Category Archives: Newsroom

Media literacy

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My best friend, who is teaching in UP, has been consulting me about some TV guesting in a show where she is an executive producer. The topic was “fake news” and the elections then our conversation drifted to media literacy and society. Then she said my ideas were perfect for the show so she onboarded me as one of the guests just talking about it. It’s funny because I only have a master’s degree on this while she has a PhD. Hahaha! She says I’m on the ground as a media practitioner so I have real-world application.

As a half-assed academic (or former academic), I do have my moments. 😂

I will be on air on the 21st.

Cradling Kimchi while I worked. Photo by Twin I.

I’ve been surrounding myself again with things I love to lift my mood. Recalling the horrendous days when I unearthed a lot of information and relating to my shrink my feelings and the roller coaster ride I experienced the entire month of Feb had undone me this week. Because I had been suppressing them so I can function but out of necessity I had to dig for them again. I just wish it would just end now. I had been squishing my cats today as a stress reliever. I also watered and trimmed my plants, which are blooming again. Woooohooo!

Marigold. Photo by CallMeCreation.com
Photo by CallMeCreation.com
This was supposed to be dying a few months ago but it has now bloomed again. Photo by CallMeCreation.com
My variegated mini roses in bloom again. Photo by CallMeCreation.com
Photo by CallMeCreation.com
Morning glory I had grown from seeds. Photo by CallMeCreation.com

After a day of editing, transcribing interviews, and writing an article, some quiet preoccupation is needed. Like tending to my plants or drawing.

Initial sketch. Panglao island, Bohol. Art and photo by CallMeCreation.com

Ok I just had a lengthy discussion with some editors this late at night because a company is threatening to sue us because my boss didn’t edit the story properly. It’s a long story but she really doesn’t edit and fact checks and stuff. My hands have always been tied because I cannot usurp my boss even though she’s effing up.

Sigh. I need to destress. I’ll start coloring this sketch above. Thank God for watercolor sketching.

UPDATE:

We’re so f*cked

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This lockdown will never end and this Delta variant is just getting started. I’m scared for my children as no vaccine has been allowed for those aged 18 and below. Even if I’m already fully vaccinated, I can still carry the virus back home when I’m buying supplies outside. I haven’t gone out since Thursday last week or 8 days. My freezer is holding up so I really don’t have to buy meat but I have gone low on vegetables. I have to brave it tomorrow.

Meanwhile, Dept of Health Secretary Duque is going straight to hell. He has to answer a lot of questions…missing funds, unpaid hazard pay and allowances to healthcare workers, missing PhilHealth money…He is Satan’s little worker. He’s going straight to hell.

According to Commission on Audit (COA), DOH spent PHP 700,000 (USD 13,868) for four laptops. I wonder what kind of rocket DOH was launching to require them to buy a laptop costing PHP 175,000 (USD 3,467) each.

When I was still reporting on national issues, I used COA reports during my slow news days to investigate how each line agency or Congress is spending its budget. I once wrote about congressmen spending most of their pork barrel on waiting sheds and basketball courts that do not exist. When I was doing the investigative reports on the Napoles pork barrel scam, I used COA reports to follow the money and I haunted the Securities and Exchange Commission to get the General Information Statements of the NGOs that were supposedly the recipients of the pork barrel funds.

PhilHealth not paying hospitals is already crippling the country’s healthcare system. A lot of hospitals are going belly-up and many more will become crippled and may have to close down if this goes on. I wrote a long-form article last year regarding this. As some of my sources said, private hospitals outside Metro Manila have bigger exposure to Philhealth compared to those in Metro Manila as the percentage of privately insured patients and out-of-pocket payers is higher in the country’s capital compared to the provinces. This is dangerous since there is a dearth of public and private hospitals in the provinces and if you have a raging pandemic, it’s like you have already doomed the population that lives outside Imperial Manila.

I was supposed to write something related to this for a local news outfit but the lockdowns and my lack of free time for other things outside my day job have hampered me from doing this. This kind of reportage requires old-fashioned shoe-leather journalism—it involves poring over voluminous public records and documents that could only be provided by sources. Clandestine meetings with sources. Working as an independent journalist on output-basis arrangement with a news agency is not feasible unless the journalist is under a grant. Investigative stories should be done by news outfits that can dedicate a team for this, which we did before. It’s expensive and a lot of work. The news desk will also be understaffed because it will lose people who can write and edit daily spot stories because these people will have to dedicate their waking hours to the project.

So I can’t blame newspapers, TV networks, and online news outfits for not being able to build and retain a special team to tackle stuff like this. They are caught up with the day-to-day production of news stories as they fight for eyeballs and ad revenues. And this country is not like Singapore where nothing happens–where trivial things get front page treatment. Our news cycle is faster than other markets–about two weeks max–because this country is just too fucked up, too many things happening. I remember going through and reporting on a civil war, major earthquake, and earth’s strongest typhoon on record, all of which happened in just three months.

So it is up to the special dedicated investigative journalists to put these corruption stories to the spotlight.

All The President’s Men and Spotlight will not happen if not for them.

To feed the soul

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A colleague, who is my junior, and I were talking about our past lives as online journalists for a TV network. She was saying she missed it, the camaraderie and the achievements that we had, the kind of coverage that we did. She said she missed writing for an audience who would care about what she is writing about.

Writing with meaning. Writing about things that matter.

As I said before, we are writing for money now. Not our money but rather money for our readers–exclusive content that would make them money. It’s not writing with a noble purpose.

I think every writer at some point looks for the soul of what she is writing about.

rewrite edit text on a typewriter
Photo by Suzy Hazelwood on Pexels.com

I had quit that for a while. I gave so much of myself in that last job before this one that I got burnt out. I was headbutting government officials, the government, the world. The country’s problems were my problems. I was a walking mass of nerves. If my insurance covered my jumping out of planes, I would have but my editor strapped me to my chair and said, do something less wild, ok?

I was doing investigative reports. Knocking on doors upon doors, literally, looking for the people in the web of lies I have mapped out. I conducted interviews in the dark, in safe houses, having multiple phones with me just in case one of them gets bugged. I hung out in court houses, listened to court proceedings, pored over evidence and more evidence. I talked to people who were willing to give me evidence. We were almost there, almost sent the criminals to jail. They were indicted. Senators. Ring leaders.

Then it all came to naught. Things got reversed. It’s so tiring. Fighting for justice in this country is tiring.

And then I became a casualty of mergers and acquisitions. The parent company had done a series of bolt-on acquisitions that made my role redundant…even though it didn’t seem like it at first. But as a business journalist, I already saw the writing on the wall. I exited before it happened. After a couple years after I left, it did finally happen. All of them were shown the exit door.

Did I miss it? Yes, I do miss writing from the soul. Do I miss my former life? I don’t know. Maybe the burnout hasn’t worn off yet. The disillusionment has not worn off yet.

I was offered to write a weekly column in a broadsheet some years ago. My boss in HK said, why not? It would have been great marketing for my current company as well. But I turned it down, thinking I would not be able to commit writing that regularly. I may run out of things to say. As it turned out, I was right. It’s not that I would run out of things to say but I ran out of time. I don’t have enough time for everything. Especially in the last 3 years when I was running around with J. I barely had time for myself. A weekly column would have been a chore and I may just churn out something that would be subpar, with no real purpose or meaning.

crop woman using laptop on sofa at home
Photo by Vlada Karpovich on Pexels.com

I was watching this video of of a girl who quit her job to become a full-time artist. It was like her day job was sucking out her soul but she was doing the math and she stayed in her job year in and year out to be able to save enough, create a portfolio of work, gather clients for commissioned work, and students. Then she made the leap and was happy that she was able to do it sooner than she was thinking.

I completely sympathize with her. I was stuck in jobs in other industries for a couple of years before I made a jump to full-time journalism and not just dabbling in writing here and there. At that time I was writing on the side–to keep my spirit alive while I stayed in soul-sucking jobs to put me through graduate school.

Now years later I’m still working at home as a writer. Not that kind of writer that people are romanticizing about, like Hemingway or Nick Joaquin. But writer nonetheless.

Maybe I should restructure my colleague’s question: Do I miss writing about things that matter? Yes. Do I miss the former life of a mad-dash journalist out there in the trenches? Sometimes. What do I want to do to feed my soul?

Maybe I should write on the side. Of things that mattered.

I got an invite to write for a news outlet, a special report about healthcare. I haven’t done it yet because it required too much leg work.

I must pick my battles. Start small. Write in a literary magazine for a start while I write big stuff for my day job.

Oh, and this is the reason why I blog regularly. My writing sucks most of the time because I’ve been stuck writing for my day job for seven years. My writing growth was stymied. I regressed.

Here is something I wrote five years ago about this searching for the soul:

Long form journalism in the click-bait era

Let me tell you about the moment I realized I wanted to be a journalist. We had in our house a desk calendar from the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism (PCIJ). That calendar had a black and white photo for every month, which I presumed was used in some PCIJ story. I cropped those photos to use in one of my projects for xxx (subject) during my freshman year in college. And somewhere in my gut I knew I wanted to be a journalist after flipping through the pages of my finished project.

All The President’s Men and now Spotlight reinforced my desire to be and stay in this profession.

I cried at the end of the movie. The most poignant part of the film was when Micheal Keaton entered Spotlight’s office and saw the phones ringing off the hooks. He was probably expecting calls from angry parishioners and supporters of the Catholic Church (hence his surprised remark about the absence of picketers the day after the Boston Globe ran the story). But no, these were calls from victims of sexual abuse perpetrated by Catholic priests in Boston. These victims were coming forward to tell their tales, emboldened by Boston Globe’s investigative story on how the church covered up decades of sexual abuse. That for me was the most powerful scene–the reason why we journalists do what we have to do. Marty Baron (Liev Schreiber) was right: you don’t focus on the individual stories because nothing will come out of it. You have to go after the system, the system that was so rotten that it has killed so many children who were silenced by shame, guilt and haunting memories of predators. And good journalism serves as a spark that would lead to the correction of that faulty system.

Sadly, dwindling advertising money and the audience’s propensity to gobble up “fastfood” news are whittling down the capacity of newspapers to carry the long form, good ol’ shoe-leather stories.

Keeping an investigative team is expensive. Running stories that may not bring you “hits” or mouse clicks is kind of hard these days. Doing investigative reports is exhausting, and at times you feel like you are alone in your battle. I’ve been there. Countless late nights interviewing sources undercover. Poring over documents and piecing together clues then hitting a brick wall. Sacrificing family life just to be able to bring out the truth to the public is painful.
But what keeps us journalists going? Mark Ruffalo has put it perfectly:

“They knew. They let it happen. To kids! Okay? It could’ve been you! It could’ve been me! It could’ve been any of us! We gotta nail these scumbags! We’ve gotta show the people nobody can get away with this! Not a priest, not a cardinal, or a freaking pope!”

“Spotlight” was devoid of histrionics that made the horrific story that was unfolding so palpable. It was a methodical movie but was a great thriller. It didn’t dwell on the heartbreaking stories of the victims, but by doing so “Spotlight” made each stories of those children more devastating.

Spotlight is an ode to newspapers and to the journalists dying to stay in the profession. To the journalists who fight for change.

‘Rurouni Kenshin: Kyoto Inferno’: A fangirl’s review

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Published in InterAksyon.comAugust 7, 2014 · 3:20 pm

MANILA – “The strong shall live, the weak shall die.”

That might as well be the line that defines this second installment of the “Rurouni Kenshin” franchise, which is based on the manga and anime “Rurouni Kenshin” (shown as “Samurai X” here in the Philippines more than a decade ago).

This was also the guiding principle of Kenshin Himura’s (Takeru Satoh) arch nemesis, Shishio Makoto (Tatsuya Fujiwara), who was the rogue hitokiri that the Royalists/Imperialists engaged after the former laid down his sword 10 years before. Kenshin was the assassin that the Royalists used in broad daylight while Shishio, his kohai, was the hitokiri in the shadows.

Fujiwara plays Shishio with relish–he even has Shishio’s raspy, menacing voice that the character had in the anime series. I could barely recognize Fujiwara (who played Light Yagami in the live-action Death Note movie) behind the bandage, red-rimmed eyes and peeling skin.

The movie opens with Saito Hajime–the chief of police of the Meiji government and formerly the head of the Shinsengumi (the military police protecting the Shogunate)–facing Shishio, who in turn has the Meiji policemen hanged and later dropped into the roaring fires below. Saito (played by Yosuke Eguchi) is still as stoic as ever, barely showing any emotion as his men fall to their fiery end.

This sets the tone that this movie no longer tries to be cute and the body count will surely mount.

In the midst of this inferno, Shishio tells Saito of his grand plan to wrest control of the country from the government and lead Japan in becoming a stronger nation at the expense of all what he considered as weaklings. Obviously he’s a fan of social Darwinism.

Those who have not watched the anime, read the manga or seen the first installment would have a difficult time following the next scene that shows life for Kenshin and his friends at the Kamiya Dojo. The movie dispenses with introductions and references to the first movie to save time (since the “Shishio/Kyoto Arc” is about 30 episodes in the anime).

The Meiji government has asked for Kenshin’s help to neutralize and even kill Shishio, who is now a growing threat to the hard-won peace that the Emperor’s men have managed to put in place. As Home Minister Toshimichi Okubo says, Shishio’s skills as a samurai are equal to that of Kenshin’s.

But then why would Kenshin help the government clean up its mess? It was the government who created the monster that is Shishio, Sanosuke points out during Kenshin’s meeting with government officials.

The movie does not make the government’s failed attempt to kill off Shishio pretty. Instead of just shooting him in the head (which should have explained the metal plate around his head), the Ishin Shishi (government’s group of assassins) stab him repeatedly with their swords at close quarters and douse him with gasoline together with the other corpses that Shishio killed in the name of the Emperor. The only fly in the ointment is Shishio manages to live–thanks to the snow that falls right after the grisly crime.

Shishio, however, is thankful for what the government did to him for this taught him resilience and made him stronger. His ultimate aim is grander than just merely exacting revenge on the government. Getting rid of it is just a means to achieve his goal, he tells Kenshin during their first encounter in a village that Shishio burned to the ground.

To help him realize his dream of taking over Japan, Shishio gathers his Jupongatana (Ten Swords) to fight off Kenshin and kill all those who oppose him.

As a fan of Rurouni Kenshin, I can’t help but notice the movie’s glaring departure from the anime and manga (sorry to non-Samurai X fans):

1. Aoshi Shinomori should have been part of the first movie, as an employee-assassin-bodyguard of the opium pusher Kanryu, and the last members of the Oniwabanshu are supposed to be there with him. Megumi and Aoshi should know each other since they have been employees of Kanryu but in the second installment of Rurouni Kenshin movie, the two are complete strangers to each other.

2. In the anime and manga, Aoshi’s men are supposed to be annihilated by Kanryu’s Gatling gun (in the first movie). He pins the blame on Kenshin. In the movie, however, Aoshi goes looking for Kenshin to avenge his men’s death, who are supposed to be protectors of the Edo castle before the Restoration period. Aoshi’s men were tricked and killed of by the Meiji government after the Royalists took over. Guilty by association, Kenshin is hunted by Aoshi.

3. Cho’s long flexible, whip-like swords (similar to the urumi from India) were replaced by ordinary long swords. It would probably would have been difficult to train with and film fight scenes with this kind of weapon without resorting to CGI.

*Spoiler alert!*

4. Kenshin was supposed to have gone to his sensei, Hiko Seijuro, after his fight with Cho (member of Jupongatana), to complete his training and learn the essence of the Hitten Mitsurugi Ryu (his style of swordfighting). In the movie “Kyoto Inferno”, an unconscious Kenshin is found on the beach by Hiko after he jumped off the battleship Rengoku to rescue Kauro, after she (kidnapped by Sojrio Seta) was pushed off by Shishio into the ocean.

5. Sanosuke is supposed to destroy the Rengoku with the bombs supplied by his friend and Shishio, Yumi and Hoji escape and regroup in Mount Hiei where the final battle should take place. No such thing happens in the movie. Shishio and his Jupongatana successfully leave for Tokyo in the battleship.

*End of spoiler*

CHARACTERS

– We have a more brooding Kenshin here, who now has the tendency to hunch his back, tilt his head to one side and narrow his eyes when he throws his dagger looks to his opponent. There is a scene where he looks like a possessed angry animal with a stiff neck and walks like he’s suffering from cramps.  Attempts at “oro” and to make him comical fail.

– Sanosuke is still baka (stupid) and loud as ever. He is probably the only comic relief in this movie.

– Kaoru has expanded her menu of weapons. Aside from the usual bamboo sword (shinai) for kendo and wooden sword (bokken), she uses a jo (wooden staff) and a naginata (similar to a European glaive) during the Kyoto attack. She rarely smiles now.

– Smaller screen time for Megumi but the chemistry between Megumi and Sanosuke is more palpable compared with that of Kenshin and Kaoru. There is even more love (bromance!) between Sano and Kenshin (compared with the Kenshin-Kaoru pair) when the former hits the latter in the case and says he followed Kenshin to Kyoto to help him.

– I fear for Saito’s health. He always has a cigarette stuck between his lips, even when slashing his enemies. No facial expressions whatsoever still.

– I love Sojiro Seta. He delivers that happy smile when he kills, he speaks with other people, and with dealing with Shishio. He is like a misplaced child among the seasoned killers. But he is the best fighter among the Jupongatana and the fight scene between him and Kenshin is one of the highlights of this movie.

Which brings me now to…

The fight scenes: I will watch the movie over and over just for the fight scenes and wax lyrical about them.

Kenshin fighting with Shishio’s men after burning down a village is so much fun. Great choreography and fast sword play on the part of Takeru Satoh. No, the bad guys are not lining up to be beaten and do nothing while waiting to be beaten up. They attack Kenshin from all sides and Kenshin beating them all up from all directions was a sight to behold.

Kenshin’s fight with Sojiro after Shishio and Yumi took off involves lightning-fast swordplay and great choreography. If I remember it right, there is flying involved. Kenshin and Sojiro’s fighting stances are similar and it is exciting to see what comes after the stances. When you finally see Sojiro’s fighting technique on live action, your heart will stop.

The fight between Kenshin and Cho elicited “whoas” from the audience during the movie premiere at Megamall Wednesday night. In one scene where Kenshin catches the “true sword” thrown at him by Arai (the swordmaker’s son), the audience even clapped their hands in delight. Can’t describe it properly because I have to watch it again to appreciate its beauty.

DOWNSIDE:

Long speeches. They look and sound like orations instead of explanations made by several of the characters in the movie. The exchange between Kaoru and Kenshin before the latter leaves for Kyoto is too long. This same problem made the first movie’s ending look silly, with Kaoru running out of breath but still able to deliver her long monologue.

Too little chemistry between Takeru Satoh and Emi Takei makes the parting before Kenshin’s travel to Kyoto too long and the meaningful gaze between the two contrived. Or maybe it’s just me.

Despite these (because of the nitpicking on my part), this movie is still a must-see for “Rurouni Kenshin” fans out there. For the non-fans, the sword fights are enough reason to watch.

NOTES FROM GROUND ZERO | How aid agencies convince their workers to stay long in a disaster area

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Working and staying in disaster zones is no piece of cake. You work long hours, face hunger, fatigue, mosquitoes, uncomfortable sleeping accommodations and on top of that you have to deal with inefficiencies and politics–conditions that could wear down ordinary people like me. (That’s why the aid agencies and volunteers–local or foreign–have my respect forever).

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) Norwegian contingent was among the groups that responded to the calls for medical aid in the towns of Basey and Marabut, Samar two weeks after Typhoon ‘Yolanda’ (International Code Name: Haiyan) hit Central Philippines on November 8.

The ICRC took over the management of the badly damaged and crippled district hospital in Basey. These Norwegians also stationed themselves in Balangiga, which is already in Eastern Samar and is two towns away from Basey. They also have a half-way “tent city” somewhere in Marabut, the last town of Western Samar.

Team InterAksyon had a picnic in what seemed to be a beach resort that was completely destroyed by Yolanda and where the Norwegian ICRC set up camp.

DSCF1756They have a hi-tech porta-let (the zip-up tent-toilet), portable lavatory and a solar-shower, which i think collects water from the atmosphere to provide water for bathing, and another solar-powered thing that collects water for drinking.

The view and the location is perfect for our Scandinavian friends. It’s like living in a tropical paradise complete with coconut trees, warm sand, and beautiful sunsets everyday. If only the circumstances were different…

While we were having lunch, we got a chance to chat with two of the ICRC-Norway’s supervisors (and for the life of I cannot remember how to spell their names so I won’t attempt to write it here).

“Nice view you have here. I think this used to be a beach resort,” I said.

“Yes. We chose well so we can encourage our staff to stay longer,” he replied.

DSCF1759
Marabut has had several beach resorts dotting its coastline, which are now wiped out by the typhoon. The town is also blessed with limestone/rock formations, reminiscent of Ha Long Bay in Vietnam, which are still picturesque post-Yolanda.

Photo courtesy of Samartours.blogspot.com

Our Norwegian friend here told me that the owner of the beach resort offered them the place so they can have somewhere to unwind after work and where they can appreciate the beauty that has enticed local and foreign tourists alike to come to Marabut. Back in Basey, Olav Aasland, the Red Cross team leader in the town’s make-shift district hospital, told me they plan to stay for 4 months and hopefully by that time the Department of Health could already take over the healthcare needs of the Samarnons.

I think this resort…

Photo courtesy of Samartours.blogspot.com

…is now this:

DSCF1767
And another aid agency is also camping out here.

So I hope our friends from ICRC and other agencies enjoy (albeit I know it’s rather difficult under the current circumstance) the raw beauty of Samar.

NOTES FROM GROUND ZERO | InterAksyon meets Alagang Kapatid in Marabut

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God really works in mysterious ways.

While we were on the road to Marabut town center–or what was left of it–we met the Alagang Kapatid Foundation caravan by chance along the national highway. We were taking photos on the road when I saw a TV5 crew cab slowly driving by and immediately flagged it down. I introduced myself as a reporter from InterAksyon.com and asked the passengers of the red pick-up truck if they were from News5 or Radyo5. It turns out they were the Alagang Kapatid unit based in Palo, Leyte and were about to distribute relief packs in some communities in Marabut. We were invited to tag along.

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Alagang Kapatid turns over genset, distributes relief packs in Marabut in Samar

MARABUT, Samar – The Alagang Kapatid Foundation has turned over a generator set to the local government of Marabut, Samar and has distributed relief packs to the victims of Typhoon ‘Yolanda’.

Paul Segui of Alagang Kapatid told InterAksyon.com that the genset, which is now being used by the municipal town hall of Marabut, was donated by the National Press Club.

The Foundation has also allocated 1,100 units of relief goods for several coastal communities in Marabut, which is the last municipality before reaching Eastern Samar.

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Senior citizens and pregnant women received mats and blankets in addition to emergency relief packs that also contained hygiene kits that include sachets of shampoo.

Segui said they are assisted by Alagang Kapatid volunteers from Palo, Leyte who are victims of ‘Yolanda’ themselves.

“They survived 15 to 20-foot waves that destroyed their town. They also lost loved ones. But here they are helping fellow victims,” Sequi said.

Alagang Kapatid has been stationed in Guiuan, Samar and Palo, Leyte even before ‘Yolanda’ hit Region 8 and continues to give emergency aid to those affected, he added.

###

Paul Segui said they responded to the call for aid when they read our stories about Marabut. I told Paul I was the one who wrote the stories about Basey and Marabut because no one was paying attention to this side of Region 8.

“So here I am, we finally get to meet!” I told Paul.

God bless to Alagang Kapatid and may they never tire of helping those who are in need.