*disclaimer: this is something political. thus, it might bore you. i just need to wake up the political side of me.
it is always my funny dream, to walk along katipunan avenue one day without seeing a single foreigner passing by. mind you, i am not a racist neither an extreme nationalist. the idea just came to me one night while i was looking for a place to dine in. while i was walking, i noticed that almost everybody that i've passed by were foreigners. there were people that have european, american, hispanic and/or chinese features. but mostly koreans (which i think is already given). then, i just realized when everybody thought that filipinos were all over the world, it was actually the world that was all over our country.
everyday, hundreds and hundreds of filipinos are going abroad. while thousands and thousands of them are sacrificing their ambitions and undergoing different trainings into something else just to go out of the country. and the remaining millions are left also just dreaming to follow.
it is just sad to know that nowadays, most of the answers i hear from small children whenever they are asked, what they want to be when they grew up, are no longer: "i want to be a teacher", "a dancer", "a ballerina", "an artist" or "snow white". now, it is usual to hear from their petite lips, responses such as: " i want to be a nurse like my rich tita", "to marry a blonde husband like our old neighbor" or "just have a green card". naive as they may seem, but it depresses me to know that, these kids in their young years are already conscious about the harshness of life which is way ahead of their innocence. they actually need to trouble themselves with this sad reality that in this life there is no room to play. everything is a vicious game of survival. honestly, i can't blame them. but like everything else there is always something that we could pinpoint to including ourselves.
i have just realized that in this period, it is no longer the person who decides what path he will take for his life. the considerations are no longer within what you like or love to do, what interest you, or where your passion lies. foreign countries are gracious enough doing this for us. they made it easier for us, not to bother thinking anymore of what to pursue on our life by setting job demands with a more promising future--- or so we thought.
then out of this thought and while taking dinner alone, i have formulated a futuristic short story (well talking about just into a different topic---so anti-climatic, i know. hehehe)
by the year 2050 or probably sooner, the philippines will be the leading producer , manufacturer and exporter of cheap man power. ironically, but not that surprising, its economy will still be plunging into deep wells or probably will plunge into worst because of perrrenial, unimmaginable and worsened corruption.
modern filipinos will be equipped and designed to provide world class skills, love, care and even internal organs to satisfy the dainty taste of foreign buyers. consumers will be guaranteed with exclusive use and rights for each of the filipinos that they are going to buy. since all the product's rights will be programmed solely to the discretion of their buyer. it couldn't be utilized by any other people, not even their own families.
modern filipinos will also come with the state-of-the-art energizer batteries that are expected for a lifetime and doesn't need to recharge. meaning, customers will be assured that this product would never run out from working and all potentialities are maximized until the last drop. these will practically, save buyers from energy and gasoline consumption. because it is also predicted that by that time, petroleum price will soar up to $562,726 per liter due to foreign economic monopoly.
philippine market will also offer, specialized abaca fiber chips that could be plugged at the back of any modern filipino's nape and this enables them to learn different skill/s that would be perfect for multi taskings purposes. though these will be sold separately.
they will be put in presentable boxes with a manual book inside. it will also be informed to foreign customers to always look for the "made in the philippines" seal at the back of each product to avail its 60 years money-back warranty.
such action will be made because of a forecasted massive attempt of china as well as third world countries to pirate and imitate filipinos through a will-be-invented-cross-breeding-copier machine. although, competition will get tough and the expected impossibility of the philippine government to eradicate piracy, filipinos will still remain as the primary in-demand product in the foreign market. since nothing still beats the original.
all modern filipinos will come in different models and sizes that would fit to any foreigner buyer's needs.
see posters and print ads for details.
BLURP!. i can now taste the sweet-bitter taste of globalization fastly coming ahead. unfortunately, the worst thing is, i am tasting only a part of it.
34 comments:
hey, we don't have to wait until 2050 to see the Philippines as the top labor exporter. we currently ranks third... behind China and Mexico. i wanted to comment on globalization kaya lang baka maging kasing haba ng term paper..;)
hahaha... well probably i could revise it. how bout by the year 2050, we are the ONLY labor exporter? hehehe.
naku, pareho tayo ng sentiments, it actually took me 3 hours para lang mapaiksi itong entry na ito. i tried deleting some parts of globalizations because it might be too heavy to read. ewan ko, relatibong pagtingin lang. hehehe.
but it would still be nice to read your comment about it! :)
i don't know what to see 'bout this. i will not go with the flow. i go against the flow and follow what you want and not what other people want. How else would an airplane take off and fly if it were to go with the flow of the air.. ;)
xlinks? na add na kita sa blogroll ko.. thnks!
hmm, the grass is always greener on the other side. I actually have given up any hope for the country to prosper, its a psycho-cultural-genetic thing, the filipinos just cant help it.
no need to revise your entry. baka naman umabot pa talaga sa 2050 bago natin malampasan ang China. Zebrang dami talaga nila aver! i'm going to post thoughts on globalization and other political chu sometime ... hanap lang ng tyempo..;)
at ayun na nga, akala ko wala nang magpo-post ng katulad nitong isinulat mo, nagtatagalog ako(akala mo ang galing mag english eh noh!) para sumapi sa ideya mo na kulang ang pagpapahalaga natin sa kakayahan natin na paunlarin ang bansa natin gamit ang sarili nating kakayanan...
siguro lang, mas napatid tayo sa kasabihang "the grass is always greener on the other side"...
"kaya pa kaya?" ang tanging maiiwan ko na katanungan para dyan kapatid...
i dont know what to say
yah i only taste a part of it
baka nga taste test lang din!
Globalisation should be viewed as an opportunity rather than a threat. The same could be said of multiculturalism. Intellect is not confined to certain races. As Filipinos we could not (nor should we) claim to be superior intellectually.
The current situation the country is in is brought on by the political instability, widespread corruption and greed (not just in government). It takes at least four generations before we could see significant change. The later the action, the later the change.
graperoof987chase: exactly! i strongly agree.
bulaang katotohanan: probably, but i am still holding into my grip. ika nga change is a process and process is something that doesn't happen over night.
no matter how long it would take i am still staying on my grip...
jericho: sige im going to look forward for that...hahaha. well, sabi nga rin ng statistics. madami daw talaga sila. china pa lang yun. hidni pa kasama ang mga nasa abroad din at ang mga half chinese. hehehe.
mel: siguro nga. pero uugat yan kung sino ang kasalukuyang nagpapasya sa balangkas o standard ng kaunlaran at kakayahan...sa tingin, magaling na tayo sa relatibong pagtingin sa ating kakayahan. pinipilit lang natin sumasabay sa konsepto ng iba.
turismoboi: gusto ko yun, taste test. hahaha.
quentin x: globalization is the homogenization of all histories, cultures and societies. basically, it wipes out the main essence of human diversity into just one general package.
provided that globalization would be an opportunity, question is: who will reign as the superior nation? which state will dictate the standards of the status quo? whose nation will we identify our culture, language, economy, citizenship and identity? and finally, where will we filipino stand at the end of all these? will we still be able to distinguish our selves from one another or from the rest of the world?
P.S.
i just remembered, a cartoon series, i have watched recentlty---AVATAR. until after i just wrote this post and from a friend, i realized that the cartoon surprisingly speaks about globalization. the fire nation wanted to share to other elemental nations (water, air and earth) the progress and modernity of their culture and society from the rest of the other nations. so it decided to conquer the rest of the other nations and make it as its colonies. so that these nations will also be able to know how to become powerful and flourishing societies under the fire nation's set of standards.
good ends. but bad means.
the avatar, who basically came from the fire nation as well, as well as the rest of other nations resisted from these thought because basically it would ruin the balance and diversity of other elements. you could never make fire go along with water. you could never mix fire with air and you could never put fire in earth.
the avatar, although a fictional story, strongly depicts the importance of diversity as the natural balance of life. indeed, in a very suprising subtleness. nobody could homogenized everything. because if so, that is not life. than is something similar than machines or robots that think the same, feel the same and act the same. this is globalization for us.
I have huge hopes in our country. Especially with our generation. I have lost all hopes in the generation of our parents. They are losers and a**holes in running our country.
When I went to Bangkok, I envied how many their tourists are. You could see white people everywhere!
funny thing i have been on both ends of globalization (uring nang-aapi at uring inaapi), i have studied it, made it my thesis. as with everything else globalization is a neutral tool, its effects depends on the user. ang mas nakakatuwa e kaunti na lang ang may will power at effort na gumawa ng pagbabago, lahat gusto ng tumakas, myself included.
i have this kind of thinking if we could exchange territories with them, since they enjoy migrating here on our country and that most Filipino dreams are to go abroad - so why not switch places? haha.
Globalisation is not about them against us. Globalisation is about harmony and respect for each other's differences. No one race is superior than another. Because of history, the Philippines is stuck in a cultural inferiority complex, always suspicious and is in a perpetual search for a role model as a validation that indeed the country is superior. I'd say, let bygones be bygones and move on with the times. The country as a whole must stop acting like victims and start thinking about implementing change for the common good and join the global community as a brotherhood of people.
If you are afraid that globalisation means a biological melting pot of races, it is unlikely going to happen. There is far more biological diversity now than there was centuries ago.
Culture, language, economy, identity are dynamic components of society. They never stay the same. There is no need to be afraid of change if change is for the better. As for citizenship, well, it would stay for as long as borders are there. Whoever came up with an idea to draw imaginary lines all over the globe has a lot to answer for.
globalization is definitely all about them.
history would tell us that racisim have lived throughout time regardless if its in the past (nazi's holocaust of germany, black slavery in the 17th century, the kucklucks clan)territorial race during the colonial times) or the present (janjaweed of sudan, or mere watching desperate housewife would tell you racism is everywhere at present). what is our guarantee it wouldn't happen by the time globalization takes place?
cultural inferiority doesn't live only within the history of the philippines. it beats within the histories of all cultures particularly to societies that are striving to survive within their own sustenance but being taken from them by international multi companies. come to think of it, even first world or leading nations have this feeling of inferiority against one another. this serves as their impetus or driving force to compete more whenever one of them prospers.
to quote machiavelli, man is evil in nature. if you're going to define globalization's real means you will understand its real ends. thus, being suspicious is inevitable especially we are dealing with multinational companies that transgresses acrosses societies serving its role as the primary vehicle for globalization. and above all, i chose not to explain marx anymore.
indeed, filipinos know the word victim very well. history and even the present situation will atest to that. thus, it is just wise for us to be cautious and more critical against things like promises of globalization which are things too good to be true. ifugaos have learned there lessons not to take chocolates from americans anymore after what happened to the st.louis world's fair in 1904, where they were exoticized, forced to dance on their tribal attires(the bahag in common) and eat live dogs(that is why we have hotdogs now) during the deadly winter of missouri (two of them freeze to death).
can't we be just more cautious to think that globalization is somehow a modern kind of such tactic? or we opt in being more cautious once it is already there? or probably we would never learn about or probably forgot the concept of benevolent assimilation?
or probably to somehow conclude, aren't we capable of standing on our own feet and not depend to other foreign countries like north korea? or probably we are really pa-victim in this sense?
let's blame anthony giddens for introducing the definition of globalization. hehehe.
Naku my thoughts are flying on this one but I keep this simple. In comparison to other countries we infact have less foreigners in this country. I agree with one guy above in Singapore and Bangkok whites are just everywhere. I have no idea why Korean love to go here when we are the total opposite of their success. but anyway they still gives tourism revenues. The Cebu Island, our top tourist destination with pop. of just over two million receives around half of two million tourist in this country. That's like two Cebuanos and One torist which is as always Korean haha...
Like socialist economies or free trade/pro Globalization countries. Anything that is in excess or leaning toward to the extreme has it's bad repercussions.What is important is that our government should learn how to balance things and not just simply believe in global economists from IMF/worldbank etc tells them.....
i-deconstruct ba ang Avatar. hehe. i just watch it because of Zuko - that hot son of a fire-bending bastard. ;)And of course all those martial arts and magical bending of elements.
anyway, my really, really short take on this topic: are we talking about globalization in its ideal sense or in the US-EU-Japan-WTO-IMF-WB-etal sense?
if it's the former, i'm not even sure what specie is an ideal of globalization. if it's the latter however, it translates to AoA, GATT, GATS, TRIPs, FTAs, liberalization, deregulation, privatization, denationalization and a whole gamut of agreements and policies that have long since been discredited.
let's a call a spade, a spade. globalization is but a revival of colonialism (read: imperialism) garbed in slogans of global integration, exchange of technology, free market ideology and other hullabaloos of imperial states just so they can save their behinds at the expense of other economies.
(kudos to you wandering commuter for starting such a topic!)
Globalization is a wolf wearing a sheep mask.
China and Thailand have invested on improving the English skills of their people.10 to 15 years from now, call centers here will pack up!
How can you call it "free trade" if our mangoes can't even get through Australia's shores while their celery and lettuce are everywhere in Rustans?
@Anino. Probably because Australia produce their own mangoes too. Having said that, I have come across some imported mangoes particularly during winter when local mangoes are not in season. Another possible reason is the strict quarantine laws in Australia. I know for a fact that Australia refuses to import bananas from the Philippines because of some endemic fungal disease.
@ wanderingcommuter. There are a number of reasons why some parts of history should not be repeated. For example, the holocaust/other genocides, the crusades, etc. Some of these events are perpetuated because of fear and have entered a viscious cycle.
As for multi-nationals, we always view them as non-Filipino. We forget that the Philippines do have the likes of San Miguel who expanded into foreign shores as well including Australia's National Foods (the biggest publicly traded dairy).
What's good for the goose is also good for the gander. That's how trade liberalisation works. It is all about basic supply and demand. Do we really want to isolated from the rest of the world like North Korea? Be careful what you wish for.
a cynic take on globalization.
lawrence: feel free to open up that cynical view. hehehe. join me and quentin x. hehehe!
quentin x: just because the world defines the concept of supply and demand of OUR economy, doesn't mean that we could not create our own concept under our own context. i maybe very opinionated regarding this, but i still believe that 75% of the goods and services that every filipino family spends is something that they really don't need.
it is because as also already known, philippines economy, culture and even its government is pre-definition of the foreign market.
to note, i am not against specifically to international MNCs, regardless if it is a foreign or a local one as long as it promotes the pushing through of globalization, then it would basically be the same. san miguel company is not an excemption. just recently, hundreds of farmers walked from mindanao to manila to fight for their land claims that was taken away from them by the company. thus, this could be considered as one specific manifestation in the national level alone regarding the effect of globalization. what else would we expect once it transgresses to the international scope?
if you try reading international news particularly CNN, NBC etc. about north korea, please don't. to start with north korea had isolated themselves not only on their international relationship, but also regarding news that comes in and out of the country. having this, it is really easy for other news companies to formulate black propaganda against them to serve malicious intentions.
in reality, north korea had been able to move a step ahead technological wise against its twin country, south korea---nuclear technology, cloning etc. as it poses a threat from the US, which they usually do for countries that were able to upgrade the nuclear capacities like iraq, iran, russia and china, to maintain their political, economic, and technological lead against the rest.
it is obvious that they need to set black propagandas for UN to restrain north korea from taking the lead. this is through the use of holding international medical and food aid that are normall provided by UN.
everybody in the political arena would not deny the factm that UN is being monopolized by the US. take for example the US-iraq and afganisthan war. despite serious efforts of other countries and even american themselves, UN wasn't able to stop US from their continuos attacks to the said countries. thus, this is a blatant manifestation of the US to control almost all countries where they could maximize their resources to their advantage. read imperialism.
Down with imperialism! (god it's good to be able to say that again ... and still mean it).
There would be no need for UN medical or food aid if North Korea is so advanced and self-sufficient.
One company's lack of corporate social responsibility or unethical behaviour is not a reflection of all others. What about the capacity for these companies to provide jobs and pay taxes.
Globalisation is not equal to imperialism. Imperialism is a thing of the past. So is America's pure capitalism. I don't support war in whatever form.
I'm all for social democracy. You just have to look at Sweden and Norway.
Imperialism as a thing of the past? From what I know, imperialism is characterized by 1. monopoly of production, 2. finance oligarchy, 3. export of surplus capital, 4. economic division of the world, 5. territorial division ... if these characters are not present today, then I don't know if I'm living in the same world.
jericho: i know the feeling, believe me...hehehe
quentin x: probably the capacity of these companies to provide job and pay taxes for ie. san mig company could be reflected on the previous issue that it was involved, the coco levy fund.
i strongly agree with jericho, globalization is indeed imperialism. probably the connatative notion of imperialism happens to have such a negative effect that is why they've used globalization to neutralize it. hehehe!
If communism is such a successful ideology, where is USSR now? Even China is starting to turn it's back on the ideology. Lenin's theory of imperialism has as many holes as you can poke in a swiss cheese.
opposition to globalization or imperialism is not necessarily communism. i've met many who are anti-globalization and anti-imperialists but are not communists. what happened with USSR and with China is not the issue (we'll have different takes on it for sure). with regards to holes on lenin's theory, i'll be glad to hear them out.
Isn't Lenin a communist?
The Philippines' major source of income is the export of OFW's - a capital that is in surplus. Does that make the Philippines an imperialist?
What scares me is people parading thinly-veiled xenophobia as nationalism or anti-globalisation.
Of course Lenin is a communist. Hugo Chavez is also anti-globalization and has no problem calling US an imperialist but as far as I know, he has only admitted to being a socialist.
Export of surplus capital as expounded by Lenin refers to finance capital in the main and, secondarily, goods produced because of the high concentration of production, financial oligarchy and shrinking market. It is produced by monopoly. Whereas surplus labor, as what OFWs are (by the way, I refuse to call people, especially OFWs as "capital" because it underscores our commodification) are not produced by monopolies but the fact that the type of economy the Philippines has is one that creates a large force of unemployed. I think the analogy hides its fallacy with the coat of simplicity.
I note your fear. Living in Hong Kong (with as diverse a culture as can be seen elsewhere), I can say that I'm no xenophobe. But what scares me more is getting trapped in the whole multiculturalist, diversity, global village, slogans without looking into the reality of what is the real globalization that imperialists are pushing for.
By the way, a friendly unsolicited advice: please don't go around labeling people "communists" just because they subscribe to a certain analysis. I'm not sure if you are in the Philippines right now. But I know for a fact that doing it in the Philippines, under the current repressive climate, gets "labelled" peopled unjustly imprisoned or worse, killed.
cheers!
Don't worry, Jericho. Lenin is long dead.
jericho: i couldn't say more. kudos!
quentin x: i agree with jericho. referring OFWs as a surplus means commodifying them to mere objects. if sending OFWs abroad would make us imperialist then how come we are still unable to monopolize the entire outsourcing and domestic business? there are still a lot of other countries that are leading on this field, such as china, mexico and other developing countries.
quentin x: thanks dude! i only hope it is.
bulaangkatotohanan: exactly! argh, i am actually thinking of saving and then put up my own business. quite risky though. but atleast i am my boss.
I highly recommend Lichauco's books.Very sensible and reader-friendly.
He even said that the declaration of Martial Law was not a political maneuvering, but an economic subterfuge of killing the Philippine's call for a true industrialization.
Thank you so much for sharing your story. It's very informative. I love to read it and do hope to read your next story.
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