MikeLigalig.com

My hometown...

hahaha small world jud, Ate Anel! Kummusta naman si Tito Felipe? I havent seen him in the longest time; not since my Lola Nating passed away in 1998.

No problem guys. Im actually making more as we speak. But wont be ready anytime soon

I salute Mr. Mike Ligalig!!

Salamat kaayo, brod Mike, sa tanan gi buhat nimo para namo.

hahaha humut jud baby pa man hahahaha

aguyyyyyyyyy...now im hungry. LOL

My favorite right now.

 MANILA, Philippines - The package from Hong Kong looked innocent enough, marked "personal clothing." But when customs officials opened it, they were stunned to see about 300 live scorpions and spiders.

The scorpions and spiders â€" which included tarantulas â€" were packed in nets, bottles and transparent plastic boxes, concealed under clothes, newspapers reported Wednesday.

"The scorpions almost bit the examiner," Nelson Ebio, a port collector at the Central Mail Exchange Center, told the Philippine Daily Inquirer. It was the first time the post office had encountered such poisonous mail, he said.

The Philippine Star daily quoted Ebio as saying the package arrived from Hong Kong on Monday, but it was not clear who sent it or why, though some speculated they could have been intended for a collector of the creatures.

The spiders and scorpions were later handed over to the parks and wildlife office.

Steven Toledo, head of the office's rescue center, said the spiders and scorpions will be "taken care of" and possibly used in exhibitions. He said some of them were still juveniles.

 YANGON (AFP) - Myanmar's military regime kept up the pressure on its people Wednesday after last week's bloody crackdown on protesters as the European Union agreed in principle to punish the junta with sanctions.

Troops who last week killed at least 13 and arrested over 1,000 people to suppress the largest pro-democracy protests in nearly 20 years have continued overnight arrests and mounted patrols to strike terror into the population.

"You must stay inside. Don't come out," soldiers said through blaring loudspeakers as they drove around Myanmar's biggest city Yangon. "We have photographs of the people we're looking for. We will arrest them."

In one pre-dawn raid, the regime detained a local UN staff member, her husband and two relatives, said UN resident coordinator Charles Petrie.

Last week's bloody crackdown -- details and images of which have trickled out on web postings and video clips despite a media clampdown -- has drawn international outrage, and governments have started to take action.

The European Union has agreed in principle to toughen sanctions against the regime in Myanmar, the EU's Portuguese presidency said.

The EU already has broad sanctions in place on Myanmar's leadership but has since been preparing new measures while stressing the importance of pressure on neighbouring countries and in particular China and India.

Japan also said it was considering cutting aid to Myanmar following the shooting dead of its video journalist Kenji Nagai.

UN envoy Ibrahim Gambari was Wednesday readying a report on his talks with Myanmar's ruling generals and democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi this week, amid global concern over the violent crackdown on anti-government protests.

Local and UN officials say that at least 1,000 disrobed monks and activists are being held inside a windowless warehouse at a Yangon campus, and there are unconfirmed reports about more mass arrests.

Many residents have said monks who used to live in neighbourhood monasteries were missing -- possibly injured, arrested or forced back to their villages.

"People feel angry, although they know they cannot fight against the military," one 45-year-old man said. "But they want the monks to come back."

In Yangon, troops have reduced their presence on the streets but soldiers with sniffer dogs patrolled bus stops and markets.

Military trucks were still parked near Yangon landmarks which were flashpoints in the demonstrations, including the city hall and Sule Pagoda which is near the spot where a Japanese journalist was killed.

As security forces in Myanmar's main city Yangon maintained a tight grip, UN special envoy Gambari was in Singapore, from where he was to fly back to New York to brief UN chief Ban Ki-moon, probably on Thursday, and the UN Security Council.

"I have to brief the secretary general of the United Nations who sent me and also the Security Council. Before that I can't say much," Gambari told reporters as he left his hotel late Wednesday, after refusing comment all day.

Over four days, Gambari criss-crossed Myanmar for talks with junta leaders in their remote capital Naypyidaw and, on two separate occasions, with Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi, who is detained at her Yangon home.

But a former mediator who helped broker landmark contacts between the junta and the opposition warned the crisis was far from over and that the generals had shown no sign they are ready to compromise.

Leon de Riedmatten, who served as an informal mediator for the United Nations, said he hoped something positive would come from Gambari's visit but warned that "we must also be very realistic about the situation."

Myanmar's generals have "never negotiated anything, they always impose their position and their will, and I do not believe that has changed today," he said.

In a sign that at least some officers had qualms about firing on their own people, one mid-ranking soldier has fled to neighbouring Thailand in the first known defection since the crackdown.

"As a Buddhist myself, when I heard that monks had been shot dead on the streets and that other people had been shot dead, I felt very upset," he said in a video interview, a copy of which was made available to AFP.

"As a Buddhist, I did not want to see such killing," said the man, who asked not to be identified.

The protests first erupted in mid-August after a massive hike in the price of fuel, but escalated two weeks ago when the revered monks emerged to lead the movement, drawing up to 100,000 people onto the streets.

 SEOUL, South Korea - South Korea expressed satisfaction Wednesday after the first summit talks with North Korean leader Kim Jong Il in seven years, while Pyongyang committed at separate nuclear negotiations to disable its main reactor by the end of the year.

In an agreement between the U.S. and regional powers at China-hosted arms talks, the North also said it would also give a "complete and correct declaration" of all its nuclear programs by Dec. 31, Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Wu Dawei said in Beijing.

The move would be the biggest step North Korea has taken to scale back its nuclear ambitions after decades seeking to develop the world's deadliest weapons.

Previously, the North had only frozen its arms programs under a 1994 deal with the U.S. But it quickly restarted production of weapons-grade plutonium at its main nuclear complex after the beginning of the latest atomic standoff in 2002, leading to its first-ever test nuclear explosion in October 2006.

Pyongyang shut down its sole operating reactor at Yongbyon in July after the U.S. reversed its hard-line policy against the regime, the first tangible progress from years of talks that also include China, Japan, Russia and South Korea.

Earlier Wednesday at the summit between leaders of the North and South, South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun said he was "satisfied with the outcome of the talks," his spokesman Cheon Ho-seon told the reporters in comments relayed from Pyongyang.

The sides were to draft an agreement by Thursday morning, Cheon said.

Roh "raised almost all agenda items that we have brought" and added there had been progress in every area they wanted to discuss â€" including establishing peace on the Korean peninsula, economic cooperation, reconciliation and cooperation, the spokesman said, according to pool reports.

There were no details on what the agreement would include. South Korean officials had repeatedly refused before heading to Pyongyang to give any specifics of what they sought at the meeting beyond vague talk about bolstering "peace and prosperity" on the peninsula.

The comments came after Roh and Kim held nearly four hours of talks Wednesday at the second-ever summit between leaders of the North and South.

Kim proposed at one point to continue the summit for an extra day but later withdrew the offer, saying there had been sufficient discussion between the sides. Roh did not have a chance to respond to the extension proposal, Cheon said, but had earlier indicated it would be difficult.

"As we had enough dialogue, we don't need to extend" the summit, Kim said, according to South Korean pool reports. The leaders shook hands at the end of their meetings, both appearing cheerful in video relayed from Pyongyang.

Roh said he had sought common ground with Kim at the talks.

"We didn't reach consensus on everything. There were parts on which our perceptions coincided, and there were other parts" on which the perceptions didn't coincide, Roh said at a luncheon with the South Korean delegation during a pause in the summit.

"However, what I clearly confirmed is that (Kim) has a firm will about peace and there was consensus that there should be an agreement this time that presents a future direction about peace," Roh said.

Roh acknowledged that the North, one of the world's most isolated nations, was taking a cautious approach in opening up to its capitalist neighbor.

"North Korea still has some skepticism about the South, and doesn't trust it enough," Roh told the luncheon. "We have to make more efforts to further tear down this wall of distrust."

He also said the North expressed regret that the international standoff over its nuclear weapons programs had prevented greater economic cooperation with the South.

As the summit started Wednesday, Roh and Kim briefly mentioned recent floods in the North that left about 600 people dead or missing and tens of thousands homeless and prompted North Korea to delay the summit from its original August date.

Before the talks at a state guesthouse in Pyongyang, Roh presented the North Korean leader with gifts including a bookcase full of South Korean DVDs, featuring popular soap operas and productions starring Lee Young-ae, believed to be Kim's favorite starlet.

Kim appeared animated and smiled repeatedly Wednesday as he greeted Roh â€" a contrast from his dour demeanor Tuesday, when the two first met briefly at an outdoor welcoming ceremony after the South Korean president arrived by road in Pyongyang.

Roh later watched a Wednesday evening performance of the North Korean propaganda spectacle known as the "mass games." Such shows feature thousands of synchronized gymnasts, and a giant mural formed by children turning colored pages of books.

Conservatives have criticized Roh for going to the show, which extols the purported virtues of the North's Communist regime.

___

 BAGHDAD - The Polish ambassador to Iraq was slightly wounded and two civilians, including a bodyguard, were killed in a roadside bomb attack Wednesday in downtown Baghdad, according to Polish government officials.

Gen. Edward Pietrzyk was being treated for minor burns covering 20 percent of his body and "is going to be fine," said Deputy Ambassador Waldemar Figaj, who spoke to The Associated Press from a hospital in Baghdad's Green Zone. Pietrzyk was to be flown home to Poland by way of German later in the day.

A civilian passer-by died after at least two roadside bombs were detonated around 10 a.m., an Iraqi police official said on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to release the information. A Polish security guard, Bartosz Orzechowski, 29, died at the hospital a short time later, Poland's Interior Minister Wladyslaw Stasiak said during a news conference.

At least 11 people, including three security guards with the convoy, were also wounded in the attack in the Karradah neighborhood, police said. The guards worked for Poland's Government Protection Office, which is responsible for the security of Polish officials in Iraq, said Dariusz Aleksandrowicz, the agency's spokesman.

The attack, which took place a few hundred yards from the Polish Embassy, seemed to target the ambassador. said Robert Szaniawski, a spokesman for the Polish Foreign Ministry.

"We still don't have the reasons for the attack," he said, adding that the embassy is not in the heavily fortified Green Zone.

Polish Prime Minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski said the attack would not weaken his countrymen's resolve to fight terrorism in Iraq.

"Backing out before terrorists is the worst possible solution and I trust that the Poles, who are a brave nation, will not desert the battlefield," he said. "We must fight terrorism and that entails a certain risk."

State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said the United States was shocked by the attack.

"Poland is a good friend and a good ally and we appreciate the fact â€" the Iraqis appreciate the fact â€" that they have such high-level diplomatic representation in Baghdad," McCormack said. "We are going to do what we can to help out."

Poland contributed combat troops to the 2003 U.S.-led invasion, and has since led a multinational division south of Baghdad. About 900 Polish troops are stationed there training Iraqi personnel; 21 have died in the war.

Last year, the Polish government extended its mission in Iraq until the end of 2007, leaving a decision on further extensions for later this year.

"Poland has been a strong and steadfast ally here and around the world, and we commend its commitment to a stable and secure Iraq," said a brief statement issued by U.S. Ambassador Ryan Crocker and the U.S. commander, Gen. David Petraeus, condemning the attack. "We stand ready to provide any additional assistance we can."

U.S. officials said Blackwater USA, a Moyock, N.C.-based security firm, flew the ambassador to the Green Zone for treatment.

The company is under investigation for the role its personnel played in a Sept. 16 shootout that left 11 Iraqis dead in Baghdad. The incident prompted the Iraqi Interior Ministry to order the company out of the country, but Blackwater guards were back on duty less than a week later.

Blackwater has an estimated 1,000 employees in Iraq, and at least $800 million in government contracts.

U.S. authorities confiscated an AP Television News videotape that contained scenes of the wounded being evacuated. U.S. military spokesman Lt. Col. Scott Bleichwehl told AP the government of Iraq had made it illegal to photograph or videotape the aftermath of bombings or other attacks.

Pietrzyk, 57, who was formerly commander of land forces in Poland, was appointed ambassador to Iraq in April, Szaniawski said. He studied in the Soviet Union in the late 1980s, and spent two years at the National Defense University in Washington. He then served as commander of Polish land forces from 2000 until 2006.

 WASHINGTON - President Bush, in a sharp confrontation with Congress, on Wednesday vetoed a bipartisan bill that would have dramatically expanded children's health insurance.

It was only the fourth veto of Bush's presidency, and one that some Republicans feared could carry steep risks for their party in next year's elections. The Senate approved the bill with enough votes to override the veto, but the margin in the House fell short of the required number.

Democrats unleashed a stream of harsh rhetoric, as they geared up for a battle to both improve their chances of winning a veto override and score political points against Republicans who oppose the expansion.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., decried Bush's action as a "heartless veto."

"Never has it been clearer how detached President Bush is from the priorities of the American people," Reid said in a statement. "By vetoing a bipartisan bill to renew the successful Children's Health Insurance Program, President Bush is denying health care to millions of low-income kids in America."

Democratic congressional leaders said they may put off the override attempt for as long as two weeks to maximize pressure on Republican House members whose votes will be critical.

"We remain committed to making SCHIP into law â€" with or without the president's support," said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., referring to the full name of the State Children's Health Insurance Program.

The White House sought little attention for Bush's action, with the president casting his veto behind closed doors without any fanfare or news coverage. He defended it later Wednesday during a budget speech in Lancaster, Pa., addressing a welcoming audience organized by the Lancaster Chamber of Commerce and Industry in GOP-friendly Pennsylvania Dutch country.

"Poor kids first," Bush said. "Secondly, I believe in private medicine, not the federal government running the health care system."

But he seemed eager to avert a full-scale showdown over the difficult issue, offering that he is "more than willing" to negotiate with lawmakers "if they need a little more money in the bill to help us meet the objective of getting help for poor children."

The program is a joint state-federal effort that subsidizes health coverage for 6.6 million people, mostly children, from families that earn too much to qualify for Medicaid but not enough to afford their own private coverage.

The Democrats who control Congress, with significant support from Republicans, passed the legislation to add $35 billion over five years to allow an additional 4 million children into the program. It would be funded by raising the federal cigarette tax by 61 cents to $1 per pack.

The president argued that the Democratic bill was too costly, took the program too far beyond its original intent of helping the poor, and would entice people now covered in the private sector to switch to government coverage. He has proposed only a $5 billion increase in funding. After Bush's speech, White House counselor Ed Gillespie said the president's offer of more money meant more than the $5 billion extra, but he wasn't specific about how much more.

Democrats deny Bush's charge that their plan is a move toward socialized medicine that short-changes the poor, saying their goal is to cover more of the millions of uninsured children and noting that the bill provides financial incentives for states to cover their lowest-income children first. Of the over 43 million people nationwide who lack health insurance, over 6 million are under 18 years old. That's over 9 percent of all children.

Eighteen Republicans joined Democrats in the Senate, enough to override Bush's veto. But in the House, supporters of the bill are about two dozen votes short of a successful override, despite sizable Republican support. A two-thirds majority in both chambers is needed.

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., said Democrats were imploring 15 House Republicans to switch positions but had received no agreements so far.

House Minority Whip Roy Blunt, R-Mo., said he was "absolutely confident" that the House would be able to sustain Bush's expected veto.

Senate Minority Whip Trent Lott, R-Miss., said Congress should be able to reach a compromise with Bush once he vetoes the bill. "We should not allow it to be expanded to higher and higher income levels, and to adults. This is about poor children," he said. "But we can work it out."

It took Bush six years to veto his first bill, when he blocked expanded federal research using embryonic stem cells last summer. In May, he vetoed a spending bill that would have required troop withdrawals from Iraq. In June, he vetoed another bill to ease restraints on federally funded stem cell research.

In the case of the health insurance program, the veto is a bit of a high-stakes gambit for Bush, pitting him against both the Democrats who have controlled both houses of Congress since January, but also many members of his own party and the public.

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee launched radio ads Monday attacking eight GOP House members who voted against the bill and face potentially tough re-election campaigns next year.

And Gerald McEntee, president of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees union, said a coalition of liberal groups was staging more than 200 events throughout the nation on Thursday to highlight the issue. The group, which includes MoveOn.org, and several unions, also has a goal of more than 1 million contacts to Congress through calls, letters and e-mails demanding that lawmakers override Bush's veto. The coalition is spending $3 million to $5 million on the effort.

Good morning ladies and gents,

Just came back from class a while ago--I'm a bit vexed today. One thing im happy that academics are going as planned, but i was really saddened by news that Mr. Mike Ligalig, our dear administrator, had to skip work for a day to fix the problems in the website earlier. I just want to point out to you guys that though we come here as guests or as members to read news and communicate with friends, we have to owe our great thanks to Mike Ligalig, because seriously he is the backbone of this web forum. The man, my brother, loves us so much that he even took a day off from work, kita ka ana!! Who would do that for just anyone? Only a family member diba? Would any of you skip work---? That in itself tells me--and awakened me to how much we all really do matter in here. We are the Boholano people; abroad and domestic. And we all want to reconnect with our home province, and we should show greater appreciation for that. Please send Mike an email or a personal message jud---everyone---and give him some appreciation, uy.

The man just had his birthday a couple of days ago--and now he does this for us. Ma hilak pood ta writing about this, uy...

++++

And i also want to say that being unable to come to TB was rather unearthing for me yesterday--because even if i dont post or am not feeling to post, i usually read whats going on in bohol or what everyone is up to. A sense of family, so to say. However, when we were separated yesterday---i really felt lonely and a sense of detachment form all of you. And I just wanted my close friends in here to know that. I did really miss you guys. You're like family to me.


Sige,,,,

Bran

Quote from: Bohol on October 03, 2007, 10:41:51 PM
I was absent from work to save our website. Bahala na ug mapotbol sa trabaho.

Sorry lang Mike that you had to do that...that irresponsible, childish individual (who is in his late 60s by the way) has no sense of morality, respect for any of us in here. Who is he to DARE edit posts from our members? He could've deleted his posts, but he should have left everyone else's post alone. He had no right, whatsoever. His desperation and idiocy will be forever remembered in here, and I personally ananthemize him from ever coming here again. He has no respect for Bohol and he clearly has no respect for us for destroying our posts---which was not his intellectual property at all (as if he has any).

Mike, I say this again bro, I am very sorry. I get really angry just thinking what he was doing---probably laughing and seething as he was deleting things---pathetic old curr.

Quote from: Bohol on October 03, 2007, 09:50:30 PM
Coming back is costly for all of us. More than 1,200 posts had to be deleted, more than 300 of those posts came from the question: "Are All Politicians Prostitutes?"

I had to make a choice: if I reverse the database to an earlier date, we can recover the deleted posts which were replaced with "a period" on the previous date I want to, but topics and posts made from that date onward would be lost.

Too much work to do and the Government of the Republic of the Philippines is not paying me for this effort. I had to manually delete the posts with a period and it was time-consuming, so I decided to delete the account of a member, including the topics and posts made by this member. Comments on those topics made by other TB members were automatically removed too.

Personally, I was deeply hurt because even my own comments were deleted and were replaced with a period. And I felt great sorrow that many beautiful write-ups of our compatriots here were replaced with a period.

In light of this abuse and misuse of our website, and insult to the Boholano people, I have decided to ban all from modifying any posts.

Better to impose this ban today rather than waking up one day and seeing our well-written articles being deleted and replaced with a period.

I still cannot believe that he had the ability to delete and edit the posts in that thread. There was so much debate and so much good points--all jeapordized because of that same individual. Mike, I hope that we all can rise above this incident and build from what we experienced here. If there is anyway we can help you, sir, please let us know.

Sincerely Yours,
Bran

PS. I'm working on those videos for you, sir. As I promised.

I just want to say that that individual who was responsible for this destructive action on Tubag Bohol website was desperate, not only in trying to destroy the website, and attacking others. I logged onto the site last night and after i saw what happened--as what Mike told everyone--i knew exactly who it was. His selfish and pre-pubescent act affected the long work of our dedicated Admin, Mike. I really am sorry Mike that you had to deal with this..and the sacrifice you made to fix what was wronged.

You cant imagine how angry I was after learning of what happened. Beyond words.

Mike, we in TB would like to thank you for what you did to keep this site clean. We really appreciate it man, and sincerely do hope you feel better.

Always,
the TB family

good evening guys!!!

im about to leave for my presentation in 30 minutes. But good night mi amigos!

I am a natural born Philippine citizen. Born in the province of Cebu of the Republic of the Philippines. Naturalized as an American citizen, yet maintain dual citizenship in the Republic of the Philippines and the United States of America.

Signed.

I agree, what they said was totally unfounded and disrespectful.

good night guys.

my bed calls me.

Is the great GEC speaking to me? hahha
Kummusta man ka! hahaha hapit na pood ko mo tug, Sir GEC.
My warm regards, sir GEC.

good night ate!

hahahaha the addicted group...lol

Uy! the great GEC speaks again!

hahaha moa ba, 'te? Naka observe diay lol.

Vacation? Havent had a 'vacation' since senior year of high school. Too many summer internships--which could count as 'vacations'..and one thing i dont like about it is that i have to take orders from grumpy old men.

LOL. I do that all the time with my buds, well we do that to each other. Pero you know macho-macho man na! Dili lang mii mo squeze. Hahahahahhaa

hahahahahha!! wait  wait wait...

are you her 'reliable source' ?? hmmmmmmmmmmmmm

HAHAHAHAHAHA!!! Mo keep jud na siya..she has so many of their free bags pood. Last time i went to their bathroom, i saw all the bags she keeps in the drawers. Ingoon ko niya "mommy uy! unsaa-on man ning tanan bags dinhi? di man ka mo use ana?" ingoon pood na siya with her bogol-bogol-on flare "Collecsssyooon ra man na, honeyy" hahahahaha!

Pero mo hatag man na siya--last time she sent alot of those bags and mascara things in a balikbayan box to some of her relatives.

Perting collection2x jud na si mom. Ma suko na si dad kai...if theres a sale on things..mo adto jud na si mom sa Macys, jcpenny, strawbridges, etc etc. Hahaha. Wa maka stop niya if there are sales.

Yea thats true Mr. Barbaro. But does spanking each other's ass count as being 'gay' as well? hahaha.

hahaha kamo duha uy...you guys are too funny.

Quote from: ms da binsi on October 02, 2007, 12:44:26 PM
I use cologne every after shower...

i had three choices, my favorites:


DKNY be delicious which my banana shared with me

lancome (green) every day if i ran out then i use

La coste for women everyday too...


i use coco chanel's mademoiselle (eu de parfum) when i go to party...

Ate, uyyy you're just like my mom hahaha!

You wear lancome pood? Mommy wears that...she's a big lancome freak haha. Mo adto jud na siya sa mall to buy their facial creams and whenever there are 'special sales' where they give free bags and stuff pood hahaha.

Quote from: EL MUNDO on October 02, 2007, 12:35:26 PM
walay perfumay, natural odor lang hehehe

bitaw, i like d&g and Ck. i have some collectionsa sa CK. kahibaw napud akong mga cousin unsay gift nila para nako.

pero naa koy bench, etc...mao na gamiton pud nako. depende sa perfume/cologne nga nice ang smell..

Leo, you wear D&B? Sexy...

haha not the only thing she was kumut kumuting hahaha (((friends ra mi uy!)))
hahaha kinsay ma jealous?

hahahaha i know..i think its the reason why the chics cant get enough of me haha jp jp


Stop playing with me, Summer...

(i think it was the Armani..hahaha)

My mom is an ICU-RN and my dad is a Civil Engineer by profession in Saudi and in the Phils, pero he took nursing classes here in the 'states. He is now an OR-RN, but works baylor though. Mom is the one that is the big timer hahahaha. It was my mom that encouraged my dad to go for nursing here in the 'states...since there was so low demand for Civil Engineers here.

Quote from: ms da binsi on October 02, 2007, 12:22:20 PM



C2 i hate to take meds baja.. pero akong pasyente akong pugson..

pero naa baja right ang pasyente not to take their meds...

so it's okay ug di ka mo tomar hahhaha

pero ug pasyente tika, tingalon gyud ka naho!!!

Ate Belle, are you the serious type when you're at work? Because I notice that most of my mom's Filipina collegues in the ICU and Trauma/ER are very serious baja. I remember shadowing Dr. Burmingham, a pulmonologist, and he made a wrong prognosis, and the Director of Nurses, who happened to be  Filipina, flipped out on Dr. Burmingham. I was just watching and tried to keep my mouth close tight. Mo bilib jud ko sa Filipina nurses because they recognize a mistake very easily made by doctors and other nurses. You guys are very serious and work related when you have to---and still maintain a straight face after 12-16 hour work shift.

I am in full amazement of the Filipino/Filipina medical professional. I salute all of you.

Quote from: ms da binsi on October 02, 2007, 12:20:07 PM
hhhaaahahha... pero bow gihapon ko sa mga docs Dong...


in other words bow japun ko nimo pohon..

when you finish maybe that would be the time my banana would allow me to work....


ill work w/ u..how's that???

Ate Belle, you can teach me the ins and outs of the hospital. If i get a residency in Michigan area--that would be great. Pero..i really dont want to work close to home. lol. Because ma hadlok pood ta if i end up working with my mom and dad. hahaha, specially my dad

Quote from: ms da binsi on October 02, 2007, 12:16:08 PM


nurses has different views from docs Dong.. we are more of taking care and they are to cure... both doesnt know each field mao nga sigi lalis ang nurse and docs...

Mao jud, 'te. That is what my mom says, "Physicians give orders or oversea the mode of treatment, but it is the registered nurse, physical therpaist, who nurture the patient--assist in the healing process itself."

It is the nurse, in my opinion, who intervenes for the patient and his/her rights. The lives of patients literally hang on the care of the registered nurse, the work horse of the medical profession.

You know more than me, Ate Belle. You're are the Nurse. I agree what she says tho, she has the experience in working in medical environment.

So, yes ma'am!!

I wear different kinds of cologne for different types of occasion. When I go to class, i usually wear Polo Blue or Armani Black to set in the professional feel. And I wear Armani Acqua di Gio aftershave to add. When I go out with my buds--i like wearing musky cologne like Aramis or Tommy Classic. When I go out with the ladies or go to the mall--i like to wear Polo Black---its very classy and subtle at the same time.

But for professional occasions such as medical school interviews or meetings with my professors--i wear Burberry Brit. I love its fragrance...it is very stylish and sleek jud. It cuts through air yet soft enough to tingle the roof of the mouth. Highly recommended, in my opinion.

Quote from: teng on October 02, 2007, 11:56:31 AM
kana ra intawon mga baratohon akoa kay kani laging ordinaryo rata nga mamomoo

Okey ra man pre, kai women find the man's natural scent very attractive. Its medically proven--to induce women in ovulation, hahaha.



Same as how women's pherimones induce men to make advances..

hahaha, good point jud 'te. That is the one of the many reasons why women are 'Angels' jud.
Pero i do try to be intimate with women that i take on dates, and one thing that i notice immediately whenever i take a girl out is that after the 2nd date, i notice that she will twirl her hand in a side-to-side motion, or make slight movements of her fingers--in subtle fashion of course. Is this like a sign or something to hold their hand?
I remember when I was still with my xgf, what she would do was hold my pinky finger with her pinky finger. She thought it was very cute---but i on the other hand was sweating droplets of water whenever we went to the mall or to outing events with friends. I really felt..exposed or naked..when she did that.
I wont deny that i have a very strong Machismo personality---and i get very..unfortable when i have to hold hands or pink-to-pinky holding when theres alot of people. LOL.

I dont mind if we do that in closed doors or when its in private--pero..outside..its a different story.
I dont know, is it that im too conservative? Do you guys feel the same way too? or am i the lone black sheep in this.?

Mr. Ferniz,

I'll extend the news to my family and my Uncle Rey that you will be coming home this summer. Perhaps, sir, I'll have the honor and priviledge of meeting you. You'll probably find me driving and hiking around the interior of Bohol and driving around from town to town with some of my friends. My best buds are coming with me this summer as well---so it will be interesting since it will be their first time out of the US and first time in the Philippines at that. But from the amount of rice and Filipino food they eat---im sure they'll fit right in hahahaha.

Mr. Jun Ayag, you dont mind if I include my friends in the tour do you, sir?

My best friends John and Rudy--i tell you they're really Filipino haha. Both can eat their share of diniguan and pancit, lol

I've come across this recently--and i notice that the ladies love to hold hands whenever they go on dates or on walks. Personally--im not the type to hold hands, its too mushy-mushy for me. hahaha. But ive noticed my friends who bring their gfs along whenever we go out; and i always notice that girls love to make hand movements..hahaha

You guys notice that? So why do girls love to hold hands?

What is your favorite cologne and/or perfume brand?

So tell us, you good looking person you. 

Kummusta Latagaw.

Question..unsay meaning sa 'latagaw'?

hahahaha di ko mo bilib joke ra na! sigor tinuud jud na, 'te?!
Miracle whipe da! kinky ra na kaayo uy! hahahahahah jpjp jp

Sure na sure ka te, joke ra to?

hahaha, your husband must be lucky to have you as his miracle-wife, diba 'te?

Quote from: Bambi on August 23, 2007, 11:19:56 PM
Happy, bisag asa i-pad pad sa hangin o bagyo ba.

My ancestors:

Lolo : Mr. Francisco Dagohoy, Inabanga

Boarding in Mr. Tamblot house, Tagbilaran

Dagohoy? Are you related to the great Dagohoy?

Quote from: Macky Ferniz on October 02, 2007, 01:15:45 AM
She was born with a golden spoon. All her life is spent on facing the camera and living in the lime-light is stressful. These kind of people are living in a world of a fairy tale.

While they mature, they seek for the truth and the real world. That's why you often see celebrities going to exotic places. Like Brad Pit and Angelina going to Thailand and Vietnam adopting kids.

Hence, there's no reason why a celebrity like Paris Hilton and Britney Spears could not come to Bohol someday. It is like a space race kay virgin pa gyud kaayo ang Bohol of Hollywood celebrities.

Thats true Mr. Ferniz, and it doesnt help that Paris' mom was the one that encourages her to party and live it up. The parents also have to take responsibility for the actions of their children. Albeit, Paris' father is rather firm, the mother also needs to chastise her daughter for some of her actions.

But that is the life of the 'rich and famous'---they can afford to do all of those things because money is literally in their blood. I do hope that Paris' intent to go to Africa is legitimate and true.

PIEDMONT, CA â€" Senator Barack Obama is set to break away from the conventional campaign trail and give equal priority to winning the votes of Asian American-Pacific Islander groups, including the Filipino community.

The strategy will build on Obama’s ties to Asian culture, a fact that the prospective presidential candidate has been faulted for not highlighting as much as his having a Caucasian mother.

“Not too many people are aware that Barack had an Indonesian stepfather and has an Indonesian American stepsister living in Hawaii,” said Wilma Chan on Saturday, September 22, during the initial strategizing meeting of Northern California’s Asians for Obama movement held at her residence in this city.

Chan was a three-term member of the California Assembly, representing the 16th district that includes Alameda, Oakland, and Piedmont. She served as majority leaders from 2002-2004, the first woman and first Asian American to hold the position.

The gathering also became the forum for announcing the appointment of Chan as advisory council leader in charge of Obama’s Northern California campaign. Present were members of the various teams working the Bay Area districts, cities and towns, and neighborhoods.

“Barack Obama’s closeness to Asians is rooted in Hawaii where he was born and spent a good 18 years living amid the islands’ cultural and ethnic diversity,” team leader Wayne Nishioka added.

Obama was born to Barack Obama, Sr., a Kenyan immigrant in Indonesia, and Ann Dunham of Wichita, Kansas. His parents met while they were attending the University of Hawaii at Manoa. The couple divorced when he was 2 years old.

Later, his mother married Lolo Soetoro from Indonesia by whom she had a daughter, Maya. The family then moved to Jakarta in 1967, where Obama attended local schools. He later returned to Honolulu to continue his studies until 1979, when he moved to the mainland.

According to Chan, Obama is anchoring his campaign on the need for change.

“I am convinced that change will come from the grassroots â€" the various ethnic groups in the country, including Asian Americans, which form a backbone of California’s social and economic life,” Chan said.

“With that and given the exposure of his cultural diversity, Obama is the most viable candidate,” another Bay Area campaign leader, Michael Lee, pointed out. “His integrity, above all, is unquestionable.”

Chan took the lead in mapping out strategies to promote Obama’s candidacy to Asian Americans in Northern California. First in the list is saturating the communities with multi-lingual information about his roots and ties to Asian culture.

At the same time, the group conceded, there is a need to unite all Asians â€" Chinese, Filipinos, Vietnamese, Koreans, Indians, etc. â€" and get them to identify with key issues that Obama feels very strongly about.

These include his position on immigration and all-out support for family reunification, as well as for transition bi-lingual education.

In addition to producing position papers in various Asian languages, Chan said, more public and press events will be held as the campaign moves on.

On October 2, for instance, mini rallies will be held across Northern California to mark the anniversary of Obama’s declaration of his opposition to the Iraq War. Then on October 20, a National Walk-for-Change Day will be held.

Chan expressed her excitement over the massiveness and purposefulness of the campaign program targeted at the grassroots, specifically Asian Americans.

A political campaign veteran of 20 years, Chan recalled that the last time a similar target-specific program was launched was during the candidacy of the Rev. Jesse Jackson.

While Jackson had a lot of Asians in his team, she said, he did not, however, have the same solid Asian American constituency that Obama has built and counts upon.

NAGA CITY â€" FOR the hordes of devotees and tourists waiting on the concrete banks of Naga River and along Panganiban Bridge, neither the nasty weather nor the three-hour wait was compelling enough to make them leave their spots and go elsewhere comfortable.

They remained rooted on their spot, armed with umbrellas, small snacks and videocameras. Patiently, they waited for the procession known for its color and religious fervor.

Waiting with the spectators were the colorfully garbed voyadores, who spent their idle time chatting with one another on their banca. Others took a dip by the river. Mostly males, the voyadores came from various Bicol municipalities to take part in the Peñafrancia Fiesta in fulfillment of their devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary.

Fireworks erupted after almost three hours, signaling the start of the event. The blasts woke the crowd up, and they broke into applause. Candles lit up, hankies were waved, and shouts of “Viva La Virgen!” reverberated.

The voyadores started rowing the many rowboats, linked by huge ropes, at the end of which was the pagoda, which carried the image of the Nuestra Señora de Peñafrancia or Our Lady of Peñafrancia. “Mother,” or Ina, as the Bicolanos fondly call her.

Those who make the yearly pilgrimage to the Peñafrancia Fiesta (celebrated sometime on the second week of September), the Grand Fluvial Procession is a main event. This water cavalcade sees the Virgin Mary’s icon returned to the Basilica Minore shrine in Bicol, after nine days of masses in the Naga Metropolitan Cathedral. The image is carried by barefooted voyadores across the main thoroughfares of the city from the Basilica Minore to the 400-year old Naga Cathedral in a ceremony known as the Traslacion.

The Penafrancia is a huge tourism pull for Naga, as well as a tradition for Bicolanos to show their undying devotion for the Blessed Virgin. Naga Cathedral parish priest Rev. Msgr. Zosimo Ma. Sañado praised the intense adoration Bicolanos have for the Blessed Virgin. Joe Perez of the Naga City Visitor Center said such devotion was present even during the Japanese occupation of the Philippines.

Though the celebration is in veneration of a holy icon, Sañado pointed out that Bicolanos see how “God is using the image to give divine graces (to the people), like healing, and other miracles.”

“God showers His graces to us via the image, letting people experience divine intervention,” he explained to Philippine News.

The faith has become so strong that, he said, “Wherever there are Bicolanos in the world, there’s a Peñafrancia devotion.” He said he has attended celebrations in Vienna, Austria; Florida and San Francisco. He said fluvial processions were held in Rome over the Tiber River. The Peñafrancia Fiesta website (www.penafrancia.net) also reports of celebrations in non-Catholic countries such as Thailand.

“This is one of the signs of the strengths of our devotion,” Sañado said.

Sañado traced the Penafrancia history to the first parish priest of Naga Cathedral, Fr. Miguel Robles de Covarrubias, who as a sickly seminarian in the University of Santo Tomas was cured by his strong faith in Our Lady of Peñafrancia in Spain.

He vowed to build a church for Her, which originally was to be in Pasig City, but he was called upon by the bishop of Nueva Caceres (Naga City’s name during the Spanish occupation) to serve in Naga Cathedral. During construction, the priest had a statue carved in Her image. It was then that the Ina’s first miracle in Bicol was said to have been witnessed: A dog came back to life after its blood was used to paint the image.

Word of the miraculous image spread throughout Nueva Caceres. Residents requested the bishop to bring the statue to the city so they could visit and pray to her. This led to Ina’s icon being brought to the city via procession, which became the traditional Traslacion. It was agreed then that the image be returned after nine days via boat, the fastest means of transport in those times; this became the Fluvial Procession. Ina’s boat became a pagoda when a rich Chinese merchant offered to build the main boat.

Nearing its 300th anniversary (in 2010), the Peñafrancia Fiesta has also announced preparations for its tri-centennial celebration. Divided into three years, the preparations will have a “revisiting of the history of the devotion (for a) deeper understanding” dedicated from September 2007 to September 2008, the “finding of the significance of the Devotion to Ina in the contemporary life of the devotees” from September 2008 to September 2009, and “looking forward into the future with the intent of sharing the fruits of devotion to the next generations” from September 2009 to September 2010.

The Penafrancia celebration has made way for other activities, not necessarily religious in nature. There is the Civic Parade and the Military Parade, participated in by more than 400 contingents from schools all over Bicolandia. There is also the Miss Bicolandia beauty pageant and the Voyadores Streetdancing Competition. There are concerts and parties galore.

Sañado in fact sees these civic activities as “ways of honoring and praising Ina.”

“If not for the Peñafrancia Fiesta, these schools would not get together,” he said.

In addition, the local church considers the feast as a boon for the local entrepreneurs here. Sidewalks and mall corridors hawk interesting merchandise, from T-shirts to kitchenware.

right jud na si Ate Belle uy. Nurse gud na siya, when the medical professional speaks, she is right.

yes yes ate, that will be one of my to do lists.

Quote from: Bambi on October 02, 2007, 02:35:42 AM
Hi Pare!

How is your young good looking love life? 

Had watched a movie last Sat. evening with Jodie Foster "DAS FREMDE IN DIR"....enjoy ko kaajo lagi and then my husband cook for panihapon, that means- MCDONALDS love koto!

hahaha Pare, sure ba ka good looking ang love life nako? Tambokikoy ra uy! hahaha
Okey ra uy..pero medyo busy karoon kai daghang deadlines for papers and examinations this week. Hapit na man mii Fall Break in 1 week. Happy2x jud ko kai maka balik ko sa balay namo for 5 days. Maka kaun na pood ko Filipino food...lamii ra ba mo luto ahong ginikanan..da! ma tambok na pood ta ani. haha

Ikaw pare? Kummusta man ka dinha sa GermanY? I hope and pray that everything is going well for you in your neck of the woods. Naa bay news and alerts dinha? Speaking of which, i heard naa diay attempted terrorist plot kono sa embasy dinha sa germany? Pero it was evaded, thank God.

Uy..unsa manang movie DAS FREMDE IN DIR? Unsay plot ?

You are welcome, Laguna, mi amiga!!

Thank you for enlightening us with your presence here. Mao jud...guapo jud ang lugar sa bohol kai maka feel at home jud ta. Busy2x ba dinha sa Laguna? Hope to see you more around in TB.

Regards,,,

And now you're a TB resident, Dave. Addiction will take place soon, haha, but you're in good company, sir. Good company.

Hey Ate,

Some pittsburghese terms are "Jeetjet" which is a local phrasing for "did you eat yet?" Another include:

Yinz = You all/ Y'all
Keller = Color
Kaach= couch
dahntahn= downtown
gumban = rubber band
jumbo = baloney
chipped = ham
crick = creek
worsh = wash
pop = soda
sweeper = can be used for vacuum or broom
jnt igl = (say this fast) it refers to "Giant Eagle" a popular local grocery store chain. LOL
sathsid = south side

Here are just examples.LOL!

Kummusta ka kababayan!

Welcome to TB! Looking forward in seeing you around.
Hows Laguna, btw? 

Quote from: David Dennis on October 02, 2007, 08:09:58 AM
I have to figure out when I plan to visit and at that time it will be useful to have a contact or two about rental houses and the like.  I'd like to find something with a great ocean view, Internet access and access to the water, at a reasonable rate. 

I've been in Pittsburgh for two years.  I really hate those Pittsburghese terms since I think of them as a perversion of the type of English I normally like to speak.  But I appreciate the gesture in using them to show you can identify with the area :-).

I'm afraid I have never really felt at home here and so I'm always trying to figure out a cost-effective way to leave without spending the huge sums needed to live in places like South Florida, which climate-wise are far more appealing to me.

If you're ever near the Southern part of the Pittsburgh area, let me know and maybe we can do lunch.

Thanks for writing!

D

Hi buddy,

Hahaha im sorry about the 'pittsburghese', i felt the same way you do when i first came here in Allegheny and met pittsburghers...its wierd because im actually using their terminology in increasing frequency whenever im back home in jersey. And my friends back home get annoyed by that hahaha. So you're in southern pittsburgh area? Do you live close by Monroeville and Shaler area, Cranberry area?
I'd love to do lunch some time--actually ill be down there in a few weeks for some interviews.

Feel free to message me anytime.


PS. You're welcome, my pleasure.

LOL, ate Belle.

Ma kuyawa man jud ko uy..i dont even know who cooper anderson is...
Kinsa mana siya, 'ate?

HAHAHAHA lamii-an diay ka horror movies diay?

Dave,

They're one of God's many miracles

Quote from: ms da binsi on October 02, 2007, 12:53:25 AM
kapanahunan man na nako Dong...


hahhaahha

Now that i think of it, i just watched the video again--and i cant help but getting teary-eyed when i hear that song. Its very emotional--and fits well with the video.

Hahaha, yes i will send it to you, Ate Belle. Okey ra ba to imuhang address?? Do you want to borrow any other movies? Naa ra ba ko movie "American Adobo", "Milan", "Chop Chop Lady" (hadlok nii).

The following is a composition of Aliwan Festivals, Moro Festivals, Cebuano, Boholano, Leyteno, Sulu, Pangasinan festivals throughout the Philippines. The following video exemplifies and illustrates the colorful dances of the Malay people:: That is the Filipino.

Though we may practice a different religion as our brothers and sisters in Malaysia, Indonesia, Southern Thailand, Brunei etc; overall, our cultures are almost similar.

Long Live the Malay-Brotherhood.


ENJOY!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dZ3CYwlL_dw

The song in the video is: by Litsa Gepots "Papopoly", a Greek song.

Quote from: ms da binsi on October 02, 2007, 12:27:51 AM
nindot...


ang music pod ning fit gyud...

is that cranberry nga singers???

Hahaha, yes it is, Ate Belle. I knew you'd know

Quote from: Bohol on October 01, 2007, 10:43:34 PM
Delivered at Ateneo de Manila University
By John Gokongwei, Jr.
Owner, Cebu Pacific and other companies

Good morning.

I am John Gokongwei, Jr. I am not an Atenean but I feel at home with you. Today, at least. Sixty-two years ago, I could not have dreamt of appearing before the Jesuits and their students to tell the story of MY life. I was no more than a student then, at San Carlos University in Cebu, when my father died suddenly. It left me, the eldest, the responsibility of taking care of my mother and five siblings. That was tough for someone who was 13. Creditors had just seized our home and business and I had no experience with earning a living.

But here I am - not all on account of my good looks or charming personality but because I somehow survived. And when I look back, I know now that I did so because I recognized CHANGE when I saw it.

The first change was war. I had turned 15. My mother had already sent my brothers and sister to China where the cost of living was lower. From Cebu, she and I had to make money to send to them.

I turned to peddling. My day began at 5 in the morning. I would load my bicycle with soap, thread, and candles, and then bike to neighboring towns to sell my goods. On market days, I would rent a stall, lay out the goods from the bike, and make about 20 pesos a day, enough for me to survive and to buy even more goods for next time. Those days, you might call my BICYCLE AGE.

After two years of biking and peddling at 17, I entered my BATEL AGE. The batel was a small very utilitarian boat that defied the open sea and would take me farther from Cebu and all the way to Lucena, from where I would take a truck to Manila, with companions twice or thrice my age. The sea trips could take two to three weeks depending on the weather, and the land trips another five to six hours. (I was lighter then, you can imagine.) On the batel, I read books like "Gone with the Wind" under the great blue sky to pass away the time - even if we traders were always in fear of sea pirates and the bad weather.

Once, our batel hit a rock and sank. Thank heavens for my rubber tires! Those were the goods I had with me to sell in Manila. Well, we all held on to those tires, which meant I saved all those traders and those traders saved all my tires.

At that time, the War was still going on. Ironically, I look back at the War with the fondest of memories. It was the great equalizer. Almost everyone I knew had lost big and small fortunes at the time. This meant we all started at ground zero.

When the war ended, I was 19. Because of the war, the economy was more dependent than ever on imports. So when I set up Amasia, my first company, it was to import textile remnants, fruit, old newspaper and magazines, and used clothing from the U.S.

There was a side benefit to this. I would wear some of my own stock, so I would have different clothes to wear when I went courting Elizabeth, the woman who would be my wife. But at the end of it, I made some money. The Bicycle Age was over. The TRADING AGE began. By then, my brothers and sister returned from China. Together, we worked in the trading business I had begun - as bodegeros, clerks, warehousemen, cashiers, and collectors. And all this while they were all still going to school; me, I stopped schooling. Like most Chinese-Filipino families, we worked where we lived, and at times, we had to endure the stench of rotten oranges and potatoes filling our two-story apartment.

By the early '50s, we were importing cigarettes and whiskey as well. Business was good. But two factors made me change strategies again. First, I saw that trading would in time become a low-margin business BECAUSE we were at the mercy of our suppliers and buyers. Second, I saw that the government was working on import-substitution policies to encourage local business. President Quirino wanted to shore up the country's foreign exchange reserves that had been depleted as a result of the high importation of the post-war years.

So I decided to enter the AGE of MANUFACTURING. In 1957, I started a corn milling plant producing glucose and cornstarch. Why cornstarch? Because I thought - and it turned out, correctly - that the unglamorous cornstarch would be in great demand from better known businesses like textiles, paper, ice cream, pharmaceuticals, and beer.

But there was one problem: I needed capital. This was not easy. I was 30, had no big company success to back me up, and I didn't know any bankers. Thankfully, Dr. Albino Sycip, then chairman of China Bank, and DK Chiong, then president, gave me a clean loan of P500,000 to start my business. He would be asked later why he did that and he said something about knowing a good man when he saw one. (Maybe he knew something I didn't.) Anyway, from there Universal Corn Products, the predecessor of Universal Robina Corporation, was born.

Of course, the bigger cornstarch players did not give us an easy time. They engaged us in a price war. That is a nice way of saying they tried to kill us by selling low.

But we prevailed, and started to get clients like San Miguel Corporation. It was my first real taste of competition. And I liked it. I think THAT first experience prepared me for the bigger tougher competitors in my future.

By 1961, corn starch was becoming a commodity, and I saw that there was no future in a business where we had to keep lowering margins to survive. It was time to get into bigger, and riskier, games played by big multinationals like Procter and Gamble and Nestle. I saw that all they did to capture the market was to brand their products, for instance their coffee and their toothpaste. That is, give their coffee and toothpaste a name, a face, and an image that customers would instantly recognize - and identify with quality. Me, I dreamt that one day I would be the Philippine Nestle or General Foods. So the Manufacturing Age for me was giving way to the AGE of BRANDS.

So, we put up CFC, and our first successful product was Blend 45, an instant coffee we put out to directly compete with Nestle's Nescafe. We positioned it as "the poor man's coffee," hired top movie star Susan Roces to endorse it, and employed Procter-and-Gamble veterans to sell it. Basically, we took a page out of the multinational book and applied it to our business. We gave our coffee, snack food, candy, and chocolates a name, a face, an image. Today, Jack and Jill, Max candy, and Cloud 9 have become household names. It was also at this time that I returned to school for an MBA - with all due respect to the Jesuits, at De La Salle University - and a decade later for a 14-week advanced management program at Harvard. Going back to the university for studies which war had interrupted gave me an appreciation, believe me, for the beauty and the breadth of business life. This is something I believe I would never have gained if I had chosen to stop my education. The success of URC opened up many opportunities for our group. We had the choice to focus on food where we were very successful - or to pursue other businesses. We decided that there were too many good opportunities to pass up, and that remaining in our comfort zone would stunt our growth. So we got into the Age of Expansion.

For the next two decades, we pursued businesses that answered positive on FOUR CRUCIAL QUESTIONS.

First: Is there a market?

Second: Could we compete against both local and foreign players?

Third: Could we find the right people for the job and did we have enough capital to pursue the business?

Last and most important: Did we have the stomach for it? That is, could we take the sleepless nights, the cutthroat competition?

We went into textiles, retail, real estate, telecommunications, aviation, banking, and petrochemicals because we said YES to all those questions. Still, in all those industries, we were faced with tough and worthy competitors - the mighty SM Department Stores and Malls, the unbeatable PLDT, the entrenched Philippine Airlines and the powerful San Miguel Corporation. Most pundits expected us to fail. They were wrong. Robinsons Stores and Mall, Digitel, Cebu Pacific Air and Universal Robina Corporation are now market leaders in their respective fields.

That's because they offered the public a choice.

Remember the story of David and Goliath? Every industry has its Goliath. But every David knows that all giants have their weaknesses. Every weakness is an opportunity.

In a few months, we will launch our mobile services to compete with two giants, Globe and Smart. Our stomachs are churning for sure - but we know that we faced similar challenges before, and we are hopeful we can prove the pundits wrong again.

In the past decade, which is one-sixth of my entire business life, the company has tripled in size. This was the decade when our companies raised money from the global equity and debt markets, brought our companies public, and hired the best professionals to run them. In six decades, we grew from a one-man team to a group with 30,000 employees.

Now I am in what you can probably call the AGE of GLOBALIZATION. I am always asked where I stand on this issue. I say that it does NOT matter where I stand because as sure as the Ateneo Basketball Team will win next year's UAAP championship, global barriers will come crashing down, and we have no choice but to prepare ourselves for that.

Still our company will not take globalization sitting down - OUR future and the country's depend on how we act now. JG operates branded food concerns in Malaysia, Indonesia, Singapore, Thailand, Hongkong, China, and soon, Vietnam. We also sell our snack foods in India, Korea, and Taiwan - one of the few ASEAN companies to do so.

In a few years, when foreign products find their way into OUR shopping carts as they already have, we want Piattos and Chippy to find their way into THEIR shopping carts as well. Our dream is to be the first group to plant the Philippine flag throughout Asia.

As I look back, I ask myself, "What if I had stopped at cornstarch?" I would probably be the owner of the biggest cornstarch group in the country today or just as possibly, be broke.

But I chose to live my life unafraid even during times when I WAS afraid. I discovered that opportunities don't find you. You find your opportunities.

I found those opportunities when MY FATHER PASSED AWAY, WHEN WAR CAME, THROUGH CHANGES IN PRESIDENTS AND THEIR POLICIES, DURING MARTIAL LAW,DESPITE THE COUPS D' ETAT, PAST ECONOMIC BOOMS AND BUSTS, AND IN THE MIDST OF MARKET SHIFTS AND MOVEMENTS.

Now I'm 75 and retired. And funny, but I often wonder what ever happened to my first bike! The bike that was my companion during those first years when my family had lost everything. I wonder where it is now. That bike reminds me that success is not necessarily about connections, or cutting corners, or chamba - the three C's of bad business.

Call it trite - but, believe me, success CAN BE ACHIEVED through hard work, frugality, integrity, responsiveness to change - and most of all boldness to dream. These have never been just easy slogans for me. I have lived by them. I hope that many of you in this room will some day choose to be entrepreneurs. Choose to be an entrepreneur because then YOU create value. Choose to be an entrepreneur because the products, services, and jobs you create then becomes the lifeblood of our nation. But most of all, choose to be an entrepreneur because then you desire a life of adventure, endless challenge, and the opportunity to be your BEST SELF.

Thank you. *

His personal account and his personal success is an inspiration to all Filipinos abroad and domestic. He's like the Philippine's version of Carnegie and Vanderbilt during the Age of American Industrialization some 100 years ago.

I just got packages from my parents..hahaha..so im pretty happy. All the comforts of home again
One thing that I'm really happy is that my mom included the movie "Rizal sa Dapitan", which Ive been waiting to come since i ordered it online this past august.

Today is gonna be a great week.

El Revolutionista pequito hahaha..


Mabuhay ang Pilipinas!

The Philippine Revolution, the first against western colonial rule in Asia, was directed against Spain which had colonized the Philippines since 1565. The Revolution against Spain had two phases: the first from the declaration of defiance against Spanish rule on August 23, 1896 till the conclusion of a truce in December 1897; the second from the return till the outbreak of the Filipino-American War in February 1899.

After over three centuries of Spanish colonial rule characterized by unenlightened government, outright exploitation of the Indios (the term used to apply to the indigenous population of Filipinos), suppression of the mestizos and the insulares (Spaniards born in the Philippines), belated and half-hearted attempts at reform, and on the part of the governed, countless sporadic and isolated revolts and other forms of resistance, the Philippine Revolution exploded on August 23, 1896, in the event that is commemorated as the "Cry of Pugadlawin." Located in the outskirts ofManila, there assembled on that day members of a secret revolutionary society known as the Kataastaasang Kagalanggalang na Katipunan ng mga Anak ng Bayan (Katipunan) -- Highest and Most Respectable Society of the Sons of the People, founded in July 1892), led by its founder, Andres Bonifacio, and there tore up their cedulas (identification receipts issued for payment of taxes) as a symbol of their determination to take up arms against Spain.

The seeds of revolution were, in fact, sown earlier in the nineteenth century when Spain's enforced isolation of the Philippines was shattered with the opening of the country to foreign commerce and the resulting development of an export economy by non-Spanish foreign enterprises (British, American, Chinese). Revolutionary and liberal movements in Europe and elsewhere, in addition to the persistence of friar autocratic rule, brought winds of change in the political climate in the Philippines. The most important event which possibly made the Revolution inevitable was that of February 17, 1872, when three Filipino secular priests, leaders in the movement for the secularization (in effect, nationalization) of Philippine parishes, were executed publicly by garrote for their supposed complicity in a military mutiny at a Cavite arsenal on January 20, 1872. By linking them with the mutiny, the Spanish administration, with the instigation of Spanish friars, found a convenient way of doing away with the troublesome priests, considered by them as filibusteros (anyone who showed any radical tendencies) for demanding clerical equality with the Spanish friars.

The first manifestation of Philippine nationalism followed in the decades of the 1880s and the 1890s, with a reform or propaganda movement, conducted both in Spain and in the Philippines, for the purpose of "propagandizing" Philippine conditions in the hopes that desired changes in the social, political and economic life of the Filipinos would come about through peaceful means. The propaganda movement failed to secure the desired reforms, especially the expulsion of the friars and their replacement by Filipino secular priests and equality before the law between Spaniards and Filipinos, largely because the Spanish friars used their power and resources to thwart the activities of the Filipino ilustrados (educated Filipinos who led the movement).

The revolutionary society, Katipunan, was established, on July 7, 1892, by Filipinos who had given up hope that the Spanish government would administer the affairs of Filipinos in the interests of its subjectsâ€"with justice and dignity. A secret association patterned after Freemasonry and the La Liga Filipina (a mutual-aid society founded by the ilustrado Jose Rizal on July 3, 1892), it recruited members in the suburbs of Manila and in the provinces of Central Luzon. By the time of the outbreak of the Revolution in August 1896, membership in the Katipunan has soared to about 30,000, which included some women. The Revolution broke out prematurely on August 23, 1896 because of the untimely discovery by a Spanish friar, on August 19, of the existence of the revolutionary society. The immediate result of the outbreak of the Revolution was the institution of a reign of terror by the Spanish authorities in an attempt to frighten the population into submission. Hundreds suspected of joining the Katipunan and the Revolution were arrested and jailed; prominent Filipinos were shipped to exile to the Carolines or the Spanish penal colony in Africa (Fernando Po); and still others were executed, including Jose Rizal, who was executed by musketry on December 30, 1896. The Revolution spread from Manila and Cavite to Laguna, Batangas, Bulacan, Pampanga, Tarlac, and Nueva Ecija represented as the eight rays in the Philippine flag.

Andres Bonifacio led the Revolution in its early stages, although he did not excel in the field of battle. Internal rivalry led to the division of the ranks within the Katipunan organization and with the execution of Bonifacio in May 1897 (charged with sedition and treason), leadership of the Revolution fell into the hands of another Katipunan member from Cavite, Emilio Aguinaldo, who distinguished himself in the battlefields in Cavite, at that time the heartland of the Revolution.

The first phase of the Revolution ended inconclusively, with both Filipino and Spanish forces unable to pursue hostilities to a successful conclusion. Consequently, between November 18 and December 15, a truce (in Biak-na-Bato) was concluded between the two sides which resulted in a temporary cessation of hostilities. Aguinaldo agreed to go on temporary exile to Hong Kong after the Spanish government compensated him and his revolutionary junta with P400,000. The truce failed as both sides entered the agreement in bad faithâ€"neither was really willing to abandon hostilities but were biding time and resources to resume the armed conflict.




General Gregorio Del Pilar of the Philippine Revolutionary Army

+++++++

Behold! Los Soldados Revolutionista de la Republica Filipina!









++++++++

Katipunero Cavalry Units









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Revolutionary Honor Guard

El Sr. Gobernador Basilio Augustin y Dávila (1840-1910)


The Governor-General


The Spanish Governor-General's staff---taken in Manila ~1895

On the eve of war with the United States, Spanish President Sagasta decided to name Basilio Augustin y Dávila, Governor-General of the Philippines, to head the army there, replacing General Fernando Primo de Rivera. Since Spain could not send sufficient resources to mount a defense, Augustín y Dávila attempted to mobilize pro-Spanish civilians to save Manila by establishing an advisory assembly led by Pedro A. Paterno. The assembly asked all Filipinos to support Spain, but pro-independence insurgents infiltrated the group and forced it to disband. In fact, the insurgency made resistance to the United States impossible since it hindered Spanish troop movements and claimed the loyalty of the Filipino soldiers. Ultimately Augustin tried to surrender to Commodore George Dewey at the same time the Spanish government was replacing him with Fermín Jáudenes in hopes of more vigorous prosecution of the war.

Glad you liked it guys. I made it for you all.

hahaha,

Ma tired sigoro si Jan Jan ana..kai long raba na ang great wall. Diba, Jan?

So I composed a video on Bohol, Philippines. Enjoy!!   

http://youtube.com/watch?v=9dUSkfixngA

hahaha only for you, Hazel.

haha, its a small world, jud brod Mike.

Its funny because that is what was being talked about in church today...

Mr. David Dennis!!

Welcome to Tubag Bohol! and our family in this site.
I hope you learn as much as possible about Bohol and the Philippines in here, and feel free to ask questions, as they will be answered.

Mr. Dennis hails from the great city of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania!! Go Steelers!!! 

Hey Vasegundo!!
Welcome to TB,,

Mao ba, Mike? Dili ta ma attacked sa isda dinha? Man...now i want to go snorklin' there with my little brothers and take underwater pictures of the marine life.

Is it free to swim there, or do we have to pay to get in?

Eloquently said, sir.

Mike and Leo,

What kinds of fish are in the sanctuary? The waters look really pristine...very inviting.

Quote from: David Dennis on October 01, 2007, 02:23:35 PM
I hail from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, a region that gets very gloomy and depressing during the season we call "winter".  In this "winter" the leaves drop from the trees and they become bare and gloomy.  The weather turns grim and something called "snow" sometimes falls down from the sky.  It becomes very cold, like the inside of your freezer.  Sometimes even colder.

I really, really, really hate this "winter".  It is not enjoyable.  Therefore, I wish to spend time elsewhere, like in the Philippines.  You should understand that if I wanted to get a house near the water or with a water view in a climate in the US without this "winter", I would spend around US$1,000,000, or 45 million pesos, for even the cheapest one. 

I don't have 45 million pesos :-(.

So you can see the Philippines has an enormous appeal since houses by the water cost far less than that to buy and proportionately far less to rent, too.  And the weather is almost always nice, without this awful "winter".

My basic idea is to develop a business based on online advertising based on the US and use the money to settle in the Philippines.  So you can see I'm not  trying to start a business in the Philippines, which I know is virtually impossible to do successfully.

Hope that was interesting.

D

Oh really? Djit jet? Yinz doing good, right? hahahaha

Sir, i actually am currently 1 hour north of you. I'm a senior in Allegheny College in the town of Meadville, Pennsylvania. 30 minutes from Erie. hahahaha! Small world, mate.

I'm glad that you find interest and joy in the Philippines, and I hope that you get to visit our beautiful islands this summer or upcoming summers, (even winters) hahaha. If you ever need a tour around Bohol...im actually going back home to Bohol this summer 2008. I'd be more than happy to tour you around some towns and places in the island---or we can ask a member in this forum, Mr. Jun Ayag, who knows the island well would be a great source for information, if you need any.


Btw, what happened to our Steelers today???

Regards,
Bran

Dennis, you know a great deal about the Philippines, sir. The Visayan language group is considered part of the larger Austronesian language family, but it is a sub-part of the Malayo-Polynesiac lingual group.
The term 'Visayan/Bisayan' is a broad generalization of the dialects spoken in the Central Visayas and parts of Mindanao, tho there are variances in words and particulates as well as predicates, overall, the verbatum is similar.

The term Cebuano or Sinugbuano (cebu dialect) is traditionally considered central-Visayan dialect, the dialect spoken in the island of Bohol is practically similar to Cebuano, tho it has some differences in wording--overall tho it is similar. If one masters to speak the Cebuano dialect--you can basically go anywhere in the central visayas, communicate with people and get to your intended locale.

And yes you are right, sir, Bisayan is the language of the visayas (including cebu, bohol, negros, leyte, siqijor, mindanao etc) albeit there are minor variances in predicates from region to region in the central visayas.

By JASON KEYSER, Associated Press

LONDON - The chief U.S. missile defense negotiator defended plans to place anti-missile sites in Eastern Europe, saying Wednesday that the system could prevent a war with Iran by building an effective deterrent.

"Our intent is to address emerging threats in the Middle East," U.S. Assistant Secretary of State John Rood said in an interview with The Associated Press during a visit to London to attend a conference on defense trade. "Countries like Iran are developing long-range missile systems. And we're concerned not only about the emerging capability but of the hostile intent from countries in the region."

Washington plans to place a radar facility in the Czech Republic and a battery of up to 10 interceptor missiles in Poland. The European sites would be added to two other interceptor sites â€" in California and Alaska â€" that are primarily in place to counter a threat from North Korea.

Moscow objects to the plans, saying the system is meant for spying on Russia.

Rood, a veteran arms control expert who has led a team of negotiators in two rounds of talks with Russia since July, said a European system would make it less tempting for Iran to launch a first strike, and it could also dissuade the U.S. from believing it had no alternative to a pre-emptive strike of its own.

"We think (missile defense) helps create disincentives for development of missiles," he said in regard to Iran.

The U.S. system relies on interceptor missiles with refrigerator-sized "kill vehicles" designed to destroy an incoming warhead at high speed. Rood said the sites in the western United States helped avert a crisis in the summer of 2006, when North Korea test-fired a series of missiles, including its latest long-range model, known abroad as the Taepodong-2, which experts believe could reach Alaska, Hawaii and perhaps the U.S. West Coast.

Some U.S. officials had argued for a pre-emptive strike on North Korea, but the administration did not seriously consider it, Rood said, in part because the anti-missile system provided a potential defense.

"We didn't have to escalate the crisis by moving forces to the region, placing people on alert, " Rood said.

In Europe, Rood said, it is crucial to have batteries in place before a similar threat emerges from the Middle East. The Pentagon fears Iran could develop a missile capable of reaching the U.S. by 2015. Russia believes Iran is decades away from that point.

In June, Iran's top security official, Ali Larijani, called the U.S. anti-missile plan "the joke of the year."

The new anti-missile system has become one of the most difficult issues in Washington's increasingly strained relations with Moscow.

Russia's foreign minister, Sergey Lavrov, said Friday that the United States' true intention was to spy on Russia. A U.S. invitation for Russia to join in its missile defense plans has so far failed to win Moscow's blessing.

Nevertheless, talks with the Czech Republic and Poland continue, and Washington wants to have the system in place by 2013, Rood said.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad told the AP in an interview in New York on Monday, that Iran has always maintained a defensive policy and has "never sought to expand its territory."

"Iran will not attack any country," Ahmadinejad said, when asked if Iran would ever strike first against Israel.

Moscow's concern with the program, Rood said, is that it could expand beyond its current scope and weaken the capability of Russia's strategic forces.

Russia has suggested that the United States share the use of a Russian-leased radar installation in Azerbaijan and a radar in southern Russia. U.S. officials have said the radar's technology is outdated and emphasized that even if they were to use the Russian radar, it would not replace the other elements.

But the two sides have exchanged intelligence assessments on Middle East threats and U.S. experts have briefed Moscow on the system's capabilities, which Rood said fall short of being able to shoot down a Russian intercontinental ballistic missile.

By VLADIMIR ISACHENKOV, Associated Press

MOSCOW - The chief of Russia's space forces on Thursday said Moscow would have to retaliate if others deploy weapons in space â€" a stern warning to the United States.
While Col.-Gen. Vladimir Popovkin did not name any specific country, he was clearly referring to U.S. plans for space-based weapons, which the Kremlin had vociferously opposed.

"We don't want to wage a war in space, we don't want to gain dominance in space, but we won't allow any other nation to dominate space," Popovkin said in televised remarks. "If any country deploys weapons in space, then the laws of warfare are such that retaliatory weapons are certain to appear."

President Vladimir Putin has criticized U.S. plans for space-based weapons, saying it could trigger a new arms race.

When China tested an anti-satellite missile in January, Putin said that the move was a response to U.S. plans for space-based weapons.

Russia and China have strongly pushed for an international agreement banning space weapons, but their proposals have been stymied by the United States.

"It's necessary to legalize the game rules in space," Popovkin said. He warned that the complexity of space weapons could trigger a war.

Satellites may fail on technical reasons, but their owner could think they were incapacitated by an enemy and could be tempted to retaliate, Popovkin said.

"If that happens, a nation might ask a legitimate question: could it be the beginning of an effort to deafen and blind it," Popovkin said.

President Bush signed an order last year tacitly asserting the U.S. right to space weapons and opposing the development of treaties or other measures restricting them.

Bush also had pushed an ambitious program for space-based missile defense, and the Pentagon is working on missiles, ground lasers and other technology to shoot down satellites.

The U.S. plans have worried Russia, which also has strongly criticized U.S. plans to deploy missile defense elements in Poland and the Czech Republic. Putin has rejected U.S. assertions that the missile defense sites in Europe were necessary to confront a prospective missile threat from Iran and said they threatened Russia's nuclear deterrent.

The dispute has badly damaged the Russian-U.S. relations, also strained over U.S. criticism of the Kremlin's backsliding on democracy and rifts over global crises.

Popovkin said Russia would modernize components of its air and missile defense systems. He said, in particular, that the military would build a new early warning radar near Armavir in southern Russia's Krasnodar region to replace aging Soviet-built radars it currently shares with Ukraine.

Such radars are intended to detect the launch of an enemy's ballistic missiles.

Popovkin also said that Russia in 2009 would start testing a new generation of satellites to spot missile launches. He said more than 60 military and dual-purpose satellites are currently in orbit.

By JENNY BARCHFIELD, Associated Press

PARIS - Critics who praise the "complexity" of red Burgundy and Champagne are on target.

A team of French and Italian researchers has mapped the genome of the pinot noir grape, used to make bubbly and many red wines from France's Burgundy region and around the world â€" and it has about 30,000 genes in its DNA. That's more than the human genome, which contains some 20,000 to 25,000 genes.

The team published its findings in Thursday's issue of the journal Nature, saying it identified the nearly half a billion chemical building blocks of the grape's DNA. Certain sequences of these building blocks form genes, like letters spelling words.

These discoveries won't make any immediate difference to wine drinkers worldwide. The pinot noir is the first grape â€" and first fruit â€" ever genetically mapped, and it would take years to apply this new knowledge to today's vines. But down the line, it could possibly lead to hardier grape varieties, more resistant to bugs and disease.

The team said its research had confirmed that the grape has an unusually high number of genes whose job it is to create flavor. More than 100 of its genes are dedicated to producing tannins and terpenes â€" compared to about 50 for other plants, said researcher Patrick Wincker.

He said the mapping of those flavor-producing genes could be a first step toward developing new flavors in wine by allowing scientists to breed different varieties to create precise new tastes.

But flavor also depends on external factors such as weather, microclimate, soil, size of the crop, age of the vines and the winemaker's art.

With so many flavor compounds potentially at play, these other factors become even more important, said Allen Meadows of burghound.com, a leading Burgundy critic who did not participate in the study.

Meadows said the research helps explain why wines made from pinot noir grapes have a huge variety of aromas and flavors.

"The research is genetic confirmation of what Burgundy and pinot noir lovers have known for centuries, which is that pinot noir is exquisitely sensitive to where and how it is grown," Meadows said. "Pinot-based wines produced in say Burgundy, while similar, are still distinctly different from those produced in California, Oregon or New Zealand."

In any case, Wincker said new flavors derived from genetic manipulation are years away and would likely be so subtle it would take a sophisticated palate to be able to appreciate them.

But he did not rule out the possibility that distinctive â€" and highly noticeable â€" new flavors might yet emerge.

"Anything can happen," Wincker said. "Biology doesn't always work out in the way you'd expect."

Identifying the genes grape plants use to defend themselves from mildew and insects would also allow researchers to breed new, more resistant varieties, Wincker said.

France's Agriculture Ministry, which helped fund the multimillion dollar project, hailed the team's findings. Agriculture Minister Michel Barnier said he hoped the findings would help in developing more environmentally friendly grape varieties.

Andre Barlier, assistant director of Viniflhor, a government-funded agency to support French wine, said it was laudable that the team's findings were made public so that researchers around the world can continue to work on them. But he said he doubted the genome map would change the way French vintners make wine.

"In France we are very conservative and we work according to traditional ways," Barlier said. "I don't think it will have an impact in the short term."

The pinot noir is also used to make wine in Oregon, California, New Zealand, France's Loire valley and other areas. But in Burgundy, the wine takes on the name of the vineyard or surrounding village â€" Chambolle-Musigny, for example. Champagne and other sparkling wines are traditionally made from chardonnay or pinot noir, or a mixture of the two along with smaller amounts of other grapes.

Scientists have already mapped the genome for rice and other crops, but this was the first time a fruit has been mapped, Wincker said. It took the team, based in France's national genetic-sequencing laboratory in the Paris suburb of Evry, nearly two years to complete.

 

UNITED NATIONS - Serbia is prepared to offer its secessionist province of Kosovo the "largest autonomy in the world" in upcoming talks on the future of the independence-seeking region, the nation's president said Thursday.

Serbian President Boris Tadic described as "unhelpful" statements by President Bush and other members of his administration to the effect that Kosovo will gain independence at the end of the current negotiating process which is set to conclude on Dec. 10.

"This is not very useful," Tadic said. "Saying that Kosovo has to become an independent country by the end of negotiations on Dec. 10. These statements are not encouraging Kosovo Albanians to show flexibility in the talks."

Tadic is due to meet in New York on Friday with ethnic Albanian leaders of Kosovo for the first face-to-face talks between the two sides. They will be mediated by negotiators from the United States, Russia, and the European Union.

Over the past year, the issue of Kosovo's future status has become one of the main irritants in the increasingly tense relationship between a resurgent Russia and the United States. Washington strongly supports eventual independence for the province, but Moscow backs Belgrade in its insistence that Kosovo must technically remain part of Serbia.

The province of 2 million people â€" most of them ethnic Albanians â€" has been administered by the United Nations since 1999, when NATO waged a 78-day aerial war to prevent a Serb military crackdown against Albanian separatists.

A previous round of negotiations collapsed earlier this year. On Thursday, Tadic indicated that Serbia was willing to make further concessions in the talks, but would still demand that its "sovereignty and territorial integrity remain intact".

"We are offering to Kosovo Albanians the best possible rights, which means the largest autonomy in the world, (including) some elements of sovereign countries, for example access to international financial institutions," Tadic said.

But Veton Surroi, a key member of the ethnic Albanian negotiating team, said there was little likelihood of a deal being reached at the upcoming talks unless Serbia accepts "that our place is in Europe together, as two independent nations."

Tadic warned that independence for Kosovo against Serbia's will could create a precedent which separatists around the world would use to justify their struggle.

"Kosovo's independence would present a huge danger for many sovereign countries ... that have separatist movements," he said. "It would have very serious consequences â€" there are many Kosovos in the region (including) Nagorno-Karabakh, Abkhazia, South Ossetia ... Macedonia, Bosnia or Kurdistan."

Also on Thursday, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice met at the United Nations with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and representatives of European Union nations forming the Contact Group of Kosovo negotiators.

Participants agreed that "the status quo" in Kosovo was unsustainable, British Foreign Secretary David Miliband said after the talks.

"It's the view of all members of the Contact Group that representatives in Belgrade and Pristina need to engage with the (mediators) with a real constructive spirit," Miliband said.

 AMSTERDAM, Netherlands - The Dutch World War II resistance hero, Erik Hazelhoff Roelfzema â€" better known as the "Soldier of Orange" â€" died this week at his home in Hawaii, his family said in a death notice published in a Dutch newspaper. He was 90

Roelfzema was a student at the University of Leiden when the Nazis occupied the Netherlands, and he later went underground and fled to England, where he carried out numerous missions in the service of the Dutch royal house in exile.

The notice in De Telegraaf, the nation's largest daily, did not specify the cause of death, but said Roelfzema died in his sleep Wednesday. He will be cremated and an urn with his ashes will be returned to the Netherlands "at a date to be determined later," it said.

Roelfzema's wartime activities included delivering radio equipment by boat to the Dutch coast and collecting resistance fighters to return to England. He later became a pilot, carrying out 72 target-marking missions in bombing raids against Germany as a member of Britain's Royal Air Force.

He became an intimate friend of the House of Orange, serving as adjutant to Queen Wilhelmina during the war, and he remained close friends with Prince Bernhard â€" the husband of Queen Juliana â€" until Bernhard's death in 2004.

Roelfzema was born in Indonesia in 1917, then a Dutch colony. After the war, he immigrated to the United States, where he worked for various media, including NBC, and in 1955, he returned to Europe to work as a producer for Radio Free Europe.

His fame in the Netherlands leaped after he published his book, "Soldaat van Oranje" (Soldier of Orange) in 1971. He became known outside the country after the book was made into a film of the same name by director Paul Verhoeven in 1977, starring Rutger Hauer in the title role.

Roelfzema took a job with energy company Barnwell Industries Inc. in the 1970s, and later convinced the company to move to Hawaii, where it became a major gas and oil developer.

In an interview with De Telegraaf in July, Roelfzema said he knew that he had received a disproportionate amount of recognition for his wartime exploits.

He bears a Distinguished Flying Cross from Britain and the Military Order of William in the Netherlands, the country's highest honor, which bestows knighthood for bravery in battle.

"I became a war hero because I stuck out, because I wrote about my experiences. But behind every soldier decorated with military honors there are a hundred anonymous heroes, some of them greater," he said. "I had the fortune to be recognized, and to grow old."

He is survived by his wife, Karin; son, Erik Hazelhoff Roelfzema Jr.; daughter, Karna Hazelhoff-Castellon; a granddaughter and a great-granddaughter.

 BLACKPOOL, England (AFP) - Britain's main opposition Conservatives were to start spelling out their plans for government on Monday in preparation for a possible snap general election.

The centre-right Tories insist they are keen for Prime Minister Gordon Brown to call a vote and are in fighting mood at their annual conference on the seaside in Blackpool, north-west England.

The Conservatives led by the modernising David Cameron, 40, are presenting an upbeat front despite opinion polls showing Brown's governing centre-left Labour Party a thumping 11 percentage points ahead.

Brown has refused to dampen speculation about an early election -- he does not have to call one before May 2010 -- with Labour back on top in the popularity stakes since he took over from Tony Blair in June.

The Conservatives, seeking to shake off the legacy of three general election defeats in a row since 1997 and presenting themselves as a totally overhauled party, have recently produced a series of policy reports stuffed with fresh proposals.

Under the theme of family and opportunity, they were to thrash out on the second day of the four-day gathering some key planks of their agenda for government, honing down their new ideas.

The centrepiece Monday was set to be finance spokesman George Osborne's speech on economic competitiveness, with proposals to slash the likes of inheritance taxes while hiking "green" taxes expected.

The Conservatives were also to debate public services, particularly health and education, and "fixing our broken society" -- discussions focusing on communities, employment, innovation and skills.

They were to outline proposals to improve childhood by cracking down on the compensation culture, building new schools and spreading private school best practice to state schools.

"Children need play, adventure and excitement," the party's "Childhood Inquiry" chief David Willetts was to say.

"But today, fear of litigation means school trips and adventure holidays are now abandoned. Instead, children get their excitement by retreating to their bedrooms to play video games or the artificial stimulus of drink and drugs.

"These proposals are about giving our children back their childhood."

Cameron has insisted the Tories will set out clear policies for an alternative government at the conference.

"This week we are going to mount the great Conservative fightback," he told delegates Sunday.

"It is going to be a fightback based on clear policies, based on a clear direction and based on the clear choice that we will give people at the next general election."

William Hague, the Tory foreign affairs spokesman and former leader, said: "The Conservative Party is ready, it is hungry for victory.

"If Prime Minister Gordon Brown ever summons up the courage to call an election, we are going to beat him."

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg earlier told the Conservatives they needed tight fiscal discipline and plans to hammer crime if they wanted to win public confidence.

Hinting at an election, he told delegates Sunday: "In the months ahead, I believe that in both of our countries, voters will be looking to see which candidates will offer an approach that is sensible, responsible, practical, ethical and achievable -- and who they trust will deliver results."

In an address via satellite link, California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger paid tribute to the "dynamic" Cameron and congratulated his efforts on tackling climate change.

The former Hollywood hardman said Cameron had "the kind of leadership people are hungry for. They want action and results, not ideology and stalemate."

Meanwhile British finance minister Alistair Darling stuck to Labour's "the sums don't add up" line of attack.

"At the start of their conference, the Tories have recklessly made billions of pounds of unfunded tax and spending promises, with no credible explanations of where the money would come from," he said.

 

HASKANITA, Sudan - Rebel forces stormed a small African Union base in northern Darfur and killed at least 10 peacekeepers, leaving behind charred armored vehicles and bombed out barracks in an unprecedented attack on the beleaguered mission that threatened upcoming peace talks.

More than 30 peacekeepers were still missing by late Sunday, indicating the death toll from the attack could rise significantly.

About 1,000 rebels from the Sudan Liberation Army attacked the base outside the town of Haskanita Saturday after sunset when Muslims break their daytime fast for the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, AU officers told The Associated Press Sunday at the scene of the attack. The rebels eventually stormed the base early Sunday, they said.

"We battled for hours, but when we ran out of ammunition, we took refuge in this ditch," said a Nigerian peacekeeper who would only give his first name, Aboubakar, because he was not authorized to speak to the media. He showed a corner of the camp riddled with bullet marks and mortar holes where the AU troops mounted their resistance.

Some of the surviving peacekeepers appeared shellshocked and said it was difficult to describe the intensity of the onslaught.

The rebels used armored vehicles and rocket-propelled grenades, an indication that they are more heavily armed than previously believed, peacekeepers said.

The AU troops said they initially repelled the assailants. But the rebels eventually overran the camp at around 4 a.m., peacekeepers said as they recovered from the fighting.

The Sudanese army routed the rebels early Sunday and the remaining AU peacekeepers were evacuated under the protection of the army. By afternoon, some government troops could be seen plundering goods from the burned-out camp as an AU armored vehicle smoldered nearby.

Rebels looted several AU armored vehicles and jeeps and took a large amount of ammunition from the base before the Sudanese army drove them out, AU soldiers said.

"This is the heaviest loss of life and the biggest attack on the African Union mission," said AU spokesman Noureddine Mezni. "Our troops fought a defensive battle to protect the camp, but 30 vehicles eventually stormed it. ... The camp is completely destroyed."

At least 200,000 people have been killed in more than four years of conflict in Darfur, a region of western Sudan. The government is accused of unleashing Arab militias known as the janjaweed to fight ethnic African rebels. The janjaweed are accused of the worst atrocities of the conflict including rape and mass killings of innocent civilians.

Darfur rebels also have grown increasingly hostile to the AU peacekeepers, saying the force is not neutral and favors the government side. Several ambushes of AU forces in the past year have been blamed on the rebels.

But Saturday's raid was the first time since the AU mission was deployed in June 2004 that one of its bases has been overrun, though soldiers have been regularly attacked. There are about 6,000 AU peacekeepers in the region currently.

The announcement that new peace talks to solve the conflict will open on Oct. 27 in Libya has sparked a flurry of fighting between rebels and Sudanese government forces as each try to improve their position ahead of the conference.

The attack came as rebels appeared to flee the area around Haskanita because of a large government offensive there over the past two weeks, AU soldiers said.

AU officers said they had observed several Sudanese helicopter gunships and MiG-19 fighter jets taking off for the Haskanita area early Sunday from their base in southern Darfur. U.N. resolutions forbid all military flights over Darfur.

By midday Sunday, plumes of smokes from several burning villages in the same area could be seen rising into the air. Forces from the Arab-dominated government have been accused of indiscriminately targeting ethnic African Darfur villagers on suspicions they support the rebels.

About 150 peacekeepers, most from Nigeria, had been stationed at the Haskanita base, but they had been grounded since June because of the insecurity in the area.

"This is a terrible incident. We're still trying to understand what happened," said Gen. Martin Agwai, the AU force commander, as he inspected the destroyed base.

As the last AU peacekeepers evacuated the camp late Sunday, Sudanese government troops and militias could be seen patrolling the area. Other government troops were sifting through the camp's debris amid the burning tents and a smoldering AU armored vehicle. Some soldiers carried away mattresses, fans and other gear.

"It may not be the right political thing to say, but the government forces saved us," said an AU officer at Haskanita, who also asked not to be named because of military regulations.

Speaking in Ethiopia, the AU's top peace and security official, Said Djinnit, said 10 peacekeepers were killed in the attack. AU officers said the dead included a police officer from Senegal, two military observers from Botswana and Mali and seven soldiers from Nigeria. At least seven peacekeepers were wounded.

"Some fled on foot and by car and have called us," the AU officer said. "But we're very worried for some of them."

Senegal's foreign ministry confirmed the death of one of its peacekeepers and reiterated a warning that it might pull out its troops if the situation appears too insecure.

The U.N., AU, France and Britain all strongly condemned the attack Sunday.

The Sudanese army also deplored the attack, saying it offered protection to the evacuating peacekeepers. Despite a few sporadic gunshots, the army appeared in control of the area Sunday.

The Darfur situation had been expected to improve after U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon visited Sudan early in September and announced new negotiations with Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir to settle the conflict.

Al-Bashir announced a cease-fire earlier this month, but violence increased in the ensuing weeks.

Nobel Peace laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu of South Africa and former president Jimmy Carter arrived Sunday in the Sudanese capital Khartoum as part of a peacemaking mission. They are planning to travel to Darfur in coming days and will meet in Khartoum with representatives of the government, the opposition and international organizations.

The underfunded AU force has been unable to stem the fighting in Darfur and will soon be merged into a much more powerful AU-U.N. joint force.

Rebel commanders told AP a few days earlier that they had been involved in heavy battles against government-allied forces in the Haskanita area for the past two weeks.

"The government has massed five or six janjaweed units who are converging on us," said Abdelaziz Ushar, a commander in the rebel Justice and Equality Movement, which fights alongside the SLA.

JEM rebels said they had evacuated Haskanita a couple of days ago, and AU peacekeepers in the camp said they suspected a splinter faction known as SLA-Unity had conducted the raid.

JEM strongly condemned the attack.

"JEM is not certain about the exact culprits in this senseless attack," the group said. There was no comment from SLA-Unity.

 JERUSALEM - After months of sounding each other out, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas are getting to work this week on formulating a joint vision of a peace deal to be presented at a November peace conference in the U.S., their aides said Sunday.

However, the two sides are far apart on how specific the joint document should be, underscoring the conflicting expectations and the considerable potential for failure. The Palestinians want to take a detailed framework agreement to the conference, while Israel wants a shorter and vaguer statement.

"From now and until mid-November, the agenda should be clearly set out," Abbas said Sunday in Cairo, Egypt. "More than 36 countries will attend the conference and this big gathering requires us to go there with a definite document to pave the way later for the detailed negotiations (for) the final settlement."

Israeli officials have said the conference would at best point negotiators in the right direction, but not yield solutions to the "core" issues of any final peace settlement, such as division of the disputed city of Jerusalem and future borders.

Separately, Palestinian officials were drafting their own proposed outline of a peace deal which was being circulated among Palestinian leaders for comment. According to a copy obtained by The Associated Press, the Palestinians are ready to swap some land with Israel and limit the number of Palestinian refugees returning to their homes in the Jewish state, but also demand the return of all areas of Jerusalem captured by Israel in the 1967 Mideast war.

The draft sets several deadlines. After the signing of a framework agreement, a final peace deal should be reached within 13 months and all Israeli settlers should leave Palestinian territory within three years.

Israel is likely to object to such a timeline and the proposed division of Jerusalem.

Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat denied the existence of a Palestinian position paper. He also said the Palestinians will not take any documents to Wednesday's meeting between Abbas and Olmert.

Olmert's aides said he would host Abbas at his Jerusalem residence on Wednesday morning.

Initial reports had indicated the meeting would be held Tuesday, but an official in Olmert's office said it had been put back for what he said were "technical reasons."

Erekat said the two leaders would meet privately at first, and would then be joined by their teams.

Abbas and Olmert met five times in recent months, to sound each other out and build trust. Abbas said the talks were wide-ranging, "but until now we cannot say that we are negotiating."

The U.S. is sponsoring the peace conference, which is to take place in Annapolis, Maryland, most likely in late November. The U.S. wants the conference to lead to a resumption of peace talks, which broke down in January 2001. Washington wants key Arab states, notably Saudi Arabia, to attend and lend backbone to the meeting.

 GUAM (Reuters) - A strong earthquake swayed buildings on the Pacific island of Guam on Sunday but there were no immediate reports of damage and no tsunami alert was issued.

The magnitude 7.1 quake occurred at 12.09 p.m. local time near the U.S. territory, with its epicenter at a depth of 30 km, Japan's Meteorological Agency said on its Web site (www.jma.go.jp/en/quake).

Some residents said high-rise blocks swayed and goods fell off supermarket shelves. But two hours after the quake, local television had reported no damage to buildings on Guam, an island east of the Philippines which is home to a major U.S. military base.

"We felt it. It was swinging back and forth for a minute or two," said Patrick Chan, a Guam-based meteorologist at the U.S. National Weather Service. "It's not expected to cause a tsunami." The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center, based in Hawaii, said in a statement there was "no destructive widespread tsunami threat." Neither Guam nor the Philippines issued tsunami warnings.

The U.S. Geological Survey also recorded a quake in the same area, which it said on its Web site (http://earthquake.usgs.gov/eqcenter) was of magnitude 6.8 and centered about 345 km (215 miles) south-southeast of Guam.

 SANTA CRUZ, Bolivia - Miguel Roda fires four shots into the palm trees and imagines a civil war.

"We will spill our last drop of blood, comrades!" he shouts to a few dozen supporters gathered in a city plaza. "We will defend Santa Cruz inch by inch, street by street and town by town!"

The enemy, to this black-bereted, revolver-toting Bolivian, is his leftist president, Evo Morales. Roda's dream: to revive the Bolivian Socialist Falange, an ultranationalist party that was strong in the 1950s and then dormant for decades.

Civil war may seem unthinkable, but in Santa Cruz, a lowland city and anti-Morales stronghold, the appearance of Roda's fringe group reflects the alarm gripping the white elite. Morales' reforms are popular among his fellow highland Indians, but take dead aim at the frontier capitalism practiced in Santa Cruz state.

Old regional and racial rivalries, many Bolivians believe, are deepening the split.

"The elite feel absolutely violated by the changes taking place in Bolivian society," says Jose Mirtenbaum, a sociologist at Gabriel Rene Moreno University in Santa Cruz. "The situation here is very emotional, and very irrational. But as the saying goes, just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they're not after you."

Since his election 21 months ago, Morales' program has met fierce though almost exclusively peaceful resistance from the elite of Santa Cruz, a once isolated cow town that remains the richest city in South America's poorest country.

Its U.S.-style consumerism, bootstrap mentality and racial makeup don't easily mix with Morales' vision of a communal state ruled by the traditional values of Bolivia's long-oppressed Indian majority.

Santa Cruz's elite made their millions from soy plantations, cattle ranches and real estate and feel targeted by government plans to seize land judged idle or fraudulently obtained and give it to the needy.

Santa Cruz is also the center of Bolivia's energy industry, and some worry about foreign investment now that Morales has forced international gas companies to increase royalty payments. Its leaders want autonomy and a bigger share of their state's natural gas revenues, but Morales needs the cash for desperately poor highland states.

That makes his revolution much more of an uphill battle than that of his closest ally, President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela, who has billions in petrodollars to spend.

All these are hot-button issues. But civil war?

"The Bolivian is a very impatient person. He always hopes for change, but he always sees the solution in catastrophe," says Victor Jemio, a retired Bolivian army general and military analyst. The country is notoriously unstable, he notes, having had 84 presidents and dictators in 182 years.

Morales, 47, was in New York last week for the U.N. General Assembly and showed up on Comedy Central's "Daily Show," denouncing capitalism as "the worst enemy of humanity" while jokingly pleading not to be considered part of "the axis of evil."

But in Santa Cruz, few are joking. Many believe uncorroborated whispers that Morales is flying in arms from Venezuela on unregistered midnight flights. A cryptic video recently posted on YouTube by a right-wing Santa Cruz group purports to show Indian "paramilitaries" crawling around in the underbrush on the shores of Lake Titicaca.

This year's scariest yarn was given credence by O Globo, one of neighboring Brazil's largest newspapers. It quoted an anonymous Santa Cruz state official as bragging that a 12,000-strong anti-Morales militia was hidden in the jungle, awaiting the proper moment.

The newspaper's reporter never saw any militia, and no evidence has emerged to support any of the gossip.

Roda explains his gunshots as a tribute to the memory of a handful â€" the exact number is in dispute â€" of Falange members killed in 1958 by Indian troops sent to quell their rebellion.

The "massacre" has become a legend in Santa Cruz cafes and online chat rooms, where the bitter memory sometimes carries a racist shadow.

"The number of dead is less important than the humiliation (Santa Cruz) suffered at the hands of a pack of hounds blinded by alcohol and irrationality," Santa Cruz historian Alcides Parejas said in an e-mail interview.

It still echoes a half-century later as Indian immigrants â€" largely Morales supporters â€" arrive in search of work, driving Santa Cruz state's population from 2 million in 2001 to an estimated 2.5 million today.

Morales stoked the whites' fears last month when he hosted a parade of Indians alongside Bolivian soldiers at a Santa Cruz air base.

The tension sometimes spills into the streets.

The Cruceno Youth Union, an ally of Roda's group, was accused of organizing a pre-dawn raid in August on a largely Indian market. In footage shown on national television, drunken young men smashed car windows and threatened vendors with racial taunts. A car carrying fleeing thugs ran down and injured a vendor.

Union members deny any involvement. But the boys hanging around their ramshackle clubhouse twirl big sticks and baseball bats, and don't hide their distaste for pro-Morales newcomers.

"Either they adapt to Santa Cruz, or they return to their own territory," Union member Victor Hugo Vhistrox told The Associated Press.

Some fear the pistol-wavers' dreams will come true if common ground isn't found.

"We've arrived at a moment that we don't know exactly how to face," says Carlos Valverde, a Santa Cruz TV commentator and fierce Morales critic. Valverde belonged to the Falange as a teenager in the 1950s when his father was one of its leaders, but doesn't endorse violence.

"The fear I have is that one day we'll arrive at the cliff," he says, "and we'll arrive with such force that some will fall over the edge. And then it'll all go to hell."

BANJA LUKA, Bosnia-Herzegovina - Milan Jelic, president of Bosnia's Serb Republic died of a heart attack Sunday after less than a year on the job, the prime minister said. He was 51.

Jelic suffered a heart attack while watching a soccer game in his hometown, Modrica, his brother Slavko Jelic said in Serbia. The president was a former soccer player himself and was president of Bosnia's Soccer Federation.

"This is a sad day for Republika Srpska," said Milorad Dodik, prime minister of the Bosnian Serb mini-state, using the republic's official name.

Jelic was elected president of the Serb Republic â€" one of the two mini-states that make up Bosnia and Herzegovina â€" in October 2006. The other republic is the Bosniak-Croat Federation.

The presidency is a largely ceremonial position, with power lying in the hands of the government and its prime minister.

Born in 1956 in north Bosnia, Jelic earned a doctorate in economics and was the head of the Modrica oil refinery for 13 years.

He was a member of the Serb Democratic Party founded by wartime Bosnian Serb President Radovan Karadzic, who is now a war crimes fugitive. But in 1998, he switched to Dodik's party of Independent Social Democrats, currently the most influential Bosnian Serb party.

Before he was elected president, he served as minister for economy, energy and development in the Bosnian Serb government.

Jelic was "a good man and politician who died too early at a time when he could have contributed the most," said Mirsad Kebo, vice president of the Bosniak-Croat Federation.

In Belgrade, Serbian President Boris Tadic called Jelic "a good president and a true friend of Serbia."

Slavok Jelic said his brother had undergone a bypass surgery in 2003.

It was unclear who might succeed Jelic. Political analyst Tanja Topic said the Serb Republic's constitution does not make clear the chain of succession.

Among possible successors was Dragan Cavic, an ex-Bosnian Serb president and member of the Serb Democratic Party, who came second to Jelic in last year's elections. One of Jelic's deputies could also succeed him, Topic said.

The peace agreement that ended Bosnia's 1992-95 war divided the country two mini-states, each largely autonomous, with its own president, parliament, police and army.

The two are linked by a central government, a parliament and a three-member presidency.

Jelic is survived by his wife, Milica, and son, Petar.

TORONTO - A volcano has erupted on a tiny island off the coast of Yemen, spewing lava and ash hundreds of feet into the air, a Canadian naval vessel near the island in the Red Sea reported Sunday. There were no immediate reports of deaths, but at least eight people were missing.

The Yemeni government asked NATO to assist in searching for survivors on Jabal al-Tair island, which lacks a settled population but includes military installations.

The Yemeni news agency SABA confirmed the eruption and said a military garrison on the island is being evacuated. It wasn't clear how many people were stationed on the island, which is used for naval control and observation because large cargo ships pass nearby.

Ken Allan, a Navy spokesman, said a NATO fleet just outside the territorial waters of the island reported seeing a "catastrophic volcanic eruption" at 7 p.m. local time. The two-mile-long island is about 70 miles off the coast of Yemen.

"At this time, the entire island is aglow with lava and magma as it pours down into the sea. We do not have confirmation of how many people were on this island at the time of the eruption," Allan said in an e-mail.

"The lava is spewing hundreds of feet into the air, with the volcanic ash also (rising) a thousand feet in the air," Allan said.

The Canadian Armed Forces said they are trying to locate nine people believed to be at sea after the Yemen coast guard requested help. SABA reported that the Yemeni government said eight people were missing. It is unclear why there was a discrepancy or if the reports were even talking about the same people.

The NATO fleet was sailing toward the Suez Canal when it spotted the eruption. The government of Yemen asked NATO to assist in the search for survivors and the closet ship, the HMCS Toronto, is heading toward the island.

Yemen is a poor tribal Sunni Muslim country at the southern tip of the Arabian Peninsula.

lol, ate.

Mao bitaw no? Its really amazing thinking about human colonies in space...someday. Imagine...humans living and colonizing new worlds away from our milkyway and even in other galaxies.

Good Evening Mr. Dennis,

Thank you for your interest in Bohol, Philippines and your yearning to understand the native dialect. If you would like to learn how to speak and read Bisaya, feel free to ask any of us in here, and I'm sure we'd gladly translate and help you learn.

So where do you hail from, Mr. Dennis? (If you don't mind me asking, that is).

With warm regards,