What happened last year

Here’s one reason why people should take photographs often and post them at Flickr.  Photojojo has this neat feature called a “time capsule” where, twice a month, they will email pics that you had taken one year ago.  It’s fascinating to see and reminisce what had happened a year ago.

For the past few days, the weather was still relatively comfortable, and last night there was a sudden downpour. It’s funny to find out that last year, based on the picture that I had taken about a year ago (on February 26, 2010, to be exact),  the hot weather was suffocating and we had a water shortage.

EDSA People Power: 25 years after

As I read through Cory Aqunio’s account of the 1986 people power revolution, I couldn’t help but reminisce those fateful days and be saddened on how that momentous occasion is lost in today’s youth.  I chuckled when I read Bongbong Marcos’ statement that our country would have been a Singapore now if his father wasn’t ousted from office, but, more importantly, I was dismayed when I heard that a number of people believed it so.

Would we have been a Singapore now if EDSA People Power never happened?  I personally don’t know.  And people can debate all they want about it but the argument is moot.  The situation today is exactly what Robert Frost poetically articulated.  We took the road less traveled and it had made all the difference.  We knew not how it would lead and we wouldn’t be able to look back.   The fact is we wouldn’t know if we would become a Singapore.  For all we know we could have ended up far worse.

The youth today decry that the economy is worse off than it was in the 1980s.  Corruption, they also cite, is more widespread today than 25 years ago.  I probably could do the research to prove or disprove such statements, but when I marched in EDSA, I didn’t really march for economics or corruption.  I marched for democracy and freedom.

The younger Marcos said that “one only has to look at objective indicators such as the country’s economy, the quality of life of the people, and the Philippines’ standing in the international community to judge whether EDSA 1 changed things for the better.”  I was subsequently asked if EDSA 1 did bring about change.  I said, without hesitation, that there was change, and to this day I believe that it is a change for the better.

Would the Philippines have been better off if Marcos stayed on?  Maybe but maybe not.  But lets assume first that it’s true.  The issue is not whether or not Marcos was a good, benevolent leader; it’s whether or not his successor would be good and benevolent.  Who were up for the running for Marcos’ successor anyway?  VP Tolentino?  Enrile? Virata?  Imelda?  Bongbong?  Would they share in the same vision?  Would they possess the same political will? The issue, for me, was a matter of succession.  Any change, no matter how revolutionary, cannot last unless the effects are sustained.  We needed a process that would be self-correcting and sustainable.

Democracy is not a perfect system.  For one, if we are made up of uneducated, uncaring individuals, we will end up with lousy leaders.  But as long as we don’t circumvent the process, we know that all we have to do is stomach that leader for 6 years and then we can elect a better one. We hope that people have learned their lesson and choose wiser the next time.

I know many people that had criticized Cory as being naive, weak, and gullible.  They claim that she did not achieve anything.  I disagree.  If there is ever one thing that she achieved, she had re-instated democracy in our country.  That for me is the biggest change that EDSA had produced.

The Rizal Memorial Sports Complex

That sports complex above is the Rizal Memorial Sports Complex, formerly the Manila Carnival Grounds, built in 1934 for the Far Eastern Championship Games which was the precursor to the Asian Games. It was destroyed in World War II and reconstructed in 1953 for use in the 1954 Asian Games. Since then it has played host to three Southeast Asian Games. The complex has actually two basketball stadiums, a swimming pool, a baseball stadium, tennis courts, a bowling hall, a gymnastic hall, and a boxing gym. The Rizal Memorial Sports Complex is also home for the Philippine Sports Commission.

I still have vivid memories of my brothers and I watching a few NCAA basketball games at the Rizal Memorial Coliseum.  During my college track-and-field days, the Rizal Memorial Coliseum was one of the few ovals that had a tartan track, and it was such a joy to run on.

This picture, taken by my iPhone from the top floor of Century Hotel, is actually a composite of 4 images that was stitched using an amazing app called Autostitch.  Click here if you want to see a high-res version.   All you have to do is take a series of shots with your iPhone and the application will take care of stitching everything to form one panoramic image.