I knew my kids were integrating well when my 6 year-old asked to be taken to the “CR”. The initials, to the uninformed belong to the words “comfort room”, a peculiarly Filipino terminology for the loo. I don’t know how this appellation came about but it does sound too literal, a trifle vulgar even for a place where bowel and bladder are emptied. The use of these initials is widespread. Ask for the “washroom” and you will be mostly met with quizzical looks.

Much like when you are placed on hold at the telephone and your patience is requested with the phrase “for a while”, another singular Filipino creation that is a literal translation of the Tagalog expression “sandali po lamang”.

I am not complaining. On the contrary, I am pleased that at an early age these kids are resourceful enough to adapt and blend with the rest of their countrymen.

The Gospel today contains one of my favorite quotes from Jesus: “I have come to set the earth on fire, and how I wish it were already blazing! There is a baptism with which I must be baptized, and how great is my anguish until it is accomplished! Do you think that I have come to establish peace on the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division.”

He saw it clearly so long ago that revolutionary change was going to hurt and divide and make people squirm. He wasn’t after compromise and he wasn’t about to bend to any special interests. His heart was burning with zeal to change the world that even then had become rotten and corrupt. Is it part of our human fate to relentlessly fight injustice and suffering? Maybe so but our true calling is to stay in the fight.

We have this tendency in our country to play nice and remain civil even to those who flagrantly disrespect the rights of other people. We are quick to forgive and we find it distasteful to mete out punishment. Take for example this Marcos crony who made a lot of money from commissions resulting in the construction of the Nuclear Plant that never produced a single watt of electricity. When Marcos got deposed, he fled to Austria and bought a title and a castle. He is now back and openly perambulates around the country with no shame whatsoever. His well paid lawyers are successfully cleaning his sordid record.

Considering millions of children received substandard education and became malnourished from the $2.8 billion we paid for this worthless nuclear plant, I don’t think it would be considered overreacting if we shaved this Count’s head and paraded him all over. We should collectively turn our backs against these individuals.

The day has come for division. It’s not whether you’re for Erap or for GMA. It’s whether we will allow immoral public officials to continue overstaying, career politicians with nothing but their self-serving motives. Should we continue to support this same cast of characters who proclaim themselves as our tribunes but who have utterly failed to unite our nation into fulfilling its glorious promise?

Tama na. Kung nais nating isulong ang laban ng Sambayanang Pilipinas ay handa dapat tayong lumaban at sumigaw at mag-wala sa lahat ng katarantaduhan at katiwaliang nagaganap sa ating Bayan.

Had to wait an hour to post this because we had a second “brownout” here in Bacolod. In all my time in the US, I don’t recall a single time when power was interrupted. When we lived in New York, our neighbors told us stories about the widespread chaos that resulted from a one day blackout that occurred in 1977.

Brownouts are commonplace here. Power surges too. Electronic appliances are severely put to the test. These inconveniences have their charming side too. We had frequent power interruptions while growing up in Quezon City and these were the times we had dinner by candlelight and we would be regaled with horror stories and we would hold “programs”, a wonderful bonding opportunity.

Now that the power’s back, everyone’s watching television and downloading songs into IPODs. The family hour just ended.

English getting lost in translation in Philippines
By Carlos H. Conde

MANILA: "We grow our hogs in our own farms so you're sure to get meat that is grown."

"The city's voice is soft like solitudes."

"He found his friend clowning himself around."

"He seemed to be waiting for someone, not a blood relation, much less a bad blood."

Such phrases, lifted from government-approved textbooks used in Filipino public schools, are reinforcing fears that crucial language skills are degenerating in a country that has long prided itself on having some of the world's best English speakers. At a time when English is widely considered an advantage in global competitiveness for any country, many fear this former U.S. colony is slipping.

English is an official language here, along with the native Tagalog. Yet the U.S. State Department, in its "2007 Investment Climate Statement," released this month, concluded: "English-language proficiency, while still better than in other Southeast Asian nations, is declining in the Philippines."

The article from the Herald Tribune is news only to those who live outside of the Philippines. We are all abundantly aware here. How can you expect these kids to learn English when they don’t even have schoolrooms and sturdy desks? And let’s not even talk about the more than 50,000 teachers who have left the country. We need to be teaching these children LOVE for country. Will you expect them to clean their surroundings, respect the rule of law, conserve natural resources, learn and earn abroad and return from abroad if they don’t give a rat’s ass about their country?

An educator who recently attended a seminar for teachers in Tokyo told me that Korean, Japanese, Chinese students had the following priorities in descending order: country, family, education, health and work. Here we have family, God, education. Education I presume being the stepping stone to foreign shores. Nothing about the country. You think Japan became the second largest economy on the strength of the English skills of its citizens? And Koreans? Ever wonder why there have been many Filipino physicians in the US and hardly any Koreans? Because Korean doctors have a difficult time passing the TOEFL (Test of English as a Foreign Language).

It’s never been about language. It’s always been about love.

Big news for the day is the 12 peso a day wage hike that labor groups are denigrating as “alms” next to the 125 peso increase they had been demanding. Both Lee Kuan Yu and Henry Ford advised paying your employees well in order to increase productivity. Ay there’s the rub, fair wages, land reform, universal healthcare and free education are all predicated on the principle that in order to produce competitive and productive and happy citizens, essential investments will have to be made with the costs borne by everybody. You want a First World country, everybody will have to chip in. Let’s face it, even if our 4 billionaire Filipinos and all the millionaires were to donate their entire estates to the national patrimony, we still will not be able to achieve significant gains in standard of living because apart from pushing the few mightily motivated people into hibernation the underlying problem of under productivity will continue to drag us all down.

We are able to build plush new residences only because these developments are prepaid with overseas remittances. Our shopping malls are full and there is a big market out there for gyms and spas because from all the money pouring from all those service-related jobs. Nothing wrong with this but we have to accept the reality that unless we are all prepared to sacrifice (and I know this sounds a bit unfeeling because how do you expect the many poor to sacrifice even more?) we can never hope to attract the potential billions of dollars that foreign direct investments bring. Why should you invest in our country when the peso is strong, the bureaucracy corrupt, the highways congested and crumbling, the electricity expensive and the minimum pay in Metro Manila is close to $8 a day, against Thailand’s $6.35, Beijing’s $3.43, Indonesia’s $3.25 and Vietnam’s $1.27?

It doesn’t have to be this way. We had a larger economy than South Korea in 1970. In 20 years, South Korea vaulted into the top 10 economies in the world. No new economic thought was required. There wasn’t a secret formula they stumbled into. All that it took was a different way and a new group of committed people to conduct an already existing orchestra to produce harmonious music. And, as in a ceasefire, we need people with credibility to coax us into entering an arena with mutual trust and a clear understanding that in order to build a nation of character we must all sacrifice together.