ORDINARY CITIZEN'S NOTES. 5. JAN 2015. MON. N3.
Betrayal and its many shades of non-meaning.
Betrayal and its many shades of non-meaning.
BEEN reading Samuel Brunk's book on Emilio Zapata, "Emilio Zapata! Revolution and Betrayal in Mexico." [U of New Mexico: 1995].
The book is a gift from my favorite son, Ie Agcaoili. He knows my non-revoluationary heart, its shades, contours, nuances, and its own fifty shades of nonsense. So, each time he sees all those books that have something to do with the big "R" or something to do with anything 'post-', he gets them for me, sometimes giving them to me for free.
But sometimes, like the small capitalist that he is, like his good friend Kez Rivas Evangelista who is now into entrepreneurship and into justifying profits from a philosophical and ethical and moral sense, he uses these books as baits in my inquiring mind, and sells them to me at cost.
No, there is no profit here, but plain at cost, shipping cost included.
And so, one Christmas morning, while he was singing those Christmas songs acapella, he told me: "This Zapata book is yours. You do not have to pay for it."
I said: "Gracias. Muchas gracias."
He responds: "De nada."
And then he takes that acapella concert a la Straight No Chaser, and the house is filled with his tenor, and the beat and rhythm got to be Christmassy, indeed. It is good that the older sister, unable to tolerate his tenor thing, is away, spending the holidays in the homeland. The youngest is in dreamland, so all is well in the home front.
I start to read him, this Emilio Zapata guy, and I am in this Mexican world of revolutionary ideals, of the dream of land for the landless, liberty for all those deprived of it, food for the foodless, and justice for those who have been denied of its in all the centuries of colonization and post-colonization.
And then I hit the last page when Zapata, still dreaming of his actualization of a free Mexico, falls into the trap of the traitor, and Brunk, quoting historical sources, described the betrayal for us:
"the guard appeared ready to do him the honors. The bugle sounded three times, the call of honor, and when the last note fell silent, as the General arrived at the threshold, in a manner most treacherous, most cowardly, most villainous, at point-blank range. without giving him time to even clutch his pistols, the soldiers who were presenting arms fired their rifles twice, and our general Zapata fell never to rise again." [cited by Brunk, p. 225]
I am watching him now in film, El Seño de Heroe, and I feel for Mexico the poor country right across the US the superrich country, and I feel for my soul-land, the Philippines, some 7000 miles of blue water away from me.
Da Filipins is as poor a Mexico, and there are many traitors among its leaders.
In the past, until today. The betrayal continues.
HON/
But sometimes, like the small capitalist that he is, like his good friend Kez Rivas Evangelista who is now into entrepreneurship and into justifying profits from a philosophical and ethical and moral sense, he uses these books as baits in my inquiring mind, and sells them to me at cost.
No, there is no profit here, but plain at cost, shipping cost included.
And so, one Christmas morning, while he was singing those Christmas songs acapella, he told me: "This Zapata book is yours. You do not have to pay for it."
I said: "Gracias. Muchas gracias."
He responds: "De nada."
And then he takes that acapella concert a la Straight No Chaser, and the house is filled with his tenor, and the beat and rhythm got to be Christmassy, indeed. It is good that the older sister, unable to tolerate his tenor thing, is away, spending the holidays in the homeland. The youngest is in dreamland, so all is well in the home front.
I start to read him, this Emilio Zapata guy, and I am in this Mexican world of revolutionary ideals, of the dream of land for the landless, liberty for all those deprived of it, food for the foodless, and justice for those who have been denied of its in all the centuries of colonization and post-colonization.
And then I hit the last page when Zapata, still dreaming of his actualization of a free Mexico, falls into the trap of the traitor, and Brunk, quoting historical sources, described the betrayal for us:
"the guard appeared ready to do him the honors. The bugle sounded three times, the call of honor, and when the last note fell silent, as the General arrived at the threshold, in a manner most treacherous, most cowardly, most villainous, at point-blank range. without giving him time to even clutch his pistols, the soldiers who were presenting arms fired their rifles twice, and our general Zapata fell never to rise again." [cited by Brunk, p. 225]
I am watching him now in film, El Seño de Heroe, and I feel for Mexico the poor country right across the US the superrich country, and I feel for my soul-land, the Philippines, some 7000 miles of blue water away from me.
Da Filipins is as poor a Mexico, and there are many traitors among its leaders.
In the past, until today. The betrayal continues.
HON/
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