Reflections of a Road Trip

Guests are coming. Make the living room presentable. Fix the sofa cover. Be sure to cover the tears on the upholstery. Fix the curtains. Be sure that they cover the cracks on the glass window. Spread the floor mat across to cover those nasty stains on the floor. Do we still have time to repaint walls?

The DPWH Secretary is coming. Let’s fix the roads. Fill up the potholes on the roads. Dump on them. Fix the highways that their convoy would be going through. Fortify the bridges. Let’s work overtime. We still have time.

Why are they scrambling to fix the roads just because a big boss is coming? If they could do these, why had they not done something like this long before? On the other hand, no matter how much they cover the cracks, the stains would peep through the edges. When the guests sit on the sofa, the covers would lift a bit to show signs of torn threads. When the wind blows the curtains, the cracked glass windows will show themselves. Stains would show by the edges of the floor mat. The visitors may not see the covered clutter clearly, but they would certainly feel it.

This isn’t something new and surprising. Classrooms would be all in order, with pupils in complete uniform, fully attentive to teachers in the day’s uniform with their ID;s hanging on their necks, seriously discussing the lesson, with copies of lesson plans and curriculum guides on the table ready for supervision. Meanwhile in the principal’s office, the school head is present, ready for an executive meeting, with sumptuous more than necessary snacks on the table. School utility workers have cleaned the corridors because reportedly, the DepEd Secretary may drop by for a visit.

Nurses and orderlies are going about their duties on freshly sanitized hospital halls. Patients are politely and promptly treated. Medicine are sufficiently stacked. Doctors are punctually doing their rounds, all present because reportedly, the DOH Secretary is coming.

Yes, we all go through that sometimes. We all straighten up from slouching when a superior would be supervising. But, if DPWH all along had the sense and skill to scramble to straighten up, why don’t they do it without their top boss going on a road trip down Andaya Highway? Why had they not done it long before? Why had they not done it when it was more convenient and controlled?

The same complacency could be thrown to mass media and to some extent, to the public. The issue of the decrepit Andaya Highway has shaken us for years or decades now. Before this issue popped up again, all was quiet in the front (or so it seemed). For someone who like to stay in one place, I thought the problem had been fixed to a tolerable extent. People stopped talking about the arduous ten to twelve hour car rides from Naga to Manila and vice versa. But going to Manila for the holidays, we arrived at the terminal at a time when students and employees would have their morning snacks. During the overnight trip, my sleep was shaken with the bus very slowly moving through what felt like a narrow passageway, with its tires carefully making their way over what felt like planks of wood just wide enough for bus and truck tires. That must have been the Mauca Bridge (or was I just dreaming?). Not much has changed. To some credit, there was some improvement, but it is very slight. I’m being generous here.

Radio commentators stopped barking at it on air. Youtube Vloggers moved on to different content. Facebook posters and ranters stopped complaining about the long rides. They stopped talking about it because the elections were over and done with. Candidates have won and candidates have lost. The Andaya Highway issue has become useless for propaganda to destabilize some candidates’ campaign. The pathetic path of the highway was just a device to discredit and demoralize and sway or shake support for persons and parties, whom commentators and complainants stand against. Now, I wonder if all that talk is really about for the people who pass the roads or some agenda that they push.

So, I guess, we have to thank Congressman Nelson Legacion for bringing Andaya Highway back to the conversation, DPWH Secretary Vince Dizon for listening, and going on a road trip. Did they really have to hit the road to really feel the conditions of the highway? Did they really have to go to the actual site to get the idea? If that were so, then every DepEd Secretary has to go to all public schools across the archipelago to know the problems. Every DOH Secretary has to go to all the public hospitals. Every DILG Secretary has to visit all city halls and municipal halls. Shouldn’t that be the job of the local directors? Isn’t that what they are in the positions for?

Isaiah 59:14: “Justice is turned back, and righteousness stands far away; For truth has stumbled in the street.”