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NEW YORK --- Last week, my submission to this page came in late and missed the press run. And so for those who where surprised at not seeing my op-ed piece, you need not be alarmed.
I want to reassure readers who had called me and the Filipino Express office and others who had sent e-mails inquiring about the absence of my column that nothing has changed. I also would like to let Juliet Payabyab, former president of the Philippine Community Executive Council, Inc. (PACEC), who I presume follows my column regularly, to know the reason, too.
I will carry on writing about our community and its leaders in the same determination you’ve all known me for. That’s a promise. Let anyone who have “assumed a special prominence in the affairs of society and occupies a position of persuasive power and influence” be aware that I’ll be on the lookout for them. As public figures that attract public interest, I consider it a fair game to write about their responsibility and accountability to the public.
So if you are supposedly a leader, like Payabyab, who may only want to bask in the limelight but have an aversion to reading your name in print that puts you in self-protective mode, the public arena is not your place.
That said, I was reminded of a Chinese proverb after having dinner with colleagues celebrating Lunar New Year last Wednesday, Feb. 9. As anyone may have experienced after having a meal at a Chinese restaurant, a waiter brings with him the tab and a few “fortune cookies.”
Inside the cookie is a small piece of paper which usually contains epigrams and a set of numbers, which you may use to play Lotto. Mine read: “Bitter words are medicine; such sweet words bring illness.” Someone had “Pride invites calamity; humility reaps its harvest.” Another one had an interesting adage: “When the blind lead the blind, indeed they will both fall into the water.” We all shared the messages with each other and a discussion ensued as we all put in our two cents worth of opinion.
As a columnist, I found it easy to interpret the idea behind the saying. I told my friends that when I started writing for this paper, some people said my advocacy for transparency and accountability had made some community leaders aware of their role. I hope so.
I am not beholden to anyone and I could write bitter words to give erring leaders a dose of their own medicine especially those who cannot account for public money. I may sometimes use sweet words not to flatter anyone but to inspire and acknowledge the good work a person is doing or has done.
I am acutely aware that an overdose of sweet words leads to vanity; it does not serve to correct what is wrong but encourages a person to keep repeating mistakes.
I am a friend to everyone, leader or not, until they cross the line of righteousness and good order. I can be brush with them if only to put everything in perspective and in the interest of the public. I may be wrong with my commentary but that’s the reason for this column, I’m expressing my opinion.
Having spent a great deal of community involvement myself, I find that some of our leaders love to hobnob with the elite, the “movers-and-shakers of the community,” and the “powers-that-be.” There is nothing wrong with that and I can understand their actions. If there are social climbers there are also those that I call “social clingers.”
“Social clingers” are those that have passed the stage of being social climbers. They desperately want to circulate in the company of the elite and in the ranks of supposedly community leaders, pretending to be one of them. In reality, however, they have no spine and are particularly conscious of what other people may say about themselves.
These “social clingers” hang on to their own world of make believe wanting to get noticed. Surprisingly, they manage to get their own following, which in the end, these followers discover who their leader really are for.
Finally, one cookie read: “Rivers and mountains may easily change, but human nature is changed with difficulty.”
Surprisingly enough, these Chinese sayings are just as relevant to our community as they were to the simple people who depended mostly on the fruits of the soil for these proverbs are as immortal as the truths they express and as practical as the rays of the sun.
Bitter and sweet words. Fortune cookies anyone?
Send comments to rickyxpres@aol.com or visit Website at PinoyOnBoard.com
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