ABS-CBN Shutdown: Once More, the Trauma

One Saturday morning in September 1972, I left for work early because it was going to be a busy day -- we were going to shoot a promo announcing the first nationwide broadcast of ABS-CBN, then as now, the Philippines' largest network. The sight that confronted me was chilling: Metrocom soldiers in full battle gear were guarding the gates of the sprawling complex in Bohol Avenue, Quezon City. Across the street, my fellow employees gathered, faces perplexed and fearful. It took a while before the collective whisper reached me: martial law had been declared, and just like that we lost our jobs, our personal stuff in our offices inside, and our freedom.

I didn't realize how deeply embedded that trauma is in my psyche until I woke up this morning to the news that ABS-CBN, the network that has since expanded tenfold since our time, has been ordered closed by the Duterte administration's National Telecommunications Commission. Once again, I felt shivers down my spine. The end was just as dramatic as 1972 -- one minute viewers were watching a regular news program; the next, the screen just went dark.

Beyond the legalese and the sycophantic justifications, we know that ABS-CBN has once again fallen prey to political vindictiveness that goes all the way to the top. It was that way in 1972, albeit under different circumstances; it is the same reason now. Talk about ill-timed and ill-conceived. With the country reeling from a pandemic and its subsequent economic turmoil, when information dissemination is vital, the nation's largest broadcast network is silenced. 

This story of course is just beginning. It took 14 years and a dictator's ouster for ABS-CBN to rise again. Will history repeat itself?

Our stories this week:

US Marines veteran and military brat Alex G. Fabros Jr. tells a cautionary tale of how an epidemic victimized his childhood friends in "Do You Remember Polio?"

Retired Philippine ambassador Virgilio Reyes Jr. relates his Covid-19 story in "Living with Corona, a New Yorker's Perspective."

For those in search of good books to read in quarantine, history professor Vicente L. Rafael shares his "Lockdown Reading List: Filipino Fiction (Mostly)."

To celebrate Mother's Day, I wrote down my thoughts on motherhood, "Love, Patience and Renewal."

Read Again Carolyn Prasad's touching tribute to her "mail-order bride" mother, "The Making of a Matriarch." 

And Cathy S. Babao's story about "A Lesson My Mom, the Actress Caridad Sanchez, Told Me" 

For the Happy Home Cook, treat yourself to a repeat of Elizabeth Ann Quirino's Mango Refrigerator Cake, because it's May and mangoes are in season. Plus, hopefully, you've been good in quarantine. 

Here are this week's links to stories you have to read: 

Commentary: Racism is the other virus sweeping America during this pandemic
https://www.chicagotribune.com/opinion/commentary/ct-opinion-coronavirus-asian-americans-morita-20200420-ep3bmn3tincczfihw3qvl64boa-story.html?fbclid=IwAR3G9NjNjFhxwBKVTWFSZWMbo5XjmyezMeB7APFYs4LGQ-QxirXK-6KwZ5s

Philippine nurses, long treated like exports, now told to stay home to fight coronavirus
https://news.yahoo.com/philippine-nurses-long-treated-exports-013256696.html

The Philippine Peso’s Resilience Is a Risk to the Economy
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/philippine-peso-resilience-risk-economy-221454976.html

'Second tragedy': Cremation traumatises in virus-hit Philippines
https://news.yahoo.com/second-tragedy-cremation-traumatises-virus-hit-philippines-043849393.html

The Heartbreaking ‘Last Shift’ of a New York City Nurse
https://ph.news.yahoo.com/heartbreaking-last-shift-york-city-170412559.html

Which ABS-CBN businesses can still operate after NTC's cease and desist order?
https://news.abs-cbn.com/business/05/05/20/which-abs-cbn-businesses-can-still-operate-after-ntcs-cease-and-desist-order?fbclid=IwAR1w8Z5dLemXle9LzpyL28VeNw0VTv3vuoX0xlYzQi9h4l9LCMC7iVNJTYM 

For video of week, the Filipino-American Airmen community of the US Air Force put together their version of the “Don’t Rush Challenge” on social media

Coping with Corona

The Duterte administration's draconian enforcement of stay-at-home orders during this coronavirus pandemic is adding to the stress of quarantine, especially among a large sector of the now-elderly population who experienced martial law. PF contributor Ernesto M. Hilario provides a timely situationer on the enhanced community quarantine that is in place until May 15. ["Fighting Fire with Fire Won’t Stop the Pandemic"]

In one country in the Horn of Africa where the pandemic is an added burden to an already dire humanitarian crisis, it's business-as-usual work albeit with tighter social restrictions for humanitarian aide worker Gerry Romay of Negros Occidental. Our Nairobi-based writer, Agatha Verdadero, reaches out. ["Horn of Africa: Social Distancing as a Lifestyle"]

More nimble than their brick-and-mortar counterparts, Filipino food trucks and pop-ups in California switch their focus to helping the frontliners and those in need. PF regular contributor Jennifer Fergesen reports. ["Filipino Foodpreneurs Keep on Truckin’ Amid Pandemic"]

They say if you have Covid-19, among the first signs are the loss of your sense of smell and taste. Well, if you cook Filipino food, as PF Correspondent Elizabeth Ann Quirino suggests, and you're savoring the aroma and the strong flavors, then you're okay. ["Stop and Smell the Power of Filipino Cooking"]

And what better way to test your taste buds than "Becugan," the Kapampangan bagoong, our Happy Home Cook recipe this week.  

For those waiting to immigrate to the US, here are the basic facts about President Trump's latest directive suspending immigration. San Francisco-based immigration lawyer Maria Lourdes Tancinco writes our Partner post.  

Here are links to more stories:

Job Losses Drain Overseas Money That Helps Fuel the Philippines
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/job-losses-drain-overseas-money-210000713.html

This 81-year-old was L.A.’s most devoted museum-goer until COVID-19 shuttered cultural institutions
https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/story/2020-04-23/81-year-old-ben-barcelona-lives-and-breathes-museums-but-what-happens-when-culture-collapses?fbclid=IwAR1H8Na5TIC2jMZMUtfV1SjzsMnTf88n23ibsaK8QpF6-Ue-seB7779eO0E

Supplier of World’s Nurses Struggles to Fight Virus at Home
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-04-23/philippines-sends-nurses-around-the-world-but-lacks-them-at-home?srnd=premium-asia&fbclid=IwAR1zyKW0MWrg11tG7uj0TnIGd5Lu2-vN_FNMT5hkTgZ8kDIlE0-asMums40

Love story that started Peyups.com revives it as pandemic ‘escape’
https://lifestyle.inquirer.net/361524/love-story-that-started-peyups-com-revives-it-as-pandemic-escape/?utm_medium=Social&utm_source=Facebook&fbclid=IwAR3FCmpteDj_4XI3sfFqVgry1Yyy15saZWNjHq9Mqko05cMlODs2eSOKFeE#Echobox=1587778400

Nursing ranks are filled with Filipino Americans. The pandemic is taking an outsized toll on them
https://www.statnews.com/2020/04/28/coronavirus-taking-outsized-toll-on-filipino-american-nurses/?fbclid=IwAR3yLDwQM2HF9IH0gw5X-eqHZSMMNp5IKIC4xO6wjfH-Yogua_8e_wWcBRs

A ‘Filipino soul food’ restaurant is reborn as a community kitchen
https://www.latimes.com/food/newsletter/2020-04-25/tasting-notes-escarcega-bebot-filipino-soul-food-long-beach-tasting-notes?fbclid=IwAR13AtMwL35EEym_p_fpC0u4j0ps6ccL9-TeyjTod5D4Mjyba7v3ghQoKB0

For video of the week, in celebration of Asian Pacific American History Month, CAAM launched the trailer of its 5-part documentary “Asian Americans” which premieres on PBS on May 11 and 12, 2020.

Cabin Fever

How do we survive cabin fever as the pandemic quarantine stretches to a month? We dream, we squirm, we imagine, we fantasize, we eat, we watch the world through electronic eyes, we cook, we read, we grieve, we exercise, we rant.

PF publisher Mona Lisa Yuchengco, in part 3 of her "Life (and Love) in the Time of the Coronavirus" talks about what she does and does not do, as the unrelenting virus continues to upend everyone's routines.

Off-tangent dreams is what Canada-based contributor Patria Cabatuando Rivera writes about in "COVID Dreams in Toronto."

Reading of course can be salvation from the drudgery of home-based routines, so here's a reading list I've put together of impressive Filipino-authored books you might want to order online.

If you've lost a loved one recently -- an experience that, according to the Worldometer tally, 176,596 families worldwide have gone through, here's a way of "Tending Grief in Community," a suggestion by retired professor Leny Mendoza Strobel. 

And if you can see travel to exotic places like Finland in your personal crystal ball, here's 2 Filipino-owned restaurants -- Pobre and Paisano -- to try in Helsinki as covered by intrepid traveler Michael Gil Magnaye in "Filipino Fine Dining in Finland."

Since we all now have the time to cook, try out Pobre's recipe for Pike Perch Pesa

Our In The Know links expand our Covid-19 coverage:

On Pandemic’s Front Lines, Nurses From Half a World Away
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/20/world/asia/coronavirus-philippines-nurses.html?fbclid=IwAR0xlwriAQ4pRzTn_NML-kuCHivJ-FH99TyKwvcN9OysxoprVCn5Ubmzs_I

Coronavirus exerts heavy toll on Filipino community in UK
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/17/coronavirus-exerts-heavy-toll-on-filipino-community-in-uk?fbclid=IwAR1_xBt4Dz7-2jZsTdVmfz5hCm4Pmzu3OVnn6Ej7QcL-VI5dVpyHpNAn3Xg

‘Bayanihan Musikahan’ now aids rural farmers and urban poor
https://lifestyle.inquirer.net/361046/bayanihan-musikahan-now-aids-rural-farmers-and-urban-poor/?fbclid=IwAR2VAtpbnmtasfMnlg4pLraioIaqr-BLSAH8n4g54_qOEZVvs_98cD6FqzY

Coronavirus: UK Citizens Furious at L 1000 Repatriation Flights from the Philippines while Travellers in Peru Paid L 250
https://www.independent.co.uk/travel/news-and-advice/coronavirus-uk-travellers-repatriation-flights-philippines-peru-a9447966.html?fbclid=IwAR3GxJAktODn7RB6h9x6s5YlBoxkiJhtYnyn3tenAcVYo5mOx7hDQgcCrcE

A Daughter’s Heartbreak: A California Mother Loses Battle to Covid-19
https://balitangamerica.tv/a-daughters-heartbreak-california-mother-loses-battle-to-covid-19/?fbclid=IwAR2gb42WFym4aoNi0qe6BmcFqAjBNjVxOSfLXVA_-UYTi0WETIDUBjJHMeg

Sheltering In Place When You’re Half the World Away from Home
https://gen.medium.com/sheltering-in-place-when-youre-half-a-world-away-from-home-3869ad0cf662

'Inseparable' New Jersey couple, both health care workers, die of coronavirus days apart
https://news.yahoo.com/married-44-years-inseparable-jersey-211632538.html?soc_src=hl-viewer&soc_trk=ma

And our Video of the Week, here's a musical tribute to the Filipino frontliners all over the world produced by the Department of Education of the Philippines.