Fetalvero: Afloat with optimism

Noemi C. Fetalvero
Two empty bottles

THE balance tends to tip toward violations against enforcement, and culpability as opposed to taking responsibility. The unequivocal presentation of the harsh realities of a Third World Nation does not mean that we simply submit to what we face today without hope for a better future. Hope stems from our ability to cope with our many crises. While superpowers panic when threatened with instability, we manage to stay afloat because we are used to the highs and the lows.

Our Head of State faces a dilemma on how to recover from our financial crisis and the recent events are not helping him at all. A dimmer future faces our tourism industry as Hong Kong authorities initially decided that Philippines will no longer be considered a tourist destination as far as their country is concerned.

This came as an aftermath of the hostage-taking that claimed the lives or injured some Hong Kong nationals. The tourist bus they were in had figured in a hostage situation.

Watching the crisis unfolding on national television, how I wished the distraught former member of the police force chose a lesser histrionic path to express his anger.

As I viewed the ineptness of our police operatives in handling the situation, I was enraged with our corrupt government officials. Had they spent taxpayers’ money in the acquisition of better equipment and in training our police personnel, the crisis could have been handled with more capability.

It was clearly an uncoordinated operation. While the operatives were planning an assault, they allowed the media to conduct a frame-by-frame account of the exigency and the troop movement despite the possibility that the hostage taker had a TV monitor.

We have not fully recovered from the tourist van incident in Balamban (it claimed the lives of Iranians taking a tour). The Abu Sayyaf kidnappings are still something to contend with concerning tourist safety in Mindanao.

What are our prospects of being regarded as one of the dangerous countries to visit?

If we have to be optimistic despite our odds, our optimism will have to rely on our reputation as a hospitable nation.