I Am Buraot

Do you see the whole picture, or read between the lines? Can you discern the pattern of words and thoughts formation that leads you to a certain pre-destined conclusion?

Are they just written syllables to fill your wandering mind? Or a well orchestrated move to stab your back and rob you blind?

Storytellers are full of talk, they’re cheap.

You could find them everywhere, but you can’t see them anywhere. Subtly, and ever so charmingly, they can suggest thoughts into our minds, mumble words into our mouths. They can move us and leave us on our tracks. They can, publicly, make us live or die. Continue Reading…

Ever since the fragmented left disintegrated into the oblivion and some into the mainstream, remnants of such had filled our more than enough field of experts, talking heads, intellectual analysts, political operators and kingmakers.

They fill the offices of government officials, national to local, and they are with politicians in all levels. Some are even in the media, from the mainstream down to mere blogs.

They fill the chatter of white noise rummaging through several channels and frequencies that unfortunately cannot be filtered. Not that anyone, for the sake of free press, wanted it to be filtered.

But where, really, have all the leftists gone? Continue Reading…

This year comes as a new dawn, the beginning not just of a new year, but of a new life. But as always, not without the remnants of the baggage past.

This time last year I was in and out of the hospital. Teams of doctors were trying to figure out what is that thing that shall not be named, only to find out that they couldn’t.

Several specialists took their chances, only to realize that even if they want to fail, they wouldn’t have a chance.

My bills have since mounted, rather incredulously. My body had since recuperated, rather unhurriedly. My immune system at its lowest in my thirty-seven years of existence that at times I certainly feel like I was five. You see I was a sickly kid. Being a menopause baby had its kicks. Continue Reading…

As like the rest of millions of Filipinos outside the country, I was keenly awaiting news updates on the Maguindanao Massacre, on the Presidential Proclamation 1959 declaring Martial Law  in Maguindanao the ongoing debates in the joint session of congress.

They were supposed to revoke it, approve  or extend it.

I was watching the news on ANC when I saw Rep. Teddy Boy Locsin, Jr. and Rep. Dilangalen in a heated argument. I became a bit confused. It seems like Dilangalen was opposing the said proclamation but on the other side of the floor, Teddy Boy, from what I read from his mouth issued a sure “put#%$#mo!” obviously referring to Dilangalen.

I didn’t quite get it. Continue Reading…

Some conspiracy theorists had it coming.

They theorized that the Maguindanao Massacre might be a ploy to justify the issuance of a declaration of Martial Law. Besides, they say, the alleged culprits, the Ampatuans, are known to be supporters of the Arroyo administration.

Far-fetched at it may seem to be, I remember the same argument of post 9-11 conspiracy theorists that argue up to this day that the Bush administration’s and the neocons of Washington had something to do with the 9-11 attack.

And given the Arroyo family’s unsatiable thirst for power and plunder, it may not be so hard to think so. Continue Reading…

The Barrio Siete Collective Blog was conceived with a common goal of responsible freedom of expression, radical tracing of one’s provincial roots and the upholding of democracy via the written form of communication despite of various differences and diversity among its members.

One proof of this is the fact that Barrio Siete writers consist of members with different faiths (including Islam), with different financial and legal status, with different political views, with different ideologies, with different citizenship and with different principles in life. Continue Reading…