BENCHWARMER
Ramon S. Dacawi
Charles
Kuralt said it: “The reporter is a stone skipping on a pond, taking an instant
to tell a story and ricocheting to the next, covering a lot of water while only
skimming the surface.”
In
a life-time of journalistic work, Kuralt traveled the back roads, the rural
streets of America. He was in search of ordinary people with extraordinary
deeds, their simple pleasures and aches, the beauty of nature and the
countryside. He wrote of folks otherwise nameless for their ordinariness, of
places whose names may not be found on the map and never mentioned, much less
covered, by conventional media. He did justice to these stories through the
feature segment of the news telecast of CBS.
Courage,
sacrifice and fortitude, he found out, are not the monopoly of big names, of
stars and celebrities, of world and national leaders, of usual and conventional
newsmakers. He found heroism among common folk. For one, he found fulfillment
recording and sharing the family story of brothers and sisters, all
professionals, coming home to pay tribute to their parents who broke their
backs sending them to school.
He
wrote about a Russian dentist and war veteran who sought him out to finally be
able to thank, through the power of television, American soldiers who risked
their lives to share food so he and his fellow Russian prisoners could survive
in a German concentration camp.
It’s
never water under the bridge to read and re-read his accounts of these human
characters and places in his books “A Life on the Road” and “On the Road
with…”, copies of which are still found in our “wagwag” bookshops.
Similar
stories surfaced from the recent deluge poured for days by the last two
typhoons.. In the rush to meet the deadline and the element of immediacy in the
news, thousands of these stories couldn’t be captured by reporters, however
they tried to cover a lot of water.
Given
the lack of time and space, the priority angle had to be on the number of
victims, the extent of damage and loss, the cause and effect of calamity, the
decisions from the top for relief and reconstruction, the lessons forgotten and
re-learned, together with the finger-pointing that comes with the ebbing of the
floods.
A
reporter has to sift through the voluminous accounts and facts taken from the
coverage, and pick one or two that somehow give a picture of the rest. The rest
would have to be written later, or never, forgotten as the situation normalizes
and other newsworthy events needed to be covered also surface.
Within the limited givens, media, especially television, depended on the
amateur footages of witnesses and victims of the floods and landslides, for a
better picture of what happened. Even in the aftermath, journalists will rely
on the submitted accounts of the rescuers themselves in saving lives. These
stories about selflessness are timeless, worth telling and recalling before,
during and after the next storm, fire or any other disaster.
These
stories that inspire need to be told even during normal times, even if we can’t
term as such this unending struggle to stand up against poverty.
It’s
responsible journalism to also focus on the humanitarian efforts of lesser
mortals and groups, as it is to recognize the contributions of greater mortals
and agencies in easing human suffering. The analogy lies in a plate of ham and
eggs, as the late human rights lawyer and Baguio boy Art Galace once wrote. The
chicken provided the egg and that’s involvement. The pig contributed the ham
and that’s commitment.
It’s
fulfilling enough to write about a kid skipping his or her birthday bash and
giving the party fund to another kid in need , as it is to record the number of
people who will join this year’s “Stand Up Against Poverty” being mounted by
the United Nations. The news value of a cancer patient giving up part of her
chemotherapy fund for another patient is equal to that of the donation of, say,
a Bill Gates. Except for the amounts, there’s no difference in the efforts.
Both acts are driven by sensitivity.
Karl
Marx said it so, even if not within this context: “From each according to
his/her ability, to each according to his/her needs.”
The
difference lies in helping and not helping. As Mike Jacobs of the Grand Forks
Herald of North Carolina noted in one of his winning editorials, we are not
what we have or own. He wrote the piece in the wake of a flood that hit his
community. The residents were not what they lost as they began clearing
and putting order back to their town. Despite their personal loss, they tried
to contribute to ease the loss of other victims.
Just
do it, then health secretary and Baguio boy Juan Flavier advised. That’s why
journalists, especially those on television, are again doing it. They have gone
beyond writing, shooting and broadcasting news, editorials and opinion pieces.
They have mounted fund drives and relief operations. Thousands responded to
their call, underscoring the power of media.
The
angle, however, may need to be refocused more on the donors rather than on the
conduits. In the same token, a footage or two on volunteer rescuers, some of
whom are also victims - of sleepless nights, of hypothermia, of hunger and of
injuries in the line of duty -, may also help complete the story
about our collective sense of community. Kuralt was right about the
limitations of reporters
***
It takes one to know one. A world
champion martial artist who fought poverty early as a mine laborer’s son in
Benguet came to the rescue of three distraught patients, including two girls
who were at a loss on to pay for the next session of their life-time dialysis
treatment for kidney failure.
Responding
to the women patients’ urgent plea for help coursed through the weekly papers,
former world Shotokan karate champion Julian Chees last week sent P10,133.72
that provided relief to four kidney patients undergoing twice[ or thrice-a-week
dialysis treatment for life.
The
sum was the latest from Chees, a sixth dan blackbelt and native of Maligcong,
Bontoc, Mt. Province who now heads Shoshin Kinderhilfe, the social arm of his
Shotokan karate school based in Germany.
Of
the amount, P4,500 covered two sessions of hemodialysis for Jemaima Gac-oy, 22,
of Virac, Itogon, Benguet who began her life-time treatment for kidney failure
September two years ago.
One
session costing P2,200 will be for Erly Dumansi, a 35-year old mother of two, also from Virac, Itogon who was diagnosed for
kidney failure five years ago.
The
other week, P2,250 was used for the dialysis of patient Marcelo Baccud who had
exhausted his resources and was waiting for a Samaritan to enable him to
undergo his overdue blood-cleansing session at the Baguio General Hospital and
Medical Center.
Gac-oy
earlier received P5,000 support from a retired professor of the University of
the Philippines whose late husband arranged the opening by
the late Shihan Kunio Sasaki of a Shotokan karate school in Baguio under what
is now the Japan Karate Association where Chees honed his skills.
Chees
earlier sent P16,452.25 for Marie Joy Ligudon, a 12-year old patient from
Ifugao whose twice-a-week dialysis is being shouldered by his adoptive mother,
Gina Epe of Bokod, Benguet.
Another Samaritan, Esther Alicoy,
delivered P2,000 for the ailing girl, P2,500 for patient Bester Imbentan, and
P2,500 for Gac-oy. -- . (e-mail: mondaxbench@yahoo.com for comments).
Read more...
