After the Monsoon Rain

While residents of the Philippine capital city of Manila are trying to re-establish what they’ve lost after the flood brought by the monsoon rains, far-flung towns like La Castellana of Central Visayas is painted with colors of hope as rice field workers come together for the seasonal rice harvest.

The Hannah Project

I don’t know Hannah.

I’ll take that back.

I didn’t know Hannah.

But if we could have met at a different time, we might have become good friends.

You see ladies and gentlemen, Hannah’s dead. She died of a disease I thought was only possible on TV, like the one shown in House. She died of Lupus.

I don’t know what Lupus is. Except that at one point, it tricked Hannah. It made her go to the office thinking she’d finally gotten over it after months of being in the hospital getting transfused one day and then getting medically poked the next.  But a week after being released and finally able to work, she was sent back to the hospital refighting an enemy I know she would have wished she didn’t have.

Lupus won and a lot of her friends felt cheated. Someone cool and someone nice was taken away so young. She could have done great things. She could have sung more songs. She could have inspired more people. She could have been my friend.

Her death, as if it wasn’t good enough, caused her family tremendous grief. They were not only suffering from losing her, Lupus was so tricky that it left the family with medical debts that I can only imagine would have kept all of her family members awake at night.

Life can be a terrible bitch. But this bitch that we all have, may have its reasons too grand for us to understand.

For there was tonight.

In the semi-darkness of the company’s pantry, over a hundred of friends and colleagues have gathered. It was a benefit concert dubbed, “The Hannah Project.” The goal was simple; raise money to help out the family that Hannah left behind.  It was an effort that, no question, was a tremendous success.

Hannah’s friends from Thomson Reuters Chorus sang. Her band mates and people she met through her personal genius in music played. Some friends, in between sobs and tears, spoke about how good a friend and wonderful a person she was. I can’t help but think that short might her life had been, she was loved – and remembered.

I am writing this semi-drunk. Drinks were offered at the benefit concert. Somewhere else, alcoholic beverages would have been banned. But tonight, I saw the head of Thomson Reuters Legal giving all out support to Hannah’s grieving family, friends and acquaintances. The value of such small a gesture deserves accolade for indeed, the drinks that everyone consumed was the last toast they can raise together to a great person who should have deserved more in life.

A common friend of Hannah and I had confided in me a few days after Hannah’s death that during her last day at the hospital when she finally took her last breath, she looked at peace.

Hannah, despite her early demise, is very lucky to have great friends. Her friends thought that she was a great friend too and I think nothing can ever get better than that.

Thank you for bringing all those crazy people together tonight, Hannah. You know what, I think the best gift you’ve ever given me, although you don’t know me, is reminding me that every day counts and that fostering relationships can be a great legacy. That much you have accomplished.

Tonight, I want what you have in your death, too. I want to be at peace. So in your honor, I will be making peace with my enemies. Life is too short to hold grudges. I will value friends and family more. And I will treat this bitch life of mine and the bitch life of those more deprived than me a little better that when I die, people will sing at my wake.   

To Hannah, a person that I’ve never come to know personally, may you rest in peace.  

Waterproof

The past few days had been crazy. I mean that literally and figuratively.

The flood in some areas is yet to subside and before thousands of poverty-stricken Filipinos can even take a sigh of relief, here come two more storms.

To have no television at home is both a blessing and a curse. A blessing because I avoid being bombarded everyday with yellow journalism and cheap dramas that rule the Philippine airwaves and it is a curse because in instances like emergencies, I have no way of finding out what’s going on out there.

Not having a television is by choice. I just don’t see the need for one. I can get my dose of news from the office. It’s a great thing to have access to online versions of newspapers and also, hearing the loud reports from other apartment units’ television is good enough for me.

***

The Filipino spirit is waterproof.

This tagline has dominated the social networking sites for a few days. I think its proliferation is due to the fact that it is very true especially during these trying times.

I’ve seen it many times before. Filipinos will figure out a way to make life a little better even amidst the most terrible of storms.

I’m praying that every one of them, those that were badly affected, to be able to regain whatever that they have lost and may they be blessed ten times over. Because God knows they deserve it.