The perennial contagious disease among Filipinos

"What's with the sound of running water?"

"It's raining here in my place."

"But it's the summer season!"

"Uhm, due to climate change."

Meet Pedro. He’s sick, but he doesn’t feel any symptoms. He can’t find the cure and waits for a vaccine that would heal himself and the people suffering from the same illness.

He and his childhood friends planned to meet in a restaurant to initiate a reunion event. They agreed to meet at 10 so they can eat lunch together after the meeting until one of his friends said that he just woke up at 9:30. It's already 11. Two out of ten had just arrived at the restaurant, including Pedro, who has been staying at the restaurant for three hours already. Let's just say they at least accomplished a program of activities for the planned event. The clock turned 6. He missed watching his favorite TV show that was scheduled to air at 4. He arrived home at 8, five hours after his expected time of arriving home if not half of the group hasn’t arrived until past 1.

After resigning from a previous post, Pedro decided to apply to a new company. He was scheduled for an interview at 10. Thankfully, he arrived at 9:45. But an hour past the time set for the interview, the boss interviewer is still stuck in traffic, the subordinate told Pedro. He raised a personal commitment to be settled in the afternoon, so he asked to leave sooner. The interview was rescheduled: next week, same time, same day. On that day, a family emergency occurred, making Pedro miss the slated interview time. He notified the company, but it did not reply. He managed to arrive at the office at 11, but the boss assessor is not there. “The boss is in a meeting,” one employee told Pedro. To cut the story short, Pedro failed in his quest to be employed at a company that offers a salary enough for him to apply for a loan for his dream car.

Finally, Pedro was invited by his cousin for the latter's most special event in life—a sanctimonious wedding. The ceremony will be held at 5. Pedro left home at 4, expecting he will arrive at the venue thirty minutes after. It's already 4:45 and he hasn't taken a ride for a commute to the wedding site. It's already 5:30 and he’s stuck in a long line of vehicles occupying the highway. He walked out of the taxi in the middle of the unmoving traffic and ran very fast. He made it to the place gasping, as the clock ticked at exactly 6:30. He missed the couple’s exchange of vows but was delighted by the lechon and Caesar salad prepared during the reception.

It’s okay if you don’t arrive on or before the scheduled time because other people do it too.

Everyone will focus on the expensive suit you’re wearing if you’re the last to arrive at the function.

There is a strain of a virus that long existed in Philippine history. Allegedly, our former colonial masters from Europe have brought this infectious agent into our land. Going back to those times, the “honorable” intentionally arrives at a party way past the scheduled start because it won’t start without the presence of the “most important person”. Other attendees won’t let the “honorable” become the sole “most important person” at the party, so they competed in a culminated informal contest to get that coveted title. That is, the last person to arrive past the party schedule, assuming that person is one of the top bananas, is crowned the “most important person” beneath heaven, second to God. When the Spaniards left for good, our ancestors did not find a treatment for this virus. We even seized it. It can’t kill a person, somebody claimed.

Government officials, supposedly role models, are no exemption from being inflicted on this condition. Imagine your graduation where you should have received your diploma at 5, but that already happened at 9 when you are already sleepy. “Please be patient,” the graduation committee said 17 times. The good Senator from wherever he comes from—your graduation’s guest speaker for being one of the most influential men in the country—started storytelling at the podium at 7:06, and that is when the commencement exercises officially started. What a very cool public servant. Nakaka-cool-o ng dugo.

The young, old, bright, broke, woke, misinformed, or educated Filipino can catch this malady very easily. But we can’t find death or recovery rates for those who suffer from this syndrome. We just count our financial losses whenever we are trapped in the bottleneck of metropolitan arteries. We don’t know how many people got stressed waiting too long for someone to arrive at the meeting place. There is also no real data on the number of people who have died when an ambulance failed to arrive at one's eventual death site in the soonest possible time.

If we catch this syndrome, we also bring malaise to the people we infected with the virus. This ailment does not need divine intervention to be healed at all. The cure is already available. Sadly, many Filipinos, including Pedro, don’t take it soberly. We do not care because, after all, it is not a national concern. It’s just a way of life. But Pedro won’t let this happen. All of us can do better than that. Problem is, he is also sick of the disorder that he wants other people to find its cure for themselves.

Can you tell Pedro about the cure for the disease? If you can, meet him in Luneta at 9. Or 10. Nah, make it after lunch. Please give him a new Rolex watch because his aged digital watch changes the skin tone of his wrist. He still loves his brown skin tone, that is why.

The scenarios told in this piece are factual in the imagination of the author and readers.

The meme was generated via imgflip.com.

#filipino #punctuality