General Admission
The world is changing; sing it, Benjie
By Al S. Mendoza
IN September 2009, Manila and its environs were hit by the most terrible floods in years due mainly to Typhoon “Ondoy.”
Marikina suffered its worst flooding in decades. A famous village there – Provident – claimed lives due to house-high floods.
That disaster put Metro Manila in its most miserable state, even destroying hundreds of cars and other vehicles submerged for hours in floodwaters.
“Ondoy” would prove to be the most disastrous typhoon to hit the metropolis in recent memory, with billions of pesos lost in crops and properties.
* * *
Barely a week after “Ondoy,” Typhoon “Pepeng” struck Dagupan, Baguio and other parts of Northern Luzon.
Many towns of Pangasinan, the Pines City and several towns of Mt. Province and Benguet were also hit by floods, road erosions and landslides – killing scores and hurting many others.
The water-release at San Roque Dam in San Manuel town was the biggest single act blamed for the catastrophe in Pangasinan.
Two years later, rains and floods were back, this time not only here (mainly in Bicol, Visayas and Mindanao), but also in Australia.
More than 40 of our brothers and sisters in the South have died of drowning and other typhoon-spawned accidents the past few days alone.
Australia’s worst flooding in 100 years has also claimed lives. Some 3,000 Filipinos there were also affected, many of them moved to evacuation centers.
The world is changing, indeed.
Global warming is for real.
May God have mercy on us.
* * *
On another note, it was a fresh whiff of breeze for me to learn that Dagupan Mayor Benjie Lim sings extremely well.
In his column here last week, the iconic Jun Velasco, who “midwifed” the birth of GENERAL ADMISSION here in 2003, said the reason Mayor Lim might have defeated Al Fernandez in the last May polls was because of Benjie’s exceptional talent for singing.
I told Jun V that people who love music are usually the advocates of peace, goodwill and harmony.
If music is in the heart, then acrimony, enmity and rancor are non-existent.
Music has always been the universal language of equality, love and friendship.
Thus, Mayor Lim should prove his being a music-man by initiating reconciliatory talks with Vice Mayor Belen Fernandez.
Maybe, he could start by serenading Belen.
May I suggest Benjie’s repertoire to include Kenny Rogers’ “Once, Twice, Three Times a Lady,” “Be My Lady” or “Lady in Red”?
C’mon, Benjie, don’t be a KJ.
Now, for an encore to cap your chivalrous act, please do Roy Orbison’s “Pretty Woman”?
For the good of Dagupan, for the good of the city folk, do it, Mayor.
You’ll be surprised at the magic music can do to melt even the most rock-hard heart in the world.
VM Belen might just suddenly, gently, hold your hand and dance the boogie-woogie with you.
In this crazy world of ours, nothing is impossible.
Right, Gonz?
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