BERNARD KARGANILLA: DOING CHINA
MANILA, SEPTEMBER 2, 2011 (MALAYA) BERNARD KARGANILLA ('The transnational crimes perpetrated by Chinese triads is simply one item in the global agenda of tackling the Land of the Dropa.')
CAN we help the poor saps afflicted with yellow fever as they run after goose dreams among the celestial delinquents?
Or will they continue to be victimized by big-time drug syndicates whose goons range aboard Camrys and Fortuners in the asphalt jungles of the Rizalian Republic?
The naïve are played by snakeheads who dump at least 8.5 kilos of suspected methamphetamine hydrochloride (shabu) in the raging slums and elitist subdivisions, netting the drug-runners the street value of 35 million pesos.
Some of these alien fiends do get caught by Philippine agencies like the Anti-Illegal Drugs Special Operations Task Force, which arrested and charged three Chinese nationals in early 2011 in one of Metro Manila's southern barangays.
The transnational crimes perpetrated by Chinese triads is simply one item in the global agenda of tackling the Land of the Dropa.
Since 1949, the Maoist movement has fascinated watchers and shakers. Cuban Comandante Fidel Castro, for instance, revealed his appreciation of the Mao mash-up to a fellow traveler and Italian journalist, "The Chinese were more divided among themselves than we are, with different dialects and even languages, and a multiplicity of nationalities. And yet, the Chinese revolution is one and indivisible."
It is the touristy fare, however, that permeates the humans' dealings with the Han. Even Jose Rizal, Filipino patriot and Malay internationalist, sprinkled his travelogues with observations of Chinese festivals in Hong Kong and gustatory reviews of chicken with champignon, shark's belly, fish head, mushroom and pork with two plates of rolls and tea. [Travel Diary, Manila to Hong Kong, Macao, and Japan, 3 February to 13 April, 1888]
Rizal saw more, knew more, said more about the industrious Chinaman "whose whole ambition is to amass a small fortune," whose relations with the Pearl of the Orient were "purely commercial" and whose trickery caused the disappearance of "our trade in indigo." ["The Indolence of the Filipinos"]
Rizal peppered his novels with images of "fantastically decorated Chinese porcelain" and "costly Chinese lanterns," "Chinese shops with their soiled curtains and their iron gratings," and "the Chinese, who exploit the simplicity and vices of the native farmers," plus "marble benches of Cantonese origin" and "lamentable medley of landscapes in dim and gaudy colors painted in Canton or Hong Kong," a typical habitation with peculiar odor mixing "punk, opium, and dried fruits" and Quiroga's gaming-houses. ["The Social Cancer" and "The Reign of Greed"]
Rizal's correspondence with family, friends and fellow Reformists referred to Chinese stores, food and practices, leading readers to surmise that Las Islas Filipinas must have been a lucrative market for the overseas Chinese profiteers.
Rizal's homeland was a magnet for the mandarins who facilitated the relocation of their enterprising cohorts. The Chinese Legation in Madrid went directly to the Filipino propagandists' office, asking to be listed as subscribers of the "España en Filipinas," and this impelled Rizal's colleague to explain, "I believe that the Chinese, who paid in advance a year's subscription, did so because in its last number the 'Review' took up the question of Chinese immigration into the Philippines." [Letter of Evaristo Aguirre, 14 June 1887]
"Due to my articles on the Chinese – with whom I don't know if you will agree – the Chinese Embassy has subscribed to the magazine by letter." [Letter of Eduardo de Lete to Rizal, Madrid, 20 June 1887] Echoes of Quiroga the Chinaman who aspired to the creation of a consulate for his nation.
Be that as it may, these Sons of the Yellow Emperor are not the only "children of the Golden Calf," that is, Earthlings "incapable of seeing beyond their noses and of aspiring to nothing noble or lofty." In Rizal's time and our's exist Filipinos at home and abroad who treat their Motherland as a vending machine, swear by extraterrestrial conspiracies yet refuse homage to the One True God. [Letter of Evaristo Aguirre to Rizal, Madrid, 26 June 1888]
All sides must come clean.
Bureaucrats, soldiers and artisans ought to invoke their better angels, an effort of selective antecedence, even in Oriental despotism.
"The Chinese mandarin is, or rather originally was, what the humanist of our Renaissance period approximately was: a literator humanistically trained and tested in the language monuments of the remote past. When you read the diaries of Li Hung Chang you will find that he is most proud of having composed poems and of being a good calligrapher.
This stratum, with its conventions developed and modeled after Chinese Antiquity, has determined the whole destiny of China." [Max Weber, "Politics as a Vocation"]
The covenant of destiny is man-to-man, community to its counterpart, nation and nation. Absent this covenant, the selfish ones will exploit the patient, the trusting and the loyal. Trapped in toxic dependency, the germinator of the golden egg will either kill himself or engage in righteous retaliation.
The capitalist road is littered with: postcolonial prostituted women and children (as many as 10 million, said Dr. Xiaoming Li, director of the Prevention Research Center at Wayne State University School of Medicine in Detroit), people with HIV-AIDS (740,000 adults and children by the end of 2009, www.unaids.org.cn/en), and pollutants ("The residents of many of China's largest cities are living under long-term, harmful air quality conditions," Zhao Weijun, deputy director of the air pollution department of NEPA, 1997), among others.
There you have eruptions of suicides (the leading cause of death for people aged between 15 and 34, according to "China Daily," 2007-09-11) and social unrest (more than 1,000 protesters had besieged at least one government office in the southern factory town of Zengcheng in Guangdong last June).
The world is dealing with a most populous, strong-armed and self-centered society (Hàn běnwè) that harbors a special grievance against Western civilization (gŭ yĭ yŏu zhī) yet at the same time believes in its superiority complex (Shénzhōu) toward smaller states (Huawaizhidi).
Mao himself warned: "What has come to light in various places in the last two or three years shows that Han chauvinism exists almost everywhere. It will be very dangerous if we fail now to give timely education and resolutely overcome Han chauvinism in the Party and among the people...Therefore, education must be assiduously carried out so that this problem can be solved step by step.
Moreover, the newspapers should publish more articles based on specific facts to criticize Han chauvinism openly and educate the Party members and the people." ["Criticize Han Chauvinism," March 16, 1953]
Will the Sino-centric tributary state system in East Asia (Junghwa-sasang, Chūka shisō) prevail over the Westphalian multi-state system of the United Nations?
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Chief News Editor: Sol Jose Vanzi
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