The Muay Thai Series of Unfortunate Events

"The more you learn, the less you know."

Leaping lizards! I knew I had a long way to go, but this is serious. Apparently, there are at least 9 kinds of Muay Thai kicks. I didn't know so many could exist.

Good stuff, but heck--I'm not even past the kindergarten level with my roundhouse kick!

Bruised and Battered

In the words of Britney Spears, "Oops, I did it again." This is the third sports-related injury I got this year, and it's not even November. That's not counting the scrapes and bruises that on a regular basis reinforce their existence on various aspects of my person. You'd think I was a battered girlfriend. But of course, how could I be?

So first it was my left pinkie. It got bruised up in an unfortunate-but-you'd-never-have-seen-it-coming sparring exercise with one of the boxing trainors at Red Corner. Cut short my sudden aspirations of getting some action in the ring--yes, with media sponsors looking on and a live audience cheering you on and booing your opponent and all (the ultimate wannabe episode of my life)--which is probably just as well.

The pinkie incident got me looking like I forever had morsels of blueberry muffin smeared on the side of my hand, too. You'd think something so small and therefore harmless to one's overall constitution couldn't elicit gasps of horror and revulsion at the mere sight of it. It was utterly hideous, I tell you. Not to mention expensive. I had to down antibiotics for a couple of weeks--doctor's orders--which actually bore a hole in my pocket. Not exactly the most enticing incentive for living the health nut lifestyle.

Elbow Grease

The second major injury was with my right elbow. My mistake, but not totally my bad. This time, it was the big boss at the training gym in Pasig. He's super duper nice and all but really, what business did I have, being a relative freshie and all, to be doing a knee strike more than 6 feet away from the target? Plus, on solid, unpadded, unforgiving ground, no less. So naturally, gravity had to play teacher. I landed splat on my right arm. There goes the wakeboarding trip. Not to mention my ego. Yep, lootsaaa witnesses there. Anyhoo, it's all good now. Took a little over a month to heal, no biggie. Lesson learned. I more or less rock the elbow now, at least I like to think.

Roundhouse Blues

And now this. ¡Hay, que mal! Some muscle in the vicinity behind the kneecap I must have pulled during training. As a result, I now can't contract my right leg in certain angles without feeling a little tingle in the area. I don't even know exactly how I got it. I was just practicing my super sucky roundhouse with one of the coaches. Maybe it was due to the lack of a proper warm-up, I dunno. I never even felt anything during the actual session. Next thing I know, passing through Megamall on my way home, I'm doing a horrendous rendition of one of those stump-legged ageing Jack Sparrow types that I see on the Disney Channel.

On the whole, it's a little funny, actually. And it's really nothing in the grand scheme of things. In fact, I knew this was gonna be the way with MT, and it's all good. I just dunno how long this thing is gonna take. Now I can't go running at the very least. To think there's another race on November 25th. What's a girl to do? I can't stand being immobile. I can't not move. Doggone leg muscle thing. Man, I'm practically baldado! Arrgggghh. I get awfully crabby when my options close shop in my face just when I'm about to sashay through the door.

Sub-reality in Numbers

(Written on May 19, 2005. Re-published in June 2022.)

The unbelievable has happened.

This morning, I awoke to the newfound reality that not only do I dream in color, but I now dream in numbers, too.

Coming from a math-averse person like me, this is news.

To give you a picture of how it went: On days when I am seriously sleep-deprived, I try to get up as late as I can to maximize the REM experience. This morning, I knew Chukie, my half-Thai roommate, was already up and taking a shower. My phone alarm was going off again and again like crazy on a 5-minute interval, but in the nano-seconds that I would emerge from light sleep to hit the snooze button, I would check if Chuks was already done. Only then will I haul my carcass off the bed and start off my day with a shower.

So anyway, during those precious seconds before my dreams got disrupted by the screeching alarm, I was dreaming that I was looking at the forecast for an IT market that I am currently doing. But it was more like I was looking at these spreadsheets to forecast the exact moment that I will have to get up and about. Weird, huh?

Now stuff like this usually cracks me up. I mean, who would have thought? I love the bizarreness of things; the mystery makes life a little bit more interesting.

But dreams of forecasts--yikes. Not a very enticing way to start the day, hey? ;) You see, these are rows upon rows of cold, colorless numbers (yes, in my world, numbers can have color) that are enough to drive anyone batty if they aren't careful enough (I know I have bouts of dingbatness come submission time, as my colleagues can attest to with excessive ardor).

I might be a number cruncher, but I have very little love for numbers (forecasts being the bane of my existence). I loved my CommRes 120 (Quantitative Analysis in Research) days in UP, though. Probably because I wasn't bad in it. In fact, it was one of the few things I enjoyed in MassComm, despite a wobbly start.

Anyway, so much for that. This whole forecast business, I think it's my subconscious saying to me, "Get cracking, you ditz!" Yes, the dreaded final forecast is due this Friday, and I have yet to start on it.

Unbelievable. The realization starts to hit home: Work has finally penetrated my subconscious. And I shudder to think of the possibilities it brings. Like, what if I wake up, panting and gasping for dear life as I lay deluged by a nightmarish vision of numbers in my sleep. Then there's also the dismal possibility of being visited by my boss in my dreams. Brrr. I'd rather take on Freddy Kruger anyday.

Just feeling it...

(Written in May 2005, accidentally published in June 2022. I stand by what I wrote 17 years ago. To the one with whom I spoke about unrequited whatevers, this is what I meant then. But yes, it's all a bunch of "nothing"...)

This must be the night of plagiarization and unoriginal thought. Nonetheless, I enjoin you to humor me as I share with you a little something that I just came across in the blog of a friend's friend (come again?).

"For all sad words of tongue and pen, the saddest are those 'It might have been.'" - John Greenleaf Whittier

The guy sure knows his stuff. Now, to "borrow" from the idiot box, here's a lengthier tidbit. Got this from the the Internet movie database, by the way.

Joey: So what is the best ending in all of literature? Don't say Ulysses. Everyone says Ulysses.

Professor David Wilder: That's easy. Sentimental Education by Flaubert.

Joey: And what happens?

Professor David Wilder: Nothing, really. Just two old friends sitting around remembering the best thing that never happened to them.

Joey: How do you remember something that never happened?

Professor David Wilder: Fondly. You see, Flaubert believed that anticipation was the purest form of pleasure... and the most reliable. And that while the things that actually happen to you would invariably disappoint, the things that never happened to you would never dim. Never fade. They would always be engraved in your heart with a sort of sweet sadness.

Whoever said Dawson's Creek was crappy, sentimental garbage or any permutation of such is absolutely wretched.

Now that I've made my point, I should be getting back to work.

Have a great weekend, y'all!

Well, lookie here!

I'm back, baby!

And that's coz I'm getting stressed out. There you have it, I blog whenever I am stressed out. But no worries. It's all good here, loving it. Just about.

Kasi naman. Why did I have to have a sort of thing with someone who goes to the same office as me? And who in fact goes to the same office at around the same time as me, like right now, when I'm supposed to be slaving my brown arse away in front of Gossip Girl and not in front of a half-cooked Powerpoint presentation. I was waxing sentimental over the whole thing (the aforementioned "sort of thing", not the PPT presentation) when he showed up uninvited. For what? A damn football game? Turn-off!

And why do I always have to write about such things anyway. My first stab at blogging in what, 7 months? On what--some boy? Gad, that's.... sad.

But yeah, I'm loving it here. Got in just before the recession hit, haha. Just like Ohms in Singapore. Yeahbah! As friends can attest to, my timing's pretty off in most cases. But this time, well, I think I've paid for it enough already. I was starting to get depressed (see below post entitled "Someday").

Some people I know would call it luck, which to me betrays their sense of insecurity and lack of faith in how this whole fate thing works for people who do work for things to happen. I worked too damn hard for this. Everything I've done in my previous company had been leading up to this. After all those months of intense prayer and relentless preparation (inside and outside the office), I got "lucky" and scored a pretty decent offer. And I'm loving it here now. Especially after I got regularized after my 3rd month on the job, so life is pretty rosy now, hehe.

And now I'm back on the blogosphere. For the same mundane reasons, but dang it, I'm back. I miss writing. I had to disappear for a while in case headhunters actually took an interest in my cyber profile and Googled me. Yes, I am Google-able. Used to be anyway, and this blog was one of the things that linked to me. It wouldn't exactly be a good idea to share more details than what are listed in the resume now, would it?

Gotta get back to (slave)work now. After all, people don't call this a country of (and for) slaves for nothing.


Keep you posted, for sure. The Saga continues in a few...

Wannabe Wanna Be Wes

Taking a break from auto-replays of We Sing, We Dance, We Steal Things:

Endorsement time, folks. I scored a find, yezzuh! Although I must say, I'm still in the process of going ga-ga over it. Thank goodness for clearance sales courtesy of Music One in Glorietta (sorry, last day today). Got a Putumayo CD that I've been eyeing for the longest time (it's all right) and Bloc Party's Silent Alarm (it rocks).


Wes Cunningham, who predates Jason Mraz in the acoustic pop-rock era, is a gem. Plus, unlike Mr. A-Z, he's totally indie. Meaning, he's no sellout (not that I'm saying Mraz is... love you, JM!). And--dig this--this Texan singer-songwriter was actually born in ole Philly. You know, as in, the Philippines!

>>Click here for a sampler<<

I especially lurv Good Good Feeling. For some reason, listening to the record makes me wanna go back to my aborted songwriting origins. Yes, folks, I have origins. There you have it. Another one of them not-so-secret secret life moments of mine. This was in the 90s, and I used to go nuts with the guitar at home. When you're a budding nerd (meaning you don't always find yourself in front of a book, although sometimes this can't be helped) and your parents are so strict that summer break means house arrest without pay, you develop non-traditional means of channeling that youthful spirit thing. And thus began my lingering summer fling with songwriting.

Hemingway, what am I going on and on about songwriting for? And in the same breath as the mention of such snazzy creative minds as Cunningham and Mraz, too. Just goes to show how much of a delusional music nerd I am. And the crazy thing, this stroke of insight totally comes just now, 10 years after my first ill-fated attempt to pen a runaway train of a hit.

Well, those were the days.

***

Happy Hari Raya to my Muslim peeps!

Warning: Taglish Post

Parang gusto kong mag-Flapjacks mamaya. Out of the blue 'tong craving, walang precedent. I think maybe it's just my tummy.

Sana alas-sais na. Sana lang. Para matikman ko na 'tong Muhlach's ensaymada at Must Be Mom's cheese roll na binili ko kaninang tanghali. At makauwi na at mabasa itong chapter 2 ng financial analysis handouts para sa training namin. Interesting siya, in fairness. I'm a little behind lang dahil napasarap sa tulog nitong weekend.

Sensha na for the piteous ramblings. I'm not given to such things, actually. At 'di naman talaga ako mahilig mag-Taglish sa blog. But at this moment, well... I'm just hoping na mapawi kahit papano ang gutom sa pagba-blog...

The Unraveling

I dunno how stringent the restriction on listening to music during the fasting season is, but I can't work like this. I'm dehydrated, I haven't had a cappuccino or soy latte in weeks, and I'm up to my eyeballs in this thing that I'm doing (recon work for a big-arse oil-and-gas client). Now I ain't complaining. Life is goodah. But looking at the data, I get the overwhelming urge to holler, "Crud! I gotta get an MBA already!"

But I can't cuss. Big no-no. Hence, I need to bring in the usual suspects to keep me afloat today.

A sample of my Nike+ playlist:

1) Prodigy - Firestarter (the first to play everytime!)
2) OK Go - Here It Goes Again
3) Justice - D.A.N.C.E. (MSTRKRFT Remix)
4) Chemical Brothers - Block Rockin' Beats
5) Britney and Madonna - Me Against The Music (Justice Remix)
6) Paul Oakenfold - Ready, Set, Go!
7) My Chemical Romance - Welcome To The Black Parade
8) Kaskade - Be Still
9) Smashing Pumpkins - Doomsday Clock
10) The Killers - Bling

So it goes. Music is my downfall.

Noontime Sideshow

It's really quite funny. I just realized this morning that the event they were sending me and the new guy to was this:


It was a foregone conclusion that I was to attend the gig. They asked newboy, but they didn't ask me. "I can't make it, please attend in my place. You'll be going with fafarrahzzi," the boss-man said in an email in which I was cc'ed. Hmmm....

Well. Que varbaridad is all I can say.
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And also, that we went and we dined and we were treated to a short serenade by no less than Christian Bautista (a schoolmate of ours, I informed him). Does this mean I have to go see his musical that's opening next week? Hmmm. Love you, CB, but no can do.

Takeaway of the Day:

Sometimes I just can't believe how baduy I can get. Yeccchhh... Not to mention, as in this case, the teensiest bit, um, deluded...? And hence, in the grand scheme of things, irrelevant.

Hay, life.

Secrets of The Heart

Haha. Yes, dear reader. I was once a trying-hard pseudo-novelist. No, not the Leo Tolstoy type of wannabe. Not even the JD Salinger or Sue Monk Kidd type. I was leaning more toward a different genre: Popular romance. No, not Harlequin, for crying out loud. More like… Sweet Dreams… or Love Stories.

Girlfriends of the 90s, remember these titles? “More Than Friends.” “Hot Summer Nights.” “Sharing Sam.” There was also that cutesy yarn about a ménage-à-trois that smacked of a well-meaning "re-telling" of Sabrina, which I think is just one of the most fab movies ever.

I don’t remember any of the titles from the Sweet Dreams line, but man, they were some good reads! Aside from going on three-hour phone marathons with girlfriends, getting brainwashed round-the-clock on MTV, and occasionally browsing through the encyclopedia set in the living room (coz these were pre-Internet times), this was my pastime. Reading was my childhood thing. This was what I would rush home for twice a week (my average reading rate then) after a quick browse through the school library. This was my almost-undoing, my late-night partying, my underage drinking. It should be quite obvious now, I had no life. (Probably still don’t.) But you can hardly call me a nerd at this point, as reading rom novels isn’t exactly the same thing as trying to finish “A Brief History of Time” by Stephen Hawking (which I have yet to read, btw) during summer break.

So getting back to the almost-novel, the eventual conclusion of a lifetime of gorging on books… As you might have inferred, the characters were based on people I knew back in school. Okay, so it was my crew versus some other group. Although for the life of me, I now can’t figure out who RY and CA were supposed to be.

Get a load of this: the popular but biatchy versus the only-sorta-popular but not quite as biatchy. Har har. Plus, dig this: the heroine doesn’t know who to pick--the cute longtime friend that she bumped into again after so long? Or his bestfriend, the popular hunk who saw her first (in a romantic sense) AND who’s actually really super nice? Haha! Toxic formula for a runaway bestseller, I know. Well, common sense –smarts did kick in after a few chapters and this wannabe writer realized she just had to pull the plug on this secret project that’s now not so secret anymore.

Hahaha. I still can’t get over the whole thing, though. It was a major kick digging this up from my prehistoric files. Cracks me up like anything I’ve ever seen.

“Secrets of The Heart?”
“Montpelier Mammoths Cheering Squad?”
“James Madison High’s Star Circle?”
My. “It’s All Coming Back To Me Now.”

Ha-friggin’-ha. Them dorkdom days of old. God, how I miss the times.

Someday

Sometimes,
even when it seems you might be in the throes of despair,
the truth is,
you're not.

Coz really,
you're too pooped to muster the appropriate emotions.
To feel.
To want.
More than you already do.
To pine for that which is forever within your reach, only to find you're still never quite there.

And you think about the sudden change in mood.
You wonder about everything.
Actually, you don't wonder--you suspect.
And what you suspect you throw right back in the garage of your mind.
Coz whatever it is, it doesn't matter anyway.

And while you can still chew on things and act like the taste doesn't make you hurl,
you're gonna give.
Oh yes you are.
Just like that song--one day.
Someday.
Soon.

The Value of The UP Experience

Received an email from our Lasallian head honcho late last week that was circulated among the UP alums in the office. As it is the centennial celebration of UP this year, I think posting the contents of said email would be the proper thing to do. Plus, being in senti mode, I just can't resist. What can I say, I heart UP.

First published 6 June 2008
The Manila Standard Today
INTEGRATIONS
Maya Baltazar Herrera
Voyage

There are no children here

This week, I went to a meeting at the UP School of Economics and I came away with renewed belief in the value of the UP experience.

If you speak to anyone from UP – student, professor, alumnus - you will get no Latin slogans or apologies about how the school teaches values in spite of its outward materialism. This is not a student population that thinks about basketball games or memorizes school songs. This is not a school that chooses one statement to drill into the minds of its students.

This is not, of course, to say that UP does not care about values. It is that UP, in its own inimitable way, believes that values cannot be force-fed. The statue of the naked man that guards the entrance to the campus in Diliman best represents UP’s approach to all education and the respect for students that is the center of its educational philosophy. All who come to this university, regardless of origin, bring themselves naked, carrying nothing but their thirst; like the proverbial empty teacup, making an offering of self, waiting to be filled.

Adults

For many students from private schools, the first lesson that is learned here is that this is a school for adult education. There are no children here, and that is why no parents are allowed either at freshman orientation or during enlistment.

The spirit of the oblation lies not in a mother or a father offering up his child to the world, it is that of the newly adult, freely offering of his self.

I remember quite vividly that moment that drove home how different the UP education continues to be. It was my daughter’s first semester in university and she had invited a group of her high school friends to our house. One of them asked a classmate whether she had gotten her parents permission form approved for that weekend’s outreach activity. From the UP population around the table came the mock horrified responses of: “Permission? ” and “Outreach?”

I thought about it and realized that all of these students were, in fact, legally adults. I thought it interesting that only the UP students appeared to appreciate this fact.

Even more interesting was the “outreach” comment. I think back to my own university years and the last three years that my daughter has been in UP and am certain there is no lack of civic activity. There are medical missions, house building projects, tree planting, community work and barrio work and so on. I realize now that the reaction was not to the activity as much as it was to the use of the word.

One of the most important differences of the UP campus from all the other campuses my children considered going to is that this campus has no walls. Many parents fear this. They are afraid their precious children will not be protected from the ills of society in a campus that is so open to the rest of the world.

But UP is open to the world in more ways than just not having the physical walls.

Community

Being in UP means much more than being a student. This campus is enmeshed in a community. This community is made up not only of the transient population of students who go home each night. It includes the many, many students who lay their heads on dorm pillows each night, enduring time away from families in the firm belief that this campus will bring them closer to their dreams. This community includes the families of faculty and employees who live on campus. It also includes the many people who work not for the University, but nevertheless work on campus. This community includes the lady who remembers the brand of cigarette you smoke and automatically hands it to you in the morning. It includes the gentleman who remembers you like pepper on your egg sandwich or the one who knows you will dip your fish balls into two of his sauces, who patiently waits for you to eat your three
sticks before being paid. It includes the woman who saw all her children through college by selling peanuts every day on campus.

To a UP student, the daily heartbeat of the school is never far away from the realities of the country. The word outreach suggests that civic activity is something outside of the normal, something you do once in a while. It must be immensely difficult to think of community as a thing apart when your campus experience brings you face to face with all of the world’s realities every day.

Character

All of this probably explains that unmistakable sense of self that you will find from students who come from this campus.

Here is a campus where all have the same opportunities to learn. But, also, here is a campus that will give all the same opportunities to fail. There are no guidance counselors who will chase after you because you have been skipping classes. The attitude this university takes is that you must take the initiative – for learning, for seeking help, for realizing you need help.

That is not to say that no help exists. But it is help that is not forced upon you.

This is a university rich in both introspection and conversation. On this campus, the student is constantly exposed to people – faculty, administrators, community members, other students – who care deeply and passionately about the world. The conversations are almost never purely cerebral. A single graph can provoke comments about government policy and its effects on people.

As a result, UP is home to a student population that looks at the world and cares. It is easy to see pictures of protesting students and dismiss it as radicalism. But there are few campuses in this country where students go beyond a passing curiosity about what is happening in the world beyond their own lives. There are even fewer universities where students not only care but also actually believe they have a responsibility to make a difference – not in some hazy future – today.

And that, I believe, is what truly forges character. Character is not molded by speeches or long classes in ethics or theology. Character grows from within. It begins by being handed the keys to your own self and being told you are in charge; you now have power over yourself and your own actions – and with that power, you take on responsibilities.

Each student in this university goes through his own unique voyage of discovery. On his voyage, as he decides what he cares about, what he will fight for and what he will sacrifice, he crafts his own personal values.

That is what education is truly about.


Maya Herrera is the managing director of Solutions Incorporated and also in the faculty of the Asian Institute of Management teaching finance, risk management, corporate valuation, leadership and human resources management. She writes the column Integrations for The Manila Standard Today.

Movie Madness

Early 2000s. Long gone are the days when my buddies and I would head over to the movies at SM North Edsa for a brief respite from life. Back then I would hem and haw and whine about the ticket price, which would set us back Php65-80 per movie. I wasn't always this unnecessarily disagreeable, though. For me it was simply recoil reflex. Compared to the cost of admission to a movie theater back in Zamboanga City, which I think ran in the neighborhood of 50 bucks at the time, it was easy to see how considerably extravagant going to the movies here in Manila could be.

July 25, 2008. I start to feel the teensiet bit nauseated upon checking out the showing attractions at sureseats.com. Lej wanted something 8-ish, so that's that. Upon further internal hemming and hawing, I mentally throw my hands up in the air in defeat. I realize I feel a little oppressed. All I can say is, The Dark Knight had better be worth it then.

Epic Final: I Love You More Today Than Yesterday

6 July 2008, Wimbledon. I should have seen this. I really should have. I don't know why I didn't. But I do know now why people say regret comes only in the end.

As such, I can only relive the high drama through prose.

Sublime Spaniard stretches the imagination

Dispatches: A Post-Wimbledon Dialogue

The Death of Wanting

This is sportswriting-cum-commentating at its most poetic. Nothing ensnares and enraptures as much as a beautifully spun yarn about a battle of mythic proportions (which actually took place just this weekend and is now entrenched in the annals of sports history).

Nothing.. Except maybe seeing the action play out in real life. Or, okay, on low-fi cable TV, as the case would have been.

Well, anyway. All hail Rafa, all hail The Fed! Long live the quintessential kings of tennis!


Photo courtesy of tennis.com

Kooky Money Talk

Pretty exciting start of the week. Got a little something-something in the works, which got me thinking about priorities all of a sudden. But the future seems so... "blooming," so to speak. The leg up Teppers gave today was just what I needed. You the best, Teppie!

Flashbacking to the present, work's got me walking around the dizzying confines of the office like I was auditioning for a part in the sequel to 28 Days Later. On the brighter side of things, we had an informal lunchtime learning session with some folks from Philam Life (an AIG company) today. They showed us some pretty neat slides that I would have requested a copy for, if only the main speaker wasn't an actual client of mine. Basically, the major takeaway there was, I had better get my @ss off the computer chair and cook me up a plan to get my hands on a couple thousand big ones. Seriously.

And nuh-uh, I ain't talking about them pesoseses here. I'm talking about the real ka-ching, baby. The greenback. Mucho dinero from the land that produced the top two richest men in the world, on top of other filthy rich dude-nerds. The capital U-S-D. But then you interrupt, "What you talking about? The Euro--it's king right now, or is gonna be anyway. Compared to the once-mighty Joe Americano, it's the one to beat. It's gonna be everywhere, P. Diddy and posse even wrote a song about it. Too bad about the whole subprime debacle, which got the ball rolling on the downgrading of the dollar. Now they have to contend with the current energy crisis, just coz they rely so much on oil and everything. And by the way, shouldn't this rant-post be penned instead by an American, not some greenback-hungry Filipino blogger who probably doesn't even know what the value of the Euro is....?"

(Okay, here's where I go schizo on y'all.)

I then respond, "Actually, it's 1.58 to the dollar, and 70.98 to the peso.. I mental-telepathed just now with Benny Bernanke, you know, the Fed guy."
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Daymmm, don't you just hate it when you realize that you got even poorer. Last time I checked, the Php was around 67 to the Euro...

So anyway. Before my MPD whisks me away to la-la land once again, allow me to get back to what I meant to say before I lost it--the point of my need to get my hands on two thousand buckaroos. The point of my semi-tirade refracted off from an imagined split personality (that's a double split already--haha, pleonasm!). The point being--well, relative poverty, really. At which point you ask, "What does the current phenomenon of energy disenfranchisement in the US have to do with your poverty?"

Elementary, dear imaginary reader who I will, for the purpose of this exercise in virtual inanity, christen in my mind Watson... Everything. The answer is everything.

Okay, maybe not every-little-thing kind of everything. But being the biggest gas guzzler in town with a consumption rate of 25% of the world's total oil, while just "merely" producing about 10% of the whole lot, is almost exactly the point. I'm sorry to hear about the state of economic unrest that's going on over there, but the rest of the world is suffering, too. As a citizen of the rest of the world, I'm suffering, too. From inertia, from opportunity wastage. (And yeah, sometimes from hunger and oppression and all those other things, too.) Now is the time to grab the bull by the horns, people. Hurry, while it's still in siesta mode. Now's the best time to get in on the action. By that I mean buy stuff. By stuff I mean stocks, mutual funds, bonds, you know, stuff. Not shoes, not handbags, not iPhones, not whatever. With the US market being down in the dumps, so to speak (no offense to my dear American readers), it's the best time to buy up since prices are so low.

Skeptical? Look, what do I know. I'm just a fan of the process, I'm not even amateur-level. We all only have to take our cue from Warren Buffett, who now heads the ranks of the ultra-exclusive Forbes ultimate hitlist. (Former Number 1 Bill G. is retired now and just a couple or so billions poorer than WB.) The Oracle of Omaha is on a jurassic roll, gobbling up companies left and right. You now see it makes perfect sense. The Tao of Warren Buffett is in overdrive.

To be specific, what I really have dollar signs in my eyes for (inspired by thoughts of endless dalliances in snow-capped settings, a la Tim Ferriss in his book, The 4-Hour Workweek) is the dollar bond fund (PDBF) that's one of the investment products being offered by Philam. For a minimum initial investment of two grand, you get to engage in high-stakes (as high as you wanna go) gambling, sans the Judeo-Christian guilt. To quote the investment objective:

To provide investors with a hedging mechanism against the peso exchange rate value with returns (ka-ching, baby!) and inflows derived out of diversified investments in dollar-dominated fixed-income instruments.

Okay, so I forget the thing is actually a bond, which means there's less risk involved than if you play to win in the equity ball game. Well anyhow, we gotta start bouncing off with baby steps. We can't just expect to go play with the big boys in the courts without training and practice.

Now I have yet to seriously digest the figures that are swimming en masse before my eyes, but I will get to that at a time when I'm more lucid. Notwithstanding the value proposition of the company versus what we can expect from others in the market, I think what's important here is that we recognize that for those of us who dare, the future is actually staring at us in the face, poking at the side of our nose even. I've had this thought germinating in my head for some time now and it's reassuring to me to hear a professional validate the plausibility of an idea that almost a year ago was alien to me.

Of course, at the risk of looking like an @ss for not walking the talk, I have to share that all this money talk doesn't mean I can readily take the plunge as I'm advocating we all should. I would if I could. And quite obviously, "should" is spelled differently from "could." See the difference? It's a whole world of it that you see. But of course, I can only speak for myself. If you have two grand (loosely translated to about Php90K), then you're in business.

My memory's pretty fuzzy right now, but I was actually supposed to blog about Mom, how she's coming over and cooling her heels in Manila for a couple of days and stuff. I was even searching the PC for a nifty picture of her to post in here. Alas, the greenback monster reared its ugly head and I just had to blog all the way up to here to convince y'all, basically anyone who should feel so inclined, to contribute in the alleviation of poverty. Help ease the burden of mankind. Donate US$2,000 to this overly excitable blogger. C'mon now, it's all for a worthy cause..... =P

Peace, mah peoples!

GG

Like I always say, babies are God's gift to the world.

Marat Trounces Novak in Wimby 2008!

Rather than taking the 8:30pm flight home right after the match, Marat Safin, love of my life, handed Novak Djokovic his walking papers in round two at Wimbledon, shocking the World Number 3--and the world--with a 6-4, 7-6 (3), 6-2 victory.


I don't usually repost entire posts in this here blog, but Jessica Zafra couldn't have said it better when she wrote about Novak's non-upsetting upset by Super Safin.

Holy Eastern European swearwords, Marat Safin just mowed down number three seed Novak Djokovic in the second round at Wimbledon, 6-4, 7-6(3), 6-2! HAHAHAHAHAHA! alternating with tears. Yes Marat is mental and we love him. His pre-Wimbledon tune-up was mountain-climbing in the Himalayas. Yes he may lose in the next rounds to some guy ranked 400. No, we’re never going to change my cat Saffy Safin’s name no matter how bonkers her papy gets!

The old guy (28) and former number one looks across the net at the young guy (21) who’s gunning for number one and thinks, “So this is the hot guy on the tour.” And the young guy freezes. What Marat can do when his head is screwed on right, but never mind that.

No doubt about it, baby's bringing sexyback, yeah-uh. Although one can only wonder how long the party will last...

If you have Windows Media Player (dunno if this can be done with other players), you can click on the link below to see how it went down...

http://mfile.akamai.com/25457/wmv/wimbledonxp.download.akamai.com/25457/wimbledon/streaming/2008/shortclips/free_highlights_nb_10448968_25062008_500.wmv


Photo courtesy of wimbledon.org

Of Modern-Day Dungeons and Dragons

So. NoKor's getting its act together. Finally. It's interesting to see that in this lifetime, our generation can still hope to bear witness to miracles taking place in worlds we've only heard about in stories of old.

Of course, it's still nowhere near as perfect as the proper exercise of freedom should be. But it's certainly something to look out for. Maybe unicorns do exist after all. We know dragons and dungeons do. They're all over the free world, even.

Anyway. To provide comic relief, let me share this site that I stumbled on a long, long time ago. Funny stuff.


***

On a separate note, it looks like I might just have to keep this blog alive for a little longer. Just coz.

Fete De La Musique 2008!

Waaaahhhh! This just in c/o Alliance Francaise. To think I narrowly missed this! It's a good thing I still manage to check my other yahoomail, the one that's heaving under the weight of some 15,000 subscription emails.


Tara troops, we're storming MOA tomorrow before dark. For some reason that escapes me to this day, I haven't had the chance to attend the Fete since 2005... Boy, that one was really something. That was probably the best concert (multiple pa!) that I've ever gone to. I need more moments like that.

Take a peek at how other countries are rocking it out this weekend. Coolness, they even have it as far as Kathmandu!

A demain!

Extravagance, Madness and Poetry in Modern Ballet

It was (or is to be) a good run while it lasted, even though I hardly made good on my promise to live and breathe the essence of eau de French Spring in Manila this year.

So before the curtain closes, Alliance Francaise and the Embassy of France leave us with one last hurrah... which I'm sure will leave us with oohs and aahs.. (Hehe, I just had to make it rhyme).

Je vous presente...

La Bossa Fataka
by Cie Hervieu-Montalvo
June 22, 2008 (Sunday) at 8:00 pm
Main Theater, Nicanor Abelardo Hall
Cultural Center of the Philippines, Pasay City


Last chance, folks. As of an hour ago, only a few balcony seats are still available. Get your tickets before they get sold out!

*Bises*
La Varbaridad

Signing Off

This is it. Tonight's the night. I'm totally closing shop for an indefinite period. For real now! Last chance, folks. For what, you ask? Wala lang, I just felt like saying...

Okay, maybe I'll limit viewing access instead. Just coz. I'm thinking this Friday should be a good time to do it, for real.

Alrighty then. Adios amigos!