Presidential Forum

After another night at EGI a couple of us GnW staffers went to get breakfast. I decided to drop my bag off at the office first, but when we walked through the plaza we came upon the line.

"Is this line for the Presidential Forum?" my friend asked.

It was, and it was a long time. Stretching from Yuchengco all the way to ZaiDe. (around 70 meters) If you think about it, it's probably not that bad of a line. What's shocking is that it was 9AM and the forum started at 2PM. The doors weren't suppposed to open till 1030AM.

My friends and I waited in line (let me point out that the line was narrow, as in we lined up by twos). We ate breakfast, played a game of chess, and I read my book. It was a long wait, and by 11 o'clock we were begging for the doors to open. Well, the doors opened. And when we looked up we start 70 meters of groups of people. The lined widened into barkadas and blocks. There was no chance we could get in, we thought. And we didn't.

We abadoned the line around 1130AM and found another venue where they were showing the broadcast live. My hopes of seeing the candidates in person crumbled as I sat down on a bench. the one constellation we had was lunch. (the people who got in - those who lined up at 8AM - didn't have lunch) The problem we had at our new venue was the audio and video weren't working. (this is at the college of computer science) So when the forum started we abadoned Gocks and made our way back up to EGI where we watched the whole thing online.

Terrible day. (the forum was in straight tagalog too -- no hope of understanding it)

After the forum we went back to school to pick up our forum stubs (proof that we watched the forum). And after a few minutes of just bumming around, the candidates came down to the lobby. Yayyyy

We took pictures and shook hands with the candidates (we mobbed them actually). I can't express how much that bettered my day.

But I got to say, Gibo has doughy hands. All the candidates look like claymation characters up close. Creeps me out.

Presidential Forum

The Presidential Youth Forum will be held this Friday. I'm actually looking forward to it (mainly so I can say "I saw the future president of the Philippines in person"). On the other hand, I'm a bit nervous that my current views (biases) of the presidential candidates will be changed. I was already wooed to root for Gibo Teodoro the other day when I received a baller band from one of his supporters. What if I turn my back on my candidate?

I'm pretty much set on voting for Richard "Dick" Gordon this coming election, with the only basis being his credentials. But what if he's not what we need right now? What if our country needs someone more charismatic? Nahhh... Gordon deserves to win, though I know for a fact that he won't. In all the polls that have gone around, Gordon receives less than a percentage of the votes.


Anyrate, I really do look forward to this forum. I hope that whoever wins this coming May will do this country some good . . . And nominate me as a Supreme Court Justice!

Blunders

Currently sitting at the GnW computer. The Campus Journal Awards is ending, the only thing left is the distribution of certificates.

"Hey L. Could you help make the certificates? You just have to type in the participants' name and print it afterwards."

Simple task if you do it right. But from past experiences, I don't always do the right thing. To my credit, I did what they told me to do: I typed and printed the names of the participants who were on the list -- all 100 of 'em (it only set me back 840php). The problem is that I used the wrong certificate format. It all looked to same to me -- Recognition, Participation -- what's the difference? What really matters is the correct spelling of the participants' name. How was I to know that the Certificate of Recognition was actually to recognize the winners. We're probably better off giving them certificates of Excellence.

Which is what we did.

O Boring Nights

When I returned to the Philippines earlier this month I had my computer taken away from me by one of Asus's service representatives. The large crack that had formed on the rear hinge of my laptop was a design flaw, and under Asus's 2-year global warranty, they were obliged to replace the casing of my laptop. We'll call you after 4-5 working days, they said. They escorted me out and I was as happy as any customer would be when given free service.

After 4-5 working days I failed to receive a call. I came back and demanded for my computer, but they apologetically inform me that Asus currently did not have the parts. It'll take 3-4 weeks, they said. I was upset that they hadn't told me this information before, but given the situation I couldn't do anything but walk away in defeat and wait another 2-3 weeks.

During this time I sit at home with absolutely nothing to do.

I generally finish school at six in the evening. It takes an hour to commute home. From seven onwards I do the following things: eat, shower, read, clean my room, and play guitar (also, I recently started "working out"). I realized that this routine takes three hours of my day, which means by 9:30PM I'm in bed wondering why my evenings seem so short.

I can't do my homework because assignments are sent through email, I can't do research because journals are now found online. And surprisingly, I'm beginning to feel like textbooks are obsolete.

What I'm trying to say is that . . . I dunno . . . I should learn how to cook.

Note: I had my cable disconnected last December, so no TV

Books I've Read in 2009

In 2008 I made a new years resolution to read 24 books that year – that’s two books a month, one book every other week. I ended up reading 26 by November. I’m a proud man. Sadly, I had nine other resolutions and only accomplished two.

Here are the book I’ve read in no particular order. Title in bold are book I loved. Titles in italics are books I tend to recommend to other people. Titles in asterisk* are short stories that I consider to be books. Titles in double asterisks** are books I reread.

· Lost in a Good Book by Jasper Fforde

· Something Rotten by Jasper Fforde

· The Well of Lost Plots Jasper Fforde

· First Among Sequels by Jasper Fforde

· The Yiddish Policemen's Union** by Michael Chabon

· Desperaux** by Kate Dicamillo

· Dreams from my Father by Barack Obama

· The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini

· The Shack** by William P. Young

· Rumors of Another World: What on Earth are we Missing? by Philip Yancey

· Angels and Demons by Dan Brown

· The 7 Habits of Effective People by Stephen R. Covey

· The Tender Bar** by J. R. Moehringer

· May Day* by F. Scott Fitzgerald

· The Great Gatsby** by F. Scott Fitzgerald

· The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri

· The Unaccustomed Earth by Jhumpa Lahiri

· The Book Thief by Markus Zusak

· Fragile Things by Neil Gaiman

· Fireseeds from Korea to the World by Nils Witmer Becker

· Twilight by you-know-who (Stephanie Meyer)

· New Moon by Stephanie Meyer

· All The Pretty Horses by Cormac McCarthy

· The Road by Cormac McCarthy

· Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro

· Griffin and Sabine (book 2 and 3) by Nick Bantock

books i've started but never finished

· The Appeal

· On the Road

· One Hundred Years of Solitude

· The Brief but Wonderous Life of Oscar

· The Last Tycoon

Thicker than Water

I spent the previous evening with relatives whom I have never met before.

Apart from the awkward moments where I was lost in translation (Fukien), I had a lot of fun. The night started when my cousin sent me a message on facebook letting me know that, “Hey, I’m in Manila. Give me call. I’m on Sun, here’s my number.” (Not verbatim) The next day we meet at a relative’s house in Torre Lorenzo where I’m introduced to 2^nd cousins D. and V., also students of DLSU. D. then calls L., our 3^rd cousin to come and join us for dinner. So we take the Ford Lynx to the Korean Village where we dine on ox tongue and Korean delicacies (I separated the two because they’re not the same).

This is when we finally settle how we’re related. We drew a family tree on the back of a placemat and apparently, my tai-tai-ma (great great grandmother) had five or seven sons during the Chinese revolutions (K., correct me if I’m wrong), but two moved to the Philippines and attempted to start a shipping business in Catbalogan. My great grandfather’s brother had his family which is how I’m related to L. Then my great grandfather begot 14 children, 7 sons and 7 daughters. My grandfather was the eldest of these sons, and begot 4 sons, my father being the eldest while my cousins, W., is the son of the 2^nd son. Thus that’s how we’re related. My second cousins are part of the 14 children, and that’s how I’m related to them.

You’ll have to read that five times or more to comprehend it, but that’s exactly how I felt that evening. It was like a whole other world opened up revealing a long lost, estranged brother. But in my case, it wasn’t a brother but a whole clan. I knew of the existence of distant relatives, but the fact that everyone seems to know everyone else makes me feel like I’m missing out. It gives perspective to who I am and where I came from.

I’ve been to family reunions before (not the huge ones consisting of 200+ people) and I’ve been introduced to different relatives with a short explanation telling me how I’m related to them, but those are easily forgotten. So I didn’t think twice about it. But after meeting people my age who are so well networked with our family, I feel ashamed.

My cousin W. came back to visit relatives and to vacation. He ended up going to different provinces in the Philippines just to say hi to this relatives or that one. Me, I find it hard just to visit a relative who lives in the same city.

Maybe this is part of growing up.

On the other hand, my mother’s side of the family . . .

Insults

At a proclamation rally of Villar in Tondo, Senator Miriam-Defensor Santiago officially endorses the presidential candidate Manny Villar.

"Santiago spent most of her speech criticizing the rich, whom she said were not actually good in English.
'Hindi marunong mag-English [They don't know how to speak english]...Their IQ's are very low,' she said." --Inquirer

I would challenge her remark, but my IQ is very low.