Parallels of Broken Lines

by Kent Jessreel Sarmiento, OD Associate Editor

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‎Lines break and lies form, both of which prevent one from making ends meet. 

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‎Humans dream and strive, those are some of the signature characteristics that make a person. Though in the road to achieve those dreams, they are often replaced by something else — the need to survive another day. 

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EIGHTY-FIVE PESOS, some may see it as just the price of a nice snack. But for millions of Filipinos, that is the difference between surviving another month and total starvation. 

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‎Coming straight from the words of the government, the daily living expenses of a family falls around P1300. This expense is contrasted by the fact that the daily minimum wage in the Philippines sits at around P700. 

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‎In that 85 pesos lay promises of the government and most of all, the president as shown in the recent State of the Nation Address (SONA). The same line "a better life for Filipinos" — same line and same promise broken over and over again as they, one day, implement the 85 peso wage hike through the initial implementation of 60 peso increase in the minimum wage, AND suspend it next day, the promise that did not even last for a month. 

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‎These things among the 500-peso noche buena and the 60-peso daily living expenses prove one thing, the people who constantly make these decisions have never felt the impact of their actions. Like a parallel line, people in power say they feel the poor but they never really touched or felt the living experience of the people they serve. 

This is the truest example of the difference between living and surviving. 

As one lives lavishly in the comfort of his/her own home, another barely scrapes by not knowing whether they could survive another day. 

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‎Now one may ask what is the point of laying all of these out. It is simple. It is time to wake up and stop thanking and worshipping the same people who give Filipinos empty promises. It is also time to stop thinking that one owes them just because they did (most often, not) their job. 

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‎This wage-hike-give-and-take scenario should be a wake-up call. The very leaders Filipinos elect, and the very system that is said, “can be relied on” for social justice, are the ones pinning them down. So one may ask this just once, please never be fooled by empty promises, never let someone decide your life when they do not or have not experienced living yours, and start voting with an educated mind. And of course as one learns to be educated, try to also inspire others to do the same. 

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‎As every "life" lines intertwine and every circle overlaps, the series of broken lines can also start to join as continuous ones. Never forget that just like a circle, every decision one makes will ultimately loop back to one's self. 

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