JessicaRulestheUniverse.com

In a break from Covid-related news, the Pentagon has officially released videos taken by US Navy pilots of unidentified flying objects. It’s good news if you want to believe that there’s intelligent life out there (Because whether there’s any in here is debatable), and bad news if you think extraterrestrials are going to enslave or eat the human race. Or try to become citizens of the United States—I smell an election talking point.

The flying objects move like no known earthly machines, which doesn’t mean they’re from other planets. They could be super-secret tech company projects, gizmos made by hobbyists, or machines from the future. Yes, our future selves could’ve sent them back to our time, to check on us and make sure we don’t manage to destroy ourselves and prevent the future. You have to admit that it’s a real possibility. Then again, if our future selves sent them, it means we survived and got there. Note to future self: Travel a little farther into the past, say 30 years earlier, when globalization and economic policies aggravated inequality and hastened climate change and the destruction of the environment. Skin care tips would be much appreciated. Please avoid direct contact with me, we don’t want to cause any paradoxes.

In Central London, The Guardian reports, hotel and restaurant workers who have lost their jobs and can’t afford to pay their rent are sleeping on the streets. A few thousand of the recently homeless have been housed, but thousands are still living rough. Establishments are closed, so they have no access to toilets and bathrooms. They can’t charge their phones. No one is out walking, so they can’t even beg for money, and they have to rely on volunteer groups for food. The restaurants are shut, so they can’t rummage in the bins for leftovers. Even the discarded cardboard and newspapers they can use for bedding are gone. A few weeks ago they were working in hotels, restaurants, and pubs. This is not the life they’re used to, and it’s terrifying.

I have to ask a very Filipino question: Wala ba silang mga kaibigan at kamag-anak? Where are their friends and relatives? Of course everyone is having a hard time, we all are, but people are sleeping on the street!

We have a ton of problems in our Third World country, and millions of us live in poverty, but as much as we can, we take care of our friends and relatives. Yes, we are tribal that way, and our tribalism provides justification for corruption (“I have a right to these public funds because I must take care of my family”) and breeds over-dependence and helplessness (Raise your hands, those with relatives who are perpetually asking for money), but we cannot let someone we know sleep on the street. Maybe we are motivated by shame and group pressure (“What will other people think of us?”), or a sense of responsibility and guilt, but the reasons that compel a Filipina to go to work as a nurse abroad so she can send her entire barangay to school are the same reasons that compel us to shelter friends (and even total strangers) in trouble. This tribalism can be a bad thing, but sometimes it’s a good thing, and if we could just figure out how to strike a balance, we’d be saner.

I remember how some years ago, some French friends had a colleague who fell on hard times and had to live on the street. They remarked on this unfortunate turn of events and waxed philosophical, but it did not occur to them to do something until my Filipina friend said, “What the hell??” She looked for the homeless colleague, invited him to her house for dinner, and let him sleep on the couch in her family’s cramped apartment until his circumstances improved.

We’re always going on about the difficulty of defining “Filipino” given our history. Why don’t we start there?

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Happy Birthday, Stephen Sondheim!