We remain the laughingstock of the world and the Dutertes and Marcoses and the Arroyos are the clowns who manipulate the Filipinos to perpetuate their greed. What I am worried about is the complacency of the opposition as they remain in their echo chambers, thinking that the echoes are the vox populi. Not so. Talk to the street vendors, the farmers, the fishermen, the vegetable sellers in the urban and rural places. They are voting for Marcos as they lap up all the propaganda crap that radio and GMA Network have been propagating. They do not have access to Internet; if they do, they can’t spend precious pesos on data. They don’t own smart phones; if they do, they may not have the cellular signal for internet. The C, D, E markets comprise the bulk of the electorate. A-B markets are just the small percentage and we often do not reach out to the grassroots.
The fight is in the grassroots.
I finally have the butane grill that I’ve been hanging on to on Lazada. Bought during the 11.11 sale. Photo by CalMeCreation.com
I no longer have to buy and use charcoal. I’ve been polluting my neighbors’ houses for so long. Whoppeee! And it’s easier to cook. No need to spend 30 mins to an hour trying to keep the embers going.
Giant Monterey beef patties. Photo by CallMeCreation.com
To cope with the unsavory news stories that keep popping up on my newsfeeds (and I really can’t tune out because I am a journalist), I indulged again and cooked a nice dinner for all of us. The burgers were juicy and nicely smoked.
Grilled salmon. Photo by CallMeCreation.com
The burgers were for the girls and Ate C. Mine was a small salmon steak with mashed potato and basil.
It’s easy to disassemble for cleaning. It packs away nicely so this is perfect for camping, together with the other portable stove that I first bought from Sarang Mart. It’s nice to grill chicken, hotdogs and marshmallows here while outside the tent as the sun goes down. I found another camping site where we could go, probably by January or February when it’s cooler and not rainy.
The Bloc Campsite, Cavinti, Laguna. Photo from Tripadvisor.comThe BLOC.Photo from Tripadvisor.com
To cope with the negativity around me, I must do the things that I love. Travel and be with nature. Simple wants and simple needs.
Duterte and his administration are really afraid of women. For all his misogynistic attitude towards women, deep down he is really scared of us. Look at those who rose up against him: VP Leni Robredo, Sen. Leila de Lima (jailed), Hidilyn Diaz (harassed by government), and Maria Ressa, Nobel Peace Prize laureate.
He loves to harass and belittle female journalists. It is a scary time to be a journalist in this country. We had been a hotspot for journalist killings for years now (we were the most dangerous place for a journalist next to Iraq for quite some time now) but it has heightened during the reign of Duterte. I am glad I no longer have to report national news and suffer through his Q&A, press conferences with Harry Roque, or even monitor Duterte’s late night ramblings.
“Many Philippine presidents have attacked the press, but only Rodrigo Duterte, of all the presidents, have publicly subscribed to the idea that journalists are fair game for murder,” Varona says.
Because of the dangers we are facing with Duterte’s rise to power, some veterans in the industry like Howie Severino, Glenda Gloria, and Sheila Coronel, called us to a meeting in a secluded restaurant in Quezon City just to talk about forming a guild so that we can protect ourselves and fight back. Sadly, nothing happened after that initial meeting because we were just too damn busy trying to survive our day-to-day work of churning out stories. This was the week I got brutally attacked by government-backed online trolls that even harassed my office in Hong Kong.
I had issues with Maria Ressa and I won’t list them down here and those who had been in the industry long enough know what those are. But I admire her grit and determination to fight this tyrant single-handedly. I had marched alongside them wearing black when they had the march for press freedom in UP.
Since day one of becoming a journalist–since I co-wrote that series on juvenile justice–I knew that every time I publish a story, I have one foot on my grave. I had been threatened with lawsuits before and I had been scared but I pushed on. Being a journalist during the time of Duterte, even if you are not covering him, is a doubly dangerous job. I was told that a powerful government official does not like me because I am vocal about my anti-Duterte stance. And he scolded me and lost his cool on national TV when I was hosting a forum where he was a guest. I was asking a fair question that everyone needed to ask. It was scary but I had to keep my composure. I was told he and other officials boycotted the forum the following year because of me.
I had friends in Reuters publicly lynched by the mob, having their IDs, photos and personal information posted on the Internet, with trolls encouraging the public to inflict physical harm on them and their families. (Upon investigation by some of my other journo friends, my Reuters friends’ personal information was leaked from their records with the National Bureau of Investigation–information that they got whenever we needed clearance to apply for visas or passports). In a country where life is very cheap (you can have somebody killed for only PHP 5,000), those are not empty threats. Their employer had to take them and their families to safehouses until the storm died down. I was so distraught that time that I had to take a break from the Philippines and went to a place where no one spoke English–Taiwan–and took a breather to collect myself for a week. I just didn’t want news from the Philippines and I just had to be away immediately.
But Maria Ressa had to endure conviction, harassment, bankruptcy, and daily mental torture and yet she plodded on. She had to wear bullet-proof vests whenever she goes out. Because it’s no secret Duterte wants her dead.
This administration has demonized us. It’s in every dictator’s playbook–demonize every journalist and create your own propaganda machine and feed your shit to the public that has lost trust on the media. Now you all have this revisionism going on and conspiracy theories that make the maleducated poor believe the lies.
Journalists in South America face drug cartels and the corrupt government officials in cahoots with them, we in Southeast Asia battle despots like Duterte and the Marcoses. Journalists in Russia, China (in HK, that is), and the Philippines face the same thing.
My daughter expressed her interest in becoming a journalist. I told her, anak, you can become whatever you want but I hope you don’t follow my footsteps. You will be penniless and you will get killed.
Duterte’s camp is really making a mockery of the electoral process. They fielded a clown to run for president alongside another clown, Bong Go, as vice president. Because you know what they will do? The last minute, they will do a substitution, with Sara Duterte running as president with her demon of a father as VP. They will make so much drama out of it, and the script would be like “people are clamoring for us to run so we will be making the ultimate sacrifice so we will, for the country.” And all of the DDS would be all applause.
OR
At the last moment, they will make a substitution, Sara Duterte will run alongside Bong-bong Marcos as his VP. If her ego can take it.
They have done it in 2016, they will do it again.
God save our country from idiots.
It has been two months since I last been in UP campus to buy vegetables and milktea for my kids.
In front of Bahay ng Alumni, UP Diliman. Photo by CallMeCreation.com
Prices have gone up. I could feel the rising inflation month-on-month and the problem is this is a supply-side issue that cannot be addressed by monetary policy alone. It is structural that requires some fixes in the real economy.
Anyway, after the veggies and the milktea, I went to Sarang Mart because I am running out of shampoo. Even before J came, I had been buying shampoos and side dishes in that Korean grocery store. I had been using either Korean on Japanese shampoos (Japanese Lux or Shisheido) for several years now even if they’re more expensive initially but they do last a long time. I remember in my last trip to Japan, I lugged several shampoo bottles of Lux back home because it was way cheaper compared to anything I saw in Singapore and even in HK. Then I found Lux in SM, which was much more expensive than the Korean Kerastase sold in Sarang Mart but a lot cheaper than Lux in Singapore (which I often bring back home whenever I have to report for work there).
So I had to replenish my stock. Bought Korean curry (which my girls liked), dried seaweed, dried kelp (which I use as kombu in some Japanese dishes), beef strips for hotpot, mandu, side dishes, furikake, ramyun, and I no longer remember what else i chucked in my basket.
Photo by CallMeCreation.comPhoto by CallMeCreation.com
When I was going back to my car, I lost my balance, sprained my ankle, grazed my foot on the pavement (was wearing slippers), and fell flat on my back. I didn’t realize that I was that exhausted with my short trip to buy foodstuff.
I am NOT yet ok. I’m still sick with Covid symptoms, mainly fatigue, even though I am no longer infectious and I can function somewhat normally. I still easily get tired and right now my head is aching. I woke up this morning coughing and wondered whether this was still Covid or allergy.
