Sunday Essays: Hop on, hop off elsewhere

WHEN a friend asks you to come by his house for dinner, of course, you'll expect that you'll be welcomed as a guest, even though you don't relish the thought of expecting anything. It's just basic protocol to expect that you'll be comfortable, safe and sound, and will be treated as royalty.

Tourism works that way. We show our foreign guests around the most astonishing places in the country, tour them at historical and heroic landmarks, go about breath-taking sceneries, give them good food, and have them taste our culture. That's tourism.

Post your reaction to the Manila hostage crisis

But for me, what we have is just "touring". When you attach the suffix "-ism" to a word, it denotes a sense of commitment -- a sense of passion; like for instance, Picassos' Cubism technique. The approaches to the craft are really direct such that it connotes a commitment to their Obra Maestra.

We cannot say the same of our "-ism". Somehow, it only manages to make our guests bob their head with what they physically see and make them pay for something that eventually gets out of hand. We take that commitment for granted.

Let the Manila hostage tragedy be a lesson to every Filipino. We cannot point fingers at each other for our slips and cracks. After all, this is our country and what happens to it is our responsibility. Together, we must work hand-in-hand for the betterment of our developing nation and not blame each other.

Things happen for a purpose. The world isn't perfect and neither are we; and imperfections are avenues for improvement. Instead of dwelling in the past and charging ill-fated love letters to the government or the police or whatnot, let's make a stand and labor for change.

As hosts, we don't want our guests to wash their own plates, don't we?

*****

Sunday Essays are compositions by third year Masscom students of Ateneo de Davao University for their journalism class.