Author Archives: admin

23 days without a car

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I would have wanted to drive somewhere today but I couldn’t. I still don’t have a car.

My brain is not functioning today—you know it’s like a deflated balloon right now after the Adrenalin rush of yesterday. Imagine, I did not allow myself to cry yesterday and absorb the fact that I lost 300k because I needed presence of mind. I needed to engage with the scammer/s while I am working with the authorities. Whatever info I extracted from the criminals, I passed on to authorities.

crop male hacker watching desktop computer in darkness
Photo by Anete Lusina on Pexels.com

After my Nancy Drew-esque adventure, I disengaged, as advised by the lawyer of the anti-fraud team because my identity will be stolen if I lingered long enough. The case is now with the investigators. I already gave him the ID of the point person from the syndicate that they can engage with so they can do a sting operation.

After I recovered my funds, I slept for 9 hours. All the stresses of the previous day were released today and my brain is barely functioning now.

My friend from the media relations of AEV said she was in awe of my presence of mind and guts. I said, maybe because I am a reporter so I’m used to masking stress and can still function under duress (I received a lot of threats from the scammer’s side when I refused to do what they wanted to me to do).

This is an organized crime syndicate. I did a lot of research and discovered the same modus operandi had been going on since 2019 or probably earlier. I passed on my research to the anti-fraud teams and the NBI; I think they need Interpol for this one. As my friend-colleague told me, they have scam farms (akin to boiler rooms) in Southeast Asia, scamming people from China to Venezeula. I’m not entirely sure if these boiler rooms do the same phising as what was done to me (and at some point my mom, but then my mom has an excuse that she is not internet savvy while I don’t; i blame my lack of sleep).

Image from Mothership.sg

It’s like being on the investigative journalism circuit again, doing covert info gathering. After being fueled by Adrednalin for 24 hours (forgetting to eat and sleep), my body gave up and gave in to exhaustion.

I’ve been pretending to edit a story from Vietnam the whole day today but I haven’t progressed to the fourth paragraph.

The best I could do today was to clean my keyboard, which was full of cat hair.

Cleaning my mechanical keyboard that has brown switches. Photo by CallMeCreation.com
Cat hair and dust bunnies from my keyboard. Photo by CallMeCreation.com

I can’t complain. After the extreme stress I went through yesterday, maybe I deserve this break. Besides, Southeast Asia is dead today because of Eid al-adha.

And oh, I thank God that I also have the foresight to keep majority of my funds in trust accounts that cannot be withdrawn that easily as these require a visit to the bank branch. I also have split my ready-to-use funds into different bank accounts. Aside from *** (where I have like 6 accounts), I have *** and ***. I now have *** and ***, which I’m testing as a financial reporter for future reference. In case of fuck ups like this, I still have funds I could use.

Diversify, diversify.

Tomorrow will be much better. All is well.

22 days without a car

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UPDATE: I was able to recover my funds, intact. God is good to me even if I’m being stupid. Kudos to the excellent anti-fraud teams of UBP and EWB who acted swiftly. It’s a harrowing experience.

dollar-currency-money-us-dollar-47344.jpeg
Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

Today my EastWest Bank accounts were phished and funds and were transferred to a Union Bank account. Around PHP 300,000 or more than USD 5000.

Using my connections at Union Bank, I have reported the bank transactions and the UBP account used to funnel funds so they can freeze it. The syndicate doing this is also using my credentials to hack into my UBP account as I received SMS and emails from legit UBP number and email address about this attempt.

I think the syndicate is a crypto gang, and this is similar to just like what they did to BDO account holders at the beginning of this year. They used a UBP account as a conduit to funnel funds into crypto accounts because this bank has connections to crypto or they’re dipping their hands into crypto so it’s easier to move money from a legit bank to a crypto account and international transfers are easier. UBP has very loose eKYC, like GCash.

I don’t think I can get back the money but I’m trying to trap the syndicate. I am in constant communication now with UBP people and my next stop is NBI. I just have to make sure they have frozen the account before I go to NBI so that the scammer/s cannot withdraw the money.

Someone is still watching over me since my BDO account wasn’t touched as it was under maintenance last night until this morning. ❤️

My HSBC credit card was hacked earlier this year and some purchases in the US were made. These were reversed as I was able to prove that the physical card is with me the same time the transactions in the US were made. I think they gained access into my account when I subscribed to Windows CCleaner app or Malware Bytes. Same thing happened to my Citi credit card; there were attempts to use my card which were unauthorized but with Citi, they were the ones who immediately invalidated the transactions and shut down my credit card number.

It’s hard to do anything online these days. The problem is, everything is going online.

21st day without a car

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Yesterday was a bit shocking that even my former boss messaged me to ask, “What’s happening with the world?!”

Looks like a case of mental health illness issue rearing its ugly head. Again. News from Japan say that the assassin is an unemployed former military (Japan’s equivalent of navy) and he killed Shinzo Abe on the basis that he believed Abe is involved with an organization (which news reports say religious) that this assassin hates.

He told investigators that his mother had become bankrupt after spending her money to support a religious group, according to Japanese newspaper Mainichi Shimbun, which cited police sources. He said his family fell apart because of his mother’s obsession with the group, and he targeted Abe “out of resentment,” Mainichi reported.

Mental health issues are taboo topics in Japan, a country that values conformity so much. Psychiatric therapy is almost unheard of there. That’s why you have a lot of hikikomori there and suicide rates are some of the highest in the world.

It’s just sad.

I brought the girls today to their friend’s house so I owned the rest of the day. And of course I spent it sleeping and cuddling with the cats. Slept probably for three hours.

Kimchi is so cute!

My cats, my children, my relatively comfortable and quiet life make my heart full. I am complete.

I am complete.

As I wrote in my Instagram post today, I fear nothing these days.

Revelation of John 4:5 “From the throne came flashes of lightning, and rumblings and peals of thunder, and before the throne were burning seven torches of fire, which are the seven spirits of God”

One of those seven is Michael the Archangel, the guardian of Israel, who is also my guardian angel.

Together with God’s promise in Psalm 91 and this archangel, I am forever protected. ❤️ I have no fear. 🔥

I am loved and protected. I fear no evil. Many times my ass has been saved from sure disaster.

I used to fear expressing my spiritual beliefs because J scorns it. He doesn’t believe in God, I think. Now, I don’t care anymore. I’m very free to do, express, and believe in whatever I want.

My faith was just tested now but the archangel is looking after me.

20th day without a car

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This story from The New York Times struck a chord somewhere, not because I have a similar story, but because the pain indirectly expressed here is universal. Pain just comes in different degrees and forms.

“What is true? The note I wrote on a slip of paper and put in the drawer of my bedside table after we broke it off that final time: ‘Long after you are gone, my stones will hold your warmth.'”

Awww, journalists are really masochists. Why is she doing this to herself?

Nope, don’t try to answer. I already answered my own question.

Some literal positive news today

And I really love how people are responding to this. 😂

St Peter Memorial 😂

These past few weeks were very challenging for Philippine media, with the revocation of Rappler’s registration statement at the SEC, the red tagging of the National Union of Journalists of the Philippines and Bulatlat.com (where my first investigative piece about juvenile justice was published). This Marcos administration 2.0 is hell-bent on shutting free media down.

Anything that publishes the truth is being persecuted by this government.

My fellow journalists are now having drinks in Cubao X and as much as I want to join them, I can’t because 1) I don’t have a car; 2) I feel like staying in bed more; and 3) my doctor hasn’t given me the clearance to have alcohol. The last time I was with them, I had to exercise great self-control because beer was free-flowing and Johnnie Walker was table-hopping.

I just sent them a bottle of wine via Grab as a goodwill gesture and in solidarity. We all had tough weeks. Will probably join them next time.

19th day without a car

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My Melody and Kuromi car key covers. Photo by CallMeCreation.com

Because I’ve gone crazy and bored out of my skull, I started dressing up my car keys so that no man would ever attempt to drive my car 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣. I got these from Shopee.

Seriously though, this solved my problem because one of the original car keys had a broken head so I couldn’t attach a chain on it. Now with these Sanrio covers, I could now put key chains and won’t get lost in my bag.

And in keeping with my penchant nowadays for bling, I bought a new bracelet for my smart watch so it would match my jewelry when I’m in my business attire.

Photos by CallMeCreation.com

Online shopping, you are fueling my insanity. 😂😂😂

One of these days I would purchase that T-Rex costume I had been eyeing on for years.

And start going around UP Diliman and UP Los Baños in this get up:

And create an Instagram account like this one:

I always got a kick out of this costume. I always laugh out loud whenever I see them. I encountered a bunch of them in Takashimaya in Singapore in 2018 😂. I wanted to buy one ever since.

At Takashimaya. Photo by CallMeCreation.com

I have a weird sense of humor. I couldn’t stop laughing whenever I watch this:

18th day without a car

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“Mommy, why are you counting the days without a car?” Twin I asked me when she saw me drafting a blog entry the other day.

“It’s like counting days without alcohol, darling. I’m so addicted to having a car at my disposal that I already forgot how to use public transport,” I said.

So it has been 18 days since I went outside my 4-km radius. It’s like a self-imposed quarantine or something.

Meanwhile, I had been struggling with sleep again for a couple of weeks now. My hours are upside down again and this time I’m keeping London hours. I don’t know how long I will be like this but this should be fixed once I get out of my house again. Maybe when I’m in Singapore my hours will be saner.

Speaking of which, I learned that none in my cluster in our company has been coming to our office regularly so I guess I really don’t have to drop by our office and I should just go straight to our conferences. I’ll just work in my hotel if I need to. Even my deputy hasn’t been reporting to our office because there’s no strict back-to-office order for us journos. That’s some kind of relief for me since I don’t want to be hopping from one train station to another just to show my face to people I don’t really need to work with. Those who regularly report to office belong to a different cluster. Well I could try to be friendly but my schedule is just packed and I don’t even have room for that.

One of the realizations I have in my healing process is this:

I now know that I am more than enough.

I am a treasure to somebody else and I no longer want to recall that feeling I had for more than 1.5 years that I am trash, hence, I was treated like trash.

I will never allow myself to be in that position again. It destroys you.

Now that I’m ok, I am able to parse things more clearly. I am thanking God everyday that I chose this route and resisted friends’ suggestions to put myself in the market to heal. That’s not healing; it’s escaping. The problem will still persist and you’re just applying bandage upon bandage on a wound that is undergoing gangrene necrosis. In the end it will kill you. You’ll just realize that you’re already emotionally dead at age 50 and you’ve never had anything meaningful all those years.

And you wonder where has the time gone.

I have now learned to love myself and realized my real value so I don’t need another person’s validation for that. I am beautiful, intelligent, funny, caring, and dignified and I truly believe that, not just lip service to myself. Now that I’ve reached that stage, I think I would have a healthier relationship with the next person since I am not looking to become a whole person through my partner. I am already whole, with or without that partner. I don’t have to bend over and backwards just to accommodate that person and make him love me.

Just be.

And these are lessons I have already imparted to my girls this early.