The Joy of Filipino Life Amidst Challenges

Blackout 

One of the most remarkable things about living in the Philippines is how the people willingly put up with inconvenience. In Leyte they will go about their business. In BayBay City the just don’t complain. 

It seems ingrained into their beings to take life as it comes with nary a word of complaint or indignation. In Guadalupe village they slough off tragic happenstance as if it is passing inconvenience. 

These people, my neighbors, are a remarkable lot. They will survive what the island and oceans throw at them, and keep living the wholesome life they make for themselves in the circumstances. The are joyful. They are kind. They share. And they joyfully sing off-key in the exuberance of life. I suspect they were this way long before the Spanish arrived, and will be this way long after the Chinese government leaves. 

History shows they will skirmish, but in the end the strength of their character, and their intrinsic goodness in the face of life’s challenges and decay will prevail. 

That’s my observation on this day in the island heat. Sweat dripping down my corpulence without the air of electric fans. The local power company has shut down electricity to make systemic repairs. 

Mid Afternoon 

Mid afternoon comes with a boom. The daily Autumn downpour. That’s a misnomer. The Philippines in general, and Leyte specifically, doesn’t have an Autumn. Not as us Yankees understand autumn (I’ll get a side bar up later about that). But these rains in late October and specifically early November have the temperament of any Autumn rain in Chicago, Hayfield, or Marion in the Midwest United States. 

With a literal boom it comes. And the rain bleeds off the humidity which has made the late morning and early afternoon so insufferable. Over the course of a half hour, the bearable heat vanishes, and the air brings the pleasant kiss of splendid cooling.

These rains remind me of the late autumn rains of childhood in Bakersfield, and Los Baños where, after Halloween came and went, the rains would come washing the streets of all the sins of summer’s excesses. Washing away the harvest chaff. Getting the streets ready for Thanksgiving. Cleaning the home for guest to come. Making way to remember that there is family times together. Even if punctuated by insufferable discussion on recent past presidential elections haunting the family like Scrooge’s unwelcome house guest. So, rain is hear, and it is time for joy that the heat is wash away for the evening. Now, if only the electric company would cooperate, and switch the power back on. 

Woolgathering 

We seem casually conversing today. We can thank the power co-op for that. I’d like to ask you to help me. Please subscribe to WPS.News. I’m collecting the best, factual information on what is happening in the West Philippine Sea. If you also follow me on X @cliffpotts, you’ll get the raw articles I pull to keep abreast of what is happening in those contested waters. 

This is front line reporting. It is also independent reporting. Remember the story when one of the Filipino Marines lost his thumb when the Chinese rammed his Zodiac on a grocery run? Remember the hearing unnamed officials telling two different, and opposite versions of that story? Remember my politely telling you the truth about how they were being perceived? I even went so far as to make a video telling the story. 

YouTube home is now WPS News Today.

Why? When this situation blows up into a total, massive, global donnybrook you’ll need to know before the lights go out. You’ll need to know why sons and daughters from all over the world are heading here to defend sanity, let alone freedom. I am talking real freedom. Not the excuses used by just about everyone to justify war for profit. Too, you’ll need to know what you can do about it now, and in the future. That’s why I am asking you to subscribe to WPS.News. 

By the way, are you on X? Are you a leftover from Twitter? If you are, please break Musk’s Shadowban of independent voices by tracking me there too. 

On Facebook, you’ll find me as Texas Progressive. On Tumblr, I am “First Occupier.” 

I would also as, if you can, follow me on YouTube as well. The link is in the video below. 

Too, I have a Patreon account using a old Radio name. You can support this work there as well. The hyperlink will take you there. 

More later when the electric does comes back, the WiFi is up, and I can get a signal to WPS.News.