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Erle Frayne Argonza
Visionary genius, patriot, martyr for Philippine independence, Gat Jose Rizal was a man too far ahead of his own time. So titanic was the luck that came upon this blessed archipelago, the Philippine islands, for the embodiment among its humble people of this encyclopedic mind, Dr. Jose Rizal. He is impeccably a ‘man for all seasons’. And he is the national hero of the Philippine nation.
Most nations declare among their top patriots a warrior or military leader as their ‘national hero’. But for the Philippines, ours’ is a genius, an intellectual giant, a mind capable of engaging in issues so recondite and subjects so diverse that, in so short a span, he was able to pen an enormous variegation of topics that befit, in their totality, an encyclopedia. At the age of 35, he was terminated by the demonic imperial forces of Spain, but he never died in vain. On the contrary, his death continued to inspire libertarian patriots here and in other Asian lands, an inspiration that continues for our youth till these days.
Mystically gifted, little did people know that he was actually transformed into a spiritual guru before his death. His guruship was unique, in that he mentored his fellows on the wisdom of nationhood and patriotism. One of his avowed readers if not disciples, Mohandas Gandhi of India, followed in his steps and became, upon his transformation into a spiritual master, a mentor of nationhood and patriotism just like Rizal.
So mighty a mind Rizal possessed, without doubt, that till these days his works overshadow the combined works of his own fellow patriots, including those who’ve gained double doctorate degrees and published widely in academic circles. Rizal’s following is solid, he need not further articulate nor gesticulate thoughts in the vogue of a desperate social marketing campaign, for even long after his death, youthful and scholarly minds read him, try to follow his ethical precepts, and emulate his exemplary patriotic behavior.
He was the first Filipino. Before his time, the term Filipino was bestowed only on those Spaniards born and raised in the Philipines. The Malayan natives were pejoratively called Indios; Chinese, Sangleys; Aetas and IPs, negritos and montanosas; and Muslims, Moros. With scathing indictment of arrogant racism of Spaniards most especially the friars, Rizal declared, with his mighty pen, that from this day on everybody born and raised in the islands will be called Filipino. That was how we islanders were to be bestowed with the name Filipino, a term that will stick till way into the distant future when a ‘Filipino race’ will evolve from out of a mere nationality today.
In his thoughts he pre-empted the political philosophy of Antonio Gramsci, the eminent Marxist leader of the Italian Left. Rizal mentored his fellow patriots that it will prove unwise to wage an insurrectionary campaign and seize political power, at a time when the ideas of nationhood haven’t permeated the private sphere yet. The most fitting strategy for that long-term goal—of building nationhood—is education. Build the new world’s ideas first till they become hegemonic, after which winning a revolution will be more facile as it was in the French revolution. That’s Rizal, and that’s Gramsci as well, but Rizal preceded Gramsci, let the world be made aware of this fact.
In gender relations, Rizal was no less ahead of his time. He scorned the ‘Old World woman complex’ so deeply that he chose to bury this woman in catacombs of history, which he did by killing Maria Clara, the Old World’s embodiment, in his novels. He advanced the idea of Modern Woman in the figures of the ‘women of Malolos’, even as he championed women who were civic-minded, actively engaged as co-partner in shaping the modern world, intellectually adroit and well-schooled. The Filipino nation he likened to the figure of Sisa in his novels, a nurturing mother who no matter under dire duress will never self-destruct but will stand out firm, tall and well-esteemed by fellows.
Amid Rizal’s liberalism, he never had any fondness for anarchism. Following Zola’s novel-writing tradition (e.g. Germinal), Rizal embodied the anarchist in the young bourgeois creole Ibarra who, at the end of his novel scripts, self-destructed. Anarchism can never be a substitute for prudent authority that should follow the Enlightenment principles of reason, progress, fraternity, and scientific verity. He was a true-blue liberal nationalist, never an anarchist.
We Filipino nationalists will continue to be inspired by Gat Jose Rizal. And his thoughts, the most treasured jewels of Asia during his time, will continue to inspire us, diadems that we magnanimously share to all enthused Fellows of the Planet, thoughts that mentor and serve as balm on the soul, like unto those writ by the most sagely personages. For these are the thoughts of a man no less sagely than the wisest of the days of old, thoughts that long after they are gone will continue to make waves into the minds of men and women of many generations yet to come.
Hail Gat Jose Rizal! Glory, genius, grandeur!
[12 June 2008, Quezon City, MetroManila]
Erle Frayne Argonza
Good morning!
As I was moving back to home-base, done with my gym exercise, my eyes caught the news bit in the newsstands about the biggest Philippine flag recently unfurled in Baguio City. So huge was the flag, it weight over 3 tons.
Whoever may have conceived the idea (a lady), she was acting magnanimously on the behest of her own Guide from Above. The choice of creating and unfurling a big flag, on the occasion of Philippine Independence day, can be perceived as a token of patriotism and love for fellow Filipinos.
On a deeper level, however, the unfurling of a flag so huge goes beyond simple tokenism. There’s more to the flag beyond people coming together and building bridges of Love for peace and world healing, which indeed had been delivered by the flag team at the moment of unfurling. It also goes beyond the hospitality of the Baguio people that was rightly exhibited too at that moment of unfurling.
For one, the size signifies the growth and galvanization of the Filipino identity and weltanschauung that took over 300 years to build. Building that weltanschauung began when the secularization movement was launched during the Spanish Era, and then moved on to the nationalist movement of Rizal’s time, and onwards to the Filipino Renaissance of the 1990s (pre-centennial through post-centennial jubilee). The Renaissance still goes on and may be the next phase of weltanschauung formation that would take probably two (2) centuries to ferment.
The Philippine nation used to be circumscribed within the confines of the archipelago, the same island group that was created by Westphalian-type treaties among world powers. Today, the nation has gone beyond the archipelago’s borders, as Filipinos have been spread across the globe, nearly 100 million strong.
That huge flag signified the strength of the weltanschauung formation galvanizing as identity, psyche, collective taste and temper that now inhere among the equally large population of 100 million. A globalized people and nation must be signified with dignity and honor by an emblem as huge as the world: a 3+ tonner flag. Hugeness means strength, power, potency, global extent. It means there is not any place in the world that we can’t dip our hands into and be part of their reshaping. It means global imprint, global impact.
The year of unfurling is very auspicious: 110th year after the independence declaration. 110 contains the numbers 11 and 10, 11 X 10 equals 110. 11 signifies conquest and leadership in certain domains of planetary life. 10 means 9 + 1, the number of completion that starts with zero (1 is leadership, 9 is martial abilities). Somehow, the Cosmic Hierarchs are heralding to the world, via this huge flag, on this 110th year of Filipinas, that from hereon a new phase of history begins: the phase of global leadership in certain aspects of life.
By the fact that Filipinos were spread across the globe, a feat that can be attributed largely to the Divine Hierarchy in pursuit of a greater Plan (which we 3-dimensional mortals are blind about), already is one cause for wonderment. Hidden Divine Hands are working on these islands, and so the message of the Hierarchy to the Dark Forces who want to destroy our people is for them to ‘make no mistake’, the Divine Plan holds and will hold through. No Dark Force can ever wreck the destiny of the Filipinos, a destiny that has global effects in the future eras to come.
Not even the destruction today of the archipelago through WMD (weapons of mass destruction) and the mass termination of 90 million inhabitants can ever kill Divine Plan. That huge quake that struck China recently, using a Tesla Earthquake Machine or TEM, was already a forewarning by the Dark Forces (Luciferans) of their resolve for destruction and global domination. But they will fail, they can never make Filipinos submit to their dictates, the future Filipino as a distinct sub-race or ‘species race’ will come, no Luciferan abomination can deter or deviate it from happening.
My kudos goes to the team that did this flag project. But most specially, I salute the Cosmic Hierarchy who actually gave the go signal for this event to take place on this year, 2008, the 110th anniversary of our independence.
[Writ 13 June 2008, Quezon City, MetroManila]
Erle Frayne Argonza
Philippine solidarity to all Fellows on Planet Earth!
On the 12th of June 1896, as the sun was rising, the Philippine Flag was raised for the first time in Kawit, Cavite. The Philippine National Anthem was also played, in the genre of classical marches, putting it alongside the French Republic’s anthem. Emilio Aguinaldo, first president of the new republic, declared the independence of the Philippines from Spain and the official birthing of the Philippine nation-state.
That moment of victory, no matter how short-lived it was as the American forces soon snapped off the flame of liberty in the islands, was of gigantic significance to all Asia. For the first time, a modern republic was born, forged from out of the struggles and blood of the Filipino people, who fought arduously against the mighty empire of the Spanish Crown. Over three (3) centuries of Western imperial cruelties, demonic calumnies and abominable barbarities were officially ended that day.
All of Asia watched the unfolding events in the islands then. The young patriarch of the nation, Dr. Jose Rizal, was terminated by the Spaniards in 1896 yet, but his ideas of nationhood spread like wildfire across the archipelago after that infamous moment of his execution. With the founding of a new republic, the Asians realized that nationhood ideas, typified by the thoughts of Rizal, were viable. No matter how mighty an evil empire would be against a colonized people of Asia, the latter will be able to forge collective might and will, terminate imperial rule and build a new sovereign nation-state.
Thus were our fellow Asians emboldened to study the path of national liberation, build the patriotic ideas and revolutionary movements that will serve as their executor vehicles, and wage libertarian campaigns to the finish, even if it will take thousands to millions of martyrs to conclude the national liberation project. Gandhi, Aung San, Sukarno, Sun Yat Sen and leading patriots from fellow Asian lands, who read and digested Rizal’s writings well, stood out among our great leaders in Asia, and the rest was history.
Modern nationhood in Asia started in my beloved country. This is an established fact, though seemingly ignored and forgotten. Because it started here, let it be the duty and obligation of all fellow patriotic Filipino to continue to spread goodwill and good faith unto all the peoples of Earth, whether from developing or developed states. For in today’s context, there are those powerful predatory forces that aspire no end to snuff out the nation-states in the name of their ignominious greed, lust for power, and tyrannical might.
Back home, here, we nationalist patriots continue our struggle against the pro-colonial forces in all spheres of life. Rizal’s dream here hasn’t completely galvanized yet, as the pro-colonials and the oligarchs they serve are ensconced in all terrains of social, cultural, political and economic life. We nationalists are in the margins, while the pro-colonials and pro-oligarchs are hegemonic, and so we will continue with our struggles until the destructive dragons of colonialism and oligarchism will be effectively slaughtered here.
Let the world remember this heraldry, that on the 12th of June 1896, nationhood and the values that underpin it (sovereignty, liberty, brotherhood, patriotism, prosperity) were born and planted in the Philippines as the first instance of nationhood in all of Asia. This being the sublime narrative, we patriotic Filipinos shall continue to bear with us the flame of liberty, and will defend the values that forged nationhood to the last instance of our breaths and energies. That which was first will be the last to fall, and will, with the blessing of Divine Hierarchy, never fall in spirit and wisdom to pursue the grand mission of helping other nations build their own narratives and practices of nationhood.
Hail the Philippine nation! Glory, genius, grandeur!
[12 June 2008, Quezon City, MetroManila]
Erle Frayne D. Argonza
[Writ 01 May 2008, Quezon City, MetroManila]
Samurais in Tuguearao! That must be a farfetched chimera, but truly in this capital town of Cagayan province (Northern Philippines) is located a village of cottage industries run and managed by marginal artisans. Their chief craft was, and remains to be that of bladed metal works.
I was pretty busy scouring for bankable projects in my own hometown (my basic education years were spent in Tuguegarao) as early as 1981 when news came to me that a certain group of Larion craftsmen desired to bolt away from their tradition and diversify into hmmm samurai swords. Already a junior executive of the Ministry of Human Settlements after barely out of college, I had the luck of having among my personnel a driver who was bona fide resident of Larion village (barrio was the term then).
The driver (Rolando Tumpalan), an Ilocano like all of his neighbors in Larion, was very vivid in his presentation to me one day of the plan of his neighbors to diversify into samurai swords and accessories. I knew since childhood that Larion produced bolos and knives, made from cast iron scraps, even as my own family abode possessed couples of the same products. But to say of samurai swords, well, my encyclopedia set was telling me that the original thing was made of a specially forged steel alloy. Besides, I knew by then that samurai craft (it was home industry in Japan) was dying if not dead already. Japanese considered themselves as Western people and had nothing to do with seemingly phoney items from their past, including kimonos and samurai blades.
Before some Larion guys might be playing tricks on me, I summoned my operations manager (Mia Calimag) and Livelihood Coordinator (Bong) to immediately set a rendezvous between the regional director of the National Cottage Industry or NACIDA (name now escapes my memory) and myself, with our technical staff around. The NACIDA was one of our partner agencies in implementing the KKK and was already in operations way ahead of us in the region (my agency was regionalized only in mid-1981).
Well, thanks to this magnanimous NACIDA official, he came right to my office, breaking protocol by visiting the office of an erstwhile official of lower rank. We than set our joint agenda and modus operandi first of all, updated each other about initial enterprise support operations of our respective agencies, and determined whether the Larion metalworkers were worth supporting. To my own surprise, this director (quite a fat guy but very intelligent) was very enthusiastic about the samurai project.
This being so, we immediately arranged for a visit to the proposed project site in Larion, had a chat with the officials of the cooperative (the coop served as beneficiary), inspected their facilities, and then delivered pep talks to the members. We were then shown models of the proxy swords produced by them, and wow! My eyes almost popped out of wonderment. The products were splendid! The intended captive market was the tourists, with domestic tourist resorts and trade exhibit sites serving as primary forward linkages.
The funding support from the KKK (Kilusang Kabuhayan at Kaunlaran) was needed to procure extra machines (metal lathe included), mini-furnace, increase the volume of raw materials (steel scraps), improve the storage area, hiring marketing & sales staff, re-train the artisans, and for around three (3) months of working capital. Funding level was past P0.5 Million, with approval done merely at our regional level (past the P1 Million it has to go to central office).
The Larion coop members were very elated over the support shown by us state officials over their venture. Such an elation would extend throughout the processing of their documents and pre-operational trainings, and on through their appearances in some KKK Recognition Days (held once a month).
The project did take off and operate successfully, and made the name of Larion blade makers shine brightly beyond their previous marginal state. It’s now over a quarter of a decade since that project commenced, and I wish the Larion samurais had graduated to global standards in any way.
Erle Frayne D. Argonza
[Writ 12 April 2008, Quezon City, MetroManila. The author was former community development assistant at the Ministry of Human Settlements, Region II, in early 1981.]
If Bob Marley were alive today and visited Mayoyao in Ifugao, Cordillera region, he might achieve euphoria even without having to smoke pot. And his cause for Dionysiac wonderment would be: a fishpond atop a mountain. And he’d declare wide-eyed, with nary a 2nd thought, that “the Ifugaos are a free people! Hail Ifugaos!”
Free indeed is this sturdy ethnicity of highlanders, who used to be ferocious head-hunters and were dreaded by the Americans. They have since become tame, no longer do head-hunting, and have instead hunted for tons of bright ideas to multiply their survival chances up in the boondocks.
I was then a newly hired program staff for the Ministry of Human Settlements’ Regional Liaison Office in Region II or RLO-2. We covered the whole of Cagayan Valley and the Cordillera provinces of Ifugao, Kalinga and Apayao. As soon as I had a couple of days of briefing as a new staff, I immediately buzzed off for field work to monitor our community services at the town levels where we have deployed community organizers who were dubbed the HSOs (Human Settlements Officers).
Over 250 kilometeres south of Tuguegarao, the location of our liaison office (we were an adjunct of the central office in the region), was Ifugao which had to be traversed via Nueva Vizcaya. Armed with my monitoring sheets, itinerary, cassette recorder with The Police and Sex Pistols playing, and an escort of truly-armed Philippine Constabulary (our regional supervisor was Gen. Olivas of PC Region II), I visited couples of HSOs in Vizcaya for a day first, after which I proceeded to Mayoyao.
Well, the road to Ifugao was narrow, winding and gravel-rough, and only single-lane. And down below was crevice, hard rock, or some cursed dangerous vertical wall that King Kong would hate to scale. And my balls (excuse me) quickly moved from down loin up to past my head, as the goose bumps overwhelmed my being till we reached Mayoyao 40 kilometers from Banawe.
The recompense for the rough and hazardous ride was the beautiful scenery, so grand and beautiful beyond words. The best-looking rice terraces are found here, not in Banawe that is merely the entry point. And, without doubt, the fish pond built atop a mountain whose peak was leveled for the purpose.
How many places on Earth could one find fishponds that are not only impossible to build but also costly? And this one was built from concrete. Rectangular in shape, around it was classy cobble-like stone and cement aisle. Below is the pond, around two (2) meters deep, with the fingerlings just seeded. Covering around one (1) hectare in size or so, it was actually more of an experimental prototype, though the town residents thought of producing at commercial levels. Tilapia was the experimental species, to recall.
The Cordillerans are truly a wonderful people in terms of innovativeness in thriving. They’ve already chiseled out the mountains into productive rice lands. Now they followed through with fish farming, and of all places, atop a mountain.
The project, installed by cooperating agencies (mayor’s office, MHS, Bureau of Fisheries & Aquatic Resources or BFAR), was a success for the duration of my stay then in the MHS (I stayed till 1983). And there were no reputable enterprise financing programs for these types then. They funded it themselves, via local funds and private donors.
So for those who are interested to know the success story, please visit Mayoyao in Ifugao. Enjoy the ride up there. For relaxation, you can choose between bottles of gin or local rice wine (tapoy). And better quaff them, because whether hot or cold days, it is always cold up there. Ride the wave of the moment!
Bro. Erle Frayne D. Argonza
Welcome to BrightWorld!
In 2006 I copyrighted a social marketing project I dubbed as BrighWorld! At that moment of project conceptualization, my aura was going through some changes which made me extremely sensitive to negative vibrations of whatever kind.
As a yogi and mystic, I already felt such sensitivity to vibrations before. Sometimes, when traversing the Taft Avenue route of Manila at night, I feel weakened by the negative vibrations accumulated in that portion of the city for the day. I feel the vibes everywhere, but most specially on the concrete pavement below.
Way back in the 1990s yet, when my path towards the mystical accelerated, I began to feel weakened whenever the persons I’m talking too stress too much on the negative, keep on recycling gossips and worn-out intrigues about their supposed office nemesis, and engage in limitless braggadocio and arrogant chatter.
But this decade, as my own meditation practice heightened, my sensitivity to negative imaging by the tri-media got added to my list of sensitivities. Wars, pestilence, pandemics, gossips, political intrigues and noise, crimes, drugs and related texts and images were proving to be too much for my chakras particularly my heart and crown chakras.
It was getting clearer to me that I do not belong to those people who thrive on the negative-pessimistic-destructive images. I clearly belong to those people who were attuned to the positive-optimistic-creative vibrations and images, and these were, to my mind, the harbingers of the new world unfolding.
Incidentally, there were people on the mass media, including the internet and book writers, who were conscious of the need to project positive imaging. Just a few minutes of exposure, for instance, to very positive images on TV about wonderful crafts, tour sites, historical sites and ecology tours can brighten the day for the viewer or text reader.
I now strongly opine that there has to be more concerted efforts to project the positive-optimistic-creative or POC images as a powerful current that can offset the psyche-destroying impact of negative-pessimistic-destructive imaging. The convergence of individual ‘social marketeers’ that highlight POC images, or LightWorker groups interconnecting through the internet, all bespeak of these efforts.
As my own version of response to the challenges of the moment, I copyrighted in Manila the BrightWorld! I originally intended this project as POC social marketing centered on Philippine reality, particularly macro-reality. The additional highlight was on the economic life.
In this blogosphere version of the project, the scope will be expanded to micro reality and non-economic life as well. It will also seek to cover positive experiences from other countries and those with an international-global character.
So, dear readers, welcome aboard the BrightWorld ship!
[Writ 03 April 2008, Quezon City, MetroManila]
erleargonza
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