Memory lane

A FEW days before my death, I was born. I died in mid-March of 1974 in Annex II of the then Northern Mindanao Regional Training Hospital. Doctors were only able to revive me after they “cut down” a major artery in my lower leg.

I have so many fond memories in the now Northern Mindanao Medical Center. As I said, I was introduced to the hospital when it was just a training hospital. I practically grew up in that hospital.

Last week, when my brother called to invite me to the launch of their year-long centennial celebration, I was so excited. It is not every day that you get to celebrate 100 years of something because it takes literally a hundred years to do so.

“Housed in a building of mixed materials with a nipa roof, the Misamis Public Hospital opened on Oct. 1, 1917, in the district of Carmen, Cagayan, Misamis Province,” the centennial committee on its history written in its short summary of its 100-year journey to where and what it is now.

It was established at a time when the country was under American colonial rule. However, it was maintained mainly with funds from the Capitol under the then Governor Isidro Rillas, who served as Misamis governor from 1917 to 1919.

In 1932, the then MPH was constructed in its present location at the Capitol grounds. However, the hospital was destroyed during World War II. In 1945, it was rebuilt and renamed as Misamis Oriental Provincial Hospital.

As I told fellow columnist Rhona Canoy, that name seemed to have stuck. Until now, many Kagay-anons, when they flag a motorela, still inexplicably tell the driver: “Sa provincial, nong.”

In 1966, by virtue of Republic Act 4662, it was renamed and declared as the Northern Mindanao Regional Training Hospital. This was the first step in its journey to becoming a tertiary medical facility in the region.

My mother, Thomasita Bajao Corrales, was already a senior nurse then. I would eat my lunch with her at its cooperative canteen or at the room for minor surgeries at the dispensary.

The best part of growing in a training hospital was mingling with student doctors and nurses — lots of fond memories there.

While my contemporaries at Xavier University Grade School were busy with their kote and jolen, I was making cotton balls and vaginal gauze swabs with student nurses at NMRTH.

I was also privy to hospital grapevine. Let’s just say that I was aware of stories about the doctors and nurses. And man, are those stories saucy!

I remember Dr. Dy, with his goatee, ambling his way to the dispensary and never failing to remind me that he circumcised me, much to my chagrin as I try to strike up idle conversations with the student nurses.

There have also been dour memories with the hospital.

No one was with me during my graduation at Xavier University High School. Earlier that afternoon, my father, Emilio, had suffered his fifth cardiac arrest and was rushed to the intensive care of the then newly established heart center of the NMMC.

After typhoon Sendong ravaged our barangay in 2011, all my kids took their prophylactic shots against leptospirosis at the hospital.

Almost two years ago, my mother died at the hospital’s dialysis room.

Let me just say that the hospital has been an important part of my personal history. Maybe that’s the reason why I was also excited with its centennial year. Like a long-time friend, we share a lot of history together.

My brother who is working at the hospital now told me they are planning to hold various activities to highlight their centennial year. It began with the unveiling of the centennial wall in front of the hospital last week. He said they will hold a major activity every month until October 2018.

I can’t wait to cover each and every one of these activities.

‘Rebolusyon sa inyong baga’

“There is no natural, spontaneous process to prevent destabilizing, inegalitarian forces from prevailing permanently.” – Thomas Piketty, The New Yorker

THIS administration and its minions have been bandying about lately the word “revolution” and its adjective form “revolutionary” like it is some kind of magic wand which will waive away all the horrific transgressions it is committing to the very people who brought them to power.

Please permit me a slight digression before I continue. I’d like to give a shout out to Fr. Brennan, SJ (apologies because for the life of me I can’t remember his first name) for teaching us basic Latin in high school. He taught us that if we learn Latin we could virtually be walking dictionaries.

Now back to the point I was making.

The Middle English word “revolution” is derived from the Latin revolutio which means a turnaround. Merriam Webster defines it as “a fundamental change in political power or organizational structures that takes place in a relatively short period of time when the population rises up in revolt against the current authorities.”

Dictionary.com defines revolution as “an overthrow or repudiation and the thorough replacement of an established government or political system by the people governed.”

In sociology, revolution is “a radical and pervasive change in society and the social structure, especially one made suddenly and often accompanied by violence.”

So, there. From the definitions alone, you can pretty much see how unnerving it is to hear people in power spouting such platitude. In the definitions, it is clear that the overthrowing variable is the population or the people governed or the ruled class.

What do this administration’s minions expect? Like, do they honestly believe Digong Dada will overthrow his own bloody rule? especially now that he has tasted intoxicating power, which possibly is only equaled by the dose of Fentanyl he has been taking?

This may come as a shock to you but what actually happened in Edsa 31 years ago was nowhere near a revolution. At best, it was a revolt of the middle class. Look where it has led the Filipino people too. It has dumbed down the collective understanding of what a revolution actually is.

It has been pointed out to me by a kuya-kumpare, no less, that a revolution isn’t necessarily a violent event. Methinks this kind of thinking is revisionist in nature — strongman Marcos’ “green revolution” comes to mind.

But if we revisited the true meaning of the word, how can an overthrow or replacement of an established system be anything peaceful or benign?

You have to realize that the system being replaced or overthrown has people (read: human beings) behind it. Do you honestly believe these people will just up and leave because they will be replaced by another paradigm?

Do you honestly believe that the P6.4 billion worth of shabu that breezed through the Bureau of Customs — thanks to the Davao Group — will end and will not happen again once this administration’s version of “revolutionary government” comes to power?

These people have been making a butt-load of money out of this sweet arrangement they have right now. Do you think they will just give this largesse for an altruistic goal of “uniting” the Filipino people?

Revolutions are always ugly, violent, and messy — always. The national democratic revolution that has been raging for the past four decades is a testament to that.

This administration threatening that it will establish a “revolutionary government” is like it says it respects human rights, due process, and rule of law. It is simply not true to what it is doing to our nation.

You cannot push a “threat” of a revolutionary government when most Filipinos have been living it for decades.

You see, revolutions are not threats. It is a lifestyle and the ruled class is living it.

The ruling class, to put it bluntly, is neither in the position nor have the moral ascendancy to call for a revolutionary government. The ruled class is the proper variable in the equation to complete a revolution, Einstein!

Jeez! Did all these “smart and brightest” flunk world history?

Egay responds to irate driver

RECEIVING feedback has always been, to me, the thing that makes writing worthwhile. It completes the writing. Writing, after all, is communication, and feedback completes that cycle.

For those who have been following “My Wit’s End” — yes, I’m talking to all 137 of you — I lent my space to articulate the rants of an irate driver-friend on the traffic situation in and around the city.

To refresh your memory, my irate driver-friend divided his rants into three parts: traffic lights, traffic enforcers, and their mobility.

It has since reached the ears, err eyes, of Cagayan de Oro traffic czar lawyer Edgardo “Egay” Uy. He PM-ed me about two hours after that day’s issue hit the streets. He has graciously answered my irate driver-friend’s rants, point-by-point.

So, to end this cycle, I have decided to once again lend my space to Uy’s reply in full and as is. Although, I highly doubt that we’ve heard the last of this particular subject matter [smirks].

Nota bene for those who have been hiding under a rock: RTA is Roads and Traffic Administration, and CCTV stands for closed-circuit television.

Please, do read on.

“Yes, brew, I read your column.  Allow me to clarify the concerns raised by your irate driver-friend.

“1. The traffic lights. The entire project [traffic light and CCTV systems] was not yet turned over to the city by the contractor. The CCTV component is already 99.99% complete while the traffic lights component is still about 70% done.

“Mayor Moreno created a task force to oversee the completion of the project.  The chairmanship changed hands recently and I now head it. We are conducting weekly meetings with the project contractor, needless to state, to closely monitor their progress.

“Our team has required some corrections in the traffic lights that were already installed, e.g., cabling method, safety triggers, etc. These are among the reasons there are flashing traffic lights. These are being worked out by the contractor in coordination with our team.

“We have given the contractor until the end of the year to fully turn over the project to the City.  Failing in this, legal action will have to be resorted to by the City.

“2. On Traffic Aides. Yes, the RTA trains them before they are fielded. We have strengthened the RTA education team and have come up with training modules both for new hires and the tenured ones. And training is continuing.

“Traffic aides are supposed to wear their issued vests for visibility especially at night. If there are those who fail to wear the vests, we would be happy to receive detailed reports so the RTA supervisors could immediately do corrective actions.

“We are currently re-organizing the RTA to address managerial requirements. One of the focus areas are (sic) traffic aides on the road because the RTA needs to closely supervise them, especially that the enforcement group comprises about 75% of its workforce.

“3. On mobility. The RTA has added motorcycles to the Motorcycle Enforcement Unit of the RTA to partly address mobility concerns. The RTA is also beefing up its fleet but we cannot do it at one stroke given some limitations. As a part of this, the RTA will also strengthen its ability to maintain its fleet to ensure the availability of roadworthy vehicles.

“Thank you for the observations. We welcome feedback from the public so we can continue to improve the RTA and the service it renders.”

Rants of an irate driver

I HAVE only been a motorist for a short time in the early ’90s. But as a long time commuter, I commiserate with them as far as the traffic situation in the city is concerned. So, when an irate long-time driver complains, I listen intently as I have never shunned from a learning opportunity.

His rant on the traffic situation in the city is three-part, so please bear with me.

The first part of his rant is of traffic lights. Like him, I would also want to know the schedule when the Road and Traffic Administration switches these on. Is there an actual schedule or are these just defective? If defective, then when will city hall allot a budget for the repair?

There is this traffic light at the junction in Cogon. Like the irate driver, I have observed this particular traffic light because my boss and I pass by this junction when going to the newsroom most of the time. The damned thing is off most of the time with only the yellow light blinking like crazy.

Suffice it to say that the traffic lights in the city are on as random as your average Christmas lights.

The second part of his rant is on traffic aides. Where does traffic czar Egay Uy hire these people from? Does the RTA train these people before deploying them in the streets?

I only ask these questions because even if I’m not driving, I find their gestures confusing. You cannot tell if they’re signaling you to stop or to go. Yes, it is that confusing. There has even been a time when they direct traffic while standing on the side of the road and not at the center of the junction.

There is the issue of their visibility at night time. No, it’s not that they are not working, as in no visibility in the streets. I’m talking about their visibility to drivers at night. They don’t have reflectorized (if that’s a legit word) uniforms.

The irate driver I was talking to last week said he cannot see the traffic aide much less the gesture the aide was doing with his hands at night. Another driver-friend I know nearly bumped the poor traffic aide and it doesn’t help that their uniforms are dark, either.

The third part of his rant is the mobility of these traffic aides. He told me he once watched a traffic aide run (yes, on foot) from the badminton place in Gusa to the junction in Galaxy to apprehend an erring driver who eluded him.

My friend suggests that every team of traffic aides should have a patrol car so they could pursue erring drivers if these do not stop on their command.

I remember watching a friend traffic aide manning the junction on Velez. He flagged down an erring taxi driver but instead of stopping, the taxi driver sped off. My friend was helpless and just gave out a sigh of frustration.

So there you have it, the irate driver’s rant on traffic in the city. I felt compelled to write his rants in my column because he has been complaining out the traffic situation in the city for the longest time.

I hope, the traffic czar reads this.