It's hot in here...

it's summer alright...

gosh it's hot. The airconditioning in my room seems to be inadequate during late afternoons... whew!!! If there's one thing I really do not like, it is a hot, sweaty weather... I'm not even a fan of the sun so I don't look forward to swimming, etc. I would go to a beach just to see the view... no swimming please.

That is why I love Baguio... the weather there is a lot better here, and when it's cold here, it is colder there of course. Last January, their temperature hit as low as -9 degrees Celsius. Nice...

Oh, although I love the cold weather more, I don't like it too cold as well. The last time I was in Canada, my sister and I were caught off guard with the sudden slide of the temperature = -36 degrees Celsius! Imagine that. My skin was breaking!

Anyways, during hot days such as this, I feel like going up to Baguio... and never come back...

Defending my Faith

There were lots of things I wanted to blog about but I decided to blog about my faith, my religion. Yes, I am a Catholic.

When I started this blog, I intented this to be about RH advocacy vis-a-vis my religion. I wanted to use this medium to shed light on misinformation and misconception primarily about reproductive health, in particular family planning, adolescent reproductive health and HIV/AIDS prevention.

Yesterday, the results of the PULSE ASIA SURVEY on family planning was published. It says, 9 out of 10 Filipinos are in fact favoring birth control. In a nutshell, the article stressed that majority of Pinoys give importance to family planning and expressed the need for the government to provide budget allocations to safe modern methods of FP. Likewise it stated that candidates who include RH/FP in their platform of government should be supported. (read the full article in the Philmade blog).

With the Catholic Church's Ten (10) commandments in voting this May 2007 elections, I felt the need to blog my thoughts about it. The "battle" between the RH advocates and the pro-life groups as backed by the Church has been in existence way way back. At some point, the catholics have abandoned their religion because of their RH advocacy. Seemingly, these two things are mutually exclusive. But they are not.

I don't want to discuss lengthily as to why but the bottomline is that we have our freewill, and that is the greatest gift we received from God. In voting, exercise this freewill based on your own analysis of things, and in consideration of the socioeconomic state of the country. Reproductive Health care and services is an essential need of our people, and candidates who have a clear platform to address this issue must be supported. It only means they truly understand and seek to address the root causes of poverty in the country.

If it would mean greater chances for preventing unwanted pregnancies, and infants being cared for completely by their mothers, women having more time for herself and her family, couples enjoying their sex life together, and families being more stable and manageable, then I don't think God will object.

My religion and my faith in God Almighty will never hinder me to grow and be the best person I can be, for myself and for others.

don't know where to start...

I want to blog about a lot of things. There's this blog summit yesterday which I attended... just the first part though... lots of things about it I wanted to write about but maybe later. Im in a hurry so I am just making my presence felt here...

Than there's the issue of partylist and the partylist I belong to... and the front page story on INQUIRER about the survey that 9 out of 10 Pinoys favor birth control....

I promise to write about these things extensively in awhile..

mundane activities...

wasn't able to blog for awhile as I became busy with household chores etc...

Easter Sunday was okay. Went to mass, had lunch and spent the day just relaxing and watching cable TV.

Then the week after that.. hmnn.. now that was productive. Since my tita from Boston will be arriving in Manila on April 22, preps were on the way. Had to clean the apartment, change all bedsheets, curtains, etc... hmnn... was satisfied though with the way things look now. Spic and span.

Then the house. Now that was gruesome. Cleaning the house has always been a task I enjoy doing, but of course not without the pains... but after all that, I always feel good with the way things look. Thanks to "auntie nene" for the help in doing all that...

He got it!

I had to blog again because guess what???

Dr H got the paper and called me up! I wasn't expecting he would call that it made me tongue-tied for awhile as I was excited and shocked at the same time. You see I only communicate with Dr. H via e-mail. That was how our connection started. I wrote him at the time he was about to leave the country as representative of UNFPA (read: United Nations Population Fund) and take on his new post as country rep. for Indonesia. My note was an expression of gratitude and admiration for all his hard work and contribution to our country. He barely knew me. I was just one of the many people working as partners of UNFPA. So when I wrote the note, I simply wrote it from the heart. The guy doesn't even know who I was back then!

I emailed him again to inform him about the blog I created for the media and to my surprise, he did reply and visit the blog. Even left a message on the c-box. That's how cool this person is, considering his stature.

Come christmastime 2006, he sent me a greeting via email. Another touching surprise. And so, imagine how cool it was to literally "hear" him when he called and hear him say a good news! =)

He told me he got the paper and he asked if I could go to Indonesia on May 1 to 10 for initial consultations with the other partners and discuss the paper with them. They will be paying for the trip and provide the necessary DSA (read: daily subsistence allowance).

How could I say no? Oh yes. May 1 to 10 is just perfect!

I do feel nervous to go there, as I will be alone and it will be my first time to go there. Oh, i don't have trouble traveling alone. I've done that several times. This is different as this international travel isn't a pleasure trip but work-related. Somehow, I get jittery... I will be dealing with gov't agencies in Indonesia and I do hope I get to "connect" with them as well and establish a good working relationship.

Nervous but I'm up for the challenge. And truly looking forward to working on this and explore all possibilities.

Indeed, good things come to those who wait. God is so good.

Whew..finished it finally...

I finally finished the concept paper I was doing. I am not quite sure if its late already but I do hope it still merits Dr H's approval. I was having a hard time finishing it due to several factors - fixed the blogs, jurassic desktop,dial-up internet connection, and a borrowed laptop from time to time --- plus the other chores I gotta do like staining my clothes when I washed it days ago (hahaha...) and taking care of Nirro (sister's kid...).

But I finally sent it! Now I can work on my room, the apartment and the paper for this other org I am connected with...

I've earned the right to sleep so gotta go...

Holy Week...

It's the evening of Holy Wednesday and tomorrow, as it has always been, the faithfuls will be more prayerful, "bisita iglesia" will be practiced and regular channels will be irregularly showing programs with more "religious" content and relevance...

But what really is the holy week about? Some people also take this opportunity to have a vacation and spend time away from the city... Luckily, a 5-day respite will be taking place from Maundy Thursday till Monday as it marks "Araw ng Kagitingan", a regular holiday...

The news shows the traffic caused by the volume of people who have travelled to take advantage of this time. Me? Well I took a short respite from the city's stress last week ahead of everyone... and this Maundy Thursday and Good Friday, I intend to spend the days as quietly as possible with my family.

I also hope to find the inspiration to finish the papers I am doing...

For the candidates:

May the Season of Lent be an opportunity for them to reexamine and find within themselves a conscientious will to serve the public and not simply to further advance their own vested interests.

The Holy Week maybe insignificant to non-Catholics and non-Christians, but still I fervently hope that the politicians, in general, use this time wisely to reflect.

With that, I end this post with a quote from the Dalai Lama:

This is my simple religion. There is no need for temples; no need for complicated philosophy. Our own brain, our own heart is our temple; the philosophy is kindness. -- Dalai Lama

A night of weird happenings...

Today turned out to be a weird night...

The results of the 2006 bar exams was released today and unfortunately, with the 1,890+ barristers that passed, my friend wasn't one of them...

There's nothing much I could do for her except pray that she finds strength and believe that it shall pass... like all things...

and then I received texts and phone calls from people I haven't heard of for quite awhile... weird because they suddenly remembered me and weirder that they all contacted me at the same night... they were old friends and acquaintances... it's uncanny that they were all communicating at the same time when all these time, I thought I lost contact. Two of them I met because of work, another my classmate in college...

Didn't get to reply to any of them as I was focused talking to my friend re: the bar results...

well I guess the holy week makes people remember to keep in touch since they are less busy and now, they're trying to have quality "life" even for some days...

I am not so sure how I feel now.. I am not sleepy yet but I feel tired...

A lot of thoughts are pouring intio my mind. Ohh weird night... I actually thought I'm over these "thoughts"... hmnnn...

Maybe tomorrow I will have a better post and discuss issues of national concern.. hehehe.. but for now, allow me to be preoccupied with mundane concerns from the past to the future...

Oh no...

Well, I was in the mood for household chores before getting online so I decided to wash my clothes, using the washing machine of course, the kind where you put everything in, and it automatically sets itself up. After sometime, you open it and the clothes are ready to be hanged...

This kind of washing machine actually allows you to engage in multitasking... so I even decided to cook spaghetti as my clothes spin and spin... then i went online to do the slide show for this blog...

Now when the timer (in the washing machine ...) reached "00", I opened it up to get my clothes and whoa! a colored shirt happend to be tucked with the rest of the white shirts..... oh yes, my shirts were stained!!! The worst part was that those stained were my favorite shirts -the UN shirt and my "ROOTS" shirt I got the last time I was in Canada...

So much for being in the mood to do chores.....

Good Morning April...

There are a lot of things I wanted to write about, but I never had the chance. I was online alright... in fact, the past weeks, I have been up until the sunrise logged in the internet. I'm using a dial-up connection so imagine how "fast" my downloads and uploads are. I am actually online and busy redesigning the blogs I created and surfing the net to get ideas and use "third-party functionality" in my blogs... Then I am trying to finish this paper I am doing..... then I shift to doing the blogs again... which is actually a part of the paper...

So there. That's what I have been doing since my "liberation"... hehehe... Oh, I did went out of town last week though... =)

I actually do enjoy this regained freedom. I get to sleep anytime I want and work on things according to my pace... Aside from being online 24/7, I actually do enjoy having time to fix things in my room, around the house and spending time with my nephew and nieces, in particular my nephew from my eldest sister... see the slide of pics from previous posts...

Oh yeah.. yeah.. I did intend this blog to be about my advocacy, as it was my work, and I did intend to be anonymous... so to speak... but I guess after awhile, I did kinda evolve that I am no longer "shy" or even afraid to show the world who I really am.. besides, who reads my blog??? Only my family and friends I do inform about it... sometimes, a random surfer drops by and even leaves a comment once in awhile....

It's 7am as I write this and I am wide awake. I haven't really slept. Well, I actually woke up past 6pm, just in time to prepare to Sunday Mass. It is the Palm Sunday.. for us Catholics, it's one of those special days as it signifies the begining of the Holy Week... then after Mass, bought pizza and nachoritos at Greenwich, went home, watched Pinoy Big Brother and went online... until now....

I recently learned that there is already a Philippine Blog Awards and it held its first awards night last March 31.... it is kinda fascinating to know how many bloggers are there and how pretty their blogs are... it did inspire to keep blogging and designing....

Ok, will post again later perhaps... for now, I have to eat.. I'm hungry...