Two Open Letters that I cannot "close"

Dear Mouse,

I do not want these two missives of importance to be buried in my archives.

An open letter to Patricia Evangelista

Ting-aling

Dear Pat,

I believe that you have every right to use your age as one of the reasons why you erred. I have to admit that at that age, my wings haven’t gained the right strength yet to fly freely. When I was 19, I couldn’t even write a good article as good as yours to pass my English courses.

I am a little saddened to see how narrow-minded people can be.

I bet you those people who seemed not to be contented with your explanation carry so much baggage with them. Why they find themselves having been misled by you is beyond me. You have been misled too by Faye and yet you chose to face the brighter side and you are only 19.

I bet you these guys are older than you are.

See maturity does not come with age, really.

I did get my handy dictionary to find out what a “Journalist” meant and these are the words I found out: A journalist could be a reporter, commentator, columnist, magazine columnist, press officer, member of the press. I went to check Philstar again to find out if your column was a news and in my humble opinion, it was not.

It was more like a feature, a magazine feature.

I did not want to comment on this against or for you until I read all sides. I must say that I followed the posts of Angelo Racoma and Cathy and read all the sides given by the government and Faye’s church everyday.

Why some people are fuming about you committing a mistake, I do not know. The real victim here is Faye not them. I cannot understand how your “lies” affected their lives tremendously. Why they think they have the right to be correcting your errors, I do not know. Why they comment like you’ve done the biggest mistake in the whole world, I cannot fathom.

I can only tell that they are cowards because they comment as anonymous. In fact, these maybe people who envy you so much because you have been successful ten hundred folds than them. I bet you they are even way older than you are and probably, they are the kind whose articles couldn’t even make it to the Ad section of classifieds.

Finally, to err is human. It is just right to shed tears even if you are a journalist, unless you have the heart of a stone. Can you imagine how the world is going to be if people if have no compassion at all?

I hope you'll use this experience to further your career! You go girl!

Yours truly,

Ting Aling

www.kuwentong-buhay.blogspot.com www.dsurfer.blogspot.com

ting_aling@hotmail.com

Second: To whom it may concern letter

Anonymous,

First of all I left my e-mail address for anyone to write me should they have any questions about my open letter to Pat Evangelista. I can then reveal myself to them, you included. Why are you so sour about Pat in the first place? Have you not committed any mistakes in your life at all? Why the crabby feeling? What has she that Faye story done to you personally? I know that this is one trait we Filipinos have to shake off..we try to clip our youngs' wings when they're just about to take off so they stay on the ground instead of letting them fly so they can explore the sky.

Oh by the way, what good is an apology if it is forced anyway? Why do you think Patricia have to apologize to you?

I should be mad at her because she condemned the Filipinos leaving the Philippines and I happen to be one of them. But you know what? It was her opinion. I should not be bad b ecause it is not true. I love my mother country. And hey, everyone is entitled to his/her opinion.

Here's wishing you will learn how to forget, how to forgive and how to move on... or you will live as miserable as you are now, forever.

Ting Aling

www.kuwentong-buhay.blogspot.com www.dsurfer.blogspot.com

ting_aling@hotmail.com

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