LISTEN TO ARTICLESynthesized Narration • 0:00 / 0:00

What does it mean to endure broken roads? Most say, it’s patience. … I say, it’s surrender. When you wake up at dawn, you already know what awaits you. Flooded streets. Cracked asphalt. The same wounds that never heal. You either grit your teeth and bear it, Or you curse under your breath and keep walking—or in this case, keep sitting in a van full of people just like you. Most of the time, we tell ourselves it’s normal. Most of the time… we convince ourselves this is just the way things are. Why? Why do we accept this? … Because sometimes, we’re left with no choice. Sometimes, we can’t afford to complain. Sometimes, we’re too tired to fight. So we endure. But what is endurance when it no longer has hope? What is patience when it has rotted into bitterness? “You have to work harder to rise above it.” “They’re fixing it, give it time.” Empty phrases. Dead promises. We swallow them whole because we need to believe someone cares. But they don’t. Not really. The ones in power will never set foot here Their wheels never kiss the potholes we drown in. Their shoes never soak in the gutter water we drag across the office floor. They glide on smooth highways our taxes built, But our feet—our broken backs—will never know. … So tell me, how much longer can patience last? Because mine— Mine drowned a long time ago. It drowned in the rainwater that seeped into my shoes, It cracked with the asphalt beneath my feet, It vanished with every peso I paid for roads that only got worse. The puddles on the streets reflect more than light— It reflects a country already sinking, pretending to mend its wounds But, in reality, is chasing the road to their own prosperity. We say, “We’ll wait.” We say, “Maybe next year.” But every year, the floods rise higher. Every year, the cracks grow deeper. And every year, we’re told to endure just a little more. But endurance is not infinite. Patience is not eternal. Someday, even resignation will drown out. And when it does, It won’t just be the roads that break. It will be us— The commuters, the workers, the forgotten— Finally snapping under the weight of a country That never carried us. … And maybe then, the flood they ignored Will no longer be made of water… It’ll be made of the patience they drowned with their thirst for money— The patience they surrendered for the love of their greed.