ACCENTS
Again, I’m leaving on a jet plane (2)
(Continued from last Friday’s column)
The “sensational” Filipinos in cruise ship SENSATION
Si Ronaldo, Josito, Michael, Meryzel, Eva, Aida, atbp.—they are the Filipinos in the staff of the cruise ship SENSATION. They are the Overseas Filipino Workers, the OFWs, the abbreviation that has become a by-word in the Filipino household. They make up the nearly 300-strong Pinoys employed in the ship… The kababayans made our vacation extra enjoyable by giving us the feeling of being in the beloved country.
They are the modern-day heroes of our time, the Bagong Bayani that former Pres. Fidel Ramos had so extolled. They count among the 9 million OFWs spread all over the world whose monthly remittances prop up the country’s economy. OFW remittances in 2008 alone totaled $16.4 billion. Cut that and the Philippine economy would scuttle in the doghouse.
Longing for Boracay in Nassau
From the Nassau harbor, we boarded a motor-powered catamaran to Blackbeard Beach, one of Nassau’s surrounding islands. It was a 25-minute voyage through gentle waves, gentle sea breeze, and bright sky—much like the ride from Caticlan to Boracay on a summer day. Ah, Boracay—the Philippines’ own acclaimed beach resort—Boracay of the crystal-clear water and powdery white sand…
A vendor had a table full of shells and corals. Should we buy one? Buying will encourage native divers to forage into the Bahamas’ coral reefs to the destruction of the environment. Walking back to the catamaran, we were tempted to pick up a keepsake. A stone beautifully encrusted with the remains of oyster shells was enticing for a souvenir, but we left it to dry on the shore. Remember the oft-repeated rule: Take nothing but pictures, leave nothing but footprints.
Conversing with an astronaut at the Kennedy Space Center
Speaking in 1962, Pres. John F. Kennedy affirmed that Man will be on the Moon before the end of the 1960’s. “It will be done. And it will be done before the end of this decade.” An assassin’s bullet in 1963 prevented him from seeing his prediction come true: Neil Armstrong landed on the Moon on July 20, 1969. A portion of Kennedy’s inspiring speech runs thus: “…[T]he moon and the planets are there, and new hopes for knowledge and peace are there. And, therefore, as we set sail we ask God’s blessing on the most hazardous and dangerous and greatest adventure on which man has ever embarked.”
With space explorations unstoppable and mankind’s thirst for knowledge unquenchable, it won’t be long when Frank Sinatra’s love song of the 1960’s would be real for you and me; if not in our time, eventually in the coming generations: “Fly me to the moon and let me play among the stars…Let me see what life is like in Jupiter and Mars…”
Welcome, Soldier! to my cousin in the US military
“Have you ever killed an enemy,” I asked Taboy who did not answer. Perhaps a tactless question, but the journalist in me prods to ask. In fact I wanted to ask more questions. He knew he has a peacenik cousin here who would forever protest against war and all forms of violence—believing only in the power of words to effect change through a peaceful dialogue.
In the enviable comfort of a retiree, Taboy would have his own thoughts distinct from what his cousin here views as US imperialistic policies that disregard the doctrine of manifest destiny, i.e., the people must decide their own fate, solve their own internal problems, chart the course of their own government however Third-Worldish and small their country is. Oppression can only go so far because a people can take only so much. A people’s meek endurance under the yoke of a dictatorship is not forever. Something has gotta give. Eventually, dictators get their day of reckoning as bear witness this long line of infamous characters: Pinochet of Argentina, Somoza of Nicaragua, Batista of Cuba, the Shah of Iran, Ceaucescu of Romania, Idi Amin of Nigeria, Duvalier of Haiti, and of course, Marcos of the Philippines. (To be continued)
(Email: lagoc@hargray.com)