1. Michael V is on the cover of Reader's Digest because of his achievements as a comedian. Wow. Given the amount of creative work he puts into it, I guess it's well deserved. Others who may have been qualified would be Willie Nepomuceno and Jon Santos, at least to my mind, considering how well thought out their caricatures are.
2. A Failed cross-cultural romance, nipped in the bud at the very start. A young man proposes to an equally young lady not of his race and she tells him in another world it would have been, but not in this.
3. Gangs who prey ...
a) the other day in the news was an ex-maid or so she portrayed who was arrested after she poisoned fellow-maids or the children of her bosses (the former, the TV version; the latter, the broadsheets' version) so she could steal jewelry and cash. Two of her poison victims were in the hospital for months, the ICU even. Good thing she was caught, all dressed in a trench coat. She has fashion sense, possibly an ukay-ukay purchase? Or did she get it from ZARA using the spoils of her excursions?
b) 3 or four grade school boys from an exclusive boys' school were victimized by the budol-budol gang (is that what you call those who use the following modus operandi?) The account is sketchy but there were these 3 or 4 young boys who played "basketball" in Trinoma. As they left the place where the game was, a man accosted them and said they had broken something and should go back. They were to leave their wallets, cellphones, IPods with one of the boys who was to remain with the man. While the 3 went back to the establishment, the man brought the last boy standing to West AVenue and divested him of the group's valuables. The mall's surveillance cameras purportedly showed that the man had followed the boys from the gaming place to where he finally accosted them.
My takes on the matter: what are surveillance cameras for? Can't malls have someone monitoring them for suspicious characters or activities rather than use what they film as evidence or to catch evil men? Can't they actually be used to effect "caught in the act" arrests like they do in the movies?
Why do budol-budol gangs continue to succeed? Years back, my nephew was a victim. He and his friend were at a gym near Cubao. They were in college by then, I think. Two men accosted the mestizo looking friend of my nephew and said he had done something bad to one of the men's brothers, so to go with them to settle the matter. My nephew is a good person so he didn't want his richer looking friend to go it alone. The men took them to Riverbanks. One of the man pulled down the shirt of my nephew at the back feigning concern, saying "hindi ka pinawisan?" That was a ploy. The man saw the necklace of my nephew. Just as one of the men took my nephew's friend to meet up with their supposedly victim-brother, the other man told my nephew to leave all his valuables on a table and to join his friend. Of course when they got back, the other man had gone, their expensive stuff along with him.
Considering that this happened a long time ago, one would think young boys would have been told to avoid such by their parents, school authorities, media. But either the young victims have refused to listen or there's a problem of ignorance there. I told my husband that maybe the school should hold a school-wide convocation where the 4 victims can recount their experience before everyone so that similar occurrences can be prevented. I don't know. Or maybe the school should write a letter to their parents to tell them to warn the boys. Or teachers can take up the matter with their classes.
Something ought to be done.
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2 comments:
Re your proposal to have a "school-wide convocation" to warn students... although this may not be totally related, let me tell you about a conversation I had with a nephew (B, the second son who goes to the local Chinese school). He texted me last week to say that he lost his calculator. Last time he lost his cellphone. So I asked him where he lost his things. He said in school and that a lot of students have been losing their things. Of course, I was alarmed. I asked him if he and all the other victims report the stealing. He said no. I asked why not? He said because "it has happened already and there's nothing that can be done anymore". I was angry! I explained to him that if he reports incidents like this (1) it could warn others that a thief (or thieves?) is/are in their midst and to be more careful, (2) it could prod the school authorities to do something and (3) this thief might really need help or at least has to be disciplined or he/she will just keep on stealing.
Ka frustrating for me to know that young people have this attitude. I remember a niece who seem unconcerned that one of their honor students was caught cheating (of course you know which school). The parents were alarmed but the students weren't. If they have this kind of attitude (i.e. they tolerate evil and refuse to do anything about it), then we should be prepared for many many more years of apathy. The "walang pakialam" attitude is what is bringing this country down. Hmm, maybe I should blog about this, no?
Yes, do blog about it. It's scary the way they're so apathetic.
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