When they see me holding fish, they can see that I am

The words of Imelda Marcos, once First Lady of the Philippines and a figure both admired and reviled, shimmer with paradox: “When they see me holding fish, they can see that I am comfortable with kings as well as with paupers.” In this strange yet evocative image, she presents herself as a bridge between worlds—the halls of royalty and the huts of the poor. The fish, simple and common, becomes her symbol: a token of humility, suggesting that even amid jewels and crowns, she could grasp what the lowly grasp every day.

The ancients often praised such gestures. In Rome, emperors would walk among the people, offering bread, shaking hands, and pretending to share in the life of common men. In China, sages taught that the ruler must eat the same rice as his subjects to prove his legitimacy. By holding the fish, Marcos sought to cast herself in that mold, as one who could move gracefully among kings yet still claim kinship with the paupers who bore the weight of her nation.

Yet behind the gesture lies irony. For Imelda, famed for her extravagance—her palaces, her thousands of shoes—invoked the humble image of fish to soften her grandeur. Like many rulers before her, she knew the power of symbolism, that one simple act could suggest compassion, relatability, and humility, even when reality told another story. Her fish was not merely food; it was theater, a tool to remind the people that their First Lady had not forgotten them.

Consider the story of Marie Antoinette, Queen of France, who once sought to appear closer to the common folk by playing the shepherdess at her estate, donning simple garments and tending sheep. To her, it was performance; to the people, it seemed mockery. The same danger haunted Imelda’s words: the gesture of humility, when made by the powerful, can inspire love or fuel resentment, depending on whether it is seen as sincerity or pretense.

Let the generations remember: the symbols a leader chooses matter greatly. A fish may suggest common ground, but it must be held with truth, not as mask. For kings and paupers alike can sense when gestures are hollow. Marcos’s words reveal an ancient lesson—that power often cloaks itself in images of humility, but true greatness is not in holding fish for show, but in breaking bread with the poor in spirit and in deed.