Pilipinas kong mahal,
The fact that I have chosen not my mother tongue, but the Australian lingua franca to address you on the eve of what seems to be another verdict in a never-ending line of trials to rescue your fate speaks uniquely of where we - your lost children, your own diaspora - now stand in relation to you.
That we weep for you, mourn for you and long for you in a language that we do not hold in common is testament to those bonds that frayed the moment we left your shores. Bonds that, despite our desperate attempts to re-fasten and re-attach, simply have to remain broken.
It is not that I cannot speak Tagalog fluently. It is that the pages of my life are not written in it. That I laugh and dream and persuade and argue and debate and romance and sing and gossip and reason and write not with the words of my countrymen, but in the speech of your betrayal, your undoing.
Simply put — in my veins run the blood of your heroes, and on my tongue runs the language of your captors.
Yet my heart despairs still to see you restored, and whispers, perhaps treacherously, that your people are my people too. That though I am not there, I can never really leave. And that the nation awaits patiently for the children who have promised their return.
I cannot be there tomorrow, and the basic rules of citizenship prevent me from casting a vote, but my most fervent prayer remains for you. My most dangerous hopes are for you. My most overwhelming dreams are tied to you.
Know that I love you with a love that believes in you, and leaves you. With a love that cannot be shaken and cannot be there. With a love that has been cultivated beyond your gallant fields.
And despite all this, know that I am also filled with the hope that you will rise. That there will be, from tomorrow, a new dawn that will slay false promises and bring about a new reality. That I will return to a people who can believe in their government, and above all in themselves.
Know that I am praying that tomorrow belongs to you.
Mabuhay ang Pilipino!
Mabuhay ang kalayaan!
Mabuhay ang Pilipinas!
