Manila (CNN Philippines Life) — Now that the all-out performance that is the Philippine elections is about to close, about to move in a different direction, about to move into its next parts — the final tallying, the conceding, the beginnings of the holding accountable to all the promises made, perhaps this in-between the acts, on a commercial break, as the actors onstage switch places, fade, actors from previous acts come back — this is the moment you breathe.
For the past few weeks, you have been watching this tragicomic soap opera variety show from afar: on the Facebook feed of your friends (at least, those you have not unfollowed), in the random videos that you see posted on your wall, on the local TV stations, and of course, in the calls to home — “How are things back there? Is it true? Has the tide turned yet? Because I’ve heard …”
Because where you are, in a country that is both faraway and nearby, there seems only to be so much you can do except hear and listen and watch how the events unfold as you lean back in your chair.
In your mind, it was not which one you voted for; it was how you did it. You tried hard to resist shading the empty circle based on fear … There was no space here for the maybe.
You are one of millions of Filipinos who work abroad, who are only home a few weeks of a year. And while the news of your country usually merely fades into the background of your daily life, there in the country of the faraway nearby, thoughts of home are always on your mind.
And especially so in the past few weeks, when the stakes have gotten higher, the words more heated. You have always prided yourself in your detachment. Neutral, you like to call it. Able to see both sides.
You realized it then, that this tendency to remain undecided to the very end was a function of your privilege. Your job does not depend directly on the government. While you will be affected by the new administration, it will not be to the degree that your family and friends back home will feel it. Not the possibility of curfews, not the threat of things merely being the way they are, not the validation of history having been forgotten.
You began to sense the despicable nature of this privilege of indecision, when you voted at the Philippine embassy in the country where you are. Elections had been held days, even weeks before the elections back home. It was as if you were doing a rehearsal of the real thing to come. It was imbued with the possibility of prophecy.
You woke up early on a Sunday morning in order to take a cab to the embassy. You were hoping that because it was a Sunday, because it was their day off, people would come in droves. You wanted to see the crowds because you missed home. While it wasn’t as busy as you hoped it would be, you were glad to be surrounded enough by the language of back home. There’s a potluck going on outside of the voting booths. Of course.
You cast your vote … with feelings, even if these were feelings of deep ambiguity. To cast, as in a line thrown into the ocean. To cast, as in to cast a spell, in the hope that something miraculous would happen.
You only began to realize it then, and it would only be clearer later on, but you wished you had come with a more decisive sense of whom you wanted to vote for. Your pen hovered over the blank circles too long. The woman beside you came more prepared than you were, and slipped her ballot into the machine. It worked. You were glad. You returned to your unfinished ballot. You stared at the empty circles that reminded you of tests that you took in grade school. These were tests you knew only half the answers to. These were tests on the lesson you had thought you knew perfectly — you had spent the previous night complacently watching TV instead of reviewing your notes, and now you realized that you would need a good amount of guesswork in order to pass.
The woman at the voters’ booth tapped her pencil on the side of the table. You suspected she was waiting for you. You went over the names again while you lingered on your inexcusable indecision. You had become one of them — those classmates you once had who breezed through exams because they did not take school too seriously, being assured of a corporation to inherit, a future more certain. You swore you would never be like them. You remembered how serious you were. You began to realize that you might have lost this seriousness, and grown into a complacency, which you were ashamed to admit. You shaded the empty circles, hoping that even if this was a test where there were no right or wrong answers, you would receive bonus points anyway.
The votes from Filipinos like you who live abroad were the last to be counted … You hoped you had the ability to say to yourself when the results were announced: “So the people have spoken. Now grant me the courage to accept that.”
In your mind, it was not which one you voted for; it was how you did it. You tried hard to resist shading the empty circle based on fear. You understood the danger of that feeling, the way fear divided the world too easily into black and white, enemy and friend, even as you grasped that it was more complicated than that. There was no space here for the maybe. There was no area to shade in honor of the “I really tried, you know.” You muster what you could — decisiveness, hope — and after a time too long for your comfort, a time too long that it unraveled your middle class heritage of harmony-for-all, seek-not-to-offend, you finally stood and submitted it to be counted.
You swore next time around you would be more involved, you would have a stronger stake. You suspected your complacency was part of the problem. You cast your vote, in other words, with feelings, even if these were feelings of deep ambiguity. To cast, as in a line thrown into the ocean. To cast, as in to cast a spell, in the hope that something miraculous would happen.
In the days that followed, you witnessed the elections unfold in your country. You stayed up all night watching the votes being tallied, the numbers accumulate. The votes from Filipinos like you who live abroad were the last to be counted. You saw how you had done. You hoped you had the ability to say to yourself when the results were announced: “So the people have spoken. Now grant me the courage to accept that.”
The posts on your Facebook wall, your direct call portal to your country, will in the coming days be about historical memory, collective forgetting. You look up the word amnesia, meaning “forgetfulness,” meaning “without memory.” The dictionary defines it as a deficit in memory caused by brain damage, disease, or psychological trauma. What wounds have we not healed from? You look out the window as it rains. It is a weekend. The performance that you are witness to is far from over. You vow to remember your feelings even as the events of the past week are already beginning to fade away into some part of your brain, a part of yourself that you hope will never again forget. You write this all down.
