The pursuit of nostalgic goals

Published in Mindanao Times 8/31/08

“The world is full of people whose notion of a satisfactory future is, in fact, a return to the idealized past.” —Robertson Davies, A Voice from the Attic

Casual or not, talks in our family seldom happened. Not that we are all reticent or mute, it maybe just one of the few consequences when most members in the family work or study. You come home, they’re already asleep; they wake up, you’re still asleep.

But when talks do happen, they often drifted to my parents’ good old days. They would recount, enthusiastically, those times when their few centavos could already buy Nutri Bun (a bread triple the size of our pan de sal today), when prices of rice and other basic commodities were way below than today, etc.

Then these recollections would end up in a rather strange desire to revive those times. “Unta ibalik katong mga panahon nga barato pa ang mga palaliton, dili unta magkalisod ang mga tao karon,” my mother would sometimes yearn.

Politicians also have the same nostalgia for the things of the past. They are profoundly conditioned by social nostalgia in solving present problems. To solve the present problems, they’ll say, past programs/solutions, which were proved to be successful, should be revived.