Manila, 23 August 2010

There is a lot of crap going on in the world right now, to a lot of people who don't deserve it. Of course, there always is. Right now it just happens to be lots and lots of flooding, worst in Pakistan, but real bad in China, too. Today, like any day in recent memory, a couple dozen Somalis made the simple decision to step outside their home and died for it. And I spent the day driving around the outskirts of Lomé, watching normal Togolese live lives that are for no good reason a whole lot harder than mine.

But if I feel injustice today--injustice, as in that soul-crunching chorus of what the hell was that for?--it is for the craziness that went down on this bus in Manila.

It is hard to think of a less offensive group of people in the world than the people of Hong Kong. I am biased, sure. But really: they are generally not very religious, have no military, are happy to be part of China but do not care for Chinese domination, dress decently well, queue in line better than anyone, and, like most people in the world, really just want to make a comfortable living above all else. Sometimes that includes going on vacation, as far as Europe or as close as the Philippines, maybe a long weekend or a couple days off what is surely close to the hardest-working environment in the world.

I felt the same way during SARS. All these people, just wanting to get by, and working hard to do that, held hostage, savagely killed--killed!--by a freak accident none of them did anything to provoke. It just seems so utterly unfair, so randomly cruel and twisted a thing to happen to a people who are all about playing it straight and by the rules. They're not even much of a sentimental people, but on June 4 every year they light candles, and when there's a big earthquake in China they donate billions, and today, all flags on government buildings are at half-staff. I just saw Donald Tsang on CNN, our ever stiff and unemotional leader, and he looked genuinely shocked and just completely sad.

Me too. WTF.