Their father's daughters
By Marisse G. Abelgas
(first published September 2002)
Imagine a novel about three bewitching women. Three daughters living in the shadows of their deceased fathers' famous names. Three women carrying the burden of their country's expectations on top of their fathers' enduring legacies. Three restless souls defiantly charting their own individual destinies, and in the process, turning their country's history askew.
It's an historical novel of epic proportions, cleverly compressed into three riveting chapters, as gleaned from the lives of three individuals whose fates are intertwined in a country beset by poverty, strife, tragedy and scandal.
The first chapter deals with a woman named Glo, daughter of a president people have nicknamed "Dadong." (In the country where this story takes place, everyone is called -- for better or for worse -- by their nicknames.) Dadong is a former president of the country, but when the story unfolds several decades later, Dadong's daughter is already president, not quite having followed his footsteps by winning the presidential election, but president nonetheless. A year before she assumes the presidency, Glo's predecessor -- a former actor who plunders the nation to keep his mistresses happy -- is booted out of office through a melodramatic uprising by the people. Claiming they have no choice (she being his vice-president and all), the people install Glo as president.
The people accept her ascension to power grudgingly and they let her know it, often pointing out her diminutive frame as unbefitting of the highest office of the land. The antsy Glo responds by turning Napoleonic from head to toe, talking tough as she forms an alliance with the white people from across the seas to subdue the rebels in her own destitute land. In their generosity, the white people give her millions of dollars to rebuild her country, and ask only that they be allowed to use her country in any way they wish. She eases out her political opponents by humiliating them in public, much in the same manner that she humiliates crime suspects by parading them in front of television cameras. If you are not with me, she tells her people, then you are communists. The people cower in fear, not knowing what the word communist really means.
She's mad, the people whisper among themselves. But Glo is undeterred. There is a method to her madness that makes her proud. The chapter ends in a cliffhanger, as she prepares to win an election, telling the people she built them roads and bridges and buildings with the money she had taken from the white people. Be grateful and impressed, she tells them, and reminds them how she singlehandedly (as seen on TV) captured criminals and brought peace to their troubled land. Blinded by her own methodical madness, Glo fails to recognize impending defeat, and the reader is left to wonder whether she even survives her presidency at all.
The second chapter is about a woman named Imee, daughter of the president they call Ferdie, who defeated Glo's father in his bid for re-election. When Ferdie's term is about to expire, Ferdie declares martial law and declares himself president for life. Ferdie, like Glo, raises the communist bogey and imprisons all those who dare to cross him. The people are subdued, not knowing what communist meant even then, knowing only that Ferdie was too powerful for them to mess with. Meanwhile, Imee grows up in the palace where Glo now holds court, a place Imee dubs the "snakepit" in her younger years. Professing no love for the palace and the power it shelters, Imee runs off with a married man, the husband of a beauty queen. As her chapter unfolds, she is seemingly reformed and becomes a beloved politician in her home province. Imee rails against Glo, and in an ironic twist of fate, makes strange bedfellows of the communists her father hounded with impunity.
The third chapter is all about Kris, daughter of the man they call Ninoy. Of the three fathers in this novel, he is the one who -- by force of circumstance -- bequeaths a legacy, not of power, but of self-sacrifice. From the day Imee's father declares martial law, Ninoy would fight him, not just for the presidency, but for freedom as well. Ferdie throws Ninoy in jail and eventually exiles him, barring him from returning to the country on pain of death. But the obstinate Ninoy does return, and is assassinated by Ferdie's men. Ninoy's martydom galvanizes the people who boot Ferdie out of the Palace and install Ninoy's wife, Cory, as president. As her chapter unfolds, Kris is constantly putting on make-up, reveling in her television show where she gossips with hairdressers about actors and actresses. Eventually, she is forced to gossip about herself : her affair with one of the country's politicians, a former comedian who's married to a former sex symbol, has just gone the way of another scandal. It's her fourth scandalous affair with a high-profile married man, prompting Imee to quip: "Compared to Kris, I'm a nun!" Embarrassed out of her wits, Kris' mother, the former president and wife of the martyred Ninoy, asks the entire nation to pray for her errant daughter, again.
Interested? A novel sounds good, but I'm really dying to see the sitcom.
(first published September 2002)
Imagine a novel about three bewitching women. Three daughters living in the shadows of their deceased fathers' famous names. Three women carrying the burden of their country's expectations on top of their fathers' enduring legacies. Three restless souls defiantly charting their own individual destinies, and in the process, turning their country's history askew.
It's an historical novel of epic proportions, cleverly compressed into three riveting chapters, as gleaned from the lives of three individuals whose fates are intertwined in a country beset by poverty, strife, tragedy and scandal.
The first chapter deals with a woman named Glo, daughter of a president people have nicknamed "Dadong." (In the country where this story takes place, everyone is called -- for better or for worse -- by their nicknames.) Dadong is a former president of the country, but when the story unfolds several decades later, Dadong's daughter is already president, not quite having followed his footsteps by winning the presidential election, but president nonetheless. A year before she assumes the presidency, Glo's predecessor -- a former actor who plunders the nation to keep his mistresses happy -- is booted out of office through a melodramatic uprising by the people. Claiming they have no choice (she being his vice-president and all), the people install Glo as president.
The people accept her ascension to power grudgingly and they let her know it, often pointing out her diminutive frame as unbefitting of the highest office of the land. The antsy Glo responds by turning Napoleonic from head to toe, talking tough as she forms an alliance with the white people from across the seas to subdue the rebels in her own destitute land. In their generosity, the white people give her millions of dollars to rebuild her country, and ask only that they be allowed to use her country in any way they wish. She eases out her political opponents by humiliating them in public, much in the same manner that she humiliates crime suspects by parading them in front of television cameras. If you are not with me, she tells her people, then you are communists. The people cower in fear, not knowing what the word communist really means.
She's mad, the people whisper among themselves. But Glo is undeterred. There is a method to her madness that makes her proud. The chapter ends in a cliffhanger, as she prepares to win an election, telling the people she built them roads and bridges and buildings with the money she had taken from the white people. Be grateful and impressed, she tells them, and reminds them how she singlehandedly (as seen on TV) captured criminals and brought peace to their troubled land. Blinded by her own methodical madness, Glo fails to recognize impending defeat, and the reader is left to wonder whether she even survives her presidency at all.
The second chapter is about a woman named Imee, daughter of the president they call Ferdie, who defeated Glo's father in his bid for re-election. When Ferdie's term is about to expire, Ferdie declares martial law and declares himself president for life. Ferdie, like Glo, raises the communist bogey and imprisons all those who dare to cross him. The people are subdued, not knowing what communist meant even then, knowing only that Ferdie was too powerful for them to mess with. Meanwhile, Imee grows up in the palace where Glo now holds court, a place Imee dubs the "snakepit" in her younger years. Professing no love for the palace and the power it shelters, Imee runs off with a married man, the husband of a beauty queen. As her chapter unfolds, she is seemingly reformed and becomes a beloved politician in her home province. Imee rails against Glo, and in an ironic twist of fate, makes strange bedfellows of the communists her father hounded with impunity.
The third chapter is all about Kris, daughter of the man they call Ninoy. Of the three fathers in this novel, he is the one who -- by force of circumstance -- bequeaths a legacy, not of power, but of self-sacrifice. From the day Imee's father declares martial law, Ninoy would fight him, not just for the presidency, but for freedom as well. Ferdie throws Ninoy in jail and eventually exiles him, barring him from returning to the country on pain of death. But the obstinate Ninoy does return, and is assassinated by Ferdie's men. Ninoy's martydom galvanizes the people who boot Ferdie out of the Palace and install Ninoy's wife, Cory, as president. As her chapter unfolds, Kris is constantly putting on make-up, reveling in her television show where she gossips with hairdressers about actors and actresses. Eventually, she is forced to gossip about herself : her affair with one of the country's politicians, a former comedian who's married to a former sex symbol, has just gone the way of another scandal. It's her fourth scandalous affair with a high-profile married man, prompting Imee to quip: "Compared to Kris, I'm a nun!" Embarrassed out of her wits, Kris' mother, the former president and wife of the martyred Ninoy, asks the entire nation to pray for her errant daughter, again.
Interested? A novel sounds good, but I'm really dying to see the sitcom.
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