On Election Day, it took me almost exactly two hours to cast my vote.
My wife and I left our home at around 6:45am, hoping that being “early” would make it less painful. Our polling center was only a three-minute walk but when we got there, a significant number of voters had already beaten us to the punch. We should’ve taken heed of the warning when cars started parking outside our home and left earlier.
The polling center had not been open an hour when we got there but there were already long lines going into the classrooms. We found our precinct without any problems and started the wait to cast our vote. I reckon that we spent about an hour in the holding room, which was already standing room only when we got there and became even more crowded as time passed.
After the holding room was the queue into the voting room where we get to fill out the ballot and feed it into the vote counting machine. By 8am, the queue progressed even slower, probably because of the influx of senior citizens. But the wait wasn’t that long and we were able to cast our vote without any hitches.
We were back home by around 8:45am.
All in all, we were fortunate to have a pretty smooth voting experience. The worst thing we saw was a guy giving out sample ballots right outside the school. I should’ve accepted one so I know which candidates he was illegally peddling but I guess my senses were still half asleep then.
We went early to try to avoid the crowds and the intense summer heat. While we failed to beat the crowd, which is actually a good sign for our democracy, but we did beat the heat. We were home while it was still technically morning, before the summer heat could’ve made things uncomfortable.
The other reason we went early because we were excited to vote. While there is nothing we can do about Pulse Asia, Octa, SWS and all those survey companies never coming to us, ever in our lives, but this is the only survey that matters and we wanted to make sure that our votes are counted ASAP, before the possibility of technical difficulties can make life difficult.
I hope everyone who was able and willing to vote was able to do so, and that our votes are properly counted because after everything is said and done, that’s the best we can ask for in a democracy.
To be honest, I have been pretty pessimistic as far as the state of our democracy has been concerned over the past few years. The values and principles of the leaders we put in power have degraded so much and our democratic institutions have been corrupted so badly that we have contemplated leaving the country. All three branches of government are totally messed up. The executive branch is run by a crazy old man who by now shows up only once a week in a prerecorded but still unintelligible message to the nation. The legislative branch dominated by yes men who see nothing wrong in the state of the executive branch and actually want more of that type of leadership, and the judiciary is composed of the executive’s appointees who haven’t been a shining beacon of anything. The number of local officials whose loyalty is to the machinery rather than the people they serve is also overwhelming.
Ten months ago, I thought elections would be a formality and the rotten system that had been established would have no problems perpetuating itself. It seemed like we were doomed to vote for the lesser evils or the impossible dreamers for the rest of our lives.
But faced with almost impossible odds, someone resolutely stood up and a jaded nation was somehow awakened. Suddenly, more and more were emboldened to rise up and just like magic, a legitimate opposition movement was formed, the likes this country had never seen before. The movement grew and gained momentum, acting as a counterpoint to the dominant traditional politics that people like me thought would be virtually unbeatable in these elections.
Those of us who were ready to give up on this country and the power of the electoral process suddenly had a reason to be hopeful and if you come to think of it, that was all we needed to restore the relevance of the campaign period and Election Day.
I cast my vote yesterday knowing that nothing was certain. The biggest difference was that this time, for the first time in a long time, I was no longer indifferent. I was hopeful that my vote would count and if enough Filipinos voted the same way as I did, we could change our country for the better.
Ten months ago, I thought that the May 2022 elections would be the most meaningless in my life. Now that I’ve seen how quickly things can change, I realized I was a fool to lose faith in democracy and the Filipino people so easily.
We have done our part. We fought for our candidate to the best of our abilities and resources and cast our votes. No matter who wins or loses, let’s continue to fight for this country and its future.*
