this is where your taxes go

I have always considered myself "taong deadma" when it comes to politics, never been very vocal about how I feel about corruption and politics, until the subject of pork barrel started to flood my Facebook wall. I guess it is true that ignorance is bliss… because after being made brutally aware of how a certain number of people have  misused and is continuously misusing their funds, i can't help but feel annoyed, a little more every time i get an update on how this organized theft works.

I am not totally naive, of course i am aware that politics is corruption-laiden, but to what extent, I never really had an idea, never knew it was already ninja level graft and corruption,  not until I got the chance to hear and learn about what Benhur Luy has to say.

It started when I took time to read a very interesting post i saw at dulzspeaks.blogspot.com  (quite a lengthy one). Took 30 minutes of my 40-minute jeepney ride to finish reading it. It sent shivers down my spine, I alighted the jeepney with mixed emotions, i felt mad, annoyed, cheated… robbed is a better word, i pitied myself. I really do not mind taking a jeepney ride home, but after reading it, can't help but try to compute and realized that if I was to refund all the tax that was deducted from me since I started working right after I finished college, I could possibly be able to afford a car, maybe not a Porsche Cayenne but something wage-appropriate for me… sure I may not always act my age, but I do act my wage.

So from then on, I tried to keep myself updated, and not help but feel sorry for myself. I am sorry if it will seem like I am bullying the model-designer baby of Janet Napoles, I just want to bash, I just want to vent! 

the caption says it all!

Okay so maybe I am jealous, maybe because I also want to live as luxuriously as her and be able have my tiny foot experience what it is like to be in a pair of Christian Loubuotin (did I spell it right?) shoes. Maybe I also want to rub elbows with the rich and famous of Hollywood, and be able to throw a lavish party in Beverly Hills. Maybe even my chubby little body will look good in a little pink dress that costs as much as, if not more than the annual salary of a minimum wage earner. Maybe I will not be late for any of my appointments if I use a  watch that costs a million pesos. 

But I know that even if I work my pretty little ass off until I retire I will never be able to afford it… and that is what pisses me the most… her living the way I can only dream of and the knowledge that she can do so by using the taxes that the government deducts from me and from every other working Pinoy.

I am willing to pay taxes, it is my responsibility. I just hope that the next time I look at my payslip, I will not feel bad about giving a part of my salary to the government knowing that my hard-earned money goes to where it should… not to a social-climbing, malnourished-looking, striving fashion designer who takes pride in following celebrities. And by the way, I am no fashion guru, I am actually a self-confessed baduy, but that so-so collection you had paraded at that catwalk thingy you had at your "legalized" party is not something that shouts haute couture. It looks like something I could buy off the rack at a department store but wouldn't. 

There… I feel better…  at least for the time being.  

this time last year

... I was so lovesick... beyond words, beyond any scholarly explanation. I turned a blind eye to the deception, all because my crazy little heart ruled over my brain. I allowed myself to be used and abused and took martyrdom to a whole new level. 

I believed in destiny, in childhood dreams coming true, in fate, in love conquering all, in first love never dying, in infinity and beyond, in forever and a day.  I believed in second chances, in that age old adage of "setting someone free and if it comes back, it is yours forever"... etc etc etc

I was willing to risk everything, to leave everything behind and just live in a place where "kilig" rules and nothing else matters. My happiness and my sense of self-worth depended on a single person. I voluntarily submitted myself to be placed on the bottom of the clearance rack, a place even the most kuripot shopper dare not waste time digging into. 

Someone controlled my happiness and made me feel like I am of so little value, As "Michael" aptly described in My best friend's wedding,I think it came to a point that my whole being was comparable to  "the pus that infects the mucus that cruds up the fungus that feeds on the pond scum"… and the worst part is that I didn't mind at all, I allowed it to happen. I was happily contented at being just pus. 

I am pretty sure my brain was still inside my skull during that time, but it did seemed like it went into a coma. I guess the danger of being alone for a very long time is that you easily fall for the very first person who shows you that you are not alone. 

I am a living proof that no one really dies of a broken heart. After countless nights of crying myself to sleep and taking 30-minute baths (20 minutes of that bath time spent crying), of taking self-pity for breakfast and wishing I had known better. I guess I found my way to moving on. 

They say time heals all wounds, and I have come to believe that it is true. I don't know how, but I woke up one day without the urge to exercise my ninja level stalking skills on Facebook, i was no longer wishing and hoping to get a message on Skype, and love songs ceased to make me stop and think "awwww i can relate". 

I died a little, I cried a lot,and spent a whole lot of time staring blankly and asking myself questions that no one can really answer.There is so much reason for my heart to be filled with hatred and bitterness. But I chose to let go of anger, to forgive but not to forget the lesson. Love is a special thing, I know I am capable of loving, and that there is this one person who deserves all the love and that person is the one who stares back at me every time I look in the mirror. I love myself now, maybe not as much as I should have before, but enough to be able to know what I truly deserve. 

So I guess there will really be people who will come into my life just to strengthen me, so I can move on with my life a better person. They are not meant to stay, they are meant to teach me something. They will be a part of my memory, not my destiny.