll be sugary, my colleagues are rather sweet), but they do deserve to know that I wouldn’t be around anymore. At least, not as an employee. So to everyone who’ve been my friend, and who’ve treated me as a friend, I am sorry. I wish I can record my voice so that you don’t imagine Gloria Arroyo’s tone along with these words, because I am sincere.

More than the companies I’ve been with and more than the colleagues I’ve had, the people who’ve made my teaching career fruitful will always be my students. They’ve made me laugh more than I should, made me study more than I want to, and made me work hard on being a better teacher, something any empty promise, training, or threat could hope to achieve.

So for my students, here is some IELTS stuff and real-life stuff to remember. Take it to heart, because I may never have the opportunity to say these things again.

1. In communicating, remember your aim: to express and not to impress.

2. You will not master anything by just sitting on your armchairs and taking down notes while the lecturer incessantly blabs about the topic.

3. So what if you know the difference between gerunds and participial phrases? Concepts are useless if not practiced.

4. Writing is frustrating. Writing is demanding. “Writing will ask you why your handwriting is like chicken scratch?” “Why you’re saying the same thing again and again?” “Can’t you say things in different ways? You are soooo boring!” To be an effective writer means you have to be a disciplined writer. No room for laziness.

5. Monotony is codswallop.

6. At the end of the day, it’ll be up to you. Your success or failure depends on you, 90% of the time. Your lecturers and coaches will only provide 10% of what you need to succeed, but it is up to you to work your bullocks of if you seriously want to achieve your goal. Remember: YOU need this exam; your lecturers, coaches, and review center DON’T.

7. Regardless of whether you pass or you fail, and regardless of which review center you enroll to, your lecturers and coaches WILL get paid. Make the most out of your review program.

And lastly, just so we’re all clear: I RESIGNED.

A Change of Heart

Confession: I was never proud to be a nurse.

This idiotic opinion was brought about by the fact that midway through my life as a nursing student, my aim of getting to greener pastures simply died. Or, at least, required more money, time, and almost everything else that I did not really have. There were more nurses that the Philippine economy can handle, and the countries the United States, the country that most want to penetrate suddenly went on financial crisis and implemented retrogression.

It was safe to say I was pissed. More so because I had given up my dream of becoming a journalist to pursue my loveless affair with Nursing.

I was narrow-minded and cynical. I guess being the go-to person in my community when there were medical emergencies was not enough to get Nursing pride through my relatively thick skull. I. Am. Sorry.

Despite this, I had my ideals. They were very simple ideals, but rather strong for someone as socially stoic as I am: zero-bullshit reproductive health policies and services that are centered on women of all ages, prevention of rape and survival of its victims, and respect of other's hard work and efforts.

I feel that should I be given the opportunity, I would go Gabriela Silang for these issues.


The Facebook Phenomenon

I started to aggressively campaign for the Reproductive Health Bill last year on Facebook. This is after meeting one of my vagina heroines, sexual health writer Ana Santos. I joined a group called RH Bill-I Support, where I met people who actually knew what they were talking about. It was a very good learning experience.

One person who stood out was Alvin Dakis, who, by the look of his cute-sometimes-goofy profile picture, seemed like the average dude to me.


The Man Behind the Picture

Can you blame me if I say he looks like the guy-next-door?

As usual, nothing is as they seem.

The average dude with the cute-sometimes-goofy profile pic is the founder and president of the Alliance of Young Nurse Leaders and Advocates. He is also the Philippine Fellow for the Philippine Young Leaders Fellowship 2011 Asia 21 Society. He writes a column for Vital Signs, and is a regular contributor for Mulat Pinoy.

More than his extensive resume, though, what is really inspiring about this not-so-average-dude-after-all is what he did not just for nurses, for for those who are often discriminated and set aside by the general populace of the Idiot Society:

It was through his leadership that young nurses finally found their collective voices to protest the blatant exploitation they are submitted to, exploitation hiding in the guise of volunteerism and training.

His outspoken support for the Reproductive Health Bill has caused a wave of response from the younger nurses, prompting them to be more socially aware of their responsibilities to their clients. To take a stand on the increasing number of maternal deaths, and the escalating statistics of HIV-Positives.

LGBT rights has come into better light because of his continuous campaign.

I have probably missed many other things, but the point is this: the things he did have caused the death of apathy.


Tangible

Whatever his achievements are, though, the great things about him are the very
simplest of things: He does not mind laughing and joking with his colleagues while riding the MRT during rush hour. He would happily wait for two over-excited gals to finish their make-up so they can look awesome for the launch of a video on HIV awareness. He will happily pour water for you when you dine with him, after a long and hard organization meeting.

Mostly, it is his ability to trust his members, despite the fact that they are not exactly the best. I know. I will probably never be the best member of AYNLA, but in some weird twist of fate I shall be forever grateful for, Alvin Dakis seems to trust me.

He will and always will be more than President Alvin Dakis, of AYNLA. For us who have had the honor of meeting and working with him, he will always be more than our leader. He is our Sir A.

Changing my heart

Alvin Dakis has, by example, taught me that, being in the nursing profession, I can be a much better Gabriela Silang for my advocacy.

And it is him that I should thank that I can finally say these words: I am proud to be a nurse.#

Nr. Janina Santos is the Secretary of Publications and Media Relations for the Alliance of Young Nurse Leaders and Advocates. She is also the owner of this blog, and a self-proclaimed bodyguard/bouncer for Nr. Alvin Dakis, together with her one and only babe, Nr. Tina Siuagan.