Switching On the Sun

Where is Baguio headed? Barely a month after the recent election, what now, Baguio? Where to? Towards modernization? Through traffic via a “one-passenger oversized carbon footprint-marking gas-guzzler batmobile”? Just going around Gotham? To the bat cave! “To the bat cave!” While that may sound like a call to rather go back in time, primitive times that is, it’s actually a reference to that of Bruce Wayne’s alter ego’s “hi-tech” means to plan and address hard-pressing issues… “Bahala na si Batman” is also another referential undertone for a probable course of action. If so, in that “bat cave” as to the “mapping out” where Baguio is headed, does that make us like Alfred the butler or like the “minding-their-own-thing cave-dwelling bats” and rather leave it to Batman? And Batman be like, either he’d be the “incognito dark knight” in all its alter ego form or simply be “Bat-Man” or the “man for the bats” in reference to “people-person (being a man for the people) ”. Coincidentally, “Bat...

As the only first-time councilor corresponding with his fledgling aspiration into the political scene with an outward boyish semblance, among the city council, Councilor Vladimir Cayabas may as well be the “Robin to Baguio’s Batman.” Deemed as the most celebrated sidekick (used to associate for that of the likes of Kobe to Shaq, Kyrie to LeBron or Pippen to Jordan paving the way to establishing their own go-to-guy stature) , being ‘Robin’ though has a deeper sense of commitment and responsibility more than just a close associate. Looking at how Batman’s Robin, in due course, imbibed that sense of leadership anchored on interdependency, Vladimir Cayabas’ ascendancy is transcending into a bigger role. Much like Robin eventually establishing his authority through the ‘Teen Titans’, Cayabas is now entrusted to chair the committee on education, culture and historical research as well as represent the local school board. These will all equate with his complementing role in assisting ...