Friday, October 05, 2007

An insult from Teri



My first paying job after college way back in 1995, is a clerk on the x-ray department of Manila Doctors Hospital in UN avenue Manila. Even though I only worked there for a very short period of time (only 4 months). I saw how hard and dedicated Filipino medical practitioners are. They work in a long period of time with different shifts. They spend countless time and money, just to be a Doctor, Nurse, X-Ray Technician,Care giver etc. They invested blood, sweat and tears just to be what they are today. And aside from that, I could attest to you that working on a hospital could be very very emotional and stressful. I guess that is one of the reason I quit there. I just could not handle the too much pressure.

In computer programming, if I commit a mistake. I just simply debug my program and edit my source code. In drawing, if I commit a mistake. I will just simply get the eraser and erase a few lines. In medicine, if you commit a mistake, people DIES. If the patient luckily did not die. You might get sued, loose your license, loose your job or thrown in jail. These are the daily risk that people who work in a hospital face, day after day.

Some times when I used to watch the TV series E.R. I could remember the times when I still work at Manila Doctors. Most of the stories from E.R. does happens on real life every day. People dies, people shout at each other, people makes mistakes, people went emotional inside a hospital.

These are reasons that I am angry at Teri Hatcher insulting Filipino medical practitioners on the recent episode of their high rating show "Desperate housewives". Desperate housewives is shown all over the world with millions of viewers. Just imagine the devastating effect of that short but powerful scene. It will leave a mark on the mind of a person who ever watched it that medical school from the Philippines could not be trusted.

The network have already written an apology regarding that scene. But many people says that "The damage has already been done." And I agree with them. What would you do if you broke the kitchen sink of your good neighbor? Well, it is not enough to say "Sorry Pedro, it will not happen again". If you are truly sorry for what you have done. You would do something to fix the broken sink. And in this case, they could do a new line of story regarding Doctors or Nurses with Filipino heritage. They could hire Phil-Am actor Lou Diamond Philips to act as a Filipino Doctor. They could make a simple story like.... Teri Hather being hit by a raging truck and Lou would eventually becomes her doctor that would save her life. And of course the story will reveal that Lou is a Filipino(like he is not).

As person who used to work on a hospital, and as a Filipino, and with many friends and relative that is one way or the other connected to medicine. This really angers me. But this kind of thing makes me strive and work harder to prove to the whole world that Filipinos and the Philippines are better than what they think.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Very well said, gio. Maganda din ang made-up story mo about teri hatcher getting hit by a truck and soon being treated by filipino medical professionals. pwede din cguro a case of surviving a rape and violence incident :p.
But no worries, we filipino here in lubbock texas are still proud. Texas Tech-UMC Hospital's Nurse of the Year is a Filipina. Magaling talaga ang pinoys. Mabuhay ang Pilipinas!

Gio Paredes said...

Hello Knhyl,
I just ready your email this morning. :-)
It sure is nice to know na mataas ang tingin nila sa filipino nurses and other professionals there in Texas.

Magaling talaga pinoy, lalo na kahapon nang nanalo si Pacman. :)