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Netnet Camomot

PLDT was again offline at home for a few days since Saturday. We had to use our phone’s internet connection which also tends to go off and on while we’re trying to listen to friends via online calls, their voices fading out once the connection reaches the point of “E.”

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The phone’s internet connection has three levels: LTE, 3G, and E. I have no idea what they mean, but there’s no need to find out. Based from experience, LTE is the strongest link, and E the weakest.

The landline and WiFi were finally revived last Wednesday, as promised by PLDT which suggested we wait for three to five days. You have to be good in Math for the counting of days. Should you start counting with Saturday as Day 1. Or should Sunday be Day 1. It took them four or five days to fix the problem, depending on how you calculate the number of days.

But who am I to complain? Marawi has been under siege for many days now, some Mindanao cities have a no-ID-no-entry policy resulting to the longest lines at checkpoints, and President Rody Duterte has invited some armed groups to please help the Philippine military in fighting the… Who are they fighting again?

A recent count of the siege says that there were 400 to 500 attackers when it began. The count last week, though, was much less—40 to 50 young boys. So, which is the fake news, er, typo on this one, should the zeros be more or less?

It’s time for “Sesame Street’s” The Count to come in and make the most accurate of counts.

The siege has kept on going and going like the Energizer Bunny. The only difference is, the Energizer Bunny is cute. The siege is definitely not cute. That’s why whenever a politician tries to make pa-cute in her relief efforts for Marawi, she gets nothing but flak in return. And why is that? Because there’s always the comparison between her and President Duterte’s lack of pa-cute ways. That’s the president who spews out all kinds of curses like it’s simply another day in paradise. Sometimes I do wonder if these two have their own public relations teams. Or, if they do have, are they listening to them? Most probably, though, that’s how they’re packaged—take it or leave it.

The trend now is branding. Thus, when we hear a curse, we think of the president. When we see cute, we think of…her, the one suspected of craving to take his place. And when we hear the word “dictator,” we think of…him, the guy who supposedly wants to take her place. But he’s not exactly the dictator. It was his father who… Gosh. Too much history, with Pinoys not learning a lesson from it.

And too much wondering for me. And I wonder if that’s how a woman ends up as a wonder woman.

Well, “Wonder Woman” fans have stopped counting the days. The movie is now showing in theaters near you and surely Cagayanons are flocking to SM CDO Downtown Premier to watch it. Wonderful movie, wonderfully newest cinema in town—wonderfully perfect formula! Yay! And I wonder if, while watching the movie, Cagayanons will remember their mayor who loves to sing, “What a wonderful world”: “I see trees of green, red roses too/I see them bloom for me and you/And I think to myself what a wonderful world.” Sigh. I gotta feeling he got votes for that song alone. And that’s branding. You hear the song, and you don’t think Louis Armstrong anymore, because the first two words that come to mind are now these: Oscar Moreno. With the city’s millennials wondering, Louis who?

Branding. Yellow, orange, violet—for CDO’s political parties. There’s one more—green. I don’t even have to tell the Cagayanon what those colors stand for—he already knows.

Mayor Moreno may sing about “trees of green, red roses too,” but the Cagayanon knows he’s yellow. Does the color affect his governance, though? I would like to believe it doesn’t. Rotary’s Four-Way Test comes to mind: Is it fair to all concerned? Will it be beneficial to all concerned?

The voter appreciates politicians who stick to the same political party no matter what. The voter doesn’t like the balimbing who’s confused of his own branding. Yellow today, orange tomorrow, violet the next day. Ano ba talaga, Kuya? The leaders of these political parties will also become confused, unsure of the balimbing’s loyalty. And all along you thought only kids can be considered as white paper onto which you can write any ideology.

Vested interests will always play a major role in a balimbing’s choices. The more, the merrier if vested interest is the only consideration—be loyal to all parties, all colors. But that’s not loyalty. That’s balimbing. Or what the balimbing calls as survival.

The best escape for now is to watch “Wonder Woman,” the woman most of us can never be. She’s a fictional superhero. If you believe she can solve the Marawi problem, you should thank the wonderful world of branding.

Gal Gadot, the actress aka Wonder Woman, is being presented as a no-nonsense kind, and that includes the long gowns that she wore to the movie’s premieres. She always looks like she doesn’t care much about her gowns or even her hair. She already has the most beautiful face and the lean-and-mean body that her character requires anyway so why bother, right? Wonder Woman is an Amazon. She’s not a damsel in distress, waiting for prince charming to save her.

This no-nonsense branding will of course help her connect with the madlang pehpohl to the point of LTE, the strongest link. No 3G or E for Wonder Woman.

And there’s Liza Soberano aka the new Darna, shouting, “Ding, ang bato!” Will that inspire PNP Chief Bato dela Rosa to do more for Marawi?

Of course there’s now a meme, with a cartoon of Soberano as Darna, where she says, “There are so maraming kalaban. I don’t want na, I’m shy na.”

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