archive of January, 2009
“Filipinos love America and what we can say is that it’s so easy to have twenty-twenty vision on hindsight when all this easy money policy was going. [It was] very good for the world, everybody’s G.D.P. and our G.D.P. because we had alot of remittances coming from America.” ~ Philippine President Gloria Arroyo in World Economic Forum ~ January 31, 2009
my translation: ‘We love America because our expatriates there have been able to send so much money back to our country.’ »→
Thinking of the kind donations from JoAnn Porter, Kathy Geller, Shannon Fairlie, and Lisa Edwards for library books for Baguio Gold Elementary School:
“Books constitute capital. A library book lasts as long as a house, for hundreds of years. It is not, then, an article of mere consumption but fairly of capital, and often in the case of professional men, setting out in life, it is their only capital.” . ~ Thomas Jefferson
First several photos were made aboard buses traveling from Baguio City to Dagupan to Bolinao
China welcomed a new calendar year at 3:56 p.m. GMT+8. This afternoon, boy scouts, girls scouts and elementary school bands in Baguio City paraded down Session Road to celebrate China’s new year. I don’t know why. I thought that the Republic of the Philippines is an independent, sovereign nation. Maybe someone has secretly sold a controlling interest to China, which has trillions of yuan to invest while U.S.A. treasury bills are no longer a good investment.
Rather than watch a pathetic parade in Baguio, I walked from downtown to Camp John Hay’s Eco-trail then past the Country Club, past The Mansion and into Itogon to home, as I’ve done about twenty times. On the Eco-trail I saw more trash than ever, people sleeping (camping?), Korean tourists lounging and snacking …
Today I spent $162 donated from some parishioners of Saint Dominic Parish to buy reference books and story books for Baguio Gold Elementary School in Tuding, Itogon. The principal, Nestor Asiong had written a wish list, and the librarian had phoned me to come to the school to get the list. »→
Olongapo City is a smelly, dirty, garbage-strewn, humid, polluted city of 227,000 people in 43,000 homes in Zambales Province. The name Olongapo is derived from the Tagalog phrase “Ulo ng Apo,” which came from “olo nin apo,” meaning “head of the elder.”
I watch one or two or three movies per month, on DVD or in a lousy Baguio theater. Haven’t watched television for months. Last week I considered watching Lawrence of Arabia, then I noticed that the running time was 217 minutes. I slid the DVD back on the shelf. »→
