Category Archives: media

For days like this, you need 90 proof drinks

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Patron Silver and the shot glasses I’ve downed this lunch time. 90 proof (45% alcohol). Photo by CallMeCreation.com

Things are so bad that press conferences come with alcoholic drinks because our hosts know how stressed we are right now. Twitter has made every reporter I know depressed today with a series of bad news after bad news, the primary one is having an incoming press secretary who is a lawyer suspended by the Supreme Court and her only claim to fame is being a fake news peddler VLOGGER/blogger. She red-tags people and is very hostile to media.

During Duterte’s admin, I have experienced being unwelcomed by the government as we legit reporters were not given seats in a national economic conference while the bloggers like uTh*king P*noy are given a special section where they can write and tweet inanities. These people who just add GDP cumulatively and declare that Duterte will end his admin with a 45% GDP growth 🙄 These people who cannot make heads or tails of FDI, stock market, mergers and acquisitions, and benchmark interest rates. I had to write my stories on the floor on those days despite my being in business clothes. That’s how bad it was.

My group chat has been on fire today. Marcos is putting hostile people in place to barricade us to prevent transparency and truth.

A lot of my friends and colleagues said they have turned off Twitter today due to the series of WTF stories coming out.

At UCC. Photo by CallMeCreation.com

Despite downing a couple of shots of Patron, one of the strongest tequilas known to the market, I didn’t get tipsy. But just to be safe, I went down from the hotel where we had the lunch briefing to have coffee and work.

My laptop bag with cat scratches. Photo by CallMeCreation.com

I wasn’t really productive today but I was able to secure an interview with an Indonesian company for one of my reporters. I’m a generous boss; I farm out the things that land on my plate and I do not hog them for myself. Besides, I should be doing more value-added things like big scoops and more global/regional stories so I shouldn’t be doing small stories that suck up my time.

Sketch. Art and photo by CallMeCreation.com
At UCC. Art and photo by CallMeCreation.com

But I’m so brain-dead now that I could not pull up my watercolors to finish this sketch. Perhaps tomorrow when I’m in the zone?

My friend from my old TV network told me he wants to quit now and join corporate. I told him, he better jump now when the offer still stands because the threat of the incoming justice secretary is serious. It’s martial law all over again, closing down independent media and promoting crony media like SNI (owned by a Duterte ally wanted by the US FBI for sex trafficking and other offenses) and Net25 (Iglesia ni Cristo station).

Oh WTF.

Now it has begun

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The demonization of media and the legitimization of disinformation peddlers like Think*ng P*noy and M*rk L*pez has started. The more that we will get harassed, the more that we will be suppressed by this government. This red-tagger is now more empowered to call us communists that will automatically put us in the shoot-to-kill order of the military and the police.

How can you even feel safe in this kind of environment? In the US, the level of harassment of newsmen is not as dire as in the Philippines, where journalist killings are as rampant as in war zones in other countries.

He is now threatening the media owners that, hey, ABS-CBN will not be an isolated case anymore.

The incoming Sec Gen of the National Economic and Development Authority is a nice guy and I often had bets with him about the outcome of GDP numbers every quarter when I used to cover the macroeconomy. However, this does not negate the fact that he used to work with Marcos Jr when the latter was the governor of Ilocos Norte and I doubt his capacity to say no to shenanigans as he is more if a “yes” man more often than not.

This is the reason why my brother is/was invited to be an undersecretary under this administration. This guy and my brother have almost the same specialization and they had worked together on my brother’s doctoral dissertation. My older sister and I already expressed our disgust if he accepts the offer.

My mom was offered a director position to head a unit at the Department of Science and Technology. But the papers would have to be signed by Jr so my mom declined and said she’s already deaf but in truth she cannot stomach working under Marcos. She said two candidates for National Scientist declined the award because Jr has to present them the award. That’s how reviled he is.

Meanwhile, I got so frustrated this morning because I got disturbed by a journo in India last night. She was the one asking me for favors and yet she’s the one who appears to be more demanding than my own reporters. 🙄 She thinks that editing analysis articles is a piece of cake.

Learning to say no.

I had a journo messaging me at 8 pm asking to discuss her analysis piece. I said no, we will discuss tomorrow since I have children to attend to now.

A content editor was asking many simple questions about a story I edited, I asked, can you address your concerns to the journalist who wrote this? It is 11 pm and I am already in bed.

I have started turning off my Microsoft Teams because they always mistake I am available 24/7. Is there a way that makes Teams put you on an “away” mode automatically at a certain time? I have no problems with emails because I can ignore them. But instant messaging is really intrusive.

my FB post

And I spent most of my day today dealing with that story.

Boundaries. We need boundaries. I hate co-workers nagging me during off-hours for work-related matters. I’m no machine! All bosses should also know how to stop this bad habit like their staff is working 24/7. Ghad, we’re not slaves!

STRESS RELIEF

#catloaf. Photo by CallMeCreation.com

This is not a perfect cat loaf as Sushi’s front paw is showing. I can’t resist squishing them when they’re in a complete cat loaf position. I don’t know why. They evoke squishy stuffed toys of my youth?

Photo from comfortzone.com

My cats had been my stress absorber since my erst-while babies are all grown up, so by substitution my cats are now my babies.

Ain’t this the truth?!

Another stress-buster for me is scrolling through IG, looking at drawings, figuring out how I can do a similar thing. I learn by looking at their step-by-step posts.

I also browse through Amazon before sleeping and check out prices of Daniel Smith and Rembrandt watercolors and Lazada for Holbein sets. As if the prices would change 🙄 These friggin’ brands are sooooo expensive and yet…I want them. I know the joy of jumping from student grade to almost-artist-grade and they’re miles apart. What more if I get to use artist-grade colors? 🥰 I couldn’t bring myself to buy Rembrandt because that thing costs USD 180!

Maybe when I’m good enough to exhibit, I will brave it and spend PHP 9,000+ for a tin of watercolors. 😶

I will buy this as a gift to myself. I’ve reached my quota of gifts to myself (new piano, computer keyboard), maybe I will do this in December???

Or or or…maybe when I go to Japan I will buy myself a huge set of Holbein watercolors and all the pens I could cart away in my bag.

In the meantime, let me browse through e-commerce sites for these babies until I fall asleep. 😂

We need to push back

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I just got back home from a large drinking session with colleagues from the industry but I didn’t drink that much, only got dizzy with the silvanas I ate. We had talked about many things that should stay within the four walls of that venue. All I can say is–and what the oldies told us—that we should take seriously all threats to our lives and the safety training that we would be taking soon.

We should be braver now and make a stand—and we should support one another even if we are from competing news agencies.

More flowers! Photo by CallMeCreation.com

This is the first time this week that it didn’t rain. Since it was too late to go anywhere far, I decided to just drive to QC Circle and buy more plants to replace the ones that died during the deadly heat of the past few weeks. So here we are, a thousand pesos poorer.

While I was buying plants, I had let the girls take rides in the mini amusement park at the Circle. Even though they’re already tweens, they still enjoy such stuff, especially since they were cooped up inside the apartment for week because of the rains.

Paddling in this green pond. Photo by CallMeCreation.com
Photo by CallMeCreation.com

Then we had dinner at Saigon Pho along Maginhawa St. I told them we should explore other cuisines so that when I bring them with me abroad, they would be more comfortable eating a variety of food.

Twin I ate three, while I only had one. She said it was delicious. Photo by CallMeCreation.com

Pho. Photo by CallMeCreation.com
Photo by CallMeCreation.com

Now they have discovered the wonderful world of pho. They loved it. They had beef, I had chicken (because I felt I already hit my beef quota for the month). I told them next time we will go to Muang Thai along Malakas St.

Muang Thai menu c/o Zomato

Since dine-in is back, I can bring them again to Little India and some other specialty restaurants in Salcedo village that are tucked away inside the CBD buildings like Warung Indo (Indonesian) and Sultan Mediterranean Grill. And of course, my favorite—Little Tokyo in Makati, which is a community of Japanese restaurants where Japanese bankers go. The former MUFG Manila head told me about this little diner there that seats only 15 people that serves the best ramen in Manila and for the life of me I already forgot the name. It’s also in Little Tokyo where I can have my okonomiyaki fix. I mean I’ve been spoilt by Osaka, the food bowl of Japan, and I had a wonderful time eating in small diners there even though I couldn’t read the menu. Because of that, it’s now hard for me to find good Japanese food now that I had the best the country had to offer. Most of the Japanese restaurants here have been “Filipinized” i.e. salty. Somebody asked me, where did I have the best Japanese food, I told him/her (cannot remember now who asked), that I attended this reception by the Japanese government for the delegates of the ADB Annual Governors’ Meeting, which was graced by then-Finance Minister Taro Aso in Yokohama. They spared no expense–they served the best Wagyu steak, best sushi, sashimi and other dishes that I could no longer identify. One Japanese official shared with me a shot of sake and he told me that was the best sake there is. I could tell because it was so smooth. The best teppanyaki I had was in the middle of nowhere in Kinosaki.

Teppanyaki. Photo by CallMeCreation.com

I digress.

The point I’m trying to make is that the girls shouldn’t be just confined to mall food. They told me that they remember that we used to go to malls a lot before and I said I hated those weekends but we only went because their dad is a mall rat. That’s one of the reasons he hated me. I didn’t like malls, I didn’t like window shopping, and I didn’t like mall food. When I had the energy, I took the girls to UP so they can play in the grass and climb trees. They picked flowers and weeds. They played make-believe games while running around. I bought them ice cream and taho (silken tofu) from the ambulant vendors scattered around the campus. They needed fresh air and real food and not be confined in malls and see all those things that tempt them to be mindless consumers of stuff. I brought them to QC Circle to play in the playground when it was newly constructed. I let them run around and play games with the other kids. It’s healthier and cheaper, too.

So I’m not surprised that he feeds them pizza and burgers when they’re with him on some weekends. 🙄 Oh well.

Gotta sleep and tackle the Sombrero island painting tomorrow.

Liwanag sa dilim

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Light amidst the darkness.

That is what my daughters are right now.

Twin A last night asked me, “Mommy, can I be a lawyer?”

Me: Of course, yes!

Twin A: I want run for president like Leni. I want to be a lawyer and help the poor farmers who do not have homes, just like Leni.

And there I was, crying yesterday, losing hope, feeling betrayed and defeated. Thinking of giving up on my country.

And here is my child, giving me a reason not to give up.

My other child, Twin I, had been reading up on the Marcoses and she is now on the part where Imee Marcos–the current senator and head of the senate committee on elections (surprise surprise!)–had the young Archimedes Trajano killed in 1977 because he dared to speak out. She said she is annoyed with Imee Marcos that she’s so plastic and that she had the temerity to tell the court and Trajano’s mother that, “It’s none of your business.”

Yesterday, they have started the old practice of using guns to instill fear into the hearts of those who have opposed Marcos 50 years ago. They are now soon going to start the witch-hunt among us journalists.

I was so heartbroken yesterday, I cried myself to sleep. I talked to my mom this morning and she said:

“We are living in dangerous times right now. The media is the next to be targeted. Come home here and we will talk about your Plan A, Plan B, and Plan C because your profession is a threat to them. We have to continue to fight. Our mistake then was we became complacent after 1986, but the Marcoses had been plotting this for decades. We became complacent that’s why we had all those missteps after 1986. This is the time for us to regroup and fight a tougher battle.”

My older colleagues who were stringers for international publications during the Marcos era were covering business at that time as well. It doesn’t mean that since I am an international correspondent, I’m already shielded. State sequestration of private corporations—just like what Duterte threatened to do with Manila Water and Maynilad—is within my purview. Every journalist now is threatened, as they had been back then. Look at what BBM did to Lian Buan.

At least I know if something happens to me, my brother and my older sister can take in my daughters.

My essay about Marcos and Radiowealth will remain where it is. I will not delete it—because it is the truth.

Marcos has not yet been sworn in but the nightmare is already starting.

As the ball-less misogynists lick their wounds…

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…a gentleman calls out these dickheads.

I really, really wanted to do house to house campaigning but my number one duty as a Filipino is to abide by journalism ethics. I have to restrain myself like the rest of my colleagues. We can express our political leanings but we cannot actively campaign for any personality as part of our sworn duty to be fair and just.

Speaking of journalists and elections, I just attended this webinar by Twitter for us journalists and the measures they put it place to prevent manipulation of the political discourse by preventing trolls/certain political candidates with well oiled machinery to manipulate public opinion (hello, Facebook!). Since this is a private webinar, I cannot disclose the things they have shared with us except for those they have already shared with the public such as 300 Marcos-related accounts (i.e. troll farms) taken down. This active policing of tweets has incensed Elon Musk so much that he is busy with his hostile takeover bid for Twitter. He is angry that Twitter is muzzling freedom of speech. Well Elon, if you go by Facebook, which has destroyed the Philippines, then I wish you just go to Mars and stay there. Don’t be an instrument in destroying democracies like ours.

Mr Musk has said he believes Twitter is limiting freedom of speech on the platform and he reiterated this at the Vancouver event. He has said his primary motivation would be to expand free speech – a US Constitutional right – on Twitter.

BBC.com

Was busy today with admin work that I barely had time time to edit and no time for writing three stories that I must finish until Wednesday. Because on Thursday, we will be leaving here at 5 am so that we would be in Anilao at around 7:30 am so we can dive early!!! Then work I start working at 10 am.

My head is pounding now, damn this headache. My psychiatrist’s secretary has not yet confirmed my schedule. I think this is a withdrawal symptom from stopping alprazolam ahead of schedule. I keep forgetting to take that thing. Maybe because I’ve been very calm the past few weeks that I keep forgetting that I still have to cure my anxiety. I haven’t been triggered since March and that’s a good thing and I hope it stays this way.

This is what I get for giving too much of myself to a man who doesn’t deserve me. Never again. Yeah, I’m hormonal right now and I’m angry again.

Meanwhile, aside from art, my other sources of serotonin are:

Kittykats keeping me company! Photo by CallMeCreation.com

Making our rooms cuter by installing shades to make the lighting cozier. Photo by CallMeCreation.com
My gallery wall. Look at the cat on the stairs on the upper part of the photo 😄 Photo by CallMeCreation.com

Simple things.

I’m running out of places to put my frames.

I don’t feel well. Good night.

Atrocious handwriting

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Printed exercise sheets for Twin I. Photo by CallMeCreation.com

My kids have atrocious handwriting that was not corrected in school because they had been at home for 2 years. I was too busy to pay attention to their handwriting and I didn’t know how to help them. My mother and their dad have bad handwriting so I thought it could be just that.

However, it was already Twin I who asked me for help so I had to sit up and pay attention. I remember when I was in third and fourth grade we had handwriting classes where we were taught cursive handwriting. We had writing exercises in which we shadowed the handwriting of our teacher or what was in our exercise book. So I downloaded some exercise sheets for my daughter to practice on. Hopefully this would help.

I had tried to imitate the neat handwriting of some of my artistic classmates but eventually I developed my own form/style. My father had beautiful handwriting, so did my older sister and brother. My brother’s handwriting is similar to my father’s.

I could say my handwriting is ok and oftentimes my notes are neat, even when I’m doing interviews or listening to conferences/seminars/lectures. I remember my high school and college classmates borrowing my notes because 1) they’re comprehensive; and 2) they’re neat. This skill helped me now in my note-taking as a reporter, especially when there are disputes with those complaining about my reportage. My editors in London or HK ask me to send my notes to them for defense. If my notes are unintelligible, I would have a bigger problem. So I have kept all my reporter’s notebooks from 15 years ago as they stand in court, in case someone sues me. That’s the power of good note-taking—and alongside that is good handwriting.

So I need to train my children how to take notes and improve their handwriting.

Meanwhile, my other children…

Sushi lounging on my bed while I’m working my ass off. Photo by CallMeCreation.com

So far they haven’t destroyed anything this week and last week. But they chewed on Twin I’s school exercise lying around so that’s her fault for being untidy. 🙄

Oh yeah, I have to trim their claws and give them a bath. And shop for supplies again. Ah, the things you do for your pets. 😶

My post about Radiowealth had really gone viral. 7k likes and 5.6k shares. My neighbor sent me a screenshot of my post that has been passed around in Ateneo. One of my sources also sent me a screenshot of it that is being passed around in his Rotary Club.

Of course, the BBM camp is not remiss in their duty in bashing me. So I posted this today, translated in English:

BBM people have been sharing my post about Radiowealth and attacking it, saying the site I shared (blogspot has no SSL certificate etc). The main questions remain, is it true that Marcos grabbed businesses he, his family and his cronies benefited from it? Is it true that we began to sink with the debts we incurred because of his graft and corruption? There was a BBM supporter who sent me a private FB message disputing my statements, that the closure of Radiowealth was not politically motivated but it was about the radioactivity posed by the TVs. 🤔 I had watched on our Radiowealth TV for long hours and until now I’m still alive. I haven’t transformed into an X-men. There were so many requesting FB friendship but NO, I don’t care about them. I’ve had so much experience with internet trolls. I just delete and delete friend requests and PMs. For fact-checking purposes here are links:

https://www.philstar.com/other-sections/starweek-magazine/2013/01/27/901409/domingo-guevara-road-industrialization

https://ph.news.yahoo.com/remembering-dmg-self-made-entrepreneur-091445720–finance.html

https://www.elib.gov.ph/details.php?uid=722235afc2209d5ce5dc064e1127bac3&fbclid=IwAR24bXlm6coSvRDSeDj1POyItA8dg-ZpYsxRehYflC3-tl7uu40kWC9xe2E

https://catalogue.nla.gov.au/Record/2006068

There was one fact checker from Tsek.ph (group of volunteer Philippine journalists) who messaged me on Twitter and said they went through my post and marked it True. I wanted him and the world to know that I am a journalist and I do my research well. I don’t make claims lightly. Plus, I clearly remember interviewing one lolo who mentioned this to me, it was also discussed in one of my broadcasting classes, plus my father told me about this. <<< well this last one doesn’t count as an empirical evidence but this was the one that prompted me to research about Radiowealth.

As I said before, media literacy must be taught in elementary and high school so people can be taught critical thinking and not just be brainless consumers of mass media information. It’s my advocacy. However, it’s hard now that I’m no longer in the academe. The lectures and media trainings have stopped during the lockdowns and that TV interview I had earlier this month was one of the few I did in the last two years.

I have a feeling I will have my other foot back again in academe soon…🤔