It was all over the news. Director Dante Mendoza's "Serbis" made it in the list of nominees in the Palme d'Or of the Cannes Film Festival. Being the news savvy that I am, I searched the web for additional information. I checked out the official website of the Cannes but I found nothing. So I googled it instead. There were a number of hits. Checking the results one by one (excluding those from Philippine pages), there was no mention of "Serbis." Not giving up, one entry aroused my interest. It reads "Cannes Film Festival snubs British movies for the second year running." And there I found this: Eight of the directors on the 19-strong shortlist have never appeared in Cannes' main competition before and hail from Belgium, Turkey, France, China, Argentina, the Philippines, Brazil and Italy. I always love reading this. Every time an article has to refer to the Philippines, there's the. Of course that's not to mean anything special, it's only the English language's being queer. But nonetheless, I love it. I love the Philippines.
We may be a small country, but we are a great one too. We may have looked stupid in the eyes of the world, what with the US health insurance scam (the latest among the many scandals that involved the Philippines), we must never forget the more important things that we have taught the world. We are after all, Asia's first democratic country. But I don't have to mention that we still need a lot of work to make democracy work in the grass roots rather just in the halls of Congress (even in Congress, the light of democracy has never been dimmer, almost put out) and articles such as this. We must never forget how we, as one nation, taught the world how to bloodlessly oust a dictator. And I know, in the near future we are going to teach the world that we can stand as one nation in making the Philippines a greater nation.
We must never forget Paeng's right arm. There's Manny Pacquiao's too. Both his left and right fists.
We must of course never forget the many Filipinos who have sacrificed family to be able to work abroad. This is no easy feat, and for that, I commend all of you. They are, after all, helping the economy keep afloat with their monthly remittances reaching record highs month after month.
Let us also not forget those who have decided to stay. They, too, are heroes. Seeing that the battle has to be fought here and not anywhere else is as well not an easy feat. Never mind those who have stayed to spread mayhem and chaos (read: politicians). One has to just look at the jeepney driver who tirelessly brings us to our workplace morning after morning. Our metro aids who put to heart the care of our streets, dawn after dawn.
The list is a very long one. But I will not end this without mentioning and giving the importance that they have long deserved, our farmers. They have long been ignored by government. They have long been sidelined by the autocrats who think they are gods and us, their slaves! I hope, the Republic that is the Philippines will not have to pay for this.
They say there is a rice crisis. There might be truth to that though quite a number argue otherwise. But one has to just look at the rising price of rice to know that there is something wrong and that we need to act, now.
Serbis, by the way, is a movie about a family that maintains a prostitution den to get by.
I pray to dear God, that the administration will see reason in ceasing to pimp the country, my beloved country, to capitalists that selfishly see profit only.
We may be a small country, but we are a great one too. We may have looked stupid in the eyes of the world, what with the US health insurance scam (the latest among the many scandals that involved the Philippines), we must never forget the more important things that we have taught the world. We are after all, Asia's first democratic country. But I don't have to mention that we still need a lot of work to make democracy work in the grass roots rather just in the halls of Congress (even in Congress, the light of democracy has never been dimmer, almost put out) and articles such as this. We must never forget how we, as one nation, taught the world how to bloodlessly oust a dictator. And I know, in the near future we are going to teach the world that we can stand as one nation in making the Philippines a greater nation.
We must never forget Paeng's right arm. There's Manny Pacquiao's too. Both his left and right fists.
We must of course never forget the many Filipinos who have sacrificed family to be able to work abroad. This is no easy feat, and for that, I commend all of you. They are, after all, helping the economy keep afloat with their monthly remittances reaching record highs month after month.
Let us also not forget those who have decided to stay. They, too, are heroes. Seeing that the battle has to be fought here and not anywhere else is as well not an easy feat. Never mind those who have stayed to spread mayhem and chaos (read: politicians). One has to just look at the jeepney driver who tirelessly brings us to our workplace morning after morning. Our metro aids who put to heart the care of our streets, dawn after dawn.
The list is a very long one. But I will not end this without mentioning and giving the importance that they have long deserved, our farmers. They have long been ignored by government. They have long been sidelined by the autocrats who think they are gods and us, their slaves! I hope, the Republic that is the Philippines will not have to pay for this.
They say there is a rice crisis. There might be truth to that though quite a number argue otherwise. But one has to just look at the rising price of rice to know that there is something wrong and that we need to act, now.
Serbis, by the way, is a movie about a family that maintains a prostitution den to get by.
I pray to dear God, that the administration will see reason in ceasing to pimp the country, my beloved country, to capitalists that selfishly see profit only.
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