Dark beauty

Some three weeks ago we spent a couple of nights in Legaspi City to organize the culminating activity of a disaster project of ours in Bicol in response to the damages caused by typhoon Reming in the last quarter of 2006. There was a tour that took our team together with some local partners and donor organizations to the evacuation centers, avalanche-hit areas, community hospitals, relocation sites and to the famous Mount Mayon which is said to be the volcano with the "most perfect" cone. The volcano was majestic and the sight of it commands your attention even as your plane lands on the airport. It was so pretty it made me forget for a while that I despised everything around me at that time...and that's just priceless!

Overworked

I've been calling in sick for the past three days because of a bad flu accompanied by a fever and I still consider it a blessing in disguise even if I'm about to consume all my leave credits for the next nine months in just one week. Why? Because for the past two months or so I've been behaving like a workaholic Japanese salaryman. I juggle two jobs at the same time in such a way that I have no rest day during the week. I have a regular day job at a Frech NGO where I work full-time from Monday to Friday, but aside from that I do graveyard shifts on weekends as a part-time Spanish-speaking agent for the booming call center industry in Makati.

So it feels good to be just at home and taking a rest, even if my body feels damp all the time and even if just yesterday my stomach would not admit any substance apart from fruits and hot tea. I swear I could vomit just at the thought of sinigang, nilaga and other oily soup stuff your elders, if you were born in the Philippines, would give you in order to supposedly make you feel better. I don't exactly like having to live with my parents but when I'm feeling sick as hell, that's one of the moments I'm truly grateful that they're here to take care of me.