NOTWITHSTANDING my many misgivings, I would like to resume the weekly conversations that are my columns. And I hope you would sit beside or across me, and we could continue where we left off.
WRITER'S block, it has been called. Except mine felt like an entire wall made of many nasty blocks. Thus a couple of months back I stopped sending in to Sun.Star Davao the weekly column. My travails had sounded plausible at first, a series of engagements that precluded writing on the days I normally allotted to it, and the intensification of school work. But as more Fridays passed and I still could not hand in anything, I realized I truly felt blocked.
At that time, I had been writing a weekly column a little over two years, certainly neither as long nor as frequent as others have. But it already felt like with each column I produced I was repeating myself. Whenever I approached a topic I ended up reviewing previous pieces to check what had been said about it by others and myself. And most times I despaired that I was not only not saying anything new, I wasn't even putting it better. I found my writing halting instead of flowing, the thought processes tentative instead of firm and decisive.
Even when the opportunities to write did present themselves, I agonized over these questions: what do I write about? What should I say? How is my voice making a difference? Is there room for my kind of writing? Indeed, why write at all? Grandmother, what huge stumbling blocks I had.
I took to writing a column because it was another way to help scrutinize, shape and reshape ourselves and the world. On more honest days I admit writing commentaries enables me to inflict my opinions on hapless others.
But mostly, writing made me feel like I was sitting across somebody who was willing to engage about interesting topic, and having an intense conversation it. The conversation sometimes felt like nothing was resolved, that more questions than answers were unearthed. I always come away amazed at what I learned, and unlearned, from that process.
But blocked I was, mistrustful of my ability to write. Until two recent events transpired.
On one of those daily hour-long commutes to downtown Davao, my partner and I witnessed how a group of Sama (more commonly referred to as Badjao) women and children were turned away by the jeepney conductor and prevented from boarding the ride. I asked him why he had done so, and he replied that it was upon instructions of the driver, because they had previously experienced ferrying Badjaos who did not pay their fares.
Flustered by the explanation, I said in parting that it was unfair and that it really ought not happen again. I had no illusions that I changed the conductor's views about Samas with that one encounter. But I hoped that he would remember that he got called out about it, and that it would cause him to at least hesitate the next time the urge to discriminate rears its ugly head again.
I thought the assumptions of the driver and conductor were at the very least highly speculative and at its worst grossly discriminatory. That act of rejecting the Samas' bid for a ride did not seem like an isolated event, but was symptomatic of deeply ingrained prejudices, and a dramatization of their marginalized status.
To me it also highlighted fundamental problems of the public transport system: that the franchises issued to public transport providers did not carry specific service standards, and a lot depended on the discretion of the providers themselves.
A franchise is more than a livelihood opportunity, it is a service contract. Would that more operators and drivers take it as a commitment to provide quality and reliable services to public transport users regardless of who they are.
And to think that Davao City has an Anti-Discrimination Ordinance that prohibits acts and conduct that discriminates based on sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, race, color, descent, national or ethnic origin and religious affiliation.
Refusing to give a ride to the Samas certainly fell within the definition of discrimination as "any act which withholds, excludes, restricts, curtails, demeans human dignity or otherwise impairs the recognition, enjoyment and exercise of human rights and basic freedoms."
Unfortunately, behavior change does not automatically happen with every legislative measure. Policy frameworks provide the rationale, direction, details and mechanisms of the envisioned change. But a lot more needs to be done to help citizens form healthy views and respectful attitudes towards each other, particularly with groups that have been "othered" historically and systematically. Perhaps the "a lot more (that) needs to be done" would include writings that shine light on issues that otherwise would languish in dark corners, and doing so in a manner that recognizes the limits of institutionalism and also calls for personal witnessing.
The other event concerns Manobos from Talaingod and Kapalong who are protesting the closure of hinterland schools operated by the Salugpongan Ta'Tanu Igkanugon Community Learning Center Inc. in Talaingod, Davao del Norte. The Department of Education (DepEd) claimed that they did not close the schools; they only did not issue a permit to operate for 2015-2016. I wish I could say the situation is merely word play and is similar to the half-full/half-empty conundrum. In this case though there is no element of gain for the children, not even a half-gain.
Isay was one of the affected Manobo school children and with a warm smile she asked for my name. She volunteered hers, stated that she was Manobo and began to talk about why she, other children, and their family members were in Davao. Wistfully, she said she would have been Grade V this school year, had their school opened.
Beyond issues of compliance with regulation, there are charges that militarization is the driving force that prevents 3,000 lumad kids from benefiting from schooling this year. Isay candidly said that her school is accused of being influenced by the New People's Army (NPA) but clarified that all they are studying in school are subjects like English, Math, Pilipino and their culture.
She also rued the organizing of the Alamara, a paramilitary group composed of members from their own tribe. Isay said that they had experienced being harassed by members of the group who order school children to collect firewood for the Alamara's use, and who fire their weapons indiscriminately when angered. And yet she expressed pity for members of their community who joined the Alamara saying they often run out of provisions and are forced to go hungry.
A DepEd representative acknowledged the need for schools for those in hard-to-reach areas and assured that this need would be met. Isay echoed the argument of one of the Datus of her tribe who claimed that they had been requesting for schools from government to no avail and found it ironic that now that they were able to set up their own with the support of NGOs, their very efforts would be thwarted.
Isay claimed that government teachers, who had to go home for the weekend and come back the following workweek and teach multiple grades, were only able to hold classes for two days within a week and that students sometimes received no more than an hour of instruction each week.
Isay has to walk for two days to buy school supplies like ball pen and paper; but this and the harassments they have had to endure, seem nothing when compared to the prospect of not being able to go to school.
As I listened to Isay's inspired narration, I can only grasp at the different interests and arguments at play. And while the issue is obviously complex and layered, the question that kept popping up in my mind was "what about the children like Isay?"
I would like to encounter more Isays, children from marginalized communities who are articulate and have vision, who can tell their own stories and compel others to listen, who in the face of their daily challenges, have no qualms about approaching others with a confident smile. And if only to make space for these Isays, let the schools in Talaingod open, and let there be more schools for more Lumad children.
In the past I winced at how my columns were viewed as progressive but not politically comprehensive. But if my role is only to ask "what about the children like Isay?" perhaps there is room for my kind of writing after all.
I'm writing this on Philippine Independence Day. The streets are festooned with the Philippine flag; social media regulars will likely temporarily change their profile pictures to display the flag. The topics that recently made it to the headlines and commentaries and were deemed trending included China's continuing incursions into the contested Mischief Reef, and how the Philippines is again playing into US interest.
If I were to concentrate on Independence Day for a column I would likely bring up points previously raised by historians, anthropologists and political activists: that there are Moros who would not celebrate today as Independence Day but as part of the series of events by which previously unconquered Mindanao got bundled into and became part of the Philippine Republic, and the question about where and how the Lumads and the Bangsamoro are represented in the Philippine flag. The one day when Filipinos are supposed to honor freedom and I'm raising these issues. Does this make me less of a supporter of Philippine Independence?
Perish the thought. But I prefer to support narratives of the struggle for independence that, paraphrasing the words of historian Ompong Rodil, has been clarified and corrected to include the Lumad and the Bangsamoro and rectify historical injustices. Because celebrations of Philippine independence without acknowledging the subjugation and marginalization of the Lumad and Bangsamoro, would be well, like flag-waving, easy and potentially a dramatic visual, but not necessarily the most lasting proof.
Perhaps there is space for columns that, despite expectations to provide incisive analysis, do not offer binaries and absolutisms, but are couched in terms that acknowledge complexities and contradictions.
Perhaps.
Notwithstanding my many misgivings, I would like to resume the weekly conversations that are my columns. And I hope you would sit beside or across me, and we could continue where we left off.
Writer's block be damned, the only true recourse when one is in the business of rights promotion and righting wrongs is to, well, write on.
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