Dontcha wish you had all these...

Barbie, Britney, Pussycat Dolls, Pimp fashion...

The picture above sure looks yummy, which is why the sexualization of little girls is happening with hardly a raised eyebrow from the adults.

Read "Childhood versus the Pussycat Dolls" at MercatorNet

Discrimination against women?

It's a program which works to help men become more responsible fathers, and the National Organization for Women is crying foul, saying the program is illegal because it's only about men.

Read "NOW demands access to program geared to fathers" at The Washington Post

The comments that follow the article are quite interesting too.

Expecting the unexpected

There was a bit of excitement at the office yesterday. For a few minutes, some of us flocked around Myrna when someone got wind of her being expectant. Myrna's doctor confirmed it last week, and only last week did I find out that she had had two pregnancies already which both ended in miscarriage during the first trimester. "Gulat nga kami eh ("We were really surprised")," she remarked as we milled around her as we heard the news, "inaccept ko na na hindi na ako magkaka-anak" ("I've accepted that I won't ever have children anymore")." That's the reason why she has adopted a young relative of hers; also, she had given away all her hardly-used maternity clothes so she'll need to do some shopping soon. She's 7 weeks on and the bulge is starting to show.

That makes two women in the office pregnant (the other one, Carla, is due to give birth in May)! Hence, everyday I have tangible reminders around me of little human beings growing until they're ready for the world outside their mother.

Carrying on nicely at 106

I looked for a photo of Mr. Zamuco but there don't seem to be any on the internet. Anyway, this is quite an inspiring read. It reminds me of my late grandfather who also spent decades at the UP Los Baños.


Oldest living Pinoy is a retired UP college dean

By RUDY A. FERNANDEZ
The Philippine Star

On May 9, Gregorio Torio Zamuco will turn 106 years old.

This makes him (as of this writing) the oldest living Filipino, a month and 26 days older than Maria Torres Vicente, who was featured in The STAR’s Jan. 1 issue. (Or is there anyone out there who is more than 106 years old?)

Interestingly, both Zamuco and Vicente hail from Pangasinan: Zamuco, a son of Aguilar town, and Apong Maria, who was born in Urdaneta City on July 3, 1901.

The STAR learned about Zamuco’s age from a friend who is now writing a book titled "Centennial Review: 100 Great Moments in UPLB’s History." (UPLB stands for University of the Philippines Los Baños).

Dr. Fernando Bernardo, who retired a few years ago as deputy director general of the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI), has been devoting his time writing books covering important facets of Philippine history as well as the arts, including poetry and painting.

Bernardo, also a former UPLB College of Agriculture dean, expects to finish writing his latest book — on UPLB — this year.

For his new project, he interviewed Zamuco, among other UPLB old hands.

One interesting vignette in the life of Zamuco, who spent the last phase of his professional life as dean (1958-1966) of the UPLB College of Forestry, was about his arrest during the Japanese occupation of Los Baños in World War II.

As he narrated to Bernardo: "I was arrested by the Japanese soldiers but was later saved by my 10-year-old son. One morning while a Japanese officer was passing by our house, he heard someone playing a Japanese patriotic tune on our piano. The Japanese officer went up our house to see who was playing the piano, and was amazed to see my 10-year-old son, Jaime, on the piano. When the Japanese officer learned that Jaime’s father was arrested on suspicion of being a guerrilla, he ordered my immediate release."

Full story here

Some eye candy

Lately, when I take a few minutes' break from work, I get away from the computer (as that's where I normally do my work). There's something "dehumanizing" (I'm sure there's a better word but I'll leave the search to you) about staring at a screen for hours at a time. So there are times when I abhor this machine -- more when I realize that I've come to depend on it for so much. And then I come across nice stuff like the following, and I feel so fortunate for having this tool to see and appreciate the fruits of artists' creativity (and entrepreneurs' resourcefulness).



Can you believe this is a bathroom? It's from an apartment somewhere in Montreal. The owners put their artistry to work and this is the result (the other rooms are pretty nice, too). According to Design*Sponge , where I saw the blog post featuring this bathroom, the owners are now selling the place!!

This one is called the Blooms Bracelet, and you can see it plus more felted accessories, bags, home decor pieces, even boots, and tips on felting (not sure what that is but it's got something to do with knitting) at Pick Up Sticks!

There are more but my computer is taking a reeeally long time to load. Maybe i'll just add them tomorrow. Anyway, it's these handmade soapsicles by Soapylove that I really get a kick out of. They sure look edible!

Where each of us started out

Though the government of El Salvador was the first to designate a specific date of the year as "Day of the Unborn," it's now celebrated as well in other countries including the Philippines. Other nations are Argentina, Peru, Nicaragua, Uruguay, the Dominican Republic, Mexico and Australia.

March 25 is DAY OF THE UNBORN!


* The ultrasound shows a fetus at week 11, or on the mother's 3rd month of pregnancy.

Gung-ho!

I've been busier than usual lately and I anticipate having my hands full within the next week or so. Hence, let me leave you with an "on vacation" blog notice that will hopefully inspire you:

When the going gets tough, the tough get going!

Bad news goes about in clogs,
Good news in stockinged feet.

- Welsh proverb

Die Feder ist mächtiger als die Klinge!

I am truly getting a kick out of this!

That title up there is "The pen is mightier than the sword!" in German. I'm no linguist; it's Google Translate that did the translation. All those hundreds -- maybe thousands -- of hours I've spent on the Internet and only now did I stumble onto this site via The Map Guys, which I found on the blog roll over at Generations for Life.

So I've chosen Spanish, Italian and Chinese, and now you can easily view my blog translated into those languages by clicking on the links on the sidebar under "blog translator". Cool huh??

If you haven't done so yet, go over to Google Translate and you can have fun translating words, sentences and entire blogs -- from English to Russian, from French to German, from Arabic to English, from English to Japanese and many other "combinations" you can think of.

I tried translating "weblog" into Spanish, Italian and German. No equivalents yet in the vernacular, amigos =)

Maganda, bonita, bello...?

I can't even begin to write my thoughts about ideals presented by the media as regards beauty and image. I'll end up ranting, that's why. Character-building, self-improvement, looking one's best by enhancing one's features (no surgery involved, that is), gratitude for what one has been given -- these are things I believe to be good. That's all I'll say for now.

Stumbled on this during blog-hopping one dayl:

Myrna Blyth writes in her book Spin Sisters, that a top beauty advertiser once told her, “We hold up the ideal to women, an ideal she can never achieve- but we want her to keep trying.” (Blyth is former editor of Ladies Home Journal and founding editor of More.)

For the average young woman, continual exposure to the media ideal produces a body dissatisfaction rate higher than 60 percent in high school and 80 percent in college. Research from Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston found that the more frequently girls read magazines, the more likely they were to diet, even though more than 70 percent of them were not overweight.
Not only do magazines show women how to look, they offer the avenue to achieve it. Lillian Calles Barger, president of the Damaris Project, noticed 45 advertisements in one magazine for cosmetic surgery or some other body-enhancing procedure. I counted several identical ads in the same magazine this month for a group of doctors which guarantee they will perform any plastic surgery a patient desires.

The message here is not that we are each uniquely and wonderfully made but that our bodies are in desperate need of being “fixed.” It’s a poisonous lie to swallow.

Having Daddy

A Government Program is No Substitute for a Bear-Hug
By Carey Roberts

For the better part of the last 40 years, policy experts and childrearing gurus relegated fathers to the parental minor leagues. Dads were seen as well-intentioned but inept Homer Simpsons who might be able to teach junior how to swing a baseball bat, but little else.

But kids see it differently. Mary Kay Shanley’s book, When I Think About My Father, recites these love-words from Amanda, age 6: “At the end of the day when I go to bed, Daddy tucks me in. We talk together about our day. He reads me a story to help me sleep. We pray together. That is my favorite part.”


Read the whole thing here