Catanduanes Forum

The Filipino today

By Alex Lacson

After the August 23 hostage drama, there is just too much negativity
about and against the Filipino.

“It is difficult to be a Filipino these days”, says a friend who works in
Hongkong. “Nakakahiya tayo”, “Only in the Philippines” were some of the
comments lawyer Trixie Cruz-Angeles received in her Facebook. There is
this email supposedly written by a Dutch married to a Filipina, with 2
kids, making a litany of the supposed stupidity or idiocy of Filipinos in
general. There was also this statement by Fermi Wong, founder of Unison
HongKong, where she said – “Filipino maids have a very low status in our
city”. Then there is this article from a certain Daniel Wagner of
Huffington Post, wherein he said he sees nothing good in our country’s
future.

Clearly, the hostage crisis has spawned another crisis – a crisis of
faith in the Filipino, one that exists in the minds of a significant
number of Filipinos and some quarters in the world.

It is important for us Filipinos to take stock of ourselves as a people
– of who we truly are as a people. It is important that we remind
ourselves who the Filipino really is, before our young children believe
all this negativity that they hear and read about the Filipino.

We have to protect and defend the Filipino in each one of us.

The August 23 hostage fiasco is now part of us as Filipinos, it being
part now of our country’s and world’s history. But that is not all that
there is to the Filipino. Yes, we accept it as a failure on our part, a
disappointment to HongKong, China and to the whole world.

But there is so much more about the Filipino.

In 1945, at the end of World War II, Hitler and his Nazi had killed more
than 6 million Jews in Europe. But in 1939, when the Jews and their
families were fleeing Europe at a time when several countries refused to
open their doors to them, our Philippines did the highly risky and the
unlikely –thru President Manuel L Quezon, we opened our country’s doors
and our nation’s heart to the fleeing and persecuted Jews. Eventually,
some 1,200 Jews and their families made it to Manila. Last 21 June 2010,
or 70 years later, the first ever monument honoring Quezon and the
Filipino nation for this “open door policy” was inaugurated on Israeli
soil, at the 65-hectare Holocaust Memorial Park in Rishon LeZion, Israel.

The Filipino heart is one of history’s biggest, one of the world’s rare
jewels, and one of humanity’s greatest treasures.

In 2007, Baldomero M. Olivera, a Filipino, was chosen and awarded as the
Scientist for the Year 2007 by Harvard University Foundation, for his work
in neurotoxins which is produced by venomous cone snails commonly found in
the tropical waters of Philippines. Olivera is a distinguished professor
of biology at University of Utah, USA. The Scientist for the Year 2007
award was given to him in recognition to his outstanding contribution to
science, particularly to molecular biology and groundbreaking work with
conotoxins. The research conducted by Olivera’s group became the basis for
the production of commercial drug called Prialt (generic name –
Ziconotide), which is considered more effective than morphine and does not
result in addiction.

The Filipino mind is one of the world’s best, one of humanity’s great
assets.

The Filipino is capable of greatness, of making great sacrifices for the
greater good of the least of our people. Josette Biyo is an example of
this. Biyo has masteral and doctoral degress from one of the top
universities in the Philippines – the De La Salle University (Taft,
Manila) – where she used to teach rich college students and was paid well
for it. But Dr Biyo left all that and all the glamour of Manila, and chose
to teach in a far-away public school in a rural area in the province,
receiving the salary of less than US$ 300 a month. When asked why she did
that, she replied “but who will teach our children?” In recognition of the
rarity of her kind, the world-famous Massachusetts Institute of Technology
(MIT) in the United States honoured Dr Biyo a very rare honor – by naming
a small and new-discovered planet in our galaxy as “Biyo”.

The Filipino is one of humanity’s best examples on the greatness of
human spirit!

Efren Penaflorida was born to a father who worked as a tricycle driver
and a mother who worked as laundrywoman. Through sheer determination and
the help of other people, Penaflorida finished college. In 1997,
Penaflorida and his friends formed a group that made pushcarts (kariton)
and loaded them with books, pens, crayons, blackboard, clothes, jugs of
water, and a Philippine flag. Then he and his group would go to the public
cemetery, market and garbage dump sites in Cavite City – to teach street
children with reading, math, basic literacy skills and values, to save
them from illegal drugs and prevent them from joining gangs. Penaflorida
and his group have been doing this for more than a decade. Last year,
Penaflorida was chosen and awarded as CNN Hero for 2009.

Efren Penaflorida is one of the great human beings alive today. And he
is a Filipino!

Nestor Suplico is yet another example of the Filipino’s nobility of
spirit. Suplico was a taxi driver In New York. On 17 July 2004, Suplico
drove 43 miles from New York City to Connecticut, USA to return the US
$80,000 worth of jewelry (rare black pearls) to his passenger who forgot
it at the back seat of his taxi. When his passenger offered to give him a
reward, Suplico even refused the reward. He just asked to be reimbursed
for his taxi fuel for his travel to Connecticut. At the time, Suplico was
just earning $80 a day as a taxi driver. What do you call that? That’s
honesty in its purest sense. That is decency most sublime. And it occurred
in New York, the Big Apple City, where all kinds of snakes and sinners
abound, and a place where – according to American novelist Sydney Sheldon
– angels no longer descend. No wonder all New York newspapers called him
“New York’s Most Honest Taxi Driver”. The New York City Government also
held a ceremony to officially acknowledge his noble deed. The Philippine
Senate passed a Resolution for giving honors to the Filipino people and
our country.

In Singapore, Filipina Marites Perez-Galam, 33, a mother of four, found
a wallet in a public toilet near the restaurant where she works as the
head waitress found a wallet containing 16,000 Singaporean dollars (US
$11,000). Maritess immediately handed the wallet to the restaurant manager
of Imperial Herbal restaurant where she worked located in Vivo City Mall.
The manager in turn reported the lost money to the mall’s management. It
took the Indonesian woman less than two hours to claim her lost wallet
intended for her son’s ear surgery that she and her husband saved for the
medical treatment. Maritess refused the reward offered by the grateful
owner and said it was the right thing to do.

The Filipina, in features and physical beauty, is one of the world’s
most beautiful creatures! Look at this list – Gemma Cruz became the first
Filipina to win Miss International in 1964; Gloria Diaz won as Miss
Universe in 1969; Aurora Pijuan won Miss International in 1970; Margie
Moran won Miss Universe in 1973; Evangeline Pascual was 1st runner up in
Miss World 1974; Melanie Marquez was Miss International in 1979; Ruffa
Gutierrez was 2nd runner up in Miss World 1993; Charlene Gonzalez was Miss
Universe finalist in 1994; Mirriam Quiambao was Miss Universe 1st runner
up in 1999; and last week, Venus Raj was 4th runner up in Miss Universe
pageant.

I can cite more great Filipinos like Ramon Magsaysay, Ninoy Aquino, Leah
Salonga, Manny Pacquaio, Paeng Nepomuceno, Tony Meloto, Joey Velasco, Juan
Luna and Jose Rizal. For truly, there are many more great Filipinos who
define who we are as a people and as a nation – each one of them is part
of each one of us, for they are Filipinos like us, for they are part of
our history as a people.

What we see and hear of the Filipino today is not all that there is
about the Filipino. I believe that the Filipino is higher and greater than
all these that we see and hear about the Filipino. God has beautiful story
for us as a people. And the story that we see today is but a fleeting
portion of that beautiful story that is yet to fully unfold before the
eyes of our world.

So let’s rise as one people. Let’s pick up the pieces. Let’s ask for
understanding and forgiveness for our failure. Let us also ask for space
and time to correct our mistakes, so we can improve our system.

To all of you my fellow Filipinos, let’s keep on building the Filipino
great and respectable in the eyes of our world – one story, two stories,
three stories at a time – by your story, by my story, by your child’s
story, by your story of excellence at work, by another Filipino’s honesty
in dealing with others, by another Pinoy’s example of extreme sacrifice,
by the faith in God we Filipinos are known for.

Every Filipino, wherever he or she maybe in the world today, is part of
the solution. Each one of us is part of the answer. Every one of us is
part of the hope we seek for our country. The Filipino will not become a
world-class citizen unless we are able to build a world-class homeland in
our Philippines.

We are a beautiful people. Let no one in the world take that beauty away
from you. Let no one in the world take away that beauty away from any of
your children! We just have to learn – very soon – to build a beautiful
country for ourselves, with an honest and competent government in our
midst.

Mga kababayan, after reading this, I ask you to do two things.

First, defend and protect the Filipino whenever you can, especially
among your children. Fight all this negativity about the Filipino that is
circulating in many parts of the world. Let us not allow this single
incident define who the Filipino is, and who we are as a people. And
second, demand for good leadership and good government from our leaders.
Question both their actions and inaction; expose the follies of their
policies and decisions. The only way we can perfect our system is by
engaging it. The only way we can solve our problem, is by facing it, head
on.

We are all builders of the beauty and greatness of the Filipino. We are
the architects of our nation’s success.

To all the people of HK and China, especially the relatives of the
victims, my family and I deeply mourn with the loss of your loved ones.
Every life is precious. My family and I humbly ask for your understanding
and forgiveness.

The Filipino today

By Alex Lacson

After the August 23 hostage drama, there is just too much negativity
about and against the Filipino.

“It is difficult to be a Filipino these days”, says a friend who works in
Hongkong. “Nakakahiya tayo”, “Only in the Philippines” were some of the
comments lawyer Trixie Cruz-Angeles received in her Facebook. There is
this email supposedly written by a Dutch married to a Filipina, with 2
kids, making a litany of the supposed stupidity or idiocy of Filipinos in
general. There was also this statement by Fermi Wong, founder of Unison
HongKong, where she said – “Filipino maids have a very low status in our
city”. Then there is this article from a certain Daniel Wagner of
Huffington Post, wherein he said he sees nothing good in our country’s
future.

Clearly, the hostage crisis has spawned another crisis – a crisis of
faith in the Filipino, one that exists in the minds of a significant
number of Filipinos and some quarters in the world.

It is important for us Filipinos to take stock of ourselves as a people
– of who we truly are as a people. It is important that we remind
ourselves who the Filipino really is, before our young children believe
all this negativity that they hear and read about the Filipino.

We have to protect and defend the Filipino in each one of us.

The August 23 hostage fiasco is now part of us as Filipinos, it being
part now of our country’s and world’s history. But that is not all that
there is to the Filipino. Yes, we accept it as a failure on our part, a
disappointment to HongKong, China and to the whole world.

But there is so much more about the Filipino.

In 1945, at the end of World War II, Hitler and his Nazi had killed more
than 6 million Jews in Europe. But in 1939, when the Jews and their
families were fleeing Europe at a time when several countries refused to
open their doors to them, our Philippines did the highly risky and the
unlikely –thru President Manuel L Quezon, we opened our country’s doors
and our nation’s heart to the fleeing and persecuted Jews. Eventually,
some 1,200 Jews and their families made it to Manila. Last 21 June 2010,
or 70 years later, the first ever monument honoring Quezon and the
Filipino nation for this “open door policy” was inaugurated on Israeli
soil, at the 65-hectare Holocaust Memorial Park in Rishon LeZion, Israel.

The Filipino heart is one of history’s biggest, one of the world’s rare
jewels, and one of humanity’s greatest treasures.

In 2007, Baldomero M. Olivera, a Filipino, was chosen and awarded as the
Scientist for the Year 2007 by Harvard University Foundation, for his work
in neurotoxins which is produced by venomous cone snails commonly found in
the tropical waters of Philippines. Olivera is a distinguished professor
of biology at University of Utah, USA. The Scientist for the Year 2007
award was given to him in recognition to his outstanding contribution to
science, particularly to molecular biology and groundbreaking work with
conotoxins. The research conducted by Olivera’s group became the basis for
the production of commercial drug called Prialt (generic name –
Ziconotide), which is considered more effective than morphine and does not
result in addiction.

The Filipino mind is one of the world’s best, one of humanity’s great
assets.

The Filipino is capable of greatness, of making great sacrifices for the
greater good of the least of our people. Josette Biyo is an example of
this. Biyo has masteral and doctoral degress from one of the top
universities in the Philippines – the De La Salle University (Taft,
Manila) – where she used to teach rich college students and was paid well
for it. But Dr Biyo left all that and all the glamour of Manila, and chose
to teach in a far-away public school in a rural area in the province,
receiving the salary of less than US$ 300 a month. When asked why she did
that, she replied “but who will teach our children?” In recognition of the
rarity of her kind, the world-famous Massachusetts Institute of Technology
(MIT) in the United States honoured Dr Biyo a very rare honor – by naming
a small and new-discovered planet in our galaxy as “Biyo”.

The Filipino is one of humanity’s best examples on the greatness of
human spirit!

Efren Penaflorida was born to a father who worked as a tricycle driver
and a mother who worked as laundrywoman. Through sheer determination and
the help of other people, Penaflorida finished college. In 1997,
Penaflorida and his friends formed a group that made pushcarts (kariton)
and loaded them with books, pens, crayons, blackboard, clothes, jugs of
water, and a Philippine flag. Then he and his group would go to the public
cemetery, market and garbage dump sites in Cavite City – to teach street
children with reading, math, basic literacy skills and values, to save
them from illegal drugs and prevent them from joining gangs. Penaflorida
and his group have been doing this for more than a decade. Last year,
Penaflorida was chosen and awarded as CNN Hero for 2009.

Efren Penaflorida is one of the great human beings alive today. And he
is a Filipino!

Nestor Suplico is yet another example of the Filipino’s nobility of
spirit. Suplico was a taxi driver In New York. On 17 July 2004, Suplico
drove 43 miles from New York City to Connecticut, USA to return the US
$80,000 worth of jewelry (rare black pearls) to his passenger who forgot
it at the back seat of his taxi. When his passenger offered to give him a
reward, Suplico even refused the reward. He just asked to be reimbursed
for his taxi fuel for his travel to Connecticut. At the time, Suplico was
just earning $80 a day as a taxi driver. What do you call that? That’s
honesty in its purest sense. That is decency most sublime. And it occurred
in New York, the Big Apple City, where all kinds of snakes and sinners
abound, and a place where – according to American novelist Sydney Sheldon
– angels no longer descend. No wonder all New York newspapers called him
“New York’s Most Honest Taxi Driver”. The New York City Government also
held a ceremony to officially acknowledge his noble deed. The Philippine
Senate passed a Resolution for giving honors to the Filipino people and
our country.

In Singapore, Filipina Marites Perez-Galam, 33, a mother of four, found
a wallet in a public toilet near the restaurant where she works as the
head waitress found a wallet containing 16,000 Singaporean dollars (US
$11,000). Maritess immediately handed the wallet to the restaurant manager
of Imperial Herbal restaurant where she worked located in Vivo City Mall.
The manager in turn reported the lost money to the mall’s management. It
took the Indonesian woman less than two hours to claim her lost wallet
intended for her son’s ear surgery that she and her husband saved for the
medical treatment. Maritess refused the reward offered by the grateful
owner and said it was the right thing to do.

The Filipina, in features and physical beauty, is one of the world’s
most beautiful creatures! Look at this list – Gemma Cruz became the first
Filipina to win Miss International in 1964; Gloria Diaz won as Miss
Universe in 1969; Aurora Pijuan won Miss International in 1970; Margie
Moran won Miss Universe in 1973; Evangeline Pascual was 1st runner up in
Miss World 1974; Melanie Marquez was Miss International in 1979; Ruffa
Gutierrez was 2nd runner up in Miss World 1993; Charlene Gonzalez was Miss
Universe finalist in 1994; Mirriam Quiambao was Miss Universe 1st runner
up in 1999; and last week, Venus Raj was 4th runner up in Miss Universe
pageant.

I can cite more great Filipinos like Ramon Magsaysay, Ninoy Aquino, Leah
Salonga, Manny Pacquaio, Paeng Nepomuceno, Tony Meloto, Joey Velasco, Juan
Luna and Jose Rizal. For truly, there are many more great Filipinos who
define who we are as a people and as a nation – each one of them is part
of each one of us, for they are Filipinos like us, for they are part of
our history as a people.

What we see and hear of the Filipino today is not all that there is
about the Filipino. I believe that the Filipino is higher and greater than
all these that we see and hear about the Filipino. God has beautiful story
for us as a people. And the story that we see today is but a fleeting
portion of that beautiful story that is yet to fully unfold before the
eyes of our world.

So let’s rise as one people. Let’s pick up the pieces. Let’s ask for
understanding and forgiveness for our failure. Let us also ask for space
and time to correct our mistakes, so we can improve our system.

To all of you my fellow Filipinos, let’s keep on building the Filipino
great and respectable in the eyes of our world – one story, two stories,
three stories at a time – by your story, by my story, by your child’s
story, by your story of excellence at work, by another Filipino’s honesty
in dealing with others, by another Pinoy’s example of extreme sacrifice,
by the faith in God we Filipinos are known for.

Every Filipino, wherever he or she maybe in the world today, is part of
the solution. Each one of us is part of the answer. Every one of us is
part of the hope we seek for our country. The Filipino will not become a
world-class citizen unless we are able to build a world-class homeland in
our Philippines.

We are a beautiful people. Let no one in the world take that beauty away
from you. Let no one in the world take away that beauty away from any of
your children! We just have to learn – very soon – to build a beautiful
country for ourselves, with an honest and competent government in our
midst.

Mga kababayan, after reading this, I ask you to do two things.

First, defend and protect the Filipino whenever you can, especially
among your children. Fight all this negativity about the Filipino that is
circulating in many parts of the world. Let us not allow this single
incident define who the Filipino is, and who we are as a people. And
second, demand for good leadership and good government from our leaders.
Question both their actions and inaction; expose the follies of their
policies and decisions. The only way we can perfect our system is by
engaging it. The only way we can solve our problem, is by facing it, head
on.

We are all builders of the beauty and greatness of the Filipino. We are
the architects of our nation’s success.

To all the people of HK and China, especially the relatives of the
victims, my family and I deeply mourn with the loss of your loved ones.
Every life is precious. My family and I humbly ask for your understanding
and forgiveness.

They hate Filipinos for the hostage fiasco earlier this week, right ? then should we hate chinese people for the lead poisoning and melamine contamination ?

Hindi dapat isisi sa lahat ng Pilipino ang nangyaring hostage crisis. kasalanan ng isa kasalanan ng lahat, mukhang hindi tama yun.

I fully understand how SOME Hongkong nationals felt after the infamous Quirino hostage tragedy. They surely are supposed to empathize with their own people.

But I know that majority of the people of Hongkong are aware that what happened was out of control of the ordinary Filipinos.

What happened was supposed to be purely police matters exposed to the world by the extensive coverage of our local media.

Not even the media should be blamed for their JOB as they only showed to the world what is happening in this part of the globe.

Every Filipinos must learn something from this experience, specially our police.

I deeply sympathize with the people of Hongkong for this hostage-taking tragedy that claimed the lives of their citizens.

But I’m particularly shameful on some of our “kabayans” for their act unbecoming of a Filipino.

Before they even felt "ashamed" of what happened they should have thought that wherever they will go and whatever they will do, they will always remain one of our own.

Shame on this Great Pretenders...

May hangganan ang pakikiramay sa karimarimarim na naganap na bloodbath sa Quirino grandstand.

Ang pakikiramay at pakikidalamhati ay nararapat ngunit hindi po ito nagbibigay daan upang yurakan ang dangal at bastusin ang sambayanan Pilipino.

Sino man Pinoy ang ikinahihiya ang Pilipinas at ang lahing kayumanggi ay taksil sa bayan! Isang masahol pa sa Makapili.