Daghang Salamat Pagadian!

Nov. 22 – 28, 2010: They say Pagadian is the Little Hong Kong of the South, for me, it’s a place which smells of watermelon, grass and the sea. I was greeted with rain when I arrived on the 22nd – Monday and my memories of Pagadian revolved around circling the city on board Sir Danny and Nat’s motorcycle, of course with Fred and Hicut’s motorcycles as well, with the beautiful volunteers of Pagadian City chapter, it really made me wonder, there seems to be a lot of beautiful girls in this city. :-)

And there’s also the weird tricycle, where its sidecar is tilted for about 30-45 degrees, it’s a bit hard to board it, but they say, that’s how they cope with the slopes of the city – it reminds me of Benguet actually. I had the chance to roam around the city on Friday, after a few days of helping Danny during the training, and with Nat’s help, we circled 3 municipalities of Zamboanga Sur, and then on Sunday, had a feastful breakfast at Kumalarang – another municipality.

Thanks to everyone – the participants who were able to bear with me despite the language differences, the staffs of PRC Pagadian, the beautiful and handsome volunteers of PRC, and the rest of the madlang tao who have given their kindness in any form. Daghang Salamat, hope to see you again!

"The nicest thing for me is sleep, then at least I can dream." — Marilyn Monroe

Today's poverty is yesterday's unaddressed vulnerability. - DMC Antique, Aug. 2010

Midnight Musings

What to do on a sleepless midnight? Write down your thoughts...

2010 is going to end very soon, as each day passes very quickly. I have been preparing for the trip to Pagadian City this coming Monday and I am so preoccupied and excited about this new place to visit. I’m going to Mindanao, a beautiful place masked by a dark facade of religious controversy and civil strife, where the family of my Father came from – Sultan Kudarat – his stories revolves around images of poverty, conflict with Muslim people, land grabbing, and militarism. That is why in the later part of his youth, they transferred here to Luzon, despite meagre income opportunities, and they survived, that is why I’m here.

The training in Pagadian City is Community Based Disaster Management Training. I guess it should have been easier have I not watched 11th Hour nor The Inconvenient Truth. Watching these films gave me the burden of always linking DM with Climate Change – which should always be the case, actually. I remember JP during the last time we met (on his birthday), he mentioned that their organization is dealing with Climate Change politics, not really Disaster Management, and I was then asking ‘Why not?’ – his organization saw the links, have weighed, and lead them to deal with CC politics – which I think in ‘our’ organization, what can we actually do, or what have we been doing so far? In the local arena, how are our chapters capacitated to deal with Climate Change issue, or shall we deal with this issue knowing that no matter how we change our lifestyle into loving Mother Earth, we still cannot do so much unless the US signs and ratifies the agreements?

With all these questions, looking back at the last 10 months of experience with the organization, I’m thrilled that at last, at least, I will have the chance to share the lessons I have learned and practised – in Pangasinan, Benguet and most especially, in Zambales.

Danny Cabalyero will be my best friend in Pagadian. It’s going to be one week of stay, and I guess I’m ready for it.

Christmas is near, and still, we haven’t put up some decorations. Things are going smoothly in the house, and I’m looking forward to go home by Christmas in Aurora, hope there’s no disaster at that time, so we’ll all have a disaster-free Xmas. I really wanted to go home, and just relax, my Mom said the cat – Sascha is big already – that’s one of the things to motivate me to go home.

The 11th Hour

Rating:	★★★★★
Category:	Movies
Genre:	Documentary

See below selected and compiled reviews about this film, a must-see!
...
Salon.com

A haunting, elegiac history of how human beings have brought the planet to the edge of a precipice, and call upon an impressive array of thinkers to discuss how, and whether, we can avoid the abyss that waits below.
...
New York Times
Manohla Dargis

An unnerving, surprisingly affecting documentary about our environmental calamity [that] is such essential viewing.
...
Richard Roeper
Ebert and Roeper

A sobering look at the astounding changes in our planet over the last generation -- and the bleak future that awaits us if we don’t get our act together.
...
San Francisco Chronicle
Joe Garofoli

Best put by Bay Area entrepreneur and environmentalist Paul Hawken: "The best thing about the dilemma we're in is that we get to reimagine every single thing we do. And so there are two ways of looking at that: Oh, my gosh, what a big burden. The other way to look at it, which is the way I prefer, is: "What a great time to be born! What a great time to be alive! Because this generation gets to essentially completely change the world."
...
Detroit Full Press
Terry Lawson

It benefits the most by providing good advice and an abundance of well-considered ideas from forward thinkers of all stripes and persuasions who refuse to give up hope.
...
TreeHugger

The 11th Hour examines the human relationship with earth from its earliest glimmers of innovation, to the challenges humanity faces in the present, to the possibilities of the future.”
...
Variety

“True to its doom-laden title, global-warming doc "The 11th Hour" presents the viewer with reams of depressing data, loads of hand-wringing about the woeful state of humanity and, finally, some altogether fascinating ideas about how to go about solving the climate crisis.”
...
Chicago Reader

The filmmakers take pains not to foster fatalistic gloom, concentrating on some of the progressive solutions still available to us.
...
Toronto Star

If Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth was a warning, The 11th Hour is the red alert.
...
Killer Movie Reviews

Nothing less than a complete rethinking of the relationship between humankind and the planet on which it lives. Complex, challenging, mind-expanding, and sometimes mind-blowing
...
About.com

Among recent documentaries questioning the status quo, The 11th Hour takes the most far-reaching point of view and connects issues into larger patterns, culminating in a truly global call for change.
...
Metromix.com

Manages to be serious without being extreme in its message that global warming is no longer something to be debated but addressed and fought NOW.
...
Montreal Gazette

“Leonardo DiCaprio's environmental film presents a concept of frugality that doesn't preach living cheaply.”
...

I promise myself I'm going to have a healthy (but not the so-ideal type) lifestyle starting this week. No more occassional cigarettes, not so much alcohols during sessions, and eat healthy stuffs in moderate amounts. Its not a promise that is meant to be broken (for the meantime). :-)

The First Time I Loved Forever

I was checking the list of songs that I’ve been listening to back in 2006 and one was this song by Melanie Safka. I remember it was also one of the theme songs for Beauty and the Beast – my favourite fairy tale. The song was derived from a poem by EE Cummings “Somewhere I have Never Traveled, Gladly Beyond”. I like it so much, it keeps on ringing on my head.

The First Time I Loved Forever
Poem:
 
“Somewhere I have never traveled
Gladly beyond any experience
Your eyes have their silence
And your most frail gesture of things
Which enclose me
But which I cannot touch
Because they are too near.”
The first time I loved forever
Was when you whispered my name
And I knew at once you loved me
For the me of who I am

The first time I loved forever
I cast all else aside
And I bid my heart to follow
Be there no more need to hide

And if wishes and dreams
Are merely for children
And if love's a tale for fools
I'll live the dream with you

Poem:
“oh, if your words be to close me
I, my life will shut, very beautifully
Suddenly, as when the heart of this flower
Imagines the snow carefully, everywhere
descending”.

For all my life and forever
There's a truth I will always know
When my world divides and shatters
Your love is where I'll go

Poem:
“I do not know what it is about you that closes
and opens. Only something in me understands
the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses.
Nobody, not even the rain has such small hands.”

DMC San Jose, Antique - Aug 15-30 2010

San Jose, Antique: August 2010

Undas @ Aliaga, N. E.

It was more than a year that I wasn't able to visit the hometown of my mother, and since then, a lot of things have changed. Thanks to the long weekend, and to the fact that my grandmother started undergoing dialysis - my 'always cancelled' plan to go there was now fulfilled, and I hope to visit her as often as I could. My cousins (just a few years older than me) have babies already, one of them "Shane' looks just like me when I was an infant.

I miss my grandfather, and being in their house once again brought back lots of his memory. He fought very hard way back then against diabetes and all its complications. And he left us unwillingly. He was strong, and gentle, and he had a good and happy life.

"True humanity lies not so much in protecting myself and my own from others, as in protecting others from myself." - Got this from one Red Cross reading..

Post 25th Bday Nyt @ Mugen

Thanks so much for everyone who greeted me on my 25th birthday. Salamat talaga. My whole year of being 24 was spectacular. With all the new people I’ve met, and everyone who inspired me and changed me into a better person, I guess there’s more to come in the coming years! Cheers everyone!

Pictures below: me and Willy at Mugen (Metrowalk) the night after my birthday. Great RnB club, great band playing (of course) RnB songs. Nice crowd as well. We didn’t stay long though, kase may liquor ban starting 12mn.

Additonal pix: flowers from Willy (for the first and last time, hehe, choclates na lang!)

Karaoke Night w/ Colleagues 16Sept2010

Lymphatic Filariasis

Its one of the good things why I'm starting to enjoy being assigned at OpCen, is that we receive different reports from Chapters regarding certain incidents/ accidents/ floods/ earthquake and even health bulletins from Chapters all over the country. And today, one thing that strikes me is a report from Sultan Kudarat province about a stakeholder's meeting regarding National Filariasis Elimination Program. They have 8 suspected cases of Lymphatic Filariasis plus 35 cases still to be validated in Palimbang, Sultan Kudarat.

 

Ate Jenny and I started googling about this disease, and here comes the unpleasant photos of this disfiguring disease. 76% of the population of affected individuals live in 4th - 6th class municipalities, which I believe are the most far-off and hardly inaccessible, poorest of the poor communities in the Philippines. Health personnel have high hopes, given that they will devote the whole month of November for the mass treatment of heavily affected communities, it is said that the main strategy to eliminate Filariasis is through Mass Drug Administration once a year for five years. The photos are awful, how much more the ostracism and psychological burdens these people suffer from?

 

On the lighter side, last week was good. Stayed again at my favorite hostel c/o Mam Ging together with my colleagues while Andy treated us for Dinner and some drinks at the pool after 3 days in the field. Friday night is Sergi's Farewell Party, and it's good that I got acquainted to some confederates, that before, they were just faces without names, or names without faces.

 

Also, I got my own camera last Saturday! Not too fancy though. I named him "Boris". It's the result of an advance cash bday gift from Willy and my Dad - the 2 most loved men of my life. Hehe. Ciao!

Bad Times, Good Times

For the last two weeks, I’ve been suffering again, as always every year, clogged nostrils and sticky phlegm, coupled with pre-menstrual syndrome, annoying headache and a thing that comes out of the lid of my right eye due to over smoking and unhealthy lifestyle, I guess. I decided not to take medication (aside from the Vitamin C) since it’s not getting worse anyway and that I know drinking water and eating the right things would be sufficient to make it go away. But it’s not, unfortunately. The aircon and the fan pisses me off, I go to bed as early as possible and then in the morning, its takes a lot of effort to move my ass and go to work. These, I believe are the bad times.. Bad days, when you need passion for work, but you fake the smile, and you do your best knowing that hell, it was just your problem.. Blah blah.

Good thing, after months of not-seeing-each other, I met my friend last Thursday, who turned a year older last Sept 25. It feels good in a way to have someone hear (not listen) to my rants knowing he’s not capable of giving empathy. But it was the same pleasant feeling way back in college that I talk most of the time, and he gives me that mocking grin, and off we go, knowing that we will meet again after some time.

For this week, I should say, after all the physical inconveniences, the new demands from people I’m working with, I wanted to stay positive and to free myself from the unnecessary distractions.

Parting Poem

Yesterday, my Boss (who is about to leave the country in a few days time) gave me a book, handwritten on the title page is this poem by Rainer Maria Rilke, he said that it suits me somehow. It’s true. I was teary eyed when I finished reading it the first time.

At first, I thought I was cynical because of the title , with the word ‘God’ – which is commonly interpreted as a Supreme Being overseeing and watching us all, checking if we are either doing good or bad, but in this poem, it shows the ‘God’ that is not placed in religions.

God Speaks To Each Of Us

God speaks to each of us before we are,
Before he's formed us — then, in cloudy speech,
But only then, he speaks these words to each
And silently walks with us from the dark:

Driven by your senses, dare
To the edge of longing. Grow
Like a fire's shadow casting glare
Behind assembled things, so you can spread
Their shapes on me as clothes.
Don't leave me bare.

Let it all happen to you: beauty and dread.
Simply go — no feeling is too much —
And only this way can we stay in touch.

Near here is the land
That they call Life.
You'll know when you arrive
By how real it is.

Give me your hand.

And today, 17^th September, is my Boss’ birthday.

‘De Mi Jardin’ By Jose Palma (1876-1903)

I came across this poem while being irritated that the last trip of the ferry boat going to Hulo Station left already, I had no choice but to take the LRT and MRT, and suffer from the buzzing crowd. And there, inside the train, I saw it, haunting and sad..

Me pide sampaguitas, no te envio

Porque al ir a cortarlas de la rama,

Senti temblar mis manos y mi pecho

       prensado por la lastima.

No quiero que padezcan esas flores,

Como padece, lejos de ti, mi alma;

No quiero que al contacto de mis manos,

          perezcan marachitadas.

Translation in Tagalog:

Humingi ka ng mga sampaguita...Di kita bibigyan,
Dahil nang puputulin ko na sa mga sanga'y
Nanginig ang aking kamay at ang dibdib ko'y
Nanikip dahil sa awa.

Ayokong magdusa ang mga bulaklak na iyon,
Gaya ng pagdurusa ng puso kong malayo sa iyo;
Ayokong sa sandaling hawakan ng aking kamay,

Iya'y malanta at mamatay.

Some Thoughts

Just started a new responsibility in the department I'm in, but I still cant feel the extreme excitement I have been waiting for. To kill time, I have read some articles about the previous disasters that happened in the US, Aceh of Indonesia (Tsunami), etc. Its not too much, I need more information. My assignment in Operations Center last Tuesday was great, in a way, it's always exciting the first time. But when calls come in about some emergency, there goes the rush of the blood, and the sense of urgency to decide on what to do next.

Things are still slow..

 

Puerto Galera July 16-18, 2010

Philippine/German Red Cross Pix

Getting emotional over Edward Bellamy's 'Looking Backward'. Huhuhuhuh..