Summer Internship Reflection

I quite expected the assignment.

When our formation officer announced that I was assigned to the Governance and Leadership Institute, I was extremely delighted. This field of science is something that I personally desire to engage myself in. My experiences in college being a student leader and a social advocate on certain issues made a more solid grounding in my desire to engage governance and leadership. The name of the institute itself strikes a chord within that moves me to excitement. So I did confidently say after I heard where my assignment was that this is my first step to deepen my outward engagement on the management of power and development.

The initial task that was given to us was more on research work on legal doctrines and public administration studies. Confined in the office and facing a computer screen, I tried to connect how this research would eventually translate into something concrete. It eventually dawned on me that all these research output helps the institute consolidate its knowledge bank and aid in the development of its seminars and modules. Considering that hopefully in the future as a lawyer, most of my time should be devoted to legal research and this made me appreciate my initial task. Well, this was just the first week. The second week was full of learning.

As I see it, the meat of my internship was my engagements with the Local Government Units through the seminars the institute conducts. I was able to participate in 2 seminars on Barangay governance and local legislation. It was a tremendously rich experience learning both technical and legal dimensions and also meeting these community leaders. In the duration of the seminars, a thought kept on running in my mind. I would always wonder how these people define and see political power and influence. I never really got an answer because I never bothered to actually ask them. I just hypothesized that these people must have quite a unique definition of such because they are immersed in the front lines, the first layer of our government structure. They see the people face to face and deal with them at their level. They are the closest to the people. Their definition might be shaped by the faces of personal friends affected by disasters and how government addresses such situation. It might be defined how a local curfew helped mitigate crimes in a vicinity close to their homes. Whatever their definition is, I am well aware that it is formed by an intimate relationship between those who govern and those who are governed where results or consequences are felt personally and immediately.

Flowing from that thought, a macro understanding of local governance can bring about a rich collection of legal precepts and constitutional doctrines. My experience with GLI brought to life the bias of our Constitution towards local autonomy. More than that, my experience provided me a feasible answer to one of the almost cliché but serious questions of every Filipino: With such a rich country, why are we still poor? Progressive and solid Institutions are key to our national development and the most basic of it is our local institutions of political governance. GLI as a manifestation of the thrust of the university towards governance engagement has provided enrichment courses for local government officials and also provides long term technical assistance for LGUs.

Such a grand picture of law and politics but what does this mean to me personally. As a young citizen, it means that for local government to effectively work, they should also partner with an effective citizenry. And in return, that citizenry should also enlighten itself so it can delegate its sovereign power to qualified and honest individuals. The call now is local engagement and this has so much meaning now for what we have collectively experienced during Sendong where we saw how our local government allegedly crumbled in the midst of a vast disaster. Local government matters so much to our daily lives and so much more in times of crisis. Acknowledging how vital it is, it is imperative that as a schooled person, it is my personal obligation and duty to engage our leaders in all means that I can. From lobbying in the city council to advocating issues online, the options are limitless. And as a law student, my elementary knowledge of the law holds a respectable amount of influence that can be used to advance causes. I think this is an important position a law student should understand. Our idealism coupled with our legal knowledge can bear good fruits if properly placed in the right causes. Our opinions matter and they are given attention. If properly positioned, we can very well contribute to a passage of a cause. The success of government ultimately lies in the audacity and veracity of the people it governs.

Seeing all these dynamics of politics, power, and the law, my study in the college of law has elevated into a higher more meaningful level. I can now begin to see the image of what am I studying for. I know ultimately the answer does not only satisfy itself from my personal ambition derived from the prestige of being a lawyer. Ultimately, I am confronted with a moral question of whom am I studying for, whom am I practicing law for? This intersection between my desire to be lawyer and the greater need of my community should produce a commitment in my part to not settle for transactional lawyering but go to the frontiers by using the law as a tool to bring earthly justice into the lives of those who most need it. This is a lofty journey filled with all kinds of temptations and Law school is not even the beginning of it. However I am convinced that this initiation to the cause has deepened my commitment for justice and development and has provided me more than personal ambition to pursue my law studies with excellence.  

Spaghetti

As I was about to swallow my first serving of spaghetti, an old man with a certain calmness suddenly appeared in front of me. He was carrying the same spaghetti as I was eating. Suddenly, my space, my moment with my spaghetti, my sense of privacy at that little corner in MacDonald’s seemed to vanish. After that millisecond mental flash on my concept of privacy, the old man spoke. He was asking me if it would be ok If he can sit with me since the only available table was at the other side of the restaurant. With an apologetic tone, he explained that it would be a great effort in his part to walk all the way to end. My table was the best alternative. Sure, for a second I felt uneasy like all of us do when a stranger suddenly step in your psychological space. However, this split of a second internal uneasiness is swept away by a similar internal surge of kindness. So as I did not mind, I said yes and gave a smile.

As I attempted to re-establish my lost eating momentum, I tried to strike a conversation. I told him that hey we have the same lunch. He replied while mixing the pasta and sauce with a jubilant description that this thing has all that is needed for a good lunch. I nodded and ate. Silence followed after. However my mind was running that time. A slogan “share a seat, win a friend” which once caught my attention instantly shimmered with an abundance of meaning. I am not expecting to instantly win a friend in this case – I did not even ask for his name – for that occasion does not call for that in the natural course of human affairs. I just thought to myself this stranger, as old as he is bears in him a tremendously rich story. He is wearing a shirt of a community cooperative which led me to believe his work in life. He was also wearing glasses and carrying a small note book with a couple of inserted news clippings. All these seem to assemble a story of this man whom I’m sharing a table with. 

He never spoke but this very ordinary scene reminded me of a truth that I can’t easily grasp much more articulate. It is simply that sense of awe flowing from that truth that the world is interpreted as many times as there are people and this is more appreciated when you have a close contact with a person whom you don’t know and most probably have no chance of knowing at all. I wondered what his story is, what the world is for him. Well, that’s all what I thought of aside from enjoying my spaghetti. I finished eating first and then swallowed 3 ice cubes as I usually do. As he was still eating, I said that I’ll go ahead. He stopped and nodded four times with the words ok and thank you. That was it. 

YayatLoue

As I was to exit the room, a small fairly skinned lady went inside the other door. I did not recognize her for a moment but when I got to see her in full view, I was amazed to see my childhood “yaya”. Ya Telou (from Marylou) as I use to call her. She was my yaya from birth up to my kindergarten years.

She went to me with a glaring sense of excitement and hugged me tight. I hugged backed with a little awkwardness but with a deep sense of gratitude. I could just imagine the joy she might me feeling seeing the once baby boy she cared for, now a 22 year-old law student. It was quite a light moment as I settled and started talking to her. I shared to her my more significant milestones in life and fittingly enough, her replies were insightful moments of my babyhood. She mentioned how silent I was as compared to my older brother. In my playing time, I loved building or assembling things as compared to more kinetic activities my other cousins were so into. Even before my eating time as a baby, she managed to observe that before I eat, I would prefer to be shared a story from fables to horror stories. I did not know I was fond of listening to stories. She also mentioned that I leaked regularly and mother did not mind to by me pampers. She only used natural lampin – she always prefers the natural. Speaking about natural, I was also breast fed for a relatively longer  period of time as compared to my peers and also I ate baby food well beyond the prescribe time. So I seem to have a longer baby period.

It got me thinking. This short yet profound reunion with my yaya as brought such a rich glimpse of a part of my past where I can never vividly recall anything. For those who are blessed to have these people still around, try to reconnect with them and simply share the common past. It reveals another side of love from the eyes of people who are entrusted to their care.  It stirred in me a deep sense of gratitude and awe at how images of life captured by these people can aid so much in understanding where I might be heading. 

Community and I

These are the slides given to the School of Business and Management Student Council Basic Orientation and Leadership Training at Sea Side Bible Camp, Opol Cagayan de Oro City

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