Talaga lang....

Jon and I just got home from our weekly dinner with Mommy & Daddy followed by a visit to Kuya and the two girls. Only Gail, a.k.a. MufFIN and the Blog Queen, was there (Gwen went out with her bf). As always, we had questions about blogs for the Blog Queen and as usual, she had the answers!!! Kakabilib talaga!!!

For dinner, we brought Pao Tsin fried dumplings w/ that specially flavored green rice. We gave Kuya and family too. Ang saraaaaaaap!!! I don't think i'll get tired of eating Pao Tsin. Super talaga!!!

While our Pao Tsin order was being prepared by the staff of the newly-opened branch at The Block at SM North City, Jon and I bought Christmas decors, at the department store, that we'll use to decorate our Christmas Tree. Picking the right color and type of decors was a breeze. Waiting for the cashier to punch them in took a long time because she had to re-check the receipt with the items... it seemed that there was some discrepancy.... only to find out there wasn't any!!! Kakainis talaga!!!

Oh by the way, Doods, Mommy's dog in Quezon City, bit in the foot the helper of a neighbor this morning. She is a frequent visitor there and she hasn't had any problem with Doods in the past; but apparently, she passed by Doods while she was eating... maybe Doods thought she's there to take away her food... that's why she probably bit her. Tonight, I had to talk to the helper and explained to her that Doods had been vaccinated. Nevertheless, i told her we'll still observe Doods for any change in temperament or personality. In the meantime, I advised her to get anti-tetanus shots for extra precaution. Because of this, we also had to tie Doods up on a leash. It's the first time for her and she hates it. Since birth, she's had the run of the yard; now she's confined to the gazebo in the garden. After some time of crying, trying to remove the collar and the leash, and getting suffocated ....she calmed down, lay on the floor and looked very, very depressed ....her usual bubbly nature whenever i come close to her gone!!! Kawawa talaga!!!

Talking of a dog's personality .....is this really an appropriate term? shouldn't it be "dognality"??? Just asking. Corny ko talaga!!! hahahahaha

In celebration of halloween....

To celebrate halloween, I should be wearing this.....hehehehehe ....this is what I get for being a fan of "Miami Ink"!!!

Your Unique Costume is Tattoo Freak

Get your freak on!

What Totally Unique Halloween Costume Should You Wear?

HAPPY HALLOWEEN TO ALL!!!

Hmmmm.....I like....

I took this quiz about what season i am... and here's the result i got:

You Belong in Spring

Optimistic, lively, and almost always happy with the world...You can truly appreciate the blooming nature of spring.Whether you're planting flowers or dyeing Easter eggs, spring is definitely your season!

What Season Are You?

Things I miss...

One of the things i miss most about living in a temperate country, e.g. USA or Japan, is the presence of the four seasons. The Philippines is a tropical country and we only have two types of seasons - the dry season and the wet season. The dry season, especially during El nino is very HOT, while during the wet season we get rains most days due to the monsoon.

I'm not sure exactly which of the four seasons I like most, but for sure it isn't Summer. I hate the humidity and the heat and, in some places like Minnesota, I hate the mosquitoes. When it's hot and humid you can remove all your clothes and it's still hot... you can stay in the bathtub or take showers for hours but when you get out of them it's still hot and humid ....unlike during Winter or cold days, you can feel warm just by adding layers of clothes to your skin.

Generally, I guess I love the start of each season and I don't care much for the end of each season. I love the start of Spring when days get warmer, flowers start to bloom, grass & leaves start to grow. I love the start of Summer when days are no longer very cold yet not yet too hot. I love the beginning of Fall when leaves start to change colors and days start to get cold. I love the beginning of Winter especially when the snow starts to fall and covers everything outside with a blanket of powdery white ice.

Mid-seasons are also very appealing to me. They have this mystical quality in them that conjures different emotions within me... the Winter Solstice, the Spring Equinox, the Summer Solstice, and the Fall Equinox ....just the words alone make me feel like going outside, find a quiet place, meditate and reflect, and just be one with nature!

Sigh....I wonder when I'll ever experience these again...

My Mommy....the Beauty Queen...almost!

Like my father, my mother was born and grew up in Pilar, Bataan. But unlike him, who spent his childhood and early teen-age life in the town proper, she spent hers in a quiet, sleepy, fishing village about 2 km from the town proper. Like Daddy too, Mommy or 'Me for short, as we call her also grew up and kept on celebrating the wrong birth date of June 7, 1931... only to find out later that her real birth date is July 7, 1931. This happened when she obtained her birth certificate from the town registrar for her passport application in preparation for her trip to the US in 1986... coincidence? ....i think not!

As i mentioned earlier, 'Me is the youngest of the six children born alive to my maternal grandfather with my grandmother, his first wife. She finished her elementary education at the town's elementary school and her high school studies at the province's capital. During the war, Mommy's family (minus the eldest son who was a Lieutenant with the resistance forces fighting against the Japanese troops) evacuated to a nearby province by boat to sit out the war.

In 1945, when Mommy was 14 years old, my grandmother passed away. Shortly thereafter, 'Me joined her elder sister at their Caloocan City house while she attends college at the Centro Escolar University in Manila towards a Bachelor of Science degree in Pharmacy. Meanwhile, during her free time, she went out with her cousins and their friends to enjoy the city life. In one instance, she was spotted by a photographer and was convinced to join the Bb. Bulaklak (Miss Floral) Beauty Pageant. For this, she was given a free photo shoot by Tropicana Studio, the foremost photo studio of the day.

Unfortunately, she wasn't able to continue competing in the contest in spite of her strong standing nor was she able to finish her university studies because a certain "Pabling" swept her off her feet!

When the children started coming, Mommy joined the government service to help augment the family income. She worked at the Philippine Atomic Energy Commission (PAEC) as research assistant. As the boys became teen-agers, she retired from government service to more closely take care and monitor her growing brood. She was then the Chief Librarian of PAEC at the time of her retirement. As a stay-home mom, 'Me continued to help augment the family income by going into backyard chicken and pig raising and buy-and-sell ventures operating from our present home in Quezon City. I remember her going to the US bases at Sangley Point or Olongapo with her cousin to buy PX (post-exchange) goods which she sold to her friends; and going to Pateros to buy fresh fertilized duck eggs which she boils to make balut that we, the three boys, sell at night around our neighborhood while shouting "baluuuuuuuuut!!!".

As I entered high school, Mommy joined the Pacific Memorial Plan to sell pre-need memorial plans to company employees. Here, she was extremely successful and through hard work and perseverance, she reached the level of a Unit Manager with numerous sales agents under her. For several consecutive years, she was one of the top Unit Managers of the company and received financial rewards, as well as appliances for our home and even country-wide travel opportunities to attend company annual conferences.

In 1986, Mommy was invited by her cousin, who was then involved in exporting rattan furnitures at that time, to man their commercial booth as they join furniture fairs across the USA. In July of that year, Mommy left for the US bringing along my kid sister, Mabelle, with her. Mommy and Mabelle was joined by Daddy in 1991 after his retirement. In 1998, 'Me and 'De came home and are now back at our Quezon City home.

Angel with Bird of Paradise Flower

You...younger guys have it easy....

If you have lived as long as i have (or even longer) .....you'll be amazed, as i am, at how much and how fast we (the modern man) have evolved during the last half century ....and made life a little bit easier for all of us.

Consider these:

1. My High School Term Paper (1973):

• Researched by: hours of reading & searching books and writing notes on intermmediate pad paper at the school library; drafts handwritten on pad paper; spellings checked using the thick-volumed dictionary at the library.


• Printed by: bulky manual typewriter using reusable, manually installed and wound nylon ribbon.


• Reproduced by: typing the original with carbon papers and onion skin bond papers underneath.


• Remarks: final product submitted in a hard paper folder.

2. My College Undergraduate Thesis (1979):

• Researched by: hours of reading & searching books and writing notes on individual index cards at the college library or at home if i was lucky enough to have been able to reserve a book for overnight borrowing; drafts handwritten on yellow paper; spellings checked using a pocket dictionary.


• Printed by: portable manual typewriter using manually installed reusable nylon ribbon and sheepskin bond paper.


• Reproduced by: manual typing of the original with carbon papers and onion skin bond papers underneath.


• Remarks: thesis defense done using subject outline, graphs, and tables written or drawn on sheets of manila paper stuck to the walls with wooden stick used as pointer; xerox copiers have just been introduced and the cost per page is very prohibitive, hence, i rarely used xerox copies as notes; besides, the copies are printed on special, thick, heat-sensitive paper using ink with foul odor of chemicals and the print fades within 2 weeks; final products were submitted in hardbound form after one week in the bindery.

3. My Masteral Thesis (1982):

• Researched by: hours of reading & searching books & journals and writing some notes on index cards at the university library; most notes are photocopied (using liqid ink) journal articles; drafts handwritten on yellow pad paper; spellings checked using pocketbook dictionary.


• Printed by: electric typewriter using reusable nylon ribbon; figures drawn by hand, photocopied, handcut, and handpasted on final pages.


• Reproduced by: photocopying using liquid ink on photocopy paper.


• Remarks: thesis defense done using graphs & tables drawn on art paper, subject outline on acetate transparencies, and photos on ectachrome slides and using a collapsible antennae type metal pointer; final product submitted in hardbound form after 3 days in the bindery.

4. My Doctoral Dissertation (1991):

• Researched by: hours of reading, searching, and photocopying (using powder ink) of books & journal articles or ordering printed copies of journal articles by mail; drafts typed in Panasonic Word Processor (with built-in Word Perfect Program and built-in black & white screen and spell checker) and saved in 3.5 ordinary floppy discs (see photo);


• Printed by: the Panasonic Word Processor, using the built-in printer with interchangeable daisy-wheel cartridge for fonts and single-use cartridge ribbon, on ordinary bond paper; figures were handrawn, photographed, then pasted on final pages; photos were pasted directly on final pages.


• Reproduced by: photocopying using powder ink.


• Remarks: dissertation defense done using subject outline, graphs, table, and photos on ectachrome slides and using a laser pointer; final products submitted in hardbound form with gold letterings after overnight binding and in 3.5 ordinary floppy discs.

5. My Professorial Chair Lecture (1994):

• Researched by: hours of reading, searching, and photocopying books and journal articles at the college & university libraries; drafts inputed in the department IBM compatible pc at the office or personal lap top at home, both with Microsoft Word and black & white screens and saved in 3.5 2HD IBM formatted floppy discs; spellings checked using spell checker.


• Printed by: dot matrix printer using black reusable nylon ribbon.


• Reproduced by: photocopying using powder ink.


• Remarks: lecture presented using graphs, tables and photos on ectachrome slides and using a laser pointer; final product submitted in hard bound form after overnight binding.

6. My Technical Presentations to Clients (2005):

• Researched by: a few hours of searching and reading the internet for information and photos with the help of Google or Yahoo browers using the office pc and notebook with colored screens; drafts of notes inputed on Microsoft Word; grammar & syntax and spellings checked by grammar & spell checkers; tables prepared using Microsoft Excel; own photos scanned or taken with digital or cell phone cameras, formatted, and edited using Adobe Photoshop; all these saved in hard disc and/or cd's.


• Printed by: ink-jet printer using black and colored ink cartridges on ordinary bond paper.


• Reproduced by: photocopying using colored photocopier or by making cd copies using cd burner software.


• Remarks: presentations done using Powerpoint on a lap top computer attached to an LCD projector and using a laser pointer.

So what's my point? I just wish to express my gratitude to the people responsible for making all these advancements in technology possible. I urge them not to stop in finding ways to make all our lives richer and better!

Then, maybe, i could finally produce this idea of a mystery- suspense novel that's been in my head for the longest time.... if someone develops a machine that could read my mind and put them down on print ....'coz my brain works faster than my fingers.... or i'm just too plain lazy to type them down!!! hehehehehehe....

This is sooooo cute!!!

need i say more????

I'm grateful for.....traditions

Among the traditions that our family follows, for which i am grateful for, is the respect we have by the way we call each other based on sibling hierarchy. This tradition common in Northern Tagalog families is based on Chinese practices. ...as evidenced by the similarity of the words used... (Maybe the Chinese among you will recognize some of these terms, especially those who speak Fookien.)

In our family, the eldest male child is called "kuya" by the succeeding siblings. The second eldest male child is called "diko"; and the third male child is called "sangko". This has a counterpart among the female children. The eldest female child is called "ate" by the succeeding siblings; the second eldest female child is called "dite"; the third female child is called "sanse"; and the fourth female child is called "ditse". In the meantime, the elder children call their younger siblings by their names or nicknames.

In our immediate family, for a very long time, there were just the three of us "Limcumpao Boys".... there's Kuya ....then there's Diko .....then me... plain me..... sigh!!! Only Diko and I have the right to call Kuya as such....and I'm the only one who has the right to call Diko as such. In turn, Kuya and Diko call me as plain Lynn.....sigh ....sniff!!! For the life of me, I wouldn't and still couldn't call Kuya and Diko by their names.... otherwise, mom and dad would be mad....sigh!!!!

Then, miracles of miracles!!! ....we had Mabelle, our princess!!! Yipeeeeeeeee!!! There was no sibling rivalry between Mabelle and I (after all, I was already 21 when she came to our lives!) .....on the contrary, among us three boys, I may have been the happiest to have a kid sister because at last.....I am a "Sangko"!!! Hehehehehe. I was so proud.... most especially when my mom and dad took my suggestion for a name for her!!! (More on this later.)

The respect for elder siblings also extend to their spouses, irrespective of age. For instance, I am older by age than both Kuya's and Diko's wives; however, I still call them as Ate (plus their names).....never would I call them by their names alone!

(Incidentally, this practice of using "kuya" and "ate" also extends to older cousins.....except that they're used regardless of age and hierarchy among their own siblings and their names are added to "kuya" or "ate". Kinda confusing, right? I myself, as small child, was initially confused but as i understood it's meaning, I felt a close family belonging especially to my Kuya and Diko).

In my future posts I'll be introducing my Kuya and his family, my Diko and his family, and Mabelle and her family.....because after all.....they are FAMILY.....and they are extensions of who I am!!!

My Dream "Other" Car

....this is my dream "other" car... i wonder if it comes in moss green and automatic??!!

Greenhills.....NOT!

Oh by the way, the gift i got last night... it came with this... i could just roll ecstatically!!!

Love Notes I've Received....Part 8

Oh Happy Day....

Wheeeeeeeee....yesterday was a very happy day!!! Last night i received an advanced gift for my birthday and 2nd from somebody... i could just roll ecstatically!!! wheeeeeeeeeeeee!!! what happy day!!!

My Old Man....the Original Pabling

There are numerous ways of calling one own's father... depending on where you live. Here, fathers may be called Papa, Daddy, Dad, Tatay, Itay, Tatang, 'Tang, Ama, Erpat, etc. I call my father Daddy or 'De, for short... that was how my mom & dad want him to be called and that was what i first heard him called.

'De was born on May 17, 1927... although we grew up celebrating his birthday on the 29th of May... because as far as he can recall, he had celebrated his birthday on this date. It was only in the 70's that he realized his birthday was on the 17th... after he obtained his birth certificate from the town registrar for his application for a passport to go abroad...and the 29th was his day of baptism! (Good thing 'De doesn't believe in the zodiac signs, otherwise it would've been very complicated!!!)

'De grew up as the third and youngest child of Jose Tiangco L. and Eulalia Roman L., after sister Rosario and brother Primitivo or Kakang Chayong and Kakang Tibong, as we fondly called them, respectively.

He grew up in the town of Pilar, Bataan and took elementary studies at the town's elementary school. His high school studies were at Balanga, Bataan... the provincial capital, located just next to Pilar. As a teen-ager during the Second World War, my dad's family evacuated by boat to a nearby province, Pampanga, when the Japanese troops took over Bataan. They stayed in a school which was converted into an evacuation center and stayed there until the war ended. Since there were no universities or colleges in Bataan at that time, 'De had to take his university studies at the Pontifical University of Santo Tomas (UST) in Manila. While studying, he stayed in Caloocan City at the home of a niece from his stepbrother, the son of my grandfather from a previous marriage. Daddy graduated from UST with the degree Bachelor of Arts in Journalism in 1952.

Shortly thereafter, he started his career in the government; first, as clerk at the Philippine Homesite and Housing Corporation (PHHC), then as administrative officer at the National Coordinating Center for the Study and Development of Filipino Children and Youth (NCCSDFCY), and lastly, at the National Manpower and Youth Council (NMYC), now known as the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA), where he retired as Director in 1990. After retirement, he joined my mom and sister and my elder brother & his family in the US. In 1998, Daddy and Mommy came home and they are now living back in Quezon City.

Daddy, as i knew him has always been in love with books and writing. He imparted to me the love for books and reading ....in one of my earlier birthdays he and mommy gifted me with a 13-volume, double back-to-back set of the classics by Grolier Books (including the Aesop's Fables, The Swiss Family Robinson, Robinson Crusoe, Moby Dick, The Grimm Brothers Fairy Tales, Gulliver's Travels, Alice in Wonderland, etc. which I read over and over again!) . Early on, he moonlighted as the speech writer of the then congressman of Bataan, Jose R. Nuguid. He took masteral courses at UST but failed to finish it because he hadn't had time to write his masteral thesis since he was busy with his work. He's taken and passed at least 7 government examinations including that of interpreter. I remember that sometime in the 70's, he was offered an opportunity to go to the US and work as an interpreter. He turned down the offer and opted to stay here and be with his wife and his growing children.

Like his father before him, 'De is deeply religious and goes to church everyday. He's been a member and eventually the head of several parish organizations ...he has even served as President of our Parish Council in Quezon City. Unfortunately, 'De suffered a stroke in 2000 and developed pneumonia for which he was hospitalized in intensive care for 3 weeks. Now, he's strong and healthy with some side-effects of his illness, but he's still active at our church.

As a child and a young man...and even when he's already married to my mommy, my Daddy has always been Pabling... because that is his nickname... his name is Pablo Roman L.!!!

Angel with Guitar

Portents of things to come?

Have you ever had the feeling that you were destined for something big?... Something so big you cannot escape it?.... Something so much bigger than what you are now... and you have no power over it... you just have to give in to it??? Me, i haven't. Hehehehehe.

But, consider this pic... this was taken in 1961...during our graduation from Kindergarten at St. Mary's College in Quezon City... i was 5 years old then...

Now, take a look at this...

What do all of these pics say?

1. i was born to dance
2. i like dressing up in Filipino costumes
3. i love the attention
4. all of the above
5. none of the above

Well, nothing i guess... or maybe they just show that i was a frustrated japayuki, willing to dance on stage, in a shopping mall, or even in parks, when i was in Japan!!! hehehehehe.

But one thing is for sure though... i enjoyed doing these because they were welcome breaks from my studies... i liked it especially when we were featured in a program of an International Expo...

Blog Makeover....

Last night we had our weekly dinner with my mom and dad in Quezon City. After dinner, i asked my niece (who we call the Blog Queen) to polish the new look of my blog. What you see now is the result ....and i am very much pleased! i think i'll be keeping this format for a long time to come.

Thank you jon for the initial major changes from the Blogspot template ....thank you Gail for the final product!

Through the Decades....The 1990's

The 1990's was largely a decade of self-discovery, reflection, and evaluation for me. After four years of arduous and unrelenting work at the Virology Laboratory, sometimes staying overnight in the dead of winter to finish my experiments, i obtained my PhD degree in Veterinary Microbiology from the University of Tokyo in March of 1991. i came home immediately to Manila the following month and reported back to work at the UP College of Veterinary Medicine at UPLB shortly thereafter. This time, i didn't stay at the campus but opted to commute daily from Manila to Los Banos, Laguna.

During this time (and even before i came home), my friend Benjie has been involved with a seminar organization that promotes excellence and personal growth by providing the tools necessary to balance one's physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual natures... leading to peace of mind and perfect self-expression. At first i was reluctant to take their seminars. I was even thinking that this might be a cult because everyone in his group seems to be happy and contented always... but without the "Ohm...Ohm...Ohm..." chanting! But because of the positive results that i saw in benjie and in his new-found friends and because i realized that up until that point i've been putting too much emphasis on my mental side, i took the basic seminar two weeks after i arrived from Tokyo. From then on and the rest of the decade, i myself became involved with the group and have taken and staffed all their seminars ...even becoming the Corporate Secretary and Member of the Board of the non-stock, non-profit organization.

Because of the above, i took stock of my life thus far and made some choices that greatly altered its course. Although i love teaching, in 1995, i resigned from the University of the Philippines as an Associate Professor of Veterinary Microbiology (incidentally, i was the Chairman of the Department of Veterinary Microbiology, Pathology and Public Health of our College at the time of my resignation) to join a private veterinary drug company. I figured that 16 years of serving in the government was enough and it was time to move on and fulfill my greatest potential.

At my new company, we established a Diagnostic and a Vaccine Laboratory that produced Philippine-made vaccines for ruminants and swine. Aside from that we also conducted numerous technical seminars to livestock and poultry producers to promote the health of their animals and to increase their productivity ...so it's as if i didn't leave teaching at all... only this time, i deal with different "students" everytime and i get to travel the entire length of the country.

The latter part of the 90's was a period of great achievements and creativity for me. I received the Most Outstanding Veterinary Practitioner for Research from the Veterinary Practitioners Association of the Philippines (VPAP), i became a Diplomate of the Philippine Academy of Microbiology (PAM), as well as a Charter Diplomate and Vice-President of the Philippine College of Poultry Practitioners, Inc. (PCPP), and i was the National President of the Philippine Society for Microbiology, Inc. (PSM) bringing the Society into the next millennium ....all these while i spent most of my non-working hours and weekends staffing and coaching self-awareness seminars!

Thank God for Holy Days and Holidays...

Today is a holy day here in the Philippines ...in honor of and in celebration of the Eid, the end of the holy month of Ramadan. Although the Filipinos are (if i'm not mistaken) at least 85% Christians, lately we've been celebrating this day to show our solidarity with our Muslim brothers ...in much the same way as they share with us the Christmas holidays. If only everyone, regardless of race, religion, sexual orientation, political beliefs, etc., would accept, respect, and tolerate each other and live each day according to the spirit of these holy days, then i believe this world will be a better place.

Being a holiday today, jon and i were able to go out and party last night until past 2:00 am. Actually, it was a despedida (going away) party for a friend who's going abroad to work. The wife and her sister are also going abroad to source things for their business but they're coming back... so the party last night was for all of them. Generally, i don't particularly like despedida parties because they usually mean that the honoree(s) is/are going away and i will be left behind... especially if he/they are going away "for good" ....which means that the dynamics of our relationship/friendship will be physically altered.

Of course, when one goes away (voluntarily) that means that it is for the best ....and so, to our friends who are leaving in the next few days... happy trip, good luck, Godspeed, ....and make sure you keep in touch!...

i don't have photos of the party, jon took care of that! ... but i do have photos of me which i took while my friends were busy with their videoke singing (yep! i don't do karaoke or videoke!) ...and here they are... the latest of my self-pics...

Looks vs. Image

For the observant reader, you might've noticed the new look of my blog. Actually, i was planning on having my own look even during the first time i created this blog. However, at that time, i didn't have enough knowledge and skills about how blogs work... i settled for using one of the available ready-made templates that particularly appealed to me.

Now, after almost a month of almost daily entries, i still don't have the knowledge and skill to do it... but jon does!!! ...and so, i asked him to help me. What you see now is the fruit of hours of testing several outlines, numerous colors and styles, and many, many changes. (i'm just grateful jon is very patient! hehehehehe).

with the new look, do you think i'd change my image? ...i don't think so....

My Affirmations

My Maternal Grandparents...And Their Family

One disadvantage of being one of the youngest offspring of one of the youngest children of your grandparents is that there is a greater possibility that by the time you are born, your grandparents are already too old for you to enjoy them... or worse, they have passed away. This is what happened to me... and certainly, to Mabelle, my kid sister! Nevertheless, i believe it is very important to still know some things about them... not only to honor them but also because after all, they played a very big role in my present existence.

My mother's father was for a long time the Cabeza del Barrio of their sleepy fishing village in the historic province of Bataan. His name was Lucio Sanchez A. I have no memories of my Lolo since he died of a heart attack in 1958 when i was barely two years old. The only image, and the only photo i know exists, of him is his picture still hanging by the hallway of their home in Caloocan City, where my aunt lives. This black & white photo shows a portrait of a very dignified middle-aged man in coat and tie. In that photograph, he had such piercing eyes that seems to gaze at you wherever you go. As little children, my cousins and i were afraid of that portrait such that whenever we were noisy and misbehaving, my aunt would tell us that our Lolo is looking straight at us and is not happy with what we are doing. That would immediately make us calm down and behave the rest of the day! During the times when my mom and my dad would leave my brothers and i to the care of my aunt, i'd be so frightened to go to the bathroom alone passing through the darkened hallway where his picture hangs and sometimes i'd even dream about his steely gaze. As i grew up, i felt the need to know more about my Lolo... and i'd ask my mom over and over again if he ever knew me before he died. My mom would say that he did know me and would even play with me sometimes ...i'd feel real good after i heard that from my mom!

My Lolo Lucio was married to my mother's mom, Dorotea Santos H., my Lola. Together they had 11 offsprings... five of which were stillborn. The surviving six children were Corazon, Jesus, Ismael, Milagros, Segunda, and my mom Lydia.

My aunt, Tita Corazon, had three children, my three first cousins, Rosita, Lina, and Florante. Tita Corazon passed away at a young age and i don't have any memories of her.

My uncle, Tito Jesus, had a single child, Mely, who is now a practicing physician in Texas, USA. Tito Jesus was an officer in the military and fought during the war. He survived the Bataan Death March, only to be killed in action by the Huks (members of HUKBALAHAP movement) during the late 50's... needless to say, i don't have any memories of him too.

Tito Esming (Ismael) left the country and joined the US Navy after my mom got married. He was closest to my mom and had great plans for her...support her college education, then bring her to the US. But when mom got secretly married to my dad, and he found out about it, he suddenly left and had no contacts with my mom's family until the death of my Lolo. When Tito Esming was assigned in England, he married an Englishwoman, Tita Sheila, and together they had two girls, Carole and Debra.

Aunt Milagros or Kakang Migring, as we fondly called her, had nine children - Mario, Teresita, Beth, Nette, Enrique, Hermito, Wilberto, Leoncio, and Gigi. I have many, many fond memories of Kakang Migring because it was with her care that my brothers and i were left by my mom & dad every summer vacation ( 2 months of every year!) when we were in grade school. Mom & dad would enroll us in school and fetch us from the province in time for school. Sadly, Kakang Migring passed away a few years back.

Aunt Segunda, or Ima Unday have 7 children, named alphabetically, Arturo, Bemelda, Christina, Dolores, Eloisa, Ferdinand, and Gliena. Of the seven, five now live in the US with their respective families. Ima Unday actually had a twin sister who was born ahead of her (but she dies shortly after birth)... that's why she was named Segunda ( or Spanish for "second"). She inherited and still lives at their ancestral home in Caloocan City. She doesn't care much living in the US, in fact she has an expired green card!

My grandmother, Lola Dorotea passed away when my mom was only a teen-ager in 1945. Lolo Lucio remarried two years later... to my mom's stepmother, Lucia Vasquez or Impong Lucia. Together, Lolo Lucio and Impong Lucia had a son, my step-uncle, Napoleon ...who now lives with his wife, Maria, and three children in Canada.

There, that's my mom's entire family. In the future, i may be talking about my uncles, my aunts, and my cousins as they impact my life.

Brain Twister (?)

Guess what these pictures have in common?

(Answer: My humongous eyeglasses!!! Thank God for disposable contact lenses and smaller-framed eyeglasses are available today... like my B&L and Giorgio Armani's... hehehehehe.

Another Productive, Happy, and Full-filling Family Lunch

Haaaaay... i'm so tired. We've just come back from Elisha's (Jon's niece) bday celebration ....lunch at EDSA Shangri-La's Paparazzi Italian Restaurant. Actually, it ended 3 hours ago... but from there we proceeded to Makati to get my re-programmed cell phone and to buy a few things for the house. As usual, Jon's whole family was there, including the children, who had the run of the place, ...and the buffet lunch was great. i was soooo full and so filled ...we had to pass by the house because i had to take care of some things before proceeding to Makati... hehehehehe.

Before lunch, jon's brother-in-law and i discussed some things about our planned project. As each day passes we come closer to the fulfillment of our business project ...yipeeeee! i can't divulge what it is at the moment though... suffice it to say that if this pushes through, it'll end my in-between-jobs status... hehehehehe.

Love Notes I've Received....Part 7

The Centennial Angel

Keeping the flame of national identity and independence alive and the Philippine flag forever waving is the Centennial Angel. She stands proudly dressed in the Terno, the national dress, in spite of trials and adversities, as the darkness surrounds her. She reminds me most of The Moro Princess!

The Moro Princess

In my father's newspaper articles about his father, he mentioned something about moro-moro plays or komedya. "The moro-moro is a play that became popular in the Philippines during the Spanish colonial period. It depicted battles between Christians and Moros - as Muslims in the Philippines are popularly known - with the Moros as the perpetual villains who always lost to the Christians in the end. Progressive historians have viewed the moro-moro as a tactic by the Spanish colonizers to demonize the Moros, the largest ethnic group that successfully warded off attempts at conquering them. The moro-moro plays helped fan the flames of anti-Moro sentiments among the Christianized ethnic groups." (from Bulatlat.com)

Moro-moro plays were usually played on a stage set up at the town square during fiestas or the feast day of the town's patron saint. After the Spanish left the country and especially during the times when there were no televisions and moviehouses in towns yet, these plays were widely anticipated and viewed by the townfolks. They can last for several hours to several days... the longest known being a staggering 12 days! Among the lead characters in these plays are the Christian kings, queens, princes and princesses, and the court jesters, who provide comedic relief to the adults and keep the children awake with their antics throughout the plays. In some instances, the plum role is that of a Muslim princess (with whom the Christian prince falls in love) called the Moro Princess. Needless to say, the Moro Princess is a beautiful maiden in real life.

My grandmother, Eulalia Roman L., was a Moro Princess. She must've been a stunner during her heyday (as you can see in the only known existing photo of her) as to rekindle the spark of love in an aging widower more than double her age... heck, she was even younger than my grandfather's first child in a previous marriage! Sadly, i (the youngest then of her youngest child) have very few memories of her... as she died when i was still young and she herself wasn't that old... of lung cancer.

My fondest memory of my Impong Eulalia is her having a small store by their house in the province. Every time my family and i would visit them from the city, my Impo would let me inside her little store and give me everything i want... she'd give me candies, biscuits, and even soda. I remember the two of us making small talks but i don't remember what we talked about.

My saddest memomies of her was when she stayed with us at Quezon City while undergoing radiation treatments for her cancer at the nearby Veternas Memorial Hospital. I remember how we, the three boys, would keep her Bataan Matamis cigarettes in unlikely places and she'd still find them and smoke them no matter what. In the end, she succumbed to the cancer and had to be hospitalized. When the treatments were deemed unsuccessful and they were making only making her weak, it was decided to take her out of the hospital and bring her home to the province to be with her loved ones. I remember well that day... my mom borrowed her cousin's big American car and driver and we took my Impo out of the hospital. She was laid on the backseat of the car on my mother's lap. On the way to Bataan, the car passed by our home where my dad, who was weak because he had the flu that time, said goodbye to her by the roadside ...that was the last time my dad saw her alive and the last time my Impo saw and talked to her youngest.

A few weeks after that, my dad surprised me and my elder brother by showing up at our school. In the middle of class, he entered our classroom looking sad and forlorn with the principal. At first they talked to my homeroom teacher, then he asked me to gather my things because we are going home to the province ...my Impo has just died. My whole family took the last bus trip that night and we arrived in Balanga, the capital of Bataan at 2:00 o'clock in the morning. There were no jeepneys yet running at that time, so we had to take the calesa (horse-drawn carriage) to my father's ancestral home. When we arrived and all our relatives saw us, they met us with loud cries. As my dad approached the coffin there were no dry eyes around the place. i just sat on a chair in a corner crying and crying...with a soda bottle on my lap.

That was in 1963 ....he was 36 ....i was 6 ....and my Impo, the Moro Princess, was 65.

I'm obsessed!!!....help!!!

Aughhhh.....of the hundreds and hundreds (maybe even thousands) of photos i have here at home and at our family home in Quezon City, i can't find a single old photo of my dad as a young man before he got married!!! Sure, that was in the late 40's and early 50's ....but didn't they have cameras and photos then? I do have lots of old photos of my mom as a beautiful young woman....how come i don't have that of my dad?

Well, i guess it's not so much about the cost (it's not as if my dad couldn't afford it at that time!), as it is about priorities and the gender differences between men and women then.....and even, maybe, now.

At any time, women tend to publicize and preserve their looks and keep the proofs...more so when they are still unmarried, hence the reason why my mom had and still have many pics when she was still single. When women get married, they either use these pictures to show that they have not changed a bit even after having several children ....or use these pictures to make their children feel guilty about the sacrifices they have to endure by giving birth to them and raising them!

Single men, on the other hand (especially before instamatic cameras became available), do have their pictures taken when they were single but they don't tend to keep them....they give them away to friends and prospective girlfriends to increase the possibility of hooking a bride. This, i think, is what happened to my dad's single pics.... (after all, according to my mom & aunts, girls used to run after him!) However, when they do get married...that's when lots of their photos come out....this time initially with their new brides, and later with their children....(trophies perhaps?)

With the advent of digital cameras and the pc, things may not have changed much with single women....but with single men, they now have their pics taken, reproduce them as much as they want, give copies away, and still have copies of their own!

Be that as it may...i'm still obsessed with having an old pic of my dad as a single man! So, if by chance someone out there who's reading this has one or knows of anybody who has one (an old maid aunt perhaps?) please send me a copy....hehehehehe.

Big Angel with Little Angel

Father & child, mother & child, brother or sister & brother or sister, uncle or auntie & nephew or niece, grandfather or grandmother & grandson or grandaughter, or simply man or woman & child?.... whatever!

My Father's Old Man - Part 2

When my father sent his article about his "old man" to two national daily newspapers, he didn't expect that both papers would publish it during Father's Day of 2000! Although this article, published in the Philippine Daily Enquirer, didn't include the photos, this article was on the front page. (Please click on the photo to read the article.)

(I only found out about these published articles when my dad showed them to me that memorable Father's Day! He didn't even tell us he wrote and sent them out for publication.)

I was planning on putting these entries on Father's Day.... but then again, why wait! This just goes to show that we can honor our fathers anytime.... even in death. I just hope I can measure up to my own father.

My Father's Old Man....Part 1

Yup, you read it right ....this is about my father's old man, not my old man ...in other words, this is about my grandfather. this article came out in the Manila Bulletin during Father's Day 2000 ....a year before my own father (who i will talk about later) suffered a stroke and had pneumonia.

I wonder if i'll be able to do the same for my "old man" later on, when the time comes. (Please click on the picture to read the article).

Note: My father is the youngest of 3 siblings born from the second marriage of my grandfather who was a widower when he married my grandmother. Shown in the black and white photo are my uncle, Primitivo (deceased), my aunt Rosario, (deceased) my dad Pablo, and my grandfather, Jose.

(By the way, as I mentioned in an earlier blog entry, I was named after him.)

When my grandfather passed away, it was estimated that he was at least 105 years old. No records of his own birth exists because during the war, the town hall in our province of Bataan was bombed by the Japanese during the Second World War.

Through the Decades....The 1980's

The 80's saw me largely out of the country pursuing graduate studies. after one and a half years of teaching at UP Diliman, i left in December of 1980 for the University of Minnesota, St. Paul, Minnesota USA for my masters under a World Bank scholarship. with Dr. Dale Sorensen as my adviser, i finished my Master of Science in Large Animal Clinical Sciences and Avian Medicine degree in December 1982 ....by January of 1983 i was back home in Manila.

Soon after arriving, i reported back to work at UP Diliman. As part of the College of Veterinary Medicine's transfer to UP at Los Banos, i was one of the first two faculty members to transfer to Los Banos in 1984 to begin the operations of the Animal Disease Diagnostic Laboratory (ADDL) and the Veterinary Hospital there. Consequently, i was also the first to occupy one of the then newly-built, Swiss chalet-type, 4-bedroom, wooden houses located at the foot of Mt. Makiling for UPCVM faculty and staff.

In April of 1987 i left for Japan under their Research Student MONBUSHO (Government of Japan Ministry of Education) Scholarship Program. After a year as a research student at the Department of Microbiology of the University of Tokyo, i took and passed the qualifying oral and written exams for the Phd program (despite my very poor Japanese language abilities at that time... hehehehehe).

Love Notes I've Received....Part 6

All creatures great and small....

Ever since i can remember, we've always had animals in and around the house when we were growing up ....no, not the mice, rats, and cockroaches type ...but the type we raise, feed, and pet.

as early as i can remember, we've always had pet dogs at home. we usually get them as puppies and naming them was always fun. at first, we usually name them dogs according to their physical characteristics such as their color....we've had Blackie, Whitey, Brownie, and Rusty... when i came of age, i was the one giving them names ...i gave them outrageous names such as Stevie & Wonder, Istapokok, and Doo-Dee-Da & Doo-Dee-Do. when i left home and had a house at UP Los Banos, i had dogs too... Puypuy Da Kuykuy, DJ, Mak-Mak. most recently, i've had Kwang-Kwang. just about the only time the family house in Quezon City didn't have any dog was when all of us were abroad ....and even when i came back, i didn't stay there.... a cousin and her family lived there and took care of the place.

we didn't believe in putting our dogs in chains or in cages... we like them having the run of the place, in some instances, even inside the house. it is always a joy having dogs to care for and love.... however, losing them (through sickness and death or any other means) can be very heartbreaking! they invariably become members of the family ....later, they even share my bed and they sleep on my pillow above my head, by my chest to hear my heartbeat, or by my feet... when they know i'm a bit mad, we sleep back to back!

together with the dogs, we've had birds, fishes, ducks, chickens, and pigs in Quezon City. For a long time while we were growing up, we raised pigs, chinese chickens, and even quails in the backyard to augment the family income.

right now in our rented apartment, as much as i would want to, we cannot have dogs.... that's why we have a pair of african love birds and 2 fish tanks. but in Quezon City, my mom and dad have Doods (a mongrel) and my nieces have Amidala (Ala for short... a Shih Tzu). These two dogs are my "pets" for now and i see them and play with them during our weekly family dinners. i can't wait for the day when we can finally have our own dogs again!

The Angel of Business and Technology

(I gotta upgrade that cell phone....look at the antenna on that thing!!!)

Of phones and men.....

I remember well the first time we had a landline phone at home in Quezon City....after waiting for 10 years for our application for a phone line to be approved, we finally got ours in the early 70's. i was at home the day the dial-type phone was installed. right after the pldt lineman left i excitedly tried the phone and was so ecstatic that finally, we are wired!!! it didn't matter that we had an "old witch" for a "party line", the important thing was we had a phone...at last, whenever somobody asks us what our phone number was, we could give an answer.

i was so excited that sometimes, whenever i answer a call from anybody wanting to be my phone pal, i'd say yes and we became pals for a while. that phone line was very well-used. it was during the time when my brothers and i were in our teens and sometimes i'd go to sleep with my elder brother using the phone and i'd wake up in the morning with him still on the phone doing "telebabad"! one very exciting use of the landline phone then was receiving calls from relatives overseas. whenever my eldest brother called from Japan, we'd crowd around the phone and impatiently wait for our turn to talk to him and ask him to buy us "imported" things! hehehehehe.

fast forward to the mid-90's ....other landline phone providers besides pldt entered the scene and i remembered it took only a day for our newly-established laboratory to have 2 phone lines!...a few weeks after that, we also got 2 lines from pldt via their "zero backlog program".

a few years thereafter came the mobile phones. at first, it was only the rich who can afford to have bulky mobile phones complete with monstrous rechargeable batteries ....as the years went by, the mobile phones became smaller and smaller (and more affordable)...until the present...when almost anybody between 10 and 60 years old have their own cell phone!

my very first mobile phone was a company-issued black nokia standard phone. it was about double the size of my present phone and it didn't have texting capabilities. when texting became available, i bought my own Ericsson phone (take note: it wasn't Sony-Ericsson yet.!). as the years went by and technology improved, i changed phones either by buying them myself or as gifts (can you name the different brands & models in the photo? i can't! hehehehehe).

i've changed phones at least a dozen times ....and each time it happens....i still feel as excited as i was when we had our first phone in the 70's.

Love Notes I've Received....Part 5

Taihen gomen nasai....Dekada '70

I was so caught up with myself and what happened to me during the 70's i forgot one very, very significant event that occurred within our family during that decade .... the Birth of a Princess!!!


In early April of 1978, our family's little princess, Mabelle, was born. She came at a time when the three of us (the three boys) were just about ready to leave the nest. Perhaps, the happiest among us was me.... because finally, there's somebody who'll be calling me "Sangko" ....hehehehe.

More of the little princess later....

My favorite b&w photo

during the olden days, my family (minus the little princess, who wasn't born then yet) loves going to Luneta on weekends. during these outings, sometimes we had our pictures taken. in this
particular instance, i (that cute little thing there at the middle of the pic) was caught doing something i loved to do as a child. in fact, this is the only proof (aside from me having an overbite!) that shows i ever did this "thing"....that's why this is my favorite b&w photo. can you guess what it was i loved doing?

Answer: I used to suck my right ring and middle fingers! Hehehehehehe.

(Similar to thumbsucking except that it wasn't the thumb involved.)

Unidentified girl in pic was our nanny.

Check out the socks on my dad...cool huh?

Photo circa 1957

The Light....

"sometimes i am so caught up with my issues, my problems, my worries; or i am just plain facing the wrong direction and not open to other possibilities....that i do not see the light at the end of the tunnel!!!"

(model info: mabelle, my kid sister, at 2 years old in japan)

My Frustrations....Part 1

i am a frustrated artist....or aint i!

ever since i can remember, i have always dabbled in the arts .... visual arts as well as the performing arts.

in kinder, i was the reluctant star dancer of manang biday during our graduation ....(but that's another story.)

in elementary school, i drew pictures in crayola and in water color in art class. (i remember having received an honorable mention certificate from the National Children's Library for one of my works.)

in high school, i tried learning to play the guitar but only got so far as to accompany myself singing "More" in my final exams for our music class. i was heavily involved with our school's dramatic guild that staged the rock opera "Jesus Christ Superstar"....as head spotlight director!!! hehehehehe.

in college, i literally created an entire wallpaper consisting of colorful, interconnected by wire, whole-page glossy advertisements, (from imported GQ magazines and glued on illustration boards) of men's clothes & leather shoes; i "copied" and made a modern wooden candle holder; i created a floor-to-ceiling tie-dyed katsa (cheesecloth) circular corner lamp for my room; and i even designed and made double-purpose cabinet cum cushioned benches made of lawanit (they're so freakin' hard to saw and nail properly!) for my room...i also tried to join a theater group but only lasted a day.

in graduate school, i designed the interior of my itsy-bitsy tiny dormitory room doing all the carpeting, painting, carpentry, and electrical works myself.

and in my more recent past adult life, aside from designing the interiors of our rented apartment, i've made and sold several one-of a-kind desktop meditation fountains (even before they became commercially available!), and painted some angel watercolors.

among all of the above, the closest to my artist "self" are the angel watercolors. there were two factors that spurted me to create them....one was "The Artist's Way" by Julia Cameron & Mark Bryan, and the other was the Asian financial crisis of 1998.

i did the angel watercolors as part of my taking a self-help "course in discovering and recovering my creative self". after some soul-searching, i chose the visual arts as my vehicle in my "spiritual path to higher creativity ....however, i only finished up to week 4 of the 12-week course ....and these watercolors were what i have to show for it.

i painted all of the more than 30 angel watercolors in the midst of a crisis at work. earlier that year, the vaccine laboratory that we established was just taking of. from an initial staff of 8 in 1995, we peaked at 22. then....i had to let go of 14 of them through the course of that year....one of them was even with us from the start!!! creating the angel watercolors helped lessen the pain of talking to each one of the 14.

i think i haven't thanked them yet....so here goes....thank you my angels for protecting me from the hurt i would've suffered!!! in gratitude, i'll be posting these watercolors in the hope that anyone who needs them will be guided and protected too!

Celebrating Success!

just a few days ago, my friend and MufFIN were discussing about blogging. my friend remarked that blogging was probably created for people with "star complex"....to which MufFin added she read a newspaper article in which the columnist bashed blogging and mentioned things about bloggers & blogging similar to what my friend said.

my take on the this issue is.....so what? what is wrong with celebrating success? the problem with some of us is that we have forgotten to celebrate our successes...or if we do, we tend to celebrate only the "big" successes in life....

just by being born is a success....in fact, it is our first success....and that's the reason why most of us celebrate our birthdays every year....'coz for every birthday that comes along, it means that we have successfully lived to see and experience another year! taking off from celebrating birthdays once a year, why not celebrate being alive every single day?....how can we do this?....by having a diary or a journal....or simply, by blogging!!!

now, if by living a full day we happen to accomplish or achieve something....celebrate that too!....and share it with others....(hopefully others will be inspired to succeed too)....by blogging!!!

celebrating successes does not have to be grand or expensive....patting yourself on the back or rewarding yourself with a long night's sleep may be enough...but if you wanna really go all out with your celebration...that's ok too....by inviting your family & friends out....or by blogging!!!

what about if you commit mistakes?....mistakes can be successes too, if you learn and become a better person from them....learning from a mistake can happen instantaneously on your own... or through comments and advice from others....by talking and analyzing what went wrong to your boss, your partner, your friend, your counsellor....or by blogging (that's why comments are welcome for blog entries!)

personally, a big part of my blog are about my successes....because whenever i write about them i re-live the successes...and when i re-live them, i re-live the feelings i felt when success came ....more importantly, i re-live my "beingness" that brought about the success in the first place!...was i courageous? was daring? was i loving and caring? was i compassionate? was i determined?....in so doing, i can apply these beingness again to achieve more successes!!!

when i celebrate my successes, i celebrate life....and when i celebrate life, i honor and value Him who gave me life...

"I celebrate and value life as a child of God!"

(by the way, if you think you have not celebrated a success or if you feel like you have not celebrated it enough, it's never too late! ....go out and buy yourself a strawberry ice cream on a cone to celebrate having taken your first step....buy yourself a matchbox toy for having flown your first kite....or even fly a kite to celebrate having driven a car alone for the first time ....or create a blog (hehehehehe)....the possibilities are endless....and can only be limited by your imagination!!!

My Life List....Part 1

1. Own or co-own a tremendously successful business.

2. Spend a one-month holiday in Europe.

3. Go on a 3-week cruise of Asia.

4. Own a Bali-inspired spa-like retreat by the beach or on a mountain top.

5. Spend a one-month holiday in the U.S.

6. Attend a mass officiated by the Pope at the Vatican.

7. Visit Jerusalem and the Sphinx and the Pyramids.

8. Have a personal chauffeur.

9. Watch an Olympic Opening ceremony in person.

10. Go on an African Safari.

Love Notes I've Received....Part 4