The Bayong and the Floppy Hat: Mr. Palengke Meets The Jester-in-Exile (et alii heh heh)

Seriously. What sort of fellow would I be if I were starstruck by a government official?

(Let's not count CJ Reynato Puno -- he is the exception to the rule, especially since his rectitude seems to be the exception to the rule when speaking of government officials.)

That said, I found myself fairly impressed with Senator Mar Roxas, the fellow known to quite a number of Pinoys as Mr. Palengke, after a small group of bloggers and I met up with him last Friday evening at Annabel's along Tomas Morato.

It was an interesting evening. There was a pleasing drizzle, the coffee was rather delicious (as was the dinner after), but the wifi connectivity was rather, erm, pathetic. The conversation was, to indulge in understatement, rather spirited.

(Heads up, Carlo; note that bad connectivity is BAD for a blogger meetup -- we can't do streaming video, liveblogging, and other stuff that could help us share the experience with our readers and your boss' constituency. Good job, otherwise, man.)

(Kevin, you just might have something with your support of the man there.)

But let's tell the tale in the way we should be telling it.

***
Last week, Filipino Voices Editor, Not Chief Nick sent a message to the FV wordsmiths, asking to RSVP on an invitation to bloggers for a meetup with the senator. I'm guessing that it took quite a while for us to get our schedules straightened out, but even online the FV console jockeys stepped up to the plate and sent in questions for the senator, for those of us who can make it to bring to the meet.

(Heads up, FV folks, Carlo has said that the senator will be answering your questions on his posts on his blog in the coming weeks. But we've been digressing again. Sorry folks.)

And so it was that the jester-in-exile found himself walking down Tomas Morato Street in Quezon City to Annabel's, arriving at the restaurant about ten minutes to five. Seeing no indication where the meet-up was to take place, he cooled his heels outside, waiting for other bloggers to show up.

About five minutes later, Juned arrived, and the two went inside to ask. The uniformed waitress told them that she didn't know of any reservation by Mar Roxas, and so they turned to leave; another waiter caught up with them and told them that the meet-up was to be at the Victor Room. The jester-in-exile then thought to himself: make up your minds, people.

Upon entering the Victor Room, they saw some bloggers already there -- Noemi, Lester, Paolo, and Susan -- and quite a number arrived not long after (Marocharim seemed to have rushed his way there, while Marc had to point me out to Gail, who had not recognized the jester-in-exile without the hat heh heh). The Mar Roxas and his small staff arrived at about 5:10 PM, and he and the jester-in-exile shook hands as the senator made his way along the table, taking his seat beside Noemi.

While we were settling in, it was interesting to find out that the senator is quite tech-savvy (he is on Twitter -- although he doesn't seem to be updating it often), and he made a quip about how it's on meetups such as these that everyone's got a PC up and running. (Of course, the lack of connectivity got in the way of liveblogging, tweeting, and livestreaming the event; the jester-in-exile had to be content of taking notes via Notepad.)

Carlo then proceeded to ask us to introduce ourselves, and we began with the blogger on the senator's left. That day's blogroll listed this way: Noemi Dado, Lester Cavestany, the jester-in-exile, Arbet Bernardo, Marck Rimorin, Juned Sonido, Sonnie Santos, Abe Olandres, Paolo Florenda, Ding Gagelonia, Gail Villanueva, Marc Villanueva, Ricky Carandang, Yvonne Chua, Ellen Tordesillas, Susan Ople, Manolo Quezon, Carlo Ople, and Mar Roxas.

It was interesting to listen to the introductions, what with the senator asking questions of each blogger, and with discussions peppered in between. The senator seemed to be very interested in the blogging phenomenon, and seemed to listen keenly when a discussion of the difference of blogging and mainstream media (an indirect reference was even made to the posts Confessions of a New Media Heretic and Storm the Gates nyahahaha); likewise, the senator seemed to give the impression that he wanted to get to know the people around the table, asking rather pointed questions of each blogger (it seemed to me at the time that Mar Roxas doesn't quite see yet that a blogger need not have to have a background in writing, only that one feels the need to express oneself somehow).

The discussions during the introductions were quite stimulating: a cheering moment came when Ricky did say quite unabashedly that he "blogs to piss people off" (hahaha!); Ellen, Ding, and some of the rest of us spoke of how the "Filipino diaspora" was brought back home via the blogging phenomenon, in that Pinoy expats kept in touch via blogging (which with the personal touch that mainstream media websites -- like Inquirer.net -- don't have); a short digression from Yuga's introduction right into a quick commentary on e-commerce (well, why not, what with Mr. Palengke online); and quite a few more until Carlo brought our focus back into the Q&A.

It was Marocharim who fired off the question that sparked the discussion on the senator's advocacy to scrap the VAT on oil. Using the analogy of a homeowners' association, the senator rather gamely defended his stand that the VAT should have been earmarked for specific projects instead of going into the common pot that the government could draw funds from and spend rather irresponsibly. The senator was fairly persuasive, I'll give him that, what with his fielding questions like a pro (well, he IS a pro), and quite smoothly did he dodge questions whether or not he had presidential ambitions (he said that he was not categorically announcing his intentions -- to which the jester-in-exile quipped that he was not categorically denying them either).

The discussion then turned to governance, of which the senator had much to say. I think that he had the audience riveted when he spoke of the president being the single most important individual in moving the country forward, and in keeping with his views of governance he spoke of what I think I will call the Mar Roxas Methodology (patent pending haha): given that one's resources one can move things ten inches, others try to move twenty things half an inch, still others will try to move ten things by an inch, while he would try to move one thing across all the ten inches. His example was education: instead of throwing money across the education portfolio, he says he'd rather fix Grade 1 in a year, fixing classrooms and textbooks and whatnot (spending what's left on the rest), Grade 2 the next year (spending what's left on the rest), and so on. A more specific example he used is that he would rather build five classrooms completely in a period (the next five in the next), instead of half-finishing ten classrooms in the same period, to be completed in the next.

(I wonder if Senator Roxas has an engineering background? He seems to be fond of the MoSCoW methodology.)

Carlo then began to bring our meet to a close, but not before two rather interesting questions. To Marocharim's question on which Dark Knight character did the senator identify with, Mar Roxas replied that he'd love to have a drink with Two-Face, then the Joker, and the Batman (in that order), as he'd want to shake Harvey Dent's shoulder and ask "anong nangyari sa yo?" Yep, that was hilarious.

On the other hand, Yuga's question on leadership vis-a-vis hard choices vis-a-vis unpopularity resulted in the senator speaking rather soberly, saying that betrayal of the people's trust is in and of itself bad thing. People will grumble if they have to undergo hard times, true; however, they will only begin to hate you if you betray the trust they have given you.

(Of course, GMA doesn't care a whit about that.)

Carlo then announced the launch of the online rally against the VAT on oil on Virtual Rally (still on beta testing -- Carlo has promised to create a special avatar for the jester-in-exile hahaha), as well as Mar Roxas's blog. The senator then had to leave, but not before lenses captured the event for posterity.

(Or perhaps notoriety, fears the jester-in-exile. Haha. Photos sourced from Noemi, Carlo, and Juned.)


The bloggers and Mr. Palengke. Clockwise from top left: Manolo, Yuga, Carlo, Paolo, Lester, Senator Mar Roxas, Marocharim, Juned, Arbet, the jester-in-exile, Marc, Gail, Noemi, Ellen, Yvonne, Susan, and Sonnie.


Some of the Filipino Voices bloggers at the event: Lester in the foreground, and Arbet beside the jester-in-exile (hatless in the photo, but in front of his trusty console). Onscreen is an image of Filipino Voices, flashed for the senator's benefit.

The bad boy bloggers of Philippine politics? Maybe not. From left (no, your other left): the jester-in-exile, Juned, Arbet, Manolo, Lester, Carlo, and Marocharim.

Senator Mar Roxas and the jester-in-exile

Other reports on the event:

Senator Mar Roxas and New Media
Blogger Meet up with Senator Mar Roxas
Up Close with Senator Mar Roxas
An Encounter With Mar Roxas
Mar Roxas Asks: What Do We Have To Show For P7-Trillion?
Marocharim Meets Mar Roxas
Sen. Mar Roxas blogs, for real
Mar Meets the Bloggers
Dialogue with Senator Mar Roxas
Mar Roxas, The 2010 Elections, and The Internet
Mar Roxas: Charter change to be defeated in a plebiscite

Ding has said on Filipino Voices that he's going to add to his reportage of the event (this quick one was pretty nice).

Oh, and yeah, afterwards we had dinner at Annabel's. The food was, well, okay. Lots of behind-the-scenes stuff, too.

***
A couple more vignettes from the event:

I mentioned to Sonnie that it was going to be interesting to watch how Mar Roxas's blog will play out, what with the utterly failed concept that was Jun Lozada's blog, because of the content by and large not being written by Lozada. Sonnie said that he didn't believe Lozada anyway.

Oh, and yeah, there was some talk on Romulo Neri's appointment to the SSS. The senator discussed this at length, pointing out the conflict of interest between being the caretaker of the funds of SSS members and that of his appointment to a Cabinet post with a portfolio on social welfare. The senator quipped that Neri had betrayed his Ignatian values. Hmmm.

Gail prompted quite a bit of laughter when she asked the senator why Korina Sanchez didn't join us. The jester-in-exile thought to himself that it was better off that she didn't, what with having aired a rather asinine segment on her show Korina Today entitled "Beware of the Blog".

In a conversation with Ellen, the senator alluded to moves for another Cha-cha to happen, and that he was prepared for it. In that same conversation, he provided a quick analysis of the SONA: given that the successful radical changes involved the Catholic Church and the business sector, GMA ensured their support by declaring she would use the VAT to fight the deficit (thereby ensuring that interest rates and other numbers remain low) and by declaring her commitment to natural methods of family planning. I was unable to ask his position on reproductive health issues, pity.

Shared a laugh with Yvonne over the wiretapping series of PCIJ. I forgot to tell her this series that she was involved with was one of the things that prompted me to go into blogging on political topics. Oh, and she's such a sweetie. Heh heh.

Carlo has said that the senator will make time to answer Filipino Voices' questions for the senator on posts on his blog in the coming weeks. I'm going to keep an eye out to see whether or not that's a campaign promise. Yup, we made it clear to Carlo that if his boss wasn't truly going to be the point person of his blog, that blog was going to a project that will backfire. (Oh, and we did tell him that we're not looking forward to speeches and press releases on that blog, either.)

At an after-dinner discussion with Lester, Marocharim, and Manolo, I asked Manolo his opinion on what happened that night. His terse reply went "getting to know his blog's audience"; in hindsight, I'm calling it intelligence gathering, what with his foray into the chaos that is the Filipino niche of cyberspace.

Marocharim and Arbet still are not convinced that they are famous. Heh heh.

Watch out for the jester-in-exile's special avatar (as promised by Carlo) on Virtual Rally. The blogger in teh floppy hat will make an appearance on that online EDSA gathering haha.

Oh, and non-appearances: I had thought that Jen and Rom were going to show. They didn't. Drat. Such a pity... and here I was going to treat them to the coffee/ drinks I owe them. (Besides, Arbet once said that these two women are, well, cute. This is the part where we all say, "Arbet ha!" Moohoohahaha.

A comment heard after the event: Senator Mar Roxas could indeed become a contender for the top spot in 2010, if he goes on the race with Senator Chiz Escudero as his running mate. Hmmmm.

Now there's an interesting thought. In the meantime, let's see how the senator will walk his talk.

***
I hope my report is enough for my Editor, Not Chief. Heh heh. Maybe next time -- assuming the organizers do it right -- we can livestream events like these.

Oh, and as I've been asked by Noemi to do, please do join the 2008 Philippine Blog Awards. Volunteer, nominate, or just plan to attend -- it's all good.

(Scout Area Online should be a contender, I think. Truly nice work.)

Later, all.



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