Just Enjoy The Show

May 2010 election is fast approaching and of course our running politicians for the different positions in the government are extremely busy that it made me wonder if they ever have time to blink. Election season in our country is, as ever before, like a fiesta. A raucous combination of colors, music, tag lines, promising speeches, and other gimmicks verging from seriousness to stupidity.

Lets start with colors. Using colors in campaign strategy is a good way of making an imprint to the minds of the people. It's all about association. Yellow, orange, green, blue, and all colors that Crayola could invent are now associated to a certain candidate or political party. Visual learning, such as the use of colors and shapes, are often used by kindergarten teachers in teaching kids effectively. It helps a lot in making a lesson retain in their mind. And this strategy is used by politicians in selling themselves to us since they know that we all act like kindergartens. Just kidding! (Naaah... not really.)

The music or better known as political jingles proliferating currently in the air are either exaggerated, absurd, funny, inspiring, or merely so so. One of these jingles that particularly caught my attention is the listeners if they have ever tried bathing in a sea of garbage? Or spending Christmas in the middle of the street? To answer the first one, I have never ever tried bathing in a sea of garbage and I have no plan to try it in the future either. Think of all the diseases you might get from those murky waters? About the second question, no I haven't tried spending Christmas in the street because you'll just end up with severed limbs (due to hit and run by reckless drivers) or with a hole in the belly (the favorite diversion of robbers, snatchers, addicts, etc.). Besides, with the current economic crisis, Christmas is treated like an ordinary day lately. Seriously, I know what the song is trying to convey. It is trying to ask us whether if we have ever experienced poverty in our existence in this cruel planet because the candidate who owns the jingle did (well, that's what he said). My God, do they still need to ask that? Here in the Philippines, we eat poverty for breakfast, problems for lunch, and misery for supper. And yeah, corrupt public leaders for dessert!

And then here comes the never ending barrage of promises. Promises so sweet to the ears like honey that it's nice to be drowned by them and get intoxicated.... until you developed political diabetes and die with bitterness that you were deceived by their treacherous tongues. Yeah, I may sound cynical but can you blame me for being so?

The forthcoming May 2010 election is very promising and historical. Promising in the sense that a lot of Filipinos, particularly the youth, are involving themselves in the campaign for an honest, peaceful, and conscience-driven election. Historical too because this election will the first time that COMELEC will be using automation for the counting of ballots. I just hope that there will be minimum technical problems with regards to the automation. Whatever will be the result of this election, lets just pray for the success of it. And with regards to the circus our politicians are putting up right now, throwing issues to one another and creating gimmicks here and there, all I could say is that just enjoy the show guys!

Concepcion and Delivery

I went to Concepcion, Iloilo for 4 days just this week for my delivery room assignment in their rural health unit's birthing center and the experience was great. From Iloilo City, I think it took me and my 5 classmates 2 or 3 hours travelling on a bus towards our destination. I love travelling to the northern part of Iloilo province since you would be able to see the coastal area on the right side and the plains and mountains on the left. It felt so liberating just looking outside the bus' window.

The municipality of Concepcion was a rural type of town. Farming and fishing were the main industries of the locals there. What I liked about the place was that the folks were warm and congenial. We were heading to our quarters after our arrival at their bus terminal when two natives I met along the way flashed me with a friendly smile. I think I'll enjoy my stay here, I said to myself.

When we reported to the town's rural health unit, we were introduced to the RHU staff by our clinical instructor, Sir Andrew, and they welcomed us with sincere smiles. Dr. Minguez was the rural health physician and she was a simple yet graceful woman in her early forties if I'm not mistaken. We then took a tour around the RHU building including its birthing facility which was just a small structure constructed at the right side of the main RHU building. There, we stationed the first three of us until evening.

Despite its reputation as a "living university of family planning" in the country because of its successful programs in reproductive health and population control, we still got nine cases of successful deliveries all in all in our 4 days of stay there. Maybe we were just lucky or maybe we just prayed too much because we badly needed the cases in order for us to complete our number of scrubs required for us to be able to graduate and take the board exam. Although giving birth is a messy and painful process, we really enjoyed our duty there. Giving life is a great miracle and assisting a mother in labor and in giving birth is a wonderful experience. My clinical exposure in Concepcion made me feel that I was a part of those miracles. It overshadowed my need to complete my scrubs because of the sense of fulfillment. The fulfillment of being a part of this great circle called LIFE.

E.R.

Emergency Room. My new area of assignment in my nursing clinical exposure for this year. I was supposed to be assigned in the female infectious ward but the assignment was dissolved for the reason that the risks are too high (as the name of the ward suggests). Our college is very concerned with the safety of its students. Ows? How touching! Anyway, I like the E.R. You'll never know what action and drama you'll gonna get. The adrenaline is most often high in the place but there are also times when it is like a silent room in which boredom suddenly lands on the E.R. people's shoulder. One time, during my previous assignments in the said area, I was pretending that I am George Clooney. All cameras were focused on me and I made up that I was in a medical drama series. A top-rating one. But when a bloody patient suddenly greeted us at the entrance and I suddenly froze to where I stood upon seeing it, the George Clooney persona in me instantly evaporated.

This is reality, I said to myself.

2010

Happy New Year!

It's a brand new year. I have no resolutions only realizations. Realizations of how blessed I was last year. I thank God for all the courage and strength he gave last year to face and overcome all of life's trials and tests. I thank him too for the great things I have and that includes my family, friends, my studies, and the new avenues of life I am starting to travel.

2010 is the year of the metallic tiger according to the Chinese calendar. That means I have to be tough this year like a metal in facing life's everyday struggles and brave, fearless and graceful like a tiger in everything I do.

Once again, a prosperous new year and be careful from all those firecrackers! God bless us all.