The revolution brews itself in the middle of a circle of chairs, plasticized on a turquoise, around the seven women and talk about men and children. Everyone brought food in large bowls. It could be a harmless coffee party, Friday afternoon in Rodriguez, at the extreme edge of the Filipino capital Manila, where the high -rise landscape fiber in simple corrugated iron huts.
But the women plan great. They want to wash in, which is still considered a big sin in their country-they want to divorce their ex-partners.
AJ, the lively spokeswoman, stretch her fist up and calls: “Every voice is important!” Then the women start telling.
Heidi: “He was a Womanizer, dependent, lazy, he is constantly.”
Maria: “My children never knew what the burden I had to wear. I always made sure that we only argued when they were at school.”
Milagros: “I brought my ex back to his mother. He had another woman.”
Stella: “I suffered for nine years.”
They all lived a life here that they never wanted. With a name that was stamped on the altar, which you are now spurning, but it does not go away and reminds of dark times like an unloved youth tattoo. You still have to sign with him if you want to apply for a new passport or want to buy a house.
But sometimes emancipation begins on a small scale: when the women of the Divorce Pilipina’s coalition imagine, they do it with their maiden name.
In hardly any other society, Catholic faith dictates life as much as in the Philippines. Sometimes it looks like the clocks stopped in the Spanish colonial era. On Good Friday, Jesstreuke men can be nailed to the cross. To the festival of the Black Nazarian, millions of believers make a pilgrimage barefoot after a dark statue of Christ. A high-rise facade in Downtown Manila promises, visibly visible to the distance, a quote from the Lukas Gospel: “Because nothing is impossible for God.”
Only divorces are impossible for God, here and otherwise only in the Vatican. Death actually separates alone on the island archipelago. And before that, life in a stock conservative society drives many young people to a forced look at a mixture of Machismo, alcohol and violence.
The fact that a covenant can also break for eternity has long been a taboo subject in the Philippines. At home the scraps flew, on the street you smiled, the neighbors did not ask any questions. But slow marriage is slowly faltering. Especially women desire. A new law could legalize divorces in the coming year. It would be a change of reformation – if it came about.
Source: Stern
I have been working in the news industry for over 6 years, first as a reporter and now as an editor. I have covered politics extensively, and my work has appeared in major newspapers and online news outlets around the world. In addition to my writing, I also contribute regularly to 24 Hours World.
