He struggles for things we take for granted. He worries how
to clothes and shelters his family. There are times when he
wonders where to get the next meal.
Harvest is few weeks away and the list he owes at the corner
store is already quite long. Though he senses the reluctance on
the face of Manang Sylvia, the storeowner and his kumadre,
she still extends her patience to honor his credit. He already
owed her heavily since last year when the harvest was poor due to lack of rain.
This year is different. The harvest is good. But most of his crops
will go to the store to pay his debts and the rest to the loan shark
who lent him money to cultivate half hectare of rice field he
owned through Land Reform. He has nothing left after he pays his bills.
Three of his five children are enrolled in the barrio school. His
wife, Sabina, is carrying the sixth. The quality of education
is poor. His eldest daughter, Mingay, is already in grade
four and though her interest is to become a novelist, she has not
yet memorized the alphabet. Her teacher is a lowly paid educator.
She failed to qualify teaching in the city. But because of
political connection, she was hired to teach in rural schools.
Barrio schools are up to grade six. Some are even to grade three.
Students have to go to town to have high school education. Affordability
becomes an obstacle on parents that children have no choice but to
quit school. With substandard elementary education, they could hardly read
nor write. They have very little chance for advancement in life.
Young barrio women are lured by the glitters of big cities. They heard
stories of fortune and fame and aspire to share the good life. They
instead become housemaids and in some cases working in ill-refute
nightclubs as hostesses. They ultimately find themselves selling their
bodies as prostitutes. Mingay, when she fully develops her curves
is a likable candidate.
The barrio folks are the most overlooked people. While highways,
bridges, overpasses and other infrastructures are built and buildings
are racing to the sky in big centers, the feeder roads from
the inner barrios to the main highways has been dismally ignored
for ages. There was an incident in Agusan Sur where a town mayor
was kidnapped and the ransom demand was to repair the already impassable
road for years. The road was fixed quickly.
Cabcabon had been lobbying the government to improve the feeder road from
Taguibo. They first filed their request during the time of Governor
Curato. This was generations ago. All the original people were long
dead and gone. So was the good governor. Nothing is done to the road so far.
However, town and city officials seem to recover from acute amnesia just
before election. They suddenly become mindful and generous to allocate money
by hiring barrio folks to work on impertinent projects. The real reason
obviously to this awakening is not really for the well being of the
rural inhabitants. It.s only a ploy to buy votes by using taxpayers
money. The projects as expected are discontinued a day after election
regardless of its outcome.
Election Day is more exciting than celebrating the barrio fiesta. People put
bets on candidates. They entertain odds too like in the horserace.
They wager money, belongings and sometimes even the family carabao. They
cast their ballots late in the afternoon. They wait for the highest bidder.
While history proclaims the noble and heroic sacrifices rendered by many
to gain our precious right to freedom, the barrio people today openly
sell this right to those who can best afford to buy it.
The practice of making money from election in the countryside evolves into
an open and acceptable conduct. It develops as a routine exercise that
condemnation from the populace is a thing in the past. It.s as common
as chicken soup. It started as a penny ante game and advanced to
become a lucrative enterprise. It is now a major component of the electoral
process. To reverse the system is like putting the toothpaste back
into the tube.
Technology has put men on the moon and advancement in sciences is incredible.
It is beyond understanding that in this day in age, some barrios still
have no electricity. They are still in the kerosene ingenuity to light up
their houses. Indoors plumbing is yet unheard of. The toilet is a
latrine type open pit and is located a distance away from the house.
The only valid excuse to justify this, is that Philippines is a developing
country. Nevertheless, sound reasoning fails to reconcile the length of
time it takes for a barrio toilet to develop.
Rice stalks dance in rhythm with the summer breeze. Palm trees gently sway
and lush green banana leaves murmur as it hugs the somber wind. He stares
upon the horizon being contrasted against the fading glow of sunset. It is
a lovely sight. It.s an idyllic postcard picture of the land he was born
and raised.
But beauty is least in his heart. The agony in poverty occupies his
thoughts. He is not alone. Dozens of families in his barrio share
his fate. He visualizes the hardship his family endures after the harvest.
Nothing is left to feed them after Manang Sylvia and the loan shark take
his crops. The fruit of his labor for the whole year is not enough
to pay his needs. Another mouth to feed is coming. His family is not
only increasing in numbers, but his children are also growing up. What
kind of future awaits them?
The future is bleak It's a cruel world.
