Where was I on August 21, 1983 and on...

Today marks the 25th anniversary of Ninoy Aquino's death at the tarmac of the then Manila International Airport. I remember I was watching TV when a news flash reporting on his assassination interrupted my light TV viewing. I was dumbfounded, incredulous, aghast. I was mostly apolitical but a political killing was something I couldn't stomach.


Having been paralyzed for a year and three months by then, I asked God why Ninoy. I even thought God should have taken me instead, although in no way was I a match for the man that Ninoy was, but in terms of any life for someone else's, why not mine?

I guess God wanted the Filipino people to awaken from their lethargy, our lethargy. Because it was only after the death of Ninoy that most of us made known how we felt about the oppression, suppression that haunted our beings since the declaration of martial law.

I am no activist, I am without any intentions to be one, never had any aspirations in that regard either. But enough was enough. And I guess we needed Ninoy to die for us to be shaken out of our apathy.

*******************

Just like I remember what I was doing when I learned of Ninoy's death, so do I vividly remember how two decades or so earlier, I learned of John F. Kennedy's death, he who was envisioned to lead America's version of Camelot. I had just come in from the garden where I had played on the swing when my father greeted me with the news: JFK is dead. The silence was deafening in the house then despite a tape of my sister playing a Scriabin concerto emanating from a reel tape.

*******************
9-11. The latest of the memorable dates in my 52 years of existence. We were watching TV when the phone rang. My father-in-law asked if we were watching the news. We weren't but promptly switched channels. Oh my God, I thought, a scene right out of the movies. When I saw a plane ram through the skyscraper, I thought it was just a replay of the first one. I fervently hoped it was except that the height at which this plane was doing it didn't appear to be the same height as the first plane's. Incredible. How people can just undertake the taking of so many innocent lives. Just like that.