Make yourself at home

People say the youth today are restless and passionate (not about the bigger things in life like career options, national issues, and international trade, but more about how many Facebook friends and Twitter followers they have, and how many likes they got on Instagram for that selfie captioned with a “pa-deep” quote), driven (to be rich, famous, and successful, but without having to lift a finger, just getting plain lucky and looking fabulous without the effort manifesting itself), and just too shallow (with petty problems ranging from what to wear in school for the next week to shifting from one fad diet to another to be pretty and skinny), too far from the vigilant, critical, assertive “future of the nation” they should be.

I am 18 and so maybe I fall right in. This is my generation, welcome to the club, and head right in—because this is who we are and what we have become: cold, hardened convicts guilty of apathy and downright indifference to the pressing issues that the world, the Philippines included, is facing.

But I refuse to believe this. I refuse to accept this characterization of my generation. I refuse to conform to such an identity.

Call it tacky, but I know that deep down, my generation cares about the “bigger” things in life that adults worry about. We, too, worry about the things that cross their minds, like happiness and fulfillment and what to do with the uncertain paths the future has laid out for us. We, too, deal with the predicaments that the adults we look up to deal with every day, like money and what to do after graduation, where to work, and how to maximize professional and personal growth. We, too, bear on our shoulders the burden of ensuring that we do those who came before us proud for what our country has become, though the progress is slow and little in the eyes of many, and at the same time build on what we enjoy today to make each tomorrow a little more livable for those next in line to be the vigilant, critical, and assertive future of the nation.

Our effort may not be noticed at this point, but it’s there. And I know that one day we will make it big. But for now we have to involve our fellow youth who may have fallen out of love with the country and who have lost the passion and drive for all the lofty things—nationalism, economic growth, genuine progress and development. Let us take these big things one baby step at a time.

It’s time to come home. This is an appeal to my fellow Filipino youth raised abroad and immersed in foreign cultures and lifestyles: Come home and recognize that though your passports and birth certificates say otherwise, you are Filipinos, too, and, as part of the country’s hopes for a better tomorrow, share the same task of nation-building though thousands of miles and many seas separate us. But more than those far away, this is an appeal to those physically present in our country: Stop letting your minds wander to greener pastures and lush futures on the other side of the globe, and direct your thoughts to come home.

We say that the Philippines is corrupt, that the government is excessively bureaucratic but inefficient, that the basic services available to us are all so Third World compared to what the First World has to offer—comprehensive health insurance plans that cover major surgeries; retirement benefits guaranteed to get retirees through old age while preserving their good health; mass transportation so efficient that owning a car is not a necessity; elaborate and successful waste segregation schemes and treatment plants that make the air cleaner and more lung-friendly…

We see the understaffed, overcrowded, and nearly dilapidated Philippine General Hospital that, ironically, should be the best place to recuperate in. We hear stories of retirees who spent most of their lives working in government to help all of us, in their own humble ways, to get the basic services we deserve, and who fall ill and eventually pass away without being able to claim and make use of the retirement benefits they worked all their lives for. We watch people go by in train after train, fitted like sardines in a tin can especially during rush hours, while some of us are trapped in heavy traffic, suffering economic and personal losses. And every single day we breathe the same toxic air guaranteed to shorten our lives…

Every hour we lose skilled workers and top executives to foreign economies and companies. And surely, more than an hour in a day, a lot of us dream of an escape from this reality we live in. And we shake our heads, laugh sardonically, and ask: How has visiting, or worse, living, in the Philippines become more fun? We sigh and smile and surrender. It has become a question we can answer with sarcastic remarks and viral Internet memes made to poke fun at our country’s current state. But if we dig deeper and try to go beyond our cynicism, it becomes a question that generations of Filipinos cannot substantially answer anymore.

Now what do we have to propose? Do we leave the question unanswered? Do we continue to poke fun by coming up with smart, sarcastic remarks? Who will make us proud of our country again?

Yet if we scan the crowd and zoom in a little more closely, we will see that there are still some youth who have not given up on bringing back the pride in being Filipino. There are still young people who are forward-looking when it comes to “adult” concerns such as juggling financial resources, finding fulfillment, and being proud of the country once again. There are still young Filipinos who have not given up on the vital role of the youth as the leaders of tomorrow in the continuous process of nation-building. There are still young Filipinos who care, more than their petty Facebook updates and tweets and Instagram self-portraits.

They recognize the value of engaging in political discourse and discussing and dissecting the country’s economic policies. They propose solutions to Malacañang over and over again, hoping that the President himself will grab a copy, scan their demands and suggestions over morning coffee, act on the call to invest in the youth and for once listen to what they have to say, and push the enactment of some of the solutions proposed. They help us learn a little more about nation-building and to recognize the value of participatory governance—an affirmative action that hopefully will soften hardened hearts and inspire them to come home and heed the call of the nation to help it get back on its feet—and maintain steady footing.

Not everyone has taken the easy way out to become shiny but shallow. Not everyone has given up on being Filipino. Look a little closer, in your own chest. The love the Philippines needs lives right inside you, and it burns like the passion that burned in Rizal’s and Ninoy’s hearts, which they allowed to take over their lives in the service of Filipinos, who are “worth dying for.”

Rekindle that burning passion in you. Act on it, build on it. Spread it like wildfire.

Joelle Eloise Nieves C. Monje, 18, is a third year public administration student at the University of the Philippines Diliman.