A Safer Haven for Bloggers: No More

The Philippines was declared as one of the unsafest place for Journalists since the dawn of Marcos's Martial Law in 1986. The Arroyo government was worse - journalists' blood colors the waters around Malacañang Palace bloody red. The last most inhumane treatment of Journalists was still unsolved as of Press time, referring to the Maguindanao Massacre done in cold blood by the Ampatuans - fed by the bloody hands of Malacañang.

Then the past few days, another alarming case reached my interest through one of the wall posts from Rep. Liza Maza of Gabriela Women's Party-list:Maza raises questions on libel case filed against blogger. The blogger was named Ella who allegedly "exposed and criticized the DSWD’s alleged inability to deliver relief goods to typhoon victims and hoarding of relief items in its warehouses on October 21, 2009 at the height of relief operations for victims of tropical storm Ondoy," quoting Maza's statement on her website.

This fact is alarming. I have been a blogger for quite sometime now and oftentimes speaking my rage, sentiment, opinion on different issues that confront me as a citizen imbued with the right to freedom of speech and expression. To blog and speak against an entity - person or organization, who is known to the public as not different from what you are saying is now a ticket for you to stand before a judge and a court? Well, I don't think Ella is alone in her sentiments, isn't she? It is not only DSWD for chrissake.

Filipinos were never dumb Secretary Cabral. so don't make us one. Rep. Maza was correct - show us the facts and we will decide. But is it worth questioning is the question.

Now, with the new law that they are trying to pass in Congress - the CyberCrime Act, would things be worse than this?

Will there be no more safer haven for even us bloggers?

A Child's Birthday : My Birthday

I realized just now that I am aging. 7 days from now, I will be a year older.

It makes me think really deep; makes me contemplate on how my life has been for the past 21 years.

Not good enough. So many dreams unfulfilled - caused by quite a lot of misjudgments on my part and up until now, being debated inside me if they're something to be regretted...

I am a year older but everything in me would just not grow up.

I am still a child.

Out of Inspiration

When writing, I always look for an inspiration to write..

As of now, there is none. I don't know when one may come.. till then

soy un escritor de pluma-menos...

Tasty as Mom?!

I love bread. It's one of my favorite breakfast ever. Here in the Philippines, we have this habit of dipping our bread on hot coffee. We also have a very special brewed coffee locally made in Batangas, one of our provinces here and we call it Kapeng Barako (Barako Coffee). Barako is the Filipino term for the male stud of an animal, and has become associated with the image of a tough man. The most famous bread in the Philippines is pan de sal.

Well, going back, I just bought a loaf of bread from a bread station in one of the malls here in Naga City. And look what I found, and look closely in the pictures below and guess what might be wrong:



Did you find it? It's right there! The phrase that says "So good... like mom"! I was like, what the heck?! Do they really mean what I was thinking? I really thought about it a long time. Presenting different angles on how one will understand and take the phrase.

This is just one of the tragic results of the misusage of the English language. Maybe what they mean is this: "So good... just like Mom's homemade bread." At least they could have added the apostrophe s ('s) after the word mom: "So good... like mom's". At least with that, we can speculate that it is something that mom makes, which in this case, could be home baked bread. Or the best thing to be done here is complete the phrase. With the phrase "So good... like mom," the only meaning I can think of is this: The bread is as tasteful as my mom. What a very dirty phrase, right? I was trying to find a way to at least point that out to them. I just remember this when I was browsing through my phone and found these pictures. Maybe I am just wrong with my analyzation here. Here is the manufacturer of the bread being supplied to that mall:

Disclaimer: This is just my inquisitive mind inquiring. No intentions of destroying someone's reputation :-).

Vocation

The bird is standing by to eat this starving child. This picture was voted as the best journalistic photography many years ago. And the photographer later committed suicide because of his emotional breakdown attaching to his own work.
(The pictures and texts are courtesy of Suwan Victor Juntiwasarakij's blog ~ click picture to visit his blog)

The other day, while on board the multicab (our local mode of trasporation) on my way home, I feel so tired because I just finished my shift which was graveyard shift, just like everyday. I was so sleepy as well. Nonetheless, the mother and her el niño (little boy) didn't fail to catch my attention. The little boy has an unusual body swelling. The mother was trying to remove the morning glory in her child's eyes and the child was trying to push away her hand. It was a very nice picture of them two. The little boy's face especially was swollen, and his eye bugs drooping down because of the swelling. He seems to be having some breathing difficulty as well. Such an innocent child. He was too young to know pain, nor to define it and worse, to experience it. Children like him seems to melt my heart out of pity for them, that I hate looking out of the window of the bus when going home at night when I was still in Manila. You will see homeless street children sleeping in line on the side street pavements, with carton boxes as their bunks. We're not rich ourselves but I can't help to think myself as very fortunate and feel great pity for them.

Long before, I have felt in my heart the need to help them in the future. Maybe join an organization which has a genuine intention of helping children like that little boy. Or even put up one myself. Thinking about the little boy made me teary eyed. I have still little siblings and I always cry thinking about them experiencing the same. I just can't imagine it, and I will never permit it. Only if I can do the same to all suffering children.

Even pictures of suffering children or those children in war pictures would always crush my heart. I always have these questions in my head and heart every time I am seeing these sufferings:
Why are these things permitted?
Who's the cause of all of these?
Why is our governments doing nothing?
Why do most of us become selfish and uncaring?
What can we do to end them all?
When will all of these end?
Et cetera, et cetera.

So many questions, but so few are the answers. So many dreams, but so few have the courage to make those dreams a reality. Including me. When will I answer the call that I do so often hear, I don't know.

Still so many crossroads. A lot of roads still untraveled. The path to my vocation seems too far but already, within sight.



I have posted Michael Jackson's song, Heal The World because this is the most appropriate song for this post and a personal favorite of mine. This song never fails to move me and as well as mist my eyes. This is for me the most inspirational song that I have ever heard.

This is as well a tribute for MJ, forever the King of Pop, in spite of the controversies that surrounded him. Rest in Peace MJ. You will forever be remembered through your Music.

Praying for Emma Rose

As I was browsing for other pages here in Blogger, I accidentally stumble upon this attractive blog about an innocent and little angel who doesn't fully understand pain to suffer it. Upon opening the page, the header is that of the picture of that little girl angel and her name, Emma Rose, and the description of what she's going through right now, that says:

"Emma Rose was diagnosed with Juvenile Rheumatoid Arthritis (now known as Polyarticular Juvenile Idiopathic Arthritis) in September, 2008 at 18 months. Follow our journey as we live the ups and downs of JIA)."

The one who created the blog is her very courageous mother. I admire her mother so much because in spite of it all, she remains strong, along with her family. Though I cannot speak for her about the pain she might be going through with her daughter's ordeal. Emma Rose is taking more medicine than I ever took in my 21 years so far, one to prevent the inflammation from becoming worse. Now, since I can't really give her a material donation, I am helping out in my little way, which is posting her picture button in the four blogs that I am managing. So if you want to know more and get details, just click on button in my page or the one above. That's one little way of ours to help her out.

If only we can help all children. They're too young to understand pain, much more to suffer them.

Joe Jonas doing Beyonce's Single Ladies (Put a Ring on It)

Well, this was kind of hilarious and as they put it, awesome. Yeah, for me, Joe Jonas' masculinity was never compromised. He was sport to their fans' requests and he did great. Well, watch the video, salivate for his muscular thighs and prominent butt, yeah, watch out for his butt people :-D... This is awesome, and I love you Joe Jonas!!!