And Thus Endeth The Practicum
Wednesday, May 17, 2006
Subic was disappointing. The buildings were bland and there were hardly any people. The only remotely interesting thing we did was visit the Olongapo crime lab, this dingy room on the second floor of a wet market, as makeshift as any other government office. (I’ll give them points for uniformity; I’ve never been in a government office that didn’t seem to be made entirely of plywood, didn’t have potted plastic plants on graying doilies and didn’t have overexposed photographs of the president or the mayor to convince its occupants that yes, you’re working for the government and yes, that makes you very, very dignified, so please, sit down and pretend to file something.) The only sign it was a crime lab were the little baggies of drug samples (the marijuana sample was missing, by the by) tacked onto a cartolina like a third-grade geology project.
Edilberto, the beer belly-in-charge, took the evidence from the rape case out of this broom closet, taking each piece out of their crushed brown envelopes with his bare hands. I saw the bottle of Pale Pilsen the victim drank from, the victim’s jeans, the Marine’s condom wrapper, etc. That was as fascinating as the trip got.
What saved the day were the hours I spent spacing out on the long, dark stretches of road. That did me a lot of good, as always.
posted by marguerite @ 11:51 PM
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