Filipino victory! :D

I'm pretty sure this news will be in many blogs and emails but I just really have to have it here too. hahaha.

Gian Dapul won the English Speaking Union’s International Public Speaking Competition.

Yes. This is the same competition that Patricia Evangelista won. Only, Gian is just an incoming senior student at Pisay.

It's amazing when you hear news about Filipinos we can be proud of and know not only their names and their feats. Watching the group of Ivy, Cindy and Mariel on TV for their project that won in Intel and now Gian gives credibility to what people always say, we can all make a difference in our own way and make our country proud.

Congrats Gian! :D Good job. The entire Philippines, especially the Pisay community is migty proud of you.

As we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same.

Thank you

I got into ASLA Batch 6!

Thank you Lord! This is another wonderful blessing. Pahiya na naman ako when I tried to give up when a challenge came along.

Thank you parents, Sir Ed, Jason, Rob and Ivan for the support. :D Thank you God for these people.

Congrats to Rob, Ivan, Kuya Ed, Kuya Jaron and Ate Noreen! :D

I'm so excited. :)

Long overdue greeting

Congratulations!!!

Daniel Go
Tin Pascual
Eric Sy
1st Place Freshmen Math Intersection Challenge Category B

Mike Ybanez
Edgar Toledo
Vyen Villanueva
3rd Place Freshmen Math Intersection Challenge Category B

I wish I could have watched but I had to go home. Oh well.

Congratulations, guys. Block N and Math18 Section B are the best!!! :D Having 4 of the most intelligent Math people (uy. haha) in our block is great news for me. Patulong :) Just goes to prove that the best are in Computer courses. :p Congratulations again!!!

Congratulations!

Congratulations Rob and Ianna. :D

I'm so happy for the two of you. You deserve the win. God bless you both in all your endeavors for SOSE! :D Congrats talaga!! I'm really excited for you. haha. Halata ba? :))

SOSE!!! We just proved we're a bunch of really intelligent and wise students and voters. This victory is not only Rob's or Ianna's or Ignacio's. It's a victory for the entire School of Science and Engineering. We deserve to have the best leaders and we did get them. So congrats to all of us too!!! =D

Pisay Movie Reflection =)

Those on the right side of the normal curve are the winners. Inside each side of the normal curve, there are smaller normal curves. No matter which side you're on in that smaller normal curve inside the right side of the major normal curve, you're still a winner!

No. This is not a review. =)) Refer to the hyperlink in the next paragraph for a wonderful review. :)

from Ogg's movie thoughts:

The highly specialized academic training breeds a curious and unique culture among its students. Characterized by vicious competition, contained social lives, and harsh predestination, the Pisay culture feels very much like a tribal unit; separated from the suggested norm of those outside the cemented walls of the institution, but still operating a reflex against any extraneous stimuli that comes its way.

Being a member of the Pisay community, I couldn't agree more to the fact that the academic training we received brought out a curious and unique culture that non-Pisay-ers may not easily understand. These are brought about by (1) the sense of pride that getting into that school gives us, (2) the humility that the early realization that there will always be people better than us brings, (3) the tremendous amount of workload we receive, (4) the early commitment to pursue a career in the field of science and technology, (5) the pressure/responsibility to make this country a better place that we receive as early as 1st year and (6) the feeling that we have been so blessed by God to experience all these. That is to name only a few.

When I talk to many Pisay friends especially now that we have moved on to college, we realize how idealistic we have grown. We expect the best from everyone and everything because we know it's possible. We know that idealism isn't inversely proportional to realism. It is when we start believing that we and the country don't deserve the best that we contribute to our country's doom.

I met a couple friend of my parents who has a son in Batch '09. When we discussed the fact that Pisay students don't seem to want to go abroad, they said, "Ano ba ang pinakain sa inyo ng Pisay?" My parents have another friend who is an alumnus of Pisay. His son is in Pisay as well. They share the same ideals. Hindi ko rin alam kung ano ang pinakain sa amin ng Pisay, pero ito lang ang alam ko, ano man yun, masaya akong natanggap ko yun.

The film brought almost all the emotions you could experience in Pisay to the movie screen. I couldn't help but cry.

More than saying congratulations to a wonderful movie, I deem it more appropriate to say "Thank you!" Thank you to Director Auraeus Solito, Batch '86 for immortalizing Pisay and for making all of us more proud of our school than we already were. Thank you to the cast for giving justice to all the roles. Ang galing niyo lahat! Of course, lalong lalo na Batch '07's very own Shayne Fajutagana! You make us all proud! :D

So everyone, go watch this movie! If you're not from Pisay, I'm not sure if it'll make you feel we're actually humans too or if it'll make you feel like we're mutants. haha. Nevertheless, I'm pretty sure everyone can relate to the emotions in the film because this film is all about being young and being Filipino. I'm sure we either are or have been both that in our lifetime. To the Pisay people, it's our story. I don't see how you're not going to love it. :D

regionals press con '06

Congratulations to the following people:
Ray2 - 7th place in News Writing
Jerome - 10th place in Pagsulat ng Editoryal
and...
Jeric - 2nd place in Sports Writing (kahit 10 min article ang sinubmit mo)//fisher ka talaga. isama mo kami.

grabe! yeah. end na ng secondary press con careers namin(except jeric, apollo & honey) pero it was so fun. ang galing ni God. instead of being sad, i am more filled with joy and contentment. i'm just thankful i was given the chance to join these contests, which helped build up confidence in myself and in the way i write and taught me to look deeper into every story. ang news, hindi lang kung ano yung nasasagot ng 4 w's and 1 h. ito ay may masmalalim na kahulugan dahil ito ay may epekto sa buhay ng mga tao. haha. :D

also, i'd like to congratulate my previous school:
mandee - 3rd in news writing, 1st in editorial writing (pahingi naman ng 1 slot. lol.), highest pointer, most outstanding journalist. //grabe! galing!
kat kam - 2nd in copyreading & headline writing
kat lucas - 1st in feature writing
meryl (my sister!!! :p) - 7th in sports writing. //2nd year pa lang yan. :D
St. Paul College, Pasig - highest school pointer
*applause*

Praise God!!! :D

award-winning journalist sister ko!!!

My sister, Meryl, won 2nd place over-all in English in the San Juan-Pasig Division Secondary Schools Press Conference (DSSPC)!!! :)

Praise God!!!

She won 4th place in Sports Writing and 4th place in Feature Writing.

I'm the super proud sister. Galing ni God! :D

Yun lng. :p

Praise God!!!

Thank you lord for these victories...

Kanina lang... YMCA Search for Outstanding Campus Journalists
Jeric - 1st place Sports Writing
Ivy - 6th place Pagsulat ng Balita
Clar - 8th place Editorial Writing

Oct 4-6... QC Division Secondary Schools Press Conference
Rob - 10th place Editorial Writing and 2nd place DevComm Essay
Ryan - 5th place Feature Writing
Jeric - 3rd place Sports Writing and 1st place Sports Essay
Clar - 5th place Editorial Writing and 2nd place Sports Essay

Thank you once again God! To you be all the honor and glory.

Freaky Fairday

The best fair ever...

When we started planning even before the opening of the school year, the goal was already to make it the best Pisay fair ever. At the end during the fireworks display and when we were wetting people, we realized we pulled it off. It was great.

There was no better sight for us than people enjoying themselves, serious about getting redemption tickets, watching the events and trying out the wall climbing, inflatables and the velcro wall. Oh, and of course going around in a circle led by the brotherhood. It was really just something that gave the Pisay community the chance to bond.

And it didn't even rain during the fair (nung BotB lang)!!! To think that rain was pretty hard the days before and after. God really held the rain for us. Thank you Lord! Oh and Sta. Clara too for interceding for us.

Congratulations to all of us!!!

07, we pulled it off!!! Thank you so much for being so united and cooperative. We just never fail to show Pisay that we're one tremendous batch. Let's continue to make our last school year together meaningful and memorable.

Brotherhood/jailers, ang galing!!! You were very organized. At the end of the day, you managed to show everyone that the catching was just part of the business and the fun. It was so admirable how you were able to unite the people through the line, circle, whatever that was.

Fair com, thank you so much for the love and dedication you put into this event. despite the large amount of school work, you were still willing to help. we really appreciate that.

Kat, Nico and Kuya Caleb, I enjoyed my first attempt at marketing with you. Kat & Nico, thank you so much for being so hardworking and patient with the sponsors and me as well. Kuya Caleb, thank you for being our consultant. We really appreciate the time you gave us, the help and the concern.

Ma'am Gene, Sir Vlad, Mich, Rob, Redg, Nico, Maisie - Thank you! This was one great learning experience for me and I'm glad I did this with all of you. Thank you for the inspiration, the contagious dedication and the support. Congratulations to us.

God!!! thank you. we couldn't have done this without you. :D

family day '06

We won over-all champion in the games.

But what was truly great about this day was the camaraderie. I have never seen our batch cooperate, cheer and act the way we did today. We were very proud of our victories but remained gracious in defeat. There was just so much love for the batch and I’m pretty sure everyone in that gym felt it too. It was our last family day in Pisay and we showed everyone how a batch is suppose to act. We showed everyone what the family day was all about – family, bonding, fun and love.

But none of my words would ever be able to explain how great I felt about 07 today. I’ve never felt as proud of our batch as I did today. Kahit yung almost sweep of last year’s awards couldn’t compare to this. I feel so blessed that I'm in this batch. I guess it’s the fact that we’re parting ways soon. But we’re not done yet. Pisay, expect great things from us this year. GO ’07!!!

district press con

District press con

We won 3rd over-all with 109 points!!!

The winners (courtesy of ray2):

News
Ray2 Alcantara - 4th (English)
Ivy Ventura - 3rd (Filipino)

Copyreading and Headline Writing
Henson Turalde - 6th (English)
KJ Cenidoza - 10th (Filipino)
Marcgene...? - 9th (Filipino)

Editorial Writing
Clarisse Ligunas - 3rd (English)
Kristine Mortega - 2nd (Filipino)
Jerome David - 1st (Filipino) !!!

Sports
Max Gana - 2nd (English)
Marc Lancion - 3rd (Filipino)

Feature
Tami Reyes - 5th (English)
Ryan Magtibay - 3rd (English)
Jerome David - 7th (Filipino)
Honey Dela Cruz - 5th (Filipino)

Editorial Cartooning
Regina Estrada - 9th (English)
Dani de Leon - 7th (English)

Photojournalism
Gino Gomez - 9th (English)
Joanna Cuayo - 6th (Filipino)

Broadcasting
Best Anchor - Umm. Egg? Or Jiano? Or Egg AND Jiano?
Best Script

God is so good!!! His love is overwhelming. Thank you for the victory! Thank you for being our guide!!!
SS-LL, walisin na natin YMCA.

Harbour Center Portmasters...

are the PBL Unity Cup 2006 champions.

They worked hard to climb from the bottom but they victoriously made it to the top. Every single one of them did what they had to do. They truly deserve the championship.

Congratulations Harbour!

And once again I'd like to mention, it's only their 3rd conference in the PBL.

Yay!!!

Ateneo Summer Programming Camp

For the past two weeks, I’ve been attending the ASPC at the Ateneo De Manila University. Everyday, may lecture sa start from members of the Department of Information Systems and Computer Science (DISCS) Faculty followed by practice exercises tapos contest sa end. The last two days official contest na. Teammates ko sina Rob & Nico. We won 3rd. Sorry hindi ko memorize yung names nung 4th and 5th. Yung team nila Nellie, Mary Grace & Marnie from Chang Kai Shek won 2nd. Tapos UNEXPECTEDLY yung first place yung team nila Fatima, Ivan & Paul. We were all so surprised. Lol. The entire 2 weeks were really fun. It could have lasted for an entire month and I wouldn’t have mind.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS:

Sir Anton & Ivan - for telling us about the camp.
Sir Anton (again) - for waiting for our forms patiently even if some of us submitted them to you less than 15 mins from the deadline (Goes to show how much we procrastinate), for inviting the entire group out to lunch, for wishing us luck and making us feel that we could still fight, for developing our interest in programming through both comp sci class and proogies, for opening for us an exciting new world. We are really super sorry for leaving early last Thursday.

The organizers – for preparing such a wonderful event, for all the hard work you put into it, for the challenge, for giving us headaches ü, for everything you taught us, for being so approachable and friendly, for making us feel at home, for always checking on us and making sure we were all fine, for being so patient with us especially us pisay people who were always so intense and hyper, for the warm welcome and goodbye, for the very updated yahoo group, for the pizza (esp for considering that it was Friday), and for everything you imparted to us
The kuyas:
Kuya Neil – for continuously cheering for everyone and pushing us to continue, for the constant plugging of the Ateneo and CS, for being the judge, for showing us how long one of our problems took to execute(lol), for helping me with one of the triangles, for teaching us that contest programming is not all about skill but is about knowing how to work well with others
Kuya Elijah – for moderating the games during the first day, for being so warm and friendly, for the tour, for pouring the pepsi for us a while ago, for moderating the contests, for taking our pictures a while ago
Kuya Kenny – for always smiling, for making the test cases, for always being so cool and relaxed in everything you did
Kuya Mike – for making the test cases too, for seeming like you didn’t want to give a speech a while ago, (like kuya Kenny) for also being so relaxed

The Ates - even if there were only 2 of you out of the 6, super galing niyo po pareho. Girl power talaga:
Ate Gretch – for being super friendly, for being the president of the computer org something (kasi girl power kaya ang amazing po), for telling us and the other teams daily to continue solving and do our best when we were already tired and quite lazy (making us feel that we still had the chance to solve more. ü), for also being so approachable and warm, for making us feel that we were so welcome, for moderating the games, for taking the gazillion number of pictures a while ago
Ate Steph – for also being super friendly, for always watching over our backs (both abstractly and literally), for helping us with our syntax problems (ang bilis niyo po magdebug. Grabe. One look alam niyo na po yung mali ü), for being happy with us when our programs successfully ran, for always smiling, for being soooo approachable, for all the help and patience especially since we were in one of the rows assigned to you.

My teammates:
For being patient with me, for being great programmers, for bearing with the times I was lazy, hungry or sulky, for the tsimis I obtained, for not replacing me even if I was absent nung Day 8. lol. I’m super sorry for the mistakes I committed a while ago. I realized that they could have made much of a difference in our time and gave us more to solve another. But I do know looking back at the contest this way is an insult to God and what I was saying (even if it was jokingly) a while ago wasn’t good. But we did win so congrats!!! Ang galing natin. We were very consistent. Go team 17!!!
Rob – for coding really well, for reminding nico and I not to be sulky, for understanding my vague explanations of the solutions to the problems, for uplifting nico and I and keeping the team intact, for your good programming practices during the last half hour which gave us so much, for saying I’m not fat. lol.
Nico – for doing most of the math stuff because I sure am happy that you took those kind of problems ;>, for being ultra pessimistic and ultra optimistic with me, for being organized and oc too, for knowing which problems were easy and which were difficult, for providing the team with the energy and enthusiasm we need.
**I had lots of fun with both of you. Though we have our disappointments, I enjoyed every part of it. I enjoyed sharing everything we’ve accomplished with you two. Now, I don’t think I have any regrets at all because we learned a lot from each other, from the experience and even from the results. The experience was both uplifting and humbling and it couldn’t get any better than that. Thank you to the two of you talaga. Ang drama ko. Nacarry over from the moment a while ago. Haha.

The other Pisay people:
Fatima – hey! Wala na talaga akong posibleng message for you. lol. Thanks for being there, for cheering for us(haha), for the stories and for the telebabad sessions despite the fact that we were already with each other the entire morning
Ivan – ikaw lang sa pisay ang hindi ko naging kagroup kaya tulungan mo na lang ako sa cs & proogies next yr. Haha. Thanks for the challenge! You always pushed all of us to our limits. Your presence helped us keep going on and never stop. Thank you for cheering for us too.
Paul – for being yourself. You still manage to make us laugh kahit araw-araw ka na naming kasama. Sorry kung it took me quite some time to understand what you wanted me to code nung magkagroup tayo. Thank you for cheering too.
**To the three of you, congrats! I am amazed at your efficiency as a group. You three helped a lot by cheering for us. It was uplifting having your support.

To the others:
Erlyn – partner… thanks for dealing with my panic and for being friendly. It removed my uncertainty in working with other people besides my schoolmates.
Nellie, Marnie and Mary Grace – Congratulations! thanks for the competition. Your group reminded us to keep on solving and never give up. Galing niyo. ü
Rai, Miggy and Kevin – for the conversation at the cafeteria and being friendly. You 3 are fun.
Patricia – for the conversations especially when Fat, Nico & Rob had our very educational tricycle experience and when I was fetched late, for helping Fatima and I find our way, for being so friendly, warm and nice
Kim – for visiting my blog. Too bad you guys became so busy. ü
… and everyone else – It was super fun to be with everyone. Thanks for bearing with our noise. Sa bagay, weren’t we all? ü Too bad we didn’t have more time to bond. I hope we all bump into each other someday or better yet we organize something pati na rin the ates and kuyas that will bring us all together soon.

Haha. Ang dami kong sinabi. It was so much fun e kaya I couldn’t just let the event pass without a blog entry. ü If you reached this point, thank you for still reading. ü

YMSAT week (part 2-math club events)

And now as Math Club members, we get to do the most enviable tasks.

·First off, Fatima gave the Math club symposium regarding the Pythagorean theorem (I know… It’s nerdy but who cares. People from other schools actually signed up to attend it. Haha.) I was there to support and conduct games and stuff. It was fun. Most of the group seemed to have fun too. For the 1st and 2nd years who were there, SOH-CAH-TOA will now be one of the topics they will await with much joy and excitement in their hearts in the year/s to come.

·Math intersection of the 1st year was the only one I was able to proctor in. For the team competition, I proctored Topaz who won 2nd place. *applause* The determining factor for their victory was the 9 points they earned from the difficult round. They were very active children but if that’s the way they solve Math problems then who am I to object. lol. *another round of applause*

·For the individual round, I was supposed to proctor Ysy Alvero but since Neon Antonio was according to ate Pauline a difficult proctoree(I do know that’s not an actual word), I was transferred to him. He almost won. He was after-all 1st at the end of the easy round and 2nd at the end of the average. He was 5th at the end of the difficult round. He almost got the very difficult question correctly with bonus points because he raised his flag but he had one extra digit in the answer that required only 7. Neon will forever remind me of the 7-digit number 9765431 and the 8-digit number 97654321. After raising his flag, he wanted to check if there were only really 7 digits in his answer. It turned out there were 8. Sad but he performed really well even if he wasn’t feeling very well and according to him wasn’t good at solving math problems. But as he said, what was important was that he had fun. He also made proctoring a moody yet very appreciative proctoree enjoyable for ate Pauline and I. lol. *applause*

·Friday is math interscholastics competition day. Janel, Fatima, Kristine and I were in charge of registration. The schools that arrived were (in alphabetical order) Ateneo, Chang Kai Shek, Grace Christian, La Salle Zobel, Mandaluyong Science, Parañaque Science, Paref Woodrose, Rizal High School, San Francisco, St. Stephen’s, Tarlac High School, Uno, UP Rural (Laguna), and one more I apparently forgot. Fatima and I proctored one of the rooms where the guests were taking the eliminations stage, the written exam because some 4th years didn’t arrive. Then we checked the papers and found out who qualified for the finals.

·During the finals, I proctored in the individual round. I was assigned to Mico Cariño of the Ateneo, who is apparently the brother of my sister’s classmate in the Math DD of St. Paul. He started of pretty rough. There were 2 consecutive questions wherein he was the only one who was not able to get the answer correctly. He ended 9th after the easy round, 7th after the average round. And then the difficult stage came. Before that round, he was not fond of using his flag. Even if he got the answer quickly, he opted to check it once again. In the difficult round which had 5 questions, there were only 3 questions where the questions were correctly answered. He got the maximum score 9 points for 2 of the 3 because he used his flag. *applause* He ended 2nd after that round and since only one person answered the very difficult question correctly, he was able to end the competition in 2nd place. *applause once again* In contrast to the others I’ve proctored this year, Cariño was serious with what he was doing. In contrast to what a friend saw in his blog, I never reminded him he was in last place but as he mentioned correctly, I constantly reminded him of the scores. lol. I only told him his ranking when he was second already and congratulated him for that. haha

·Sadly, I wasn’t able to watch the team competition, the 1st time in my entire stay in Pisay because we met with Ma’am Edulan and ate Tin regarding the youth camp. In previous years, I attended all the Math club events. This year I wasn’t able to help out with the treasure hunt and the team finals. Sorry ate Athena. But this was the year where I most enjoyed every event I helped out with. I did in previous years but this year was extra fun. I’m sure you know that because I’ve used the word “fun” more times than I would usually do.

Yun lang. Haha. Kung umabot ka dito, salamat at nagtiyaga kang magbasa. Kung hindi, well hindi mo na to mababasa so wala akong message for you. Gosh. Ang bangag ko na. Yun lang. Bye.

YMSAT week (part 1)

//I know this entry is late but I just can’t stop myself from writing an entry about it.

The YMSAT week is the event I look forward to every year. Here are the reasons why this year’s version of it was so fun…

·Our group, the Be Dye-namics group won 2nd out of 20 groups in the Chemistry Entrepreneurial Contest. Congratulations to our group (Rob, Nico, Lara, Krishna, Jan Michael, James, Paul, Wewel, Jao, John Mark and I)! Our artistic ability in tying rubber bands and mixing colors and of course never to forget our exceptional advertising (or pangungulit, which those who bought probably find more appropriate) abilities paid off. To Rob, Nico and Lara… Thanks for leading the group so well. Really sorry I was almost totally if not completely useless for 2 ½ days. To Jan Michael, Wewel and Jao… I never knew you guys were so artistic. To James… Thanks for being so willing to run to wherever we needed you to run to. To Nico and Paul… Our routine was so cute, “entrepreneurial”, “scientific” and formal all at the same time.

·Beryllium won the Math Treasure Hunt. With our convincing bargaining skills, knowledge of the mistakes in the set-up and John Mark and Ivan, we enjoyed it. I commend Ate Athena and Sir Chuck. They prepared a less tiring (it was still tiring. The other treasure hunts were just exceptionally and remarkably exhausting.) but more interesting set-up. They were also able to allow some of the less mathematically gifted of us to do some things.

·The Chem Quiz Bee had the honor of being graced by our class’ most promising love team, Givan (Gihan and Ivan). The Math Interscho saw the pride of our class, John Mark and Ivan.

·The president of India arrived at our school. It was pretty amazing to see the gym being cleaned, bomb squads inside Pisay, the red carpet rolled out, a lot of Indians who made everyone look at the entrance whenever they arrived thinking the president was with them.

·The Physics symposium was interesting. Mr. Palima’s talk had so much in it. Everyone in the room especially liked the way he related love to Physics concepts. The Chem symposium was amazing because she didn’t explain chemistry. Maoi Arroyo had so much to share but she never left a dull moment in her 2-hour talk. I would love to get a copy of the ppt she used during her talk. She’s an example of one Pisay graduate I would love to be like in the future. Though I doubt that I would go into business or anything biotech related, her success and (I guess it would be safe to say) dominance in her chosen field at a relatively young age is inspiring. I would like to earn my 1st million before I reach 30 too.

kung ano ano

1) Congratulations to: Ray2 – 7th in news writing
Kuya Jman – 3rd in editorial writing
In the regionals presscon. Galing niyo talaga. Sobra!!! Galing din ni God. Good luck and more importantly God bless kuya jman.

2) Beryllium’s Christmas party was really fun. Galing gumawa ng games ni Lara.

3) Batang Masaya is an exceptional program. I was really glad to have had the chance to be part of it. Kuya JF and I were team leaders of the red team. The team won 1st prize. Red! Red! Red! Red! You could really see that the kids were having fun and the team leaders weren’t exceptions. We also enjoyed playing the games and listening to the stories. May magic chemical silang panlaba. :p At the end of the day, we were indescribably tired but we didn’t mind because it was very fulfilling as it was a great way to serve God and His children.

4) After visiting 168, Gateway, St. Francis Square, SM Megamall, Tiendesitas, Shangri-la and Market! Market!, I have a good idea of what I’m getting for all of my friends. I’ve started buying for some oh them. I love shopping especially during Christmas.

5) I’m really excited about CA3’s praise concert. Fun. Fun.

6) I’m going to buy cloth for my prom dress already and I’m still trying to choose from the designs I have at hand.

SEA Games

This might be a bit too late but I just wanted to share.

Isn’t it irritating to hear rumors about cheating in the SEA Games? What’s worse is we hear even our own countrymen considering it. Some are even quite certain about it. Personally, I believe no such cheating happened. I think the Philippines won fair and square. We obtained the over-all win by the strength and talent of the Filipino athletes and God’s grace (we couldn’t have won without His help). So here’s what I have to say to those who doubt the Philippines’ SEAG win.

First, there is no problem with the officiating personnel. The Philippines didn’t hire them. They’re not Filipinos. We can’t bribe them either because we don’t have the money to do so.

Second, most sports do not rely on its officials for the results. Take for example, athletics where we did really well in, bowling (It’s quite absurd though that Singapore thinks something was wrong with their lane which caused their losses.), swimming and many others. You know what I mean.

Third, it isn’t surprising that we’d end up with a better prize in our country than when the SEAG are held in foreign lands. People argue that when the competition is held outside the country, we don’t perform as well. Here’s why. It’s not even the home court advantage. That advantage lies only in the familiarity with the sporting venues, weather, wind speed, and anything else related to that. Sometimes, playing in front of your kababayans can even be quite pressuring. Like what the national bowling team’s coach said, when you’re winning, the crowd’s cheers and smiles can uplift you but when you’re not doing so well, their presence would put a lot of pressure on you. Our true advantage lies in the size of our delegation. If the competition were in Thailand or Vietnam, the Philippines won’t be able to send as much athletes. Here in the Philippines, transportation costs wouldn’t be much of a burden. Thus, we gain more chances of winning. Do you think RP could send 800++ national athletes to another nation?

Finally, it’s been proven time and again that Filipinos do really well in sports. The Philippines is home to some of the world’s sporting legends. I won’t even start naming these people. Let’s give it to our national athletes. They trained hard. They gave their all for the Philippines’ glory despite the lack of funds from the government. They gave it their best shot. It’s just but right for us to acknowledge that effort and inspiring love for our country. They gave us reason to be proud that we are Filipinos. It would be unfair to question the victories they wholeheartedly offered to all of us. The least we can do is show some appreciation for what they’ve done for this country.

Congratulations to our Filipino athletes! You deserve all our praises and thanks!

A tribute to the God most high

More often than not, people depend on their own capabilities in dealing with all the challenges and opportunities that come their way. They do not realize how much they are missing by not accepting that there is so much more God can do with our lives. At times when you think nothing is going right and the world wants to fall down on your head, he brings you something great. He gives you a source of joy and fulfillment. That’s the kind of God He is. He loves his people so much and is willing to give us our hearts’ desires if it will be for the good of our souls. All we have to do is ask and He won’t be selfish. God’s gifts are readily available for everyone. We just have to offer our lives to Him and allow Him to do whatever He wants with them. Nothing could ever beat the knowledge that He is the one controlling our lives. With Him in the driver seat, we know that we are heading the right direction, we are safe and that great things are up ahead for us.
Thank you God! Pisay’s victory is for you. Your love and goodness cannot be measured.

/* Ray2 won 1st in news writing, Henson won 2nd in Copyreading and headline writing, Jerome won 2nd in the Filipino counterpart of Copyreading and headline writing, I won 4th in Editorial writing and Ryan won 5th in Feature writing. Pisay won third over all (out of 48 schools) in the YMCA Search for Outstanding Campus Journalists earlier today. Congratulations sa lahat ng Pisay contestants (Ray2, Hiyas, Ryan, ate who joined features writing in Filipino. Sorry po ate I don’t know your name), Sarah, Kuya Daniel, Apollo, Henson, Jerome, Nico, Angela, Ate Val and Andy) and of course our very beautiful and handsome advisers na sina Ma’am Jams and Sir Santi. God gave us this win. Journ the best!!!! */