| "mamang pulis" and inflation blues |
[May. 28th, 2008|01:47 pm] |
| [ | mood |
| |  so-so | ] |
on our way to ust yesterday (i was with my mom and my baby sis), the jeep we're in suddenly felt a crash from the back after it unloaded a passenger at manila city hall. apparently, an fx unloaded one of its passengers too, while it was in the middle of the road and the man at the side of the drivers seat opened the doors tooo wide or at the wrong time; it bumped the tail of the jeep we're riding and was dragged enough to have a dent on.
i didn't personally see the incident as we were on the left side of the jeep, where the bump was felt, but one woman in front of us said she saw the whole thing. the first instinct of the jeepney driver was to go down to check his jeep, while the fx driver was still inside, hoping that the man who opened his fx's door could shut it already (the dent made it improbable for the door to shut and the lady who unloaded there already went on).
the fx then moved in front of us, its driver went down and said to the jeepney driver to wait. there were no policemen in sight (and we're talking manila city hall here, for cryin' out loud!). my mom joined the irate passengers in blaming the guy who opened the fx door and a lot of them said they were already late and "naabala pa tayo". the jeep driver was likewise pissed and repeatedly shouted "ba't ko aanuhin yan?" pointing to the fx door "ako na nga yung nagasgasan."
amid the shouting drivers and the irate passengers, i was looking around for a policeman and screaming in my head that instead of just bickering, someone should call for a policeman fast - it may delay our trip but it's the right thing to do (and since the jeep driver has witnesses favoring him, he's practically off the hook too). but i felt trapped in a spiral of silence, plus we were on a hurry, which was why i was still having second thoughts on going down and heading to the city hall gate (we were at the corner end of city hall, near the point where the lrt line bends). but when i finally mustered enough civility in me to go down, thje jeep driver suddenly went in and took off.
of course, the fx driver couldn't do anything. while he blamed the jeepney driver for going on while it felt the bump, i'm sure he knows that the real culprit there was the man who opened his fx door, who could only say "eh lagi naman nang ginagawa yan eh" in his defense (he was arguing with the irate jeep passengers that since unloading in the middle of the road was a common practice, they didn't do anything wrong - sigh. the failure to use logic in everyday life).
while we went on, i really felt guilty about what happened. i agree in principle that the jeepney driver was right that he shouldn't pay for the damages to the door of the fx and that, circumstances analyzed, the fx driver by unloading in the middle of the road and the guy who carelessly opened the fx door were at fault. but i thought it was wrong for the jeep driver to not wait for a policeman to come and arbitrate the incident and that we were all accomplice to a disobedience of the law.
at the other end of the city hall though, when i saw a traffic policeman in the middle of the road, i thought that while we were all disobedient of the law, the law enforcers themselves were doing a bad job. not that i'm simply passing the blame, but it really gets me that we were at the corner of city hall and no policeman was patrolling nearby (i remember when my father was still a policeman, makati city hall had patrolling policemen in almost every corner). at that moment, i thought it would be really good for the "mamang pulis" campaign to emulate the japanese police force habit of patrolling the streets. while our policemen report to their respective stations here and stay there until trouble would require them, policemen in japan actively patrol the streets as part of their duty.
anyway, just another note on inflation.. even the prices of second-hand books of some "booksale" outlets and bargain book stands climbed up! one used-book stand in robinson's ermita was selling books almost at their original price already (while a few books in national bookstores and powerbooks jacked their prices up to; i bought clavell's version of "art of war" in national bookstore in 2003 for only 150 pesos and it's now selling for 350 plus pesos! and oh, the list goes on) good thing the booksale in pedro gil devalued some of their used books that still weren't bought after months' time, so i was able to buy two good books ("the conspiracy of ignorance" and "talking sociology") at 70 pesos each. if infaltion hits the cost of internet cards, sheesh! i wouldn't know what to do anymore.. |
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