New Directions and Learnings

For those who have not kept up with me in the 1 year since the last blog entries, I am now in Brisbane , Queensland taking a Master's of Business Process Management Degree. Hopefully with the experiences, learning and other interactions I will have in this 1 year and a half journey it will lead me to new opportunities and a greener path. Thus the succeeding entries will deals with my reflections for my subject INN 101 "Impact of ICT"

Will we have any beaches left?

Today is Pilipinas Blog Action Day , organized to make the readers and users of the Internet and the various blogs aware of the need to promote Environmental consciousness and the spectre of climate change. I am not a "Green Peace" sort of a guy nor do I want to hug whales or sharks or the like, but I guess as a future beach bum, it would be weird not to have any beaches left.

I grew up in Cagayan de Oro and spent most of my summers in a sleepy little town called Medina , Misamis Oriental. We were fortunate that as part of my mom's heritage was a strip of white sandy beach where we had a summer house.

All summer long we would laze away the days at the beach,playing, swimming and generally loving the feel of sand between our toes and the hot sun bearing down on us and turning us into black slippery kids.

 

During the 80s I was fortunate to have visited Boracay when there was only one place to stay in the island and the sand was smooth and unblemished and the natives friendly and caring. Boracay nowadays is a joke, like an old punch drunk woman whose face and body show the ravages of too many parties, too many people and too much commercialization and construction.

We try to pursue so many ecological initiatives, so many "Save the Earth" project  while behind our back others are pissing in the rivers and undoing what little repairs we have done.

Is it a lost cause? I really don't have the answer nor can I peep into a crystal ball and divine the future. All I can say is that if we don't do it for our own children, then we condemn them to a life less meaningful.

Meanwhile, all I can do is continue to go around the beaches and seashores, savor their pristine condition and capture them for all eternity. Hopefully years into the future,some kid will peer at the picture and dream of better days gone by.

 

Chickening out

As I type this short musing, I am  sitting in our downstairs study sipping a hot mug of green tea. If things had worked out differently I would probably be sitting on a beach in Mambajao,Camiguin reveling in the view and the fresh air .

Today is the wedding of my eldest nephew , Desi , the first of  the next generation  to get married. It would be a beach wedding and then a sumptuous repast under the stars and with the sound of crashing waves applauding the newlyweds.Was already psyched up to travel since last week, despite the pain in my tailbone, having just got back from another trip to Tandag.

I would have taken the last bus last night from Davao to Butuan, Early morning bus from Butuan to Balingoan, then ferry from Balingoan to Benoni and lastly multicab from Benoni to Mambajao.

I like to plan trips. It has been my passion since I was young to travel and I slaked my thirst for travel when I worked with PAL by racking up the miles and destinations. Even after my stint in PAL, I would travel albeit not as far and free as before .

Anyway to get back to my story, everything was laid out and budgeted  but some spoiler named Pepeng got in the way…yes Typhoon Pepeng. An old time friend Roch Vivares who lives in Camiguin and would have met me there and caught up on old times called yesterday saying that winds were very strong and the waves were high. Having watched “A Perfect Storm “ yesterday on HBO gave my imagination fits. I know that I can still swim somehow but a hungry shark, age and hypothermia would surely catch up with me  .

 

.And although some people mistake me for an out of focus George Clooney , I did not relish having to brave the waves  and swim for my life.

I chickened out and canceled my trip. My nephew was somewhat disappointed on the phone when I broke the news. Thus instead of adding another adventure to the numerous notches on my belt, I opted to stay home , tickle the plastic keys on my keyboard and chill out.

To Desi and Baba, Congratulations and best wishes.

Craker nuts anyone?

Musings while bouncing around on a bus-July 2009

Sun is just piercing the veil of darkness, Waking up and stretching while on a Bachelor Express bus from Davao to Tandag, Surigao del Sur. I have been traveling to Tandag for quite a while helping a friend out with his budding business and also starting up a cargo venture. Left Davao at midnight, approximately 5:45 am already, still about 4 hours from my destination.

Thinking of  how long this trip is, so uncomfortable seats, me with my bad back (that’s another story) spotty aircon…at times too cold at times too hot, watching an old man snore with his mouth open across from me, dentures poised to leap to freedom .

Trying not too eat or drink on the bus or stops. The worse part about gorging yourself on a bus is the inevitable rush to the toilet at stops. A sign confronts you “IHI – 2  LIBANG-5 “  if you are out of coins, tough luck. Very few toilets are of acceptable quality, I shudder to remember some of the bowls with large foreign objects floating in them---DON’T PUKE, SERVES YOU RIGHT READING MY BLOG WHILE EATING!!!

Some are just walls with a drain pipe, one was just nothing really nothing just a patch of grass smelling of pee, you pay 2 pesos for this privilege? I am a stickler for bathrooms, I can take faded peeling rooms, sagging beds or frayed bed sheets, but I put my foot down on dirty and filthy toilets.

I can now understand why some people do their dirty business in the water or on the beach, a handful of sand rubbing the s***t off your a**. I am getting pretty yucky about this.

Cant wait to get to Tandag, the beach beckons….

Revival

This blog has been sleeping and slumbering for such a long time. I guess the initial thrill of writing a blog passed suddenly like a stray cloud across the blue sky. Other people have persevered and made it a part of their lives that inevitably , they reach for the keyboard with trembling hands eager for their daily fix of words, wit and wisdom.

I on the other hand started a blog to spark a revolution , so I thought against the sluggishness and apathy that was clouding the industry that I was in, yes, I was angry that things I wanted done were not being done, screw everyone and everything.

But almost 2 years later, I realize that things should go as they are, we should learn to go with the flow and relax.

I aim to continue to write this blog but most of my stories will be first in hindsight, trying to recall the gaps between where I stopped and where I am now. Hopefully it will be entertaining enough for some people to continue to follow this , if not then something to while away the time while travelling in different directions and different areas.Some stories might appear out of sequence, I beg your indulgence since my mind is not as exact or compartmentalized as it used to be.

Technopreneurship

What creature is this? Just some fancy words? If that is what you think
 just believe in your thoughts hard enough as you throw yourself
 off a tall building  (Note : in Davao you only have 2 choices Marco Polo Hotel-19 stories or Landco
Bldg-17 stories personaly I would choose Marco Polo, Landco elevators are slOOOw and lousy, so is the rest of the buildingexcept for the Blu gre Coffee Shop on the ground floor)

But seriously, the new Technopreneurship program in Davao City, if managed properly has the potential to seriously put the city on the map. People (at least the filipinos) malign the Chinese for
accumulating such large piles of money without realizing that they (the Chinese)have to work from a very young age and learn to be entrepreneurs from the cradle.

At least a program/advocacy that I can sink my teeth into! Hopefully the colleges and universities
in the City will have a good launch of the program by June 2007 and probably will bear fruit in the next 2-3 years.

Unless the Dark Side decides that this program will destroy the sweatshop mentality that they
have kept the industry captive under for the longest time and start  their underground campaigns to stop this. Come on! this is not the middle ages! Wake up and smell the Durian!

What we need is commitment and dedication, which some course in a foreign school or work/exposure abroad will give.

CARPE DIEM!

rebirth

 It's been almost 2years since I gave up the position of President of the ICT Council of Davao. Nice to have the title but it was lonely being the only one running this organization. People don't want to participate if their personal or business interests have to be put aside for the good of the whole industry. I've made enemies but also friends in the industry and it was so sad for me to let go.

After that I just lurked around the city and had almost given up on the industry. But lo and behold I was appointed as the ICT Committee Chairman of the Davao City Chamber of Commerce and Industry (www.davaochamber.org) Ha! to all my detractors Ha!, I guess if I wasn't good enough as ICT 
Council President , I probably had to console myself as ICT Committee Chairman!

What Sayeth you?

Want some Milk?

People here in davao get so frustrating sometimes, they want development but they dont want to 
work for it. You can;t just walk into a store and drink milk without paying!!!

Crazy!!! If you want it free just suck it from a cow! 

Welcome to my mad world!

Well, I just jumped on the Blog bandwagon like everyone else . In this fast and ever changing world this seems to be the in thing and I also wanted to take this opportunity to put down on paper various thoughs that have been rattling around in my head like looses stones in a tin can. Feel free to post comments and views, this is a no holds barred site, I won;t be editing out content unless you catch me in a foul mood or the content is otherwise offensive to general sensibilities.

Enjoy the ride!