Worry



Only people have the capacity to worry. Being a child is one of the most happiest moments of one's life, most of the worrying is done by parents. One only has to worry about studying well. But when one grows up, one starts to worry, because of problems at home, career, work, children, money, health and many others. Worrying caused by different source of problems.

Worrying increases as one's career, social status or wealth increases; as compared to other common people, who have simplier needs. Aside from money, there are other sources of worry.

Worrying does not go any good to anyone, then why do people love to worry? A lot of worrying comes from misgivings over past incidents. Because of one word, action, assumption, love, hate, revenge or whatever emotions, etc. All these things locked inside one's soul, unable to forget or let go from one's mind. People take showers, change clothes, shoes, and use other things to keep themselves clean. We must also clean our minds and hearts, which means that everyone must examine oneself everyday, so that our worrying would lessen and become more healthier people.

There is a need to resolve such worrying, if we don't resolve it, then what would happen? If we can transform big issues into small trivial stuff, and small worries into nothing, then we can make allowances and ask for forgiveness, so we can become better people. We can learn not to worry in our future choices, and not let ourselves suffer and punish ourselves, which is really harmful for us. It can also make us ill at ease and can annoy other people as well. Useless worrying is like a mountain of trash in your mind, dispose of it quickly, the soul would then be at peace. Most of the time, worrying is caused by oneself.

Whenever things go wary, try examining it from a different perspective, try to open oneself to the boundless possbilities, adversity encourages new beginnings(?), dangers can bring opputunities, don't try to burden oneself with worries anymore.

Mulawin Doll



After wandering around the crowded streets of Divisoria, I accidentally stumbled upon a familiar looking doll/action figure. Yep it's a mulawin doll and I was amazed at how popular the TV series had become... to earn an action figure line for its cast.

Chinese Essay



I remembered one time when my mom and her friend had dinner at Greenhills. At that time I was the one who drove them to the restaurant. My mom and her friend kept talking about the living conditions here in the Philippines. Suddenly my mom asked, "if you did not migrate here, how would your life turn out in Hong Kong?" Mom's friend laughed as she replied, "I think I would not turn out to be this fat, my son would be more diligent in his work and he would concentrate more with business." My mom nodded as she replied, "I'm thinking the same things too."

While I was listening to their conversation, I was thinking - how would I turn out if I grew up in Taiwan? I would definitely turn out as a different person. I wouldn't be that much fluent in English, probably I'd be a Buddhist, and I would have a deeper appreciation of Chinese Culture. My parents and I would have a smoother relationship (there would be no Bad Filipinos to influence me). If we still stayed in Taiwan, we might not experience any kind of prejudice towards outsiders.

Honestly I never knew why my grandfather decided to migrate to Manila. I'm guessing that at that time, China's economy was not that stable. So in order to earn some money, my grandfather decided to move here and open a business.

Our family have lived in the Philippines for many years already. My parents also grew up in Manila, and they view this place as their homeland as well. Despite the chaotic political situation and the everyday difficulties of earning a living, I believe that we will continue to stay here in the country.

Oyster Cake

Today a Chinese friend introduced me to an interesting restaurant in Binondo. Its a small restaurant called 'Sincerity'. Its an old place but I haven't really noticed it much. The restaurant's specialty is its fried chicken, as well as its oyster cake.

My friend and I ordered half a chicken, as well as bola-bola (meat ball) soup. I noticed that other customers were ordering oyster cake (or o-wa-chien in the local Chinese dialect). At first I thought it was just scrambled egg but my friend told me that it was oyster cake.

I then remembered my dad bringing home that stuff. I never knew it was oyster cake and I found it strange. But my friend explained that it was oyster and eggs fried together. I still was reluctant to order it.

But aside from that, the chicken was good. It was crunchy and tastes like cheese (or something like that). The soup had a plain taste but it was a good contrast to the sweet chicken (as well as the catsup).

New Palm Product



Now this is something I'd like... but then again, I already have a T3 unit and I think its almost the same (well, except for the 256mb memory...)

Check out the Palm site for the newest T5 unit

Life at Divisoria



With the start of the 'ber' months, shops at Divisoria are starting to sell Christmas decorations and stuff. I admit business has slowed down quite a bit this year, with all the economic woes and typhoons that struck the country. But Divisoria is still the best place to buy bargain stuffs. I wonder how the place would look like after another decade? Will it still remain the same?

Robbery in Broad Daylight

Yesterday I was doing my usual rounds in Divisoria when I heard some gossip going around a couple of stores. Apparently one of the sales agent got robbed during lunch time. He just stepped out of a shop when a guy held a gun at him and asked for his money and celphone.

Somehow I felt that the guy actually deserved it because of his own negligence and carelessness. First, He wears a gold necklace while doing his rounds in Divisoria. Second, he carries his Sony Ericsson P900 celphone on his hands most of the time. Everyone who knew him by face would know he travels with his P900 unit.

I still have to get the guy's personal account of what happened. Gossips tend to exaggrate the truth. But I heard the robbers took his necklace, phone and even 3000 pesos cash. Poor boy. Tsk tsk tsk.

Revisiting Buck Rogers

Last night at the Trekkie's classic sci-fi hour, the guys viewed the first episode of 'Buck Rogers'. The show is about an astronaut who gets stranded in space. He was cryogenically frozen and is reawaken in the 25th century. Gil Gerard stars as Buck and the beautiful Erin Gray stars as Wilma. I was surprise to find out that the late Mel Blanc did the voice of Twiki the ambi-quad.

It was one of those shows from early eighties which I distinctly remember. I remember as a kid, I marveled at the special effects of the show, the battles in space with the star fighters firing "lasers" at each other. Now that I'm seeing it again as an adult (after twenty years) the whole show looks more like a classic sci-fi show.

Anyway, I'm glad to have a break from my research and books. Watching this show made me relax a bit and forget about my thesis problems.

Father's Day and Cellphones

No Father's Day celebration would be complete without the usual bickering that happens between my mom and dad. This time, the source of argument is about cellular phones.

After years of resisting the cellphone lure, my Dad is finally contemplating on buying a cellphone of his own. It would have been a nice gift for him for Father's Day... but then again my Dad is not really good with English or modern technology. So me and my mom are having second thoughts of buying a unit for him.

It would be nice to buy a second hand Nokia 5110 unit for my dad. Such a phone costs around P1,500 to P1,800 pesos in Divisoria right now. But then again, my mom is eyeing on one of those nice looking Nokia 3650 and plans on giving her Nokia 3310 to my dad. Unfortunately my Dad refuse to take hand-me-downs from my Mom and wants to buy his own 5110 unit (even if the unit is also a second hand unit from someone else).

Life in Divisoria

Today I visited Nano, an artist friend of mine, who lives in Tondo. He used to live along Juan Luna on the otherside but now his family bought a new house on the Tondo side of Juan Luna.

I guess there must be a trend to the outward migration of pinoys and chinoys from Divisoria. I have a feeling that the place will be colonized by mainlanders from China in a few years time. You see them everywhere already.

Most of the wholesale shop owners were laughing at the government's futile attempts to regulate the prices in the area. Since transport fares will rise next month, the government made a survey asking if the goods in Divisoria would also be effected. Obviously everyone would be affected by the price increase, but in a super-cut throat-competitive market such as Divisoria... you can't afford to rise your prices or else you will run out of business in a matter of days.

Riding to a New Song

Seems like there is a new song playing in the streets of Divisoria and Recto. It might not be as catchy as ‘Bulaklak’, ‘Otso-otso’ or the ‘Spageti Song’ but local radios stations are playing it by the hour. I heard it a few times over the last couple of weeks and now the song’s refrain keeps playing in my head. And it goes “…sasakyan kita… sa lahat ng gusto mo… sasakyan kita… kung sasakyan mo rin ako…” (Literal translation: “…I will ride on you… on all the things you want… I will ride on you…. If you will ride on me too…”). I don’t know who the sung this song or if the song has any subliminal message like ‘bulaklak’. I hated it when it was first played… but after hearing it all day long in the factory, my mind keeps playing it over and over again.
Brad Pitt's acting

Watched Troy last night. Got a dose of Brad Pitt's acting again. I couldn't help but laugh whenever he cries or makes his (trademark) brooding face... makes me wonder if he is really emoting or just bored with his work.

I'm amazed at how Hollywood can manage to squeeze a decade(?) long war into a two hour++ film. In this age of fast food and instant-quickie products, I guess even Homer's epic story can be made into a box office hit... so what's next, the divine comedy?
The Horror that was Van Helsing

Since my friends had written their comments about the movie, I decided to post my own impression of the movie. Overall Van Helsing was okay, but its not something I would watch again. If I would label it as one of those movies that you just watched because there are famous actors in there and the effects are good.

After watching this movie, I can say I now have a favorite villian actor. I've seen Richard Roxburgh in many movies and he has played the main antagonist in all of them. From Michelle Yeoh's 'The Touch', 'League of Extraordinary Gentlemen' and 'Moulin Rouge', richard Roxburgh seemed to have a flair for playing the evil villian. Even though he is typecasted into these roles, I still think the characters he play are more interesting than the lead heroes themselves.
Jack Black's Movie

Watched 'School of Rock' yesterday on DVD, and it reminded me of Whoopi's Sister Act. Perhaps I have grown too familiar to the standard formula that hollywood uses for its movie plots.

Basically the movie is about a rocker who (due to deperation) impersonates a teacher at a school, uses his unique style to inspire students, gets exposed as a fraud, but somehow manages to redeem himself at the end.

But for me, the movie's message is more than the over-used plot or the lame dialogues that they have. It talks about having dreams and trying to fulfill those dreams, despite getting old and facing reality. What I liked about the movie was that you don't always have to win first prize to be considered the best. You just have to do your best and have fun making your dreams come true.

Revisiting the Past

Just finished reading Legend of Huma, a Dragonlance classic. I know I turned my back on that fantasy world a long time ago, after the entire story was bastardized into one disgusting money-making bandwagon of poorly written fiction. With the coming of the Age of Mortals, I figured that Wizards of the Coast should have learned to leave that world alone.

Maybe I was just bored or curious on how the story of Huma turned out. Prequels are a tricky thing, I think. It is a hit or miss when it comes out into the bookstores. I think this prequel did good. The story was interesting, despite the blandness of Huma's character (I think the writer did the best he could to make a boring knight into a heroic legend). But I am more intrigued with the minotaur, Kaz. I think he has more character and depth than Huma (because Huma's destiny was layed out from the start till the end).

Reading Foundation

Finishing rereading the first book Isaac Asimov's foundation. It's really one of the good classic science fiction books - better than the recent books out in the market. I can't help but admire writers like him and Frank Herbert who have the vision to set a story like this with such an interesting plot. The man is really a genius.

The Galactic Empire was falling.

It was a colossal Empire, stretching across millions of worlds from arm-end to arm-end of the mighty double-spiral that was the Milky Way. Its fall was colossal, too - and a long one, for it had a long way to go.

It had been falling for centuries before one man became really aware of that fall. That man was Hari Seldon, the man who represented the one spart of creative effort left among the gathering decay. He developed and brought to its highest pitch the science of psycho-history.

Psycho-history dealt not with man, but with man-masses. It was the science of mobs; mobs in their billions. It could forecast reactions to stimuli with something of the accuracy that a lesser science could bring to the forecast of a rebound of a billiard ball. The reaction of one man could be forecast by no known mathematics; the reaction of a billion is something else again.

Hari Seldon plotted the social and economic trends of the time, sighted along the curves and foresaw the continuing and accelerating fall of civilization and the gap of thirty thousand years that must elapse before a struggling new Empire could emerge from the ruins.

It was too late to stop that fall, but not too late to close the gap of barbarism. Seldon established two Foundations at "opposite ends of the Galaxy" and their location was so designed that in one short millenium events would knit and mesh so as to force out of them a stronger, more permanent, more quickly appearing Second Empire.

Foundation has told the story of one of those Foundations during the first two centuries of Life.

It began as a settlement of physical scientists on Terminus, a planet at the extreme end of one of the spiral arms of the galaxy. Separated from the turmoil of the Empire, they worked as compilers of a universal compendium of knowledge, the Encyclopedia Galactica, unaware of the deeper role planned for them by the already-dead Seldon.

As the Empire rotted, the outer regions fell into the hands of independent 'kings'. The Foundation was threatened by them. However, by playing one petty rule against another, under the leadership of their first mayor, Salvor Hardin, they maintained a precarious independence. As sole possessors of atomic power among worlds which were losing their sciences and falling back on coal and oil, they even establish ascendancy. The Foundation became a 'religous' center of the neighboring kingdoms.

Slowly, the Foundation moved from a religious to a trading economy as the Encyclopedia receded into the background. Their Traders, dealing in atomic gadgets which not even the Empire in its heyday could have duplicated for compactness, penetrated hundreds of lightyears through the Periphery.

Under Hober Mallow, the first of the Foundation's Merchant Princes, they developed the techniques of economic warfare to the point of defeating the Republic of Korell, even though that world was receiving support from the Empire.

At the end of two hundred years, the Foundation was the most powerful state in the Galaxy, except for the remains of the Empire, which, concentrated in the central third of the Milky Way, still controlled three quarters of the population and wealth of the Universe.