Lacking a culture of maintenance

Many of my close friends visiting the country frequently comment on how there appears to be a run-down look, a certain kind of shabbiness to much of Metro Manila. The observation comes from returning balikbayans as well as foreign colleagues familiar enough to express their observations as we tour the city.

I find it difficult not to agree with them even as I feel embarrassment and anger as they methodically tick off their bills of particular — a decrepit bridge here, some drab government offices over there, the potholed avenue we are traversing and the purportedly five-star hotel they stay in where the drapes smelled of nauseating, stale cigarette smoke.

Do we really ever think of maintaining anything well in this country? Many bridges across the Pasig could easily use a coat of paint, both to protect them against the elements as well as to simply make them look less depressing. Recently constructed buildings have inert elevators or escalators crying to be energized so they could perform their natural function. Older edifices cracked sport marble panelings and ceramic tiles but the months and years roll by with no attempt being made to either repair or replace them.

The roads are particularly badly maintained. Mathematicians could delight in designing topographic models which capture the complex patterns of ruts and potholes which every heavy rain provokes in the streets of Metro Manila. From the country’s most-traveled "expressways", professional odds-makers like Jimmy the Greek could generate handsome incomes. They could calculate and offer odds of randomly chosen drivers surviving the challenges of flooded sections, gaping holes — at times water-filled to make them even less visible and thus more excitingly unpredictable, slippery curves guaranteed to be improperly banked and missing warning signs and, finally, bridge approaches designed to shorten the life of the most durable shock absorbers. (Speaking of shock absorbers, a former secretary of education with a penchant for motorcycles once estimated that better than three-fourths of all the vehicles in Metro Manila have shot shocks which their drivers feel perfectly comfortable with, not knowing or not believing — perhaps simply not caring – that their shocks need replacement.)

Some years back a national administration hosted a prestigious international conference on economic cooperation among countries bordering on the Pacific. Meetings of several heads of state were held in both Manila and Subic. Being the perfect host, we worried about everything that might affect the quality of economic collaboration our guests would commit to in the conference’s final communique. We thought that traveling from Manila to Subic and back, filled bladders among our guests might cause some stress and prejudice the conference’s noble objectives. So, in two or three strategic places along the route, we had world-class toilets built to comfort our distinguished visitors.

Marbled, with first-class stainless steel fittings and high-quality ceramic toilet bowls and urinals, we tried to create the Ninth Wonder of the World in Lubao and Dinalupihan. The finished toilets actually came with water and tissue paper.

I don’t know whether President Clinton or Prime Minister Mahathir or any of the other illustrious personalities actually ever got to use the facility. I do remember my ten-year old son being interested in looking over the Lubao creation during the APEC conference, daring to use its urinal, and marveling that our own toilet at home appeared to be world-class too. He was proud to be Filipino and so was I.

Two months later, I passed by the same place and thought it might serve my purpose. Afterwards, I vowed not to bring my son there again. Missing soap and toilet paper, with the lavatory faucet handle held by a rubber band and showing no sign of maintenance, the facility may no longer get him to say – as he did before – WOW Philippines!

There are far more delicate and immeasurably more important things than buildings, bridges, roads and toilets which a nation must learn to maintain well and protect at all costs. The character of its people needs careful maintenance if a nation is to endure. Decent parents, competent teachers, conscientious workers and patriotic leaders need assiduous maintenance if a country is to develop and do well in an increasingly competitive world. Above all, whatever it takes, the collective memory of a nation’s truthful history must be well maintained and assiduously guarded. Otherwise, those who seek to betray the nation will fabricate their self-serving version of it and foist it on a suspiciously senescent nation as the truthful record.

Filipinos have to commit themselves to a culture of maintenance. Shirking such a commitment, anyone can easily predict what people in this country will hear — and suffer – by way of State-of-the-Nation Addresses or SONAs for the next 100 years. It will not much matter who the presidents or prime ministers might be during this cursed period. Just as irrelevant would be which group becomes the legal majority in the country’s formal governance. Without a culture of national maintenance, laws and lawyers may exist but there can be no good governance.