By: Iris P. Concepcion
I wonder what is wrong with some of the misplaced black prop on people. I sometimes laugh at the audacity by which esteemed writers had resorted to dirty tricks in playing up the stories. I am glad the concerned parties are all standing up to debunk the falsities. Lately, they are being named for who they really are.
I often ask myself: it has come to this?
But on the flipside, I likewise read well-balanced stories that tell it as is.
This line, from a recent Aquino story, has the best last words I have read in years. Here:
"Romy Mercado, a friend of Aquino's since high school and a close aide, says they have been received in such fashion nearly everywhere. The campaign, according to Aquino himself, is quickening something "dormant" in the Filipino people. "I haven't seen anything like it since the days of Cory and People Power," Mercado shouts over the din, sitting one vehicle behind Aquino's. But when asked to talk more about his experience of that now faraway time, Mercado is unable to respond. Head in his hands, he's too busy wiping away the tears."
Somehow I have experienced the same route, when everything is dangled like I am the worst harlot on earth; the things I post get defaced; I am thrown pestilence and whatnot along my way. I have known people in the molds of Aquino and I can assure you, that ain't a fluke. That is just how some people view their world despite their flaws. I know a man such as the one described below:
"Aquino is not the only candidate promising social renewal, but he seems well suited for the part — carrying himself with an air of almost Gandhian simplicity and uprightness. Ahead of his decision to run, he consulted in seclusion with the nuns of a Carmelite convent. He later exasperated aides by sending back shoes purchased for the campaign trail because they were too expensive. Unmarried, he leans on his four sisters for support. "Someone had to tell him that a shirt has to fit in a certain way," sighs Kris. "That his jeans can't have pleats."
Replace shoes with cars and you get my point. I think the article put it succinctly well with a quote from Mandela on Aquino: "You chose your parents well."