Comments on: No Tears.

By: Cory

Cory — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 12:24:11 +0000

Uy seminarista ako ha, reading the Bible back to back when I was 13 and imagining how many times King Solomon had sex given his 100 wives, 200 princesses and 300 concubines!!!! Yong rebolusyon years ahead pa..UP na yon. Definitely walang Ozamiz “royalty” sa amin….

By: Benito Vergara

Benito Vergara — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 12:11:27 +0000

Jojo, hindi naman ako kagaya mo na trese anyos pa lang, tibak na. Eh ni isang ka-batch ko sa UP Rural High School nakikimartsa din ‘ata.

By: Cory

Cory — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 11:34:52 +0000

Ibig sabihin ni isang beses between 1983 and 1986, hindi ka nag-martsa? Actually may na interbyu na mga pisante after the shooting. Nasa ABS-CBN pa nga yong iba eh. You mean, you turned off the TV after the tsinelas?

Anong sabi ni Francois Abaya sa iyo? At ng dakilang teoristang si Raul?

By: Benito Vergara

Benito Vergara — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 09:06:54 +0000

@ “Cory”: oh, I have no doubt that that IRRI/UPLB divide, and all the differences that entailed, may have had something to do with my general political outlook… but a “psychological wall”? I think it’s easier to trace the roots of that wall, as it were, to my parents or a Protestant upbringing.

Re: tsinelas — eh iyon lang ang nasa TV! Hindi naman pinakita kasi yung mga speech noong mga magsasaka eh.

Ok naman ‘ata yung talk.

By: Cory

Cory — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 07:52:03 +0000

P.S. Teka, kumusta pala talk mo sa UP?

By: Cory

Cory — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 07:41:16 +0000

Sorry sa mga typing errors, Wiley…nagwawala itong keyboard ko. Pasensya na..

By: Cory

Cory — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 07:38:00 +0000

Wiley..eh este, Sunny…yong “IRRI royalty” is not my term and it was not used in reference to the expats. Ang mga taga-LB ang nag-introduce sa akin nito noong naghanap ako ng daga doon, and they used the term to describe Pinoys in IRRI.

You may also have watched Voltes V and Eat Bulaga, Iskul Bukol, true, pero these were shows closely supervised by the National Media Production Center of Kit Tatad. Of course, there were no reportage nor documentaries on the anti-Marcos protests during those times, for obvious reasons. And who would like to watch Marcos on TV? Kaya abstract image ang latter, pero no-image ang former (Cory and the others).

In short, hindi ka nga kasasma sa bus papuntang IS, but you were still inside that psychological wall that separataed the IRRI “royalty” from the rest of the great unwash of LB. Question is how much of this wall framed this particular “no tears” blog?

Well, yong transference theory got me more curious: why tsinelas lang? Why not getting angry as one listened to the pisante themselves? Are we talking here of symbolic galit lang? Something that really is just fleeting…? Watcha think?

By: Benito Vergara

Benito Vergara — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 06:25:08 +0000

@ Jojo, este, “Cory”: Hmmmm — I see your point about “IRRI royalty”, and our class position and parental conservatism would have had to do with my relative isolation. (“Sheltered” might be the better word.) But Jojo (I’m assuming you’re referring to the IRRI Staff Housing compound here), I never really lived in that enclave (as a baby, yes), nor did I go to school or play regularly with any of those kids (at least until I was maybe 4). They all got bussed to the International School in Makati, and saw themselves rightly as part of an expat community; I stayed the entire time in Los Banos — except for a very brief semester-long detour in Diliman — all the way until we met in the fall of 1990. I watched “Voltes V” and “Eat… Bulaga!” and “Iskul Bukol” and “Flor de Luna” and read Funny Komiks weekly like a lot of other people.

Your psychological transference theory… interesting too, but I’m not sure I connected Mendiola with IRRI. But again, that previous apathy stems from being a mere 12-year old kid in 1983 — aggravated no doubt by my parents’ social conservatism — and probably just barely thinking about what to do with girls, much more politics! Though it’s likely as well that my sympathy towards more progressive politics as a 15-year old was a form of mid-adolescent rebellion.

By: Cory

Cory — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 03:48:33 +0000

Pero iho, you left out of some crucial detail in your argument that as a promdi you were detached from the events of 1983-86. Marcos was an abstract image and Cory not at all important to you because of your relatively isolation as part of what UPLB people call “the IRRI royalty.” They refer to that little affluent “enclave” in the middle of Los Banos which stood in stark contrast to the rest of UP Los Banos. Inside it’s American pop culture all the way. Now spice that up that with good old family values and Protestant ethic, then of course what was happening beyond that enclave was insignificant.

Hence, why bother with 1983, or for that matter, why go to EDSA in 1986? It’s only the ouster of an “abstract image”!

What is more peculiar was your dramatic and sudden shift from apathy to angry radical sympathizer. Was it merely the comrades at the student newspaper? Or the increase in rallies, and visits by the likes of Joey Ayala? Or is it also possible that there was a psychological transference of sort? After all the IRRI enclave claims to serve the interests of the farmers. So when farmers were shot in Mendiola, it was like insulting IRRI’s dream. Hence the anger…

As well as today’s refusal to shed a tear on someone who, in the first place, was “remote to me.”

Whatcha think?

By: seriouslyanna

seriouslyanna — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 14:25:22 +0000

jane…este… wahnah, when cory became president, the police and the armed forces didn’t turn overnight into a band of angels. they may have had a blinding saul-to-paul moment at edsa when they thought twice about running over praying nuns with their tanks, but the anti-left programming of the marcos years remained very much intact. thus lean, chi’s husband, and many others…