Loving and leaving

Watching all the episodes of the Friends series and reading too many novels set in New York has enticed me to take a big bite of the Big Apple. For so long, I’ve entertained fantasies of walking the halls of Columbia and living the life of a starving writer, or reading hundreds of manuscripts as a book editor.

It did not occur to me, until recently, that I was getting closer and closer to that opportunity. Not that I have a plane ticket ready by the time I finish college (I wish); just that soon enough, I’ll be working and saving for that one big move to another country, one that inspires adventure and ambition.

I am pretty sure I am not alone. More and more Filipinos go abroad for greener, or rather gold, pastures. Likewise, more and more young Filipinos go abroad for further study or work opportunities. My development psychology professor once remarked that the kind of plans, which college graduates of today make, is the very distinct line that separates the young people of the past and the present.

Ask seniors what they plan to do after college and they already have answers—law school, med school, Master’s or go abroad to study. Young people now, I included, make their life plans earlier than those in the past did. That does not mean that we are sure about these plans but they pretty much give us an idea of where we want to go, and sometimes, that is to another land a plane ride away.

However, as a college student with still idealistic ideas, I can’t help but worry about what leaving my country will mean. Does that mean cheating on the Philippines that taught me the things I know now? Does leaving make me a hypocrite—after years of writing about improving my country, the government and its people? Is it imperative that I come back to my country in my retirement?

In Jessica Zafra’s website, somebody asked Cong. Teddy Boy Locsin what he thinks about Filipinos packing their bags and leaving this country. This, to my surprise, was his answer:
Every person owes his first allegiance to himself, to make the best of his talents, to study hard to that end, and to get the best job wherever it is that allows him to show those talents and rise in the world. The rest is just crap.
Pacquiao did not become the greatest boxer of all time by thinking of his country. He did it by fighting to the best of his ability and when he became champion he included Filipinos in his glory. Do the same. If you amount to nothing by staying in the Philippines, nobody will want to be a part of you.
You owe your parents for your education and not your goddamn country, not even if you came from UP which is partly subsidized because what made you a good student was not the subsidy but your study. All the more so if your parents paid for your entire education. Kiss their feet. You owe it all to them and only to them. The country can go to hell.
Locsin spent years writing former Pres. Cory Aquino’s speeches. He spent years working on publications for this country. He spent years serving this country as a member of the Congress. Why will he answer that way? Why will a man, who loved his country in word and deed, say that the country can go to hell?

Locsin made me wonder many things—one of them the question what love of country really is. I know it’s been asked in all history classes. I’ve been asked that question too many times to count; however, it’s one of those questions you think you have the perfect answer to until somebody actually asks you or until somebody challenges your answer.

Slogans, history teachers and Efren Penaflorida will say that gone are the days when you have to literally die for your country. I say that gone too are the days when you let your own dreams wither and die by staying in your country.

It hit me hard when Locsin said that you are no good to your country if you are not good, and your first allegiance is to yourself. After some thought, I could not agree with Locsin more.

We are in no position to crucify those who leave the Philippines; we cannot accuse them of not loving this country. OFW remittances give lifeblood to the economy. Look at the faculty roster of the top universities. The best of them have degrees from schools abroad. While that is not a black-and-white indication of a good teacher, education, from a foreign land and from some of the best schools in the world, results in a higher probability of being a good teacher.

It is not selfish for a Filipino or a Filipina to want a better-paying job or the opportunity to take further studies, and if those are outside of the Philippines, then by all means, one is free to leave this country. The country does not need another jobless citizen nor one who can get the best kind of education in another country but refuses to leave because “he or she wants to serve the country.”

What kind of service are you capable of giving if your skills are half-baked? One that is half-baked too, and that just makes up a substandard country. This country deserves and needs more.

I realized that I can love my country and leave, and yet still be able to give more to my country than if I stayed. I used to think that the Philippines taught me the things I know but really, that’s not the case. I learned the things I know now, not from my country but from my own life and my education. I just learned those while I am in my country. Leaving does not make me a hypocrite; it just makes me a Filipina who is not afraid to take risks.

I know that the best opportunities for me are not here and I am very sure that one day, I’ll leave. However, if ever I make it big somewhere else, I am sure to include my country in whatever little piece of glory I acquire. I’ll always be a Filipina, and in that regard, my country will always have me even if I’m living somewhere else. Locsin is right. I do not owe my country anything, but I will still choose to give back to it even if I am far away. That’s love.

Everyone is free to take chances and leave this country. Leaving does not mean not loving. True love of country is when no matter how many seas separate you and the Philippines, you still tell people you’re from the beautiful archipelago near the world’s equator. It is when even if your tongue speaks a different language, it still longs for the taste of adobo.

It is when even if you managed to petition your entire family to wherever you are, you still teach your children and those who will come after them the same Filipino values your lola taught you. Of course, it is when you send your remittances here, or you go back here and teach the generations that will come after you, or even when you support charities in the Philippines that you show you that you may have left but you did not leave this country to rot.

True love of country is never severing that deep bond that connects you and home. Very Filipino.
Not all Filipinos are capable of that kind of love of country. That only makes that love all the more special.