More People Dissatisfied with Agua Bendita
I’m really disappointed with the teleserye, Agua Bendita. We used to watch it every night and still watch it most nights but frankly, me and my boy don’t pay much attention to it anymore. We’re losing interest fast and that’s because the role of Agua is too much of a doormat. She’s too good to be true and it really get on my nerves while the character of Bendita is too “salbahe” for my taste. People who stumble on my blog because of my Agua Bendita post can’t resist to speak their minds too and a few months back I already made a post about a reader’s comment on Agua Bendita who left a long comment about her dissatisfaction of the said teleserye. Just yesterday, I received another long comment from Cammie which I think deserves some space in my blog so I’m going to publish it here. I hope the production team behind Agua Bendita would be able to read this and get some insight on what the people really think about their teleserye and make the necessary changes.
Read MoreI wholeheartedly agree with your reviews. “Agua Bendita’’ promotes self-pity and victim mentality. Even the theme song itself (hanggang kaya aalis ang paghihirap niya?) just gives the viewers the whole ‘’poor me, I’m a victim, there’s nothing wrong with me and the world is so unfair and cruel’’ kind of thinking. An even BETTER protagonist should be able to:
A. Fight Back- Agua NEVER does this. If she did, I personally would’ve loved the show more. All this is teaching our kids that defending themselves against injustice is a bad thing. The reason why corruption and injustice are so rampant in this country is because people forgive too much and are too passive to intervene. If we teach children that it’s a good thing to let people do horrible things to you and not fight back, what would happen if they end up with an abusive spouse, smuggler with a knife or a corrupt official?
B. Have Resilience- Anaylze the lyrics of the theme song. Is that what we want our children to sing to themselves? Seriously, the song is the most pathetic one I’ve heard in my life. It not only promotes self-pity, but unconciously avoids people to do anything about their situation. And the song is not the only thing bad here—the entire show is about how good Agua was, how pityful she was, how many problems she had. ZERO RESILIENCE, man.
Is that what we want to teach our children? To pity themselves too much? Of course not! We want to let them know that through integrity, intelligence and courage, we could survive the most unpleasant ordeals of life.
C. Avoid Victim Mentality- And replacing it with an open-minded survival mentality. All this show does is to satisfy a person’s oppressed feelings by making him or her think that he or she is the ‘’good’’ victim when in fact, there are times (I’m not saying that this happens everytime) when our own actions are the cause of our problems. Everybody has good and bad points. (See letter D for more) One of resilience’s greatest enemies is self-pity, which is brought upon by victim mentality. If all of us see ourselves as survivors instead of victims of our problems, our country would be in a much better state.
D. Have Flaws-Seriously! Agua is 100% perfect. While others pity her more for this, it just annoys me to no end. If Agua had some flaws, I’d love her better. Instead, the show makes her some sort of perfect little angel who commits no sins, when in fact, all of us humans do. Take Santino from May Bukas Pa, for example-even though he was the typical ‘’miracle’’ boy, he had the tendency to do what he wanted and at some points he even disobeyed the priests. Does this make him a bad protagonist? Not at all! Quite the opposite, it makes him a better, more human, more lovable, more relatable and less annoying character than Agua.
On to Bendita. Honestly, I feel that she’s an even better character than Agua! Not because of her bratty, selfish behaviour—but because of the depth she had. She had a lonely childhood with fighting parents and a constant struggle for attention, and was taken care mostly of a greedy grandmother, and though these do not excuse her ugly behaviour, it reflects real life instances where abused children abuse other children. However, also in real life, when we fight with other people we tend to see ourselves as ‘’victims’’ and our enemies as the ‘’abusers,’’ when most of the time, fights occur because of faults from both sides. What does this show teach our children? If you have a fight with someone, you’re the good one, you have done nothing wrong and you should pity yourself and not look in both sides of the situation. And the way Bendita’s actions go unpunished. Thing is, in real life evil deeds do go unpunished, however, evil deeds also get imitated. There are too many Benditas in this world. Let’s not add more.
The point is, if Agua made mistakes and acted more like human (despite her liquid-like appearance) her character would have much more depth. And child viewers wouldn’t see the world in black-and-white. Because the world isn’t like that—good people could do bad things,and vice versa.
Our Floor Mats Saved Our Day
We rarely notice our car’s floor mats but last Sunday I realized how important those were. We were about to go to church and as usual we were in a hurry. When all of us were finally inside the car we noticed something bad smelling coming from our feet. Yes, it was what you think it was! Good thing we had a quick fix. We instantly removed our floor mats, changed our footwear, and we were all good to go. We made it in time to church and everything was fine. Floor mats are easy to clean so the mess wasn’t much of an inconvenience. Thank goodness we have floor mats or else it would have been a nightmare cleaning the car.
Read MoreFinancial Nightmare
The last time I rode a plane was when I was a little girl with my late grandma. I look forward to ride one again more so now that I have a little boy who I know would also be delighted with the experience. Maybe that is the reason why last night I dreamt hubby and I were on a plane. We were on the way to the US of A and we were of course ecstatic. I don’t know the reason why we’re going there but I felt it was for a vacation (sosyal!). We were having time of our lives on the plane and had a pilot’s view of the sky (hahaha! that should have warned me it was just a dream but no I believed it was real). Anyway, the dream turned into a nightmare when I realized that we have no dollars in our pockets just a P500 bill which was roughly just $12. I had a few dollars in my Paypal account but of course that’s not enough and there was no way for me to withdraw it because it wasn’t verified. It turned into a nightmare for me indeed but there was no ghosts – only financial nightware. *shudder* Maybe that’s a sign for me to verify my Paypal asap because I’m even having dreams about it.
Need to Verify my Paypal
If you’re looking for an instant credit card that would be approved right on the spot then you’re not alone. I’ve been having difficulty with my Paypal because I have already reached my limit which means before I can use my Paypal money I would need to verify it with credit card or with a card like an Eon. The problem is I don’t have both. Fortunately, hubby has one so for now I’ve been using his Paypal to pay for my online purchases. I’m torn between applying between Unionbank’s Eon or a BPI credit. I heard BPI is one of the best credit cards out there. My eternal problem is one, I have an income but I don’t have a fixed income which is a requirement for the credit. Since I work online I can’t give them a payslip either. Number two, I don’t have a landline which they’re constantly asking for.
Do you have that same problem? I swear that’s why it took us years to get a credit card. It’s because of those simple problems which we can’t seem to get around of. Hubby, although being employed, took a long time to get one too because of the landline problem. For some reason the agent kept on can’t reach him at his office until finally after months of waiting they were able to get hold of each other. This is so tiring just thinking about it again so I guess I’ll just get an Eon then since all they’re requiring are two IDs which I already have. So I’m going to apply for one this week. Wish me luck!
Read MoreExercise Equipment for Us
We have one exercise equipment and that is the Timeworks machine. In a bid to want to stay fit we bought it four years ago but it served just an additional clutter in the house for the past years. We found out too late that what we bought is not ideal for two lazy couch potatoes like us.
So now we’re looking for trying to look for another one that is more fit with our lifestyle. I’m thinking that a treadmill will fit more with our lifestyle. I know it’s cheaper walking around the neighborhood but it’s not really ideal here with the dogs in the neighborhood that might chase us. I was bitten by a dog when I was a child so I had been wary with neighborhood dogs ever since. It’s still convenient being able to take an exercise in the comfort of your own home.