High School Life Oh my HIGH SCHOOL … The Senior Year

I think this is a long overdue entry that should have been posted several months ago. This is the final part of the high school memory ensemble and as far as I could remember, the Senior Year was one of the most memorable.

Of course, everytime I met up with my batchmates, we dared each other to sing with whole heart our graduation song. Someone from batch ‘95 composed a graduation song, it was lengthy and semi-dramatic with lyrics that include “remember when the leaves are falling as we walk hand in hand in the rain…” Uhm, I could never recall a time when i held hand with someone while it drizzled. I knew I would run to the corridor or to the AL Building and seek shelter from the rain.

By the way, the title of the song was “I’ll Remember You” and was written by our classmate who was on the cover of a Sunday magazine of a local newspaper. Yes she was featured as a cover girl, accompanied with a feature about her and her achievements. It was mentioned in her story that she was part of that year’s Club Pen (a selection of good looking men and women who represented Penshoppe) only to find out that the newspaper posted an erratum on the next issue stating that our classmate was never a part of Club Pen. Awwww.

What else did I remember about 4th year high school? Hmmm, advanced chemistry class of Ms. Fedillaga. We were no longer forced to memorize the KREBS cycle over and over again for it had become a thing of the past. I barfed the citric acid cycle the previous year. Though we still encountered the same topic in our final year along with the organic chemistry and the never-ending redox equation, our teacher was way better. 

We were happy that the bride of chucky did not handle the advanced chemistry subject anymore.  Actually we hated her style for she just copied a problem from a book and wrote it on the board and then she would write the solution line per line, stealing a look from her notebook and then she’d utter what she’d written. The bride of chucky was a poser. But she had a master’s degree from XU. Ms. Fedillaga on the other hand was from Philippine Constabulary.

I belonged to section Aldrin and our adviser was this Filipino teacher who could not even speak the language naturally. Hers was a bit hard and laden with stress and accent in all the syllables of the Filipino word. For example, mag-asawa:  The stress is on the SA. Our teacher-adviser would say it as MAG-asawa.

The scary side of this teacher was that she became violent when she’s angry. She’s pretty demonstrative about it. Most of us, Aldrininians remembered the black wooden horse figure on her front table. In her intense and utter disappointed that we never cleaned the home room, she screamed, held the carved figure and threw it on the floor. I was seated on the front row and I saw how the horse was thrown by her angry hand and flew over my head. I followed the projectile path with my eyes and saw how my classmates ducked and sought shelter from the flying object. It landed on the aisle in bits and pieces.

For the very first time, the Junior-Senior Prom was held outside of the school premises. Our batch was very furious with the bride of chucky because she schemed out the grand plan of holding the event at the Social Hall of the Provincial Capitol. We were furious not only because the principal allowed the juniors to have the prom outside but also because the venue was the Social Hall. There were some rites and formations that were deleted and modified.

I got pissed because I remembered what the principal bellowed the previous year that “It’s a SHAME to break TRADITION.” And for tradition’s sake, we let down our guards and held the PROM on the school ground. But this very same principal allowed the tradition to be broken by the bride of chucky.

I could still remember how we fared poorly in physics. We blamed it entirely to the troll who was just forced to teach the subject. There was a shortage of teachers that time and so the troll doubled up as a Chemistry and Physics teacher. So did we ever learned anything? I could barely remember how to compute the vector equations and Newton’s law of motion.  The troll skipped classes more than her students.

There was Mr. Capistrano who had his practicum in the school. He studied physics at Philippine Normal University and he would come to school as a substitute for the troll. He didn’t look like a troll but his eyes were huge like the eyes of the tiny primates from Bohol. He was the saving grace for our batch because he taught well and he could communicate better than the troll.

Some of our classmates had a crush on Mr. C because of his wit and teaching styles. That time, I wondered how to compute the luminous intensity of his eyes using the unit of Candela. But still, we fared poorly in physics. I remembered how we were trampled by other schools during a local Physics olympiad. Physics surprisingly was my Waterloo in college.

Our English teacher was also very interesting. We failed miserably in our attempt to get a closer look of her teeth. We sang the “Sound of Silence” in class in an attempt to expose her incomplete set of teeth. And we laughed when she realized that altogether, we stopped singing and she was the only one singing “narrow streets of cobble stones . . . ‘neath a hallow of a street lamp…” Hahahaha Priceless.

One time, one of our classmates returned from her Thailand trip and she gave some chocolates and M&Ms to the English teacher. My classmate said that it’s for the whole batch. Seeing it as a problem, Ms. English teacher decided to solve it by placing all the M&Ms on her table, counted them one by one and divided it equally according to the number of students in her class. The M&Ms were placed on a sheet of intermediate paper and distributed during her ‘Sound of Silence’ class. It really was a bit embarassing.

In our fourth and final year in Sci-Hi, we had the following as our teachers:

English – Ms. “Sound of Silence” , responsible for the terms “if only the plant could talk it would say woohter (water), woohter, i need woohter”

Physics – Troll with the special participation of Mr. Capistrano

Filipino – Ms. XXXX, responsible for the flying horse.

Technology & Home Economics – Mr. Toggenberg a.k.a. Mr. Ibex; others were under Mr. Nacua and Ms. Enriquez

Mathematics – Mr. Orais, responsible for the latin phrase Q.E.D. or quod erat demonstrandum!

Values Education – Mr. Astroboy

Physical Education – Ms. Alino

Social Studies – The Hobbit

The senior year would have been different if these teachers were not around to provide us with entertainment and support. They were responsible for the memories we had on our final year as a scholar of the city. Some of these teachers have already retired while others have moved on to distant lands.

In the future, we may bump into them, share memories and or exchange stories with them. One of these days, my batchmates would meet up again and perhaps will remember how to sing our graduation song. If I bumped into my classmates again, I would have to let them sing ”the time has come that we gathered here…”

SCI-HI years was one of best years ever.

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The links to the SCI-HI Years

The Junior Years

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The Sophomore Years

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The Freshmen Years

Les Amis de la France

Classes had already started and for three weeks now, I have been attending french classes at Les Amis de la France at the QC Pavillion, Cebu City. For the past 18 months, I’ve been trying to go back to learning the language. But since I relocated to Cebu, I hadn’t had the time to check out the available foreign language schools here.

Only until I bumped into their displayed tarps last month in one of the malls. I immediately called up their accueil and inquired about their schedule of activities. The second session would start in August and so I was able to enrol in the Saturday class.

The organization has been existing for almost a year now, having started in November 2007, they were established basically as a center for french culture and language. It is relatively new and different from other foreign language schools.

I wasn’t able to continue my french classes at Alliance Francaise de Manille. I stopped 3 years ago. Letting my self return to the french school gave me the chance to compare the approaches and methods of Alliance Francaise from LesAmisdelaFrance. At Alliance Francaise, the focus is more on the grammar and the structure with the module basically traditional and a bit difficult.

The approach of Les Amis de la France is a bit on the conversational, with the focus on the student’s ability to learn the language through constant use of French in any conversation. Les Amis uses a different set of books. They used the ’Alter Ego’ Series over than that of Alliance’s ’Forum’ series.  My teachers at Alliance were all Filipinos. All the teachers at Les Amis are french. Currently My teacher is Mademoiselle Perrine.

I think the objectives of both French institutions are similar. And I am happy that I got back to learning French again. I needed to finish what I have already started. And this would be a very long process.

Le Blanc Tableau

Dans le photo: Cesar, Mlle Perrine, John et Stacey

Ma camarade de classe: Melanie, Leslie, Harry et Ariane

To be very good in speaking the language, one must have to practice speaking the language. For me, getting a French petite ami is not an option. J’ai ma petite chou chou already. So I am banking on my classmates in Les Amis to at least improve our confidence in the language.

But for now, I wanted to ask Mademoiselle Perrine: “What’s the french word for ‘nosebleed’? Comment dit NOSEBLEED en francaise?

Good luck na lang.

Street Siomai Special

This is another first for me this year. It’s a different kind of food trip where you don’t have to dress up and look your very best. All you need is just a few bucks, tough guts and a positive attitude.

 

It’s just a mellow food adventure. Have you tried eating al fresco on a dingy but crowded street, sitting on smudged polyvinyl stools, hands wrapped with plastic and elbows brushing other people’s elbows?

 

Today I didn’t mind the little inconveniences for as long as I could ‘swallow’ the food fine. I was with my dealer’s staff and we trooped to this little crowded street called Katipunan near Punta Princesa and ate at this joint:

 

 

This is D’Original Siomai sa Tisa. No, I was not referring to the four smiling faces in the pic. But all of them were so excited to try the Siomai experience. Siomais are dumplings filled with ground pork meat and steamed and kept warm on a hot stainless steel steamer.

 

Siomais are served with chilli sauce and calamansi and a toothpick. It’s ideally paired with puso or hanging rice or steamed rice wrapped in palm leaves. For the even hungry food tripper, one can also order instant noodles with egg, a choice of chicken or beef “Lucky Me.”

 

 

One doesn’t have to worry about getting ill. You wont be sharing any utensils (well except for the bowl and the spoon if you order instant noodles) because everything is disposable. This type of business is quite successful. Proof of success can be seen at its adjacent sides. Some jealous neighbors have put up siomai stalls in the same street and tried to compete with D’Original.

 

 

Hmmm. Because of competition, siomai is brought down to only 6 pesos per piece. All sorts of people enjoyed the cheap food thrill. Young and old, students and workers, rich and poor, the beautiful and the ugly, all opposites flanked the siomai strips that usually open at night.

 

 

 

I personally liked the experience. Some street food aren’t really scary. Some are worth a try. But would you dare to try?

 

 

La Flamme Olympique

The Beijing Olympics is on. Highlight of any olympics is the lighting of the cauldron. Here are some of the dramatic versions of the lighting ceremony:

1988 Summer Olympics Seoul, South Korea

 

1992 Summer Olympics Barcelona, Spain

1996 Summer Olympics Atlanta, Georgia, USA

2000 Summer Olympics Sydney, Australia

2004 Summer Olympics Athens, Greece

2008 Summer Olympics Beijing, China

Other noticeable cauldron lighting ceremonies from the winter olympics are the following:

1994 Winter Olympics Lillehammer, Norway

1998 Winter Olympics Nagano, Japan

2002 Winter Olympics  Salt Lake City, Utah, USA

2006 Winter Olympics Torino, Italia

So which of the lighting ceremonies you like the most?

A Lonely Journey Back Home

 

 

My things were already packed and I have already checked everything I brought inside the hotel room. Wallet, car keys, toiletries and my laptop bag, I checked them again when I woke up very early on a Saturday morning.

 

I took a bath shaved and cut myself in the process. Blood came out of the cut as I hurriedly placed my left cheek under the faucet and let water hit on it to stop the bleeding. I continued to shave the other side when the phone alarm sounded off. Twenty minutes after, I checked out of the hotel and began a lonely journey back home.

 

ZeeWee, my voiture, was already eager to return to Cebu. I had her car-washed to clean her up since we hit a chicken from our previous day’s trip. I could sense that she’s a bit nervous about today’s trip because her power locks were malfunctioning. I told her not to be scared because I would be with her in this journey.

 

 

It was still dark when we left our hotel in the Goldenfields of Bacolod City. We’ve stayed here for two days and  two nights to work with my distributor and to meet friends on the side. Goldenfields is the city’s ‘entertainment’ complex filled with restaurants, bars and hotels. It’s 5.30 am. ZeeWee and I left while the place was still in slumber.

 

Seeking the road that would take us to the town of Murcia, we turned to a corner across the old Bacolod runway and reached the town before sunrise. Murcia is a first-class municipality of Negros Occidental and is a land-locked town with protected forest areas. It is situated at the northern foot of Mt. Canlaon, a very active volcano.

 

 

The town was created by Fr. Miguel Alvarez in 1860 and has since grown and developed because of the logging and sugar industries then.  I stopped ZeeWee at the side across a school and entered Murcia’s relatively modern church and said my prayers.

 

Since logging was already banned in the province, Murcia had only the sugarcane fields to fuel its development. We passed vast agricultural lands with sugarcanes rising several feet from the ground. Taking the concrete roads of Murcia, one could witness great sceneries and breathtaking views.

 

 

 Like the majestic Mt. Canlaon which towers over 2,400 meters.

 

 

 And the enchanting Mt. Mandalagan at the northeastern boundary.

 

A few kilometres towards the interiors of Murcia, fog began to cover the view of the great Mt. Canlaon.

 

 

 

I switched off the aircon unit, opened up the windows and let the fog and the cold air enter the car.  It was slightly difficult to drive through the fog on a very winding road. I somehow let ZeeWee feel the bumps and curves of the road and let her run at an incredibly slow pace.

 

At 6am, we passed by the crooked and winding road leading to the town of Don Salvador Benedicto. Tall pine trees lined the sides of the road, giving the motorists views similar to Baguio City.

 

The town may have been the least accessible among the mountain municipalities of Negros Occidental. The isolation was finally solved when the local government began to build roads on its rugged slopes, connecting it to the towns of Murcia, Calatrava and San Carlos City.

 

 

 

 

Several kilometres more, we navigated the downhill track and reached the city of San Carlos. A first-class component city of Negros Occidental, San Carlos City had a good exisiting port facility that served as a gateway to Western Visayas. The city’s pier is vast and modern since the city was chosen by the Philippine Ports Authority as the site for their expansion in 1998. San Carlos City is very much a great location for development.

 

 

We reached the town at 7.30 am. The barge was not yet in sight so I decided to drop by the Church of St. Charles Borromeo, said my prayer of thanks and left for Carmelle’s Inn and ate breakfast.

 

 

The barge arrived at 9am and left an hour after. I managed to load ZeeWee into the barge and squeezed her between two other vehicles. To reach Toledo City in Cebu, the barge must have to go around Refugio (Sipaway) Island, cross the Tañon Strait and dock at the city port found at the heart of Toledo. We reached the island of Cebu before noon.

 

Leaving Negros Island

 

Nearing Cebu’s Toledo City

 

I made a brief stop to at the city center to have lunch before taking the last stretch of the drive home. We took the Naga-Uling Road, a relatively crooked mountain road that cuts through the mountains of Cebu.

 

Which way to go?

 

Nearing home, almost there. 

 

I felt relieved when ZeeWee finally passed by the coastal road and to the national highway leading to Consolacion. I was excited to reach home and to tell my family about the loneliness of traveling alone. The trip was not too lonely though. There were good sights and beautiful views along the way and besides, ZeeWee had kept me company all throughout the journey home.

Usapang Business(es)

I drove for several hours today, leaving my house at 5am to cross the Tañon Strait at 8 am and arrived safely in Dumaguete City before 10. It was a long drive through the southeastern towns of Cebu that ended up in Samboan where ZeeWee and I had to board a barge to get us to Tampi, Amlan in the island of Negros.

 

The trip to Negros Oriental was plainly about business. One of my dealers had already raised the white flag for the Negros territory because of poor sales output and bleak sales forecast for the coming months. I made it a part of my call plan to validate my dealer’s claim about the impending loss of sales.

 

As Merck’s management representative, it is but important to protect the existing business in the territory on top of the responsibility of monitoring growth in sales of the distributors and the depth of coverage. Any potential loss of sales must have to be addressed while it’s still premature.

 

These thoughts ran through my mind as I drove to the town of Samboan. I thought about it so much that I almost did not notice that a speeding motorbike was about to hit ZeeWee’s bumper as I turned left for the gasoline station. I almost bumped into an old man in Argao as he crossed the street with much hesitation. It’s my business to get to my destination safely and on time. One of my greatest fears in life is road accident and I could not imagine how I would ever react if such would happen. But God forbid, I shall knock on wood.

 

In Dumaguete, I met up with my dealer who was based in Bacolod City. He was in the city to check if he could expand his business in Southern Negros. I had to personally check if this dealer could actually increase the sales of Merck items and Diasys reagents in the area. The rules of distributorship clearly define territories for every dealer and the exclusivity to distribute our products is limited to the declared areas.

 

Business must have to be at least sustained or increased for every cycle. There may be factors and reasons if negative or unachieved growth was observed. In the case of Dumaguete and the entire Negros Oriental, I need to determine the reasons and factors for its dismal performance.

 

My dealer from Bacolod had other businesses (yes in plural form) aside from dealership. He likes cock. Fighting cock that is. He actually raises and sells fighting cocks and he has two huge lots placed with hundreds of cocks that are fed and raised to fight in the buwangan. He had this business for more than a decade already.

 

I was able to visit his cocks (yes in plural form and yes he has too many) in his wife’s hometown Dauin. The southern town is basically near the foot of Mt. Talinis where there’s an on-going project by PNOC. In Barangay Magsaysay, there are hundreds of live alarm clocks that ring forever.  I saw how vast his lot was. The ground was basically filled with cocks. Some of them were shedding feathers. Others were molting. Still others were not yet fit to for the arena. My dealer pointed to me his cocks that won several fights already.

 

I saw how my dealer was passionate about his cocks. I saw how happy he was as he narrated the ups and downs of the business. He mentioned that he had some shares or stocks in one of the biggest galerias in Negros Occidental and that he always looks forward for the distributions of the dividends at the end of the year.

 

We talked about my ex-officemate and our common friend who’s planning to put up a piggery. He is now based in England, earning hundreds of pesos every month (if you convert his monthly salary from pounds). Raising pigs is similar to raising cocks except that one could not send any pig to fight another boar. Pigs are raised for human consumption. We eat them for protein and cholesterol boost. Putting up a piggery is difficult as you need to identify a location where water is abundant and available and that the land should be far away from houses. Hog-raising is a dirty endeavour and is very expensive.

 

After my brief visit to my dealer’s cocks, I went back to Dumaguete City and decided to do some brisk walks at the boulevard. Business is doing good near the baywalk. Hotel occupancy is high, brisk sales of barbecues and street food at one end, and a lot of old male foreigners engaged in intimate conversations with the young exotic-cum-erotic dusky Filipinas. After 10kms and an hour of brisk walking, I returned to my hotel and made a quick change to visit a college friend in the outskirt of the city.

 

Some interesting facts about my friend who’s based here in Dumaguete: After college, he landed a good job in a multi-national firm at a Manila office and studied nursing on the side. He resigned from his post and got a job and was relocated in Cotabato. After 2 years of isolation, he decided to return to Dumaguete.

 

Here in Dumaguete he manages businesses (yes in plural form) like a traveller’s inn, an internet café and coffee shop, a laundry service and a string of apartment for lease. I paid him a visit to check out his inn and his laundry shop. The guy was busy all week because his coffee shop cum internet café will be opening in time for the Olympics.

 

I met him in his inn, and we basically talked about his businesses and why he decided to put up so many. For now, he has decided to stay in the country and focus on his brainchildren. He’s been having birthpains. He has had placenta previa. I said he was so brave to have taken a lot of risks.

 

Well life is a business. It’s a risk. At some point in our lives, we need to be brave and to take risks. I may not be taking risks at the moment, but sooner or later I’m going to. I just don’t know yet what business I could have. I am still in the process of knowing what things I’m passionate about.    

 

 

 

 

 

Not Again and Again and Again

Please don’t even wonder whether this entry is a repeat composition about Cebu Pacific’s notorious flight delays. Yes, this is once again an expression of my complete distaste of the said airline.

 

People may think that Cebu Pacific had already solved its problem on delayed flights but no. The problem still exists. For July alone, there were flights delayed and flights cancelled. My Cebu-Manila flight two weeks ago was delayed. Three days after, my boss and I travelled to Iloilo on board the delayed flight from Manila Domestic. Our Cebu-Davao flight was also delayed. Though my flight back to Cebu was okay, my boss’s flight to Manila was delayed for more than an hour. But I noticed that the earlier flight to Cebu was cancelled.

 

And then the latest event! Last weekend, most of the Cebu-Pacific flights were delayed. A fine example was last Sunday. I was booked for the 12nn Davao-Cebu flight. The check-in counter was already closed when I got inside Davao Airport. They processed my ticket though and I got a boarding pass with the 1130H indicated as the boarding time.

 

45 minutes after 1130H the pre-departure personnel announced that our flight will be delayed since the aircraft was expected to arrive at 1pm. I did have the usual feeling that the flight will be delayed. I never truly believed that Cebu Pacific had finally come out from such dilemma.

 

What could be the reasons for flight delays? I do not know! Engine troubles? Plane defects? Not all Cebu Pacific aircrafts have access to airport facilities such as the passenger tubes and the transfer buses.  Most probably, parking and loading areas are not adequate.

 

Now if you are a frequent flyer, do yourself a favour. As much as possible, refrain from taking any Cebu-Pacific airline flight. The chances for delayed flights are still high.

 

Cebu Pacific had me wait for one and a half hours. I had no lunch and no free lunch was served on board (Asa pa ako). I also learned that my sister’s flight to Manila was delayed too. This airline is really notorious with flight schedule inconveniences.