EDSA Revolution Anniversary

Twenty-two years ago today, the world witnessed its first ever People Power. The people of the Philippines had had enough of the dictatorship of Ferdinand Marcos, his family and his cronies. Filipinos poured into the streets, onto the main highway, Edsa, to show their support for calls for the strongman to step down. Armed soldiers atop tanks were showered with flowers and given rosaries, food and drinks. Later on, top honchos of the army catapulted and joined the peaceful revolution. The rest, as they say, is history.

No gun was fired, no bullet flew. Everything was peaceful, non-violent. Oh, if it were this easy today. For today, our country is rife with corruption and greed. People in power have no ethics and disregard the plight of the 90% poor people of the country. Worse, everyone is cynical. That to me, is the bad omen. If people are cynical, we will always look and EXPECT the bad side of things, the bad things to happen. If people are cynical, we will not move a muscle to help our country improve its plight. We will not listen to people protesting in the street, preferring instead to listen to ourselves put down other people to justify the status quo.

Pathetic picture, I know, but unless we do something, this is what the Philippines will be a few years from now. Today, outrageous scandal after scandal involving corruption and greed are being uncovered...all done by people in power. Yet nothing is happening. True, there are calls of protest, of taking to the street, but it seems only a few heed the call. WHY?

I'm not the type of person who will take to the streets at a moment's call. But piss me off and I will.....after much thought hehehe. There are a lot of groups calling for the resignation of GMA now, but there's a train of thought going around thinking...does this group really want change or do they want to grab power for themselves? Cynical? Yes, probably. But with this country's history of power-hungry people, it's a fair question.

No school or work today. Originally, the holiday had been called back. But stupid GMA was probably enlightened and figured people would be at rallies and stuff, so she made it a holiday yet again (as it should be anyway) and most people took advantage of the long weekend.

We "celebrated" today by having a "shrimp broil" at La Vista. Dic and family arrived from Bacolod and we had shrimps and crabs served on banana leaves along with rice and fried chicken and kielbasa. Yummm! At the rate I've been eating I'm going to be needing a couple of corsets to fit into any of my clothes! Aaargh! Good thing they help my back though, hehehehe.