Too Much of a Good Thing
Column by LL Cool Joab
Whenever I am writing for a column I am having a hard time where would I start. Thinking I have been doing this since I am making my own fanzine too. Well, I personally offered to dha-dha that I will contribute something for her fanzine. So, I will try my best to do this so that my effort will not get wasted. But I know it will not get spoiled because I am helping someone with a project that is worth supporting. I also like to take advantage of this to correct some of my bad habits. I have this kind of manner that I am not making up to the words I am giving to anyone that I know. Which obviously is bad? So, I am using this space to correct that oversight & much props to my sista dha-dha for this chance.
There were a lot of things happen to my life these five past months. You know what in 25 years of existing here in our hostile world I’ve got the opportunity to work at 711. It was a great experience to deals with your job & my relationship between my co-workers & supervisors. Since I am new with this kind of activity I had to bestow to the nature of the work in there. To move as fast as you can while having a transaction with the customers buying corporate product on the store. How to respond with curses & sarcasm of your supervisors. Not to mention in here the degrading look the customers giving to you like you are some kind of a low life alien or something. Talk about pure attitude in here. In five months I had to trade with that without losing my sanity on there. To tell you the truth I nearly quit on the job from the pressure I am getting on it. It was also because I am on adjustment period not having any idea that’s the kind of environment on there. Thanks to my mother who really inspires me not to quit & advised to me just go with the flow.
The most tasking part of the job at 7-11 when my schedule was on the graveyard shift. This is the time when the delivery on this store is not a joke. I can’t do this time imagine to myself how I am able to cope up with my task. Like how I managed to lift all those boxes & beer crates with my bare hands. In short the kind of work at 7-11 is very tasking you have to be “productive” with all the eight hours you have.
I am not complaining on this. In fact I am thankful I had that kind of work with my first job experience. For that I will not have a hard time to make an adjustment whatever the nature of the work I will get in the future. It was also a real timing I’ve got the job considering the circumstances we have for having financial constraints. I am able to contribute to my parents even in a small scale only. I am not putting myself on a pedestal on here. I just like to share what is happening around me outside my “punk life”.
My contract ended last August 14. I took a rest for a while because I was so tired with that job. But this October I have plans to find a new one. As of now I am a bum & a lazy asshole. You see how pretentious I am having guts & the nerve to criticize those radical parasites for being a bum while looking on myself I am the same just like them. Yeah, talk about irony in here. Well, I hope I can find a new job. It is boring as hell to stay always in your house reading a decade old magazine, man. So, now for the million dollar question. You ask me now, what the fuck is the relevance of this in the hardcore punk scene? You know what I am also asking this to myself. Do I have to make reasons for this? Reasons according to webster dictionary means: a statement offered in explanation or justification. So, now you are thinking why I am writing about my past job. Like you have this kind of reaction “what the hell is he trying to point in here?” So, what the hell is my reason for this? To tell you frankly I really don’t have any idea. I just feel like writing about it because this is my outlet. Now raising your voice at me saying “that is enough you have to give a part for this nonsense” with a grin in your face like you are ready to hack me with your newly sharpened jungle bolo. Ok,ok,ok I’ll try my best but first take away that kind of look in your face I may lose my concentration in here. I am having writer’s block in here. There you go that’s more like it. Let’s go now with the next paragraph.
It’s obvious ever since we are born here in this warlike world we have our own reasons to justify our actions. For instance why I worked there & I already said that a while ago. That was my alternative for me not to be a burden to my parents & to help even in small scale only. For sure we have different reasons why we involve ourselves in this small community we called hardcore punk. Oh, oh, oh, do I hear side comments out there like “Cool Joab is not punk anymore because he worked on a multi-national company & he likes to be a slave by those greedy suckers for that he is a major sell-out.” Fell free to say that goddamn it but here is my question to you what is so punk if the time comes you don’t have anything to eat & doing nothing at all? Can you eat your ideologies & principles to ease your hungry? What is your solution about it? Oh, you say you will go dumpster diving as you solution. Oh great what a fool! For me dumpster is not applicable here in our country all you will get in here is left overs of the left overs. That’s it nothing more nothing less, men. So, I am challenging the author of evasion to try to live here in the Philippines & apply the kind of lifestyle you have there & let see what will happen to you? Don’t get me wrong in here I’ve read that book it is really a great story. The problem is that some people who read it they hold it in a wrong way & the other problem is that most Filipinos have this stigma of colonial mentality. They are like “let’s do this it is done by an American & let’s exaggerate some part of it to make it cooler.” Oh, so you say you will scab vegetables at the supermarket. Well, yeah for a couple of days people will gladly help & give away some old vegetables. But on the third day people will start to get pissed on you for begging old vegetables & they will tell you right in your face. “Hey why don’t you get a job & stop bagging us.” People have limitations most especially if they are being abuse by a stranger.
We really cannot escape the fact that money plays a big role in our life. In order for us to survive we need money to buy the basic necessity in life. In order for us to earn money we need to get a job from the corporate world we despise so much in our life. For that we cannot hide the fact that we are still part of the capitalist system & worst of all we really cannot escape from that reality. But at least thanks for the efforts of the luddites for destroying some of machineries during their time. Unless you want to rob a bank & be a criminal. Or you want to be a radical parasite & being a bum as your job & take advantage the compassion your friends giving to you. Proudly feeling how cool you are while you are looking in the mirror. I really feel sad for you because behind your face you look like a baloney because of how you project to your self how radical you are. That’s thee said case here in our country. Even the left do not have any answer or solid solution for this. For how many long years they have talked to this in their endless debate like the dictatorship of the proletarians. But still the machines of the capitalist system had the long way to manipulate our lives with different façade. And still their debate of the dictatorship of pro
