palembang

i arrived at palembang around 7 pm. at the airport's exit, taxi drivers swarmed around me, so i decided to go back to the airport and book a taxi from there. i was upset coz i thought i gave 100,000 rupiah to the lady, but she was insisting that i only gave her 10,000. both bills were of the same color. or so i thought. anyway, since we couldn't understand each other, i boarded the taxi that would bring me to novotel palembang. i haven't had dinner yet and i was in 2 flights the same day and had trouble getting a taxi. at the hotel, they put me in a room that would make me walk all the way half through the entire floor area of the hotel. when i reached my room, i dropped everything, got a glass for drinking water. to my horror, i dropped the glass and broke it. what a first 2 hours in palembang!

anyway, i told myself to get a nice dinner instead... all the bad luck were already taken by the broken glass. i had nice seafood nasi goreng and fried noodles. thursday morning, novotel staff got me a regular taxi for my first meeting. but i didn't get the taxi to wait for me to go back to the hotel, so i didn't have any choice but to take becak (pedicab). i met with 2 more respondents, both of them were very nice. for dinner, i met with hp's dewi, who was very nice to accompany me to palembang's tourist spots such as the musi bridge, kuto besak, palembang grand mosque and the palembang fountain. dewi, together with her brothers, also talked to a lot of people so that i can enter the grand mosque, and i did! that was my first time inside a mosque. they were trying to get me inside the mosque's center prayer hall but it was closed for a feast of muhammad's birthday the following day.

the night ended with a nice meal of local delicacies - pempek and tekwan! nice! friday was all about meetings and checking out IT outlets and mall-based PC fair. at 6 pm, i took my flight back to jakarta.

medan

since i got a midnight flight to jakarta, i needed to stay at sheraton before boarding a lionair domestic flight to indonesia's third largest economic center, medan. upon landing at polonia international airport, i took a taxi to go to jw marriott medan hotel, changed to my meeting clothes and met with my first respondent, who took me to a a nice restaurant for a meeting over lunch. he was kind enough to drop me off jalan asia for my next meeting. after that, i spent 20 minutes waiting for a taxi to go back to the hotel. but there was none. i ended up taking my first becak ride. then, my next meeting didn't push through, so i stayed at medan's sun plaza. after having dinner at merdeka walk, i took a becak to see maimoon palace and medjid raya mosque. both sites were already closed, so i just took pictures from the outside.

the next day was pretty much about meetings: breakfast meeting at starbucks in sun plaza, meeting at disty office. then, i went back to merdeka walk, stayed at mcdonald's for free wifi and checked my mails. my third day in medan was a quick one. i had meeting in the morning, at 10:30, i was off to polonia airport to go back to jakarta and catch my next lionair flight to palembang.

lahuy

we finally made it to caramoan! yeheey! although we weren't able to go to the famous gota beach, we were able to see lahuy beach, the Virgin Mary at tabgon and several other islets.

liezl and izhi were able to join us. we stayed at ma'am beriso's house and had all of our meals (except 1 at caramoan bed and dine) at lutong bahay, just across ma'am beriso's place.

how did we get there?! 9-hour bus (php 880) ride from cubao to naga; 1.5 hour van (php 92) ride to sabang; 2-hour boat (php 120) ride from sabang to guijalo port; and 15-minute tricycle ride from guijalo to centro. almost 14 hour non-stop trip!

going back, it was even longer, coz we were stuck somewhere before lucena city, quezon due to a road accident that involved 2 10-wheeler trucks. we got here in makati at around 9 am, as the bus ride took about 12 hours. good thing that the penfrancia bus was comfy.

water

today is world day for water.

nelson

i still haven't seen this movie. mcs pirated dvd peddlers didn't have a copy for the longest time now. gotta get it from somewhere else.

Change moves in spirals, not circles. For example, the sun goes up and then it goes down. But everytime that happens, what do you get? You get a new day. You get a new one. When you breathe, you inhale and you exhale, but every single time that you do that you’re a little bit different then the one before. We’re always changing. And its important to know that there are some changes you can’t control and that there are others you can.

- Dan Dunne, Half Nelson (2006)

indo

wednesday morning, i came back from a 9 day work-related travel to indonesia. the trip was a great one. all alone in a country where i only understand similar tagalog words or indonesian-ized english words.

the respondents were really nice. local transportation was the difficult part, as there were no taxis in palembang and medan roads. food wasn't bad, although too spicy to my liking, but generally it was ok.

more on this later when i have the chance to transfer the pics from my 2 elementary cameras.

(",)

robin

back in the days in nagkaisang nayon elem. school (nnes), we had this as a piece for a district-wide choral interpretation competition. we were in grade 3, our competition included grade 3 pupils from lagro, san agustin, kaligayahan and delfin geraldez: 4 schools plus nnes used to make up district 10 of quezon city. from what i recall, we didn't have any special costumes, unlike other schools that went complete with feathered costumes and headdresses. nnes kids were in our good old uniforms but we still went home with the 3rd place award.

nice to be a little bit nostalgic coz our batch celebrates 18th anniv of our graduation from nnes, where we learned pretty much all the basic and stock knowledge that we still know today. thanks to our wonderful and outstanding teachers like ma'ams lucia paras, rosa gutierrez, lolita ventura, priscilla cancino, elena dianzon, margarita vinarao, helen barnig, aurora bernal, teresita ferguson, aida dela cruz, rosario bonifacio, ceferina pomer, martina noveloso, marilou ramirez, heidi alejo, corazon paracha, alicia batol, thelma sedigo and haydee basug, among others.

Cock Robin

Who killed Cock Robin?
I, said the Sparrow,
with my bow and arrow,
I killed Cock Robin.

Who saw him die?
I, said the Fly,
with my little eye,
I saw him die.

Who caught his blood?
I, said the Fish,
with my little dish,
I caught his blood.

Who'll make the shroud?
I, said the Beetle,
with my thread and needle,
I'll make the shroud.

Who'll dig his grave?
I, said the Owl,
with my pick and shovel,
I'll dig his grave.

Who'll be the parson?
I, said the Rook,
with my little book,
I'll be the parson.

Who'll be the clerk?
I, said the Lark,
if it's not in the dark,
I'll be the clerk.

Who'll carry the link?
I, said the Linnet,
I'll fetch it in a minute,
I'll carry the link.

Who'll be chief mourner?
I, said the Dove,
I mourn for my love,
I'll be chief mourner.

Who'll carry the coffin?
I, said the Kite,
if it's not through the night,
I'll carry the coffin.

Who'll bear the pall?
We, said the Wren,
both the cock and the hen,
We'll bear the pall.

Who'll sing a psalm?
I, said the Thrush,
as she sat on a bush,
I'll sing a psalm.

Who'll toll the bell?
I said the bull,
because I can pull,
I'll toll the bell.

All the birds of the air
fell a-sighing and a-sobbing,
when they heard the bell toll
for poor Cock Robin.

poor

The trick is not in having come from the poor, although that helps. The trick is never forgetting what it means to be poor, and not wanting others to remain poor. The trick is not in having been the poor boy from Lubao, it is in continuing to feel for the poor of Lubao. The trick is not in having come from a shrimp trader’s family (although how being born to a shrimp trader can possibly qualify as poor only Manny Villar can say), it is in continuing to feel for the vendors who sell pails of shrimp in the bulb-lit caves or wet markets or talipapa of Quinta and elsewhere. - Conrado de Quiros, March 2, 2010

mangrove

summer's here! can't wait to see caramoan. end of this month.

monsod-no

just found out that the previous article on noynoy was not written by mareng winnie monsod. anyway...