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I thank all of you for giving me the opportunity to face you today to tell my story. Your microphones, voice recorders, and cameras make me realize that this story will not be forgotten after today. You will continue to tell this tale over and over again, until many people realize that I am but one with this kind of story.
You probably don’t realize how thankful I really am to stand before you today, because there are many like me who have not been able to do this, and many more that will not have a chance to face you.
My daughter is everything to me. The only treasure I have left in this life devoid of possessions. If her father were alive, he would be more inconsolable than I am right now. Her father passed away when she was just a child of six. And I raised her on my own from then on. I was able to send her to the university on my retirement pension.
I don’t know who taught my daughter to be fearless – me or the university. While the education she received there made her think independently and critical of our society, she probably saw how fearless I was making a life for the two of us. I did what I could since I was faced with no choice to make.
My daughter grew up thinking that if one runs out of choices, one has to do what he or she has to do – fearlessly.
Fear was something I didn’t pay much attention to in my day, as I tackled head on a life for me and my daughter. She grew up seeing this – and many more, I’m sure.
I probably raised a person who is so fearless that she is bound to disappear one day.
I don’t know which is more painful – to finally find my child by knowing she’s dead or not finding her at all.
The long wait is the most excruciating part.
I light a candle at dusk everyday to remind me of two things: One, that there’s no greater tragedy than having to outlive your child. And two, that if my daughter is gone from this life, I would rather that she died for being fearless than to have lived not doing anything about a fearful world.
Desaparecidos means missing (literally) or enforced disappearances (figuratively). These people have disappeared due to political causes (involuntary disappearances, summary executions, or extra-judicial killings).
RSS 
http://ph.news.yahoo.com/gma/20080808/tph-unsolved-killings-on-the-rise-lawyer-ce44f36.html
There is nothing more disturbing than having a loved one disappear, and not knowing whether he or she is still alive or not. The long, painful wait is a very dark world.
I’ve spoken to some victim families and they admit that life has never been the same for them since losing their loved ones.
The tragedy lies in not being sure about anything. This is what causes the most anguish. Some families even said that it would be better if they can just confirm that their desaparecidos have actually been killed. Absurd but true.
Grace, I think when system itself is an accomplice in such disappearences and murders the judiciary can do very little. Judiciary is a part of the same system. There will be sham investigations, sham proceedings under the pressure from activists people but justice, I doubt will be delivered.
The true justice will be curbing the powers of Vigilante and ensure there are no more such instances.
I don’t think any solution will emerge, simply because there is no political will for solutions.
Unfortunately the political parties drop the crucial issues like hot cakes, though they ride piggy back on the same issues to come to power.
Human insensitivity has reached shocking levels...
It’s a terrifying manifestation of power gone mad.
Paying back all the debts and debts of gratitude. This, now, is patronage politics.
So it’s just the elite perpetuating power and all its evil deeds.
”The long wait is the most excruciating part.”
Nothing is more oppressive for them than the uncertainty that they experience everyday. It is the oppression of hope - hope that they will see their loved ones again.
This is the time when hope becomes a nightmare.
Absurd as it sounds but some victim families even say that it’s better if they just confirm of their loved ones are indeed dead.
It is more than sad. It’s the superlative of misery.
Nothing can be more worse than what they are facing everyday...
The powers of an oppressive state are so that they can quash the mechanisms of any budding revolt.
Precisely, the desaparecidos are people who take part in that revolt. And the state’s response to them are involuntary disappearances, summary executions, and extra-judicial killings.
Desaparecidos is a phenomenon that is essentially anti-revolt.
Tragically absurd...
day after day,
some do it-
some are led astray!
but all will lose their way...
some day...
in the
maze of
The
World!””
SHAHWAR
Thanks Shahwar! I am deeply honored with your verse. I kneelest by thy feet. :)
THOU SHOULD NOT DO SO!
TAKE THIS VERSE AS MY WAY OF COMPLIMENTING TO SOME ”BEAUTIFUL” POSTS BY YOU AT INSTABLOGS!
Thanks for sharing you experience with desaparecidos. Though your experience is vicarious, it’s a living testament of its existence.
also. And it’s the same for both men and women.
Clarification needed: Has the women already lost her daughter or is she only afraid to lose her?
But a pearl nonetheless and the swine shall put it in back inside the shell.
Thanks again Grace for bringing to fore the issue of human rights violation.
Btw, this is a true story.
Sorry Grace for my questioning, but if you could indulge me for a moment. :)
And you didn’t read my lazy poem? did you? :(
You didn’t read all the links here, did you?
Human rights violation (involuntary disappearances, summary executions, and extra-judicial killings) are a product of an oppressive state employing the politics of fear.
This is a huge issue here.
I wrote this article in a poignant (your word) way because the grit is too much.
Anyway, they are all in the links.