Philippine president Gloria Arroyo once boasted she will turn our country into an “Enchanted Kingdom.” If a story should be written about it, it should begin with “Once upon a time, in an abjectly poor country ruled by an evil and corrupt witch…” (Photo by Raymund Villanueva)- bulatlat.com
A kasama shared this with me when I left the Pinas (Philippines) for the second time. The picture shown here is a picture of the urban poor living in make shift Shanties in Manila. Gloria Macapagal Arroyo claimed in her State of a Nation address that the Philippines will become a first world nation known as the “Enchanted Kingdom” by 2010. Bold statement as the nation relies on two means to keep its economy afloat, neither means is a solution to advance the 3rd world country into a modern 1st world country – The Philippines still borrows heavily from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and relies on remittances from Compatriots abroad.
Come home to the Pinas
By Ka Lengua
Come home to Pinas. I want to see you. I want to see you, so that I could share the life that I live, that I live it with my loving family, with kasamas and the masses who I serve. Come home to Pinas. See our motherland once more, and the work we do here. See the shanties, factories, farms, and the masses. See the movement within them. See the interactions. That everything is in motion, slow and fast, moved by a subjective force that is us, based on the objective conditions perpetuated by foreign domination and all reactions. The crisis deepens, penetrating every human body, every drop of dignity, and whatever is left of our humanity.
