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.

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…