HAPPY BIRTHDAY, SAGE!

Sage, you chose a very simple cake (Brazo de mercedes type.) And blew a candle that even though had seen better days, was made special because it was the only candle who heard you make your 10th bday wish

Gun Ban...

Sabine as an out of this world "Kitloyd"

The North Face

Dear Kids,

Yesterday was my 42nd Birthday on this Earth, I was lucky enough to have a woman who indulges me my every whim. I asked her if I could go wall climbing and like a sexy genie in a bottle, she granted my wish. Off we went to Market! Market at the Fort.


It was around 11:30 AM. While everyone in the world was watching Manny Pacquiao pummel a low calibered fighter named Clottey, I was living a very small part of my dream.

The dudes manning the Sandugo.Ph wall climbing facility at fifth floor of Market! Market! told us that we only have to pay P50 per climb. It was a come on for the undecided to make them shift from being an onlooker to a wannabee adventurer. What they fail (or deliberately failed) to tell us was we have to pay an additional 200 pesos for the dudes outside who will stay on the ground as we climb up. They will pull on the harness attached to us to break our fall or pull us down when we have completed the climb. I had to grudgingly shell out precious moolah.

After putting on the harness I began my self-propelled ascent to the top of the world… I mean… wall.
Itutuloy...

testing

123

Akyat Center

When I was a kid as a treat to me when we visit Manila, My Dad would usually drive by Roxas boulevard so that we can see the then lonely monolith, the Cultural Center of the Philippines, rising from what used to be the waters of Manila Bay. Once sighted, I remember I always excitedly wrap my arms around my Mother’s neck as I try to pull myself up from the car seat while shouting “Akyat Center, Akyat Center!” (It was a signal to my Dad. I wanted him to drive the car up the ramp of the Cultural Center so that we can view the length of Roxas Boulevard from the top and then glide down on the other end like a slow moving plane coming back to the level of the earth). That was “the event” that I usually looked forward to whenever we came over for the Christmas Holidays.

My Dad is still fond of telling this story to his grand kids, or at least to those who would patiently listen.

My parents kept on with the routine of taking me to the top of the CCP until those who ran the complex wised-up and started to politely refuse the general public access to the ramps.

That’s why ever since I can remember CCP, had a mystical hold on me-- even though the shows regularly held there were not interesting to me. Because, frankly, they are beyond my budget for entertainment. To me they were expensive and uninteresting…

…Except for the coming show on March 28.

Yesterday Ayheen told me that she was informed by Sabine’s Ballet teacher that she is going to join their Corps’ recital at the CCP on March 28.

This Date happens to be Sage’s Birthday too.

Sabine has been taking Ballet Lessons for only 2 months now that’s why we didn’t expect her to be a part of any show.

So this means just like my Dad, who will be watching the Ballet Recital with us, Sabine will take me to the top of the Cultural Center too, along with her sisters, brother and those who are closest to our Hearts.

I’m sure the landscape that I will view from the top has changed after all these years

BUT not the kind of love that has brought me back there.

I can’t wait to see Sadie and Tristan’s faces when we go up that ramp…

Bravo, Sabine!

Happy Birthday, Ate Sage!!!

Sunday Morning... February 21

A Sage at 9 years old

Happy Bloody Valentine's Day...

Me> On a hot summer night, would you offer your bloody throat to the wolf with the red roses...

Wife> Yes...

Me> owws? Bolera. I bet you say that to all the boys.

Walking in the Sun...

“You might as well be walking on the sun…”


This morning, while stuck in traffic somewhere under the bridge along floodway, Pasig, Janine, Sage and Kay were talking about how one of their classmates saw a planet the other night. The conversation drifted to include the Stars and the Sun (One of them noted that the sun is the nearest star to Earth.)

Janine skeptically asked off-handedly, “Can a person really walk on the sun?”

Sage answered her “No.”

Then Kay chipped in “they can only walk on the sun in Phineas and Ferb (a cartoon series on TV.)”

Then somebody asked is the sun the biggest star? During the pause that ensued, I volunteered that sometimes stars like our sun balloon into really gigantic stars called “red giants.”

They asked how really big do they get? I answered, the sun can become so big it will gobble up the Earth. In the rear view mirror I could see Sage and Kay got a little upset with what I said.

So I added “don’t worry about it, by the time that happens we will all be long gone, including everyone we know and their great, great, great, great grandchildren.”

“What’s the difference between the Milky way and Black hole?” I realized I just opened the Pandora’s box of Janine’s curiosity. Kay gamely answered, “I know: Milky Way is white chocolate while a black hole is a Dark chocolate.” This brought the house down. I mean, Car. We we’re laughing so hard at how ingeniously she phrased the metaphor.

I just added that the milky way is one of the galaxies in space where our own sun is located while the black hole is formed when a red giant becomes so big. I asked them, “what happens to a balloon that has grown so big?” unanimously they said, “It explodes.”

Boom! I said that’s how black holes are formed. Imagine a Red Giant Star exploding because it becomes so heavy, it collapses and becomes smaller than my thumb. Its gravity will suck in everything around it including light…

Then it hit me! Susmaryosep! I’m talking about General Relativity to Grade Schoolers and they are gamely taking it in stride.

“Why did God create other planets when no one lives there?” Wow! That was a hard one. Janine was on a roll. As far as I’m concerned she just asked the grade school equivalent of the question “If a tree falls in the middle of the forest, does it make a sound?” I felt my nose will bleed in a few seconds…

Thank God one of them said that if someday when the sun becomes too big and gobbles up the Earth, we will need to live on other Planets.

Kay exclaimed “Then we will be the aliens in those planets!” (I just realized that James Cameron’s film “Avatar” has entrenched itself in our pop culture.)

When we reached another bottle neck in the Eastwood area, Janine asked “Tito Marvin, is there a planet where time stops.” Ok, I asked myself how the hell does one explain special relativity to a 5th grader?

I treaded carefully, I said we can not really stop time but time slows down. “Ate Janine, right now our car is traveling at around 30 kilometers per hour because we’re in traffic (and we are running late). If your friend is in a car that is traveling at the speed of light , which is almost 300,000 kilometers per SECOND, time will slow down. Once you catch up with your friend who is now in School after riding in a car that traveled at almost the speed of light, and you compare your watches, you will see that her watch ran slower than yours.

I think it was Kay who asked “what about the watch of somebody on a Jet plane who is not traveling as fast as light?”

I answered that there will also be a difference in their watches when compared to the one who traveled on a Jet plane. But I added that difference will be so small.

Kay guessed “Will the difference be one second?”

I answered “Well, not quite. You guys studied FRACTIONS and DECIMALS, right?” I continued, “the difference can be measured by probably a billionth of a second.”

Sage commented that no one can feel THAT difference. Everyone including Sabine agreed with her. On the flyover while looking out the window, she commented that the Sun is like a giant ball with many flashlights. Then added that Ms. Romero said that there was a place called “Big Apple” not because it contains Red Giant Apples but because of the many people there.

I said, “That’s New York.”

I think it was Janine who sang the chorus of “Empire State of Mind.” Mercifully, the conversation shifted to Jay-Z and Alicia Keys. I secretly breathed a sigh of relief and thanked God. I told myself I can relax now. Talking about the Grammy Awards and Beyonce will not make my nose bleed unlike the previous topic.

January 26, Sadie's Birthday

Ballerina Girl

Recent Adventures

On the way to Enchanted Kingdom, last month, they trained Sadie to ask "Are we there yet?" Notice how they made Sadie close her eyes so that she will be able to concentrate on asking that irritating question and not be distracted by the scenery outside.





Enchanted Kingdom's Space Shuttle...

I was the one whispering into the cam phone the words "first loop.... not bad" and something unintelligible that I can't remember now. I was not the idiot shouting his lungs out like a 5 year old kid in his first roller coaster ride


Sage really enjoyed this. Buti nalang. I thought she'd find it boring and sleep halfway through the glide over the lake.


Look at how she posed for the camera...


That was me giving Sage the Thumb's up sign.

The Lovely Bones

“THE LOVELY BONES.”

Jimmy Lichauco once said that Karma is a law of the universe. Simply put, the evil that happens to you is a direct result of what you did or did not do.

Bullshit... (Pls. excuse my French.)

Everytime I hear self-proclaimed psychics like Jimmy Lichauco talk about Karma, I become nauseated. Because I remember kids like Jon Benet Ramsey and the other DESAPERACIDOS, kids, mostly girls, abducted, molested, and then ultimately murdered.

It doesn’t take a scientist to realize that Jimmy Lichauco is dead wrong. These girls did not, could not have done anything to deserve their fate. If Karma is indeed a universal law like gravity or thermodynamics, then there wouldn’t be any girls like Susie Salmon, the lead character in the novel, Lovely Bones (LB for brevity.)

That book gave a detailed account of the circumstances surrounding the murder and brutal molestation of a teenage girl. She was 14. In the vernacular, “Katorse.”
The same age recently, unfairly, sexualized by a popular telenobela. (Coinicidentally, I finished reading the book LB while the women in my life were watching the replacement of that telenobela in the same room with me.)

IT still gives me chills. I believe in God and the Goodness, Justness of God. But I don’t believe in ghosts or vampires or the Devil. And I believe that Satan is just a symbol of evil lurking within the human heart. Satan is Wrath, Satan is Cancer, Satan is Ignorance- Like the kind of Ignorance being imposed on us by people like Jimmy Lichauco who want us to believe in the extraordinary claim of existence of ghosts without satisfying our scientific requirement for extraordinary proof.

It takes more than a story about ghosts to scare the living daylights out of me. But this book about ghosts, LB, still gives me chills.

I’m scared because even though I know there is no proof that the devil or evil ghosts, or those who have sold their very souls to the devil are capable of breaking the laws of physics, books like LB make me realize that Satan doesn’t need to break Einstein’s laws to wreak havoc in our lives. Satan may not be able make a book levitate at will because laws of gravity prevent him from doing so, but he can whisper unimaginable wrath into the human heart owned by someone flying a passenger plane. With that wrath he could will the pilot to plow the plane into the World Trade Center.

The perpetrator of evil in the book, serial killer/rapist George Harvey, doesn’t have horns, or hoofs, or tail.

Just like Jason Ivler.

He could be anyone. You can never know. Because how exactly can you gauge the human heart? That’s why, as I have said, IGNORANCE is EVIL.

That’s why, reading that book made me paranoid. I wanted to arm those women in my life and my kids and my son with assault rifles whenever they step out of the house, or make them put on chastity belts, or implant them with indestructible Adamantium claws of Wolverine. I couldn’t do that. I could enroll them in self-defense classes for them to learn the ways of mortal combat.

But the truth is, all I can really do is pray as hard as I can for them to be delivered from evil, everyday of their lives…

And he said...

And he said 'cast your burdens upon me
those who are heavily laiden

come to me all of you who are tired
of carrying heavy load

come to me...

and I will give you rest.'

Dear God, I realized that this is my first blog entry for the new year... for the new decade. I want to thank you... after so long a time

THANK YOU

for lifting that heavy burden.
for letting me see there is real beauty within
for showing me, I'm not a beast at all.

Now I can have faith in myself again.

Merci Tres Beaucoup.

Predictions for 2009 (NOT 2010)

Nostradamus was a man who wasn’t able to predict anything about the future. Those who study his

writings can not predict anything accurate enough to be of any use to anyone. His quartrains are good only as propaganda to sell poorly written books, B movies, and pseudo documentaries about the supposed existence of “psychic” powers.

Nostradamus’ writings are also useful to dictators like Hitler.

Before the Nazi invasion of France, Joseph Goebbels,
the chief Hitler propagandist, circulated a lie: he said that based on the predictions of this obscure French Doctor, His boss will succeed in invading the whole world. Those in France who were superstitious enough to believe this lie unwittingly contributed to the capitulation of their country to Hitler. In essence, Nostradamus’ writings not only succeeded in pulling the National IQ of France a few notches lower than before, it also contributed to its temporary defeat by lowering its morale.

The truth is, his writings are so vague, if you are smart enough you can take any of them out of context and make it appear that he was able to predict what you had for breakfast this morning. All you have to do is make a vague connection with what he wrote, and Voila! You can make it appear that Nostradamus was able to foretell, HUNDREDS OF YEAR AGO, that you had hot dog sandwich and brewed coffee while watching CNN.

Because they are so vague, you can connect anything he wrote to anything else that has

happened YESTERDAY
or is happening around you NOW.
But you CAN NOT use his writings to predict what WILL HAPPEN TOMMORROW.

Since Hitler’s time, Nostradamus fans have been studying his quartrains. None of them convincingly warned us about September 11, 2001. The only time they claimed that his quartrains were able to predict the 9-11 tragedy was only on September 12, 2001 (when they started connecting what happened in the immediate past to his vague writings.)



In case you missed what I just said… THEY WERE ABLE TO MAKE THE PREDICTION ONLY AFTER THE DISASTER HAPPENED.

That’s why the study of Nostradamus’ writings is also known as Bovine Eschatology (loosely translated, it means bullshit).

That being said, here are my Top 10 PREDICTIONS for the year 2009!!! (a.k.a. more useless crap) :






10. “PeaceMaker” Obama will launch missile strikes against the moon.

9. Andal Ampatuan,Jr.’s picture will be the MOST WANTED newspaper banner.

8. Cory Aquino’s Bodyguards in active duty will become famous for being INACTIVE.

7. Jinky Pacquiao will want to borrow the Golf Club of Tiger Woods’ WIFE.

6. Price of Cars and real estate will… DIVE… in Marikina and Pasig areas.

5. Obviously, NEW YORK YANKEES will win the 2009 World Series.

4. Year 2009? For Michael Jackson… This is IT.

3. Hayden Kho will show he has a SMALL talent in front of cameras.

2. This Internet RUMOR will gross-out even stomachs of steel:
VICKY BELO sex scandal.


AND MY NUMBER 1 PREDICTION FOR THE YEAR 2009…


1. Even though there are no elections, Filipinos WORLD WIDE will vote for a HERO.

My Predictions for the year 2010?... Come back next year… I’ll write them on December 2010.


Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! (hwag mag paloko sa mga manghuhula)

Happy New Year!

May the Next Year and the Next Decade be better than the passing one.

A Prosperous and Healthier New Year and New Decade to one and ALL!!!

Famille

LINTEK LANG WALANG GANTI.

Tristan is 10 Months Old (October 15, 2009)

Long story...

NO TV WEEKEND

I received a letter last week (September 18) from Sage's teacher, challenging me to spend the coming weekend with my daughter without watching TV. My first reaction was, "You have gotta be kidding me." How am I supposed to bond with my kids over the weekend without TV? The answer to that question came really fast... about 150 km/hr fast.

I woke up that Saturday morning without seeing the sun. Thick sheets of rain roared down from the heavens. Typhoon Ondoy came knocking at our doors with gale force winds. We suspected there will be serious flooding. Problem is we still had no groceries because during the past few days, Ayheen was sick, she even had to miss several ER duties at St. Luke's last week, and Sadie, our youngest daughter, started having febrile episodes the night before.

Ayheen and I went out to buy much needed supplies. But the water level outside the village was already knee-high. We decided to go back and prepare the house before the flood breaches our front door.

The rain kept pouring in buckets (in the vernacular "Balde, balde"), the first trickle of flood water stealthily crept into our house through the front door around 12:30PM. Seeing it goaded us to move faster. We were playing beat the clock against Ondoy. The bastard was winning. But I told myself that was just round one.

The water almost reached an exposed portion of an extension electric cord lying on the floor which I had not noticed before. Fortunately Ayheen alerted me of the danger. and so I was able to get the cord out of the way. She's the reason why I didn't get fried last week (just imagine the kind of obituary I would have gotten. I mean, burning to death... in the middle of a flood?).

We only moved the essentials to the second floor and we asked the kid's yaya to cook anything and everything edible as fast as she could then send it upstairs. I can tell you now, in times of crisis, those omelets and hard-boiled eggs taste like million dollar Faberge’s.

We joined the kids and my mother-in-law upstairs just before the level reached the electric socket in the kitchen. While doing an inventory of the food we rescued from the ground floor, the kids asked about the whereabouts of Parrot fish-- their only pet I allow them to keep. Without second thoughts I ran back downstairs to get the fish and its aquarium. While my kids were in awe thinking how heroic their dad was in saving their pet, their dad was trying to remember how many calories does a very, very raw sushi have.




SURVIVOR: Pasig

At one point, the flood water rose at a rate of 3 ft./hr. At that rate, I figured if we were to be rescued, we’d be on our toes… standing on the roof.

That’s when our brains clicked into survival mode. Our furniture and vehicle below were starting to swim in the flood but they were farthest from our minds. I started to pull out the curtains and strung them together as makeshift ropes just in case we need to tie ourselves together to prevent being washed away from our house by the rampaging floodwater. I looked for a large tarpaulin that I kept in the attic that would serve as a shelter above our heads should we find ourselves fighting for our lives against the wind and rain should we need to make our last stand against these elements on our rooftop.

We have an attic but the windows have grills. Should the flood reach that level we’d be trapped. I tried to pull out the air conditioner but it wouldn’t budge because it was awkwardly positioned. The part outside the house is slightly tilted towards the ground, hence pulling it out of its casing would have required superhuman strength. So I did what all other self respecting husbands would have done under such extreme circumstance—I called Superwoman, my wife, for help.

Together, and with the use of a barbell handle bar as a lever, I was able to yank the air conditioner out of its casing. As it slid out, the kid’s yaya Ning helped me carry it down to the attic floor. The air conditioner’s casing was extremely difficult to pull out since it was nailed to the window. The roaring sound of wind and rain was joined by the periodic, metallic clang of my barbell handle bar as I tried to use it as a pike to pry the metal casing loose. It took me a while to get the job done. Later, the neighbors told me they thought I was going desperately crazy by making all that bone chilling noise.

My mother-in-law was rock solid all throughout this ordeal. She kept on telling Sage not to panic, to have presence of mind because we might need to swim that night. She sounded like she was talking to Sage just before we go to her school’s family day. The only time I heard her voice falter was right after she lead the praying of the Rosary, she muttered, “Dyos ko, tama na po.”

The wind and rain were merciless. If I were to die that night and should the kids be lucky enough to live, they would remember everything I’d say, so I chose my words very carefully. To all my three daughters, I repeatedly told each one of them that:

“You are very beautiful. You are beautiful because real beauty lies within.”

“Dad loves you so much. But God loves you even more. Whatever happens, God loves you more than I love you.”

But the truth is, should we find ourselves that night outside the comfort of our bedroom, their chances of survival is practically nil. Sadie had fever and Tristan is just a babe; their bodies are the least prepared to fight the biting cold outside. In the cold calculus of survival, I will lose some of my family if we find ourselves trapped in the roof. And I will lose all of them if we get washed away by the flood.

AWAITING DAWN

Earlier that day I was thinking of the battle against this typhoon as a game or a boxing match. He was ahead on points and I had to hustle. I was wallowing in the illusion that I was living Sebastian Junger’s Perfect Storm. That illusion turned into a nightmare with the sudden realization that I can lose my wife, my kids, my life that very night. It humbled me. It depressed me. I felt so helpless.

We did everything we could. I already prepared my family and asked our neighbors and everyone within hearing range to prepare for the worst. The only chance we have is for the heavens to answer our prayers and stop the rain from falling. I found myself echoing the plea of Ayheen’s Mom: “Dyos ko, tama na po.”

I turned my attention to my kids. I may not be able to stop the rain, but I can try to make this experience less traumatic for them. I let them sing songs. I think their favorite was Taylor Swift’s You Belong With Me. My most important duty is to help them go through a rough experience without letting them get emotionally scarred.

Of the three girls, it was Sabine who showed signs of being distressed. She becomes reticent when she feels something is terribly wrong. Her eyes become alert… and terrified. Looking into those large brown eyes is like seeing her beautiful soul. That night I saw fear when I looked at her.

I tried to talk to her but for the longest time she stubbornly held on to her fear. She finally smiled only when I said that on her 6th birthday (October 30), we will go to CAMSUR so that we can go wakeboarding. That perked her up. She finally smiled and said she only wants to swim in the pool there. Sabine started wearing the inflatable rings around her chest and arms. She started walking around as if she were a beach bum.

(In retrospect, I feel so sorry now since I can’t make that promise happen. We have to wisely allocate our surviving meager resources and prioritize meeting our budget.)

The rains finally stopped furiously beating on us sometime that night (I couldn’t tell when since I measured the passage of time not by the ticking of the clock but by the number of steps in our stairs that the water level has reached.) But even though the rain has stopped, the wind was still howling. I knew that rescue will come not earlier than the coming dawn.


SABINE PRIVATE RYAN

After a sleepless night, a cloudy dawn greeted us. The water level has yet to recede. And the rain occasionally poured down the water that has yet to be drained from the heavens, further slowing the flood level’s descent. As we talked among ourselves (our small neighborhood became tightly knit overnight) we started hearing the sound of helicopters mechanically chopping the air around us with their blades. They were flying so low, I could see the serial number near their tails. Sabine came out of our small balcony, smiled at the pilots, waved at them and playfully shouted “FOOD PLEASE!”

I guess the pilot scratched his head, decided that Sabine didn’t look the part of an emaciated flood victim, then tossed out his kitty of relief goods to the other side of the row of houses away from us. It actually made me smile-- Atleast my kids look healthy even if they are candidly caught by those big broadcast network’s cameras for their prime time audience.

But at that moment I did an inventory of our supplies and despite of my absence of actuarial skills, I can tell that we wouldn’t last a day without more supplies of water and food.

Fortunately, Ayheen spotted the tightly sealed, 2-gallon bottled water we left behind as we dashed to the second floor the previous day to prevent getting electrocuted in the flood water. It was floating in filthy, mud filled water that was still about 7ft. deep. I tied the makeshift ropes (curtains) I made to our balcony window and carefully climbed down to a waiting liquid pool of brown filth below. I swam towards the 2-gallon bottled water and tied the handle to the end of the rope so that Ayheen could pull it up the balcony. It was so heavy, I was waiting for it to drop so that I can just climb up the rope and pull it myself. To their credit, Ayheen and Yaya Ning didn’t let it drop down. With sheer force of will they were able to pull it up. I said to myself I was one luck SOB being in the company of Superwomen. I climbed back using the rope and promised myself that I will never, ever drink Café Mocha again for as long as I live.

Though that water has been secured, our food has yet to be replenished. And Sadie was still febrile.

I learned later that my whole family were working the phones through the night, asking help from friends, trying to pull whatever strings they can pull, collecting on whatever debt owed them by somebody or anybody just to get us out of there by any means necessary.

My sister, Ate Joy, and her whole family came all the way from Cabanatuan in the middle of the storm to try to help us. My brother emailed the coordinates of our apartment to a friend who is also a fellow KBP Standard’s Authority Director, and Air Force Officer, Col. Somodio, using Google Earth. My sister-in-law, Jen, braved the receding flood waters at the foot of Rosario Bridge, Ortigas Extension to talk to our Dad’s old friend who has become a top notch technocrat in this administration’s Press department. She was endorsed to his people and was ultimately referred to very tall, melanin-impaired guys with big boats.

Later that day, inside our flooded apartment, I heard my name being called out by a familiar voice. When I peeked outside our window, I saw my diminutive sister-in-law, Jen, looking every inch like Bonaparte in yellow raincoat and New York Yankees’ cap, in command of a small fleet-- Two rubber boats manned by the US Navy.


ANSWERED PRAYERS

The kids and my mother-in-law and Yaya Ning had already been rescued about 30 or 40 minutes earlier before Jen came with her boats. We decided to let them leave with the police because:

Sadie may need to be hydrated with Intravenous Fluid which we didn’t have,
Tristan’s can of milk powder is starting to hit Tin bottom.
Ayheen’s Mom was complaining of non-specific symptoms including epigastric pain,
Food supply is really low I’ve been eating only small quantities of high caloric peanut butter and Ayheen, despite of my prodding, was developing her own version of a killer south beach diet which involves eating only liberal quantities of air.

When Sadie was asking for real food instead of crackers, Sage replied that she will call 911-11-11 for a Pizza. Marie Antoinette would have been proud.

My instructions to Sage before she left was that she was to take really good care of her sisters. She was not to let them out of her sight-- even when they had to use the Restroom they should all stick together. She was to maintain her presence of mind.

When they boarded the police's boat, I heard our neighbors cheering them on. They were all smiling and my kids smiled back at them. "Para lang silang nagpi-picnic" commented one. When they left Ayheen smiled at me and said "o ngayon pwede na tayo magutom."


ANNIE AND SOFIE

30 minutes after they left, Jen arrived with her fleet. When we boarded one rubber boat I wanted to tell our caucasian friends "Welcome to New Orleans!" but I decided it was not the time for wisecracks. They kept on telling us that they only have 5 minutes to spare. And that they can only accommodate the two of us.

Right.

We told them that there are others needing rescue near the back of the Village where the flooding was worse. After hesitating for a moment, the guy who looked like Dennis Leary radioed his CO then asked me for directions. Jen, on the other hand, was rescuing a whole family trapped inside a house near our apartment. She asked, or was it "ordered," those burly guys she was with to breakdown the submerged frontdoor so that those people can get out.

From 2nd avenue we went all the way to the 10th. There we aided a young mother named Annie and her 6month old daughter, Sofie. We assessed that Sofie was not yet dehydrated, thank God. She looked so fragile and terrified of her new acquaintance. We didn't pry her away from her Mom for the rest of the trip to Rosario.

The Americans were amazed at what they saw around the village. Despite of the rubbish and devastation, people were waving at them, sometimes playfully chanting "VFA! VFA!" There was evenone guy in his balcony waving at them with soap suds all over his body, apparently bathing in flood water. Rich and Poor residents are asking for food and water. The Navy grunts promised us that after dropping us off, they are coming back to supply our neighbors with those basic needs.


AMAZING KIDS

Meanwhile, The Kids, their Yaya and Ayheen's Mom were all safe inside the Ambulance of The Medical City. I was told that when an MD commented that Sadie didn't have fever, it was Sabine who correctly volunteered the information that it was because Sadie was just given medicine at 11 AM and that it hasn't been four hours since her last dose of paracetamol. The doctors asked why she knew those things. She replied it's because her parents are Doctors too.

They were all supposed to be taken to an evacuation center, but Sage's eagle eyes spotted the Car of her Ninong Noel, my kid brother, that was parked near a gasoline station. iT turned out that my all members of my family were all there at the Rosario gasoline station.

All their cousins were there to greet them. It was like a reunion for them. After spending an afternoon picinic.

But since we were still inside the Village in the rubber boat, we didn't know they were OK. Ayheen cried when she called My Dad's house and was told that the Kids were not there yet. We were so worried we thought we made the wrong decision in letting them Go before us.

It was then Annie’s turn to comfort Ayheen as Baby Sofie quietly looked on, more relaxed as if sensing that she had been delivered out of danger.

We started calling out Sage’s name while walking along the length of Rosario Bridge. I looked for them at Grocery just beside the Rosario Church. When I couldn’t find them there I went inside the church. I tried to look at all the faces inside and outside the church. It was the middle of the homily. The priest was giving a sermon about why we shouldn’t blame God for disasters like floods because Men are to blame for these disasters—Not GOD. I heard that sermon before or a variation of it. It’s a cliché but it has taken on a new meaning for me. Almost tearfully I told myself that God is also not to blame for my stupid decision of letting my kids leave the house without us.

Fortunately, when I left the church I saw Jen talking to her CP that finally got a working mobile phone network signal again. She then shouted out to me that the kids were safe. They were all in the van with the rest of their cousins.

Itutuloy...