Imperyalismo at kahirapan

Madalas kong mapanood ang mga rally ng maralitang Pilipino sa telebisyon. Alam kong mayroon silang ipinaglalaban ngunit alam ko na mayroon din namang naisin ang ating gobyerno. Nasa isipan ko pa rin ang pantay na pagtingin sa dalawang kampo. Bagamat nakasali na ko sa mga rally, rally sa walang awang pamamaslang sa mga dyornalis o kaya naman ay sa hindi pantay na paglilitis ng DOJ sa anomalyang nangyayari sa ating gobyerno. Hindi na bago sa akin ang init, pagod at paos sa linyang "Ang tao, ang bayan, ngayon ay lumalaban?" na kailanman ay tila hindi niluma ng panahon. Kay tagal na ngang isinisigaw ito ng kapwa kong Pilipino, ilang henerasyon na nga ang nagdaan at parehong linya, parehong problema at kahilingan pa rin ang hinihiling ng bawat Pilipino.

NGUNIT, iba ang naranasan ko kanina. Ang karanasan kong iyon ay higit pa sa pagod sa layo ng biyahe, pagtakbo at paglalakad na ginawa namin, higit pa sa init, dumi at pangit na minalas ko kanina. Tungkol iyon sa buhay ng mga taong naalisan ng karapatan sa pangkabuhayan at disenteng tirahan, kamatayan dahil sa pang-aangkin ng lupa ng mga mahihirap nating kababayan, mga kababayang walang ninanais kung hindi ang ingatan ang kani-kaniya nilang buhay at pag-aari, mga kababayang may karapatan sa lupang kinatitirikan ng kanilang mga tahanan.

Kailanma'y hindi maaalis sa aking isipan ang mga mukha ng paghihikaos ng mahihirap na mamamayang ang ipinaglalaban lamang ay ang mumunting lupang kay laki na para sa kanila na binayaran nila ng dugo, buhay at pawis. Sila ang matatawag na biktima ng imperyalismo at kapitalismo sa bulok na sistema sa ating bansa na kay tagal nang nilalabanan ng ating mga ninuno.
Bulag na demokrasya, binging kalayaan.
Nasaan nga ba ang hustisya para sa mga taong pinaslang na parang mga hayop para lamang sa kanilang mumunting pag-aari?

Nasaan na nga ang batas na dapat na pumoprotekta sa karapatang pantao ng kahit na sino?

Parehong ang hustisya at batas ay nasa mga kamay ng mga burukrata kapitalismo na siyang mayayaman, makapangyarihan at higit sa lahat sagana sa pang-aalipusta sa kapwa nilang Pilipino.

Ngayong araw namulat ang aking mga mata sa sistemang paulit-ulit, walang tigil at hindi madaling tibagin.

First day, second job

I know it would be very boring this day. The fact that I would be working in a library already gave me a hint of what's going to happen.

I arrived late this morning at 10:10am. I should have allotted 2 hours as my travel time. I was wrong. To commute wearing a corporate attire is what? A mess, hassle.Sobrang init kaya sa labas tapos maglalakad sa kalye nang naka-long sleeves? Suicidal. Hahaha

My first task: To photocopy the workshop handouts for the Creative writing workshop. 15 copies each.

For the first 5 hours of doing that, I manually arranged each of the pages. Sa totoo lang hindi naman talaga ako marunong mag-operate ng photocopying machine eh. hahaha nagpaturo lang ako kung kani-kanina diyan sa tabi- tabi sa office. Siyempre ang ituturo sa kin yung pinakasimpleng way ng pagxe-xerox. Hindi ko alam na pwede pala dun sa machine namin yung pangmaramihan.


I wasted my whole day at pagod na ko. Sumakit ulo ko. Haaaay.

Nakakabingi ang katahimikan dito sa office ngayon.

Energy Efficiency Summit

Finally, the day has come! Behold! :)))

After weeks and days of preparation for the Sustainable Campus Project the big day has come.

I, Sir Jeff and Sir Ranny fetch the participants from Mindanao State University at the NAIA 3 Airport Terminal. They arrived in Manila at around 6pm. We went straight to a stop over to eat dinner. There are 6 of them from their university. Three of them are born again christian that's why we easily became close to each other. I really didn't expected them to be Christians because they come from Mindanao region. We expect that everyone from Mindanao are Muslims wearing long modest dress covering their faces but I am so glad that these young people are Christians too.

We arrived at the De La Salle University Dasmarinas Retreat house late at night. Knowing that there's a lot of things to do for tomorrow, the moment I saw my room I opened my laptop and began writing the program script for tomorrow's event. After finishing it at around 1am I decided to sleep so that I'll be ready to host the event.

I felt so happy doing things for this kind of event and I'm half nervous and excited to see what's going to happen.

Yes, Kim and I are your hosts for today. We (actually I) are having too much time to think of the things that we are going to say, on how are we going to introduce the next presenters or speakers, how to say 'It's lunch time!' and many other things.

Sustainable Campus Project

"Ang kabataan ang pag-asa ng ating bayan."- Jose Rizal

I firmly believe that there's a lot of things that a young person can do, they have the physical and mental strength and also the will to do things that they want to do in life, achieve their goals and live the most of it. I read something in the bible that says:

"Don't let anyone look down on you because you are young, but set an example for the believers in speech, in life, in love, in faith and in purity." 1 Timothy 4:12

 See? There are something in youth today, they have the power to change the course that was set by the previous generations. Now, climate change is a serious problem we are facing right now. It's the outcome of the past generations' bad practices in the environment and now, the generation today are suffering because of it and if we do not change our ways, the future generations will inherit this. Sadly, they won't be able to experience living with nature if we continue to do things that harms it.

The Sustainable Campus Project (SPC) aims to transform schools into living and learning models of energy efficiency and environmental sustainability. These schools are: Mindanao State University, Ateneo de Davao University, De La Salle University- Dasmarinas, St. Paul University- Quezon City and University of South Eastern Philippines. The project is hosted by the Greenpeace Southeast Asia funded by the Foundation for the Philippine Environment. The Phase 1 of the project already started on June 1 last year and they already conducted a lot of campaigns regarding energy efficiency. Initially, they conducted the Walkthrough Energy Audit in each school to know the school's energy consumption.

What's the connection between climate change and energy efficiency?

One of the main causes of climate change is the burning of fossil fuels that emits carbon dioxide to the atmosphere (as what I know).

Energy Efficiency and use of renewable energy are some of what we can do to save the environment.

Everything that was done by the universities and Greenpeace will be weighed or evaluated on the Energy Efficiency Summit that was held last April 30, 2012 at La Salle Dasma.

Kim (co-intern) and I were fortunate to host the event but I also assisted my supervising in organizing the event a day before the event.

Two universities from Mindanao experienced difficulty in raising the funds they need to sustain their campaigns and programs in Energy efficiency. The good thing is that they can partner with NGOs that may help them in the project.

Mindanao is currently facing power crisis today and Energy Efficiency is the answer.

Each university have their own effective projects. Here are some of them:

They distributed campaign materials, conducted exhibits, Fun Run, installed Solar PV Systems in campuses, promote NSTP class on Energy Management, measured student's carbon footprint, conducted Energy Efficiency caravan, seminars, poster making contests and Quiz Bees

With their creative minds, the young people conducted programs in their school that campaigns energy efficiency. After the replacement of the bulb lights to CFLs and LED bulbs, they also promote these Simple Lang Tips:

SWITCH OFF.

UNPLUG.

LIGHT UP EFFICIENTLY.

Simple acts when done collectively will help stop climate change.

I wish my school is included in the project. Seriously, I absorbed a lot of "wonderful" programs during the event. I even copied a lot of what they have done because I also plan to focus my environmental school organization programs on climate change. I want to adopt these programs to our Environment Society in St. Scholastica's College- Manila to raise awareness to Scholasticans. I already proposed some of these to our Org president and she's interested with it.

All schools here in the Philippines should be also aware of this issue we are facing right now. Collective efforts mean success. The youth today can do more than we could ever think of considering that free flow of information is too accessible for them.

Youth, let us be informed about Climate Change. How can we defeat something that we didn't know? Research on the internet.

Let us start a difference in our own selves. Check our homes and energy consumption and start with simple corrections. Switch off and unplug appliances that are in standby mode.

We can also protect our climate by joining programs through NGOs or other institutions.

Spread the word! Let us encourage everyone to do simple acts.

More infos on how we can help, check www.greenpeace.org.ph.

This problem is serious and we are running out of time so we better do something before it's too late. There's nothing that we can't do if we are determined to achieve our goal.