True Anon Truth Feed - Episode 380: Tribunal 1
Aired: 2024-05-20
Duration: 01:20:08


=== Hello Brussels! (02:51) ===

[00:00:00]  I was trying to think of some kind of like dootle dootle doot like foreign correspondent very spelden checking in from Brussels.
[00:00:12]  I know there's no like war.
[00:00:15]  There's no war scene in Brussels yet.
[00:00:17]  Brussels.
[00:00:18]  Oh my God.
[00:00:18]  I'm not sure.
[00:00:19]  Until I see this place.
[00:00:21]  No, Liz, you have to understand this morning.
[00:00:24]  In fact, last night when I was sashaying my little ass down the street, before I got to the street to do my little sash number in the lobby of this hotel, which by the way, hotels in Europe are hostels.
[00:00:38]  They are not hotels.
[00:00:40]  They're hostile to you.
[00:00:41]  They are extremely hostile to me.
[00:00:44]  At the bottom was maybe 40 blokes, like British lads, but they're all 50.
[00:00:51]  And the British tourist is a scourge on this earth.
[00:00:56]  It is crazy.
[00:00:57]  They're all wearing these like matching kind of long, short, and like long shirt combinations.
[00:01:03]  They are all balding in ways that I didn't think hair could do.
[00:01:07]  Like I didn't know that hair could be in some places and not in other places in that particular, it's like camouflage.
[00:01:14]  And they are having a pint and a laugh.
[00:01:17]  When I finally get home last night at just midnight, not even that late, the street, the Belgian road, the cobblestone in front of my hotel, slick with vomited potato.
[00:01:30]  These Brits had come back and just thrown up en masse to use a French-Belgian word.
[00:01:38]  And literally an American Tex-Mex one.
[00:01:41]  These people are insane.
[00:02:10]  Hello, Brace.
[00:02:12]  Foreign correspondent, Brace.
[00:02:15]  You're really making it tough enough for me not to do an accent there.
[00:02:18]  I'm not going to.
[00:02:18]  The thing is, is that you have been, well, wait, really quick.
[00:02:21]  I'm Liz.
[00:02:22]  Hello.
[00:02:23]  Hello, I am Brace, and we are joined by producer Young Jomsky.
[00:02:26]  Get out of the way.
[00:02:27]  And the podcast is called?
[00:02:28]  Drone on.
[00:02:29]  Bye.
[00:02:29]  Okay.
[00:02:29]  Okay.
[00:02:30]  So you, we need to get this out right at the top of the show because I want this on record.
[00:02:37]  This is a show dealing with lots of things being said on record and being put into the record.
[00:02:42]  Yeah.
[00:02:43]  But we're just kidding about all the stuff we say.
[00:02:46]  No.
[00:02:46]  I mean, no, this episode is about people.
[00:02:48]  People.
[00:02:49]  Oh, yeah.
[00:02:49]  Okay.
[00:02:50]  Thank you for getting the show.
[00:02:51]  Yeah.
[00:02:51]  Yeah.

=== Oatly In Brussels (09:09) ===

[00:02:52]  No, no, no, no.
[00:02:52]  But I want to say, you have been what I would just call gourmand maxing.
[00:02:58]  Oh, it's tough not to.
[00:03:00]  It's everything here is.
[00:03:01]  You know, that's just a regular word here.
[00:03:04]  They just use it.
[00:03:05]  Wait, you didn't know that?
[00:03:06]  I thought that's where you got it.
[00:03:08]  No, I thought the gourmand was somebody who like takes like an Epicurean.
[00:03:13]  He's sort of like a sex tourist, but for Epicurean delights.
[00:03:16]  Like he, he, you know, he maybe lives in a hamlet, but he he travels to the great capitals to feast on their ducks.
[00:03:23]  These Epicurean delights have Epicurean ends.
[00:03:27]  They certainly do.
[00:03:28]  But sometimes if you get your end big enough, you got to get the whole booth to yourself.
[00:03:32]  But it's crazy.
[00:03:33]  It's crazy here, Liz.
[00:03:35]  How much duck have you had?
[00:03:37]  I've had duck three A's out of four that I've bought.
[00:03:41]  Yes.
[00:03:43]  I have.
[00:03:43]  Yeah, I have.
[00:03:44]  And of course, a fry or two, no?
[00:03:47]  You know what?
[00:03:47]  The fries I've had here have uniformly stunk.
[00:03:51]  They not smell-wise, but taste-wise.
[00:03:56]  Unsalted, soggy.
[00:03:58]  Well, there was one place that all right.
[00:04:00]  I don't really or they just give them to you with some stuff, but it's a big fry guy.
[00:04:04]  Yeah, not a crazy.
[00:04:05]  I mean, I like it.
[00:04:06]  I like a thin little fry.
[00:04:07]  You know what's crazy about Belgium and I didn't understand is they got they don't exist as a people.
[00:04:15]  And so right.
[00:04:16]  They're a stateless people.
[00:04:18]  It is psychotic.
[00:04:20]  I don't, it's like, it's like it's it is a reactionary country and the fact that it just never evolved into a real cohesive republic.
[00:04:28]  It's like a it's like a holdover from, I don't know, I guess the medieval period.
[00:04:32]  It's like a doctor.
[00:04:33]  Which is why they regress into all their culture regresses into children's illustration.
[00:04:38]  It really does.
[00:04:39]  But I was, so I go up to, I get it, I don't sleep for 30-something hours.
[00:04:42]  I go up to Ghent when I get here.
[00:04:44]  There's a motherfucker in Gent.
[00:04:46]  I was like, I'll spend a day in Ghent doing because it looks like a beautiful city.
[00:04:50]  I saw the Lamb of God.
[00:04:52]  It did look really pretty.
[00:04:53]  Oh my God.
[00:04:54]  The Lamb of God or the City of Ghent?
[00:04:56]  No, Ghent.
[00:04:57]  Gent was beautiful.
[00:04:59]  Oh, my God.
[00:04:59]  Very pastel.
[00:05:01]  And everybody, I got to tell you, everybody, and I mean no disrespect to whatever you guys from Flanders got going on.
[00:05:09]  The hot people were very blandly hot and the ugly people were blandly ugly.
[00:05:15]  There was not a single.
[00:05:16]  You walk down the street in New York City.
[00:05:18]  It's like every city of averages.
[00:05:20]  Everybody in New York, in America, anywhere.
[00:05:22]  You see everyone?
[00:05:23]  They look like a freak.
[00:05:24]  And that's.
[00:05:25]  Yeah, we got high polarity here.
[00:05:28]  In Gent, nothing.
[00:05:30]  It's just like, I don't think I think I saw a single person with a logo on a t-shirt.
[00:05:34]  It was just this weird.
[00:05:35]  It was like they were smock people.
[00:05:38]  Smocks.
[00:05:38]  Interesting.
[00:05:39]  All love to them.
[00:05:40]  Yeah, it's strange, strange place.
[00:05:42]  You have a good time?
[00:05:44]  Yeah, I had a pretty, yeah, I had a good time.
[00:05:46]  I've been so tired and out of it and jet lagged that like I've kind of just been blundering through my time here, but I've been reading and walking.
[00:05:56]  Ramond in Bruges.
[00:05:59]  Now, that's a cartoon right there.
[00:06:01]  Uh-huh.
[00:06:02]  Yeah.
[00:06:02]  Oh, they love cartoons.
[00:06:03]  They do.
[00:06:04]  They truly do love comic books and cartoons.
[00:06:06]  Yeah.
[00:06:07]  Not childlike.
[00:06:08]  Very, very rich comic history.
[00:06:10]  Don't want to see it.
[00:06:11]  And it's such the good.
[00:06:13]  I can't take people seriously that call themselves Flanders.
[00:06:16]  It's just not going to happen.
[00:06:17]  The whole thing is tough.
[00:06:19]  And all love to Belgians, you know?
[00:06:21]  Well, not all, but some.
[00:06:23]  I'm part Belgian.
[00:06:24]  Did you know that?
[00:06:25]  No.
[00:06:26]  I'm the, what's the Walloonian?
[00:06:28]  I'm part Walloonian, I believe.
[00:06:31]  I'm not even kidding, dude.
[00:06:32]  My dad's.
[00:06:33]  That's what I can't handle when you bring out these Lord of the Rings or Star Wars references.
[00:06:37]  It is straight up.
[00:06:38]  Don't fucking look me straight in the eye and say I'm part Walloolian.
[00:06:42]  It's not.
[00:06:44]  I wish I was lying.
[00:06:45]  I'd give anything to be lying right now.
[00:06:46]  That's a Nintendo villain.
[00:06:49]  And I might be wrong, because I could be Flandersian.
[00:06:53]  But I think I'm Walloonian because I'm part Hugo not.
[00:06:58]  Like way back in the, and that's like, that's like a fucked up kind of Protestant that like, I don't know what.
[00:07:04]  But the Huguenots are more French.
[00:07:06]  I know.
[00:07:06]  Oh, Liz.
[00:07:08]  I know.
[00:07:09]  We're in a very untriangle of Europe there.
[00:07:14]  I love God here.
[00:07:17]  It's crazy.
[00:07:18]  But they seem so spiritually sort of empty.
[00:07:23]  Regardless, I'm coming back to my ancestral homeland.
[00:07:28]  And I get to get it.
[00:07:30]  Everyone's like, don't get.
[00:07:32]  And like, they're speaking.
[00:07:33]  Liz, have you heard someone speak Dutch?
[00:07:36]  No, I mean, in like a movie, but not in, I don't know if in real life.
[00:07:41]  But maybe when I was a little kid.
[00:07:44]  It will change your whole view of everything.
[00:07:48]  It's like you, once you go.
[00:07:49]  You don't want to get me started on the Dutch.
[00:07:51]  I've already said some things I should probably take back about Belgians, but we can't get into the Dutch on this.
[00:07:57]  We can't get into the Dutch.
[00:07:57]  I met some very nice Dutchmen last night, and I.
[00:08:02]  No, no, they were at the thing that we're going to get to, but they were very, very, very pleasant Dutchmen.
[00:08:08]  And someone listened to the show before, and I was like, is he going to remember Liz talking all that shit about Dutch?
[00:08:15]  It's not just me.
[00:08:15]  You join in on the fun.
[00:08:17]  Don't put it on.
[00:08:17]  I know.
[00:08:19]  It's like when you bully.
[00:08:20]  I do.
[00:08:20]  If a friend is big and starts bullying a nerd, you kind of give him a couple kicks, too.
[00:08:25]  Yeah.
[00:08:25]  Well, they're right there, sitting right there.
[00:08:27]  The thing about the Dutch is, I will say this.
[00:08:31]  My true feelings on the Dutch, which I have made some of them known, but I have not yet given my magnum opus on the Dutch, we'll say.
[00:08:41]  We would pay well that one.
[00:08:42]  We'd put that one on Patreon because I will probably say some things that I shouldn't say.
[00:08:48]  I guess the thing is, though, so from what I understand, because Belgians had pioneered many political ideas in the past, such as the idea of the Belgian nation or being a far-right Walloonian or Flandersian separatist, which I just don't understand because apparently the people who want to like split off the Dutch-speaking, I don't know, minority, but the Dutch-speaking part, because they got more money, but they want to join the Netherlands.
[00:09:14]  Some of them want to join the Netherlands, but the Netherlands doesn't want them.
[00:09:18]  And the people from Flanders who want to split off are just kind of like, yeah, fuck you.
[00:09:21]  We'll do our own thing.
[00:09:23]  It's, it's, they have just have their, it's like Lebanon here, except less functional.
[00:09:28]  It's totally different.
[00:09:30]  My new political belief is that we should balkanize Belgium.
[00:09:35]  Yeah.
[00:09:36]  Yeah.
[00:09:36]  You should just, well, we should give part of it to Luxembourg, part of it to the Netherlands, and then part of it.
[00:09:40]  Break it all up.
[00:09:41]  Let's make all, let's make like four new countries.
[00:09:44]  It's like four, like let a thousand Luxembourgs bloom.
[00:09:47]  And see what happens.
[00:09:48]  Because they should have one with really high taxes.
[00:09:51]  They should have like all the other ones like have some like, oh, weed is legal or whatever.
[00:09:54]  This is legal.
[00:09:55]  And then one is just fucking, it's like a police state.
[00:09:58]  Yeah.
[00:09:59]  I like that.
[00:10:00]  You know, very comfortable and pretty.
[00:10:04]  Well, it's also the heart of the EU Acracy here.
[00:10:08]  Yes.
[00:10:08]  And let me tell you, this is a multi-culti motherfucking city.
[00:10:12]  I have heard accents of every shape, size, and Estonian, Latvian, all that kind of shit.
[00:10:18]  They're all here to slightly, I don't know what the EU really does.
[00:10:22]  I did see, and I sent you a picture of the first thing I see after getting off the motherfucking train in Brussels was a building size advertisement for upcoming EU elections that was sponsored by the company Oatly.
[00:10:37]  Oatly.
[00:10:38]  That summed up the EU for me in a way that nothing could.
[00:10:42]  Oatly.
[00:10:44]  Oatly.
[00:10:46]  Oh, Wiley.
[00:10:47]  No, I can't do it anymore.
[00:10:49]  Oatly.
[00:10:50]  Oatly.
[00:10:54]  We need to explain to the people at home what the hell you are doing in Brussels because you're not there just vacationing, sending your buns.
[00:11:04]  You're doing some real work there.
[00:11:07]  Yeah.
[00:11:07]  In fact, I have not basically left a 10-block rate, except for my day in Ghent.
[00:11:11]  I haven't left a 10-block radius of my hotel in Excels, which is, that's the kind of shit their name in neighborhood is down here, baby.
[00:11:19]  Oh, no.
[00:11:21]  Yeah, I am here.
[00:11:22]  Longtime listeners of the show, or probably even short-time listeners of the show, will know that there are many different opinions that you might hear us speak.
[00:11:30]  But one you would hear us speak very often is that justice should be done in the form of tribunals.
[00:11:38]  And not just for the Dutch.
[00:11:40]  Not just for the Dutch.
[00:11:41]  No, we are a tribunal-focused podcast.
[00:11:44]  And so when I heard that there was an international, my ears perk up, people's, which you know I love the people, tribunal going on in Belgium.
[00:11:54]  You know my funky ass had to get on a middle seat ass flight over here.

=== Mining Companies and Indigenous Land Conflicts (15:05) ===

[00:12:01]  No comfort plus for you.
[00:12:03]  No comfort plus for me.
[00:12:04]  That price goes up by like $500.
[00:12:06]  I'm here for the International People's Tribunal, which is a two-day tribunal.
[00:12:12]  In fact, this is the second day, and I've just gotten back to the hotel.
[00:12:15]  It has just ended.
[00:12:18]  That essentially the goal of which was to put the governments and specific political personalities of the United States and the Philippines on trial.
[00:12:31]  Now, what did this actually entail for two days?
[00:12:35]  So what they did is a couple different organizations are basically sponsored or convened this, I guess.
[00:12:42]  One is the International Association of Democratic Lawyers, which is a, sounds like a fake international organization, but it's a real one.
[00:12:49]  It's essentially like a, it is, it's been called a Soviet front by the United States government, even though there is no Soviet Union anymore.
[00:12:58]  But it's an international like group of mostly IHL, international human rights law or whatever, lawyers, and a group called the Friends of the Filipino People in Struggle, which is a coalition with a bunch of like local chapters, a bunch of other fucking, you know, there's like many, many like kind of constituent parts.
[00:13:22]  Sammy Dune is like one of the sponsors of it.
[00:13:26]  And it's essentially a people's tribunal laying out crimes committed against the Filipino people by the Filipino state, both under Duterte, which was day one, and under the Marcos government, which was day two, and also tracing the United States' complicity in these crimes.
[00:13:45]  And they did it pretty deftly.
[00:13:48]  They assembled a group of jurors and a group of prosecutors.
[00:13:53]  And I got to tell you, the jurors were kind of incredible.
[00:13:58]  It was like a very multicultural bunch.
[00:14:00]  He had this guy, Lennox Hines, who's kind of a, I knew he was, kind of a famous guy to me.
[00:14:06]  Asada's lawyer.
[00:14:08]  He was Nelson Mandel and the ANC's lawyer.
[00:14:11]  There was a cleric of something called the Old Catholic Church from the Netherlands, but a guy wearing like fully big-ass cross.
[00:14:19]  Robed out.
[00:14:21]  Oh, yeah.
[00:14:21]  I mean, he wasn't wearing a robe.
[00:14:22]  No, it's like a monk.
[00:14:25]  But yeah, like a full, you know, white-haired, kindly old man, Christian.
[00:14:31]  A Belgian, I believe she is a municipal counselor named Severin, who is crazy ass name.
[00:14:40]  I know.
[00:14:41]  She was very Belgian looking, which I don't mean that as an insult, but Severin de Lavalais, she is, I believe, from the Green Party of Belgium, who, before you say it, are one of the less offensive Green parties in Europe.
[00:14:54]  There was a Basque politician whose name will be very difficult for me to pronounce correctly, but I believe Julen Gumuzio.
[00:15:02]  And Suzanne Adley, who is, I believe, from New York motherfucking city, who described herself as the daughter of Jordanian workers, which I thought was, I really like that.
[00:15:13]  But the prosecutors were some all-stars as well.
[00:15:15]  You had a Roland Meister, who is a, I'll just read his bio from the thing, active and well-known lawyer for numerous political refugees for over 40 years.
[00:15:24]  He is also known as a Marxist-Leninist and for many years responsible for internationalism in the Marxist-Leninist Party of Germany.
[00:15:31]  Attorney Meister has been affected by state repression for more than 50 years because of his political convictions.
[00:15:37]  Jan Furman, who is like a pretty famous human rights lawyer out here who works with a lot of radical groups.
[00:15:44]  Catherine Pungabin, who is a Filipino lawyer from the National Union of People's Lawyers, and Zarina, not even joking, Zarina Musni, who is also a Filipino lawyer.
[00:15:58]  Awesome.
[00:15:59]  And so what did the, when we're talking about these two days and these cases that they were building, I mean, what you, you know, so it's split between Duterte and Marcos.
[00:16:07]  But you talk about the, you said the complicity of the United States.
[00:16:12]  I mean, we've done, I mean, we'll link to it in the description of this episode because we've done a series over the years, various interviews with people who've endured, you know, abuse and torture by the Filipino government.
[00:16:30]  And we have often really highlighted the role of the U.S. here.
[00:16:34]  But it's really, really, I mean, that seems to be a pretty big key part.
[00:16:39]  It seems to be a pretty key part of the ongoing abuses from Duterte to Marcos.
[00:16:45]  So one thing that I think a lot of people should keep in mind is that the Philippines was really a colony, like straight up of the U.S. until the 1940s when it became something like a semi-colony with these crazy trade deals in favor of the U.S. that were like totally exploitative to the Philippine economy.
[00:17:04]  And to the, and, you know, they were an important part of our Cold War strategy of encircling China and preventing communism from spreading in the Pacific.
[00:17:16]  And we backed Marcos to the hilt when he declared martial law.
[00:17:20]  Eventually, when he became a liability, the U.S. kind of gave the go-ahead for the Marcos.
[00:17:26]  Well, they stopped going to bat for him, although they did give him refuge when he fled the country.
[00:17:32]  And eventually in the 1990s, American military bases were taken out.
[00:17:37]  Now, America had pioneered a lot of our, especially our psychological warfare, in the fight against communist guerrillas there in the 1950s and were pretty effective in smashing the movement.
[00:17:50]  We assisted the Marcos regime, Marcos Sr. martial law regime in fighting the second wave of Filipino communist guerrillas throughout the late 1960s, 70s, 80s.
[00:18:04]  But once Marcos was out of there, people really wanted the bases out and the bases took off.
[00:18:09]  Now, though, with the dragon rising in China, we are sort of re-entering the base space with the Philippines and extending all these agreements.
[00:18:24]  They sort of view them as like a very important hard point in containing China.
[00:18:30]  And so especially in the northern parts of the island, there are all these new bases popping up.
[00:18:35]  There's all these war games that are being run.
[00:18:38]  And they're receiving a ton of military assistance.
[00:18:41]  So this trial or this tribunal rather focused really heavily on the armed forces of the Philippines who receive, I think it was something like 600, 700 million in equipment in just the past few years.
[00:19:00]  There's constantly new deals being signed.
[00:19:02]  Duterte sort of waffled between trying to attract China and the U.S., but Marcos Jr. Bongbong is like fully in the U.S.'s camp.
[00:19:13]  And so what they did is, you know, most of this, most of this trial or most of this tribunal, because there's been several before, I believe there's been five throughout that the National Democratic Movement of the Philippines has put on in the past.
[00:19:26]  This one specifically focused on the armed forces.
[00:19:28]  And it's really difficult to talk about the armed force of the Philippines without talking about the U.S. assistance to them.
[00:19:35]  So you've been there witnessing this tribunal, talking to people, working with people.
[00:19:40]  We have, for our listeners, a couple interviews that you've done with people who are there kind of doing the same and giving testimony during this tribunal about abuses that they've witnessed or, you know, suffered under these regimes.
[00:19:56]  Yeah, yeah.
[00:19:57]  So, you know, one thing that was really a big theme throughout this entire tribunal is the flattening of all activists into communist guerrillas.
[00:20:09]  Because as we've talked about on the show before, there is a protracted People's War that's happening in the Philippines, mostly in the countryside, which the Philippines has vast, fast, vast amounts of sort of peasant settled countryside.
[00:20:26]  And something that we've also talked about a lot is the process of red tagging, which there was actually just a Supreme Court case about with a guy that I met who was the plaintiff that made red tagging that said it was actually a threat to life and liberty in the Philippines just a few days ago.
[00:20:45]  But there have been in the past five years, a really, really heavy witch hunt against anybody who is like an activist in any way, not even somebody who's like a member of the Communist Party.
[00:20:58]  It flattens everybody.
[00:20:59]  And if you are an activist, you are a communist.
[00:21:01]  If you're a communist, you are a terrorist.
[00:21:03]  So there's this thing called the National Task Force to End Local Communist Insurgency that is this crazy government program that's like run by this psychotic group of people.
[00:21:14]  And like the military is very involved in it.
[00:21:16]  And one thing that kept coming up is all these civilian activists, people whose activism didn't necessarily have anything to do with workers or peasants or anything like that, environmental activists, all these, just anybody being smeared in the press and on government Facebook accounts in press conferences as communist terrorists, and then being either harassed, beaten, tortured, disappeared, killed in many cases.
[00:21:43]  And so the first person I spoke to was a woman named Teacher Rose.
[00:21:48]  Well, she's name is Rose, but people kind of call her Teacher Rose.
[00:21:51]  She's a teacher at a Lumad school.
[00:21:53]  In fact, both of the interviews today kind of have a little bit to do with the Lumad.
[00:21:58]  Lumad are an indigenous people of which there are several.
[00:22:04]  The Philippines has a lot of kind of different peoples on its various islands.
[00:22:08]  There's a ton of islands in the Philippines.
[00:22:10]  They speak their own dialect.
[00:22:12]  Something you would note that the actual Filipino judicial system is done in English.
[00:22:18]  And so it's not even done in Tagalog, even though a lot of these people can't even speak Tagalog to begin with.
[00:22:23]  And so if any of these people are ever put on trial, et cetera, et cetera, like they will have no idea what's happening because often they're not even translators.
[00:22:32]  The Lumad people don't have schools in a lot of cases.
[00:22:35]  They can't read.
[00:22:36]  They can't write.
[00:22:37]  And they often, I'm not saying every one of them, but a lot of the villages that they live in.
[00:22:42]  But they sit on very, very lucrative mineral lands.
[00:22:48]  And so guys will come in there, and we've talked about it a little bit in the interview, these like Australian and sometimes Filipino, but oftentimes foreign mining corporations and will just trade people like sardines for like, oh yeah, just let us have a little mine right over here.
[00:23:05]  So activists there put school, make these schools for them, teach them how to read, teach them how to write, teach them like, hey, don't actually sign your rights away to these people without knowing what you're signing.
[00:23:16]  And they have faced heavy, heavy persecution from the government.
[00:23:20]  I just also want to preface this with this interview.
[00:23:22]  There's a bunch of little kids running around that we were kind of hanging out with before we started recording.
[00:23:27]  So there's some references to that that people may be confused by.
[00:23:31]  But anyways, here's teacher Rose.
[00:23:47]  So can you tell me about what you testified about today?
[00:23:50]  Yeah, so because I am a former Lumad volunteer teacher of Lumad Schools, it's indigenous schools in southern part of the Philippines in Mindanao.
[00:24:00]  So I testified about the state-sponsored attacks on our schools, on our teachers, students, and of course in Lumad communities in general.
[00:24:13]  What do you mean by Lumad communities?
[00:24:15]  What is Lumad?
[00:24:16]  Lumad is an indigenous people in Mindanao.
[00:24:19]  So this compromise 18 major like ethni-linguistic group.
[00:24:25]  They have their own dialect.
[00:24:26]  It's a native.
[00:24:27]  Yeah, it's native.
[00:24:28]  They have its own dialect, their rituals, their religions, and the way of living.
[00:24:34]  They're sort of isolated more out of the cities?
[00:24:37]  Yeah, they live far flung from the cities.
[00:24:40]  Okay.
[00:24:40]  So they don't have the access, or should I say, the government did not give them access to basic social services in education and in health.
[00:24:51]  So that's why way back in the 1990s, we were able to do the basic literacy and numeracy.
[00:24:58]  It's a non-formal form of education.
[00:25:01]  Then in 2003, 2004, we formalized this educational system.
[00:25:07]  Now we do have the permit from the Department of Education in the Philippines.
[00:25:14]  You do have the permit.
[00:25:15]  Yes, we do have our permits.
[00:25:17]  We recognize.
[00:25:18]  Then we also have our own curriculum.
[00:25:21]  It's in IPED, indigenous peoples, education.
[00:25:25]  Yeah, it's in the education curriculum.
[00:25:28]  We have our own curriculum.
[00:25:31]  And this curriculum answers the needs of the communities.
[00:25:35]  Gotcha.
[00:25:35]  And you know, one thing that I noticed that you mentioned during your testimony is that a lot of the LUMAD, where they live, is on land that is very lucrative for mining companies.
[00:25:47]  Tell me a little about that.
[00:25:48]  Like what kind of minerals, like what, who's coming in and wants to take it?
[00:25:53]  Yeah, so the Caraga in Mindanao, it's another region of Mindanao, said that we are the mining capital of Asia.
[00:26:02]  So we are much abundant in minerals, gold, copper, nickel.
[00:26:08]  So there's a lot of exploration.
[00:26:13]  A lot of big mining companies want to do the exploration and some are doing the mines already, like the Anglo-American, the Apex, the Sagittarius Mining Incorporated, owned by Australian, and other and other big mining companies who are not a Filipino.
[00:26:33]  Gotcha.
[00:26:34]  Yeah, they're not national companies.
[00:26:36]  They're international companies.
[00:26:38]  You know, you mentioned something I was sort of a standard by, because this is an old trick that especially people like mining companies, people coming in to try to take resources always do, is they would trade like cans of sardines or tobacco to people for mining rights of where they live.
[00:26:56]  Yeah, so in the 1990s, the Alcantara and Sans lagging concession.
[00:27:02]  So it's a big lagging concession in the Philippines.

=== Presented Documents, Denied Us (06:27) ===

[00:27:06]  Yeah.
[00:27:07]  So they used the technique of, okay, they go inside the communities, presented the documents.
[00:27:12]  They said, it's an attendance.
[00:27:14]  But it's a signature and saying that, okay, you can cut those trees.
[00:27:19]  And actually, we do have interviews of the Datus who experience this kind of tragedy in life.
[00:27:27]  So you can access in YouTube or in Google, just how you call it, the Lumad, Plight of Lumad, struggles, lands, and natural resources.
[00:27:38]  And so, but what you're saying is a lot of them are illiterate, right?
[00:27:41]  Like they don't have formal schooling.
[00:27:43]  And so they're easily taken advantage of by people who can do things like, oh, just sign here.
[00:27:48]  You know, it doesn't mean anything.
[00:27:49]  And here's some sardines.
[00:27:51]  Yeah.
[00:27:52]  So because of that, the tribal shift then said, oh, we need to be educated.
[00:27:59]  Yeah.
[00:27:59]  So they asked help from church-based group.
[00:28:03]  Then they built the schools.
[00:28:05]  And we are formal form of education.
[00:28:10]  We do have a permit.
[00:28:11]  We are recognized by the Department of Education.
[00:28:14]  We have our own curriculum.
[00:28:17]  Then yet, you can also Google it online.
[00:28:21]  2000, that's, I think that's 2019 that the Department of Education said that we are operating illegally.
[00:28:30]  Oh, that you're having, you have illegal schools.
[00:28:32]  Yeah, they denied us.
[00:28:33]  Okay.
[00:28:34]  Yeah, they denied us.
[00:28:35]  Then we presented the documents.
[00:28:37]  We go to the Department of Education.
[00:28:40]  We are negotiating.
[00:28:41]  We want to talk.
[00:28:42]  Yeah, let's do it on the table.
[00:28:45]  And you, so you were a LUMAD teacher.
[00:28:47]  You taught in these LUMAD schools.
[00:28:48]  Yeah, I thought in this Lumad school, but I live in the cities.
[00:28:53]  So that's the.
[00:28:54]  Are you Lumad?
[00:28:55]  No, no, no.
[00:28:56]  Okay, yeah.
[00:28:56]  2018.
[00:28:58]  No, 2016, because of our out of curiosity, there's an evacuation areas in Davao.
[00:29:04]  So I said, okay, let's visit this one.
[00:29:06]  Then I listened a lot of their stories.
[00:29:11]  Actually, it's a secret, but yeah, I would like to tell you that I don't want to be a teacher.
[00:29:15]  Yeah, okay.
[00:29:15]  In my college days, I said, Okay, let's let's uh let's study this one and this one.
[00:29:20]  Yeah, but um, I don't want to be a teacher, but then when I listen to them, okay, this might be my calling.
[00:29:28]  Yeah, and you were pretty, you were pretty good with those little kids that were over here.
[00:29:30]  Yeah, yeah, so I volunteer after I graduate.
[00:29:35]  I finish a degree of a bachelor of secondary education, major in mathematics.
[00:29:40]  So, I do love numbers, but long numbers don't have me back.
[00:29:44]  Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[00:29:46]  So, I said I pledge that after I finish my study, I will be your volunteer teacher.
[00:29:53]  And you know, it's um, it's like a dramatic scene that your family, all members of your family, are against your decision.
[00:30:00]  Yes, yeah.
[00:30:01]  So, I have to leave, like, I have to leave and find another house, another, uh, not another family though.
[00:30:10]  I have your family kicked you out for becoming a teacher?
[00:30:12]  I was.
[00:30:13]  That's crazy.
[00:30:15]  Yeah, because we are living in this, um, you know, the stereotype, the culture of after you graduated, you must support your siblings, your mother.
[00:30:26]  Yeah, but I refuse to have that kind of culture because I am not obliged to do that.
[00:30:31]  That is not my job.
[00:30:33]  Then, yeah, but so you start volunteering in these schools, you start working in these schools, and that's around the same time, like 2016, 2017, 2018.
[00:30:42]  2018.
[00:30:43]  That is a dangerous time to start doing it because that seems like when a lot of the repression started happening.
[00:30:47]  Yeah, and I want to, I want to just for our listeners too, you mentioned that there was an evacuation zone.
[00:30:52]  Mindanao during that period was very violent.
[00:30:55]  Yeah, it is.
[00:30:56]  So, there's a lot of militarization, forcible displacement, aerial bomberment happenings in Lumad communities.
[00:31:04]  So, these Lumad people forced to evacuate and stay inside the cities.
[00:31:11]  Actually, 2018, my Nanai is a victim of enforced disappearance.
[00:31:17]  Sorry, like your mother?
[00:31:19]  Yeah, because of I am her daughter.
[00:31:25]  So, wait, because you were teaching at a Lumad school, your mother got kidnapped?
[00:31:30]  Yeah.
[00:31:30]  Who kidnapped her?
[00:31:31]  The armed forces of the Philippines.
[00:31:33]  So, this battalion company commander are calling me and said, Oh, we were going to help you.
[00:31:40]  Just clear your name and surrender.
[00:31:43]  So, I say, What?
[00:31:45]  Surrender?
[00:31:46]  Yeah, they're saying that's all.
[00:31:48]  You know what?
[00:31:48]  I'm I am so new to the Lumad schools.
[00:31:51]  I just entered June, July, August, September, October.
[00:31:54]  I have five months in Lumad communities staying with them.
[00:31:58]  And the abduction was happened.
[00:32:00]  And I said, Why?
[00:32:03]  What?
[00:32:03]  I can't understand the logic of why these guys want to clear my name and said, actually, they summoned my family.
[00:32:14]  So my whole family are in municipality, in municipality office.
[00:32:21]  Then there's some armed forces, the Philippines commanding officer.
[00:32:25]  And they are talking about me as a big fish, as a member of the New People's Army.
[00:32:32]  So they're accusing you of being a guerrilla.
[00:32:34]  You've been a school teacher for five months and they're accusing you of being a guerrilla.
[00:32:37]  Yeah, they're accusing me of being a guerrilla.
[00:32:39]  But look at me.
[00:32:40]  I don't have the capacity to carry guns.
[00:32:43]  Yeah, I mean, I wasn't going to say anything, but a backpack might be a little heavy.
[00:32:46]  Yeah.
[00:32:46]  Yeah, then the mere fact that I teach this loom at school is justify that I am not a rebel, not a member of any armed groups.
[00:32:57]  But okay, they said, okay, she's just lying.
[00:33:00]  Just tell your daughter that we're going to meet her in the place she's comfortable.
[00:33:06]  I refuse to do that.
[00:33:07]  Yeah.
[00:33:07]  No, no, no, no.
[00:33:08]  I will never do that.
[00:33:11]  I am so afraid the time.
[00:33:13]  Yeah, of course.
[00:33:13]  I didn't cry.
[00:33:14]  You know what?
[00:33:15]  For one month of crying in public to surface my mother, I did not cry.
[00:33:21]  Yeah.
[00:33:22]  I did not cry because it's too exhausted for me.
[00:33:25]  Yeah.
[00:33:25]  And I can't process everything that I just want to teach these students, these kids, these little ones, then what's my fault?
[00:33:33]  Where's the crime?

=== Eat Durian in Davao (04:17) ===

[00:33:34]  Yeah.
[00:33:35]  So, yeah, then I was forced to seek sanctuary.
[00:33:42]  So I live in Metro Manila for almost six years.
[00:33:44]  And up until today, I am living far away from my families.
[00:33:49]  Because why?
[00:33:50]  Because of the security protocols and issues.
[00:33:54]  So my mom is a victim of enforced disappearance, but the armed forces are keep visiting my mom.
[00:34:00]  Oh, they keep like returning back and saying, oh, how's Rose?
[00:34:03]  Yeah, and how are you?
[00:34:05]  Yeah.
[00:34:05]  Hello, you abducted my mom.
[00:34:07]  And how dare you to go inside her house and said, like, you're, you're, um, you're showing an um empathy, sympathy on my mom.
[00:34:17]  Yeah.
[00:34:18]  Oh, like pretending to be like, oh, you know, it's so good to see you again.
[00:34:21]  Good cap, bad cup tactic.
[00:34:23]  Classic.
[00:34:24]  That's, yeah, that's so terrible.
[00:34:26]  Then this popular person, Lorraine Mariti Badui, the former spokesperson of the LTF L CAP.
[00:34:34]  So for, so I'm just to talk to our listeners right now.
[00:34:37]  NTF LCAC is something that's come up in several episodes, but that is like the special new office of government that is essentially one of their big things is red tagging and essentially persecuting anyone who is not even a communist, but an activist in any way.
[00:34:56]  So what did she do?
[00:34:58]  Yeah, so on her official Facebook page, she said that I am a member of the new people's army and it's endangered my life because she is a public figure, a public official.
[00:35:11]  Yeah.
[00:35:11]  You know what?
[00:35:12]  Before Chad killed, she also read Chad.
[00:35:16]  So wait, tell me about that really, really quick because that was head was killed in the new Bataan 5 massacre.
[00:35:23]  Yeah, yeah.
[00:35:23]  And he was a colleague of yours.
[00:35:25]  Yeah, yeah.
[00:35:26]  So because of the force of Auto, 2021, all Lumit schools were closed.
[00:35:32]  And Chad, Juren, and I, we are so very good friends.
[00:35:36]  We were close friends.
[00:35:37]  Then we have talked, oh, we decided to go back to Mindanao.
[00:35:40]  And Chad was just, he was just for context.
[00:35:43]  He was also like a pretty well-known figure in the Philippines.
[00:35:45]  Yeah, he is.
[00:35:46]  He was like a well-known popular, young, good-looking activist guy.
[00:35:50]  Yeah.
[00:35:50]  He graduated from the University of the Philippines de Liman.
[00:35:54]  Yeah.
[00:35:55]  College of Engineering.
[00:35:56]  I've been there.
[00:35:57]  Wow, that's great.
[00:35:59]  He is so popular.
[00:36:01]  Then Lorraine Bado have this kind of slogan like, ang teacher kong terrorista.
[00:36:06]  Me and Chad, my teacher is a terrorist.
[00:36:09]  Yeah.
[00:36:10]  So that's the slogan.
[00:36:11]  Yeah.
[00:36:12]  Online publication posted and several media outlets.
[00:36:16]  About you two.
[00:36:16]  About us, Chad and I.
[00:36:19]  And yeah, and after Chad being red tag, then we decided to go back to Mindanao.
[00:36:27]  I was assigned in North Katabato.
[00:36:28]  Chad is assigned in New Bata'an.
[00:36:30]  So we're doing the community visit.
[00:36:33]  We are doing this data gatherings for a passive ball.
[00:36:38]  Which area should we prioritize?
[00:36:40]  Yeah, so you're interviewing people, taking data from the people to try to figure out where to go next.
[00:36:46]  And that happened.
[00:36:47]  They were massacred.
[00:36:49]  And we were about to gather in Davao because we're planning to eat Durian.
[00:36:54]  You know what?
[00:36:54]  Durian?
[00:36:55]  The gross fruit.
[00:36:56]  No, that's nice.
[00:36:58]  Well, I've never had it, but I've heard it's I've heard it's a, it's got a smell.
[00:37:03]  Yeah, yeah, the maybe the bad smell.
[00:37:06]  Yeah, well, you know, I don't know.
[00:37:07]  And there were smells.
[00:37:08]  It will depend.
[00:37:09]  You guys were trying to meet up in Davao to eat Durian.
[00:37:12]  Yeah, eat Durian, go to the beach, your salmon.
[00:37:15]  Yeah.
[00:37:15]  I was living far away from Mindanao for almost six years.
[00:37:19]  And it's my first time to go back to Mindanao.
[00:37:22]  Yeah, yeah, you're fine.
[00:37:23]  It's a victory.
[00:37:24]  I am safe.
[00:37:25]  I am still alive.
[00:37:25]  And that's that kind of stuff and stuff.
[00:37:27]  But yeah, that happened.
[00:37:30]  And we were so shocked because we planned everything.
[00:37:33]  Okay, Chad, Jorain, and I going to beach.
[00:37:36]  We do have our iterinary of what to do.
[00:37:38]  Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[00:37:39]  Then it's just a bomb who explode in front of me.
[00:37:43]  So for almost a year.
[00:37:46]  Yeah, for almost, I need a year so I will be able to speak up again.

=== Detained Teachers Dismiss Charges (04:00) ===

[00:37:51]  So one of you, because one of your best friends, a bunch of your friends were murdered by the government.
[00:37:56]  And that you're saying you had to take a year to like collect yourself.
[00:38:00]  Yeah, yeah.
[00:38:00]  Yeah.
[00:38:01]  I need to have a year.
[00:38:03]  And to be honest, up until today, up until this very moment, I used to cry to break down.
[00:38:11]  This is especially during testifying.
[00:38:15]  Yeah.
[00:38:15]  Yeah, because I am not saying that, you know, I was forced to testify, but the fact is, when you testify, you are going to recount those negative, those bad exactly.
[00:38:28]  We saw some of that happen today.
[00:38:30]  Yeah.
[00:38:30]  Yeah.
[00:38:31]  And while some image pop up in your in your brain, a good one.
[00:38:37]  Yeah.
[00:38:37]  Chad and I are in communities in Bakwit schools in Manila.
[00:38:43]  We were singing, we were dancing.
[00:38:46]  So it's kind of hard to reconcile everything because you want to live in the past where Chad and my other colleagues are still alive.
[00:38:54]  Yeah.
[00:38:54]  While I am in the present, and the fact that they're all gone, it's too hard to absorb.
[00:39:01]  I understand that.
[00:39:02]  Yeah.
[00:39:04]  Yeah.
[00:39:05]  And even after that, this happened.
[00:39:09]  My students and co-teachers were detained.
[00:39:15]  A lot of us are facing fabricated rump up charges.
[00:39:18]  Yeah.
[00:39:18]  Red tag.
[00:39:19]  And it's too complicated.
[00:39:23]  You know what happened in the Philippines?
[00:39:25]  I know.
[00:39:26]  I know that in Ukraine also, the Palestinian people also are crying.
[00:39:30]  But we just want to address why these things happen when you or me as a teacher, all I want is to educate.
[00:39:41]  Yeah.
[00:39:42]  To teach the students.
[00:39:43]  So I didn't get the point of where's the bad things of being a Lumber volunteer teacher.
[00:39:50]  Yeah.
[00:39:50]  I mean, this is, I mean, it's just something that I think young people all over the world will see something like, oh, yeah, I should volunteer to help these people.
[00:39:57]  No one's helping them.
[00:39:57]  The government's not helping them.
[00:40:00]  And then, you know, several years later, you're called a terrorist and your friends are all, you know, are killed.
[00:40:04]  Are you still facing persecution now?
[00:40:09]  My latest fabricated criminal charges were dismissed.
[00:40:13]  But that what were they?
[00:40:15]  Kidnapping, human trafficking.
[00:40:16]  You were charged with kidnapping and human trafficking.
[00:40:19]  They said that I am trying to kidnap much bigger than me.
[00:40:22]  I was going to say, and I mean no disrespect whatsoever, Teacher Rose.
[00:40:27]  You would have to kidnap a very you're it'd be hard to be kidnapped by you.
[00:40:32]  I just want to, I mean, I'm not gonna, you know, I don't mean anything by that.
[00:40:36]  But that scene, I understand why they dismiss those charges.
[00:40:38]  That's tough to, tough to like, tough to believe.
[00:40:41]  And it's not just one student, it's a bunch of students.
[00:40:46]  Yeah.
[00:40:47]  So when I received the subpoena, I said, huh?
[00:40:50]  Yeah.
[00:40:51]  My first reaction is, why?
[00:40:53]  Huh?
[00:40:54]  It's unbelievable.
[00:40:55]  How can I?
[00:40:56]  Like, I know my capacity.
[00:40:58]  And, you know, even grabbing this little hands of this child or children, it's too hard for me to manipulate them.
[00:41:07]  It's too hard for me to control them or just to grab them just easily.
[00:41:11]  Like, what?
[00:41:12]  Where is that narrative came from?
[00:41:14]  Well, because they, because I think it seems to me like they paint you in particular, but Lumad teachers as a whole, as like these, these people who come in and like brainwash these kids to become Maoist rebels or whatever.
[00:41:27]  And so with that sort of narrative about you, they're able to say whatever they want because that can, they can just like, all they want to do is paint you as this sort of evil creature.
[00:41:37]  But they dismiss the charges.
[00:41:38]  Yeah, they dismiss the charges after one year.
[00:41:41]  It was in the prosecutor level.
[00:41:43]  And some of the accused are detained and still in the sanctuary.

=== Next Interview: Peace Talks Murder Case (06:44) ===

[00:41:51]  And so what now?
[00:41:52]  What are you doing next?
[00:41:53]  I am helping the Gabriella.
[00:41:56]  No, it's Gabriella.
[00:41:57]  I am the Secretary General of Gabriella.
[00:42:00]  It's a progressive women's union or organization where we are trying to do women, not women empowerment, because every woman is empowered.
[00:42:13]  We're just introducing them their rights, their domestic rights, their right to participate in political, economic.
[00:42:21]  And we also have this urban gardening program, urban gardening program, and trainees on health.
[00:42:31]  Yeah, so that's kind of stuff that I am doing.
[00:42:34]  Yeah.
[00:42:36]  We've actually, we've had someone from Gabriella on the show before to talk about Pastor Kibaloy.
[00:42:40]  Yeah.
[00:42:40]  Who is a real, that's a Filipino freak right there.
[00:42:43]  That's a real one.
[00:42:44]  Kibaloi is live in Davao.
[00:42:46]  I don't know.
[00:42:47]  They live in Davao.
[00:42:48]  I know.
[00:42:48]  I live in Davao.
[00:42:50]  But I am not a member of those two.
[00:42:52]  I wouldn't think so.
[00:42:54]  Is there anything else you want to say, Miu?
[00:42:55]  Thank you so much for taking some time out and talking to me.
[00:42:58]  Thank you.
[00:42:59]  Thank you so much for being here today.
[00:43:01]  I know it might not be shocking, but thank you for listening, our stories, hearing our first-hand experience.
[00:43:09]  And for this interview, yeah, it's a big help for the Filipino people, especially the indigenous peoples who were voiceless, who were killed, and still were calling for justice.
[00:43:23]  Thank you.
[00:43:24]  Thank you.
[00:43:32]  So tell me a little bit about this next interview coming up.
[00:43:35]  Well, just to give a little bit of context too.
[00:43:37]  So there were, I believe, 11 witnesses and victims that were heard during this.
[00:43:46]  Genuinely, at one point, I thought to myself, I was like, I'm really glad Liz isn't here because there were some pretty graphic fucking pictures of autopsies that were shown and bodies.
[00:43:57]  There was one woman whose daughter was killed by the Armed Force of the Philippines, and they desecrated her body and her daughter's body.
[00:44:09]  And she gives this witness statement essentially about that.
[00:44:13]  And they show the pictures.
[00:44:17]  It was tough to watch.
[00:44:19]  This next interview is about a murder.
[00:44:23]  And so, you know, for the last maybe decade or so, I don't know, like two decades, there have been peace talks between the National Democratic Front of the Philippines, which is an organization that has not only the Communist Party of the Philippines, it's led by the Communist Party of the Philippines, but a bunch of constituent organizations within it.
[00:44:46]  And, you know, there's been peace talks with the government.
[00:44:48]  Sometimes they've gone a little far.
[00:44:49]  Sometimes maybe not so much.
[00:44:50]  Duterte cut them off.
[00:44:51]  But one thing that has remained and supposed to remain very sacrosanct, not just in this conflict, but in any conflict, is that you're not supposed to kill peace negotiators.
[00:45:02]  That's a kind of a no-no diplomatically, wherever you do it.
[00:45:08]  And one thing that has really trended, I guess, in the past six, seven years is the murder.
[00:45:16]  Not just the killing and an encounter, which is what they call fights between the guerrilla and the army, but like straight up going to someone's house and shooting them while they're asleep.
[00:45:30]  Yeah, I hear about this frequently.
[00:45:31]  A lot of the peace negotiators or consultants, as they're often called, are people kind of older members of the movement who maybe live in a city or they're retired.
[00:45:42]  They're in their 70s.
[00:45:44]  And unknown forces, often people in masks, will go to their house and kill them.
[00:45:53]  There's no gussing up.
[00:45:54]  There's no exaggerating it.
[00:45:55]  It has been like a really frightening trend.
[00:45:57]  And it's illegal under, I mean, it's illegal to murder people, but that hasn't been really followed, especially during the drug war period in the Philippines.
[00:46:09]  But this next interview is with a politician who is the head of a legal political party whose predecessor, who was also the head of the party before him, and was also a peace negotiator, was murdered at his house.
[00:46:26]  And yeah, we'll just, we should just play it now.
[00:46:41]  So can you tell me who you are and what you testified about?
[00:46:44]  Yes.
[00:46:44]  Yes, I am Ariel Casilao.
[00:46:47]  I am currently the national president of ANAC PAWIS Party.
[00:46:52]  ANAK PAWIS means Toiling Masses Party.
[00:46:55]  It is a national political party in the Philippines representing the farmers, fisher folks, agricultural workers, and the rural poor.
[00:47:07]  I am also the national chairperson of the National Federation of Agricultural Workers or UMA, Union Namangagawas Agricultura.
[00:47:17]  I am here in the International People's Tribunal to present our case.
[00:47:24]  Being the national president of the party, we have documented and we have experienced several cases of violations to human rights and international humanitarian law that, until present, justice has not been served.
[00:47:43]  So I presented the case of my national chairperson, the national chairperson of the party, Mr. Randall Echanis or Karandi.
[00:47:54]  He is also a consultant, a peace consultant to the peace negotiation between the government of the Republic of the Philippines and the National Democratic Front of the Philippines.
[00:48:07]  He was brutally killed last August 10, 2020, while asleep in the we are of the morning.
[00:48:15]  He is 74 years old and he is an unarmed, unarmed consultant to a non-combatant consultant to the National Democratic Front of the Philippines.
[00:48:28]  And he was the chairman of the political party.
[00:48:31]  Yes, he is also the chairman of the ANAC PAWIS party.

=== Autopsy Reveals 40 Stab Wounds (03:24) ===

[00:48:36]  And so, I mean, I saw the photos and the autopsy.
[00:48:40]  Can you describe to just listeners what happened?
[00:48:43]  Yes, the autopsy was conducted by a well-known forensic expert in the Philippines.
[00:48:50]  There are just two forensic experts that conduct autopsy in a case where murder happened or a massacre.
[00:49:00]  There are only two doctors who are authorized to conduct an autopsy investigation or an autopsy conduct on an autopsy.
[00:49:10]  The autopsy report showed that Karandi suffered 40 stab wounds in the front of the body, in the back of the body, a fractured skull as a result of a blunt force trauma, and a fatal stab wound in the back that pierced to an artery of his heart.
[00:49:36]  And The metal that being used to stab his back that pierced to his heart is still lodged in the body of Karandi while the autopsy was ongoing.
[00:49:53]  And the autopsy also showed it manifested torture marks.
[00:50:00]  The stab wounds is a result of Karandi defending himself.
[00:50:07]  There are stab wounds in the right part of his hand, signifying protecting his face or his head.
[00:50:16]  There are stab wounds in the part of his back he wants to protect the front part of his body.
[00:50:29]  And those stab wounds are as a result of a torture process.
[00:50:41]  While getting information, if he refuses to give information, because shallow stab wounds were seen in the chest part of the body, that signifies or manifests that it's not intended to kill.
[00:50:58]  So it's just intended to suffer, a person to suffer.
[00:51:03]  So there are markings of torture prior to a fatal stab that killed Karandi in the process.
[00:51:15]  Well, I mean, yeah, just to put it in perspective, he's in his 70s, 74 years old.
[00:51:20]  Yeah, and they broke into his house and seemed to beat him to death and stabbed him to death.
[00:51:29]  The autopsy also shows that the time of death is between one o'clock in the morning and three o'clock in the morning.
[00:51:39]  Therefore, Karandi was sleeping at that time when armed men, five men wearing ski masks, violently entered the rented apartment of Karandi and manhandled him and tortured him to death.

=== Murder and Custody Battle (15:08) ===

[00:52:01]  How do you know there's five men in ski masks?
[00:52:03]  The neighbor, in the affidavit that I issued and in the affidavit that I submitted to the tribunal, there was a neighbor who heard, first heard the commotion and the cries for help.
[00:52:20]  Then he went out of his unit because the rented apartment of Karandi is there are several units, apartment units.
[00:52:31]  So one of the neighbors of the apartment unit that Karandi is located heard the commotion.
[00:52:38]  Loud commotions.
[00:52:39]  And then when he went out, he saw men exiting the apartment of Karandi.
[00:52:47]  And in fact, in the witness affidavit, one of the armed men said to the neighbor, you go back inside, you have no business here.
[00:53:01]  So, and he saw five armed men who went outside and rode their vehicle.
[00:53:09]  So, I understand that this took place during lockdown, like COVID lockdowns in the Philippines, which I think we've talked about on the show before, but were pretty intense lockdowns.
[00:53:19]  Like, it was really like you could not leave.
[00:53:21]  So, it's not like you go on a walk to the park.
[00:53:23]  You, as government officials, could be out, and basically, nobody else.
[00:53:27]  August is at the height, still at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic in the Philippines.
[00:53:35]  The government implemented a very strict, stringent policy of community quarantines and lockdowns starting March of 2020.
[00:53:48]  It only eased out from stringent restrictions in October of 2020.
[00:53:54]  So, the incident happened August 10, 2020.
[00:53:59]  We are still in a community lockdown.
[00:54:01]  Residents, civilians are not authorized to go out of their houses.
[00:54:07]  We need to seek permit or permit to travel or permit to we need to acquire permit for us to go out and go to the market to buy something.
[00:54:18]  Only authorized persons are allowed to roam around or to travel freely.
[00:54:24]  These are police, military, and government officials.
[00:54:29]  These are only the authorized persons allowed to freely move during that time.
[00:54:36]  So, all the civilians, non-authorized persons, are limited in their own respective households.
[00:54:47]  So, my question is: I mean, this is a pretty big murder case.
[00:54:51]  Yes.
[00:54:52]  Was there any follow-up from the Philippine police departments?
[00:54:55]  Was there any, I mean, was there a public outcry?
[00:54:58]  How was this investigated?
[00:54:59]  Was it investigated?
[00:55:01]  Yes.
[00:55:01]  Well, hours later, during when we conducted a quick response, when the report came into our attention, and since we are living with the family of Karandi in the same house or in the same headquarters of the party, While we were informed,
[00:55:28]  we immediately dispatched a team of our volunteers and the officials of our party to go into the crime scene.
[00:55:38]  And upon reaching the crime scene, there are several members of the scene of the crime operation or scene of the Karsoco, PNP investigation, barangay officials.
[00:55:52]  And then, when we coordinated with regards to the whereabouts of the body of Karandi, the police said they already transferred the body to the morgue.
[00:56:04]  So we went to the morgue, and upon arriving at the morgue, there are several military officials, military personnel, a battalion of them guarding the morgue together with police personnel.
[00:56:19]  So we were confused.
[00:56:21]  We were thinking, what is happening?
[00:56:25]  Why are so many military personnel and police personnel guarding the morgue?
[00:56:32]  So when we confronted, there was the statement of a military official that because Karandi was a top-ranking NPA, NDF, he was a top-ranking NDF leader.
[00:56:51]  It is their duty to secure the place because probably colleagues of Karandi will storm and get the body.
[00:57:00]  That ridiculous storyline of the military personnel.
[00:57:04]  So we asserted, we brought the wife of Karandi and the lawyers, our lawyers in the party, to assert the custody of the body.
[00:57:15]  So there has been a tug of war to take the custody, despite the right of the wife of Karandi to take full custody.
[00:57:26]  But because the assertion of the military, no, he is a top leader of the NPA, we should conduct first investigation.
[00:57:36]  So there was a tag of war to take the custody of Karandi's body.
[00:57:42]  But fortunately, because of our assertion of our lawyers, we had the custody after nine hours.
[00:57:53]  Wow.
[00:57:53]  After nine hours, we started to assert our custody at 10 a.m.
[00:57:59]  And we had the custody at around 6 p.m. for us to transfer in a proper morgue for the body to be cleaned and for the body to be conducted in autopsy.
[00:58:10]  So did they ever, I mean, was there a real investigation by the police who did it?
[00:58:15]  Two days after the incident, the government announced the government announced that they will create a task force, Randal Ichanis.
[00:58:28]  It is an interagency task force from the police, CIDG, the criminal investigation detection group, to conduct an investigation on the killing of Karandi.
[00:58:42]  So the task force, Randal Ichanis, is the government body that made supposedly the task to investigate the killing.
[00:58:55]  So we had several meetings between the task force Randal Echanis, the family, and the party to provide them with the circumstantial, to provide them who is Karandi, what is the job description of Karandi, what are his advocacy, etc., etc.
[00:59:16]  And after three or four meetings, we provided them the autopsy report, we provided them the death certificate and everything.
[00:59:26]  A month later, we followed up what is the status of the case, still under investigation.
[00:59:35]  Almost four years later, a few months ago, during Karandi's birth date, supposedly on April 27, we made also a follow-up.
[00:59:49]  We made a representation through the lawyer of Karandi, Karandi's wife, to ask on the status of the case.
[00:59:58]  But again, the answer was still under investigation.
[01:00:01]  And so, I mean, just from an outsider's point of view, it doesn't seem like it's under investigation.
[01:00:07]  Yes.
[01:00:07]  Seems like just like a bureaucratic thing to make you stop bugging them.
[01:00:11]  In fact, the documents that they have is because we provided them.
[01:00:14]  Yeah, exactly.
[01:00:16]  They did not do the effort, the proactive effort, to produce documents.
[01:00:24]  In fact, when we were asked who would you suspect to the killing of Karandi, of course, we said because the killing was done during the COVID-19 pandemic, movements were restricted.
[01:00:44]  Definitely, it's only authorized person.
[01:00:48]  Second, because Karandi's works is related to a known or a considered enemy of the state, the National Democratic Front of the Philippines is considered an enemy of the state.
[01:01:00]  Therefore, probably the killers were from security, state security forces.
[01:01:08]  And third, Nobody will benefit.
[01:01:14]  One less communist is one less communist for the government.
[01:01:17]  So when we relayed that answer to the prosecutors of members of the task force, Randall El Chalis, they were just laughing.
[01:01:28]  I mean, I have two more questions for you.
[01:01:30]  One is, Randall seems like one of many generally pretty elderly consultants for the NDF that has been murdered and certainly not the only one murdered in his sleep in the past five, six years.
[01:01:45]  I mean, this is a trend that seems to be like it's almost like a death sentence to become a peace consultant for the party.
[01:01:55]  I guess the real question I have is, you now have his old job.
[01:01:58]  I mean, you were a congressman in the Philippines for three years.
[01:02:02]  And I was there during the election, the last, like the presidential election.
[01:02:06]  And the red tagging I saw going on with Alec Paulos is out of this world and like this crazy weird propaganda leaflets and WhatsApp messages.
[01:02:15]  I mean you yourself I assume have been red tagged.
[01:02:18]  Red tagged, filed.
[01:02:21]  I faced several Trump up charges.
[01:02:23]  What are they charging you with?
[01:02:25]  One, they charged me of child abuse because we helped the Lumad children.
[01:02:31]  Oh, for the Lumad school.
[01:02:32]  Yeah, I talked to Faceliroda, the transfer of Lumad children from one place to another.
[01:02:39]  Then we were accused of exploiting those children.
[01:02:44]  So a child abuse case was filed against me.
[01:02:47]  Libel case was filed against me because of my statements against the government.
[01:02:53]  I was also charged with inciting to sedition.
[01:03:00]  I was charged with rebellion.
[01:03:04]  I was charged with usurpation of authority.
[01:03:11]  These five charges along the line of my political work were all dismissed.
[01:03:18]  Fortunately, we're all dismissed because we have good lawyers.
[01:03:22]  And definitely, I am very much innocent with these allegations, especially those ridiculous allegations like child abuse, rebellion.
[01:03:34]  I'm in Congress.
[01:03:36]  How can I rebel against the government when I am part of the government?
[01:03:40]  Those are ridiculous allegations.
[01:03:43]  Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[01:03:45]  I guess my last question is: are you afraid for your own life?
[01:03:49]  Well, aside from these Trump-up charges and judicial harassment cases, I have received multiple numerous death threats.
[01:04:02]  And in fact, I am jokingly part of the we call in the Philippines national refugees.
[01:04:13]  Why do you mean why national refugees?
[01:04:15]  Because I originally come from Mindanao, Davao City.
[01:04:21]  That's my hometown.
[01:04:22]  That's my home province.
[01:04:24]  But since I work with the party in 2014 and I was elected as member of the parliament in 2016 until 2019, after the 2019 term that I had and a consistent opposition of Duterte, I cannot go back to where we belong.
[01:04:47]  My hometown, Davao City, is the hometown also of Duterte.
[01:04:50]  What would happen if you went back to Davao City?
[01:04:53]  There are a lot of tarpaulins in the footbridges in Davao City that is indicating my face and my brother's face.
[01:05:05]  So wait, just for our audience to hear, there is in the place that you're from, they're hanging tarps, like giant banners with your face on it and your brother's face on it.
[01:05:18]  What do the tarps say?
[01:05:20]  Because my brother is allegedly, or not allegedly, he is a top-ranking leader of the CPP in Mindanao, NPA in Mindanao.
[01:05:33]  And because I am his brother and I am a known political opposition of the government, they wanted to show that one plus one.
[01:05:43]  Gotcha.
[01:05:45]  Eric Casilao, a known commander in Mindanao, Ariel Casilo, the brother of Eric Casilo, a known terrorist in the Philippines.
[01:05:54]  Gotcha.
[01:05:55]  And so they're trying to smear you as a terrorist.
[01:05:58]  But aside from that, streamer hanging, a lot of posters in the terminals.
[01:06:04]  Like the plane, like the airport terminals?
[01:06:06]  No, no, bus terminals.
[01:06:08]  They have posters of you hanging up in the bus terminals?
[01:06:10]  Leaflets, posters and leaflets.
[01:06:13]  And multiple death threats.
[01:06:16]  In fact, those death threats were all documented.
[01:06:19]  I have filed several manifestations in both police and court manifestations that I have received several death threats in the past.
[01:06:33]  Basically, in the social media, death threats are being peddled just like a normal routine.
[01:06:46]  I got messages from the social media: we will kill you.
[01:06:50]  You are a terrorist.
[01:06:51]  You are a defender of the terrorist.
[01:06:54]  Yeah, yeah.
[01:06:54]  And so there's just people messaging me all the time.
[01:06:57]  Like, okay, well, you might want to filter those messages a little bit.
[01:07:01]  That's why I'm called national refugee because I took refuge in the national capital region.
[01:07:07]  Yeah, because I cannot go home in Mindanao in Davao.

=== Build, Build, Build Laws (11:54) ===

[01:07:10]  You miss Mindanao, though.
[01:07:11]  Definitely.
[01:07:12]  I haven't been back in Davao city since 2019.
[01:07:17]  Wow.
[01:07:18]  So it's almost six years or five years that I haven't physically.
[01:07:27]  I lived in Davao for more than 40 years of my life.
[01:07:33]  So I'm 45 now.
[01:07:34]  You're 45?
[01:07:35]  Yeah, yeah.
[01:07:36]  Listeners, you can't see this guy.
[01:07:38]  I genuinely thought you were younger than me.
[01:07:41]  I'm 45.
[01:07:42]  Good God.
[01:07:44]  Wow.
[01:07:44]  Good job.
[01:07:47]  I guess death threats keep you young.
[01:07:48]  So who knows the three basic problems in the Philippines keeps me?
[01:07:53]  Okay, fair enough.
[01:07:57]  Yeah, given the three basic, what are the three basic problems in the Philippines?
[01:08:00]  Yeah, we have imperialism.
[01:08:03]  Of course, this is a semi-colonial U.S. policies are being implemented in the Philippines.
[01:08:11]  U.S. policies are being dictated.
[01:08:14]  And we have a puppet regime.
[01:08:18]  We call them puppet governments that bows down to the interests of the imperialist powers like the U.S.
[01:08:25]  We have feudalism.
[01:08:27]  Land monopoly is being controlled, monopolized, concentrated under the few hands of big landlords who are also in the government, who are also in the parliament.
[01:08:38]  They own big businesses.
[01:08:40]  They own big vast tracts of lands for purposes of not for food production, but for export orientation, agribusiness plantations like pineapple plantations, banana plantation, rubber plantations.
[01:08:56]  And we have a bureaucratic, we have, we call them bureaucrat capitalism.
[01:09:02]  We have a government that is governed, ruled by landlords and big bureaucrats.
[01:09:09]  So that's the three basic problems that we are facing in the Philippines.
[01:09:13]  And that's what keeps you going.
[01:09:15]  Yeah, yeah.
[01:09:16]  As long as this remains, there's no radical change, there's no genuine change of this system.
[01:09:26]  There are million reasons for us to continue to struggle.
[01:09:30]  Well, I really appreciate you taking the time to talk with me.
[01:09:33]  It's my pleasure.
[01:09:34]  Yeah, let's get back in there for the verdict.
[01:09:36]  Yeah.
[01:09:36]  Thank you very much.
[01:09:45]  Liz, one of the most insane things that I've heard during the past couple of days is that, and we talked about this a little bit from when I called in from the Philippines with those episodes.
[01:09:57]  Duterte had this program that was like build, build, build.
[01:10:00]  That's what it was called.
[01:10:01]  Exclamation points between every build.
[01:10:03]  That was essentially just a huge graph program to give money to, like his construction company buddies.
[01:10:08]  Nothing got built right right right, classic Bong Bong Marcos's program that replaced it.
[01:10:14]  That's the same program, same aim.
[01:10:16]  All all the same.
[01:10:17]  It's called Bong Bong Build no no, it's called uh uh.
[01:10:24]  It's called build better, more Bbm.
[01:10:30]  He needs to go to prison.
[01:10:33]  You can't be doing that.
[01:10:34]  You can't just replace a program that already exists.
[01:10:37]  It's a graph program with the same program, but you just change it to be your initials of your nickname.
[01:10:43]  Yeah.
[01:10:43]  I still think Bong Bong Build would be good.
[01:10:47]  Bongbong Build would be good.
[01:10:48]  Yeah.
[01:10:49]  Bongbong is just, I guess, like a really common nickname in the Philippines.
[01:10:52]  It could be like Be Better Build.
[01:10:55]  Be Better.
[01:10:56]  Be Best Build?
[01:10:57]  What was the?
[01:10:58]  It does kind of sound like very 2020, like COVID.
[01:11:02]  Yeah.
[01:11:02]  Build Back Better.
[01:11:04]  Well, that's Biden, right?
[01:11:06]  Yeah.
[01:11:06]  And also, weirdly, was, I believe, in Britain, too.
[01:11:11]  I think it was.
[01:11:12]  But what was the, what was the Melania?
[01:11:15]  Be best?
[01:11:16]  Be best.
[01:11:17]  I believe it was.
[01:11:18]  I'm always trying to be best.
[01:11:20]  I like that one.
[01:11:21]  I still really like that one.
[01:11:22]  Be best.
[01:11:24]  Well, I got to tell you who's not being the best is the goddamn armed force of the Philippines.
[01:11:28]  I heard so much crazy shit about them.
[01:11:31]  I bet.
[01:11:32]  I'll link to.
[01:11:32]  Hopefully by the time this episode's out, they'll have the full decision out.
[01:11:36]  But I came here, and I know I'm a little, sound a little punchy, but it's because I have not fucking slept in like four days.
[01:11:45]  The jury did find the U.S. and the Philippines guilty on all counts.
[01:11:52]  And there's going to be a release of evidence and of the witness statements and everything.
[01:11:59]  I think there's only a thing for press right now that I have, but there's going to be one that's released to the general public later.
[01:12:05]  If it's not done by the time this episode comes out, the next episode we have, that's an interview.
[01:12:11]  We'll put that out with that.
[01:12:13]  It is just one thing that really came up and that we've talked about on the show a lot is counterinsurgency.
[01:12:19]  I've heard the words counterinsurgency more in the past two days than I think I ever have in any forum in my life.
[01:12:26]  You know, there's the whole of nation counterinsurgency approach.
[01:12:30]  And both the Filipinos and some of the friends of the Filipinos who spoke this weekend were really adamant in stressing the point that so much of this is about hardening up the Philippines for a potential war with China and using it as a battleground and preparing for it as a battleground, whether that's having marine littoral, whatever forces there or just Have an invasion, whatever.
[01:12:59]  You know, there's the, there's increasing, increasing cooperation between the U.S. and the Armed Force of the Philippines, even as that same armed force is, is, list, there was this one girl, and I, I, I shouldn't call her a girl because I think she's like 21, but there was this one woman from the Philippines who spoke, who got up there and gave her testimony.
[01:13:19]  She must have been 5'1, maybe, I don't know, I can't, I don't know, weight, but she was very skinny, like 90 pounds or something.
[01:13:27]  And she is like an environmental activist, like very like, you know, she's got big, big glasses, like very kind of like, yeah, you know, like, I want to help the environment.
[01:13:35]  She's like trying to stop the pollution of Manila Bay because they want to build this like airport ship, which will never get built.
[01:13:43]  It's this Dutch company.
[01:13:44]  It's a whole big fucking scam.
[01:13:46]  And she was kidnapped off the street.
[01:13:50]  And they like, they said, I guess she was a little older than 21, maybe, but like they have her, they kidnap her.
[01:14:00]  They hold her in detention.
[01:14:01]  They like berate her.
[01:14:03]  They threaten to kill her frequently.
[01:14:04]  They're like, we're going to throw you and your friend in an unmarked grave.
[01:14:06]  Like your family will never hear from you, et cetera, et cetera.
[01:14:09]  Until she agrees to a press conference where she says that she is a guerrilla fighter and that she's surrendering.
[01:14:16]  I've never seen anything like this in my life.
[01:14:18]  This woman, her name is Janilla.
[01:14:20]  She gets up there in the press conference, and they played the press conference.
[01:14:24]  She gets up there and it's like supposed to be like, I am a guerrilla.
[01:14:26]  I'm so sorry, but I surrender now.
[01:14:30]  And she says, they kidnapped me.
[01:14:33]  I'm not a gorilla.
[01:14:34]  They're forcing me to say this.
[01:14:35]  Like, this is a complete fucking sham.
[01:14:38]  They're trying to disappear me.
[01:14:39]  And you can see like the colonel or whatever's face who's sitting next to her, like slowly dawning on him what she's saying.
[01:14:47]  And eventually it led to her release.
[01:14:49]  But, you know, they're trying to say that, you know, she's like an AK-47.
[01:14:53]  She called it, I think, an AN, AK-27.
[01:14:56]  And I'm like, all right, I don't think she's, I don't think she's a gorilla.
[01:15:01]  I think she might be just like a woman who really cares about the environment.
[01:15:06]  And it was really incredible to see, but it clearly very much traumatized this woman.
[01:15:12]  I was going to interview her, but I was like, I actually don't really want to bring this.
[01:15:16]  I would just be like making her cry the entire time because it's very, it's really hard for her.
[01:15:21]  It's, it's the flattening of non-combatants and combatants.
[01:15:26]  I don't know sometimes saying that, is so fucking like clearly against the laws of war, which the was stressed, like the, the, the, the Communist Party of the Philippines, the New People's Army say they, you know, they adhere to the Nuremberg Convention.
[01:15:42]  That's what they say.
[01:15:43]  They like, you know, the laws of war, et cetera, et cetera.
[01:15:46]  It is just so apparent that America is flooding arms and assistance and Drilling together with the Armed Force of the Philippines, who have absolutely nothing.
[01:15:58]  I mean, they're like a fucking gay.
[01:15:59]  It's like the NYPD, but the Army.
[01:16:04]  Totally crazy.
[01:16:05]  But I had also, I was just like, so impressed because everyone has that thing where they're like, I'm going to fucking get one on these guys that like kind of wrong me.
[01:16:12]  And this lady actually like really, she like went on TV and was like, humiliated this fucking army officer.
[01:16:18]  I can't imagine the amount of courage that must take like standing in front of those cameras and just deciding to go for it.
[01:16:25]  Totally.
[01:16:26]  I mean, yeah, really.
[01:16:27]  It's like a very young woman, too.
[01:16:29]  Just incredible.
[01:16:30]  I mean, just one thing that I learned, though, is you can get fined for talking shit in fucking the Philippines.
[01:16:39]  What do you mean?
[01:16:40]  You can get fined or jailed for being like, this guy's a piece of shit.
[01:16:45]  I looked it up.
[01:16:46]  I can't remember what the exact thing is, but it's like making disparaging remarks is a crime there.
[01:16:52]  Wait, it's a crime to be a hater?
[01:16:54]  It's a crime to be a fucking hater in the Philippines.
[01:16:58]  Not one more cent to them.
[01:17:04]  You know, when people are like, you know, I got a real problem with like hate crime laws.
[01:17:08]  This is what I'm talking about.
[01:17:10]  This is where it's hater crime laws.
[01:17:12]  Hater crime laws.
[01:17:13]  It's crazy.
[01:17:15]  My God.
[01:17:17]  Anyways, we should probably wrap up here.
[01:17:19]  I feel like this episode.
[01:17:20]  Yeah, we should.
[01:17:21]  There's more.
[01:17:21]  We've got more content coming from your time.
[01:17:24]  And I keep wanting to say in Bruges, even though you're not in Bruges.
[01:17:27]  No, and I still haven't seen it.
[01:17:30]  Is it good?
[01:17:30]  Should I watch it now?
[01:17:31]  Will it make me feel like I wish I went to Bruges?
[01:17:33]  Yes, it will.
[01:17:34]  And it is good.
[01:17:35]  It's a fun one.
[01:17:37]  It's a real romp.
[01:17:38]  I will say, you know what?
[01:17:40]  It's 7:30 right now.
[01:17:41]  I got to go to a wedding, so I'm flying back tomorrow.
[01:17:44]  I leave it like 11 and I get in at one.
[01:17:46]  I got to go straight to a fucking Russian Orthodox wedding.
[01:17:50]  My God.
[01:17:51]  What?
[01:17:52]  Why?
[01:17:52]  Who?
[01:17:53]  It's my friend.
[01:17:54]  These two people I know getting married.
[01:17:56]  What Russian Orthodox people do you know?
[01:17:58]  You can say their name on their show.
[01:18:00]  They're not like in robes and shit, but I guess he was raised Russian Orthodox.
[01:18:03]  They're having a wedding.
[01:18:04]  It's a Russian guy now.
[01:18:06]  And his non-Russian, but now Russian Orthodox wife.
[01:18:09]  But she can be.
[01:18:12]  I don't know.
[01:18:13]  And it's none of my business.
[01:18:14]  I just know.
[01:18:14]  I mean, it's.
[01:18:15]  Do they listen?
[01:18:15]  Sorry if I'm talking about them.
[01:18:17]  No, I don't know.
[01:18:18]  I'm not talking shit at all.
[01:18:19]  I have no idea.
[01:18:19]  I don't know what I'm saying.
[01:18:20]  I'm not talking shit.
[01:18:21]  I'm just asking questions.
[01:18:22]  I hope there's a guy with a brasier.
[01:18:23]  I hope there's a guy.
[01:18:24]  I'm not a brasier.
[01:18:25]  A brazier.
[01:18:26]  A what?
[01:18:27]  A brazier.
[01:18:28]  You know what I'm talking about.
[01:18:29]  He's not a brazier.
[01:18:31]  I hope there's a guy with a brazier.
[01:18:33]  Well, it's Manhattan, so who knows?
[01:18:36]  With like incense coming out of it and a crazy giant wooden cross.
[01:18:39]  You should make one of those for Zoomers called the Brozier.
[01:18:41]  The brochure.
[01:18:44]  But anyways, I'm going to have, I have a crazy 40 hours going up ahead of me.
[01:18:50]  You're always, there's chaos always coming off of you left and right.
[01:18:53]  I am, but I'm getting old, Liz.
[01:18:55]  I'm getting old, dude.
[01:18:56]  That's why you just fly in and go to bed.
[01:18:59]  I don't, I don't, I got on at 8 a.m.
[01:19:02]  You got to stay up?
[01:19:03]  You got to stay up?

=== Nodding Over Beef Stew (01:04) ===

[01:19:04]  I was nodding out.
[01:19:05]  I ordered beef stew the first night at a fucking, what's the thing that I like to go to that the gourmand goes to?
[01:19:14]  A brasserie.
[01:19:15]  Brosserie.
[01:19:16]  I went to a brosser.
[01:19:16]  Brazier again.
[01:19:18]  The brosserie, and I said, give me your beef stew.
[01:19:21]  And I was straight up like a crackhead, like nodding out at the table, waiting for it.
[01:19:27]  But I will say this too.
[01:19:28]  I saw American-style tweaker this morning, but she was, she was Walloonian.
[01:19:34]  Don't say Walloonian to me.
[01:19:36]  Well, I am Walloonian.
[01:19:37]  That's my culture.
[01:19:39]  My name is Bryce.
[01:19:40]  I'm Liz.
[01:19:41]  We are, of course, joined by producer Yank Chomsky.
[01:19:43]  And this has been Truan.
[01:19:46]  We'll see you next time.
[01:19:48]  Bye-bye.
[01:20:07]  Come out.
[01:20:08]  Come out.