Independence

Weeny Cayme-Kim
June 10, 2007

It’s nice to hear the word INDEPENDENCE! which means great freedom. Our country's experiences of colonialism and invasion by Spain for 400 years were really a terrible pain in the hearts of our Filipinos who understood the value of human dignity and integrity.

This is what Jose Rizal and other national heroes and revolutionaries fought for during that time. We were treated by Spaniards like servants and worst to say is "like animals" who didn’t have any value at all.

Those were the periods were our human dignity and value were trashed and smashed. I think more than any material things that we have to claim from the Spaniards, the most impt to restore and regain is our value. Dr Jose Rizal was offered high position, money and others just to join and unite with the Spaniards, however, he rejected all those things because he believed that human dignity can't be bought by money and material wealth. Andres Bonifacio and Mabini were even lured to betray our nation but the more they were encouraged to fight for our freedom that led to the existence of our Katipuneros and the birth of the Himagsikan.

Look at those who betrayed the nation...the people who sold our country and fellow Filipinos to the foreigners, nothing great had happened to them. They didn’t become rich even nor they became famous. Moreover, in our history a memory of shame remains for them.

This is what I would like to point out in this message. Our independence is the re-claim of our value as Filipinos, restoration of our dignity as human beings and building our integrity as greatest creation of the Supreme Being (God). We may be living outside the Philippines like many of our kababayans in other places of the world...but let us not forget that the internal reason why many of our great heroes died for the independence of the Philippines was for the reclaiming of our value-dignity-integrity. From these 3 internal jewels, lies our POSITION now, who we are in front of other people and even before the Creator.

We have lost this impt internal meaning of the word INDEPENDENCE. Many of our govt leaders today gave in to material temptations, position and power craving and many others resulting to a very serious graft and corruption in our country. The most serious problem we are facing now in the Philippines is not just the economic fall down but most of all the lost of our sense of value-dignity and integrity as human beings. If only we can have this kind of consciousness and elevate our moral standard as well as our norms and etiquette, I believe our country can develop more and our fellow Filipinos can be regarded as one of the many great people in the world.

In truth, Filipinos are great! we are very adjustable people and we can adapt ourselves easily to the culture and all situations in the country we are living at. We can even communicate well and express ourselves. There are lots of records that our Filipinos in other places of the world excel in various fields. HOWEVER, despite these clear accomplishments of our kababayans, Filipinos are regarded still as DH or muchacha image in the international community. WHY? because many of our kababayans don’t really see the importance of our internal value as human beings. We don’t see ourselves as collective mass of people that’s why we can just live on our own desire. Individualism and lost of sense of value-dignity-integrity made our nation where it is now and even affects the image of other Filipinos outside the country. Whether we are married with foreign nationals or OFWs in foreign lands or we may have changed our citizenship, but the very truth remains... the blood running in our veins can never be changed. We are all Filipinos in blood relationship.

Let us all remember that the cry for freedom our national heroes were shouting more than a hundred years ago were freedom to stand as real human and to exercise our rights. It was a cry to reclaim our value and dignity and a fight to be who really we are in the original context of our existence.

Let us uplift our nation's image in the international community by being the people with highest ideals and sense of value-dignity-integrity in ourselves, in our lifestyle and in our relationship with people.

Mabuhay ang kapwa ko Filipinos!