Ramblings Intérieurs

Ramiele Malubay and David Archuleta

I will take a short break from this "truth and honesty" thing and will write about two contestants that got my attention in the world's (or at least America's) favorite TV show, American Idol.

41. Ramiele Malubay

We got another Fil-Am in this Season 7 of American Idol. She is 18-year-old Ramiele Malubay. I don't know why a lot of Filipinos gets very excited whenever a Fil-Am gets in to the Top 24 of American Idol. I am not because I know there's a lot of more good and better singers here in our country than OUTSIDE the Philippines. That is why I am not so thrilled with Jasmine Trias. So, I am not really expecting anything from this Ramiele Malubay.

After hearing nine of the Top 12 girls in the first week of AI Performance Night, I was not happy. I didn't see or hear anyone that got my attention. Sure there were some good singers but this is American Idol and with the awesome singer from their boys counterpart, I was expecting the girls to be better or at least equal the performance of the guys.

The tenth performer was the Fil-Am, Ramiele Malubay. She sang the song "You Don't Have To Say You Love Me" by Dusty Springfield. While she was singing, I was thinking this is so boring, and up to the time she ended the song. I was expecting the judges would have something bad to say. It turned out the other way around. They had a lot of good things to say to Ramiele. I said to myself, "What?"

I realized later that the problem was not with Ramiele's singing but with me. I was used to hearing the song from Lani Misalucha and Regine Velasquez and their versions, particularly with Lani, of the song was very different from Ramiele. She didn't sang her lungs out like what Regine and Lani do and like what our current female "singers" do (with the exemption of our very own Philippine Idol Mau Marcelo).

After watching the replay, the judges were right especially Randy Jackson. Ramiele started it slow, took her time, and saved the best for last. She could have made the run with all the high notes but she did not and she made the song her own. After hearing the song again and again on YouTube, I realized that she really sang the song beautifully. It was very classy. I think Ramiele is a much, much more better singer than Jasmine Trias. It is a welcome relief that a Filipina is singing a song and not "belting" out a song and she's doing it on American Idol. 

Good job for a Filipina living outside the country.

42. David Archuleta

I think I already saw and heard the new American Idol. I half-agree with what the AI producers said that that this batch (Season 7) is the best batch yet. That is because the Top 12 guys are really, really good singers. Unfortunately I can't say the same thing for the Top 12 Girls. The only one that got my attention is the Fil-Am girl, Ramiele Malubay. Not because she is half-Filipino (I explained this above).

Back to the guys, the Top 10 Guys left are all great singers. One, and that is Jason Yeager, got the judges rap only because of poor song choice. I think this is what happened last week, this week, and probably the weeks to come. I must say, however, that the other nineteen contestants left will be having a hard time because of a 16-year-old very good-looking boy by the name of David Archuleta.

On the first week of AI, David sang a song (the title was "Shop Around") that I didn't knew and boy did he impressed me. My mom was impressed. Of course she is, she belongs to the female population. The whole female population, or at least those who watch AI, young or old, loves David Archuleta. But me being impressed and actually applauding the performance of a 16-year-old cute boy? I won't be impressed not unless the performer is really, really good. Right after his first performance in AI, I knew this boy is going somewhere.

Now comes the second week. David sang a John Lennon song that is very simple with simple melody and simple lyrics, yet so hard so sing. That is because the song is one of the most beautiful song ever written and as judge Simon Cowell always points out to some contestants, if a contestant sings a popular song that is very attached to the singer, the contestants gets to be compared with the original singer. And the comparison would, of course, not be to the favor of the contestant. Now I get to hear a 16-year-old (I just have to point it out time and again) singing "Imagine" by John Lennon? I knew it would be a disaster. It would suck. The kid can't sing it and pull it off.

Guess what? "It worked." said Simon Cowell. "It was brilliant." said judge Randy Jackson. But the comment that that matters most was the one coming from judge Paula Abdul. She said that "It was the moving performance I heard in the show!" I agree with what all the judges say especially the last statement from Paula Abdul. Correct me dear readers but I saw a standing ovation from the crowd and I think it was the first time I saw a standing ovation from the AI audience. Simon ended his comment by saying that David is the one to beat.

Sorry Ramiele but even if you are a kababayan and a really good singer, I think America already found the new American Idol and he's a 16-year-old cute boy.

A Test Of Honesty?

If you have been reading my blog lately, you would notice that two of my latest blog entry speaks about the human quality of communicating and acting truthfully related to truth as a value. That's Wikipedia's definition of honesty for you. Two people I really don't have a personal connection to gave me a lesson or two about honesty which is of course Jun Lozada and a service crew in Chowking by the name of Lester. I didn't know I was going to be tested by God about the same value. Being honest. I know deep inside me and my friends know that I am an honest person. But this time, I am having second thoughts about that statement.

Last week, Friday morning to be exact, I went to the ATM to withdraw my salary for the past 10 days and saw the available balance in my ATM: twenty-five thousand pesos! Yes, you read it right. 25,000 pesos. I may be working in a call center and very well paid but I would never get a salary of 25,000 pesos for ten days even if I worked 14 days straight without any rest days. You might be asking, "what happened?"

Our company's bank (I will be not be mentioning the specifics for obvious reason) changed our old ATM's for new ones for standardization. After we received our new ATM's, we were advised to wait for 24 hours for activation. When payday came which was Friday, I heard that some of my colleagues had more than their expected salary. Fifty-thousand, thirty-thousand, twenty-thousand plus. The numbers were too unreal. Some, or most of my colleagues to be exact, withdrew the extra cash. They bought stuff and spent the money as if they won the lotto. Some of my colleagues, however, didn't get their expected salary. It was short of their expected salary which was the other side of the coin.

When it was my time to withdraw, I didn't expect that I would get more of my expected salary. To my surprise (actually delight is the more appropriate word), the available balance is 25,000 pesos. The moment I saw the amount there was no hesitation on my part that I would only get the exact pay that I got. So I withdraw the exact amount. Not the exact amount actually because I left the ATM with 15,100 as my available balance. I left 100 pesos for myself. There you go, you know how much I got and how much I get paid (it includes a lot of overtime by the way). Since this blog is about honesty, I decided to be honest about the circumstances surrounding this event and this blog will be my accountability partner (you would know why later). My plan was to wait for the word from the bank on Monday on what happened and see what would happen next.

The next day, my colleagues told me that everything is okay. Which means the balance they see on their ATM is stating the right pay amount they got. They again withdrew the amount which is their right pay. This is where I felt envious of them. They were buying stuff (cellphones), ordering pizza and spending the exceeded amount they got like there's no tomorrow. That was the time I decided to go back to the ATM to withdrew the one hundred peso that I left in my ATM. I was excited to withdraw not the 100 pesos that I left but with the excess that I would be getting.

True enough, the available balance registered 10,100 which is the right pay I would be receiving. I withdrew the whole amount.

I still have the excess 10,000 pesos with me and I still haven't touched it. I planned to buy a cell phone for my mom and a capital for her Autoload Max business but I decided not to. My mom is also pestering me to let her borrow some of it and she would just pay it later if the bank will say so. I didn't give in. I knew the money was not for me and I didn't work for it. It was really hard for me to do that with all the debts that we are in and the financial problems that we have right now.

But I am no saint. I wanted the money. All the time I was asking a lot of people like my friends and my mom for advise and almost all of them were saying the same thing. It is the bank's fault. If it shows that amount is in your ATM, it is yours and you can withdraw it. It's like this scenario: If you walk out of a bank and the bank teller gave you a change then you suddenly found out that it was short, you can't go to the bank teller to say "Your change was short" and expect to give the exact change because there is a sign on the bank teller's post that says "Count your change before leaving."

That is also my position.

The last advise that I had and I think is the most reasonable one came from my best friend. The bank can go after the money but they can't force us to give back the money. It would be upon your conscience to return it.

As of today, while I am writing this blog, there is still no word from the bank when I checked my email. The reason why I am blogging about this is because I want to be accountable for what I will be doing with the excess 10,000 pesos I have with me. Whatever I will do, I will post it here and I will be responsible and accountable to myself and to God whatever I will do with the money.

How about you? What would you do?

And The Oscar Goes To...

This is the second time in my blog that I used the title "And The Oscar Goes To" but this is really the only way to start a blog about the Academy Awards. I won't go into details about what happened and who won in this 80th edition of the highly-respected awards body and one of the highest-rating TV show in the US. However, I would just like to mention that I liked Jon Stewart's hosting this time. I am not really into Jon Stewart's brand of humor but he had me laughing several times. I also enjoyed watching the 80th Academy Awards as always.

40. The Oscars Awards

As any of my friends know, when I was young (up until now of course) there are two M's that really moves me like no other - movies and music. Since this is about the Oscar, let's concentrate with movies first.

By act of fate, my first "real" job is working in a video recording company called Magnavision. There I was able to watch countless great movies which I wasn't able to see since I wasn't born yet, I didn't have money, or I just didn't know that a such a great movie existed. These are the movies that won "Best Picture" in the Academy Awards. A few of them are "Kramer vs. Kramer", "The Deer Hunter", "The Godfather" series (although only Godfather 1 and 2 won Best Picture), and for the new ones "A Beautiful Mind", "American Beauty", "Shakespeare In Love", and a whole lot more. I will be listing down some of the great movies I enjoyed in the future to be included in my 2008 list.

In the meantime, the 40th in my 2008 list is, of course, the Academy Awards because of, among other things, the Oscar showed me that the movies above existed. I have come to know and watched these movies because the Academy chose them as the best in the year they were released. Indeed they were.   

"Love Struck" Writing Contest Winners

No, I didn't win the contest. The competition was stiff and there were a lot of good entries. At first, I thought and I felt my chances of winning was good. But as the entries increased and read some good stories, I felt my chances dipping. I wasn't able to read all of the entries because it was being blocked at work (oops!). Most of the winners (except one) I just read today before writing this entry.

This blog is to show you the winners so that you can enjoy some great literary blog masterpieces. So here are the winners and of course they are included in my 2008 "hit list."

But wait, before you read the winner's blog entries, you might as well read mine first. It's not a masterpiece but it came from my heart.

Love Story: http://yllor.blogs.friendster.com/my_blog/2007/07/love_story.html

The Winners:

34. Mnel- First Kiss: http://docmnel.com/ladolcevita/blog/?p=1

35. Lady Cess- The Promise of a Fairy Godmother: http://one-twentyone.com/2008/02/23/the-promise-of-a-fairy-godmother/

36. KingDaddyRich- Siya: http://kingdaddyrich.blogdrive.com/archive/82.html

The Runners-up:

37. Kongkong - The End of Friendship: http://scroochchronicles.blogspot.com/2008/02/0319the-end-of-friendship.html

38. Fitz- A Valentine’s Date to Remember: http://readytoberich.blogspot.com/2008/02/valentimes-valentines-romantic-date-up.html

Note: This was the only entry that I was able to read before Noemi Dado announced the winners. I predicted that this would be in the Top 3. Well, it did not. But it was on the Top 3 runners-up and still a winner in it's own right.

39. Mr. Z- Strange Times My Dear: http://www.whileyouweresleeping.org/7/strange-times-my-dear.htm

If you want to read all the entries, here is the link to Noemi Dado's website: http://aboutmyrecovery.com/2008/02/24/two-year-blog-anniversary-lovestruck-winners/

Enjoy reading! =)

Jun Lozada

33. Rodolfo Noel "Jun" Lozada Jr.

As a follow-up to Lester's honesty, I am adding another person to my list of 2008 reasons to be happy and thankful that I am living in this life time and that is none other than the courageous Jun Lozada.

I have already posted a blog about his testimony but I noticed that I didn't include him in my 2008 list so here he is.

I was watching Lozada testify at the Senate and tears flowed in my eyes (I have been crying too many times lately like Jun Lozada) after he was grilled and forced to confirm that his friend, former NEDA Director General Romulo Neri, said that the President, Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, is "evil."

Lozada initially didn't want to answer the question not because he was afraid to tell the truth but because of his friendship with Neri. He didn't want to implicate Neri. But the senators wanted to know and after taking a break, Lozada finally said yes and continued to talk about "the meeting that never took place" together with Senators Ping Lacson and Jamby Madrigal.

Lozada went on and said the the context of the meeting was how his friend Neri presented to them how and why corruption exists in Philippine government. I wouldn't go with the specifics but as a summary it said that the government is in connivance with the military and the oligarchs. It also said that the only reason why the economy is afloat is because of the dollar remittances of the Filipino OFW's. The presentation also said that the middle class families don't want to meddle and would just go abroad to work but in the process leave a broken family. That's the summary and I agree with it although not 100 percent. But that's another story.

What I like about and the reason that Lozada is in my list is because of, time and again, is his honesty. A lot of people has been attacking him left and right, the government, the press, the private sector but they can't bring him down because of one thing-he tells and is telling the TRUTH. The Lozada detractors can throw everything to Lozada, including the kitchen sink, but they can't pull him down. I have always believed that you can't put a good man down. Much more an honest one.

I am again raising my hats off this time to Rodolfo Noel "Jun" Lozada Jr.

You are an inspiration.

Lester

32. Lester

Since the headlines in newspapers todays is focusing on one important thing in life that we all want to be but still having a hard time to do it, which is being honest, I am sharing you a story about it.

Yesterday on our BP4 Get-Together in Star City, my friend Melissa and I arrived in Star City in time at 2:00 pm and we're the first to arrive and it looked like we will wait for another thirty minutes to an hour before our other BP4 friends would arrive. We decided to eat first in Chowking to kill time and eat since I was also a bit hungry already.

After we ordered, we waited inside the restaurant for our food to be served and the rest of our BP4 friends. After about 5 minutes, which is quite fast (you would know that if you eat in Chowking a lot), a cheerful looking guy came with Melissa's order and Melissa joked that she liked her order number (I don't know what it's called), which is 143, this guy smiled and jokingly served Melissa's order with a smile and said "143 for this, 143 for that..." until he has said and gave all of Melissa's order and said "Is there anything else?" Melissa instantly liked her and said "Ikaw talaga Lester" upon seeing his ID and Lester said "Ay!" and hid his ID in jest. When he turned to me, he jokingly said to me "Sir, 1 hour pa po yung order nyo," to which I replied "Ok lang yun, kasi malamang 1 hour pa rin kami maghihintay," and we all laughed.

After that their manager gave us a customer service feedback form that the manager asked us to send through text message. Melissa said she would text the name of Lester because she like him but the manager said it's not allowed so we just sent a text message with the highest rating of 7 for the service crews with a comment of "friendly crew."

End of story? Well, not quite. After one hour of waiting, the rest of our BP4 friends finally arrived. We then decided to leave Chowking and wait for the rest of the gang outside.  Thirty minutes more of greeting and picture-taking, I realized that my Spalding eyeglasses was not with me and that I left it on the table in Chowking. Instinctively, I went back to Chowking to see if it's still there on the table we ate. It was not. I then asked the manager if someone was able to see my red Spalding sunglasses and I knew it already but I was still surprised when the manager called Lester. Lester was already eating, not in uniform, and just finished his shift. With a smile in his face, he said, "Yes, sir...nakita ko nga eh at sabi ko parang kila Sir to ah," remembering me and adding "original pa naman." (I don't buy imitation anymore...ehem! haha!). He gave my sunglasses back to me and I profusely thanked him and said that I really appreciate it. The appreciation was from the bottom of my heart. I tried to call back the Chowking number that we texted to commend Lester but it was just ringing.

I know you think that it was just a simple sunglasses that Lester returned to me and that it's just a little thing. But the Bible says, "Whoever can be trusted with very little can also be trusted with much, and whoever is dishonest with very little will also be dishonest with much."

We need more Lesters here in our country.

My hats off to you, Lester.

Jun Lozada's Testimony

The next day after writing a blog about courage, I found one person that exemplifies how one becomes courageous and it's in the person of ZTE-NBN star witness Rodolfo Noel "Jun" Lozada Jr. 

I wasn't watching about it last week because I thought it would just be the same old thing-a little expose here and there, nothing concrete, and a lot of thruths being suppressed for the sake of of each other's interest. I was wrong. My mom, who has been watching it religiously, said that Jun Lozada was intelligent and very honest because he was quick to point out if the senators said something wrong about his testimony.

Since it was my rest day, I decided to watch the hearing yesterday and I was glued to the TV set. My mom was right, Jun was and is really honest-and very, very scared. My heart goes out to him and I can really feel the pain and ordeal that he had to undergo in the "abduction" and with the grilling of the senators (the administration senators, at least).

Conrado de Quiros, in his column in PDI yesterday, wrote that courage is not the absence of fear. It is the presence of fear, often a most crippling one, but a fear that is overcome by a heroic act of will, or by the recognition that one has no choice but to do what is right. And that is what Jun Lozada has done.

That is also what we all need to do when situation calls for it.

Hillsong

31. Hillsong

If you have been reading my blog lately, you would know that I am now attending the weekly prayer gathering of the Light of Jesus in Valle Verde Club in Pasig called "The Feast."

In "The Feast" I have re-discovered Christian music that I forgot for a while. One of these is the music of a great Christian group in Australia called Hillsong. It was about a decade ago when I first heard a song called "So Close (I Believe)" in a Born-Again church I used to semi-attend and the song's lyrics captured me and I really felt that "God is with me, holding me, in His Hands, I belong and would never let me go."

It was the start and few more songs came that touched my heart like no other songs did. "The Heart of Worship", "Lord, I Offer My Life", and "Majesty (Here I Am)." 

Today I am again re-discovering their music and I am currently listening to one of their new songs called "This Is How We Overcome."

I know this is one part of the start of my journey of re-discovering God and never letting go. By reading my blog, I am inviting you to read on and enjoy this journey with me.

After re-discovering Hillsong, I remember a Philippine Idol forumer's signature saying "Music for God is the greatest music there is."

I can only say "Amen."

About Courage

30.) 2 Timothy 1:7

Are you a coward? Well, I am. Or I used to be one. Yes, you read it right, I "used" to be one. In my old post http://yllor.blogs.friendster.com/my_blog/2008/01/praise_and_wors.html, I wrote that "I am shouting to all people who are reading this, if not the world, that I am no longer a coward. I would prove that and would write proof about it in my next blog entries."

I still don't have "solid" proof but I can assure you and myself that I have done things that I wouldn't be able to do before because of cowardice. However, they are just little things that really have no big significance yet to write in this blog. What made me turned my back to cowardice is a simple reminder from God that I knew all along but really didn't practice. I'll be writing it here in this blog so that you can be inspired and be courageous in life and turn your back to cowardice. What is it?

Its' simple. It's a verse in the Bible and it says:

"for God gave us a spirit not of fear but  of power and love and self-control."

Be courageous at all times.

Love Struck Writing Contest

I joined a blog-writing contest in Mrs. Noemi Dado's blog (http://aboutmyrecovery.com/2008/01/26/love-struck-writing-contest/) However, my entry is a blog I wrote last year and Noemi wanted to have it updated to the current date (for me to be able to join) which I don't want because it would lose the significance of the date and it was one of those "spur-of-the-moment" writing. Although I did update my blog to "customize" with the subject of her contest, the date when I wrote the blog is retained.

Noemi said I just need to write a new entry that says I wrote a "Love Struck" entry then link to the old entry. So I am writing this entry and giving the link of my entry below. I just don't know if I got her instructions correctly. Haha...

If you happen to be reading this blog and you have your own "love struck" story, I gave the link above and you know what to do. She has some cool prizes in store.

So here's the link to my entry - http://yllor.blogs.friendster.com/my_blog/2007/07/love_story.html

The Youth

No, this is not about the old rock band that popularized the song about the ghoulish gay (I just coined that term...haha!) This is about two young girls I read about in Philippine Daily Inquirer that I think would define the youth today.

28. Carla Gisela Ysabel Concepcion

This 21-year-old senior at the University of the Philippines in Diliman, Quezon City, won first prize of this year's BPI-DOST Science Awards over six other finalists. Why did she win? She found a unique and inexpensive way to track the movement of cancer cells in the human body. I won't explain the details about it because you might get lost along the way but I know this is a great discovery. I know something about medicine and stuff. I took up a 6-month caregiver course about a few years ago but unfortunately I wasn't able to apply the things I learned. I can tell that I learned a lot in those 6 months. Wait, I'm going away from the subject. To make it simple researchers have learned a great deal in recent years about how cancer cells develop and what causes them to grow out of control, little is known about metastasis, or the dispersal of late-stage cancer cells to previously unaffected parts of the body. And this is what Carla Gisela Ysabel Concepcion discovered with the help of classmates and research associates Mana Xyza Oro and Kristina delos Reyes. Why is it important? Metastasis is the cause of 90 percent of deaths from cancer.

29. Ladylove Torsiende

My favorite newspaper, Philippine Daily Inquirer, put up a contest of sort wherein readers are asked to write a certain wish and they would grant the wish depending on the wish and the circumstances of the wish and the wisher. It's like "Wish Ko Lang" but not quite. One young girl wished to meet a man that she admires so much. However she didn't want to meet Piolo Pascual, John Llloyd Cruz, or Richard Gutierrez. She wanted to meet-hold your breath-81-year-old business tycoon John L. Gokongwei.

The young lady's name is Ladylove Torsiende. Why did Ladylove wanted to meet John Gokongwei? She idolized him. Gokongwei's journey from humble beginnings in Cebu province to the top echelon of Philippine business has become her source of inspiration. Ladylove thought that Gokongwei came from a rich family but after reading a story in Sunday Inquirer Magazine, she learned that Gokongwei's is also one of the famous rags-to-riches story. And she wanted to be like him.

Ladylove Torsiende is a bright girl from Cotobato City who was forced to drop out of high school because of her family's financial difficulties. But despite the financial difficulties, she was determined to continue her schooling and she was able to finally get back to last year after three years and was able to enroll for a six-month computer vocational course at the Notre Dame University and is set to take the Department of Education's high school equivalency test this month.

Ladylove also dreams big like her idol. She wants to study in Ateneo de Manila University's John Gokongwei School of Management. When Gokongwei told Ladylove, "Ateneo is a tough school to get in..." Ladylove simply replied, "I dream big." This definitely had Gokongwei impressed that he promised to pay for Ladylove's tuition in Ateneo should she pass the entrance exam.

I hope the two girls above would inspire other youths of today just like they inspired me tonight to write about them in this blog.