Life in the East of England

Some friends have been waiting for me to write something about what happened next about a Filipina named Madonna Decena who joined British Got Talent.  A mother of two, I would say that I do enjoy watching Madonna perform.

Now, I want to write about what I think about last night’s Britain’s Got Talent Semi-Finals.  I have watched the semi’s from Monday to Friday and patiently waited for Madonna’s performance.  As a Filipina myself, I wanted her to win.  After all, it is not everyday that a talented Filipina gets the opportunity to be on the telly.  Madonna sang ‘The Greatest Love of All’ but it wasnt’ as impressive as her performane during the audition where she sang ‘I Will Always Love You.’  I dont’ really know what happened there.  I don’t sing so I wouldn’t know what exactly went wrong.  All I knew was I didn’t feel ‘it.’  I didn’t have goose pimples whilst watching her perform.  I find the song to be very fast-paced, therefore reducing the effect on the listeners.  I always believe that the choice of a song in any competition (singing or dancing) plays a major role.  It has got to have the X-factor so to speak…and choosing the right song could make you and the wrong one, break you.  In Madonna’s case, it was neither.  I think that she will make it to the top.  I believe that with her talent, she will go somewhere.  Britain’s Got Talent was a good venue for exposure and for a great taste of being on stage with thousands (or millions?) of people watching!  So, losing, really, is not losing at all.  In some way, all the contestants of the show were already winners, even without making it to the finals. 

With Madonna’s gift, I do not think there was a need for her to make an emotional appeal in her interviews.  When asked why she thinks she should win, she said, ‘For my family’s survival.’  Whilst I appreciate the fact that life in the Philippines is not easy (I, myself, was not born rich.  My father had to work extremely hard to send me to the University), but was it rather misleading to say that to win the competition would mean ’survival of my family’?  Maybe she didn’t mean that.  Because if she did, that was emotional blackmail.  It was like saying that if she didn’t win, her family would not survive.  When I am pretty sure they would.  Life, sometimes, is hard.  But we do survive and pull it through.  We do make it through with hardwork, perseverance and determination.

Don’t get me wrong here.  I do like Madonna Decena.  Very much indeed.  In fact, I like her so much I wanted her so desperately to make it to the finals.  I did vote for her.  I gave her my 3 votes.  After all, she is my country’s pride.  I was heartbroken when she did not make it to the finals.  I like her a lot but what I did not like was the way the Philippines was pictured in her interviews.  She also said, ‘You don’t know how life is in the Philippines.’  Here I am, trying to paint a beautiful picture of my own country, telling my husband’s friends and my colleagues about the beauty and charm of the Philippines, about the truth that despite poverty, there is something good about it, here I am drawing a very faint beautiful picture to let them know that I am proud of it - only to be overshadowed by Madonna’s more convincing picture of my country that depicts only hardship, poverty and difficulty and this picture was being shown all over the world.  It hurts me even now.

I can understand the emotions whilst being in a television show.  I was moved when the lead singer of another one of the contestants, Diva Las Vegas, said, ‘…this is emotional, it is amazing…because it is dreams coming true.’  I can understand Madonna’s desperation to win.  I know the kind of life in the Philippines and I know that it is not the kind of life that we live in the Western world.  But don’t our countrymen deserve some dignity?  I would like to give them some dignity back by writing this piece. 

This is for my family.  For my father and my mother who worked so hard to send me to the University, without having to ‘beg’ to get a job and send me to school.  This is for my friends at WHO, MNTC, Toastmasters, VSL, the radio, and all of the people who take pride in their work, who work very hard for that amount of dignity and pride even they are in the poor Philippines.  This is for my sister.  I thought of her who is working so hard at SM.  She did not go for the job interview and just to get the job said in her interview, ‘I need this job for my family’s survival.‘  Although I knew she needed the job, she needed the money for her son, she went to the interview with confidence, with the ardent hope to get the job but not with desperation and hopelessness.  All of my friends, my father, my sister, my Mom worked with positive aura, with a certain amount of pride, confidence and most of all, dignity.  Every one of my friends, when they go for a job interview, one way or another says to the interviewer, ‘I know I can do this.  I am confident I can perform the job.’  They project poise and showed talent.  I know I have overused the word ‘dignity’ in this entry.  But it’s a point I would like to make.  Just like you and me, being in a competition is like getting a job.  You have got to convince people why you should be the winner, why you should get the job.  To use poverty as a weapon to win is so unfair to the people in the Philippines.  Because even without that appeal, Madonna, I know you can make it.  I hope you can stand up proud and say to them, ‘I want to win.  It means a lot to me and my family.  I want to make them proud.‘  Because after all, it is not for survival that you joined Britain’s Got Talent.  Come on, it is for fame and fortune (who doesn’t want it?)…but aside from that, I think it is the joy that you feel in your heart everytime you perform.  I would like to quote Paulo Coelho, author of ‘The Alchemist.’  In this book, he wrote:

But if you believe yourself worthy of the thing you fought so hard to get, then you become an instrument of God, you help the Soul of the World, and you understand why you are here.’ (in the Introduction, The Alchemist, by Paulo Coelho)

To watch Madonna Decena’s performance on Britain’s Got Talent Semi-Finals, please click here.  She did not win but for me, she already is a winner.