Most likely, Joselito “Jowie” de los Reyes knows something about everything, and he can give an opinion on anything. His recently released compilation of status posts on the social networking site Facebook seems to support this. Here is a writer who is a thinker, and while at first glance and reading of his latest book “Istatus Nation, Mga Istatus Kong Hindi Pang Status Quo”, one might well simply mistake de los Reyes to be merely a humorist, when what he is, actually, is a social observer and commentator.
Of course it would be plain stupidity and the height of obtuseness if one does not see the strong gift of humor that de los Reyes has. “Istatus Nation” is a very funny book, and de los Reyes has the gift of comic timing in his writing, if there’s such a thing. He reminds one of the late great George Carlin who, in his books and stand-up acts, discussed, attacked, dissected and pulverized random social issues and developments with rapier-sharp wit and cunning insight while leaving one in stitches.
[quote_right]“Istatus Nation” is a very funny book, and de los Reyes has the gift of comic timing in his writing[/quote_right]If de los Reyes, only 38, continues to explore this gift of humor that he has and develops a more analytical mindset – he can choose not to, after all, and instead just continue to poke fun at different issues that take place in this godforsaken country – he has the potential to become the most accessible yet completely credible social commentator in this age of social media.
There’s no question that de los Reyes can write. He handles the Filipino language with expert yet deliberate casualness – he “Tagalizes” English words, spins grammatical but linguistically mongrel sentences that are a mix between cono-speak and “salitang kalye” and then finishes off with an often biting remark or an unexpected line that can make the reader cry from laughing. He writes about whether shellfish like mussels and “talaba” swim and should be caught (they don’t swim – the cultured kind are stick on special culture ropes suspended between 6-10 meters below the water surface), why the local broadcast media use the same similes and metaphors over and over when there are typhoons, stampedes, and other calamities, and why the DepEd’s K+12 experiment is off to wonky start because of underpaid teachers and poor structural support for educational reforms.
He is also not above giving advice for the lovelorn, the gender-confused, the occasional student who’s flunking school, and how to outfox taxi drivers with burgeoning criminal tendencies.
In the meantime, if de los Reyes ever ventured into movie making, he’d do well making short films that are complete by themselves: no long-drawn out plots, only action-oriented, slightly deranged characters who know what they want and they darn well how to get there.
When writing about political issues, he clearly has no problems with outlining arguments. Oh he’s still funny, but in the midst of all the laughs his writing generates, there’s the unwritten message: “Don’t just sit there laughing and tolerate the crap around you, do something!” Only, of course, de los Reyes does not present specific calls to action or alternative even in ways of thinking. This, perhaps, is what he will need to cultivate if, if he wants to deepen his analysis of social conditions while poking fun at idiotic politicians and shredding apart the system of idiocy, inefficiency and corruption that typifies the Philippine government. If he doesn’t, well, he will still be funny, and because his posts are often about current events, still relevant.
Case in point: his celebrated post on Pork Barrel Queen Janet Napoles is a certified rant which in the 
end mainly called for Napoles’ arrest, but did not go beyond it to criticize the real culprit: the Aquino administration, its corrupt allies and officials, particularly Budget Secretary Butch Abad and Pres. Aquino himself. Of course, this most likely is asking too much, but then again, why not? When he wrote the 975-word rant in August 2013, the Philippines was in an uproar over the government’s Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF) and Disbursement Acceleration Program (DAP) scams, and it can be argued that de los Reyes’ post helped popularize the issue to many ordinary Filipinos among the ranks of students, fellow academic (de los Reyes is a teacher by profession), and colleagues in the literary and media community. This post was shared, as of September 9, 2013, over 35,000 times and liked 25,000 times according to a report by the University of Sto. Tomas’ official student paper “The Varsitarian. “
Click here to read Joselito de los Reyes’ viral Facebook rant
“Istatus Nation” is also more than a series of Facebook status posts. Collectively, they can be considered to comprise an autobiography. De los Reyes does not go out directly to state who he is, what he’s done and what he wants in life, but every “post” is infused with his personality (he’s already orphaned, but he has been resilient) and hobbies (he is somewhat an expert on boxing!), and descriptions of his work as a teacher, a poet and writer, and more importantly insights into his life as a proud father to two beautiful little girls and a loving husband to his former classmate in the Philippine Normal University. Incidentally, his wife “Teacher Angela” figures prominently in his book, and one can only assume that she has the patience of a saint given how many times de los Reyes featured her in his posts –- she is the long-suffering wife of a man who keeps angling for a MacBook Air when they barely afford (an exaggeration de los Reyes keeps making all throughout his book) to buy diapers for their youngest.
BTW, as of the launch of “Istatus Nation”, de los Reyes’ youngest is already attending kindergarten and is already bathroom trained.
[quote_center]De los Reyes does not insult his readers, and instead, in an amusing, bemused and tongue-in-cheek-kind of way, encourage them to take more notice of the things that take place around them, take a stand, and make an opinion.[/quote_center]
Finally, “Istatus Nation” is a book that entertains. It has more substance than many other offerings of the various members of the Philippine publishing community to come out, and it is accessible without pandering to the lowest common denominator. De los Reyes does not insult his readers, and instead, in an amusing, bemused and tongue-in-cheek-kind of way, encourage them to take more notice of the things that take place around them, take a stand, and make an opinion.
And then post it on Facebook.
| Originally published in the Philippine Graphic Magazine September 2014
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