I made this box, worn out being carried from place to place, still finding a place it will decorate, but otherwise okay. It bears resemblance to the Philippine politics we see today, patched up and worn out from so much corruption. Why patched up, you might've asked? Its laws and the way it operates comes from different nations, predominantly America's capitalism and Spain's Christianization.

This system of politics involves the padrino or the patron-client framework wherein politicians develop close ties with people by means of playing a role of the common godfather/godmother in baptism of his/her clients' children.

After the Japanese Occupation, relief goods and services were sent to the Philippines to aid its postwar redevelopment, but in time corruption formed, turning it to a ground where only the corrupt survives. Today, corruption proves as a necessity when you are in a government position partly because of the padrino system. Let's say you're a mayor of a city, and you happen to become the common godparent of the city. It is expected of you that you give each of your godchildren a good present. It is also expected that there is a demand for special citywide projects, frequent city maintenance fees, road and facility repairs. Both require massive amounts of money, and how do you solve the problem without incurring debts within a short period of time with your position at stake altogether? Local politicians resort to corruption, jueteng, and there is a large possibility that they would push drugs such as marijuana and shabu in secrecy to acquire the money needed. Why would the position be at stake? It would be because if you make one wrong move, everyone will know what you did, and they might give you a nasty reputation that might just come to the ears of higher authorities, giving a large chance that they will unseat you.

To look at it with criticism, I see corruption as the identity of the politics the colonizers helped create in attempting to make us grow as a nation in their different ways, ways that undoubtedly failed. It is in us that change may be willed to help create a better system, a separate nation with a good identity and reputation, may we be spread evenly around the world today. Make the box that we are, a better one, with a better look, and a better way of how it will serve others with its purpose.

-Daniel Paul Alveyra Anzaldo, POSC1-B