Thoughts about my country

I was browsing through yahoo the other day and I stumbled upon an interesting article about the top 5 happiest countries in the world. I observed, the common factors that these countries possess were

1. the citizens trust their government
2. quality education for everyone
3. Low business start ups.

Of course while reading this, one cannot help but compare my own depressing country to other happy countries. I realized, none of these factors are present in the Philippines. We don't trust our government (thats obvious enough), theres quality education only for the privileged few and with prevailing poverty and low economy, its difficult to start businesses, ergo less job opportunities which lead to more poverty (and population increase).

Last Christmas, I was talking to my aunt Marilyn about Denmark, the country which ranked no.2 as the happiest. She settled there ever since she got married to a Danish ambassador. She told me that even plumbers, technicians, and other blue collar jobs were lucrative enough to sustain a whole family, buy a house, cars and everything a family would want and need. Going to college isn't really necessary for them to earn a good living. Here, jobs like those won't even be enough to sustain oneself. Sure, maybe for preservative food, but what about shelter? What about security? What about health? What about good clothes, proper sanitation, comfortable lifestyle, leisure and all those in Maslow's heirarchy of needs? Even those who have finished college struggle to look for sustaining jobs.

I wonder, is there really any hope for our country? Maybe our country is just a disaster waiting to happen. Sometimes I feel like this country is dying and vultures are flying around it, waiting for it to die so it can feed on the corpse. I mean, look around you, everywhere is marked by poverty. The other day, I happened to watch Willing Willie and I was just so struck with pity for the contestants there. A lady had to sell her only kutchon for 500 pesos so that she could go to the show and gamble her luck. Grabe. 500 pesos. Thats like one balcony1 ticket to a CCP concert. I want to do something to help alleviate poverty here but I feel so helpless.

I've never really thought about leaving the country until now. I've always believed that I should give back to my country by serving its people. I still want to stay but somehow, I feel like I am paralyzed. I know there are opportunities for me in the Philippines but I know there are a lot better abroad. Why would I work my ass off to earn when I could earn twice as much with less effort in other places? I don't know, I haven't really thought about the pros and cons for myself, my family, my future and the bigger picture - my nation. What I'm thinking now is, maybe the grass is really greener on the other side of the fence and its about time we put down the barrier. Maybe brain-drain our country should happen first in order to brain-gain.

Is there really hope for our country? When will poverty end? Will the government ever gain the trust of its people? When will corruption end? Do politicians even know they're corrupt?? Who will solve the problem if not the government? What can we do? What can I do?

I'm tired of watching local television where they make entertainment out of real life suffering and poverty and then profit from it. Its just so sad. Its like feeding on corpse.

Will our country ever have the chance to be happy?