Fine, Fine Time

Whoever at Nike decided to print only 150 Ateneo three-peat championship shirts is an absolute idiot. Either that, or he has developed an aversion to making money. In any case, it feels good to refer to that asshole, whoever he may be, as an absolute idiot. Almost therapeutic, even.

Look. Those 150 shirts would not even be enough for all the resident-students of Eliazo Hall alone. That is how dumb that decision is. That a demand for this shirt was artificially created is obvious - there is not enough supply even for the residents of the smallest dormitory in campus. It's like providing a slice of cake to a convention of supermodels the day before the apocalypse.

* * *

Of course, by now everyone knows that the blue birds from Loyola Heights won the UAAP men's basketball championship yet again, making them champions for three years running. This year, like last year, the cows from Morayta were favored to win it all, for good reason. The cows had two players who are members of the national basketball team. They had the eventual MVP and ROY. The birds, on the other hand, lost three players to graduation. All three players ended up being picked in the PBA draft, two of whom were picked first and second overall.

After the Game 1 blowout, there were suggestions of game-fixing. So, I will take this opportunity to confess. Yes, I bribed the entire crayola squad to play like shit that day. That is the only way I can ensure a 23-point blowout. Pay off every single soul wearing a yellow and green jersey. Having only the MVP in your pocket just doesn't cut it.

This explains why I almost had no more budget for the second game. Beavis almost refused to lose the game until funds were transfered just before he took three free throws at the endgame. He missed two, setting up Buenafe's shot of a lifetime on the other end.

If you believe any of that, then you must be someone from Nike who thinks that printing only 150 shirts for the most rabid basketball fans in the country is a cool thing.

* * *

I was lucky enough to watch most of the first round games, and some of the second round games live - including both games against the pepsters. The first round game was already won, before one player decided to lose the game all by himself. The second round game was pure, unadulterated pleasure. It was a game that was over by the middle of the first quarter.

Which is very much like the first game of the finals, which I watched from the comfort of a hotel room near Taft. I am still hoping that that would be the last time I would spend a night at that hotel. I watched the second game from Upper Box A, in the same section where an elated Jumbo Escueta later climbed up to moments after the final buzzer.

* * *

Speaking of the apocalypse, another moron decided to ruin some otherwise promising lives one afternoon in Manila, by throwing a fragmentation grenade at a huge throng of people in a celebratory mood. Over 40 people were injured, including a sophomore law student who had to lose both legs because of the senseless act of an idiot who could very well be the living argument that abortion should be legalized. I will forever be in awe of the courage shown by Ms. Raissa Laurel after the incident.

GiTZ mo, n0h?

The st8 shol pRoTectnDProMotE D rIGhT Of ol CITiZEnZ to qUalitY EducAtion at Ol lEVElS,ndshoL tAke appropRI8 stEPz to mke suCh educaTioN acCESSiBLe to oL P0Wh.

- CoNSt p0wh. ArT. xiv, § 1.

Sa Wakas

Kay tagal ko nang naghintay at nagsunog ng kilay
Ngayon ay masasabi ko na matamis ang tagumpay

- verse written by some students, c. 1994

The grade for PIL, from the first semester, came in last. Exactly one hundred thirty three units. All accounted for. So, unless somebody over at the OCS made a really horrible mistake, I should be able to add two more nice letters to my name by the end of next week. (Those two letters should be in the right order. If you mix them up, you just end up as someone behind a turntable mixing sounds for those who are colloquially referred to as "party people".)

I went to Diliman yesterday for the first time after taking Tax finals, to fill up some forms, and to pay, for the requisite clearance and the application for copies of the TOR. It was not weird, but it was different. For instance, I went inside Room 107 to leave papers for the lucky girl who inherited my cases, and I did that without cursing under my breath or wanting to leave immediately. Those are the thoughts that ordinarily overwhelm you every time you do that. At the same time. I also had to get a visitor's pass to enter the library. I entered that place every day for five years just by making small talk with the guard. I later left the Twilight Zone and went with two blockmates to the alumni hostel to get a "loose piece of clothing that is put on the shoulder" that we are supposed to wear next week. Apparently, it should be worn over something else.

I would probably miss all the things that made my evenings quite different for the past five years. In fact, I was already staying late at work and not leaving the office at 4:00 PM as early as last October (or the end of the first semester), since I only had classes on Saturdays during the second semester. I was already spending more time online at home, and less time searching for stuff on Lawphil at [Section 17, Article III, 1987 Constitution]. Actually, I am going miss it all. Just not now. Right now, I am just grateful and delirious that I do not have to do any of that ever again.

Next.

Hope Springs Eternal, Again

"I find I'm so excited, I can barely sit still or hold a thought in my head. I think it's the excitement only a free man can feel, a free man at the start of a long journey whose conclusion is uncertain. I hope I can make it across the border. I hope to see my friend and shake his hand. I hope the Pacific is as blue as it has been in my dreams. I hope."

- Red, The Shawshank Redemption

After I submitted what hopefully was the last blue book I will ever submit in my life last Saturday, I also hopefully finished Tax 2 and hopefully said goodbye to five long years of cramming for night classes after work, photocopying boxes of cases half of which I probably tried to read at least once, grasping for answers out of thin air during recits, writing down answers legibly, or at least mumbling them, for your reciting seatmate to see or hear. (Disclaimer: I actually still have to submit a portion of an arbitral award, but I just need a working computer to do that.) Five long years were spent looking for the perfect reviewer after an all-too imperfect semester, surviving final exams, waiting for grades, removing conditional failures, and bidding - yes, bidding - for subjects. We also spent some time counseling (presumably) indigent litigants, representing them before courts of (presumably) justice, and experiencing firsthand how (presumptously) a law firm should not be run.

Hopefully, they are all over, and hopefully, I will not have to do any of those things ever again.

When in Rome

I was thinking, if we had "dress-up day" back then, I probably would have worn a collared shirt. Maybe long pants, too. Ok, maybe even a pair of shoes.

虎, 虎, . . .

. . . burning bright

In the forests of the night,

What immortal hand or eye

Could frame thy fearful symmetry

Sinta

Mayo noon ang buwan, at may Santacruzan.
Ikaw ang Elena, sa gabi'y siyang reyna.
Libo ang kandila; ngunit pagtingala -
tila ba himala - higit pa ang tala!

Ilaw rito't doon sa puso ko noon.
Ngunit ako'y lito, kaya't di natanto,
na lahat ng ilaw, na sa aki'y tanglaw,
ay ikaw. Ay ikaw. Ikaw.

Paglipas ng Mayo, pagsungaw ng Hunyo,
nang ika'y lumayo, ilaw ri'y naglaho
At mga kandila nangagsipagluksa
at sa pagtingala wala ni isang tala.

Dilim dito't doon, pumaligid noon,
kung kaya't natanto ng puso kong ito
na lahat ng ilaw na sa aki'y tanglaw,
ay ikaw. Ay ikaw! Ikaw.

Kung ikaw ay wala, wala rin ni tala.
Kung ika'y kapiling, kahit tala'y saling.
Sapagkat ang ilaw na sa aki'y tanglaw
ay ikaw! Ay ikaw! Ikaw!

---
"Ikaw," awit sa dulang "Sinta" ni Pagsi.

Push Button to Eject

A little over nine months after I first entered a courtroom, to make my first appearance before a judge, in my very first case, the client calls and tells me that they received a copy of the decision ordering the adverse party to vacate the property.

Like I said elsewhere, the outcome of the case had everything to do with the contents of the killer position paper, and had absolutely nothing to do with its page formatting. Of course, it also helps if the opposing counsel does not appear to know what he is talking about in his position paper.

I won my first case. Whatever happens for the rest of my life, I can now always say that with a straight face.

Poor Eli

Does anyone who watch Heroes here really think that Eli (and all of his copies) has a snowball's chance in hell of beating Peter and Sylar? I will be disappointed if that fight is not over in five seconds max.

It's a poem. By Robert Burns.

"Anyway, I keep picturing all these little kids playing some game in this big field of rye and all. Thousands of little kids, and nobody's around - nobody big, I mean - except me. And I'm standing on the edge of some crazy cliff. What I have to do, I have to catch everybody if they start to go over the cliff - I mean if they're running and they don't look where they're going I have to come out from somewhere and catch them. That's all I do all day. I'd just be the catcher in the rye and all. I know it's crazy, but that's the only thing I'd really like to be."

- J.D. Salinger (1919-2010), The Catcher in the Rye

---
The Catcher in the Rye, incidentally, is the best ten peso book i ever bought from Book Sale, or anywhere else, for that matter. It was an old Bantam paperback edition with a solid maroon cover with lemon yellow type. It was borrowed and was, unfortunately, never returned.

Higher Learning

At about this time of the year 19 years ago, I and six other people came to school on an ordinary day and found our names posted on one of the bulletin boards along the walk. We passed the UPCAT. The letters arrived at home a few days later.

I recalled that day because last week, my first godchild did not find her name on the list. That list, I presume, is still posted on the bulletin boards of the old "alma meyter," even though UP has already been posting the results on the Web for years now. Ramon Magsaysay HS in Cubao is still posting their list on their wall facing EDSA. That alone gives me enough reason to believe that every other high school in the country is doing the same thing.

It is a fact that it is statistically difficult to get into that list. While high school grades are considered in the selection process, having high grades does not at all guarantee admission into UP. Of the seven of us who made it, only two graduated with honors, prompting one of my classmates who did not make the list, but graduated with honors, to tell to no one in particular that day, that he should have chosen another campus. One of my friends who chose UPLB as his first choice could only snicker. He later met his wife in Elbi, and to make a long story short, they made me a godfather a few years later.

While admission into the premier state university of the country is source of pride for all of us who were lucky enough to make it, it does not mean the end of the world for the others who did not. If anything, I can guarantee that they will be less arrogant than the stereotypical UP student. I myself turned down my slot in UP 19 years ago to attend another school, and it turned out rather well for me (except for the arrogance part - that other school was apparently good at churning out arrogant dicks as well). It was so good, in fact, that 10 years after finishing college in that small liberal arts school in QC, I passed the LAE and was admitted to UP Law. I figured that that would settle, once and for all, all lingering questions in my head about what would have been if I stayed at UP, just like six of my friends. But, that's another story.

While I have no doubt in my mind that she will excel in whatever it is that she chooses to do in the next four years of her life, I want to warn her that, chances are, she will be experiencing the most wonderful moments of her life within the next four years, and she must not be carried away. She will also face her biggest problems and see the best and worst in people. During those moments, it is very likely, that she will be on her own. She must not be overwhelmed by all the new things that she would have to face and she must not lose sight of what she came there for in the first place.

It is, nevertheless, fortunate that she is attending college away from home at this time and age. Unlike her parents and I, she does not have to lug coins with her and fall in line to use the only working PLDT pay phone in the dorm (or campus) to call home. She will have the luxury of a relatively cheap Internet connection to send email and to chat. She can choose to spend her free time in any of the God-knows-how-many malls around the city. She does not have to go to SM City North EDSA every time to catch the last full show.

She will have the best years of her life. She only needs to make sure that she does not have too good a time while at it.

The Homestretch

I have started to count the Fridays and Saturdays off the calendar. Hopefully, in a few more weeks, I can already see the so-called light at the end of this cursed tunnel. It is so close, you can almost taste it.

I have been away from college for more than 10 years now, and I can still recall, with fondness, my days and nights there. Right now, I think I will leave this place (Hopefully. Soon.) with no fondness, except for the remarkable people who made all those years a little bit more tolerable. Of course, things are significantly different in college, the most significant difference being in college, the only thing I had to do was to go to class and pass. That is it. Everything else took care of itself.

(One other thing, is that I don't think my professors in college really went out of their way to really inflict moral damages upon my person. But, of course, one can also argue that it is the method at work.)

Anyway, I have finally started working on the paper. Hopefully, I will be able to finish it on time. I have been religiously attending the elective subject, and so far, it looks like that's all I have to do to get out of it in one piece. The one remaining major subject was supposed to be a 3-unit subject, and it was, until the professor decided that we are not suffering enough, so we now all go to class one hour earlier. "Room 1408," of course, is still one of the seven portals to hell.

By the end of March, I would have already submitted an ejectment case for decision and obtained a final settlement of an award from the NLRC, in a case that has dragged on since my classmates were still in grade school. Hopefully, I would also be able to ask a court to reset a hearing in a case for slander. To May.

Speaking of "Room 1408," is it just me or the old hags just decided to be a wee bit more maniacal? Look, I have been working for more than 14 years and I already had four different jobs in two different countries during that span. I have never, ever, seen a working environment worse than this hellhole pretending to be an office. And that is putting it mildly.

Anyway, I hope everything goes as planned. My sanity cannot afford to stay in that place one day longer than I have to. Besides, I already paid my old college more money for a five-month course, than I ever had in all my four previous years there, combined.

And it is non-refundable.

Scum of the Earth Taxi Co.

It is Christmas once again, where all through the Metro, not a cab driver could be found. Oh, yes. It is open season once again for R&E and all other enterprising Manila cab drivers who suddenly become a wee bit harder-to-get than your stereotypical dalagang Pilipina. They do not even bother to come up with excuses anymore, they just look away and step on the gas.

Which is not to say that this phenomenon is exclusive to the last quarter of the year. It is a year-long event in these parts, and the government agencies mandated to protect the riding public (yes, you DOTC, LTO and LTFRB) seems to be inutile to do anything about it. If we presume that official duty is being regularly performed, and that they are actually eagerly waiting for pissed-off people to file complaints before them, and that no one has done exactly that, it should conveniently explain the temerity of these scum to just continue going about their merry ways, shouldn't it?

But, come on. It is public freaking knowledge. You and I watch the Amazing Race, and I am willing to bet the head of a cab driver on a plate, that we have the only spot of earth in the known universe where cab drivers routinely turn down passengers. I would not even be surprised if it is on Lonely Planet.

(Here is an unsolicited suggestion to the next president: appoint Bayani as chair of the LTFRB. If he can do to these assholes what he did to street vendors, I'll vote for him for whatever position in 2013 or 2016. That's a promise.)

On a related note, I would like to commend Michael Fajatin (who might just live down his Mendiola episode) for being a Good Samaritan last Friday by asking a cab driver, in not so subtle terms, to take a pregnant woman to her destination. The woman was apparently initially refused by the scumbag because she was not going to where he was going.

Welcome to the Philippines and Merry Christmas.

Mellon Collie

T'was the week before christmas
And all through the town
All the people were trippin
Then somethin came down

I never knew i had it
Day after day the dullness grew
Then one day i just felt plain lazy

- Eraserheads, Mono Virus

Vote For Me!

Better yet, vote wisely.

---

Image courtesy of the Center for People Empowerment in Governance (CenPEG).

Quote of the Day

"We wants it, we needs it. Must have the precious."

- Gollum Macapagal-Arroyo

Hayok

Sabi pa nila ay dito mo rin matatagpuan
Ang tao na nagmamay-ari ng isang upuan
Na pag may pagkakatao'y pinag-aagawan
Kaya naman hindi niya pinakakawalan
Kung makikita ko lamang siya ay aking sisigawan

- Gloc-9, Upuan

Just in case we need somebody to blame someday, here are the towns composing the second legislative district of Pampanga: Floridablanca, Guagua, Lubao, Porac, Santa Rita, Sasmuan.

FYI.

Hindsight is 20/20

MALACANANG
MANILA

EXECUTIVE ORDER No. 546

DIRECTING THE PHILIPPINE NATIONAL POLICE TO UNDERTAKE ACTIVE SUPORT TO THE ARMED FORCES OF THE PHILIPPINES IN INTERNAL SECURITY OPERATIONS FOR THE SUPPRESSION OF INSURGENCY AND OTHER SERIOUS THREATS TO NATIONAL SECURITY, AMENDING CERTAIN PROVISIONS OF EXECUTIVE ORDER NO. 110 SERIES OF 1999 AND FOR OTHER PURPOSES

WHEREAS, Section 12 of Republic Act No. 6975, as amended by Republic Act No. 8551, provides that the primary responsibility involving the suppression of insurgency and other serious threats to national security rests with the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) and that the Philippine National Police (PNP) shall, through information gathering and performance of its ordinary police functions, support the AFP on matters involving the suppression of insurgency, except in cases where the President shall call on the PNP to support the AFP in combat operations;

WHEREAS, the National Democratic Front, the Communist Party of the Philippines and its military arm, the New People's Army, have been waging an armed struggle against the Government and the Filipino people for more than thirty years;

WHEREAS, the ongoing insurgency has a negative impact on the economy and resolving the insurgency will foster a climate conducive to economic growth and national development;

WHEREAS, to effectively address this threat, there is a need for a "whole of government approach" to ensure sustained, consistent, integrated and coordinated international security measures against the Communist Terrorist Movement and other organized elements/groups engaged in armed offensives against the Government;

NOW, THEREFORE, I, GLORIA MACAPAGALARROYO, President of the Republic of the Philippines, by virtue of the powers vested in me by law, do hereby order the following:

SECTION 1. The PNP shall support the AFP in combat operations involving the suppression of insurgency and other serious threats to national security.

SEC. 2. In the exercise of its responsibility, subject to the concurrence of the appropriate Local Chief Executive through the Local Peace and Order Council, the PNP is hereby authorized to deputize the barangay tanods as force multipliers in the implementation of the peace and order plan in the area.

SEC. 3. The Department of the Interior and Local Government shall exert efforts in securing and institutionalizing funding support from Local Government Units. For this purpose, governors and mayors, as deputized representatives of the National Police Commission in their respective territorial jurisdiction, and in relation to their sworn duty to implement Section 16 of the Local Government Code, shall ensure that sufficient funds shall be appropriated in their annual budget for the operational and logistical support of the concerned PNP units for the implementation of this Executive Order.

SEC. 4. The Local Chief Executives, in coordination with the Local Peace and Order Councils, shall include in the integrated area/ Community Public Safety Plan of their respective city/municipality, the priority program of action/thrust in resolving the insurgency and other serious threats to national security and ensure appropriation thereof for effective implementation of this Executive Order.

SEC. 5. All executive issuances, rules and regulations or parts thereof which are inconsistent with this Executive Order are hereby revoked, amended, or modified accordingly.

SEC. 6. This Executive Order shall take effect immediately.

DONE, in the City of Manila, this 14th of July in the year of Our Lord, Two Thousand and Six.

(Sgd.) GLORIA MACAPAGAL-ARROYO
President of the Philippines

By the President:

(Sgd.) EDUARDO R. ERMITA
Executive Secretary

Open Season

Look at the shoes your filling
Look at the blood we're spilling
Look at the world we're killing
The way we've always done before
Look in the doubt we've wallowed
Look at the leaders we've followed
Look at the lies we've swallowed
And I don't want to hear no more

My hands are tied
For all I've seen has changed my mind
But still the wars go on as the years go by
With no love of God or human rights
'Cause all these dreams are swept aside
By bloody hands of the hypnotized
Who carry the cross of homicide
And history bears the scars of our civil wars

- Civil War, Guns N' Roses

Reeling and Writhing

It is amusing how the "country's largest political party" with its highly-touted "machinery" could not even field a complete Senate slate of twelve. This much was admitted, barely a week after party leaders shrugged off reports of defections, and referred to those who left the party as "insignificant."

Within the past week, the "country's largest political party" selected actor and game show host Edu Manzano to be its candidate for Vice-President of the Philippines (Can you say "Game KNB?"). Former Senator Ralph Recto and his wife Batangas Governor Vilma Santos confirmed yesterday that it left the "country's largest political party" for the Liberal Party. As far as I know, they were not called "insignificant." Earlier today, Quezon City Mayor Sonny Belmonte and Vice-Mayor Herbert Bautista followed suit.

With all the airtime its party leaders are enjoying, I am at a loss as to how it cannot field a slate of twelve. Off the top of my head, I can suggest Eduardo Ermita, Prospero Nograles, Prospero Pichay, Mikey Arroyo, Romulo Neri, Raul Gonzales, Ignacio Bunye, Anthony Golez, Cerge Remonde, and my all-time favorite Lorelei Fajardo. That's ten names right there. Add that to the eight other people they are considering (which incidentally includes incumbent Senators of the Republic Ramon "Bong" Revilla, Jr. and Lito Lapid), there is no way the "country's largest political party" cannot come up with twelve names, and there is no way they could possibly lose next year's elections.

Right.

Today, ladies and gentlemen, is the first day, of the rest of its life.

* * *

May 2010 is shaping up to be a three-way horse race among alumni of three institutions of higher learning: Aquino and Roxas are from Ateneo, Villar and Legarda are from UP, Teodoro and Manzano are from DLSU. Well, you know where my loyalties lie.