I used to sing this in our gigs 23 years ago, with the heavier version by Goldfinger. I tried singing the original lyrics but my German is terrible so we decided to stick to the English lyrics. It’s an anti-war song, which was a perfect match to U2’s Sunday, Bloody Sunday that we also covered.

I had been educating my kids about the beauty of the music of my generation—at least they know who Rage Against The Machine and White Stripes are. I just introduced Twin I to this song today and told her this was part of my repertoire decades ago.

We’re housebound since yesterday as it has been stormy and dark. We can’t go to Lake Yambo if it’s muddy and slippery. Our barge may capsize if we try to board it in this weather. I’m not sure how it is in the city—it’s probably wet and dreary—but here in the province it has been cold, wet, and stormy. Perfect time to curl up in bed with a book, which I had been doing since yesterday. There’s an occasional anxiety-triggering email from my manager but I decided to ignore it for now so it won’t destroy my holiday.

This short movie by Disney, which is distinctly Filipino, especially with the word lola indicated there, has tugged at my heart strings.

Christmas without parol (Christmas star lantern) is a bit sad. We Filipinos can do away with the tree because it hasn’t really been in our tradition (American) but the parol has been with us since the Spaniards introduced Christmas to us by way of Catholicism.

I have always been insistent about hanging parols wherever I lived to remind me of Christmases here in my home province and in Batangas, where we spent Christmas holidays when I was growing up. Those Christmases in Batangas were more traditional in the sense we went to the the midnight mass before noche buena, with hot chocolate made from tablea waiting for us in my lolo and lola‘s home. The next day, Christmas day, we would be visiting paternal and maternal relatives, with countless hands of our elders put on our foreheads (the distinctly Filipino mano po). After our grandparents passed, we spent the holidays here, stuffing our faces with food that we seldom get to eat in Metro Manila, where three of us worked after college. I remember spending days re-reading the Lord of the Rings trilogy and other JRR Tolkien books that I had. Then watching the feel-good movies on HBO and Hallmark/Lifetime channels. Temperature drops to 20 or lower. I love reading during this time of the year.

I hope my girls will have fond memories of Christmas holidays, even though they have to split their holidays between my side of the family and their father’s side. I hope they’re not gonna resent me down the road for not having a traditional Christmas where the family is intact, just one unit.