i think i did it

I was reviewing my old blog and found this entry, which I wrote in November 12, 2005 (more than three years ago). In it, I swore I would become what I have always feared I would become - an apathetic piece of shit. I sounded so sure then. Now, I don't know.

I have pasted the entry below.

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I knew I have turned apathetic when I began defying weather. Everyday I come home to an airconditioned house, drive an airconditioned car, work in an airconditioned office. I also choose not to see Manila’s ugliness. I pass by tree-lined streets, shop in malls that sell Lancel, drink coffee from Brazilian mugs. Even my cable television is filtered – I would watch Homes Across America instead of a documentary about Filipino families living in makeshift houses smaller than my bathroom.

All of my friends are this way, too. We – all fortunate enough to have decent paychecks in a country where the unemployed people outnumber cows in New Zealand – meet up in posh restaurants and talk about things except social realities. She wants a condo overlooking Makati; she wants the latest car with the side airbags; he wants new furniture. And we all can’t wait to get there.

I could feel guilty about the lifestyle we are leading, but then I realize: maybe we don’t have too much – others just have too little. This life we have is not excessive. It should be the standard.

It’s Catholicism’s fault for saying ‘blessed are the poor.’ Fuck poverty. It's disgusting and unacceptable and no amount of holiness can make it look good. Nobody wants to be poor, so can you blame third world intellectuals like us if we move heaven and earth to make sure we die rich?

Guilt is illegal, so suck it up and move on. Let's go on and become the people we hated back when we worshipped Karl Marx and believed in protectionism. Let's climb our way to the top of the food chain, that minuscule slice of the economic pie (with fancy caviar on top). Let's become painfully, ridiculously bourgeoisie.

And when someone criticizes us for wanting too much, let’s be the snotty scholars we always were and tell them what we have always told people who don’t get Umberto Eco: We don’t expect you to understand. You are too simple.