A view to “the gates to hell”

Watching the “Umagang kay Ganda” morning show on ABS-CBN this morning, I recoiled at the sight of MMDA workers under the direct supervision of Atty. Francis Tolentino clearing out the sludge in drainage canals of Manila. It was so dirty, and even on the TV screen, I could almost smell the stench of rotten garbage that is a familiar sight and odor in the national capital. Then the TV camera moved to shots of informal settler shanties underneath bridges and on riverbanks.. One doesn’t need to see the inside of these shanties to comprehend the human congestion that live there. Precisely the scene described in the book “Inferno” by Dan Brown.