Lolo Pepe ( Jose Rizal ) And Some Of His Thoughts on the Present State of His Mother Land

My fellow countrymen, again and again you make me proud to be a Filipino. Many times we have fought for our freedom with nobility and sincerity. Our former Spaniard colonizers were just the tip of the iceberg; later on, we fought for our own sovereignty with our American--ahem--friends, and then we fought the Japanese for it in World War II; and then much much later on, we stood up against a fellow Filipino who should have been a promising President but ended up being an egomaniacal dictator who put the country to ruin. And then, only recently, we defended our freedom one more time and overthrew yet another President who turned out to be engaged in the most distasteful criminality.

Yes, we fight for freedom--or what modern political reality designates as "democracy", if you may--and we are repeatedly victorious in doing so. That's something that I will always be proud of. However, it might have escaped most of us Filipinos that being a “free” and “democratic” people is in itself merely a Beginning. Freedom undeniably plays a big role in defining ourselves as a Nation, but what is this so-called “democracy” without a Destiny in mind? Oh yes, we can talk endlessly amongst ourselves about how liberty is still the best virtue in a country, but this liberty should be...for what end?

Better education for our people has always been what I've been pushing for. And why not? The whole Community of Nations can be compared to a big, vast classroom. Each country can be thought of as one student. And of course we know who the top students, the sobresalientes, of this Classroom of the World are. Where once they were called Great Nations, now they are designated as the First World Countries—nations which excel in industry and commerce, modern innovations and technology, both pure and applied sciences, even in athletics and military defense capabilities, just to name a few. More importantly, taking the analogy of a World Classroom further, these First World Countries, or top students, shall we say, are able to give the best quality of life to their peoples.

Sadly, if we are to consider the Philippines a student, we have always been ranked among the “mediocre” majority in a Classroom of the World. This would be quite incongruous with the way we yearn for our own children to excel in their studies—to strive to be at the top rank. Why shouldn't a Whole Nation be motivated with the same vigour to excel within the world community?

I have always written about the Great Nations around the world that I personally visited in countless journeys and sojourns. I have always longed to see the same operating principles that made them Great right here in our Motherland, to be experienced by all Filipinos. Yes, we Filipinos will fight for our freedoms, but we must also equally fight for a Destiny.