Bisaya Bloggers

After the disappointing founders’ lineup of activities, the gathering of familiar faces, and the frequent cupping of our chins with our hands to quote someone, myriad of thoughts have already crowded my mind.

HIT 1: My manuscript has finally been sent. I’m keeping my fingers crossed also hoping that my fellow Hipons and Katsubongs would get into the workshop. Reunion, please!

HIT 2: I am not actually sure but there are some things that existed but not entirely visible. Where is it? When is it? How is it? Never mind, it’s not worth anything—just my diploma.

HIT 3: Someone is not well and nothing makes me more worried than not knowing what to do. Get the feeling? I hope not—consistent “hug hug” is not enough. And another someone is acting weird today. Or is it just me? Well, I need to breathe for the apple dies beyond room temperature.

HIT 4: I just couldn’t get why some people have not yet learned the basics of what is a basic! Such mindless authority they have….

HIT 5: Shakespeare in my room may look brilliant and dorky but is he enough to create a divine spark? Anyway, I’m hanging him on the office wall someday.

HIT 6: Three more issues and the Weekly Sillimanian’s blood this first semester is drying up.

HIT 7: The semester is going to end and my play hasn’t realized it needs to end. Yes, my work has a mind of its own.

HIT 8: The semester is going to end and I haven’t written any letter for Dark Blue Southern Seas, inviting alumni and other acquaintances to submit their literary works.

HIT 9: The semester is going to end and I only have four pieces yet that passed the standards of my poetry teacher. At least, “Rain March” proved to be the best among my list of first drafts.

HIT 10: This cycle of monotony is really getting into me. I need a break!

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Web hosting used to be a service that can be had through an intermediary. But as more and more individuals go into self-publishing with blogs and personal websites, the more intrepid home-based publishers are now being presented with a myriad of choices on where to host their blog or website.

My advice is to seek three things. Price, guarantee of availability, and word-of-mouth recommendation.

Price is always a consideration, as self-publishing may not necesarily be expensive. Shared hosting will meet your needs, but you need to know that it means that there may be more of you sharing the same webspace than you think. The downside here is if you chance upon a webhost that is not as secure as the average provider, your site can go down even if its another site that gets hacked.

Guarantee of availability is knowing how often in a year your site can go down within the stated service level agreements presented by your potential webhost. Self-publishers do not really need webhosting that can offer 99.999% uptime reliability with the accompanying hefty price. Cheap web hosting doesn’t necessarily mean frequent downtime. A web hosting service that guarantees 99.6% uptime means that you can be down only for as long as one weekend in a year, and that they’re going to get your site back up by Monday morning.

But if you know several other people who have gone out and actually bought hosting on their own with their trusty credit cards and have been blogging or publishing for more than a year, go ahead and ask them for their stories. They can tell you their own experiences with a particular webhosting service. They will be as valuable to you as you make the final decision of where to host your own blog or website. Knowing who to avoid is almost as good as knowing where to go.

I have always been of the opinion that corporate gifts should be useful, something the recipient can use everyday until it wears out or breaks, or better yet something that, with adequate care, will not break at all. This is always preferred by most recipients, myself included. Promotional items must always have a practical reason for being. Usefulness always outweighs (and outlives) novelty.

This may spell the difference between the branded pen and the branded lanyard. Each may both advertise your products, but the pen is more likely to break than the lanyard, and the pen will definitely run out of ink before the lanyard breaks, and the lanyard is more visible when it is worn around the neck compared to the pen which is kept in a pocket or in a bag.

In the corporate setting, products may be promoted according to business type. Mugs may be more welcome than USB drives in an office that is not focused on the use of computers. The usefulness of a USB hub is lost in an office that does not have any practical use for it. There are universal gifts such as umbrellas and caps, useful as the weather calls for them. It’s the discerning company that goes with the best ideas for promoting their products.

“You looked so sad! Why are you so depressed?”

Goodness gracious. No matter how hard I cover up my unhappy state with molar-to-molar smiles and gaily attitude, these articles of unwanted tension stemming from something that was ought to be forgotten just naturally exuded from my being. Last Saturday—when I, Marianne, and Donna left the sweet confines of Sans Rival—I heard that statement above being called out from afar. I thought the call was for someone else but upon knowing from whom the message was my happy mask simply got off my face like a limp banana-peel. He was a teacher; someone who I thought only had the command of reading great literature but also of reading depressed auras. (Nah, the latter part is just a joke.) As for the query, I didn’t know what to answer so I just flashed my metal-wrought pearly whites for added arrogance and disbelief. I was not sure if it worked, though. Anyways, I realized I'm bad at pretending nowadays.

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One of the more encouraging articles I have read about weight loss is Losing Weight By Drinking Water by Pete Koerner.

When you are drinking enough water, you simply don’t get hungry as often. Besides the fact that most of the times you think you’re hungry, you’re really thirsty, having water in your stomach sends a signal that you are “full.” You won’t want to eat with a stomach full of water. As you become hydrated, you’ll notice yourself eating less, losing weight, feeling better, healthier, and more flexible, and having more energy and vitality. As you find yourself with more energy and flexibility (hydrated cells are flexible cells…), you will find yourself wanting to become more active - adding to your overall health and fitness.

How many times have I heard this and ignored it, opting instead to try out diet pills and at some point not eating rice. Nice to know now that I can eat rice and still loose weight just by drinking more water.

Excuse me while I refill my tumbler.

This site will be undergoing a few major technical adjustments in the next few hours.

Please bear with us.

My young co-worker Leila is getting married in October and her entire family is in the swirl of preparations for the momentous event. The wedding invitations are being designed, the caterers have been selected, Leila herself has picked a gown from a catalog for her chosen dressmaker to fashion out of miles of silk and tulle.

I love looking at young folk when they are swept in preparations such as these. I have looked teary-eyed at young moms-to-be preparing hand made birth announcements. Friends with young families who mail me their holiday photo cards, which is always a surprise, because it feels so different to receive real tangible mail handed over to you with a smile by your old postman.

With the internet came email, then e-cards and e-vites. I didn’t realize how much I missed real envelopes that contained a solid baby shower invitation or a holiday photo card until I got one from my cousin Hilda. She and her husband Exie always sent an update on their family goings-on every Christmas. It’s actually one of the things I look forward to during the holidays, almost as much as I look forward to the noche buena treats.

Never thought I’d see the day when I’d win anything — ANYTHING — on the internet. No, I did not win a gazillion dollars for my bank account, but something that can mean a lot of interesting visits across the blogosphere.

I won 2000 Entrecard Credits! I had blogged about the new features available at Entrecard, which among others include the consolidation of multiple blogs into one account, their e-book Say Hello to the Blogosphere!, and using the RSS feed for the Top Ten droppers on my blog.

This morning I got a short but really sweet email saying I’ve won 2000 EC Credits and sure enough when I checked my Dashboard, there they were! I had all but depleted my credits when I went on an ad-buying spree the other day, but now I have 2000 EC Credits!

Yey!

Having been raised by a yaya (nanny) I had at one time promised myself never to get a yaya for my kids when the time came. This was not because I had a horrible experience with my nanny, on the contrary. My aunt, the one I lived with for most of my childhood life, worked full time as a government employee and when I went to live with my parents my dad worked full time as well. My yaya WAS my mom for most of my working hours, and this was a sort of love-hate relationship that I guess most daughters have with their own mothers.

This is why I always either gape in horror or shake my head incredulously when I hear about yayas being cruel to the kids that they look after. Some parents, to avoid incidents such as these, go to agencies to hire their nannies and even install a nanny camera in the house just to make sure that the nanny isn’t maltreating their kids. I think that’s a bit extreme, becoming necessary only if the parent(s) have not had enough time to personally assess the new nanny. It takes

The thing is, my first yaya was my father’s yaya, she was fourteen when she first joined my grandmother’s household, and she took care of my dad, the youngest in the brood, because my grandmother worked full time as a modista (fashion designer/dressmaker). This was a time when no one had even imagined the existence of a nanny camera. Moms knew their nanny personally, and usually she was either a younger sibling or cousin, and part of her salary would be her tuition in a nearby school.

When I had to work full time I had to get a yaya for Maui, who was then 5 years old. I had the good fortune of finding someone who knew how to deal with kids and was quite likeable. In fact I have always considered myself lucky when it came to finding someone who would look after my kids, which is something that is apparently not shared by other moms I know who have had to find nannies. I had quite the same luck with Ate Beng, whom I have blogged about a few times, and who is practically Maia’s second mom. Nope, a nanny camera won’t be necessary for me, thank you.

I’ve always found it curious that a country such as the Philippines that can get so hot in the summer months can boast of the largest skating rink in Asia. Each time I’m at an SM Mall with a skating rink I get a glimpse of these young boys and girls, graceful in their skate shoes, sliding across the ice just like I’ve seen Lyn Holly Johnson in the movies, and Dorothy Hamill and the statuesque Katarina Witt on television, and I wonder how did our kids get to be so good, after all it’s not something you can do in your backyard. It brings to mind the Disney movie Cool Runnings, which was the story of the Jamaican bobsled team which debuted in the Canadian Winter Olympics in 1988.

My favorite new toy—the Entrecard—just came out with a spanking new feature today, the ability to link more than one blog to your existing Entrecard account.

Until today, if you ran more than one blog or website and wanted an Entrecard badge on each one you’d have to get a separate account for each blog or website. Not anymore.

You can link up all your sites where you have the Entrecard widget and consolidate them in one account. To go from one account to another, you just click on the Switch link that you can see beside your logged in account name at the top right corner of the header.

You can also see all your linked blogs by clicking on the new Linked Blogs tab on the dashboard. On the Linked Blogs page, you can also Switch Entrecard accounts by clicking on the Switch To link beside the blog name and credits. You will know which account you are currently logged into, as it will be marked as Active in the Linked Blogs page.

You can read more of the new feature in the Entrecard Blog.

One of my dreams is to be able to make enough moolah to give our bedroom an air of romance. Not that we don’t have enough romance going on, but I just think it would be nice to come home to comfortable yet classy bedroom furniture.

The house we live in was built in the late 60s, so I suppose modern bedroom furniture is out of the question. I prefer rounded edges and soft cushions and covers that can be removed, washed and replaced. I like cushions on chairs and sofas and even on the floor, although the dust pit where we live in keeps me from going all out on the fluffy stuff.

Contemporary bedroom furniture seems to be the answer, if only I’d be able to find pieces that will blend in with the high ceilings and the wide windows of the inner sanctum which we call our retreat. Now if only finances weren’t an issue…

I’m going to sing another if-only song, this tme in honor of my oft-unmadeup face, mainly due to the lack of natural acne treatment in my teen-age years when I needed it. Don’t get me wrong, I have tried applying makeup to this tired old face on special occasions in the years past, but I’ve always woken up to zits galore the morning after.

If only there’d been a way for me back then to have had instant treatment without having to worry about the consequences both to my parents’ pockets and my social life, perhaps I may have grown up in to a more well-rounded, unself-concious young adult.

But then again maybe not.

The computer, boon and bane of my middle age, has not only taken away my ability to write legibly, it has also made me forget about adequate lighting. These days, adequate lighting for me is the one that comes on when I hit the Fn and PgUp keys on my office-issue IBM T43.

Along with forgetting about desk lamps and the need to actually see where I’m going, the computer has also made me forget how to read a book. Not an eBook, but one made of ink and paper and glue. The last piece of reading material I bought was a Reader’s Digest December Issue in Christmas of 2007 and I still haven’t read it from cover to cover, the way I did when I was younger and had all the time in the world and NO computer.

It’s only a matter of discipline, you might tell me. I really shouldn’t bring the darn laptop home after working on it the entire day, only to work some more on it in the evening. I should find a book that I know I would really like, one from my list of favorite authors, and then curl up in bed with it, turn on the house of troy lighting and start reading.

Which reminds me. I need new glasses.

Finally visited the Paco Park (when it was open), as part of Sam’s mother’s day treat for me. Didn’t have much time to sit and ruminate under the shade of the old acacia trees because we had Maia the whirling dervish with us, but we did get to walk both the outer and inner circles of the concentric cemetery. And take pictures.

Paco Park Entrance Archway Detail

Ama and Maia at the Inner Circle of tombs.

The Fountain and the Church of St. Pancratius

Maia and Ate Beng do a Ta-daah! at the Inner Circle Steps

This is the marker that was erected where our National Hero Jose Rizal was first buried after his execution at Bagumbayan Field. If you check out the wikipedia entry on the Paco Park you will see that the photo on that page is of the wrong marker.

This is the Gomburza Marker, which on the wikipedia entry on Paco Park is mistakenly introduced as the Marker for what used to be the tomb of Jose Rizal.

This is the inscription at the archway of the entrance of the Park. I have Googled for every possible spelling for the first word: beatiaorium, beatiaortum, beatiaortura — it may even be in Latin. What it means is something that escapes me right now, as much as the name John immediately under that word. If there is anyone out there who happens to read this post and can enlighten me, please leave a comment below.

Related reading:

• The immortal charm of Paco Cemetery
• Robert Gardner’s Paco Cemetery Park, Manila - Oasis in Stone
• Paco Park Map on the National Parks Development Committee Website.
• Paco Park Manila

The advent of the Internet and email has completely changed the way we communicate with other people. When before we would have pen pals and engage in stamp collecting (an offshoot of having pen-pals from abroad), today we send email and digital photos over the Internet. Which brings me to the question: Is the mailbox obsolete?

For some people it may be true. While occassional bills still find their way into my mail box they have web-based counterparts which I take care of directly from the online banking facility that my bank provides. For purposes of bills and bills payment, mailboxes may indeed be unncessesary in this day and age.

On the other hand, offices that still require hard copies both for their filing system and therefore from their clients or subscribers as well, the mail box is alive and well and still being stuffed. And I suppose, until the personal digital signature has been perfected to the point where identity theft is impossible, I think the mailbox will be around for the next few decades.

I remember the old houses in which I had the privilege to live. They had high ceilings, expansive living areas, and front lawns. They even had carports even if the owners didn’t have a car. I suppose this was standard design back in the 50’s and the 60’s, when middle class Manila had the space and the materials to spare.

It may have been in the mid-70’s when houses became more compact. Lower celings, carports that doubled as garages, and gardens that looked more like closets. I suppose this was because builders were starting to feel the economic crunch and space had become scarce.

If one walked leisurely down Buendia Avenue (as if one could) and looked at the buildings that have sprouted side by side in anachronistic order one could tell what year an edifice came to life, just by the design. Low concrete buildings squeezed in between high-rise metal buildings. Glass windows framed in aluminum on the checkered faces of steel buildings.

Some of the old buildings, rendered obsolete by today’s commercial requirements, have disappeared. Either literally torn down and ripped to its foundations or given a radical facelift (such as the Insular Life Building at the corner of Ayala Ave. and Paseo), the necessity of change and renewal has given old avenues that I knew as a child a face that still awes me even as I traverse its sidewalks today.

*Photos from lakbaypilipinas.com

Most gadgeteers will not rest until they have had the latest most recent model of the gadget(s) that they are currently into. I have a few friends who cannot sleep, who sweat cold beads while looking at the website or catalog page of the latest model cellphone or music player, and can only breathe a sigh of content when they have the latest model in their hands.

Around the time when that happens, I hover along the sidelines. This is the time when my friends are ready to dispose of the earlier version gadget and so use the funds from the sale to partly fund the new acquisition. The soon-to-be-disposed-of gadget will now be sold for somewhere between 50-70% of its original price, which to me is just fine, if the gadget comes complete with its box, manuals and other original paraphernalia.

This was more or less the conditions by which Sam now has an iPod Shuffle Orange. My officemate and lunch parter Abi had a friend who wanted to buy Abi’s pre-owned iPod nano 4GB and therefore was selling her iPod Shuffle. Abi was selling hers so she could get the iPod nano 8GB. And so there I was on the sidelines more than happy enough to catch the discarded iPod Shuffle Orange for the same price that I would shell out for a day’s trip to the mall.

So now Sam sits at his computer with his ears wired into his iPod Orange (which he prefers to see as Bronze) and when I sit on the table in front of him I will have to wave at him before speaking to him so he can take off the earphones, because he won’t hear me when he’s tuned into CSNY.

I just hope he won’t turn into one of those wired zombies whom I sit beside with on the bus every now and then, who have their players turned up so high that I can hear what’s playing. On top of that some of them actually start singing along. Imagine your seatmate singing along with Green Day while Chris-Tsuper and Nicole-lehiyala are on their raucous spiel on Love Radio and you’ll get an idea of how some of my mornings are, on the way to work.

Got this about an hour ago from my cousin who normally doesn’t send me serious stuff. I’m supposed to forward this by email as well, but it may get more exposure here.

I took the test before I put this here, deciding to do so after being encouraged by the results. I didn’t realize how much I’d changed over the years. If I had taken this test five years ago I would have answered so much differently.

How you gonna see me now
Please don’t see me ugly babe
‘Cause I know I let you down
In oh so many ways

Albert Hofmann, father of mind-altering drug LSD, dies at 102

GENEVA – Albert Hofmann, the father of the mind-altering drug LSD whose medical discovery grew into a notorious “problem child,” has died. He was 102.

Hofmann died Tuesday at his home in Burg im Leimental, said Doris Stuker, a municipal clerk in the village near Basel where Hofmann moved following his retirement in 1971.

Hofmann’s hallucinogen inspired – and arguably corrupted – millions in the 1960s hippie generation. For decades after LSD was banned in the late 1960s, Hofmann defended his invention.

“I produced the substance as a medicine. … It’s not my fault if people abused it,” he once said.

I’m on my way, it’s you I turn to
How many days have I to love you
I got to say this is inside me
I’ve got to have someone to guide me
Hate it when you leave, hate it when you leave
Hate it when you’re leaving me

Hofmann himself took the drug – purportedly on an occasional basis and out of scientific interest – for several decades.

“LSD can help open your eyes,” he once said. “But there are other ways – meditation, dance, music, fasting.”

Her dog day’s just begun
Now everybody is on the run
What did her daddy do?
It’s Janie’s last I.O.U.
She had to take him down easy and put a bullet in his brain
She said ’cause nobody believes me. The man was such a sleeze.
He ain’t never gonna be the same.

Even so, the self-described “father” of LSD readily agreed that the drug was dangerous if in the wrong hands. This was reflected by the title of his 1979 book: “LSD - my problem child.”

In it he wrote that, “The history of LSD to date amply demonstrates the catastrophic consequences that can ensue when its profound effect is misjudged and the substance is mistaken for a pleasure drug.”

Ako’y may kaibigan
at sya’y nahihirapan
handa na ba kayong lahat
upang sya’y tulungan
Ang himig natin
ang inyong awitin
upang tayo’y magsama-sama
sa langit ng pag-asa

Hofmann’s last public appearance was at a Basel ceremony honoring him on his 100th birthday.

“This is really a high point in my advanced age,” Hofmann said. “You could say it is a consciousness-raising experience without LSD.”