What if EDSA I didn’t happen?

What if EDSA I didn’t happen? 

27 years after EDSA I, a daydream of a honor student


I wasn’t born on February 25, 1986. I didn’t see what happened that day. I look at my computer and search YouTube clips of the People power as the revolution. I watched as the people began celebrating the fall of a dictatorship and the rise of a new democracy. And I think about it, I ask myself:

“What if EDSA I didn’t happen at all?” 

I think, then slowly fade into a daydream.

The year is 2013, and Manila is quite. People stay at their homes, afraid to go outside. The faces of the people are filled with pity and fear. 47 years of despotic dictatorship have made the people become hopeless.

Ferdinand Marcos is long dead, yet one of his cronies took his place as the new dictator. I turn on the T.V. and I see the news, news that probably is controlled by the government. The news anchor reports about a writer arrested for writing bad things about the regime.

The video shows a man being led away, to a jail cell. I feel pity for the man. So saddening that this man, who simply stated his own beliefs, wrote his convictions and showed his want for change is now being arrested. It is only now that I see a person get arrested for saying the TRUTH. 

Journalism is dead. All you see in T.V., all you hear on the radio, and all you read in the newspaper, is all propaganda. All meant to praise the regime and fool the people. 

I look outside the window, and caught sight of a few teens sneaking away. Most of the youth don’t go to school anymore. Some joined the resistance. Some became rebels and went to the mountains. Everyday, I see more of them get taken away to a truck. Where the truck goes? That I don’t know.

Just last week Aling Nene’s eldest son, Carlo was taken and loaded to a truck. Aling Nene begged the guards to be merciful. But the guards didn’t budge. I haven’t seen Carlo ever since. 

Day in and day out, people remain at their homes. They do not leave. They are oppressed, hungry and hopeless. The parents don’t go out for work, because there are no jobs. They are stuck at their homes, dreading and cursing each day that passes.

Children do not play in the sun anymore. Parents get mad at their children if they want to play outside. The children are taught to be quite. For even the slightest of noise can irritate the guards. 

There are no banderitas, no festive sounds. All is quite. There are no fiestas, no celebrations.

It is night, and the curfew is in effect. I gaze again out the window, and saw a man walking alone, he was trembling. He knew that the guards will take him away too if they caught him.

From behind him came two more silhouettes. They wore uniforms and were rushing to get the man. He man looked back and tried running, but he cant. The guards were gaining on him. The man trued all his might, but he got caught. There was shouting, out of pure desperation the man punched one of the men in uniform. 

He broke free and made a run for it.

Then one of the guards got something from his hip. The object was black as the night. He aimed the object at the man running. He squeezed the object with intent.
Time slowed down. The silence of the night was broken by a loud sound came from the object the guard was carrying. Time still moved slowly. The man fell to the ground. Lifeless. Dead. 

The gunshot was  so loud that I awoke from my daydream. I have beads of sweat on my forehead, and my heart was pounding hard and fast. 

I look myself in the mirror and I say to myself:

So this is what happens, if there was no EDSA I.