You’ll Never Know…

July 3, 2008

The words of this song express how I feel tonight.

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Am I Dying Soon?

July 2, 2008

How long do you want to live?
Given a choice, would you want to live up to at least 100 years old?
Do you want to live long?

These are three questions I would frequently hear friends ask to each other, at coffee shops, coffee breaks, and long drives. I believe I’ve been asked the question at least twice, and my answer really hasn’t changed.

I don’t have any illusions about being a centenarian. In fact, I dread becoming one. Given a choice, I prefer not to live too long. I just wish for a life well-lived, and if possible, and miss out on the health problems of old age — strokes, heart attacks, diabetes, rheumatism, etc. I dread the day when one would depend on caregivers and relatives to clean your behind, just like in Tuesdays with Morrie. Sometimes, I would think of being happy just reaching 40-ish. But this, I suppose, would change if and when I get married and have children of my own to live for. So who wouldn’t want to live a long life, if it were full of blessings?
In any case, I will be thankful with what I will be blessed with. And, I am not afraid of ageing. Having said this, I don’t think I will subject myself to botox or plastic surgery — like a wannabe president, who regularly undergoes botox to hide his real age, he prepares for 2010.

Whether or not I live long, what I wonder about from time to time is just how long I will live — and when I will enter the departure lounge. This, given the kind of stress I get and used to get, the kind of environment we now have in Metro Manila, the amount of exercise I do, and the kind of food I eat. Years back, a friend had told me about a morbid site on the internet called The Death Clock, which actually predicts the exact date of one’s death, by providing certain details about your lifestyle. I’ve never had the courage to calculate my own demise, as I don’t think the site is very scientific anyway. However, I would joke friends about having calculated theirs. Hahaha!

On the Martha Stewart Show tonight, I heard what could be a more scientific way to measure one’s life expectancy. This is the Living to 100 Life Expectancy Calculator, which is said to be based on the latest scientific research. Martha Stewart tried it herself and apparently will live up to 110 years old. Unbelievable! Good for her if she does.

You will just need to take a 40-question internet test on your health, lifestyle, etc., and you get your results presto!

I’ve tried it myself, and at the rate I am going, I would live up to 79. That’s not too bad, I thought. It even came as a pleasant surprise, for I was expecting a lower number, given the kind of environment we have nowadays. Not bad either, for the latest World Health Organization puts the average life expectancy at 64 years of age for Filipino men, and 71 for the women.

Again, I have no illusions about living too long. But the results are challenging me to step up my exercise and balanced lifestyle. And what a relief also to know that our office promotes a work-life balance. I may have given myself additional years on earth after all.

So, no more chocoloates? No more spaghetti? No more hotdog? Try the test yourself at livingto100.com.

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Cardinal Gaudencio Rosales: Sulpcio Lines in a wrong business

July 1, 2008

CBCPNews — MANILA, June 30, 2008—The head of Manila ’s Roman Catholic Church said the Sulpicio Lines may have ventured into the wrong business following another tragedy involving one of its passenger vessels.

“Maybe they (Sulpicio Lines) should not be in this kind of business,” Manila Archbishop Gaudencio Cardinal Rosales told church reporters on Monday.

Rosales said the MV Princess of the Star owner, which capsized and was swept into shallow water near Sibuyan, should face and address their problem instead of making excuses.

He said the shipping company had been involved in at least three major tragedies in the past— reasons enough for the authorities to take serious action.

The prelate also chided earlier claim of Sulpicio officials that the recent tragedy was “an act of God” brought by the raging typhoon.

“Sailing right into the eye of the storm is not an act of God. It’s an act of a stupid person,” he said.

“There’s something wrong in that institution considering that they are in public service and yet they have been involved in the deaths of thousands,” Rosales added. (Roy Lagarde)

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Ramdam ang Mataas na mga Presyo

July 1, 2008

2007 indeed was arguably a banner year for the Philippine economy, and it was around the same time last year, when Malacañang bragged about the country’s economic growth, the highest in three decades. But the same could not be said now. This, considering the global economic slowdown, brought about by record-high oil prices, as well as the economic problems of the United States.

Last year, President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo was particularly proud of the Peso’s performance, the good performance of the stock market, and the record-low inflation. But with the global economic slowdown, the public is opened to the realization that these specific gains are only temporary gains. The peso, both because of the pressure of exporters and the economic conditions, is on a downtrend. The stock market isn’t a rosy, and a number of companies have postponed their IPO’s. And worst, inflation is at a 9-year high, with June’s inflation projected at 10.2% due to oil prices and high-priced food commodities. Because of the corruption in bureacracy, the political turbulence, and lack of infrastructure, the government has not been able to get more FDI’s, and have lost many contracts to more competitive countries like China and Vietnam.

Needless to say, the government must need to act double time — even triple — to arrest the immediate problems, especially now that gasoline has reached P60 per liter. To realize this should not be a problem for the bigwigs at the Palace, for failure to respond promptly to these problems may lead to more political instability, and God forbid, ultimate downfall of the government.

The government will need to think and work out of the box. It cannot rely on subsidies, which are a big joke. To save on fuel, the government must work to truly decongest the urban centers of heavy traffic. It needs to encourage the use of carpools. It needs to hasten the development of decent mass transit, and finish the development of more roads. And most importantly, it will need to step up its efforts to promote alternative energy through compressed natural gas and biofuels.

The private sector in other countries has been active in saving energy as well. Office lights and air conditioning would be turned off at lunch, and an hour before office hours are done. And many households do make an effort to save energy. The government needs to get ordinary citizens involved.

Food supply still remains an issue, of course, and the government should not stop at bringing rice hoarders to justice. It makes me wonder if special courts for rice hoarders and economic saboteurs would help.

The government must act now if it wishes economic gains to continue, and for these to be truly felt finally. For without any effective action, the government cannot shout its battlecry of “ramdam ang asenso.” What we’d all feel, as we feel now, more than ever, is “ramdam ang mataas na mga presyo.”

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Partners and Marriage by Eduardo Jose E. Calasanz

June 30, 2008

Ralph’s note: Here is an interesting article forwarded by a good friend. It’s a good read.

Eduardo Calasanz was a student at the Ateneo de Manila University, Philippines, where he had Father Ferriols as professor. Father Ferriols, meanwhile at that time, was the Philosophy department head. Currently he still teaches Philosophy for graduating college students in Ateneo.

Father Ferriols has been very popular for his mind-opening and enriching classes but was also notorious for the grades he gives. Still people took his classes for the learning and deep insight they take home with them every day (if only they could do something about the grades… )

Anyway, come grade giving time, (Ateneo has letter grading systems, the highest being an A, lowest at D, with F for flunk), Fr Ferriols had this long discussion with the registrar people because he wanted to give Calasanz an A+. Either that or he doesn’t teach at all… Calasanz got his A+.

***

PARTNERS AND MARRIAGE

by Eduardo Jose E. Calasanz

I have never met a man who didn’t want to be loved. But I have seldom met a man who didn’t fear marriage.S omething about the closure seems constricting, not enabling. Marriage seems easier to understand for what it cuts out of our lives than for what it makes possible within our lives.

When I was younger this fear immobilized me. I did not want to make a mistake. I saw my friends get married for reasons of social acceptability, or sexual fever, or just because they thought it was the logical thing to do. Then I watched, as they and their partners became embittered and petty in their dealings with each other. I looked at older couples and saw, at best, mutual toleration of each other. I imagined a lifetime of loveless nights and bickering days and could not imagine subjecting myself or someone else to such a fate.

And yet, on rare occasions, I would see old couples who somehow seemed to glow in each other’s presence. They seemed really in love, not just dependent upon each other and tolerant of each other’s foibles.

It was an astounding sight, and it seemed impossible. How, I asked myself, can they have
survived so many years of sameness, so much irritation at the others habits? What keeps love alive in them, when most of us seem unable to even stay together, much less love each other?

The central secret seems to be in choosing well. There is something to the claim of fundamental compatibility. Good people can create a bad relationship, even though they both dearly want the relationship to succeed.

It is important to find someone with whom you can create a good relationship from the outset.
Unfortunately, it is hard to see clearly in the early stages.

Sexual hunger draws you to each other and colors the way you see yourselves together. It blinds you to the thousands of little things by which relationships eventually survive or fail. You need to find a way to see beyond this initial overwhelming sexual fascination. Some people choose to involve themselves sexually and ride out the most heated period of sexual attraction in order to see what is on the other side. This can work, but it can also leave a trail of wounded hearts. Others deny the sexual side altogether in an attempt to get to know each other apart from their sexuality. But they cannot see clearly, because the presence of unfulfilled sexual desire looms so large that it keeps them from having any normal perception of what life would be like together.

The truly lucky people are the ones who manage to become long-time friends before they realize they are attracted to each other. They get to know each other’s laughs, passions, sadness, and fears. They see each other at their worst and at their best. They share time together before they get swept up into the entangling intimacy of their sexuality. This is the ideal, but not often possible. If you fall under the spell of your sexual attraction immediately, you need to look beyond it for other keys to compatibility.

One of these is laughter. Laughter tells you how much you will enjoy each others company over the long term. If your laughter together is good and healthy, and not at the expense of others, then you have a healthy relationship to the world. Laughter is the child of surprise. If you can make each other laugh, you can always surprise each other. And if you can always surprise each other, you can always keep the world around you new.

Beware of a relationship in which there is no laughter. Even the most intimate relationships based only on seriousness have a tendency to turn sour. Over time, sharing a common serious viewpoint on the world tends to turn you against those who do not share the same viewpoint, and your relationship can become based on being critical together.

After laughter, look for a partner who deals with the world in a way you respect. When two people first get together, they tend to see their relationship as existing only in the space between the two of them. They find each other endlessly fascinating, and the overwhelming power of the emotions they are sharing obscures the outside world. As the relationship ages and grows, the outside world becomes important again.

If your partner treats people or circumstances in a way you can’t accept, you will inevitably come to grief.

Look at the way he/she cares for others and deals with the daily affairs of life. If that makes you love her more, your love will grow. If it does not, be careful. If you do not respect the way you each deal with the world around you, eventually the two of you will not respect each other.

Look also at how your partner confronts the mysteries of life. We live on the cusp of poetry and practicality, and the real life of the heart resides in the poetic. If one of you is deeply affected by the mystery of the unseen in life and relationships, while the other is drawn only to the literal and the practical, you must take care that the distance does not become an unbridgeable gap that leaves you each feeling isolated and misunderstood.

There are many other keys, but you must find them by yourself. We all have unchangeable parts of our hearts that we will not betray and private commitments to a vision of life that we will not deny. If you fall in love with someone who cannot nourish those inviolable parts of you, or if you cannot nourish them in her, you will find yourselves growing further apart until you live in separate worlds where you share the business of life, but never touch each other where the heart lives and dreams. From there it is only a small leap to the cataloging of petty hurts and daily failures that leaves so many couples bitter and unsatisfied with their mates.

So choose carefully and well. If you do, you will have chosen a partner with whom you can grow, and then the real miracle of marriage can take place in your hearts. I pick my words carefully when I speak of a miracle. But I think it is not too strong a word.

There is a miracle in marriage. It is called transformation. Transformation is one of the most common events of nature. The seed becomes the flower. The cocoon becomes the butterfly. Winter becomes spring and love becomes a child. We never question these, because we see them around us every day. To us they are not miracles, though if we did not know them they would be impossible to believe.

Marriage is a transformation we choose to make. Our love is planted like a seed, and in time it begins to flower. We cannot know the flower that will blossom, but we can be sure that a bloom will come. If you have chosen carefully and wisely, the bloom will be good. If you have chosen poorly or for the wrong reason, the bloom will be flawed.

We are quite willing to accept the reality of negative transformation in a marriage. It was negative transformation that always had me terrified of the bitter marriages that I feared when I was younger. It never occurred to me to question the dark miracle that transformed love into harshness and bitterness. Yet I was unable to accept the possibility that the first heat of love could be transformed into something positive that was actually deeper and more meaningful than the heat of fresh passion. All I could believe in was the power of this passion and the fear that when it cooled I would be left with something lesser and bitter.

But there is positive transformation as well. Like negative transformation, it results from a slow accretion of little things. But instead of death by a thousand blows, it is growth by a thousand touches of love. Two histories intermingle. Two separate beings, two separate presences, two separate consciousness come together and share a view of life that passes before them. They remain separate, but they also become one. There is an expansion of awareness, not a closure and a constriction, as I had once feared. This is not to say that there is not tension and there are not traps. Tension and traps are part of every choice of life, from celibate to monogamous to having multiple lovers. Each choice contains within it the lingering doubt that the road not taken somehow more fruitful and exciting, and each becomes dulled to the richness that it alone contains.

But only marriage allows life to deepen and expand and be leavened by the knowledge that two have chosen, against all odds, to become one. Those who live together without marriage can know the pleasure of shared company, but there is a specific gravity in the marriage commitment that deepens that experience into something richer and more complex.

So do not fear marriage, just as you should not rush into it for the wrong reasons. It is an act of faith and it contains within it the power of transformation. If you believe in your heart that you have found someone with whom you are able to grow, if you have sufficient faith that you can resist the endless attraction of the road not taken and the partner not chosen, if you have the strength of heart to embrace the cycles and seasons that your love will experience, then you may be ready to seek the miracle that marriage offers. If not, then wait. The easy grace of a marriage well made is worth your patience. When the time comes, a thousand flowers will bloom…endlessly.

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A Spoonful of Inspiration (part one)

June 28, 2008

We are only human after all, and we lose energy and motivation from time to time. We momentarily lose our drive to work with passion. We lose of zest for the many good things that life has to offer.

Speaking from experience, nothing beats the power of prayer — the power of faith. Thankfully. But we are blessed too, to have people and things around us both big and small, which make our lives much easier, and provide us the needed push we need to conquer the many battles and obstacles we all encounter day to day.

I probably have more than a hundred small and big things. Here are just some sources of inspiration, which never fail to brighten up my day. Thank goodness for all of these:

Music of the Heart

I never tire watching this film because of its moving story. Starring Merryl Streep, Music of the Heart tells about the true story of Roberta Guaspari, who, after being left by her husband for another woman, moves to Harlem and who finds herself and makes a difference by teaching young children to play the violin. It’s a woman against the world story, as Roberta would later need to fight the state’s education department for cutting the budget on music education. To surpass the obstacle, she rallied her students past and present to a fund-raising concert, which was held at Carnegie Hall — with the most prominent international violinists on her stage.

There are two scenes from the movie I find most moving. One was when she coached her handicapped student, who felt hopeless about playing the violin because she wasn’t able to stand. Roberta says: You don’t need legs to stand. You need to stand from within. The second scene was just before the Carnegie Hall concert, where after so many weeks of practice and training, Roberta tells the children to do their best, but not to forget to play from their hearts. I was just so moved!

The Mary Tyler Moore Show

I never thought I would be addicted to this 70’s sitcom, which I learned from Oprah’s 20th anniversary DVD. I love watching this show so much that I went on a mission with my uncle in Minneapolis just to see her monument. I am inspired with the family-atmosphere the characters had both on cam and off cam. And who wouldn’t be inspired by her hat toss at the end of the show’s OBB? It has been hailed by TV Land as the 2nd greatest moment of all time — next to JFK’s assassination in 1963. All I need during a bad day is to play the OBB, and I know that I will make it after all.

A Piece of Sky from Yentl

I have never seen the film in its entirety. I tried to watch it once on television, but I found the movie a bit dragging, so I didn’t really get to finish it. But the very message of the movie’s final song, A Piece of Sky hit me. The words are very powerful, and the way the final frame was executed by Barbra Streisand (who directed the film herself) push me to continue fighting amidst many obstacles:

The more I live - the more I learn.
The more I learn - the more I realize
The less I know.
Each step I take-
Each page I turn-
Each mile I travel only means
The more I have to go.
Whats wrong with wanting more?
If you can fly - then soar!
With all there is - why settle for
Just a piece of sky?

My iPOD’s “Jumpstart Playlist”

I have a playlist entitled “Jumpstart,” which contains a number of songs that also never fail to inspire, both for their words and melodies: Free (Roselle Nava with Bukas Palad), The Power Inside of Me (Richard Marx), Reach (Gloria Estefan), Two Words (Lea Salonga), Ain’t No Mountain High Enough (the Sister Act 2 version), Burn and If I didn’t Love You (Tina Arena), Here Comes the Sun (The Beatles), Children of Easter Morn (Bukas Palad), Ocean Drive (Lighthouse Family) and of course — Breakout (Swing Out Sister). If I were to make my own CD compiling songs of inspiration, these would be the tracks.

Other Movies
I will have to admit it. I’m a hopeless romantic at heart, and quite a number of films (as well as TV movies and mini series) also never fail to inspire: One Fine Day, While You Were Sleeping, Ice Castles, Charade, The Cutting Edge, About A Boy, The Lake House, Anne of Green Gables, and Life Or Something Like It to name a few. The Back to the Future Trilogy is not a romance flick, but I also enjoy watching it endlessly for inspiration.

People

Of course, the people I’m surrounded with are also the greatest inspiration: Family, Relatives abroad, True Friends during thick and thin.

Eating and Cooking
Of course! I turn to eating and cooking comfort food as a way of detoxification from stress. Haha! (to be continued)

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The Height of Irresponsibility

June 27, 2008

I am horrendously appalled. I am sickened to the stomach. I am almost at a loss for words. These, after hearing the news that pesticides have been discovered in the ill-fated M/V Princess of the Stars of Sulpicio Lines, which sank last week at the height of typhoon Frank.

Simply, it is the height of irresponsibility on the part of Sulpicio Lines to have failed (neglected?) in informing the government of the presence of ten metric tons of Endosulfan in the ship. What were the bigwigs of Sulpicio Lines thinking? For aside from the hundreds of lives that they have yet to be accountable for, they put more lives in peril — those of the rescuers, who have been working full swing, not knowing the real dangers they are exposing themselves to. How many more people must die just so that a company can save face?

It almost obvious at this point that the shipping company had no intentions of declaring the presence of the shipment. For if the Fertilizer and Pesticide Authority had not spoken up, then how would the government and the rescuers know of the dangerous shipment. Shouldn’t have this shipment be the the first thing that Sulpicio Lines told the government as early as Saturday?

A prosecution is truly in order, and government must ensure that swift justice is applied. Not just that, Sulpicio Lines’ permits to operate, as well as its other negligent counterparts should be reviewed.

Is such shipment really prohibited in such passenger ships, as authorities ask? It should be. If it isn’t, the government better find out now, instead of just asking the question to the media. Let’s pray that the containers have not leaked and contaminated the rescuers. The government should act very fast to prevent a repeat of the Guimaras oil spill that happened in 2006.

While Del Monte Philippines, the owner of the pesticides, says it was not aware that their pesticides were carried on the wrong vessel, it will need to show real proof through documents that the pesticides were not supposed to be on the M/V Princess of the Stars. It is also not enough for Del Monte to tell the public through the media that it is a “responsible” company. After all, actions speak louder than words. Let’s see.

And again, why is it that the Philippine Coast Guard wasn’t aware of the cargo? Who should have jurisdiction over this?

***

I also find sickening that Sulpicio Lines is now blaming PAGASA for the disaster. We certainly agree that PAGASA isn’t the best weather agency in the world. But even a high school student knows that even with the best equipment, typhoons can easily change direction, and that it would be too late for any weather agency to warn the ships. But aside from this, did Sulpicio Lines rely too much on the governments transportation guidelines? They have been in business long enough and they’re supposed to have common sense on such things, at the very least.

The public is not seeing enough action from Sulpicio Lines. Instead, it has gone on a spree, blaming everyone it could. And not surprisingly, it is again blaming force majeur — the kind of behavior that has no place in business, nor in civilized society.

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