Deserving Ondoy

A year ago I rode a jeepney from North Fairview to Philcoa. As I was sitting all of a sudden the person beside me kicked the guys face in front of me afterwards shouting: “What now huh? What you gonna do?” The guy answered “What did I do to you?” turned out the guy who kicked the other guy has someone with him.

They were already shouting inside the jeepney until such time that the people inside told them to get down and settle their scores in another place.

I saw the three guys going down the jeep and at the instance of the jeepney speeding off I saw the lone guy being beaten by the two guys.

Forward to 2009 I was going to work and taking a ride in Philcoa when I saw three women fighting, the two going at a single girl, one holding a stick and hitting the head of the other girl while the other girl is holding the hair of the other.

Then three days ago in the MRT as I was about to board the train all of a sudden a guy suddenly pushed me in as if hurriedly he also took off his shirt while saying that its hot. He was at my back at that time when a guy came walking towards our direction and said “Hey give me back my celfone, brod don’t do what you’re doing!” at that the guy behind me retorted “Oh sorry brod I thought that the celfone is not yours I found it on the floor here take it”

The guy gave back the fone but was ostracized by the people inside the train saying that he’s a pickpocket and he should never be let out of the train. At that instant the guy just spewed out the same argument over and over again saying that he gave the celfone back and its a mistake.

In the end the guy got out but was escorted by a guard on the station where we stopped.

All these happened where other people were looking.  Where other people are almost there to help but wouldn’t and rather watch.

I asked the question if they would help to other people and they told me the same thing. They will not do anything.

1. Because the criminal might have other people around to help them.
2. The perpetrators might have some weapons with them.
3. Nobody knows the real reason why they are fighting.
4. They really just don’t want to meddle with them.
5. They would help only if the person asks for help.

In psychology one would call it “The diffusion of responsibility” and you can look it up in Google and there you’ll find a number of reasons why people do such things, but that is another story.

I’d like to direct your attention to the victims of typhoon Ondoy and Pepeng, In a blink of an eye the most wonderful rainy day of my life as I saw it that time turned out to be the most catastrophic and tragic to most of our countrymen.

At that we witnessed the deaths of hundreds and the loss of homes, stories of kins dying, of places literally drowning and loved ones disappearing. In all these we heard the hundreds and thousands of people helping in their own small way the victims of the typhoon, while the victims themselves ranting at the slow pace of help distributed by the government.

In a rather sad way to look at it indeed we lost lives but then we made rivers live again, where once it was a dumpster for the wastes of people living underneath bridges now they become what they are meant to be, bridges and not houses.

It was also around that time when we heard of people pointing at each other on whom to blame, whose fault is it that water raged on for a day and left the dry lands in murky mud and dead animals and men.

I have sympathy for them, the victims but I have more sympathy for nature which time and again we fail to heed its voice.

Until late I just protested trees being cut in katipunan, those trees who served as silent witnesses to students and professionals walking in the lowly highway perhaps looking for a drink, the MMDA cut them down as if these trees didn’t live older than them and their generation, they cut their branches and left them to rot. They did all of these in the middle of the night where everyone’s asleep, where people who loves trees would even tie themselves around the tree to protect it.

After a number of months and the onslaught of Ondoy there I look at katipunan where not a single car was spared, and as if it was a river the water raged on knowing that the end of its gigantic tree protectors have lost their losing battle and died a meanigless death.

I have sympathy to the poor who can’t afford houses and build themselves shanties amongst canals and ditches but I have more sympathy to the once flourishing river with the fishes that feed the hungry and could feed the poor, the thousands and millions of them, the river that can bathe the children a treasure waiting to be discovered, yes these poor people killed these rivers and made it deader than dead killing it more day by day.

I also have sympathy to the ones who died, but I have more sympathy to the one’s who died for a cause and with meaning, these victims blaming the government for its snail-like response and lack of foresight, where were they when people marched on the street crying for changes in the system? Crying for a better government that would make this country safer for each and everyone? Where were they when the disappeared and tortured kin of these marchers marched again looking for justice? Who are they to talk against the government telling it that its inutile only because they didn’t get what they want? Perhaps its different, these people died because of the climate and the other ones died because of their political Ideology, but arent they both just pushing for the same thing? A better country? A better response time for the government to address the issues and the corruption it represents?

They are dead and I’m sorry they are but the other ones who are fighting for the ones who died, died before them and they have most heartfelt sympathies.

I remember a story told by my friend one time when they were giving out food on a really flodded place, they only had with them enough food to give to the people and when their food were already gone the people threw mud and slippers at them, all because they couldn’t give them what they want. Thakfully he said their car was spared.

Another story goes where a church fed some refugees mongo and rice and the refugees threw the food because they want chicken and more meat. the priest was so angry he decided not to give them any more food.

A la salle student had her breast snatched intentionally while giving out food to the people.

The list goes on.

You help people who don’t want to help themselves and you got a people who’d only do something when they are the ones at the receiving end of disaster.

I now think theres’ really wisdom to what Jose Rizal ones’ said, “The people only get the government they deserve.”

And if you sum it all up with the three stories I mentioned earlier “People will only do something when they are the ones at risk otherwise look at the above five reasons”.

I am also afraid that there will also come a time when I will just not give a damn anymore, unless perhaps you share the same sentiments.

(photo courtesy of my good friend Toffy Ilagan)

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