Tweet-to sotto

My 3 latest tweets are about Senator Vicente "Tito" Sotto III. I find his act of plagiarizing a blog and tagalazing a speech very disturbing. They say hate the deed, not the dude... But how tito-sen defends his misdeeds is more bothersome than the deed itself. Don't get me wrong, I do not have a deep-seated hatred against this actor-turned politician. As a child, I even had dreams of meeting him and exchanging banter with him in the question and answer portion of little miss Philippines in the noontime variety show that he used to actively host. But I was never really an uber cute child, so I never really thought I'd pass the audition. I guess at a very early age, I have already manisfested my fear of rejection.

I am guilty of cyber bullying him... does he deserve it? maybe. Because I am not huge fan of plagiarism. I know that this blog of mine is not something that the Mr. Sotto would copy.  I know I may not live to see a 6-digit figure on my blog view counter because I am aware that not too many are interested with my random ramblings. But at least I can say that the things I write are all my ideas: wrong grammar, incoherent thoughts and spelling errors included. I do follow some very nicely written blogs and I do sometimes get my inspiration on what to write about from these "plagiarisable" blogs. But I always always state the source... and link them too... because those little counters that tell how many took time to read his posts is a treat to a blogger.

I am pretty sure Mr. Sotto will not be happy if someone else will claim to have thought of the teamup word game "Pinoy Henyo". So please Mr. Senator... don't just copy-paste, at least have the decency to paraphrase. and please give credit to where credit is due... cite your sources.

From Russia With Love

I am a very very lazy blogger, I just realized that since I started this blog almost 2 years ago, only 2089 people took time to read my random ramblings... And I think half of these views were done by yours truly... Ok that may be a bit exaggerated... Maybe just a quarter of it. I wonder how accurate the stats are though, a glimpse at my most recent one:

My Top 5

PHILIPPINES - 917 views

I am not surprised. After all much of what I blog about, foodtrips, places I've been to, and other activities happened in the archipelago. Not to mention most of my friends are in Manila. So I guess the Philippines being at number 1 is justifiable. 

UNITED STATES - 441 views

I doubt if the Joe's and Jane's reads my blog. I am pretty sure my friends and relatives who have flown to the land of milk and honey are the ones who takes time to check what I have been doing.

GERMANY - 68 views

I honestly expected a middle eastern country; say UAE or an asian territory to occupy spot number 3. I have quite a good number of friends in Dubai,Qatar and Singapore. I called Macau my home for 14 months and even if I have yet to revisit that place, I managed to keep in touch with my Cantonese friends as well as my Filipino friends who work there. Germany, I probably know a maximum of 5 people there. 5 very busy people who I doubt has time to blog hop.

UKRAINE - 66 views and RUSSIA - 58 views

At number 4 and number 5 are Ukraine and Russia respectively. I definitely do not know anybody from Ukraine and Russia. I wonder what part of my blog interests the Ukrainians and Russians. Weird but interesting.

Well it doesn't really matter who reads my posts. I just want to write.
Busy busy week ahead. Time to hit the sack.

Bright Minds Read

"If you are a kid, reading is really important stuff."
- Bruce Jenner

As a kid, I used to read a lot. My allowance back then was just enough for my daily expenses, for me to purchase a book; I have to really save up for it. I envied my classmates whose moms buy books for them. You see my mom was a working one and I never really wanted to bother her to ask her to buy a Sweet Valley Twins book or a Nancy Drew book or one of those books that lets you choose your own ending. I simply borrowed from my classmates. I remember this particular seatmate of mine in high school; Ivy, she was really neat and took good care of her books.  Whenever I was given a chance to borrow her Sweet Valley books, I took extraordinary diligence in making sure that the sides of the book never had a crease. I read lying on my bed and opened the book just enough for me to somewhat peep through the entire page. I almost did not flip the pages, I somewhat figured out a way to flip my head, or my whole self. I may not have my own books, but I still consider myself lucky to have classmates with books who was kind enough to lend it to me.

But there are kids who can't buy books... and their friends can't buy as well... and I think what's worse than not being able to read is being able to do so but not having something to read. A few days back as I was cyber-stalking someone on facebook, I chanced upon a post from a friend who is very active with TREK (TRails to Empower Kids). A group of friends who did not just admire the beauty of the mountains but also saw how deprived the isolated tribes were. So they have decided not just to trek, but to bring treats to the tribes that they visit.

Sometime next month , August 25-26, they will again embark on a journey,to have a good exercise, to marvel at the beauty of nature and most importantly, to bring treats to Primary School Kids in Nagtipunan, Quirino.  I am such a wimp and wouldn't want to go with them, not for the fear of being away from my urban lived comfy life, but from the fear of embarrassing myself because I might just be deadload for the group.

So I just told my friend that I will try to collect books for the kids. And I need help. I need books that an 8 year old can read and learn from. To my mommy friends, I know some of your kids have been given books that they no longer read and are just collecting dust, I am more than willing to meet up, and catch up too with a cup of coffee. I also need pens, crayons.. lots and lots of them.  I want these mountain trekkers to really have heavy bags on their backs full of treats.

nostalgia kicking in again

a blogpost from DEC 2008.....

CATHY's ADVICE


I had a long chat with my high school seatmate Cathy a couple of weeks ago. It was so nice to talk to her again after a very long time. She has migrated, fell inlove, got her heart broken, cried an ocean, fell inlove again, got married and now living blissfully.  She has always been a delight to talk to, so sweet.. to the point that I sometimes wish I could be like her, but then again it would not be me anymore.
She was very enthusiastic when she was telling me about her wedding. How she met her lucky husband, how i loved the personal touch of her menu, how she managed to look stunning despite the fact that it was a do-it-yourself wedding.  Of course, no catching up will be complete without a little nostalgia… our carefree junior high school days, how we would go around the classroom after lunch break to collect some coins from our classmates to be donated to the school to build a new gymnasium (she was the elected treasurer, i was her appointed assistant) and the times i would go to their house in las pinas to finish some projects.

Then she asked me if I still write poetry. I said not  anymore. I was pleasantly surprised that she remembered that I used to write poems. Of course my works would not have been comparable to a Sartre, nor could have it been worthy of a Noble prize, but just the fact that someone remembered my works was compliment enough.  I used to write poetry, back in high school,intense emotions triggers my literary creativity.

Cathy then asked me to try it again, at least to keep me off the television. So here goes… I am not so sure if Cathy checks my blog.. i hope she’ll have time to blog hop one of these days and chance upon my page.

TEARS

The tears I shed,

tell so many tales,

If you see tears rolling down my cheeks,

Would you care enough to ask?

or care even more to listen?

Did I shed a tear because of deep sorrow?

Or could it be tears of joy?

I could have cried out of anger,

or could it be out of fear?

Would tears be enough to replace words I could not say;

like how much I am sorry, or how much I worry?

Am I glad?  Am I sad?  Am I hurt?

Is it because I am missing you?

Or is it because I am happy of where I am right now without you?

Did I try and lost?

Or was I lost and now happily found?

What are the tales that my tears are telling?

Would you bother to stop and try to comprehend?

Or would you just look away, and pretend you never saw me crying?