Filipino Standard Time (FST)

I entered another chess competition today, my second official tournament, and I had observed certain similarities in events that happened in this tournament and the previous one that I joined.

Filipinos seem to have developed the habit of starting events or ceremonies at least two hours after the appointed time which is actually quite a waste of daylight and productivity.

The registration for the tournament started at nine o'clock and there were barely any people in the venue and as time passed by, the participants came in until the list of players was posted at around noon and we started playing at 12:30.

Afterward, we took a break for lunch and resumed the games a quarter past one.

The whole affair ended at around seven in the evening which is quite early considering I went home at eight in the evening the first time I joined one of these chess tournaments.

Filipinos, in general, and I can personally attest to this habit of procrastination or the 'la mañana' habit since I myself lazily burn a lot of my time on idleness.

We seem to delay our activities and events so much that we would sometimes finish projects, documents, events, or ceremonies later than if we started them early.

Of course, this always has to do with the mindset of Filipinos that it is all right and dandy to be late since many of the participants or members would also do the same and be late, so why bother to go early and wait for a long time?

But this mentality is exactly why we seem to get stuck in the rut most of the time.

It would be better, I think, if we just simply start early and slowly progress toward the result that we aim for, making improvements along the way and checking if we have done the work correctly.

This is to ensure that we would not have to go over them again than to do all the work in one big swoop without sufficient time for consolidation and review because most of the time, rushed work always ends up as mediocre and incoherent.

Just as with chess, it is much better to slowly improve your position, making sure that your strategy is A-OK than to quickly rush into a premature attack where your position will be worse in the end when you have lost all your steam.

Hopefully, we Filipinos will be able to break the bad habit of wasting time, procrastinating, slacking off, spending too much time on siestas, and doing sloppy work.

From what I know by the historical and cultural evidences in our society, Filipinos are the most industrious and hardworking people on the face of the earth, doing our work with excellence and heart.

Let us learn from our mistakes and forge on ahead to a brighter tomorrow for our nation.