blackshama's commentary on Philippine issues

Malaysia has an emerging blog community. Lately some bloggers have dealt with religious topics and this nation being a multireligious and multicultural society, the government has been concerned. Apparently publishing insulting comments about race and religion is against certain provisions of the Internal Security Act. Malaysians say that bloggers will test the free speech credentials of the incumbent Prime Minister Abdullah Badawi who upon his election a few years back promised to be more moderate and less confrontational than his sometimes controversial predecessor, Dr Mahathir Mohammed. Well my Malaysian friends say that the blog community in Malaysia is far from boring. Malaysia has developed advanced IT infrastructure in the last decade or so (thanks to Dr Mahathir) and society seems to have used this to test the limits of their liberties. And in killing time I read some products of the Malaysian blogosphere. Some blogs are witty. English blogs have some words particular to Ma...

A man who has known the sea is bound to it forever. This is a paraphrase of DR Sherman's famous quote from his book "Brothers of the Sea". How can the sea bound a man forever? How can a man be married to the sea? The theme of being bound to the sea is ancient in literature. There is a whole genre of sea stories the most famous writer of which is Joseph Conrad. The sea in it's waves and tides exerts a strong pull on a man or woman. The struggles and caresses are etched on the face and on the soul. I have a copy of one of the latest book of the marine biologist Trevor Norton entitled "Underwater to get out of the Rain, A love affair with the Sea" Norton tells the tale of how he became a marine biologist. Like all of us in this business, it started when we were small children. Norton remembers living on the coast and dreaming of the shores beyond the horizon. As salts like us are always observant, he noted the pull and push of the tides and this is when he fel...

I have a niece who passed the UP College Entrance Exam and now is a freshie at the College of Business Administration. She dropped by my faculty office to say hello on the first day of school, June 12. I was curious to find out how much her parents paid for fees and I was shocked. They paid about 20K pesos for this semester. I have attended the sometimes cum gravitas , ironic, flippant and comedic sessions of the University Council. In council the breakdown and schedule of the increased fees were shown as a Powerpoint presentation. The Chancellor (who chairs the sessions) explained how this increase is much needed given the parlous state of the university. True, the university's share of state subsidy has not increased and costs have increased. The results of this lack of funds is evident everywhere. The classrooms are overcrowded and there is a serious safety and security on campus. The university can't even pay for an effective security force to ensure students' safety. ...

Palagiang pinaguusapan sa Pilipinas ang kakulangan ng edukasyon sa agham. Ang kakulangan at kahinaan ng "basic science education" at iniuuganay sa mahinang pagusod o pagunlad ng ekonomiya ng bansa. Ito ay nakakabit sa sitwasyon ng agham sa bansa. Sinasabi ni Propesor Flor Lacanilao, dating Chanselor ng Unibersidad ng Pilipinas sa Kabisayaan at direktor ng Southeast Asian Fisheries Development Center Aquaculture Department (SEAFDEC-AQD) sa Tigbauan, Iloilo na nakikita ang kakulangan ng ating agham dahil ang mga siyentipiko ay di nagpapalimbag ng resulta ng kanilang pananaliksik sa mga pandaigdigan na journals. At dahil dito nahuhuli ang komunidad ng mga siyentipiko sa Pilipinas sa pagunlad ng pandaigdigan na agham. Ang ugat ng kahinaang ito ay may politikal na aspeto. Ani ni Prop. Lacanilao, ang mga kasapi ng Pambansang Akademya ng Agham at Teknolohiya (National Academy of Science and Technology) ay di naman nagpapalimbag ng kanilang pananaliksik. Sa panananaw ni Lacanilao, sa...

Like a Pope, Her Excellency Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo has made many of our sacred national holidays movable feasts. This reminds me when Paul VI decided to make Epiphany movable (the first Sunday after New Year's Day) right after Vatican II concluded. There was resistance since a lot of people especially children who had learned their third R calculated that they would lose a few days from the 12 days of Christmas. But if January 1 happened to be a Sunday then kids would get 2 extra days of Christmas. But why bother? Schools tend to restart their terms on the first Monday after January 1. Christmas evaporates soon afterward. Gloria made June 12 movable, something unthinkable in other countries. What if the United States of America made July 4 movable (following Gloria's lead) and by quirk of calendar fate, Independence day fell on July 1? Horrors for the Americans! That's Canada Day! England and the other Commonwealth realms celebrate a national day called the Queen's Bi...

One of the things that happened in the course of doing science is that I began to understand more about me. Me as a male. This is because when I was studying a group of coral reef snails belonging to the genus Oliva or olive snails, I discovered interesting things about their penises. The penis is what allows a male to inseminate a female. A penis is a muscular organ, capable of contracting and relaxing. Some species have males with penis like structures, capable of penetrating the female, but since they aren't muscular they aren't penises. An example is the gonopodium of a male guppy. The male animal has to rise to the occasion, that is the penis must remain erect at least until sperm is delivered to the female. And this is no joking matter. Male olives spend a lot of energy in getting their proportionally large penises ready for a night of sex under the coral sand. Despite my best efforts, I couldn't find an erect Oliva penis in the field. I spend moonlit nights on r...

I attended a workshop-discussion sponsored by the NAST or National Academy of Science and Technology (not National Academy of Senile Teachers as one wag who is an academician herself jestingly told me!). The whole meeting was about our blog post title. The mantra that we have heard often is that science and technology translates to more investments, economic growth and ergo, jobs. But unlike the quick fixes that our government economic planners have, science requires massive investments whose returns will not be realized in a few years. In fact the returns may be seen in a decade or so. The problem is that while DOST (Department of Science and Technology) has invested heavily in scholarships, infrastructure development and laboratory equipment, our science seems not to have left the ground (by this I mean have generated new knowledge and technologies) save for a few notable exceptions such as the University of the Philippines institutes of physics and marine sciences. The measure of th...

Whew! Turning 40 shouldn't be much of a fuss. However I don't think it is a sound idea to consider one's 40th birthday as just any other day as one blogger thinks his day is. Tradition places a special character on each birthday. The birthday person is actually King or Queen for that day. That's why birthday boys and girls receive presents and special prayers. Now 40th birthdays are even more special. After all it is really the midpoint of human life. Life expectancy now ranges from 75-80 years so 40 is really the midpoint. Indeed it is high summer of life. And what are summers made of? In higher latitudes, trees are in full leaf, sheltering birds and other small mammals. Some trees are in full bloom. At high summer, Autumn and winter seem far away. The sun is at its zenith. There is truth to the belief that upon reaching 40, people are at their peak. While mental faculties peak in one's thirties, the full impact of these faculties only become apparent when you re...

Driving along Gil Puyat Avenue a.k.a. Buendia Avenue, I came across a small group of leftist protesters opposed to increased Australian military assistance to the Philippines. One of the protest banners had the title of this blog post. This is an instance of wry irony and humour. There is nothing so antithetical to the Australian ethos as imperialism. Australia was once a colony of Britain and was part of the Empire and was not The Empire. The Brits from the Bondi tourists to the occasional visitor, Her Majesty are still the object of colonial angst. Australians were among the first to die in England's wars. Australia is much as a victim of imperialism as any other colony. The key difference with other colonies is that Terra Australis was colonised by whites (even if it was of the convict kind) and England defined the land as Terra Nullius even if there were people living there for over 40K years! When Britain cast off its colonies in the South Pacific, Australia naturally as a in...

The government of Her Excellency will have no choice but to read the writing on the wall. We are in a transition and our President PhD I think is smart enough to navigate what could be choppier waters for her. The 2007 Philippine midterm elections seems to show the failure of political machineries to deliver guaranteed winnings. The elections showed seems to have brought down the curtain on cinematocracy or celebritocracy, or what we can call government by illusion. Almost all of showbiz candidates lost. The most notable exception is Vilma Santos, who by the way had no longer been an actress but a politician. And as a pollie she has quite delivered to her constituents. Richard Gomez?.... He did fencing, rowing, taekwondo etc didn't win and the electorate saw through all of that. An example that you cannot govern a constituency by the illusion you can knock out foes is the sad tale of Manny Pacquiao. His electorate had tried to warn him beforehand. It does not surprise me why a Cat...

We birders are going to run in the next elections. First we try the partylist route. We call our party "Ang Bird" Our party president is the Great Tit, the treasurer is the Dollarbird and the Secretary is you guessed it The Secretary Bird. Our PRO is the Flowerpecker! Our platform is to make the Philippines a bird friendly place. We will ban slingshots and guns and bird cages. We support the right of citizens to flock together as long as they have the same feathers. Our youth wing is called "Ang maliit na Bird" We will support Pied Trillanes if he runs for Prez !

Geography The casting of ballots ended at 3:00 PM and now the antiquated way of counting the votes begin. Manolo Quezon blogs about the geography of cheating and electoral fraud. When I was enrolled in some higher statistics courses at the UP School of Statistics, I was enrolled in a probability course and the professor required us to listen to a lecture on vote irregularities and the probability of that happening. It was Gloria's time to be elected in her own right as queen regnant and not just as a heir to the throne who took over under constitutionally questionable circumstances. But as history unfolded Gloria Regina's crown of winning votes has "Hello Garci" written over it. Filipino citizens everywhere until this election are not convinced that she was truly elected as President. Thus the geography of cheating and probability of that happening was interesting to put it mildly. Yes there were areas that the probability of cheating was highest. But those were in...

Sometimes good intentions turn awry. The 1987 Philippine Constitution instituted the party list system to give chances for marginalized sectors to be represented in Congress. But years later, it seems that it has neither empowered the marginalized but gave a non-marginalized a cheap way to get elected! While the Left have always won their seats, without a wider (geographical) constituency they are condemned forever to say their time worn cliches in Congress. I don't know if the Leftists read their history. Of course they want to gain power, but they will never do that as a Party List party. If Weimar Germany had a party list system and the National Socialists limited themselves to that forum, it is unlikely that they would have seized power. Hitler was more sophisticated. He gained power through a parliamentary majority and Hindenburg had no choice but to appoint him as Chancellor. I am not espousing Nazi ideology. In fact Nazism has a lot of lessons to teach us. We should not all...

While Helen Mirren may have been able to essay her role and win an Oscar to boot, the real life role of Her Majesty Elizabeth II is definitely a hard one. After all there isn't any curtain closers and she can't get off the stage. It is hard to be a constitutional monarch. She can't express her private opinions except to her family, or perhaps to her Prime Minister and of course to her Royal Diary. There are still quite a few constitutional monarchs around but Elizabeth II is the best admired. She understands the need for reform and updating Britain's institution but she won't compromise her identity. While her relations in Scandinavia may have taken riding on bicycles, she still rides her limos and the occasional carriage when her duties require it. While she has done away with the royal jet (flying to the US to meet the Bush on a chartered BA jet), she makes sure that she represents her nation well. So when she met the President of the United States on the White Ho...

Manila, The Philippines I saw and heard the much talked about "gago" campaign ditty while jet lagged. I know politics involves muckraking but this takes the cake. In a democracy, the electorate shouldn't be taken for idiots. We know what this campaign ad will come to. The ditty has some catchy lyrics Gago, gago ang oposisyon Ang lider ay nagnakaw kaya nakakulong The opposition are all idiots, idiots Its leader did steal and that's why he's in jail. There is such a law called Karma for which one Indian religious scholar explained that the Law is like a credit card, it bills with much interest. Fate has the last laugh. Who knows those libeled now may be singing. Gago, gago ang _________. Ang lider nandaya kaya makukulong Dear blog readers please fill in the blank.

Farewell Louisiana. I hope to be able come back and visit. There is probably no state in the whole of the United States where I felt almost completely at home. The hospitality of your resilient people, and their warmth are what makes you weather the storms. Of course I'll miss everything Southern. But it is likely we'll meet again sometime. English again.... Now that I am in Memphis airport, Tennessee I just read about the trade of barbs between Makati Mayor Jejomar Binay and Senator Lito Lapid. And the whole thing is about English competency. Binay says that being poor isn't an excuse for not being able to express oneself. Binay is may be correct. Lapid belongs to the 'silent committee" in the Senate. Well, a senator can express anything in the senate in any language! Have we heard anything from Lito Lapid? We'll if he can't say much in the Senate. I don't think he can say much in Filipino.

What's my Sunday routine? I wake up a bit late at 7:30 AM After eating brekkie and the requisite glass of orange juice, I walk about a 2.64 km route (a mile!) to CTK (Christ the King Catholic Church) which is inside campus. It takes me about 20 minutes to travel the distance by foot. On the way, I get to see the spring flowers. But in winter, I got to see the bare trees. Mass On my last Sunday here, the Mass was for vocations. Appropriately, the Mass caps the academic year. Exams are due to be held and those who are candidates for graduation are busy wrapping up their school work. I know a few of these students. Also appropriately, the Mass caps the process of receiving new Catholics into the Church. We followed the process as a congregation, from the time the candidates were presented and when they were dismissed as catechumens. Later they were baptized and confirmed and then received communion. Some of the new Catholics decided to be one as adults. They answered a call. The homi...

The latest salvo in the Philippine language wars was fired early this week when a group of academics and cultural leaders petitioned the Supreme Court to prevent the President from implementing her executive order mandating English as a medium of instruction in science and math. The petitioners believe that this is unconstitutional. Manolo Quezon has given the sides why it is un(constitutional). Nonetheless Quezon's post has garnered more than a hundred responses. Obviously for the lively respondent blogger, the question of whether we should dump English or not was not the issue. The issue is whether school children should use Filipino to learn the basics of science and math, or to use English. Scientific studies in psychology, basic education and science education seem to suggest that numeracy and scientific thinking is more effective in the first language of the speaker. Only when the child has attained a more mature level of cognitive skills can English be introduced. In man...

Every year, on New Year's Day Lake Superior State University comes out with a list of words that should forever be "banished" from the English language. As the university would have it these words are banished for "for Mis-Use, Over-Use and General Uselessness" Since I arrived in the US in December when I read the papers, I perused over the 2007 list. Some of the words are "Gitmo" combined celebrity names like "Brangelina" "Now playing in Theaters" "Awesome" "Undocumented alien" and my pet peeve "Ask your doctor" Well, Gitmo is army slang for "Guantanamo". During the Cold War, hearing the word "Gitmo" probably irritated only GIs assigned to that hardship post. Now civilians who are against George W Bush's policies are irritated too. I need not comment on "Brangelina" but "Now Playing in Theaters" was the subject of a comment from a lady "How often are...

U of Michigan Psychology Prof Richard Nisbett in 2003 wrote an intriguing book entitled "The Geography of Thought". This book says that the differences between Asians and Westerners are not mere cultural but cognitive. In short Asians and Westerners view the world differently due to different ecologies, culture and philosophy. In other words Asians and Westerners think differently. The conventional wisdom in psychology is that all people think the same, we can peel the cultural onion to find that at the center things are the same whether you are Japanese or German. Looks like Nisbett has cast doubt on this paradigm. He lists the probable reasons why Chinese excel in algebra and arithmetics but bomb out in geometry. (The first Jesuits in China noted that the Chinese had not much use for geometry (aside from surveying) as compared to the Greeks who used it to derive aesthetic principles). He also says that Asians find it so hard to remove an object from its context. The reverse...