Bumoto Ka Ba?

When I woke up past lunch, I already had several texts waiting to be read in my cell phone.  One was from Popsy. It said, "Patay, nag-hang pa ang machine at mas tumagal. You line up thrice. Am still at the 2nd line, waiting to get my number."

As everybody knows, today is election day.  I'm not really one to have a tibak inclination, but neither am I apathetic to the political landscape.  After all, we've been flooded by the blatant campaigning that's been going around the past few months.  From the television to the streets, to the radio and the newpapers, potitical ads have been bombarding us incessantly.  Heck, thanks to a tropa of mine, even the ads of Villar are littered all over cyberspace whenever I surf!

Ad rants aside, what really perked my interest in this time around was the use of the automated voting machine. Hello, anong petsa na?! It's about time the election process was brought into the 21st century noh.

So after a very late lunch, I hied off to the polling precinct, excited at the prospect of inserting...my ballot teehee

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I arrived at aroud 3:30 p.m.  Popsy was right, though.  I had no problems at the first line where you search for the cluster thing.  The line for reconfirmation didn't present any problem either.  But oh boy, the third one was long.  I'm all for long and hard stuff, but this was ridiculous.  At the rate the line was slugging along, it would take forever and a half before I could even enter the voting room itself.  Worse, when I made kapkap my pockets, I discovered that I left my phone at home. Grrrrrr.  Good thing I was able to bring along an e-book reader to while away the time.  But one cannot live on  written words alone, so of course, I had to do what Iurico does best: I did some guy-oggling.

"No."

"No."

"I smell."

"Juskopoh, jokla."

"Pwede na. Panawid gutom."

"No."

"Badaf."

"No."

...

Ay, hanuvah! Laos itech!!! What kind of COMELEC is this?! They didn't even bother to post the schedule when the cute 'n yummy guys would be voting!

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Once I got in the room, everything was a breeze.  I had the list in my head for the major positions. All I needed to do was to shade the oblong beside the name, and I'd be set.

Shade. Shade. Shade. (cute 'tong candidate na 'to) Shade . Shade. Shade. (isa pa 'tong cutie) Shade. Shade, ad infinitum.

Finished with the task, I stood up and went towards the machine.  There was this manong guy manning the contraption. Totally dumb-blond and clueless as what to do next, I asked him, "So paano na 'to?" He replied, "Ah, ipasok mo lang dyan," pointing to the slot, "tapos babasahin yan at may message na lalabas kung o.k. na."

I gingerly aligned the ballot on the slot and watched as the machine slowly pulled it inside.  I couldn't wait to see if I shaded the stuff properly.  When the ballot was fully inside, a message popped out on the screen beside the slot.

It read:

"Keri na, bakla. Charot!"

In fairness, how very echuzerang froglette naman this voting machine is! lolz

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Today, I practiced my duty as a Filipino citizen to choose who would lead the Philippines for the next six years.  It is a right that has been dearly fought and paid for.  We should never forget this, and by casting my vote, I give honor to the memory of all the sweat and blood our forefathers shed to build our nation.

Yes, I voted today.

And I am proud of it.