Diary of a Revolution
This article appeared on the March 2001 issue of Metro Magazine.

By Jim Paredes

Tuesday, January 16, 2001. 10 PM

Shock!!

I can't believe those bastards actually voted against opening the envelope. Who do they think they are? It is so sad. On the one hand, here are the Filipino people who have invested so much time trying to learn the procedures of court, looking at the big picture, wanting to believe in the system and hoping to find out the truth. And then here are the senators acting out their little political manuevers for Erap and justifying everything with legal gobbledygook!!

I'm definitely going out in the streets and spewing hell all over the place. I remember the song by the Eagles which starts with "Somebody's gonna hurt someone, before the night is through". For a peacenik who is almost Buddhist, acting out this aggression is unthinkable-but that's how angry I am! I just hope I can vent out my anger through a noise barrage!

Same night, 11:15 PM Katipunan Avenue, Loyola Heights, QC

And what a noise barrage it is. It is spontaneous combustion. Look at these kids! I thought this generation was a passive, apolitical one and yet here they are all over the street, shouting their lungs out , banging on cans and on any surface that can make noise. The whole of Katipunan is teeming with juvenile youth power.

Wednesday, Jan 17, 2001. 1:30 AM at EDSA Shrine.

There's thousands of people at this time of the night. Who called them here? Were they texted to come? By whom? It almost seems like everyone was drawn here like some spirit had called us, not unlike the people in the movie Close Encounters who found themselves compelled to go to a mountain. There's a mass going on not on the stage but right here below the steps. With no microphone, I can hardly hear Cardinal Sin. Communion is passed around the crowd. I break the bread and pass it on.

2:40 AM Wednesday

I was just interviewed on TV. My phone is beeping non-stop from so much text soon after. Everyone is commenting on how mad I seemed to be on TV and how angry they are about what happened earlier this evening at the Senate. I actually raged at the senators and shouted "Magkano kayo?" on camera.

8AM January 17 on the Breakfast TV show

á I am with writer Rina David and activist Dinky Soliman. We are asked if the government spokespeople are credible. I comment "How can I trust a man like Maceda who plucks his eyebrows? I rest my case."

Hmmm..I must still be seething.

9:30 AM

I pass by the house, take lunch and proceed to EDSA. While in the car with my wife, I wonder what could be on Erap's mind now? I'm sure he's watching the gathering storm. I entertain a sarcastic thought. "I am full of concern regarding the pressures on Joseph Ejercito Estrada.. With all the stress he's going through, the poor man might be driven to drink!!" Ha ha!!

2:00 PM Wednesday at the Shrine (Edsa side)

I can't believe it. Another revolution in the offing just 15 years after the first one. Edsa 1 and Edsa 2! Maybe it's a continuing one-a sequel, perhaps? . We are the only country that is having a revolution in "two gives"! Paiyakan talaga ang change sa bansang ito!

By the steps of the shrine, I spot Freddie Santos, Boboy Garrovillo and Leah Navarro. An hour later, Boboy, Danny and I are on stage singing the song "Tuloy Ang Ikot Ng Mundo" with a guitar borrowed from Noel Cabangon, a fine alternative artist. The energy on and below the stage is a volatile one. Thousands of people wanting to vent out. We lead the "Erap Resign" chant and the audience follows repeatedly in thunderous cadence each time getting louder. The stage is full of politicians and wannabes who want to get known by the crowd. We try to balance the traffic of speakers and performers.

9PM

I am at a meeting of Pagbabago@Pilipinas, a group composed of civil society activists. We are assessing the past days' events. We all agree that we need to highten the mass actions by giving people options in case the crowd at the Shrine dwindles. I propose we form a human chain from Ninoy's statue in Ayala up to the Shrine. Immediately, we send it out by text.

3:00 PM. Thursday, January 18 at the Command Center, Edsa Shrine

I spend part of the afternoon calling celebrities and friends trying to find out how the human chain mass action is turning out. Apparently, it is a roaring success. Ah, the power of texting! I go outside and I am interviewed by at least 5 TV crews from ABS-CBN, GMA, ZOE, CNBC Asia, among others.

Danny, Boboy and I take our turns as hosts from 8:30 in the evening till 1:45 in the morning. The crowd is awesome and powerful. Working them up is like trying to get a trained, humongous but lithesome fire-breathing dragon to do headstands-and succeeding! We, the trainers are awed and exhilarated at the magnificent coordination of kinetic energy. We do the whole repertoire of how to work up this dragon resorting to all the tricks of the trade to keep it amused so it stays till morning. We get it to shout "Erap resign". We lead it in singing John Lennon's peace chant "All we are saying is Erap Resign!" modified of course to fit the occasion. We ask the people to do the "wave" and tidal movements of arms rise and fall rhythmically across the peoplescape until they simply fade to oblivion. There must be a million people, I think. More speakers. More performers. I must be quite exhausted but I am too energized to even feel it. As a last number, we do our concert ender-stopper "Kung Gusto Mo Gusto Ko Pa" and everyone is jumping with fists flying upward!

3:00 AM Friday, January 19

I am on top of the GMA 7 van with Charito Planas and we are being interviewed about the phenomenon of People Power 2. I am still so high from the performance we just did. But I can feel tiredness creeping in especially since I know I will be walking home to Loyola Heights because I sent the car home hours earlier. Luckily, Charito Planas offers to take me home. I finally get to bed at about 4:25 AM exhausted. I dream of large crowds!

12:00 NN Friday

I get a text from Leah Navarro urging me to go to the Shrine ASAP. A call from the office of Fr. Tito Caluag SJ telling me the same thing. Something definitely big is afoot. I get to the Command room at the back of the Edsa statue at 2:00 PM. I am told that Chief of Staff Angie Reyes is withdrawing support from the Erap government and joining the crowds at Edsa. Could I be present during the press conference to represent the artists' sector? Sure! Leah Navarro and I take our position by the press con area and wait for developments.

Around 3:30 PM

Chavit Singson arrives. Soon after, Joey Lina, Teopisto Guingona, Satur Ocampo, Raul Roco, Roilo Golez, Jaime Zobel de Ayala and others follow. Finally, General Angie Reyes, General Santiago, General Wycoco, Orly Mercado and a rush of people occupy the press con area. More politicians scramble for every inch of space they can get just to be part of this historic moment.

I listen to General Reyes make his historic switch of allegiance. I can't believe it! The air is electric. History is being made right there as a motley mob of media people record the event while throwing questions. Soon after, I leave the now sweltering room and go outside for some fresh air.

Outside, the crowd is wild with the taste of impending victory. "Mendiola" is the loud battlecry. They can sense it will just be a matter of time---hours maybe. The Ouster Band's hit "Huling-huli " is suddenly played through the sound system and people burst into dance.

Close to dawn, more dramatic events unfurl as the PNP rank and file march through the crowds in support of People Power 2. The air is ecstatic. Soon, Mayor Lim and other cabinet members like Gemma Cruz, Brother Andrew, and Congressman Jo Mari "The Slapper" Gonzales troop to the Shrine. They are booed by the crowds. I sense how close we are at that moment to violence and I curse aloud and question why these people are here-some of them even shouting "Erap Resign". Random but audible shouts of "balimbing" pierce through the excitement. Poor Gemma Cruz, unable to go out and back to her car the way she came due to the now hostile crowd has to retreat to the command center and pass through a small window and get out of the building. She is gallantly accompanied by Boboy Garrovillo to a safer place from where she can exit the Shrine area.

8:30 PM Friday night

The stage is filled with politicos. Danny Javier, Boboy Garrovillo and I take our turns at emceeing. There are instructions from Kompil 2 that NO politician would be allowed to talk to the people, much less grandstand. We had learned our lessons from Edsa 1. Only civil society and entertainers will be given their chance on stage. Soon after, the politicians, sensing that none of them is going to have their turn begin to disappear and go home. "This is the revolution of the people!", Danny proclaims to the wild approval of the crowd which by now is estimated at something like 1.8 million people. Rallyists have packed the roads north bound up to Crame, south bound up to Shaw, east bound up to the Meralco Compound, and westbound up to Unimart. Entertainers and speakers whip up the crowd to a frenzy as shouts of "Mendiola" reach an unprecedented high. Entertainers Mitch Valdes, The Company, stars of ABS-CBN, speakers from Akbayan, peasant and agrarian groups, the urban poor, teachers, among others keep things boiling. Joey Lina, the only politician allowed to address the crowd announces that negotiations for Erap's negotiations are on-going. Victory is so palpable you could touch it.

APO sings "Batang-Bata Ka Pa" as the crowd joins along. Before Boboy and I bow out for the night , we gather Cynthia Patag, The Company, Mitch Valdes, Pinky Marquez and sing "Handog Ng Pilipino Sa Mundo".

"What a sight!" I think to myself. I have never seen so many hands waving and voices singing this EDSA1 anthem I made in '86. I am overwhelmed at the experience of having 1.8 million people singing a song I made! After all. Michael Jackson's biggest audience is only 250,000 or something like that. And here are ALL these people joined as one in this hymn. This is truly something I will never forget. I feel like the writer of a song the whole world is singing!

3:45 AM, Saturday January 21

I get home exhausted, spent to the bone. My wife Lydia is still hyper. We watch TV and fall asleep soon after only to wake up by 6:30 in the morning to watch the marchers leave for Mendiola.

The TV is on as we switch channels watching, waiting to see what the next few hours will bring. Before we know it, the marchers are in Mendiola. And soon after, the announcement is made that Gloria Macapagal Arroyo is in Edsa to take her oath under Justice Davide.

I am tired but my mind is racing, trying to gel the images, sounds and impressions that have left their mark since Day 1 of the impeachment Trial. I receive text every ten minutes from people who are celebrating this magnificent triumph of People Power.

9PM January 21,2001

Exhausted, I turn in. But before I do, I have one final thought. How is it that something totally unexpected like this was impossible to conceive even just a week ago? Not the best and the brightest political analysts even came close to suggesting anything like this would, much less, could happen. Immediately, the bronze face of the statue of Our Lady Of Edsa flashes in my mind. "Of course", I tell myself. How could I miss it! Lightning hit twice at EDSA. It HAD TO BE divine intervention! A miracle! I smile and whisper a "thank you" and dream of more crowds!