Classes suspended city-wide July 25 SONA

On suspension of classes in Quezon City today July 25, message from Dean Roland Tolentino last Saturday at 11:43 am: quote “Pls be informed that classes in QC on 25 July 2011 have been suspended by the Office of the City Mayor. Pls inform your constituencies…”

ode to the snake-charmer

“She was doing the Cobra thing.   She was like…(makes movements)… copying the snake. And it was like…  right here, and she was like…”

 “You did not watch closely enough, Shao Dre… It was the snake that was copying the woman.”

“What? I don’t get it.”

“Look.” (points at pool of drinking water) What do you see?”

  “Me, well my reflection.”

“Yes. (whirls water). Now, what do you see?”

“It’s blurry.”


“Yes.”

“That woman was like still water. Quiet and calm. In here (puts hand on the head) and in here (puts hand on the heart) .

“So, the snake reflects her action like still water. Like a mirror?”

  “Yes.”

“So, she controlled the snake by doing nothing?”

“Being still and doing nothing…  are two very different things.

“She used her Chi on that snake, didn’t she?”

  “Very good.”

“You gotta teach me that.  How to control people.”

“There is only one person you need to learn how to control.”

“Who?”

“Empty your mind…”

                                  –  Quote, teacher to student, from                                               “The Karate Kid (2010)”


rains, floods

“Rainy Days and Mondays…”

When it rains golf balls and you start noticing, even if you’re  doing something else, and  when the rain starts turning into rumbling water boulders,  and you start quietly timing it in your head, 15 minutes…. 20 minutes…because you have a vivid memory, tucked somewhere,  of thousands dying helplessly  the last time that happened, and you start telling people to think of getting indoors or getting home, you have what i call – Ondoy phobia; but unlike any other kind of phobia, it is perfectly rational, and perfectly reasonable, in a country where people have  learned to take care of themselves without government.