This is reminiscent of Typhoon Haiyan, a Category 5 typhoon that ravaged central Philippines in 2013. I covered the disaster and drove down to ground zero where there was so much death and destruction. I had PTSD after that coverage and it is known in the journalism community that covering disasters is also like being in a war zone. It messes up your brain.
We did our grocery shopping tonight for our household and for the victims of Typhoon Odette (which became Cat 5 upon landfall in Siargao). I bought boxes of Century Tuna, boxes of instant cup noodles, boxes of rubbing alcohol, packs of 3-in-1 coffee, sachets of shampoo and toothpaste, bottles of mineral water.
Photo by CallMeCreation.com
Based on my experience covering disasters, victims in evacuation sites do not have the means to cook. At most all they may have are sources of hot water so ready-to-eat stuff like canned tuna and cup noodles are best during the first few days after a disaster. Hygiene kits are also important. Clean water is also a priority.
Then the girls and I went straight to Leni Robredo Volunteer Center to drop off our donations.
Some of our donations. Photo by CallMeCreation.com Photo by CallMeCreation.com Sacks of rice. Photo by CallMeCreation.com Volunteer orientation. Photo by CallMeCreation.com My girls. Photo by CallMeCreation.com
I couldn’t volunteer because Ate C already left for Tacloban today and her grandpa’s house was destroyed by the typhoon so she needed to be there to help in rebuilding it. Although the girls could already fend for themselves, I fear accidents may happen like microwaving metallic objects 🤦🏻♀️
They wouldn’t push through with the trip to their paternal grandpa given the dire situation in Visayas. They don’t have power there because a lot of transmission lines are down. Many vehicles are stranded at the ports and the seas are still violent. Cebu and Siargao airports are destroyed. I fear for a friend in Cebu, I hope he and his family are ok.
Bohol is devastated. No clear idea how Panglao is now but that island is so flat that I expect that everything was washed out. My heart breaks for that little paradise.
Panglao island. Photo by CallMeCreation.com
I will be donating again after my salary is deposited before Christmas.
Meanwhile, my APAC boss said HQ is working out an arrangement that I don’t have to be in Singapore to take on my new role next year. Hopefully, it would push through. If they can’t give me the salary I want (it should be above SGD 14k because that’s the minimum with primary school children) and not just the minimum requirement that the Singapore government demands, then it’s a no-go.
If only sending kids to school there is not that expensive. 🤷🏻♀️
Why the trauma?
Because when you loved someone so much, more than anybody in your life like that, and you get that kind of treatment, it’s traumatizing.
Yes, I’ve never loved anyone like that in my life. In the past I’ve had the courage to walk away. Not this time.
I don’t think I’ll ever love like that again. I no longer have any love to give.
So I just pray that the next person will love him more than I did because he rejected mine since it was not enough.
And as for me, I pray that I will get my peace. That’s all I ask for. Peace.
We remain the laughingstock of the world and the Dutertes and Marcoses and the Arroyos are the clowns who manipulate the Filipinos to perpetuate their greed. What I am worried about is the complacency of the opposition as they remain in their echo chambers, thinking that the echoes are the vox populi. Not so. Talk to the street vendors, the farmers, the fishermen, the vegetable sellers in the urban and rural places. They are voting for Marcos as they lap up all the propaganda crap that radio and GMA Network have been propagating. They do not have access to Internet; if they do, they can’t spend precious pesos on data. They don’t own smart phones; if they do, they may not have the cellular signal for internet. The C, D, E markets comprise the bulk of the electorate. A-B markets are just the small percentage and we often do not reach out to the grassroots.
The fight is in the grassroots.
I finally have the butane grill that I’ve been hanging on to on Lazada. Bought during the 11.11 sale. Photo by CalMeCreation.com
I no longer have to buy and use charcoal. I’ve been polluting my neighbors’ houses for so long. Whoppeee! And it’s easier to cook. No need to spend 30 mins to an hour trying to keep the embers going.
Giant Monterey beef patties. Photo by CallMeCreation.com
To cope with the unsavory news stories that keep popping up on my newsfeeds (and I really can’t tune out because I am a journalist), I indulged again and cooked a nice dinner for all of us. The burgers were juicy and nicely smoked.
Grilled salmon. Photo by CallMeCreation.com
The burgers were for the girls and Ate C. Mine was a small salmon steak with mashed potato and basil.
It’s easy to disassemble for cleaning. It packs away nicely so this is perfect for camping, together with the other portable stove that I first bought from Sarang Mart. It’s nice to grill chicken, hotdogs and marshmallows here while outside the tent as the sun goes down. I found another camping site where we could go, probably by January or February when it’s cooler and not rainy.
The Bloc Campsite, Cavinti, Laguna. Photo from Tripadvisor.comThe BLOC.Photo from Tripadvisor.com
To cope with the negativity around me, I must do the things that I love. Travel and be with nature. Simple wants and simple needs.
And as I predicted she will run as VP with Marcos Jr.
Then this:
This is just a smokescreen. To perpetuate the myth that all is not well with Sara and her dumbass father. This is their way of distancing herself from him, to woo the former DDS back and those who are still sitting on the fence.
They’re just making this a game. And all of us are the losers. All the evil and corrupt have banded together: Marcos, Arroyo, and Duterte.
It’s like a never-ending cycle. A friend who is in Spain now says people’s attitude there is like there’s no more pandemic. No one is wearing masks there. They go about their business like it’s nothing. She still does though, as a precaution.
And now you have this. When will they ever learn???
My second dose was in May, so it has been six months. I need a booster. I don’t want to get Covid again. Hell no. Once is enough. I have this aversion now to humans in tight spaces. Or even in the open if their number is above five.
Meanwhile, we’re headed for disaster.
Ah, Gloria, the Cersei Lannister of this realm
The evil witch Gloria has her pawns playing her game of thrones.
First off, I am incensed, even though I already expected this, that the Dutertes are mocking the electoral process. As I mentioned here before, Bong Go and Ronald “Bato” dela Rosa are just placeholders for Sara Duterte and her running mate until Nov 15, the deadline for any changes in the certificate of candidacy. It is yet to be revealed who will give way between her and Bong Bong Marcos. There are talks that it was Duterte (or former president Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, the mastermind behind Sara) who floated the tax evasion conviction of Marcos Jr to the public so he would be forced to slide down and give way to Sara Duterte. His conviction makes him ineligible to run for any office.
Whatever. This means the Marcos apologists and DDS would be divided. But then this would be a very dirty election, with China intervening again. They’ve already shown their endorsement of Marcos Jr. Remember the “7-hr glitch” during the 2019 elections? State Grid Corp of China owns 40% of the National Grid Corp of the Philippines (NGCP). The Chinese entry was done during the Macapagal Arroyo Administration. It was also during her rule that the ZTE corruption scandal broke out. See the network of evil here?
Incidentally, NGCP is required under the law to list on PSE for transparency because it a monopoly. And guess what? They refused to do so and found a loophole in the law. It’s the Filipino shareholders who did a reverse takeover of a shell company and is making a follow-on offering, some kind of share swap so it would appear that NGCP would become a listed entity because it now has become a subsidiary of a listed company. After structuring the deal, JP Morgan resigned as one of the joint global coordinators for the deal. The Chinese shareholders would not be exposed at all and there is still no transparency. The Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC) allowed it. When I was pursuing the story, I asked ERC about the spirit of the law and would they allow this as per EPIRA law? They couldn’t comment, saying they haven’t seen the IPO filing yet at that time.
At the end of thw day, it’s still the Dutertes/Marcoses/Arroyos who are running the show, having this unholy alliance with the Xi Jinping.
I had a terrifying night last night. I read this Twitter thread about cave diving in rivers and the open sea and the tweets and story links made me feel like I was suffocating. One Reddit entry described nitrogen narcosis so succinctly that I felt as if I was the one suffocating.
This is the entrance to Jacob's Well in Texas. It looks like a bottomless pit.
It leads to a massive cave system about 5000 feet of which have been mapped out. pic.twitter.com/KUo3ckOBlC
As a freediver, albeit amateur, some of my worst nightmares are running out of breath, currents that could sweep me away or under, and nitrogen narcosis, if not the bends, when scuba diving.
Nitrogen narcosis is one of the reasons why I didn’t want to go scuba diving even if my sister went for certification. Another reason was the bends. There are only two decompression chambers here in the Philippines as far as I know. One is in Subic and the other is in Cebu. If I would need decompression in Anilao, I would be dead.
I did not finish this video of a reckless Russian-Israeli diver who attempted to go under the arch at the Blue Hole off the coast of Egypt, in the Red Sea. It was horrifying.
He was not a technical diver, he was ill-equipped because he was carrying one ordinary tank of breathing gas, plus his gear was too heavy for the compression that he experienced at great depths, which prevented him to ascend. Add to his confusion is his apparent nitrogen narcosis.
Being out in the deep blue sea can disorient you; you don’t know which way is up or down. I felt that when we were in Balicasag in Bohol when I attempted to dive away from the seawall and be suspended in the big blue open sea. It was surreal. It would be more terrifying if you were like 30 m deeper, when the light is already faint.
I was scared for J at that time as he kept on diving along the seawall, deeper and deeper. When he did that, I just hovered above so I can easily pull him up if gets caught in an undercurrent along the seawall or if he blacks out. One of the dangers of freediving, aside from running out of breath, is blacking out from the quick ascent from the deep or when surfacing. Many professional freedivers have died of it.
That’s why I wanted to be certified as a freediver so I would be properly trained in ascents and breathing. I would also know what are the other protocols, such as having a knife with me on my weight belt so I can free myself from entanglement or from predators.
However, after reading the stories of cave divers and underwater sinkholes…
Balicasag island, Bohol. Photo by CallMeCreation.com
