To the one I love,
What if on Valentine ’s Day, everyone becomes blind and all roses suddenly lose their scent? How can I let you know that I love you aside from saying the words? How can I possibly touch your heart if you can never see the roses I am giving you? How can I find that beautiful rose if all I can see is darkness? What would happen to my dreams of leaving red and white roses on your bed so that you’d dream romantic dreams when you go to sleep? What would happen to my dreams of surprising you with a romantic shower of rose petals?
In the dark, in our blindness, there will be no romantic sunsets for us to behold. No majestic mountains and pristine seas for us to view. No candlelight to glow and glimmer between two dining lovers. No glistening stars for us to look up to in the serenity of the night. So where will I take you?
I’ll take you to a place where the cold wind blows. Be it a place where beautiful trees stand with utmost grandeur amidst a sea of shimmering green meadows, or a bleak, dry valley devoid of beauty and vegetation. For it will not matter what we shall see. Only what we shall feel. The wind’s hissing shall be the bright, blinding glare of sunlight. The gust, the blow of the wind, the stirring of the strands of our windblown hair, the tingling of our senses as the chillingly cool wind pricks our skin, they shall all be the sun rays that shower us with warmth. And when the wind seems to run out of breath, when its furious hissing becomes a soft, soothing murmur, that will be our romantic sunset. Maybe it won’t be as romantic as the breathtaking sunsets we have already seen in our lives. But what better thing can we have? What else can I offer you to make you feel the intensity of our romance? If I can’t offer you visual splendor, I’ll offer you the best I can. I’ll offer you the splendor of a beautiful feeling. If we can’t see the beauty around us, why can’t we just opt to feel all the beauty we failed to feel deeply enough because we were too busy seeing?
Come to think of it, my love. There must have been a time when no one saw the romance in sunsets. But we learned. Everyone learned to believe that there is romance in beauty. And that a beautiful sunset is a romantic sunset. So believe me, we shall also learn. We shall learn to feel the romance in each beautiful feeling. We will learn to feel romantic when we feel the wind. And let us begin the learning today. So we can start feeling the sweetness today.
As a gift, I can not give you roses. But I will give you the rain. When I hear the rain pouring, when the raindrops begin to knock on our roofs, I’ll know that my spring has come. So I’ll take you outside. And we’ll feel the coldness together. We’ll embrace and feel the countless raindrops slithering between my skin and yours. I know there won’t be a pleasant scent for us to relish. But at least we’ll have something intense and pleasant to feel. We’ll feel each other shiver. And that shiver, that little manifestation of a quiet inner suffering, that will be the assurance that this gift comes from the heart.
As for my dreams of showering you with rose petals, I will never give that up. Though blind, though handicapped, I will search the ground for every light little thing that can fly and flutter in midair, little things that will feel like rose petals when they fall on you. Be they merely torn paper, leaves or plastic garbage. And when I have gathered enough, I will throw them all up. So they can fall upon the two of us. Just like rose petals. And as they fall, I’ll hold your hand and we shall reminisce. We shall imagine. We shall believe that these light, little things are red and beautiful. For when our eyes can no longer see, we’ll see through our memories.
Memories. They are what can turn the ugly beautiful, the despicable endearing, and the painful soothing. One day we’ll find ourselves walking along the banks of a stinking, polluted river. But because that river is the same river we saw together each day as we went home, we’ll stop to relish the river’s putrid smell. Because that smell, no matter how offensive, will flood our minds with beautiful memories. Beautiful images that we shall never see again. One night, the hounds will shatter the night’s tranquility with their howls. But we shall not be disturbed. We shall not be angered by those maddening sounds. Because through the howling hounds, we’ll know that the moon and the stars are up there, glowing, glistening, existing. One night, we’ll find ourselves standing dangerously close to a fire. We shall not see its light. But we shall feel its warmth. The same warmth that shall remind us of the romantic candlelight and the glorious bonfires we stared at quietly on the countless nostalgic nights of our past. And because we’ll want to feel more, to remember more of the romantic past, we’ll extend our hands towards that warmth. And we’ll let the fire burn our palms until we could no longer bear the pain. Yes, it shall be painful. But can anyone blame us for wanting to feel this much?
One day, perhaps, in my search for light, little things that feel like rose petals; I’ll find a priceless treasure on the ground. As I try to pick up something, I’ll be pricked by the thing’s thorns. Because it is a real rose. And I will rejoice because of that miracle. In my joy I’ll grip the flower’s stem tightly, letting the thorns pierce my skin until the blood flows out. And as soon as I find you, I’ll hand you my gift. A rose in the dark. Incredulous, you will hesitate to reach for it. But because you love me, you’ll touch my hand, and feel the blood that drenches it. The same blood that had come out of the wounds caused by the rose. The same blood that proves to you that I have a real rose in my hand. The same blood that lets you know how much I love you. Then, reluctantly, you’ll touch the soft petals, and then slide your hand to the thorny stem, gripping it, letting your palm bleed as much as mine does. Letting your blood fuse with mine as it drips down the flower’s stem, and then down to your arms. We’ll bleed, feel each other bleed and find bliss in each other’s bleeding. We will grip the stem even more tightly, let the blood flow out more profusely. And then we’ll suffer, we’ll cry and find bliss in each other’s weeping. In another life, such pleasure would have been deemed sick. But can anyone blame us for wanting to feel this much? Can anyone stop us from loving this much? From being this passionate? For hurting ourselves this much because the pain brings back ethereally beautiful memories? Because this is the only way to feel our love at its deepest? As we cry, we shall embrace. And not care how much pain we have to bear, or inflict on each other, just to experience this much love.
Sometimes, for love to be truly passionate, the lovers will have to suffer and bleed.
Friday, February 27, 2009
Friday, February 20, 2009
When The Truth Becomes Irrelevant
The night sky is taunting me. It offers me a spectacle of a million sparkling stars and one beautifully luminescent moon. And quietly it asks me, all this beauty, all these marvels, were they created by one divine God?
As I ponder the question, as I stand here beneath the mottled sheath of darkness that is the night sky, my gaze shifts from the unreachable stars to the humble ground. And there, lying amidst the dirt and the weeds are a few rocks the size of my fist. Just seeing them, I already know that they are hard. But how? How can I be so sure that all such rocks are hard? Someday, will it be possible for me to see something that looks like one of these rocks but is not hard? Maybe. But so far, I’ve already seen thousands, perhaps millions of rocks in my life and all of them were hard. Is it wrong for me to expect that all rock-like things are hard? If I see a rock being hurled at me, should I remain standing where I am and believe that the rock is soft because I have no proof that all rock-looking things are hard? See, in my mind, I have already created a model of how the world works, and in that model, all rocks are hard. Can that model fail someday? Perhaps. But while it is not failing, should I assume that my model, my understanding of the world is wrong? Should I just live my life without a mental model of how the world works? Should I just make every observation, every step in my life, without any expectations (both the right and the wrong ones) of what’s about to happen next? Should I just keep walking calmly while all the possibly hard rocks are being thrown at me?
Suddenly, a car’s bright headlights flash from behind me. And before the driver can blow its horn and shatter the night’s romantic serenity, I move out of the vehicle’s way. I stay out of the way? Why? Because if I don’t, the damn car will run over me. How do I know that? Have I ever seen a man actually being run over by a car? No. Have I seen animals being flattened by trucks? Yes. Why do I expect that the same thing that happened to dogs and cats can also happen to me? Because according to my understanding of the world—my model—humans are just as vulnerable as their lowly animal counterparts. Can my model fail someday? Yes. If I am insane, or if I am merely dreaming, that car can not kill me. If that thing with a headlight is not really a car but a hologram, my model fails and that thing can never flatten me. But should I go on crossing the street mindlessly each day, believing that not a single one of the speeding cars can kill me?
Which makes me wonder how man discovered fire. When one ancient man first observed that rocks produced a spark, what could have driven him to keep scratching more rocks? What could have prompted him to believe that the sparks could possibly produce fire? While he kept scratching those rocks against each other, did he have absolute proof that the rock’s spark could produce fire? I doubt. Proof, he had none. But he certainly had a rough model of how things in the world work, a model that had been based on countless observations—which must have included his observations on how lightning produced fire upon striking the ground. And based on that model—which must have been flawed given his limited knowledge—he acted, until he produced the miracle of fire. Was it wrong for him to believe in his flawed model? Should he be called a fool for having faith in something he wasn’t sure about?
Why did man ever decide to trust reason? When one of the earliest hunters, was in the forest, observing the wild animals, figuring how they behaved, figuring how they could be captured, did he have absolute proof that his mind had the capacity to model the lives and behavior of these creatures? No. Was he wrong in trusting his mind? Should he have just believed that the world followed no definite order? Should he have just counted on luck for his fate? When humans began to think critically, did they have absolute proof that critical thinking would be more practical than depending on pure luck? No. Should they have stopped thinking critically early on? Was it wrong for them to have faith in the capacity of their minds? Was it wrong for them to have faith in Reason? No matter what they say about the impracticality of faith, one thing can never be denied: the light of reason began to exist only through the spark of faith.
It’s easy to predict that rocks are hard when you’ve proven to yourself that all the rocks you’ve seen are hard. It’s also easy to trust your mind and Reason when all your life you’ve benefited from them. But what if you find yourself in a situation wherein you have to predict the outcome of something you have never observed before?
I imagine myself walking in the dark. Alone. Or so I think until I hear the voice of the woman I love. She seems to be from afar, for the sound of her voice creates an eerie echo. She tells me that she knows where exactly I am, even though we are both in the dark. She warns that there are murderous men not far behind me and they are about to kill me as soon as they catch up with me. But, unfortunately, she says, I cannot run. Because ahead of me, between where I am and where she stands, is a cliff. She tells me that I may be strong enough to leap across the cliff and the men behind me are not. I, on the other hand, consider fighting the murderous men in the dark. Can I successfully leap in the dark across that cliff? Or am I better off repeatedly unleashing punches—stabs—in the dark until I get rid of all those murderous men? While I go on thinking, there is a truth that eludes me. Is it better to leap or to fight? But in this kind of situation, the truth is impossible to know until I decide to fight or jump. And in this situation, when the truth is impossible to know, the truth becomes irrelevant. Because I don’t have to wait to know the truth before I act. The best thing I can do is to either leap or stab in the dark.
I wonder how terrible the ordeal of the first farmer was. When he decided to till the land, to spend several months nurturing his crops, did he ever fear that the crops may all die before they could be harvested? Did he ever fear that a storm or a tornado may suddenly wipe out his crops? That he could have been better off, spending most of his time hunting instead of farming? Of course he did. But could he know when the storm will strike? And since it is his first time to farm, can he know if the land is fertile enough? No. And when he’s about to sleep at night, when he was seeing in his mind images of his wife and children starving after his failure with the farm, what could he do to avoid that nightmare? What could he do, given his limited knowledge, to protect his farm from the ruthless forces of nature? He could take a leap in the dark. And then hope that it would work. He could pray.
Often, the prayer has been regarded by intellectuals as a monument to man’s failure to take control of his fate. The prayer—a plea for God to intervene—is often viewed as a symbol of human weakness. But in reality, the first prayer was a milestone on the road to science. It was a glaring proof that humans deeply understood the world they were moving in. Because when humans began to pray, that was when they fully acknowledged that the universe followed a definite order and that by aligning their acts with this order, they could bend up benefiting from it.
Today, I still cannot prove that those stars, that moon and that sky were created by a divine God. But I do know that when I go to sleep, I want to be safe. When my loved ones are asleep, I want them to be just as safe. When I wake up tomorrow, I’d still want to see the faces of the people I love. And if ever they are taken from me, here should be a good reason for it—a reason that will ultimately be beneficial for them. How do I make sure that all my loved ones shall be safe? That if we suffer, our suffering would be for something good? The truth is, I can never be sure. That’s why I take a stab in the dark each night. I pray. Should I be deemed a fool for doing that? Should everyone think me weak?
A lot of things have happened in my life. Some are good, some horrible. Do they make sense? Yes. But only if I include God in my mental model of the world. Can my mental model of the world fail someday? Maybe. Is it possible that I may be wrong in believing in God? Yes. But until my model fails, until my faith is proven wrong and dysfunctional, should I go on living without a mental model of the universe’s order? Should I go on living without believing anything unproven? Should I go on living believing that nothing that happened in my life makes sense?
I am not saying that we should all believe in God. But if I do believe in a God I never saw, I still deserve respect for it. There is nothing irrational about that. As long as my belief does not compromise the welfare of another human being, I have the right to stick to my faith.
Going back to the scenario I mentioned earlier, the one in which I am supposed to choose between leaping and fighting the murderous men in the dark, if I happen to be walking alongside another man in that same scenario, and we make different decisions; I to leap in the dark and he to fight; should I respect the other men for his decision? Of course, I should. And in the same way, I respect all atheists, agnostics and believers of faiths other than my own.
Now, say we both decide to jump and I’m the one who goes first. And then after a while, the other man hears me screaming as I plummet to my death, hence proving to him that the cliff is too wide for a man to leap across successfully, should the second man also leap in the dark? If he jumps even after hearing my screams, his act will not be one of faith but of stupid fanaticism. In the same way, when clerics believed that the earth was the center of the universe even though Nicolus Copernicus and Galileo Galilei had presented sufficient evidence proving otherwise, the clerics’ act was not one of faith but of stupid, closed-minded fanaticism. When supposedly holy men stubbornly believe that the universe was created in six days and biological evolution never occurred, even though sufficient evidence says otherwise, theirs is not an act of faith but an act of stupidity.
On the other hand, if we make our decisions simultaneously, and I happen to die after jumping while the other lives on after courageously taking a stand against the assailants? Does that make me a fool? Does that make him the wiser man? What if I live and he dies? Should I be deemed wiser for surviving? Or should I just be dismissed as the lucky one. Truth is, wisdom alone cannot guarantee that one’s decisions would be correct. Maybe my belief in God is right. But in this case, being right does not prove me wiser than any atheist. Maybe the atheists are correct in believing that there is no God. But being correct alone does not make them wiser than believers like me.
I believe in God. Which means that I already took a leap in the dark. The leap hasn’t ended yet, though. For the truth hasn’t fully revealed itself to me yet. I am still airborne, hoping that I will land somewhere safe. Will I plummet to death? Maybe. But even if that happens, it will happen not because I’m a fool.
I will only fall because I am human.
As I ponder the question, as I stand here beneath the mottled sheath of darkness that is the night sky, my gaze shifts from the unreachable stars to the humble ground. And there, lying amidst the dirt and the weeds are a few rocks the size of my fist. Just seeing them, I already know that they are hard. But how? How can I be so sure that all such rocks are hard? Someday, will it be possible for me to see something that looks like one of these rocks but is not hard? Maybe. But so far, I’ve already seen thousands, perhaps millions of rocks in my life and all of them were hard. Is it wrong for me to expect that all rock-like things are hard? If I see a rock being hurled at me, should I remain standing where I am and believe that the rock is soft because I have no proof that all rock-looking things are hard? See, in my mind, I have already created a model of how the world works, and in that model, all rocks are hard. Can that model fail someday? Perhaps. But while it is not failing, should I assume that my model, my understanding of the world is wrong? Should I just live my life without a mental model of how the world works? Should I just make every observation, every step in my life, without any expectations (both the right and the wrong ones) of what’s about to happen next? Should I just keep walking calmly while all the possibly hard rocks are being thrown at me?
Suddenly, a car’s bright headlights flash from behind me. And before the driver can blow its horn and shatter the night’s romantic serenity, I move out of the vehicle’s way. I stay out of the way? Why? Because if I don’t, the damn car will run over me. How do I know that? Have I ever seen a man actually being run over by a car? No. Have I seen animals being flattened by trucks? Yes. Why do I expect that the same thing that happened to dogs and cats can also happen to me? Because according to my understanding of the world—my model—humans are just as vulnerable as their lowly animal counterparts. Can my model fail someday? Yes. If I am insane, or if I am merely dreaming, that car can not kill me. If that thing with a headlight is not really a car but a hologram, my model fails and that thing can never flatten me. But should I go on crossing the street mindlessly each day, believing that not a single one of the speeding cars can kill me?
Which makes me wonder how man discovered fire. When one ancient man first observed that rocks produced a spark, what could have driven him to keep scratching more rocks? What could have prompted him to believe that the sparks could possibly produce fire? While he kept scratching those rocks against each other, did he have absolute proof that the rock’s spark could produce fire? I doubt. Proof, he had none. But he certainly had a rough model of how things in the world work, a model that had been based on countless observations—which must have included his observations on how lightning produced fire upon striking the ground. And based on that model—which must have been flawed given his limited knowledge—he acted, until he produced the miracle of fire. Was it wrong for him to believe in his flawed model? Should he be called a fool for having faith in something he wasn’t sure about?
Why did man ever decide to trust reason? When one of the earliest hunters, was in the forest, observing the wild animals, figuring how they behaved, figuring how they could be captured, did he have absolute proof that his mind had the capacity to model the lives and behavior of these creatures? No. Was he wrong in trusting his mind? Should he have just believed that the world followed no definite order? Should he have just counted on luck for his fate? When humans began to think critically, did they have absolute proof that critical thinking would be more practical than depending on pure luck? No. Should they have stopped thinking critically early on? Was it wrong for them to have faith in the capacity of their minds? Was it wrong for them to have faith in Reason? No matter what they say about the impracticality of faith, one thing can never be denied: the light of reason began to exist only through the spark of faith.
It’s easy to predict that rocks are hard when you’ve proven to yourself that all the rocks you’ve seen are hard. It’s also easy to trust your mind and Reason when all your life you’ve benefited from them. But what if you find yourself in a situation wherein you have to predict the outcome of something you have never observed before?
I imagine myself walking in the dark. Alone. Or so I think until I hear the voice of the woman I love. She seems to be from afar, for the sound of her voice creates an eerie echo. She tells me that she knows where exactly I am, even though we are both in the dark. She warns that there are murderous men not far behind me and they are about to kill me as soon as they catch up with me. But, unfortunately, she says, I cannot run. Because ahead of me, between where I am and where she stands, is a cliff. She tells me that I may be strong enough to leap across the cliff and the men behind me are not. I, on the other hand, consider fighting the murderous men in the dark. Can I successfully leap in the dark across that cliff? Or am I better off repeatedly unleashing punches—stabs—in the dark until I get rid of all those murderous men? While I go on thinking, there is a truth that eludes me. Is it better to leap or to fight? But in this kind of situation, the truth is impossible to know until I decide to fight or jump. And in this situation, when the truth is impossible to know, the truth becomes irrelevant. Because I don’t have to wait to know the truth before I act. The best thing I can do is to either leap or stab in the dark.
I wonder how terrible the ordeal of the first farmer was. When he decided to till the land, to spend several months nurturing his crops, did he ever fear that the crops may all die before they could be harvested? Did he ever fear that a storm or a tornado may suddenly wipe out his crops? That he could have been better off, spending most of his time hunting instead of farming? Of course he did. But could he know when the storm will strike? And since it is his first time to farm, can he know if the land is fertile enough? No. And when he’s about to sleep at night, when he was seeing in his mind images of his wife and children starving after his failure with the farm, what could he do to avoid that nightmare? What could he do, given his limited knowledge, to protect his farm from the ruthless forces of nature? He could take a leap in the dark. And then hope that it would work. He could pray.
Often, the prayer has been regarded by intellectuals as a monument to man’s failure to take control of his fate. The prayer—a plea for God to intervene—is often viewed as a symbol of human weakness. But in reality, the first prayer was a milestone on the road to science. It was a glaring proof that humans deeply understood the world they were moving in. Because when humans began to pray, that was when they fully acknowledged that the universe followed a definite order and that by aligning their acts with this order, they could bend up benefiting from it.
Today, I still cannot prove that those stars, that moon and that sky were created by a divine God. But I do know that when I go to sleep, I want to be safe. When my loved ones are asleep, I want them to be just as safe. When I wake up tomorrow, I’d still want to see the faces of the people I love. And if ever they are taken from me, here should be a good reason for it—a reason that will ultimately be beneficial for them. How do I make sure that all my loved ones shall be safe? That if we suffer, our suffering would be for something good? The truth is, I can never be sure. That’s why I take a stab in the dark each night. I pray. Should I be deemed a fool for doing that? Should everyone think me weak?
A lot of things have happened in my life. Some are good, some horrible. Do they make sense? Yes. But only if I include God in my mental model of the world. Can my mental model of the world fail someday? Maybe. Is it possible that I may be wrong in believing in God? Yes. But until my model fails, until my faith is proven wrong and dysfunctional, should I go on living without a mental model of the universe’s order? Should I go on living without believing anything unproven? Should I go on living believing that nothing that happened in my life makes sense?
I am not saying that we should all believe in God. But if I do believe in a God I never saw, I still deserve respect for it. There is nothing irrational about that. As long as my belief does not compromise the welfare of another human being, I have the right to stick to my faith.
Going back to the scenario I mentioned earlier, the one in which I am supposed to choose between leaping and fighting the murderous men in the dark, if I happen to be walking alongside another man in that same scenario, and we make different decisions; I to leap in the dark and he to fight; should I respect the other men for his decision? Of course, I should. And in the same way, I respect all atheists, agnostics and believers of faiths other than my own.
Now, say we both decide to jump and I’m the one who goes first. And then after a while, the other man hears me screaming as I plummet to my death, hence proving to him that the cliff is too wide for a man to leap across successfully, should the second man also leap in the dark? If he jumps even after hearing my screams, his act will not be one of faith but of stupid fanaticism. In the same way, when clerics believed that the earth was the center of the universe even though Nicolus Copernicus and Galileo Galilei had presented sufficient evidence proving otherwise, the clerics’ act was not one of faith but of stupid, closed-minded fanaticism. When supposedly holy men stubbornly believe that the universe was created in six days and biological evolution never occurred, even though sufficient evidence says otherwise, theirs is not an act of faith but an act of stupidity.
On the other hand, if we make our decisions simultaneously, and I happen to die after jumping while the other lives on after courageously taking a stand against the assailants? Does that make me a fool? Does that make him the wiser man? What if I live and he dies? Should I be deemed wiser for surviving? Or should I just be dismissed as the lucky one. Truth is, wisdom alone cannot guarantee that one’s decisions would be correct. Maybe my belief in God is right. But in this case, being right does not prove me wiser than any atheist. Maybe the atheists are correct in believing that there is no God. But being correct alone does not make them wiser than believers like me.
I believe in God. Which means that I already took a leap in the dark. The leap hasn’t ended yet, though. For the truth hasn’t fully revealed itself to me yet. I am still airborne, hoping that I will land somewhere safe. Will I plummet to death? Maybe. But even if that happens, it will happen not because I’m a fool.
I will only fall because I am human.
The Death of Dreams, The Birth of Nightmares
The future is only as beautiful as the dreams of today’s children. All the comforts we relish today, all the freedoms we enjoy, all the wonderful technologies that keep us alive and driven to move farther forward, they are all legacies of the children who dared to dream big long before were born. And whatever beautiful breakthroughs shall be here tomorrow only depends on what today’s generation can come up with.
When I see pictures of Rome, Athens and the pyramids of Egypt, I can’t help but think of the dreams had by the children who grew up to build those cities and structures. When I see pictures of the New York Skyline, I think of the impoverished European immigrants who sailed across the Atlantic hundreds of years ago, most of them carrying nothing with them but their dreams and their promising children. When I see pictures of the Great Wall, the remarkable Chinese architecture and calligraphy, and the elegant clothes worn by the Chinese as early as 2,000 years ago, I think of the ancient Chinese children who dreamed of refining their own culture. When I see the filth of the Philippines, the beggars on Manila’s stinking streets, the murky waters of the Pasig River, the anarchic way by which illegal vendors occupy the two lanes of Commonwealth Avenue at night (until the Metro Manila Development Authority acted on the matter), the sewers that are always clogged, the coverless manholes, the potholed roads, the agony of commuting when the streets are flooded, the garbage on the streets, the garbage on the escalator steps of the MRT (Metropolital Rail Transit) Ayala station (which reveal that even the highly educated professionals in the country’s central business district have the shamelessness to throw away their trash anywhere), animal carcasses flattened in the middle of highways, the shanties under the bridges, and the 10 to 20 children who cram themselves in one small tricycle just to get a cheap ride to school everyday, I can’t help but think of the beautiful dreams the ancient Filipino children never had.
Albert Einstein taught himself calculus at the age of 12. That must have been in 1891. And in that year, how many Filipino twelve-year-olds were dreaming Einstein’s dreams? I doubt if any of them even heard the term calculus. If the legend is true, the legendary apple must have fallen from a tree and onto Isaac Newton’s head sometime in the 1660’s , when the man responsible for the Laws of Motion, Calculus, Universal Law of Gravitation and the Particle Theory of Light was still in his early twenties. In that period, how many twenty-something Filipinos had heard of Johannes Kepler, Nicolus Copernicus and Galileo Galilei –the giants on whose shoulders Isaac Newton stood? In the 19th century, when the likes of Thomas Edison and James Watt were dreaming of marvelous inventions, how many Filipino children were familiar with the concept of invention? Since that was a time when there were no public schools in the country, zero should be a safe answer. From 1521—the year in which the Spaniards supposedly discovered the Philippines—to 1896—the outbreak of the Philippine Revolution—what dreams did Filipino children dream? Aside from becoming corrupt politicians and wealthy feudal lords, I doubt if there’s anything bigger for those poor children to dream.
The painful truth is that the children of pre-20th-century Philippines never had the chance to dream most of the glorious dreams we have today, let alone the dreams of their western counterparts. But that truth is only painful in the sense that there is not much for us to cherish as a nation today as a result of our ancestors’ limited dreams. Had they had bigger dreams, perhaps their frustrations had also been much more painful. Even the dreamiest child would run out of good dreams if everyday of his life, the only kind of success he sees is that of corrupt officials and feudal lords. No wonder most of yesterday’s Filipino children either grew up slowly killing their beautiful dreams or nurturing the evil ones. No wonder the country is what it is right now.
There is still hope, though. Because compared to the people of wealthier nations around us, the Filipinos have been free to dream big for a very short time. Someday the dreams of today’s children may also be realized. Someday this nation may also be great. Maybe. Depending on what dreams our children today have. But what dreams do today’s children have? They dream of becoming the people they admire. But whom can they admire? Whom can they follow?
It’s bad enough that we do not have an Isaac Newton or an Albert Einstein for our children to look up to. The situation even gets worse when corrupt officials bask in the spotlight, their success broadcast on national television, all for our children to see, while our great scientists and artists fade quietly into their deaths, and into oblivion.
Not too long ago, Jun Lozada testified in the Philippine Senate against Comelec (Commission on Elections) Chairman Benjamin Abalos. The former alleged that the contract to establish a National Broadband Network (NBN) for the Philippine government was awarded to a company called ZTE because of the latter’s sinister machinations. As the senate hearings went on, several columnists pointed out that the hearings were an exercise in futility, that everything Lozada had done would lead to nothing but failure. And they were right.
A few years ago, a few enlightened congressmen moved to impeach President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo after an audio record of her phone conversation with Virgilio Garcillano (a COMELEC commissioner) was found. The conversation supposedly occurred during the course of counting of ballots in 2004-when Ms. Arroyo was among the presidential candidates, which was unforgivably unethical. Many journalists predicted that the impeachment attempt would be a failure. And they were right. The congressmen involved in the impeachment attempt failed.
In 2003, surveys revealed that former Senator Raul Roco was the leading candidate for President. By May 2004, when the elections were held, he was dead last among five candidates. The years 2003-2004 were among the saddest for Filipino idealists. That was a time when even the idealist supporters of Raul Roco swung towards Gloria Macapagal Arroyo because they feared that Roco did not have the political machinery to defeat Fernando Poe Jr.—a popular movie actor with absolutely no experience in governance. Many of them claimed that a vote for Roco would go to waste because he would certainly not win. And in a way, they were right. Roco lost.
Now I’m compelled to think of the heroes who fought for our freedom more than a hundred years ago. Jose Rizal, Andres Bonifacio, Emilio Jacinto, Antonio Luna, Gregorio Del Pilar and Apolinario Mabini dedicated their lives to the fight for freedom. Did the prospect of failure ever bother them? I’m sure it did. And I’m sure during the turbulent days of the revolution, not a few pragmatists advised them to throw away their dreams because they were bound to fail anyway. And the pragmatists were right. Jose Rizal was executed by the Spaniards. Bonifacio and Luna were executed by their own comrades. Emilio Jacinto died of Malaria while leading a group of brave Filipino soldiers in Laguna during the Philippine-American war. Gregorio Del Pilar was killed by the Americans in battle. Apolinario Mabini was exiled. Should they have thrown away their dreams before they even attempted to realize them?
What if the Philippine Revolution never happened? What if Jose Rizal never wrote Noli Me Tangere and El Filibusterismo (the two novels that sparked the revolution)? What would we tell our children when they ask about Filipino heroes? Who would be there for our children to emulate? I know many of our heroes failed. But I am grateful for their attempts. Because had they not done anything at all, I would have grown up feeling absolutely no sense of national pride. We all would have grown up feeling no sense of national pride. They failed. But their failures matter. Because of them, there are still a few good men who work honestly and efficiently in government. Because of them, there are still soldiers who die for their country. Because of them, there are still teachers who teach in far-flung barrios, notwithstanding the threats of malaria and abductions by rebels. Because of them, there are still poorly paid Filipino judges who make the justice system work. Because of these failed men, there are still impoverished cops who run after the thugs, and not with the thugs. Because of them, there are still patriotic entrepreneurs who still continue to invest here instead of bringing their money to another country. Because of them, there are Filipino children today who still DREAM of becoming good men and women tomorrow.
The hearings on the NBN scandal and the impeachment attempt against President Arroyo in 2005 may have been failures. But these are failures that will forever matter. These failures will inspire. Because of them, tomorrow will never run out of good men and women who will take a stand against corruption.
Sometimes, when I think of witnesses like Jun Lozada and the congressmen who tried to impeach President Arroyo, I can’t help but compare them to test pilots. When a test pilot climbs into the cockpit of a newly designed aircraft, he doesn’t know if he’s going to survive the flight or not. But he’ll certainly fly the damn thing. When the flight is successful and the pilot lives, everyone below celebrates and can’t wait to rub shoulders with triumphant pilot. But if the aircraft explodes in midair, even if it’s not the pilot’s fault, the people below—the engineers, mechanics, financiers and spectators—would do anything to dissociate themselves from the failed flight attempt and the heroic pilot’s name would end up buried in oblivion. Yet, no matter how many test pilots die, the world never seems to run out of them. Because as long as children can see the planes that fly, there will be children who’d dream of flying. As long as they can see the courage of the test pilots, they would have a reason to be courageous themselves. As long as children can see heroes, there will be children who’d dream of becoming heroes. When a plane crashes down, the right thing to do is not to quit flying but to build a better plane. When heroes fail, the right thing to do is not to stop being good but to be better.
Which reminds me of Raul Roco’s defeat in the 2004 presidential elections. When Roco’s supporters voted for Arroyo just to avoid a Fernando Poe Jr. presidency, they forgot two important things about voting. First, voting is not just a matter of letting someone win a government post. To vote is to take a stand and let that stand be counted. Second, why, in the first place, were there so many people eager to vote Fernando Poe Jr. for president? (I don’t mind the fact that he’s an actor. What I can’t stand is the thought that many of those people who voted for him did so because he was a popular actor.) It’s because so many children of yesterday grew up dreaming the wrong dreams. If none of us could stand for our right dreams today, if all of us would be afraid to fail, if none of us could vote for the candidate we truly believe in, how can we expect the next generation to have better dreams?
When we talk of dreamers, we should not only remember the ones who were gifts to mankind. Because the worst atrocities in human history were committed by the most passionate dreamers. Julius Caesar, Alexander the Great, Atilla the Hun, Napoleon Bonaparte, Joseph Stalin and Adolf Hitler. What do these men have in common aside from unspeakable terror upon mankind? They all lived in environments wherein the ultimate form of success was either victory in war or triumph in politics. And being the passionate dreamers that they were, they aimed for nothing less than the ultimate success.
When the Roco supporters opted not to vote for him because they feared that his political machinery was too weak compared to those of Arroyo and Poe, they were essentially handing the gift of success to Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, a success that the children of today would also want to have someday. None of those voters should be surprised then if the next generation produces ten new Gloria Arroyos and zero Raul Rocos. When we silence all the Jun Lozadas, we let the corrupt rule our land with impunity. And tomorrow, no one should be surprised if the innocent children become the corrupt rulers of the land.
I wonder what kind of dreams Osama Bin Laden had when he was a child. Maybe the young Bin Laden had often heard about the adventures of Francis Drake, the British pirate who was knighted for sinking Spanish ships--many of them merchant vessels manned by helpless, impoverished civilians—and despite the fact that he had raided African villages to capture slaves he would later sell to his wealthy compatriots. Maybe the little Osama thought that if a British pirate who had brutally killed innocent sailors and enslaved poor African villagers could be knighted, his own acts of terrorism might also compel the world to eventually address him someday as Sir Osama.
I wonder what kind of dreams the children of Iraq had when the country was under Saddam Hussein. Maybe some of them were thinking, “If a man like Saddam could be called a President, I might as well be the next Saddam.” I wonder what the children of today’s Iraq are dreaming. Maybe some of them are saying, “If a warmonger like George W. Bush could become President of the world’s most powerful country, I might as well become the George W. Bush of my own country.” I wonder what the children of Gaza are thinking. Maybe some of them are thinking, “If those men who bomb our homes can be called soldiers, I might as well be the fiercest soldier for my people.” I wonder what the other children of Palestine are thinking. Maybe some would say, “If all those citizens of other countries couldn’t give a damn about our dreams to live in peace, why should I ever care about their own dreams?” I wonder what all the impoverished children of third world countries are thinking. Maybe some are saying, “If life can’t offer me any job that’s more fulfilling than being a rebel or a terrorist, why shouldn’t I get the best job I could have?”
Walking on the streets of Manila, I still held the empty can of cola in my hand until I could find the nearest garbage can. As I walked on, several bystanders stared at me incredulously. They must have been thinking, “Why can’t this stupid guy just dump his trash on the streets like most people do?” And I was thinking, “Why can’t I just give up my dream of having a clean Manila? How much cleaner would the city be because of one piece of trash that I refuse to dump on the street?” Sometimes, it gets really exhausting.
I hope there are more dreamers out there. Ones who are stronger, brighter and more powerful than I am. I hope there are more people out there who can show the children of today that there are good dreams to dream. I hope they would never grow tired of their own beautiful dreams.
Because when all good dreams die, the worst nightmares are born.
When I see pictures of Rome, Athens and the pyramids of Egypt, I can’t help but think of the dreams had by the children who grew up to build those cities and structures. When I see pictures of the New York Skyline, I think of the impoverished European immigrants who sailed across the Atlantic hundreds of years ago, most of them carrying nothing with them but their dreams and their promising children. When I see pictures of the Great Wall, the remarkable Chinese architecture and calligraphy, and the elegant clothes worn by the Chinese as early as 2,000 years ago, I think of the ancient Chinese children who dreamed of refining their own culture. When I see the filth of the Philippines, the beggars on Manila’s stinking streets, the murky waters of the Pasig River, the anarchic way by which illegal vendors occupy the two lanes of Commonwealth Avenue at night (until the Metro Manila Development Authority acted on the matter), the sewers that are always clogged, the coverless manholes, the potholed roads, the agony of commuting when the streets are flooded, the garbage on the streets, the garbage on the escalator steps of the MRT (Metropolital Rail Transit) Ayala station (which reveal that even the highly educated professionals in the country’s central business district have the shamelessness to throw away their trash anywhere), animal carcasses flattened in the middle of highways, the shanties under the bridges, and the 10 to 20 children who cram themselves in one small tricycle just to get a cheap ride to school everyday, I can’t help but think of the beautiful dreams the ancient Filipino children never had.
Albert Einstein taught himself calculus at the age of 12. That must have been in 1891. And in that year, how many Filipino twelve-year-olds were dreaming Einstein’s dreams? I doubt if any of them even heard the term calculus. If the legend is true, the legendary apple must have fallen from a tree and onto Isaac Newton’s head sometime in the 1660’s , when the man responsible for the Laws of Motion, Calculus, Universal Law of Gravitation and the Particle Theory of Light was still in his early twenties. In that period, how many twenty-something Filipinos had heard of Johannes Kepler, Nicolus Copernicus and Galileo Galilei –the giants on whose shoulders Isaac Newton stood? In the 19th century, when the likes of Thomas Edison and James Watt were dreaming of marvelous inventions, how many Filipino children were familiar with the concept of invention? Since that was a time when there were no public schools in the country, zero should be a safe answer. From 1521—the year in which the Spaniards supposedly discovered the Philippines—to 1896—the outbreak of the Philippine Revolution—what dreams did Filipino children dream? Aside from becoming corrupt politicians and wealthy feudal lords, I doubt if there’s anything bigger for those poor children to dream.
The painful truth is that the children of pre-20th-century Philippines never had the chance to dream most of the glorious dreams we have today, let alone the dreams of their western counterparts. But that truth is only painful in the sense that there is not much for us to cherish as a nation today as a result of our ancestors’ limited dreams. Had they had bigger dreams, perhaps their frustrations had also been much more painful. Even the dreamiest child would run out of good dreams if everyday of his life, the only kind of success he sees is that of corrupt officials and feudal lords. No wonder most of yesterday’s Filipino children either grew up slowly killing their beautiful dreams or nurturing the evil ones. No wonder the country is what it is right now.
There is still hope, though. Because compared to the people of wealthier nations around us, the Filipinos have been free to dream big for a very short time. Someday the dreams of today’s children may also be realized. Someday this nation may also be great. Maybe. Depending on what dreams our children today have. But what dreams do today’s children have? They dream of becoming the people they admire. But whom can they admire? Whom can they follow?
It’s bad enough that we do not have an Isaac Newton or an Albert Einstein for our children to look up to. The situation even gets worse when corrupt officials bask in the spotlight, their success broadcast on national television, all for our children to see, while our great scientists and artists fade quietly into their deaths, and into oblivion.
Not too long ago, Jun Lozada testified in the Philippine Senate against Comelec (Commission on Elections) Chairman Benjamin Abalos. The former alleged that the contract to establish a National Broadband Network (NBN) for the Philippine government was awarded to a company called ZTE because of the latter’s sinister machinations. As the senate hearings went on, several columnists pointed out that the hearings were an exercise in futility, that everything Lozada had done would lead to nothing but failure. And they were right.
A few years ago, a few enlightened congressmen moved to impeach President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo after an audio record of her phone conversation with Virgilio Garcillano (a COMELEC commissioner) was found. The conversation supposedly occurred during the course of counting of ballots in 2004-when Ms. Arroyo was among the presidential candidates, which was unforgivably unethical. Many journalists predicted that the impeachment attempt would be a failure. And they were right. The congressmen involved in the impeachment attempt failed.
In 2003, surveys revealed that former Senator Raul Roco was the leading candidate for President. By May 2004, when the elections were held, he was dead last among five candidates. The years 2003-2004 were among the saddest for Filipino idealists. That was a time when even the idealist supporters of Raul Roco swung towards Gloria Macapagal Arroyo because they feared that Roco did not have the political machinery to defeat Fernando Poe Jr.—a popular movie actor with absolutely no experience in governance. Many of them claimed that a vote for Roco would go to waste because he would certainly not win. And in a way, they were right. Roco lost.
Now I’m compelled to think of the heroes who fought for our freedom more than a hundred years ago. Jose Rizal, Andres Bonifacio, Emilio Jacinto, Antonio Luna, Gregorio Del Pilar and Apolinario Mabini dedicated their lives to the fight for freedom. Did the prospect of failure ever bother them? I’m sure it did. And I’m sure during the turbulent days of the revolution, not a few pragmatists advised them to throw away their dreams because they were bound to fail anyway. And the pragmatists were right. Jose Rizal was executed by the Spaniards. Bonifacio and Luna were executed by their own comrades. Emilio Jacinto died of Malaria while leading a group of brave Filipino soldiers in Laguna during the Philippine-American war. Gregorio Del Pilar was killed by the Americans in battle. Apolinario Mabini was exiled. Should they have thrown away their dreams before they even attempted to realize them?
What if the Philippine Revolution never happened? What if Jose Rizal never wrote Noli Me Tangere and El Filibusterismo (the two novels that sparked the revolution)? What would we tell our children when they ask about Filipino heroes? Who would be there for our children to emulate? I know many of our heroes failed. But I am grateful for their attempts. Because had they not done anything at all, I would have grown up feeling absolutely no sense of national pride. We all would have grown up feeling no sense of national pride. They failed. But their failures matter. Because of them, there are still a few good men who work honestly and efficiently in government. Because of them, there are still soldiers who die for their country. Because of them, there are still teachers who teach in far-flung barrios, notwithstanding the threats of malaria and abductions by rebels. Because of them, there are still poorly paid Filipino judges who make the justice system work. Because of these failed men, there are still impoverished cops who run after the thugs, and not with the thugs. Because of them, there are still patriotic entrepreneurs who still continue to invest here instead of bringing their money to another country. Because of them, there are Filipino children today who still DREAM of becoming good men and women tomorrow.
The hearings on the NBN scandal and the impeachment attempt against President Arroyo in 2005 may have been failures. But these are failures that will forever matter. These failures will inspire. Because of them, tomorrow will never run out of good men and women who will take a stand against corruption.
Sometimes, when I think of witnesses like Jun Lozada and the congressmen who tried to impeach President Arroyo, I can’t help but compare them to test pilots. When a test pilot climbs into the cockpit of a newly designed aircraft, he doesn’t know if he’s going to survive the flight or not. But he’ll certainly fly the damn thing. When the flight is successful and the pilot lives, everyone below celebrates and can’t wait to rub shoulders with triumphant pilot. But if the aircraft explodes in midair, even if it’s not the pilot’s fault, the people below—the engineers, mechanics, financiers and spectators—would do anything to dissociate themselves from the failed flight attempt and the heroic pilot’s name would end up buried in oblivion. Yet, no matter how many test pilots die, the world never seems to run out of them. Because as long as children can see the planes that fly, there will be children who’d dream of flying. As long as they can see the courage of the test pilots, they would have a reason to be courageous themselves. As long as children can see heroes, there will be children who’d dream of becoming heroes. When a plane crashes down, the right thing to do is not to quit flying but to build a better plane. When heroes fail, the right thing to do is not to stop being good but to be better.
Which reminds me of Raul Roco’s defeat in the 2004 presidential elections. When Roco’s supporters voted for Arroyo just to avoid a Fernando Poe Jr. presidency, they forgot two important things about voting. First, voting is not just a matter of letting someone win a government post. To vote is to take a stand and let that stand be counted. Second, why, in the first place, were there so many people eager to vote Fernando Poe Jr. for president? (I don’t mind the fact that he’s an actor. What I can’t stand is the thought that many of those people who voted for him did so because he was a popular actor.) It’s because so many children of yesterday grew up dreaming the wrong dreams. If none of us could stand for our right dreams today, if all of us would be afraid to fail, if none of us could vote for the candidate we truly believe in, how can we expect the next generation to have better dreams?
When we talk of dreamers, we should not only remember the ones who were gifts to mankind. Because the worst atrocities in human history were committed by the most passionate dreamers. Julius Caesar, Alexander the Great, Atilla the Hun, Napoleon Bonaparte, Joseph Stalin and Adolf Hitler. What do these men have in common aside from unspeakable terror upon mankind? They all lived in environments wherein the ultimate form of success was either victory in war or triumph in politics. And being the passionate dreamers that they were, they aimed for nothing less than the ultimate success.
When the Roco supporters opted not to vote for him because they feared that his political machinery was too weak compared to those of Arroyo and Poe, they were essentially handing the gift of success to Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, a success that the children of today would also want to have someday. None of those voters should be surprised then if the next generation produces ten new Gloria Arroyos and zero Raul Rocos. When we silence all the Jun Lozadas, we let the corrupt rule our land with impunity. And tomorrow, no one should be surprised if the innocent children become the corrupt rulers of the land.
I wonder what kind of dreams Osama Bin Laden had when he was a child. Maybe the young Bin Laden had often heard about the adventures of Francis Drake, the British pirate who was knighted for sinking Spanish ships--many of them merchant vessels manned by helpless, impoverished civilians—and despite the fact that he had raided African villages to capture slaves he would later sell to his wealthy compatriots. Maybe the little Osama thought that if a British pirate who had brutally killed innocent sailors and enslaved poor African villagers could be knighted, his own acts of terrorism might also compel the world to eventually address him someday as Sir Osama.
I wonder what kind of dreams the children of Iraq had when the country was under Saddam Hussein. Maybe some of them were thinking, “If a man like Saddam could be called a President, I might as well be the next Saddam.” I wonder what the children of today’s Iraq are dreaming. Maybe some of them are saying, “If a warmonger like George W. Bush could become President of the world’s most powerful country, I might as well become the George W. Bush of my own country.” I wonder what the children of Gaza are thinking. Maybe some of them are thinking, “If those men who bomb our homes can be called soldiers, I might as well be the fiercest soldier for my people.” I wonder what the other children of Palestine are thinking. Maybe some would say, “If all those citizens of other countries couldn’t give a damn about our dreams to live in peace, why should I ever care about their own dreams?” I wonder what all the impoverished children of third world countries are thinking. Maybe some are saying, “If life can’t offer me any job that’s more fulfilling than being a rebel or a terrorist, why shouldn’t I get the best job I could have?”
Walking on the streets of Manila, I still held the empty can of cola in my hand until I could find the nearest garbage can. As I walked on, several bystanders stared at me incredulously. They must have been thinking, “Why can’t this stupid guy just dump his trash on the streets like most people do?” And I was thinking, “Why can’t I just give up my dream of having a clean Manila? How much cleaner would the city be because of one piece of trash that I refuse to dump on the street?” Sometimes, it gets really exhausting.
I hope there are more dreamers out there. Ones who are stronger, brighter and more powerful than I am. I hope there are more people out there who can show the children of today that there are good dreams to dream. I hope they would never grow tired of their own beautiful dreams.
Because when all good dreams die, the worst nightmares are born.
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