In a country of 80 million Filipinos,stricken with poverty and cynical of politics;a Manny Pacquaio made us feel seemingly invincible.
Patricia Evengelista captured the euphoria on her column:Pacquiao dedicates his fights to the Philippines. His is a heroism that drops the crime rates to nonexistent on the days of his fights, whose calloused fist has been a constant cushion against every threat to the national ego. Chip Tsao can call us a nation of servants, the World Bank may call us thieves, and Down Under we may be unhygienic, but in the end, a land that birthed the fastest fist in the east is one that can swagger with the best of them. Every indignant online forum has at least one foaming-mouthed patriot who denounces insults by a mantra of “We have Manny Pacquaio.”
This is myth made flesh: the poor man’s son who by dint of sheer hard work found his way to former US President Bill Clinton’s table at the Four Seasons Hotel. This is the Filipino Dream: the boy who never finished school now sending his sons to an international school to rub elbows with the sons of CEOs, whose mama still prays on her knees while he whips his fist in a boxing ring, whose atrocious English makes him Everyman.
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