Romantic Pinoys

Count your blessings. At least we don’t have a government agency called Family Matters, and the administration sees no need for a campaign called Romancing the Philippines. Family Matters promotes marriage and children in Singapore. To encourage residents of the island nation to go and multiply, the agency has launched "Romancing Singapore," a program that reportedly includes tips on romance and discounts on candlelit dinners.

I don’t know if being romantic can be taught. Still, it would be interesting to find out the results of this social experiment in a place where women are highly educated and financially independent. My guess is they will go for the candlelit dinners, romance and sex but still skip marriage and children.

Filipinos, on the other hand, need no tips on romance and procreation. This Valentine’s Day, the standard line even of aging Pinoy Casanovas is that they need papaya, not Viagra. And if ever an agency called Family Matters were created here, it would be involved in population control, not propagation of the race.

Viagra, by the way, retails at P500 a pop and requires a prescription, its maker Pfizer reminded men yesterday. That could be a stiff price to pay (as our resident punster put it) for a few moments of happiness. (If you’re hard up, our punster added, you can’t afford a hard-on.) For women with flagging sex drives, Viagra for women is still on the research stage, according to Pfizer. Ladies, try eating eel instead, or durian. Or even chocolate, which you might receive today.

A survey taken by Social Weather Stations Nov. 15 to Dec. 2 last year showed that 58 percent of Filipinos were very happy with their love life, although 32 percent said it could be happier. Ten percent said they had no love life. Oh well, more than half of the population happily in love is good enough.

Traffic is snarled at the wholesale flower market on Laong-Laan street in Manila. Last Wednesday my favorite restaurant in Intramuros was packed for lunch. The owner said people could be rushing to enjoy themselves before war broke out, but I think it was just the run-up to Valentine’s Day. The motels, of course, will be doing brisk business today.

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Our history is replete with stories of lovers who lived happily ever after, of illicit affairs and love stories that ended in tragedy. Next week the Cultural Center of the Philippines will present the opera Spoliarium, the tragic love story of painter Juan Luna and his wife Maria de la Paz Pardo de Tavera.

For those of you who slept through history class, Juan Luna suspected his wife of having an affair in Paris with a Frenchman identified only as Monsieur Dussacq. On Sept. 22, 1892, Luna fatally shot his wife and her mother, Juliana Gorricho Pardo de Tavera. Luna was tried but acquitted on the grounds that it was a crime of passion. No women’s lib back then, ladies; that was a male court’s decision.

To this day the Pardo de Tavera clan, which includes former social welfare secretary Mita Pardo de Tavera, maintains that Maria de la Paz was never unfaithful to Juan Luna.

But if Luna’s suspicions were true, I bet many women of my generation would understand why someone married to such a violent man would be enamored with a romantic Frenchman. Artists may be deeply passionate, but they can be difficult to live with; they cut off their own ears and shoot their in-laws dead.

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As for love affairs of the present, potential candidates in 2004 should remember that personal lives now come under close public scrutiny. It may have no bearing on votes – womanizing didn’t work against Joseph Estrada – but candidates, especially women, should be prepared to lose the privacy of their love life if they seek high office. Controversial spouses, especially those who like publicity, must be sent into exile.

You can tell, by the way, who are seen as likely presidential candidates by the jokes and black propaganda that circulate by text or in cyberspace. First Raul Roco, who keeps topping the surveys, was rumored to have cancer of the prostate. These days Sen. Juan Flavier has found himself denying that he has liver problems.

The black propaganda indicates that certain camps feel threatened by Flavier’s declaration that he is willing to be drafted for the 2004 presidential race. Whose bright idea was it to float his name as a "presidentiable"? The story came from Lakas; was it cleared with President Arroyo? Support for Flavier appears to be snowballing. He’s a physician, he did well as an administrator when he was secretary of health, he has no attitude problem or a checkered past, he doesn’t beat his wife, and his sense of humor gives him mass appeal.

If the President intends to change her mind at the last minute and run in 2004 after all, Flavier could spoil her game plan. There are people who are starting to see in him an alternative to Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.

Meanwhile, I’ve also started receiving jokes about action star Fernando Poe Jr., deriding him for bad English. The dirty tricks guys better be careful. The last time jokes about mangled English proliferated about a certain candidate, he won the presidency by a landscape – or rather, a landslide. Would Erap’s boys be the same ones circulating the FPJ jokes?

This early, resources are being mobilized to project certain candidates, of course without mentioning the 2004 presidential race. Consider that ad urging Sen. Panfilo Lacson to work for the amendment of a particular provision in the Anti-Money Laundering Law.

We’ll be seeing more of such ads in the coming months. Oh well, a political campaign may give the economy a boost amid war jitters and the terrorist threat.

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HIGH VOLTAGE: In case you haven’t noticed, the purchased power adjustment accounts for nearly half of your latest electricity bill (January to February). For some couples, this day of romance will be marred by worries about the high cost of air conditioning.