Sleepless in Bukid-non
RANT HAS BECOME MY DAILY BREAD during this lockdown, which I had hoped would be lifted in Luzon as scheduled – on April 13. There was nothing I can do about it but count the days when this is over and resume whatever tasks I had in mind accomplished before I return to Vienna on April 30.
And then, Phil. President, upon the recommendation of his cheerleaders, decided to extend the lockdown for another 20 days. Wadafak?! I thought of the many tasks I have started and kept on hold because of the lockdown — a nightmare, and I have sleepless nights since, but there’s nothing I can I do but respect the decision. But 20 days? Come on! Why not give us a reasonable timeframe, six months maybe, or even one year, to assess how we fare with the COVID issue and then decide then if lockdown is still necessary? If they don’t see the light at the end of the tunnel during this timeframe, then consider another extension but prepare us for this – no more of those last-minute announcements when we have to drop everything at your command because of the situation, and you must act quickly. Twenty days, my foot! Tell us now—no need to keep us hanging in midair.
The national government is big on making snap decisions, like when they imposed the enhanced community lockdown in Luzon, which took effect immediately after announcing it on primetime TV. Everyone was caught flatfooted. I don’t know about the others, but I panicked. They said it would be over in one month. The doubting Thomas in me hoped against hope. One month? Really? And then the 20-day extension, another snap decision. Give me time to prepare for the inevitable, please! Enough of your snap decisions!
You see, I scrapped my bucket list as they announced the lockdown. Nevertheless, I am determined to bring to completion whatever I had started once this is over – never mind if the time is tight until I bid farewell again to family and friends in the Philippines. (This flight, BTW, has been canceled and rebooked for the nth time because of this lockdown.) I’d see to it that everything worked on schedule: Tasks like my house annex construction which began in January and hoped to make habitable by April and then throw a party for family and friends after the obligatory house-blessing; dental appointments; pasalubongs to buy; take to the tailor that wardrobe I brought home for alteration (which I’m afraid will never happen because I keep on delaying for another day, enough time to do it. You see, procrastination rules my life); pick up that Barong Tagalog I had tailor-made for me by, take note, a posh boutique in Manila at Shang Mall – a pineapple fiber barong which I should have worn for a wedding interrupted – someone else’s wedding, not mine. Or maybe mine someday, why not? Hope springs eternal.
Hearing my daily rants, a friend in Vienna — a Kumare — told me to come back soon. Dami mong problema dyan (heaps of problems, you have there), You could have joined the Austrian Foreign Ministry’s repatriation program for Austrians stranded in the Philippines, she said. I was not stranded here, though; I have a home here, but the first couple of weeks during lockdown was a disaster. Rules were confusing and change every day, depending on who was imposing them.
Consider the Quarantine Checkpoints. One day the barangay council was in control of the checkpoints, and then a day later, it was the police, and then the Barangay council again. There was a time when the wife of my gardener was on her way to town to get money from the ATM, then to her doctor’s clinic for consultation. The police stopped her, and they told her to go home. (She claimed that it was a sundalo (a soldier) because of his camouflage outfit).The sundalo told her it was not her palengke (market day). She knew it was not her market day, but this has nothing to do with her going to town. “Does not matter, “the police told her. She has to have a doctor’s prescription with her. She has yet to get one, hello? Do it on your market days, the soldier insisted. Again, hello? Either the officer was dumb, or the instructions were vague.
Whoever sets the rules in my hometown must see to it that they are clear and easily understood. This rule on assigned market days is a classic example of the phrase lost in translation.
People from our barangay (village) have Tuesdays and Fridays as their market days. Some law enforcers or anyone in military uniform, interpret this rule as also days when you are allowed in the town center. Do everything on your market day like what the police manning the Checkpoint told the wife of my gardener. Lucky are those who live in the town proper, I said to myself. They can go to the market on the days assigned to them and on any day to the only supermarket we have. The supermarket is in the center of town, so are the medical clinics, the bakeries, the drug stores, the banks, the ATMs, etc. Maybe I should consider moving to where everything was accessible.
I love it here, even during these difficult times, but.