02B29: Pre-Elections Preparations

Metro Manila Community Quarantine - Day 785

For those who came in late, I'm not proud of the fact that I've never voted before. TL;DR: I had rationalized an ultra-idealistic stand where I only want to vote for candidates that I fully believed in and I had yet to encounter a politician that truly made me feel that way in most of the previous elections. I still sort of feel that way on a fundamental level, but now I accept that there are candidates I can fully support and there are others I'm willing to work with in contrast so the crap we've had to deal with for the present administration.

I've been going over my list of candidates over and over again this week, but after a last wave of research and consultation with close friends, I've come up with a list that I can live with. I did my best to support as much of Leni's senatorial slate as possible. Alternately, I went over various independent and opposition candidates whose priorities aligned with ours or at the very least we could live with. I considered not voting for a full slate of 12 senators, but given the state of things, I figured that every vote for a non-administration or BBM-affiliated candidate is still a good one. 

I had also considered abstaining for both local and party-list votes, but this still felt like a waste as well. The party-list vote was a little easier to manage - friends had shared which groups had publicly supported Leni's presidential run and then I selected from there.

Taguig's local election isn't an inspiring run since it's just a battle between two political dynasties - as is often the case at the local level. I'm prepared to vote for the incumbent party (Nacionalista Party) versus the opposition, who runs under Duterte's PDP-Laban.

And then I walked Tobie through my thoughts on each candidate so he could determine if he wanted to go with my list or make modifications. We're not automatically a block vote as a couple after all, but it'll probably go that way for this cycle.

Our voting precinct is less than 5 kilometers away, but it's also on the other side of the C-5 highway. At first, Tobie said he'd drive there, but we haven't been able to find a place to park via Waze or Google Maps, so we'll have to commute. We'll probably be able to take a Grab going there (it's only a 10-minute ride), but I suspect we may have to walk at least part of the way back to get to the Sietch. It should be an interesting and memorable experience either way as we get through our first election in Taguig. 

But it certainly won't be our last time to vote together either. 

Gotta get some sleep. We're hoping to get to the precinct bright and early to avoid complications later on. Tobie has the holiday but it's still a working day for me, so I don't want to spend too much time away. We've let our Singapore counterparts know what's going on for the day, but there's only so much they can do to keep clients on hold while folks in the Philippines queue to vote. 

One thing at a time. Sleep now. Wake up early. Get to the voting precinct. Vote. 

Then hope for the best.