Bisdak Babbles

Trick or Treat! I may be living far from the U.S. but I got my share of treats from two blogger friends!
This beautiful New Jersey postcard came from Fortuitous Faery. After some e-mail exchanges, we learned that we both love writing mails! Now, she’s not only my blogging friend, but she’s now my pen friend.

I’ve always loved writing and receiving letters!
Gotta start collecting new stationery sets again. I’m so happy I now have something new to look forward to in the mailbox. Thank you Fortuitous and I look forward to receiving more letters from you!

The next batch of treats came from Laura of Seabird Chronicles! I joined the Autumn Goody Swap and Laura sent these cool stuffs to all the way to Japan! There’s this very cute wooden bird she got from their recent trip to Uruguay.
The gummy bears that came with it helped me ease the stress away. Finally, she put in something that’s really hard to find here in Japan: Red Bull! I really laughed hard when I found out it’s my most favorite energy drink. This just indicates that she’s reading my blog. Thank you very much Laura! Those were really great treats!

Me: Ma, how’s it going? Have you won?
Mama: Nope. Didn’t make it. I lost. I just ranked 9th.
Me: Really? I don’t believe you…
Mama: It’s true! If only I had handed out something…

It’s barangay (ward) election in the Philippines yesterday and my mother’s a candidate for barangay councilor. I can attest to her love for social involvement and service. She was already a barangay official even before the honorarium was mandated. However, this time, she could no longer hold on to being a barangay councilor. New contingents had pushed her out of the list.

As her daughter, I truly want her to do what she loves doing. I understand and accept that people have their reasons for not choosing her… but I’m really disgusted at those who won because they resorted to vote buying. Yes, my mother had thought of doing the same thing, but my father and I have always been “strong factors” to her decisions.

It’s such a shame that in our barangay, we could only point to a single contingent who won fair and square. Imagine this… for 2,200 Pesos ($50-$60) of monthly honorarium/salary, many of those candidates handed out “gifts” to the voters from 20 Pesos to 200 Pesos just to secure a post! Aside from vote-buying, many of those candidates (my mother included) even got death threats! In fact, across the country, there were lots of election-related violence and deaths.

It is the smallest local government unit in the country we are talking about here and all these trash are occurring. These rubbish are just magnified as the government level goes higher.

In a country where vote buying and violence are treated like normal election processes, it’s just so hard to trust all of the government officials. Our country really needs purging… but is there still someone whom we could trust? Can we, Filipino citizens, hold our head up high and elect someone who have no other intention than to serve? We couldn’t entirely prevent people who are so buried into poverty from accepting those “gifts”. So, it all comes down to the government seat aspirants. Do you still have enough tact, conscience, and pride in you and not to resort to these rubbish? Well, I just hope that these questions won’t forever remain as riddles…

I’m really glad Rolando tagged me in this meme: 3 things that I won’t let go. This made me realize that for quite sometime now, I have not done some “deep-thinking”. I really need to sort out what are the things that matter most to me…

1. Love
Any kind of love is wonderful and has the power to transform people. It is love for my family and those dear to me that brings out the “hero” in me.

2. Hope
When things get tough, it’s nice to know (and believe) that things happen for a reason. Facing life’s challenges becomes more bearable if I keep walking towards the end of the tunnel.

3. Good memories
I usually forget the bad things that happened to me or the unkind words that other people said to me. I’d like to think that everyone is kind, so I’d choose to only “absorb” the good things and good aspects of every person. This is still a work in progress, though. There are times when it’s really tough to forgive and forget…

How about you? What are the things that you won’t let go?

Amor tagged me to join her recollection of embarrassing moments in college… hello Amor! ^-^

Being a very clumsy person, I had and still have lots of those moments that I so want to forget. Here’s one of those…

I was done with my classes that day, so I headed to Ayala Center - Cebu to window-shop. My boarding house was near the school but I decided to go to the mall, still wearing my uniform. I usually make sure that I have enough money before going inside a restaurant, but as I grabbed my coin purse, I wasn’t aware that it was open and I was holding it up-side down. Before I even realized it, all the coins “jumped out” of my wallet and rolled in every direction. I could feel everyone’s eyes on me but I had no choice but to run after the coins! And it took me a while before I gathered everything because I was wearing my pencil-cut skirt uniform and my 2-inch high-heeled shoes!

I’d been planning to take a picture of a カラオケ (karaoke) house somewhere in Osaka. Its walls, banners, and posters are all in pink! However, I’d been putting it off and it’s already Saturday!So, once again, I’m leaving you a picture of Shaynna, cuddled in her favorite comforter. She couldn’t sleep without either of her favorite comforters (the other one’s blue). Even now that she’d turned 3, she couldn’t part with her beloved comforters. ^-^

Actual date: August 2005 (I forgot again to adjust the date)

Perhaps I could post the karaoke house’s picture later.
Thank you for dropping by and enjoy your weekend! ^-^

I was originally planning on posting this one…

You got it right! I want to start a campaign against bicycle violence… just kidding. ^-^ It’s just that almost every time I pick up my bike from the train station, I find it lying on the ground. And just recently, its bell was broken and I had to replace it. Perhaps it was again smashed against other bicycles. I just pity my bike… (I treat my bike as my buddy. he he..)

Ok, let’s forget about that “no to bike violence” thing. Last night, after I got off from the train, I’d been thoroughly fumbling inside my bag to look for the bike key but couldn’t find it. Maybe I left it hanging from its lock? So I hurried to where it was located, but I was not totally worried about someone “taking” it. As I have anticipated, I saw my bike, exactly where I left it. Still standing, with the key still stuck in the lock…

Many people here just “pull out” their bike and don’t care what happens to the other bikes… but, after once again benefiting from their honesty, I’m no longer as agitated as before… ^-^

Iligan City have been dubbed as the City of Majestic Waterfalls and the Industrial City of the South (I don’t know if the second one still applies since many of the factories were closed down). I love the place very much and I’m proud to still call Iligan/Lanao del Norte as home.

However, for those who are used to hanging out in the malls, Iligan City can be a bit boring: not a single shopping mall around and no decent theatre house. Only just a few years ago, some fastfood chains (Jollibee and Chowking) were put up. We even have to go to Cagayan de Oro City or Ozamis City to find better and wider-range choices of stuffs.

All we have are department stores such as Gaisano, Jerry’s and Trendline. No store bigger than Gaisano’s 3-storey building. But I guess everything will change now. Much to the excitement of the people of Lanao del Norte (and me!), the Gaisano Mall construction is on the way. And it is rumored to open on December!

I hope it would really look like this one… but then, anything that’s higher than a 3-storey is more than we could ever hope for. ^-^ (This one’s a 6-storey, by the way.)

Hehehe… excited intawn ang probinsyanang si Inday Shiera… ^-^

He came from a big family, and a poor one at that. His father was only a fisherman and his mother was a housewife. However, he was not content at ending up like his father. So he did his best to go beyond high school - fishing at night and going to a technical school at day. A pair of slippers was a luxury so he had to go to school barefoot and only wear his only pair at school. He even took the work as a laborer at the port of Tagbilaran City to pay for tuition.

But all these wasn’t enough so he moved to Iligan City to work at a factory. He met my mother, they got married, while he and my mother continued their way to finish college. Due to his hardwork, he was also taken in as a regular employee and moved up in rank at that factory.

Their family started to grow (with the arrival of 3 children, me, on top of the list) and decided that it’s not good to just rent off a room. He was given an opportunity to work in Saudi Arabia. He chose to leave his family and go to a foreign land to give us better choices. And true indeed, we were given far better choices than he and his siblings had.

My father was the only one among his family who was able to go to college. I could also say that we led an easier life compared to our cousins. Thanks to my father’s hardwork and his love for his family… if it not for him, and of course, with the help of my mother, I wouldn’t be here…

Today is my father’s 60th birthday. For 27 years of being my father, I’d say that I could never ask for a better father. For me, he’s the best father in the whole world. ^-^ No matter how many times I fall, he’s always beside me, urging me to go on…