Manifestation of Simple Dreams and their Deterioration
by Jesse Cervantes
(appears on ‘LakeSayers’ section)
I was walking through the streets of San Pablo, down the lane of Balagtas Avenue when I saw this cute little shop that cater different party needs. A sudden curiosity rushed to me about a simple toy that every one of us knows. I’m a bit sure every one of us had held one of them once in our lives. It is one of the simplest toys there is. We dreamt of having them displayed at our seventh birthday once. I think you know what I am talking about. It’s that round, shiny, cute, and simple balloon. Bartolomeu de Gusmão, a Brazilian-born Portuguese priest, was 45 years old when he invented the first balloon and showed that air was something more than nothing. This balloon was exhibited to the Portuguese Court on August 8, 1709. Meanwhile, the rubber balloon was invented by Michael Faraday in 1824.
The purpose of Faraday to create such balloon is to investigate the gas hydrogen. It is amazing to see how this tool for experimentation became a common toy that was started to be sold for a penny in parks and circuses in America. The most common latex balloons were said to have been manufactured in London by J.G. Ingram. The mass production of balloons emerged during the late 1930s. Today, there are about one billion balloons produced a year in the whole world and about 97% of these balloons are used for birthday parties and common gatherings.
Balloons are classified according to their uses - for protest rallies, medium of art, publicity tactics, flying machine. The most common of all is for party use. Party balloons are mostly made of natural latex from rubber trees and are filled with air, water, helium or other suitable gas or liquid. They are the ones we as children dreamt of having in our birthday party someday.
The Issue
There had been a lot of questions from the people of San Pablo if the city is really growing as a community. The city had been exclaiming to the world that it is the “Coconut City” (if I may term it like that) but the numbers showed a great dispense in the production of coconut and other related products. I have once talk to a supervisor of Franklin Bakers Company when I was in high school and he said that before, they can get their raw materials solely in San Pablo but today they are now getting their sources from other places like Quezon, Batangas and other provinces. And at the end of 2008, almost 1,300 of the workers feared of losing their jobs because of the said company’s closing. What does this indicate? Are we really growing as a community?
Overlooking the Fact
I have been joking once that an urban community will never be deprived with "rugby boys" and the like. I know that was not a funny joke…it was not even a joke at all. I said before that one of the requirements for a place to be called a city is that you have to see street children roaming down the street and disturbing some passengers waiting for their rides home.
I am amused by this fact before…but not anymore. Whenever I see some boys fighting over a bottle of rugby, I can’t help but be sad for them. I can’t imagine the kind of future those boys will have. Do these scenarios really have to be present in an urban community? I wonder if those kids had their own birthday parties. But I am quite sure they have dreamed of having one before. Have they ever held a balloon before? I’m sure they wanted to but just like any other dream they had, I think it faded along with their supposed to be innocence. As I have been noticing for these past few years, there had been very seldom events wherein a birthday celebration would constitute party balloons. Can this indirectly indicate how the people of San Pablo barely survive their daily lives? I know it’s a bit far fetched to conclude based on only these facts but when you see the faces of these children on the streets, how can you be sure that the city will progress further? With these kinds of scenarios, how can we be sure that our children will hold on the simple, shiny, cute and cuddly balloon? How can we be sure that they would hold strongly to their dreams, when they know that just like that shiny red balloon, they might fly away and never return again? Let’s try to ponder on these simple things and try to act now before it’s too late.
References
Robertson, Patrick. The Book of Firsts, Bramhall House, NY, 1978;"Balloon History". BalloonsIT. Retrieved 2007-04-29;
“Franklin Baker Closing?” Retrieved: September 30, 2009.
by Jesse Cervantes
(appears on ‘LakeSayers’ section)
I was walking through the streets of San Pablo, down the lane of Balagtas Avenue when I saw this cute little shop that cater different party needs. A sudden curiosity rushed to me about a simple toy that every one of us knows. I’m a bit sure every one of us had held one of them once in our lives. It is one of the simplest toys there is. We dreamt of having them displayed at our seventh birthday once. I think you know what I am talking about. It’s that round, shiny, cute, and simple balloon. Bartolomeu de Gusmão, a Brazilian-born Portuguese priest, was 45 years old when he invented the first balloon and showed that air was something more than nothing. This balloon was exhibited to the Portuguese Court on August 8, 1709. Meanwhile, the rubber balloon was invented by Michael Faraday in 1824.
The purpose of Faraday to create such balloon is to investigate the gas hydrogen. It is amazing to see how this tool for experimentation became a common toy that was started to be sold for a penny in parks and circuses in America. The most common latex balloons were said to have been manufactured in London by J.G. Ingram. The mass production of balloons emerged during the late 1930s. Today, there are about one billion balloons produced a year in the whole world and about 97% of these balloons are used for birthday parties and common gatherings.
Balloons are classified according to their uses - for protest rallies, medium of art, publicity tactics, flying machine. The most common of all is for party use. Party balloons are mostly made of natural latex from rubber trees and are filled with air, water, helium or other suitable gas or liquid. They are the ones we as children dreamt of having in our birthday party someday.
The Issue
There had been a lot of questions from the people of San Pablo if the city is really growing as a community. The city had been exclaiming to the world that it is the “Coconut City” (if I may term it like that) but the numbers showed a great dispense in the production of coconut and other related products. I have once talk to a supervisor of Franklin Bakers Company when I was in high school and he said that before, they can get their raw materials solely in San Pablo but today they are now getting their sources from other places like Quezon, Batangas and other provinces. And at the end of 2008, almost 1,300 of the workers feared of losing their jobs because of the said company’s closing. What does this indicate? Are we really growing as a community?
Overlooking the Fact
I have been joking once that an urban community will never be deprived with "rugby boys" and the like. I know that was not a funny joke…it was not even a joke at all. I said before that one of the requirements for a place to be called a city is that you have to see street children roaming down the street and disturbing some passengers waiting for their rides home.
I am amused by this fact before…but not anymore. Whenever I see some boys fighting over a bottle of rugby, I can’t help but be sad for them. I can’t imagine the kind of future those boys will have. Do these scenarios really have to be present in an urban community? I wonder if those kids had their own birthday parties. But I am quite sure they have dreamed of having one before. Have they ever held a balloon before? I’m sure they wanted to but just like any other dream they had, I think it faded along with their supposed to be innocence. As I have been noticing for these past few years, there had been very seldom events wherein a birthday celebration would constitute party balloons. Can this indirectly indicate how the people of San Pablo barely survive their daily lives? I know it’s a bit far fetched to conclude based on only these facts but when you see the faces of these children on the streets, how can you be sure that the city will progress further? With these kinds of scenarios, how can we be sure that our children will hold on the simple, shiny, cute and cuddly balloon? How can we be sure that they would hold strongly to their dreams, when they know that just like that shiny red balloon, they might fly away and never return again? Let’s try to ponder on these simple things and try to act now before it’s too late.
References
Robertson, Patrick. The Book of Firsts, Bramhall House, NY, 1978;"Balloon History". BalloonsIT. Retrieved 2007-04-29;
“Franklin Baker Closing?”
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