Wednesday, April 15, 2009

Reminiscing India




My sobrino Jose had just finished his 16-month work contract as a marinero in an Arab tanker based in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Last week, we picked him up at the airport with my sis and the rest of her family. He’s on shore now but most of all he’s home at last.

I can say we have a very good bonding even though we have a 12 year age gap. He enjoys being with me, to the point that sometimes if not oftentimes he invades my privacy. As expected, he went straight to my flat right from the airport and there goes my privacy out of the window again.

He had the chance to work and be with Indian seafarers. He has fond memories of them. The other day, we watched this year's Academy Award Winner Slum Dog Millionaire. I paid much attention on the scenes about Agra and Taj Mahal. The movie brought back good memories of my Delhi and Agra trip in 2006.

Jose on the other hand recalls his Indian colleagues. He’d say, his mobile phone was bought for him by an Indian friend because he didn’t had an off-shore break in Dammam. He asked himself in a melancholic way if will he be able to see them again. I told him, “I guess so.”

For the good Indian’s who touched our lives… I share these priceless fotos. Thank you so much!



Monday, April 6, 2009

A Case of Bebe Gandang-Hari



This is for Oryx and his Brazilian friend who had a falling-out over a sexy mulatta. The Brazilian guy had a record-breaking torrid kissing bout with her at the dance-floor of The Embassy one Saturday night. The crowd cheered while The Oryx distanced himself from the scene ashamed of what was going on.

The Brazilian got mad with Oryx when he learned much later that the girl he was about to take home turned out to be a Bebe Gandang Hari. Too late for him to realize that she was a he. And poor Oryx got the blame for his failure to warn him.

So here’s your rhyme Oryx. Thank you for sharing it with me. One day when you visit Brazil, you will understand why your friend failed to notice the Bebe in her.

At the beaches of Rio, you might get confused as well…. Ha! Ha! Ha!

Mucho miedo que tengas
De la mujer con barbillas,
Aunque sea encantada,
Todavía tiene la polla.
Se parece como una hembra
Ya que la verdad está en sombra
Que tengas mucho cuidado -
La Bebé no tiene coño!

Saturday, April 4, 2009

Mystic India




New Delhi

Just three days after the exit of Year 2005, I got a call from the headquarters of my client in India to fly to New Delhi before their SAP system goes live.

It was my first time in Mystic India, home to one of the world's oldest civilizations.

It was not a usual preparatory landing announcement I heard a few minutes before our plane touches down the runway of Indira Gandhi Int’l Airport. One of the flight attendants of Air India announced that the plane must be disinfected, then much earlier than I thought, they came spraying the whole aircraft with air disinfectant. That caused zero visibility inside the plane, which almost triggered my asthma.

My team worked like crazy for over 14 hours daily at my client’s office and in our hotel rooms drowning ourselves with coffee to keep us mentally alert.

A few times we would take a break and see New Delhi at night as it was impossible to explore the city by day with the overwhelming tasks to be done. We explored some good Indian restaurants and ate authentic Indian cuisine rich with spices and flavours. It was a gastronomic feat for me, but to my colleague, it was a nightmare not to mention the discomfort she endures at the toilet every morning. So the rest of the trip she fed herself with Mc Donald’s vegetarian burger and fries.

New Delhi is beautiful with its tree-lined boulevards. Though I felt something creepy inside once our car would pass line of trees full of crows especially when they turned New Delhi’s blue sky to black as they took their flight just like in the horror movies.

My hard work was rewarded when my client announced on my last day that they are taking me to Agra, to see Taj Mahal, one of the 8 wonders of the world.

I enjoyed the long drive from New Delhi to the City of Agra. On our way, it was an interesting sight seeing India’s holy cows in all shapes and sizes roaming around, freely, untouched, and feeding on whatever they find edible in the streets, neighbourhood backyards, and open fields. In this part of the world, cows are considered sacred. Cows are not being turned to burgers here, so forget about that quarter pounder meal you craved for at Mc Donald’s. After all, India’s authentic dishes will never fail your quest for a unique gastronomic experience.

Taj Mahal is considered as the jewel of Muslim art. It’s a picture of perfect symmetry of structures, made of high quality white marble.

Behind the beauty of this UNESCO declared World Heritage Site is a sad love story of an Indian Emperor Shah Jahan and his favourite third wife Mumtaz Mahal, who died after giving birth to their 14th child. Taj Mahal was constructed by the emperor as a final resting place for his wife.

The construction cost was so immense that it caused the emperor’s post after a coup was successfully staged against him by his son. The building of Taj Mahal almost led the empire to bankruptcy.

However, in these days, it placed Agra in the world map, drawing millions of tourists annually.

Before the day tour was over, I took time to queue and have my picture taken at the bench where one can have the full background of this wonder of the world. Celebrities like John Lennon and Yoko Ono posed there, even the royalties of England like Prince Charles and the late Princess Diana.

Friday, April 3, 2009

Cheap Chao "Surrenders"

So what's up Cheap Chow? You started the war and surrendered too early? Can't stand this coming Sunday the fury of angry 130,000 servants who will lambast you, curse you, and would be very mean to you... that their words will reverberate in your thoughts on and on and on and you would regret your life how on earth you were so damn racist???

Know what???? We are happy reading this in one of our dailies.... " Que hijueputa eres.. cabron de mierda!!!"
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"HONG KONG—Now contrite, a Hong Kong writer who angered the Philippines with his article poking fun at the country, says he actually admires Philippine democracy and music and would like to someday visit the country he had derisively called a “nation of servants.”

He says among the places he would like to visit is “Fort McKinley,” a name that now seems to exist only in the dimming memories of old-timers, having been renamed Fort Bonifacio more than four decades ago."

Tuesday, March 31, 2009

Boycott Hong Kong's "Cheap Chow" errr... Chip Tsao

Chip Tsao is a Hong Kong-based columnist-broadcaster. On his article titled “The War at Home” which was published last March 27, 2009 in Hong Kong Magazine, he labelled Philippines “a nation of servants” . Asia City Publishing Group (ACPG), the publisher of the HK Magazine issued to the Filipino people an apology for any offense that might have been caused by Chip Tsao’s article. The article was removed after 3 days of publication in it’s on-line edition.

Below is his article. Please read and remember his name.. “Cheap Chow”…err Tsip Tsao.

The War At Home
March 27th, 2009

The Russians sank a Hong Kong freighter last month, killing the seven Chinese seamen on board. We can live with that—Lenin and Stalin were once the ideological mentors of all Chinese people. The Japanese planted a flag on Diàoyú Island. That’s no big problem—we Hong Kong Chinese love Japanese cartoons, Hello Kitty, and shopping in Shinjuku, let alone our round-the-clock obsession with karaoke.

But hold on—even the Filipinos? Manila has just claimed sovereignty over the scattered rocks in the South China Sea called the Spratly Islands, complete with a blatant threat from its congress to send gunboats to the South China Sea to defend the islands from China if necessary. This is beyond reproach. The reason: there are more than 130,000 Filipina maids working as $3,580-a-month cheap labor in Hong Kong. As a nation of servants, you don’t flex your muscles at your master, from whom you earn most of your bread and butter.

As a patriotic Chinese man, the news has made my blood boil. I summoned Louisa, my domestic assistant who holds a degree in international politics from the University of Manila, hung a map on the wall, and gave her a harsh lecture. I sternly warned her that if she wants her wages increased next year, she had better tell every one of her compatriots in Statue Square on Sunday that the entirety of the Spratly Islands belongs to China.

Grimly, I told her that if war breaks out between the Philippines and China, I would have to end her employment and send her straight home, because I would not risk the crime of treason for sponsoring an enemy of the state by paying her to wash my toilet and clean my windows 16 hours a day. With that money, she would pay taxes to her government, and they would fund a navy to invade our motherland and deeply hurt my feelings.

Oh yes. The government of the Philippines would certainly be wrong if they think we Chinese are prepared to swallow their insult and sit back and lose a Falkland Islands War in the Far East. They may have Barack Obama and the hawkish American military behind them, but we have a hostage in each of our homes in the Mid-Levels or higher. Some of my friends told me they have already declared a state of emergency at home. Their maids have been made to shout “China, Madam/Sir” loudly whenever they hear the word “Spratly.” They say the indoctrination is working as wonderfully as when we used to shout, “Long live Chairman Mao!” at the sight of a portrait of our Great Leader during the Cultural Revolution. I’m not sure if that’s going a bit too far, at least for the time being.