Things we take for granted in life. August 11, 2008
Posted by James in Daily Thoughts.Tags: poverty
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Last saturday Zenia and me saw an episode of a famous program here in the philippines “Maalaala mo kaya” which mean”could you still remember” or “can you remember” or something like that. The program features real life stories of individual. Most of the time its based on love stories of couples which I really don’t enjoy much. Last Saturday’s episode was unique and very touching.
It is a story about the love of a grandmother with her grandchildren. The title of that episode was “saging”, What captivated me to watch the whole episode is that it made me realize how difficult life is for other people, especially here in the Philippines. You don’t need to go far to realize how difficult life has become for most of my countrymen.
The story revolves around a grandmother who struggles to provide the basic necessities to her grandchildren after their mother has deserted them. The family belonged to the urban poor of society, where a meal a day is even hard to get. What made things worst was that the grandmother had no income, no work and no money.The only thing they had was a shanty in the squatters located near the shore.
The first problem the family faced after the mother of the children left was their immediate need for the food. They even reached a point where in all the grandmother could offer to her grandchildren was water to keep their stomachs full. After realizing their dire situation she tried to find ways to feed her grandchildren. Luckily for them a kind hearted neighbor was able to help them.
The neighbor told the grandmother that she can get free food at the ports where they throw rejected bananas and that she can earn some money picking up garbage at the shores and selling it to scrap yards. The grandmother followed the advice of her neighbor and was at least able provide food for her children. Even though things was difficult for her she made sure that she sent her grandchildren to school in order for them to have a better future.
After watching that episode I tried to reflect on their situation. I couldn’t imagine how she was able to make ends meet with the monthly income she earned which was even less than my daily rate. I now know why my parents are very understanding and helpful to those who are less fortunate. That episode opened my eyes and made me realize how fortunate I am to have what I have right now and that I can make a change in a persons life one way or another.
One thing I learned from my parents is that you don’t need to have a lot of money in order to change a persons life for the better. My parents have already helped a couple of people, who were willing to learn and sacrifice, and finish school. Some of them have changed their life and have become professionals. I think will follow my parents foot steps in the near future.
“Give a man a fish, he eats for a day. Teach a man to fish, he eats for a lifetime.” — Confucious
Priorities in my professinal life August 2, 2008
Posted by James in Daily Thoughts.Tags: Architecture, career, law school, priorities
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Its been a while since my last post, I’ve been really busy these past few months. Right now I’m in a very awkward situation wherein I have to decide if I have to continue doing the things that I know would benefit me in the future or concentrate in the things that I’m passionate about.
Right now I’m faced with the dilemma of what to prioritize. My professional life right now is a bit complicated, I am currently practicing as an Architect and my day job is an architectural visualizer. What complicated my life right now is that I am taking up law which is by the way really neat cause I learned a lot of things which gives me an advantage in dealing with certain problems regarding work, business, or everything that is covered by the law.
What made my life complicated right now is that I have some projects which I have to finish by the end of the month and my mid terms is fast approaching. I used to enjoy the pressure in the past but lately its really affecting me and sometimes I get so cranky that its just unhealthy.
Well if I look at the bright side I’m really glad that Zenia is supporting me with my career and my law school. It just makes things easier for me if she supports me every time I’m stressed out. Anyway I hope that I’ll be able to finish the projects on time and end up with good results and at the same time pass this semester with good grades.
Congratulation Manny Pacquiao!!! June 29, 2008
Posted by James in Daily Thoughts.Tags: Manny, Pacman, Pacquiao, Pacquiao vs diaz
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I have always been a fan of Manny “Pacman” Pacquiao and I have always watched his fights live. Today was different cause I had some important things to do together with Zenia’s family. We had a great day visiting some neighboring islands near Mactan. Even though I was not able to watch the match live, I still had updates on the status of this historical match by Manny Pacquiao since this will be the first time an asian will obtain 4 titles in 4 different divisions.
Every minute or so I SMS my younger brother for some updates on the match. There were even some prank messages spreading the bad news that Pacquiao lost the match and everytime I heard the different bad rumors spreading thru SMS my heart skipped a beat. That match has got to be the most excited boxing match I’ve ever experience. The excitement of who won the match was killing me. Maybe it was because this was the first time I ever followed Pacquiao’s match without watching it.
After several bad rumors about pacman’s defeat, I was already so anxoius especially because my brother had not messaged me for quiet a while about some updates. I was starting to lose hope that maybe the rumor’s were true. Then just when I was about to give in to the bad news my cellphone had a message alert. It was my brother sending me the latest update on the match! Pacman won on the 9th round KO!!!
I was so ecstatic about the news that I announced it to Zenia’s aunt and cousin that Pacman won and it was by Knock Out. By far that match was the most thrilling match I ever encountered ever since I started watching Pacman’s matches. The first thing I did when arrived home was to search for the replays of the matches on the net and here is a link to the whole match I found on the internet.
My busy month of June. June 22, 2008
Posted by James in Daily Thoughts.Tags: busy, pressure
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After a well deserved vacation at Bantayan island I was faced with a lot of problems the day after we arrived. The next day after our vacation I needed to finish my enrollment since I only had a week left until the deadline. It took me a whole week just to process my enrollment since I had to talk to the dean for violating some of the probationary requirements of the school, to make matters worst, while I was still processing my enrollment classes had already started and one of my professors told the class that she will give us an exam on the next meeting. Sheesh, we haven’t even adjusted from the summer break and she gave us one hell of a load of cases to read.
After sorting things out with the dean, My next objective was to buy my books for all of my subjects. I was surprised when I got all the prices for all of my books. They cost more than my enrollment fee! and to make matters worst most of the books I need were out of stock. Luckily, thanks to my resourcefulness, I found other ways to secure a copy of those books. I think any wise law student from Cebu knows where to secure those books.hehehe
I was already a week late the first day I attended my class this semester,I had a lot of catching up to do with some of my subjects. The cases assigned to us were pilling up and Just when I thought things couldn’t get any worse, a Typhoon struck our place and there was a long power outage. After the power returned the website where I usually research my cases was offline. Argh!!!
Anyway even though a lot of unfortunate events has happened in the past few days, I’m still glad that I have managed to overcome those obstacles. Though it wasn’t easy, what really matters is not giving up. I just hope this week would be better, I really need a break from all this constant pressure.hehehe
My Beachless Summer June 4, 2008
Posted by James in Daily Thoughts.Tags: beach, summer, vacation
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Ever since summer began I was aching to spend some time at the beach. I wanted to go to the neighboring islands here in Cebu. Zenia and me have been planning all summer to visit those places but to much dismay we haven’t even visited the beaches here in Cebu. There were just s many unfortunate events that transpired during the summer such as bad weather, conflicting schedules or our resources were tapped out that all our plans never pushed through. There is only a week left before summer ends. I hope that we could able visit at least one beach this summer so that this summer wouldn’t be such a waste.:(
Research on my family tree May 25, 2008
Posted by James in Daily Thoughts.Tags: ancestry, family, Family tree, relatives
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Ever since I was still in high school I’ve always wondered about my ancestry. I could still vividly remember I used to ask my grandmother a lot of questions about her family and my grandfathers family. I never had a chance to meet my grandfather on my dad side. I was so enthusiastic on knowing my family tree that I asked everyone in my family about the history of my family and decided to make a family tree. Its more than ten years since I decided to do that family tree, talk about procrastination.hehehe
A couple of weeks ago I was attending a lot of family gathering and I was stunned that there were still a lot of relatives that I still don’t recognize. I realize then that I could still trace my mothers family tree since their family is really close. That’s when I recalled that I made a promise to myself to make that family tree. Later that night after we got home, I immediately browsed the net for a program to help me with these. Luckily I found one and began tracing my roots.
After a few inputs in the program I hit a brick wall. I had a glitch in my plan, I couldn’t remember all the birthdays and complete names of some of my relatives. Another problem was I couldn’t trace a lot of my relatives in my fathers side since the connection stops on my grandfather. My dad, uncle and aunts never exerted any effort on tracing our roots in China.
I know what your thinking, why don’t I look Chinese. Hmmmmm that has got to do with my mother, she is a pure Filipina and her bloodline is quite strong thats why I look more Filipino than Chinese. After evaluating things, I decided to deal this with a different approach. In order for me to trace all my relatives and ancestors I would have to ask help from my immediate relatives. I should gather some information from them regarding our relatives there in China. I heard we have some relatives in Hong Kong. But first things first I should try and compile everything in my vicinity before I venture on looking for my relatives outside. I never thought making a family tree would take a lot of hard work. Anyway If anyone could give any suggestions on helping me with this project I am very much open to any suggestions.
My blogging reality check May 25, 2008
Posted by James in Daily Thoughts.Tags: blogging, oppps, other blog
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A while ago I was talking to Zenia about my plans with my growing blogging addiction. I told her about the things I would like to write about and the ideas that I am really excited about. I never knew that there were limitations to the things you should do on your blog and the proper methods on doing it.
Since I started blogging I always wanted to write about things that describes who I am and what I do. I never really could come up with just one topic since there are a lot of things going on in my mind.hehehe That’s why I concentrated on writing only about the topics that really catch my interest.
Right now I have 3 blogs which I am regularly updating and one blog that me an Zenia share. Anyway I decided to separate the topics from my other blogs from my personal blog instead of copying them in this blog. Zenia told me that google would penalize me for doing that,I guess I should have done my research on the things I shouln’t do before starting my blog.hehehe Anyway I’ll just link the other posts that I’ll make to my other blogs and hope you would still come by and visit it.;)
Save The Planet May 23, 2008
Posted by James in Daily Thoughts.Tags: Environment, green, Save earth, save environment, save planet
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This morning mai was grumbling about our environment and how other people ignore the fact that a lot of species are becoming extinct at an alarming rate. I stopped and thought about what she told me, I never realized that I am also part of the problem why the environment is slowly degrading. It dawned on me, although I sympathize with her concern I never really did anything about it. I was always passive with anything concerning the environment.
Thats why I’m going to start my own save the planet movement. Although I’m just one person, I’ll try to do my part on becoming part of the global movement of being green. Zenia has always been active with this type of organization and she enjoys saving the planet. For me I’m going to start on my own backyard.
I’ve already started with throwing my garbage on the proper segregated garbage bin. Garbage is a big problem here in our country and I don’t want to be a part of the problem. I also plan to apply that with my profession and once and for all be active in the drive to protect our planet.
My 25th birthday ouch. Hehehe May 12, 2008
Posted by James in Daily Thoughts.Tags: 25th bday, bday, birthday, gift
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I just celebrated my 25th birthday and I’m still a bit in denial that I’ve spent a quarter of a century here on earth. I realized that life is just too short when your enjoying it.
I celebrated my birthday with my family and Zeniamai. I had a chance to catch up with my cuz and Zeniamai had chance to bond with her. Anyway what really made my day is the gifts that I received today.
The best gift I received so far is that I am alive and healthy. The next is Zeniamai was thoughtful enough to buy me a wallet. I’ve been planning to buy one but I just couldn’t decide what type of wallet, fortunately she bought one for me.hehehe Thank you very much dear I really love your gift. Another blessing I received today is that My parents and family celebrated my birthday with me even though I didn’t have any party. My friends also remembered to greet me on my birthday. I know thats a simple gesture but that really counts a lot to me.
Anyway I’m really thankful that I have my family, friends and Zeniamai to cheer me up and be with me even if I have nothing to offer. Its having these small things in my life makes it worth living.
Dreams May 5, 2008
Posted by James in Daily Thoughts.Tags: dreams
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This morning I woke up wondering why I dreamt about something back in high school. It was kind of unusual since I haven’t had any contact with any of my former high school classmates. It was kind of odd since I was in a situation where i confronted one of the school bullies on our school. Although he never bullied in high school, I still didn’t like him for that.
This dream was running through my mind and the first thing I did was to chat with my girlfriend. Little did I know that she too had a strange dream. She dreamt that she was getting married to some guy that she didn’t want to marry and at the end she called off their wedding cause she couldn’t swallow the thought of marrying a guy she didn’t love. Fortunately for me that guy wasn’t me.Hehehe
After we had our conversation I researched on the meaning of our dreams and I stumbled on a pretty good site which was recommended by my girlfriend www.dreammoods.com. I was surprised to see the results since it almost described what was bothering me at that time. I never realized that dreams have their meaning in our life. Anyway if you have a dream that interests you just visit that website, I’m pretty sure that would help you understand your dream.
