Most Valuable Pinoy By Prospero E. Pulma Jr.

Most Valuable Pinoy

By Prospero E. Pulma Jr.


They comprise nearly a tenth of our country's population. They have been driven away by poverty and dreams of a better life. Penury has forced some of them to work in war zones. They represent every town and city in the archipelago. They work in almost all of the world's countries and sail in all of its oceans. They are our country's lifeline and have prevented its economy from collapsing. They have feed countless mouths and have given shelter to innumerable heads. They have been criticized for aggravating the brain drain by leaving our country for greener pastures abroad. They have been lavished with lip service and little else by our government.
They say that there is a dearth of heroes in our country today. If heroism means risking your life and limb to put food on the table, build a roof over your family's head and send your children and siblings to school, I say we have a surfeit of heroes. Armed with passports, prayers for their safety, and love for their family, they venture into foreign lands anxious about the fate that awaits them. Some succeed in their quest while others fail and even pay for their selflessness with their lives. The billions of dollars in remittances that they send home annually has become the government's basis for dubbing them the enviable title of heroes. But a hero's worth cannot be measured. There is no formula that can compute for the value of the service that they have rendered to our country.
The fruits of their labor cannot only be seen in jeepneys emblazoned with signs that read "Katas ng Saudi" or other similar inscriptions, in the dream houses built, and the college degrees earned. Rather, the countless dreams attained by the sweat of their brow and the hope that sprang from many desperate hearts when they leave for abroad are the legacies that most of them will leave behind.
I am proud to say that I am from a clan of overseas Filipino workers. My father, uncles, a granduncle and other relatives have worked abroad and I have seen how the lives of families of overseas contract workers drastically change after they are given the chance to work abroad. To the average Filipino, this opportunity is like manna falling from heaven, and nobody, not even Osama’s minions, can stop them from packing their bags and leaving.
If you have the misfortune of being born poor in an impoverished country like ours, would you not dream of a better life for you and your family? Would you not consider the opportunity to work on foreign soil and earn several times more as your ticket out of poverty? Would you not swallow your pride and be underemployed but be paid more? Would courage and love for your family be enough to overcome your fear of treading on foreign soil? Would they give you the strength to fight homesickness, which would be your constant companion?
Our country may be cursed with politicians from hell but it is also blessed with millions of heroes. It is ironic that while the rich and powerful have brought our land to its knees, the task of saving and rebuilding our nation has fallen on the humble shoulders of the overseas Filipino worker- the most valuable Pinoy.
Monuments may not be built in their honor. Holidays and roads may not be named after them. But to their families, their acts of selflessness and sacrifice are worthy of emulation.