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Realidad sa Lansangan

Macarthur by Bob Ong

In the novel, Mac Arthur, Bob Ong used a little humor and mixed it in with the story's social and political theme.

Bob Ong is the pen name of a modern Filipino writer known for creating funny and witty portrayals of Philippine life through conversational writing.

Noel, Cyrus, Voltron, and Jim are four friends who live in a squatters area Each has their unique personality and character, but they all have one thing in common which is poverty. They don't have it easy, so they've learned coping methods such as learning how to make a living from illegal activities and using illegal drugs to distract themselves from their problems for the time being. There are no right and wrong choices, we either learn from them or we can benefit from them and every single individual in this world has their own path in life, the choices we made and the actions we took in the past will lead to our future paths.

“Noel waste his tuition fee”

“ Noel. Typical college boy in faded jeans and white t-shirt. Problems with the tuition fee that was supposed to be paid in the finals but ended up in bisyo.”

The author of this novel mentioned Noel spends his tuition fee for vice,Noel the one who spends all of his time doing nothing but to do vice, and he is getting short of money. The situation of Noel is he is wasting money for useless vice,as well as steals things from the house and sells them when he needs money,most of the time Noel steals Layla's things. Noel has been doing vice all the time,vice is a bad habit that may affect his future path.

Everyone has their own path in life, but Noel takes the wrong path. He chose to take drugs and spend his tuition fee for useless vice which would lead to his future path. Vice caused him to be short of money. He will just steal things from the house, which makes him a thief, and get into a quarrel with his family. “A person doing vice can ruin their life and it is not easy to get rid of these bad habits.”

The choices and actions we have made in the past will lead to our future path. In choosing our path in life we choose the right on, every path in life is not easy, everyone is not easy, but if you go the wrong way, sometimes it may really ruin you for a lifetime, there's still a chance to change but It’s difficult in this process, it’s the price to pay for doing the wrong thing.

“Is he, Denver?”

The part where Denver met Jules. Denver, also known as Voltron, will do everything to accumulate money, even though knowing that working with them will lead him to the path he never desires to have.

“I love you...Denver...Son...God knows...I love you...I love you so much my son!”

Every parent loves their children unconditionally even though some won’t show how much they love their children, even when we make mistakes or fall short of their expectations their love will not fade away. Just like Voltron all his bad habits and deeds led him to the path he never wanted that took his life and never got the chance to make peace with his mother, as he always thought that his mother is disappointed and does not love him, not knowing that behind all of those his mother loves him so much.

Thus, your decisions and actions will bring you consequences or valuable lessons ahead of your life, whether you like it or not, as you're the one making choices it’s either you will learn from it or accept your fate. Everyone has their own path to find who they really are. Lots of struggle will come your way but it is the only way to prove that you have overcome it. We are always given a chance to do what's right and what we want, and we shouldn’t let that opportunity go.

" Sa bawat mura, isang bala sa katawan ng umuungol na halimaw"

In this part, the narrator is the one who is telling the story.Cyrus was hallucinating and seeing some frightening scenes that kept on haunting him in his dreams. In his hallucinations, he sees some monstrous form that keeps on changing its appearance as it comes toward him. Cyrus saw the monstrous beast eat his grandfather. Because he is terrified from what he saw, he grabs the gun under his pillow and shoots the hideous creature not knowing that it was his grandfather.

" Bumagsak si Mang Justo. Sabog ang bunga, butas ang katawan, walang buhay"

Every single individual in this world has their own path in life, the choices we made and the actions we took in the past will lead to our future paths. Based on my research, one of the negative effects of stopping taking drugs of a drug addict is hallucinations where a drug addict is battling within himself. The hallucinations that Cryus experiences are the consequences of his decision and lifestyle in the past that brought him to terrifying circumstances and regrets that he will forever think of.

The consequences of our decisions are mysterious. No one knows when or what will happen in the future. But surely, these consequences are the results of our actions in the past that will bring us into something regretful, terrifying, or delightful. The only thing that these consequences may contribute in our lives is the moral lesson either it's in a positive or negative way and how we will accept or change it.

The author uses the stories of a group of teenagers to map out and slowly dig into the main topic that tackles the corrupt phenomenon in today's society. These are things happening in the dark where lights can not be seen, those places where sunlight can not reach have been dusty, dump and rotten. Every single individual in this world has their orbit and trajectory in life. The choices we made and the actions we took in the past will lead to our future paths. Everyone has the right to choose and decide for themselves. We should always consider things while we make our choices, which are the law and our morality.

In our society, issues like drugs, corruption, and adolescent rebellion that happened in the book happen every day, every minute, and the cause that leads to these are the choices they made. In the story, the discussion centered around poverty. The reason why Noel and Cyrus' story is a tragic ending is because of the choices they made that are forced by poverty. There are many situations like these where we think that we do not have any choice; that is why we choose to go on the wrong path, not knowing that we are going to hurt ourselves and our loved ones. When we want to go back, it is already too late because the brutal tragedy has already happened. If we were lucky enough, we would end up like Noel, who still has the chance to start again. However, if we were the exact opposite, we would end up like Cyrus and Voltron, and mostly the latter is the result.

In order for us to stop tragedies that happened to the characters in the story to continue happening in our society, we should start to change, we should stop the cycle or the system to continue to grow big and spread, although it is not an easy process but if we work together we will eventually succeed.

There is a saying that heaven never seals off the exits, every cloud has a silver lining which means that there is always a way out, do not let difficulties and challenges you are facing defeat you and mislead you to do things that are wrong and things that you will regret.

Nothing should be the reason why we disobey the law and disobey our morality.

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