On Advent's first Sunday, star lanterns and Christmas belens deck this town. These brings out, the "tambourine brigade:" scrawny kids who bang flattened bottle caps, tacked to sticks, to accompany off-key carols, as they cadge for a few pesos from passers-by.

These grimy "street troubadours" never heard of Magdalo mutineers. Midweek, Magdalos barged into a Makati hotel to seek the President's ouster by "withdrawal of support" - their support. And who else?

People didn't scramble for the barricades, in July 2003, when 321 soldiers, led by Lt. (now senator) Antonio Trillanes, took over Makati's Oakwood hotel. The mutiny collapsed in less than 24 hours.

If both would short circuit our recovered constitutional processes. Trillanes & Co. would thereby remolded this country into the image of Burma and Pakistan of the juntas.

But all these mean nothing to often food-short kids who should be in school. Here, 22 percent of people are undernourished. Compare that to Malaysia's two percent. Poor nutrition stunts almost a half (47 percent) of kids in Negros Occidental and Northern Samar. They're dwarfed by better fed kids in Beijing, Seoul or Hong Kong. Are many of them frailer, and academically slower than their Malayasian, Korean or Singaporean counterparts? Why?

Poverty forces 33, out of every 100, to quit school before reaching Grade 6. "From grades 5 through the end of high school, boys drop out 2 to 2.5 times more than girls," former education Juan Miguel Luz points out. But these kids care is Christmas nets them larger tips.

"Christmas is the only time I know of when men and women seem, by one consent, to open their shut-up hearts freely," Charles Dickens wrote in 1843. But the tambourine brigade never heard of Dickens, much less read his tale of Christmases past, present and yet to come.

They can't read. Surveys show most students begin to read - and comprehend - only by Grade 4.

If you've read this far, you're not deprived. Your children and grandchildren never romped with the "tambourine brigade": Chances are they've stumbled across "A Christmas Carol," even if only on their DVDs. But Dickens urges us: Be like the re-engineered Scrooge. See the poor, "not as another race of creatures, bound on other journeys, but fellow passengers to the grave."

Today, there are about 89 million Filipinos. (That's what the ongoing census is likely to report) And 14.5 million are locked into incomes of less than a dollar (P42.8 pesos at current exchange rates) a day. That deprivation explains the tambourine brigade.

Penury is so widespread, we take its devastation for granted. Lazarus at the gate blends unseen into the woodwork. And treadmill squabbles by our "leaders" - the Glorias, Eraps, De Venecias, Villars, Lacsons and yes, our generals - blind us Their self-seeking agendas abort what makes for a humane society.

Tiene cara de hambre. ("You have the face of hunger") the young boy tells the Crucified in the film Marcelino, Pan Y Vino. It may strip our blinders if we make an effort to locate the tambourine brigade in context. How?

One is to live among the poor. Those preparing for the Catholic priesthood today must live and work among laborers, farmers, fishermen, for a year. Ordinary families share, without publicity, their modest resources for the needy. And some use their skills to strip away self-serving slogans like "Erap Para Sa Mahirap."

Where they live makes a difference even in how long these kids will survive. Overall, life expectancy for Filipinos is now 70.2 years. But it is 81 for Japanese. The disparity shows what is possible. "That a man's reach should exceed his grasp; Or what's a heaven for?" Rabbi Ben Ezra asked.

"Life expectancy, in all provinces, rose, with one sorry exception: Maguindanao. But provincial disparities continue to be large," Philippine Human Development Report notes.

Tambourine whackers in Cebu, Pampanga, Camarines Sur or La Union live where life expectancy is 70 years plus. That's a decade longer than for carolers in Antique, Apayao, Basilan plus western and eastern Samar. Sulu. In Tawi-Tawi or Lanao del Sur, the gap is two decades.

Life expectancy dropped to 52 in one province: Maguindanao, Camarines Sur, Nueva Ecija and Davao del Sur overtook Rizal in stretching life spans. Davao Oriental posted the heftiest increase: 1.7 years. So did Leyte, North Cotabato, Bukidnon and Camarines Sur. But Antique, the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao provinces, plus Kalinga and, Apayao, are among tailenders.

Lack of basic items like safe water is another cause. In Masbate, 66 percent of people use open, easily-contaminated wells. In contrast, 96 percent of Batanguenos have reliable water sources. Quality of medical facilities vary widely.

"Shortened lives and premature graves is the lot of tambourine kids. Yet, they could have been doctors, priests, pilots or teachers. In each of them, "Mozart is murdered," Antoine de Saint-Euxpery.

And on Christmas, "when we give one another our presents in His name," Sigrid Undset writes, "let us remember that He has given us the sun and the moon and the stars, the earth with its forests and mountains and oceans and all that lives and moves upon them.

"He has given us all green things and everything that blossoms and bears fruit - and all that we quarrel about and all that we have misused.

"And to save us from our own foolishnesses, and from all our sins, He came down to Earth and gave Himself "Venite adoremus Dominum."

(E-mail: juan_mercado@boholchronicle.com)