Slipping away again?

I was listening to the radio while going to work and heard this commentator talking about the plea bargain of Gen. Garcia and how it was done behind our backs. Normally I would not have paid attention to the issue since I had known long ago that cases involving high ranking officials almost always get away with any issues linking them through the use of time and money. But somehow I can't fathom how shitty our judicial system is since these tactics have always been in play and they don't do something about it.

If we look at the past, how many corrupt politicians out there are now behind bars? After years of "in depth" investigations, how many were incarcerated? I could only count a handful compared to the magnitude of cases that were acquitted.

Our judicial system is flawed. Flawed because they are subjected to the same political strategies and never learn from it. If cases are not prolonged for the public to lose interest, they are then bought with chunks of cash. I believe this was exactly how Garcia was able to have the plea bargain.

According to the sandiganbayan in January, graft evidences against Garcia was strong enough to put him behind bars, but when March came they suddenly switched sides and said it was insufficient. And by May, while we were all concentrated on the Presidential Elections, Garcia was offered the plea bargain. If these were true, then what else can we think? There might have been some underhanded negotiations going behind our backs.

Time and money has always been the loophole of our Philippine justice system. If acquittal cannot be accomplished through time, then they're going for money. In some cases both strategies are used to acquit an accused.

The judicial body always argue that the slowness of the proceedings was a result of the lack of personnel, or the lack of funds, or the observance of due process and what not. I don't agree that all of these cannot be resolved by the government. Due process cannot be an excuse since other countries observe these processes (some even more) and still ended up with a verdic in a month's time.

The shortages of people and funds can be easily addressed by the government's budget. If they're serious about finishing these cases quickly and truthfully, then I believe they know what to do.

Fastfood acquaintances

I've had a chicken fillet meal at Mc Donalds glorietta earlier today and felt nostalgic while eating the small meal. Half of my college life was spent eating Mcdonalds with my friends that it felt lonely eating one without them. I'm not really very fond of eating in this fastfood chain becaues of its repetitive dishes, but for some reason I can't seem to get the habit out of my system.

Eating at a fastfood restaurant has been the ways of college students for an affordabel and clean meal. With just a P49, one can get a rice meal and drink with free wifi for those that need it. Besides the affordability of the restaurrant, what I liked about it most are the memories I've had during college. I can't count how much time I've spent eating that fillet with my friends while enjoying the company with each other. Whether it be because of acads or just to soothe grumbling tummies, Mcdo has become a part of my college life.

Of course, half of my college life is not all Mcdo. Prior to coming to Diliman, my lunch in UP Manila consisted of eating the thirty niners of a Jollibee food chain. I remember every lunch, my friends and I would go to Robinsons Palce in Manila to pick our lunch or dinner choices from the arrays of restaurants in the fourth floor. But for some reason we always ended up eating at Jollibee and ordering the same old thing. It might be because of affordability that led us going back to that restaurant, or it might also be the memories we've shared doing our Philo 11 and Pol Sci 14.

When I'm with my high school friends, we don't go to McDo and Jolibee because they prefer something more special than the ones we usually have. That is justified because we only get to see each other once a month due to our different schools. So instead, we settled for a more fancier restaurant. A..K.A. Burger King.

Yes, a place a bit fancier (and pricier!) than your average burger shop, but still a fast food restaurant. We can spend hours just seating there talking about what was happening with our lives while eating the same old Whopper combo meal or BK chiken burger for a few extra bucks. For the past four years, we would never let it pass without mentioning eating at that restaurant despite our pallates getting tired of it. Right now, despite moving on to a more pricier...ahem... more sophisticated restaurants out there, we often look out for that BK sign at any mall we go to.

It was amusing that my college life can be boxed with the three fastfood restaurants commonly found around the metro. It became a place for having fun chatting with old and new friends. A tambayan for acads or extra curriculars. A meeting place for long lost acquaintances, and a start of a new beginning.

*photo taken from clickthecity.com

What's the problem?

I was again covering an event near Manila Bay and I got a chance to sit down again at the ridge and look at the vast expanse before me.

The sight was beautiful, especially around this time when the sun was about to set and the clouds turning a shade of orange and the water reflecting the fading light above. I ignored the stench of the putrid waters as I gazed at the sunset.

Beside me was a woman on her thirties eating Kwek-Kwek, a street food where a duck egg is covered in a dough mixture and deep fried, while noisily talking to her friend.

I glanced on the surroundings and saw the trash scattered around the bay. When the woman beside me finished her snack, she threw the styro container right into the bay. I looked at where she threw her trash and saw a big pile of rotting garbage right below where we were seated. Now I know where the stench was coming from. I was disgusted. With her and with the bay.

A professor told me once before that you can gauge a country’s state by looking at the trash in the streets..In other countries like in Hong Kong and Singapore, you can see how clean the streets are and how well the people behaved. There are laws prohibiting trash that is being observed by the citizens and nobody tries to violate the law since they know they will be sanctioned accordingly.

Now look at the Philippines. We have laws against littering. We have laws against throwing trash at the bay. We have laws protecting our environment against pollutants, but are they being followed?

The problem of Philippine politics is not just the implementation of the government, but also the people living in the government. Of course we know that the Philippine bureaucracy is suffering from degradation brought by corruption, but that does not mean the citizens have the right to violate the law.

Perhaps if we look closely, the government is being run by the Filipinos, and it was the Filipinos who voted for them for a seat in the government. Does the problem really lie with the government or does it really lie within ourselves, as citizens of the country? As Filipinos?

New and Old

It’s been over a month since I left school and entered adulthood. It ‘s really been difficult adjusting from a life you’ve had for 18 years then suddenly plunged to an unknown place where everything’s not like you would’ve thought. All those pressures and expectations dumped on you and no longer having friends backing you up. It is hard.

It is really difficult moving forward, but I now realized that life is like that. You can’t stay trapped in the past and lock yourself from what was happening in reality. It will only pain you more if you refuse reality than to accept it head on.

But the price of moving on is letting go of what you love in the past. For me it was the life I had in college and the company of my friends. Slowly, as I move on, I see the divide I’m creating from my college friends. Whenever I visit them after work, I could see a barrier that sets me apart from them. They no longer treat me as a colleague, but someone older or something, I don’t know, something not like them.

Just last month I’m sharing laughs and sharing jokes with them, but now I usually stay silent and listen to them yapping what they did in school and me slowly not understanding what they were saying.

My friends say I was getting more mature every time they see me. I’m not sure if I could accept that as a complement or that I was immature when I was in college. Perhaps I value each day more than I was an undergrad.

Sometimes I still go back to the past and reminisce what happened during my college years. From entering UP Manila and meeting my first classmates to transferring in Diliman and changing my course. The times I spent in college were the most memorable, and I wouldn’t trade them up for anything.

During my coverage near the Manila Bay, I sat down near the polluted waters and took a deep look at my life. I began remembering the time I spent with my block mates at the bay and the time we went to Bataan for an unsuccessful research that left us stranded at that province for the night.

I remembered the first time I stepped to the College of Mass Communication to secretly file my application to transfer, but was found out when I met my old block mate, who shifted there a year before me, coincidentally as I was leaving the college.

I also remembered just last month when my orgmates and I went to Bacolod to teach high school students. It has been very memorable and I was able to strengthen my bonds with my friends and managed to create new ones at that.

It was fun remembering the blunders and the laughs we shared, and it also hurts because you will never experience the same thing again. Those memories of the past are meant to be in the past. I can no longer go back to them.

I regret that I would not be able to share the same talks with them or the same experience they have had. I wasn’t able to enjoy the company of those I had not been close to before. But I believe in the future, when they graduate and are working, the bond we shared would become stronger just like what is happening now with my high school friends.

So cheers for my first month in reality and let’s continue to move on.

facing the real world

I’ve been working at my job for almost a week, and things were getting better. I was able to contain my emotions better without the need for any crying or feeling sorry for myself. In fact, I was starting to look forward to my job instead of stressing if I’m about to mess something up.

Perhaps it was because I DID mess something up and was shouted at. But by doing that, the pressures were a bit lifted from my shoulders.

Perhaps it was the realizations that I’m already a college graduate and I need to get my ass of the ground and start seriously.

Perhaps I was getting the hang of the job and understood my place in the world.

Perhaps it was because my friends and family were right behind me.

I don’t know why, but I’m not feeling depressed anymore. I hated myself in the past few days for being weak, but I knew I had to do that to remove everything from my system.

I know that there will be times when I’ll be getting depressed again for the same reasons, but I believe I can overcome that now and face it head on

My mind is clearer now, and I’m ready to face the world.

Confused

November has come by and I don’t know what to do. Everything feels like a jumble inside. What should I feel, what am I feeling, or how should I feel. I don’t know.

This month marks my new life. I’m no longer a student and am now part of the real world. I’m scared of facing it because pressures keep piling up without any hint of stopping. All I can do is face it head on and never look back. But I tried and kept failing.

Just fresh out of college then instantly thrust into the professional world without any rest, I feel confined. I don’t know. I miss my friends and classmates. I never had the chance to say goodbye to them, or even relish the thought of just finishing school after eighteen years of studying. My plans of kicking back and taking slowly were shattered by having a job.

I planned to spend this month reflecting on what I should do the rest of my life, but it was suddenly taken away from me without a second thought. I was swept by the glamor that I agreed without thinking of the future. I thought it would be a “great” experience for my career, but for my emotional well-being, it was a train wreck.

I should be happy because these kinds of jobs do not go by often, but being swept with the flow and not taking into considerations my own feelings has made me depressed and confused.

I often cry for no reason, which I have never done before, and feel anxious whenever I wake up in the morning or sleep at night. I wanted to have someone to talk to, but all they do is cheer me on without understanding what I’m going through. It pains me whenever I look at their happy faces while I’m suffering from the shock of being a fresh graduate with a high pressure job. There’s no room inside to straighten it all.

I blindly call out to anyone who would listen to my story, but it falls to deaf ears. I try to stay strong and bottle it up, but it's bound to burst. Even though I was given plenty of advices from family and friends, it was only a temporary relief that would often leave me when I become alone. I tried and I tried to stay strong, but it always fails me when I needed it most.

I want to leave it all behind, to go somewhere far away so that I can understand what is happening inside me. To understand what I really want and do what I really wanted to do. To go someplace that doesn’t confine me to the pressures of reality, someplace safe and secure. But it can only be a dream. A dream I used to have every night, but can no longer have. Sleepless nights have replaced my sanctuary without giving me a speck of contentment.

How I wished time would turn back to the way it was before. Maybe if that happened, I could have said no and find my real self instead of blindly walking a purposeless path.

I really am scared. Please help me. I need someone to talk to. I need a friend.

Surprisingly interesting for someone with little interest in games

I never realized I would enjoy watching a basketball game on TV.

I watched the whole Celtics-Lakers finals on Friday, and despite my apathy regarding basketball, I still enjoyed it.

I'm not really an avid fan of shooting hoops since I'm more interested in rallying games like tennis/badminton, but seeing the energy from the finals-- especially the Laker's redemption on the bottom half of the game-- I had a change of heart.

It was different from your local PBA games. They put more of a show in each slam dunks and lay ups than what we have in all our games combined. There was passion and anticipation as to who will be the at the top of the game. Fans (my classmates) cheering for every score from their team only boosted the adrenalin rushing from just watching the game.

Intrigued by the finals, I did a research on the whole rivalry thing between the two teams, and found out that these two had been rivals since the 80s. From 1959 to 2010, Celtics and Lakers have clashed about 12 times, with Celtics leading nine games in total.

According to the article, the clash cooled down a bit in the 90s when these two team's best players retired, and Jordan from the Bulls became rose to prominence. But the rivalry came back in 2008 when Celtics bashed the Lakers with 131-92 in the final score of game six. Seeing that Lakers redeemed themselves this year, it will be another anticipated season once the two clashes again.

Seeing the finals had made me realize that I'm a Celtics fan despite Lakers' victory. I felt that the Lakers were very arrogant for their own good. While they do have the right to gloat, just like what Cobe did when he made a great shot during the third quarter, I just don't like their overconfidence.

During the game, I felt more passion from the Celtics than what I saw from the Lakers. The way each player planned their assault (even though their energy went down during the last few minutes of the game), I felt their conviction and aspiration to win the game. Of course, add that to what my classmates who were Celtics fan told me about the team.

Though it had been my first game watching an NBA finals,I had realized why many people watch this particular sport and why they prefer it more than the Philippine counterpart. And even if the team I picked had lost, there was no remorse since it was a great show, especially coming from someone who has little interest in basketball.

*Photos from PRlog.com