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LESSONS FROM TEACHER MARK...

Wefillaos·Thursday, March 1, 2018

Teacher Mark Jayron Araneta Siose's song continues in the digital-verse, though he speaks and sings no more. His voice forever silenced by a brutal hyper-aggressive kind of brain tumor which he bravely battled quietly and as unobtrusively as possible. Not even wanting his own family to be too concerned he never complained or even expressed his pain on his Facebook wall.

Contrary to feeling entitled or ungrateful, His last public post was in fact, full of appreciation and gratitude. He wanted God to bless us all.

Apart from in the hearts and minds of friends and relatives, a short video of him singing on youtube is his only remembrance to the world that he existed. He was kind, he was cheerful, marami siyang natulungan, he was never negative or spiteful or engaged in bad mouthing or idle rumor. He kept his pains to himself. To the very end he tried his best to be cheerful and unobtrusive to everyone. He was very intelligent and generous and was thus, a very good teacher.

https://youtu.be/2bSa3EzHTew

Very productive and proud to be a Filipino. He was also a sole bread winner for his mom, a retired public school teacher,his ailing dad and his only brother who had autism. Of course, he had dreams and aspirations. He wanted to come home and teach in public school like his mom, in service of his people and country. His hopes were high as a Duterte volunteer and he wanted to do his part and share and carry the burden of nation building with his President. He had the capabilities too as can be attested to by colleagues in teaching as well as in the BPO industry.

But these have been cut short and nullified within a year from his first of several operations. He spent his last days in the hospital connected to a life support system. His skull was open and brain tissue was just covered with gauze. He was breathing through a tube. His handsome face still apparent despite the ravages of cancer. He cannot speak. He cannot sing. No one was there to speak for him except his distraught mom and loyal friend.

In Laos, OFWs are given a limit of 2 border crossings into Thailand by land (The Laos-Thai friendship bridge to Nongkhai). Beyond this, one has to pay for a single or multiple entry visa. Friends from the Filipino Community have used up these privileges to come visit him and the Philippine Embassy folks have been very kind and supportive of his appeals for assistance and have been known to draw from their personal funds for simple support such as food allowance and miscellaneous expense of Mark’s “bantay”. Pastors and leaders came to pray with him. Some funds were raised individually and by groups.

Through such intercessions, Mark was able to afford payment for his earlier battles with cancer. We learned that the DFA-ATN has been able to disburse about US$45,000 for the the prior operations from Mark’s personal application. Indeed, under the new administration, the pledge and vow of the President to the FilCom in Laos when he visited during the ASEAN Summit was being fulfilled.

Because of this, Mark had HOPE. In Filipino, the word is PAG-ASA. It is deep. For an OFW, pag-asa is LIFE itself. For we have been used to being ignored and humiliated, from the queues to get an NSO certified BC, to NBI Clearance, passport, to POEA, to that final line after airport check-in IMMIGRATION where your actual departure(esp. for first time international travelers) is made or broken by a god at the counter. Every step of the way including the challenges at work, not to mention the homesickness and occassional depression, pinoys hold on to thin line called “pag-asa”.

The typical OFW is more than patient and brave and determined to work for family. They do not have a dole-out personality. The challenges they overcome just to travel out of their home country is a major evidence or testament even, to this sense of self-determination. To be willfully a stranger in a strange land, to DO SOMETHING, to be “maparaan” (maker of ways), that is an OFW.

To think of him/her as lazy or “DEPENDENT” like a mendicant is vain and ignorant. These are survivors. If possible they would not like to bother their own embassies for matters they can manage on their own. GOVERNMENT to them, is a LAST RESORT.

So when the OFW comes for help to any government agency, we can assure you, s/he has exhausted all the means possible within their capacity. As the extension of their own BAYAN, or motherland, they come humbly to seek KINDNESS, UNDERSTANDING (UNAWA BA) and ASSURANCE (not insurance as people have come to say insensitively) that at the very least, THEIR RIGHTS or RIGHTFUL SHARE to ASSISTANCE, enshrined no less by law, will be given FULLY (as opposed to partially) when all personal resorts have failed.

For Mark, the sole breadwinner, these personal resorts, physically, psychologically, economically--have already failed and he had to swallow the reality of being, finally “WITHOUT MEANS”.

NOW, 21 days after being declared clinically dead, his remains await this KINDNESS and UNDERSTANDING from the KEEPERS OF THE FUND set aside specifically for OFWS like him. THERE IS NO PREJUDICE against fellow OFWs in DISTRESS. Like the real, typical OFW--THERE NEVER WAS a wish to have to be at the receiving end of MERCY rather than being the one ALIVE and ABLE to extend help instead.

We continue to pray, appeal, for UNAWA, and even AWA, that access to FULL APPLICATION and extension of the right to, WITHOUT PREJUDICE to the rest of his kapwa OFWS in DISTRESS, assistance such that this national can come home as soon as possible.

We thank the Filipino Community in Laos for coming together, despite their own struggles as well, in demonstration of the Filipino value “DAMAYAN”. Let others call us ambitious and naive for keeping the faith that yes, all the apparatus of government is mobilizing to afford EVERY FILIPINO, the full meaning and expression of PAG-ASA!!!

Sigaw namin lahat: MABUHAY ANG PILIPINAS!!!! MABUHAY ANG FILIPINO!!! MABUHAY ANG OFW!!! MABUHAY ANG Department of Foreign Affairs Republic of the Philippines!!!! At sa bansang kumupkop sa amin, MABUHAY ANG LAOS!