the intangibles

I know it's hackneyed but... how time flies. I was just
telling my mother this morning that it's the end of November and I
don't seem to have accomplished anything.

Today, I got a text message from a former officemate, a call
from a friend who just got home from a vacation in North Carolina, a
visit from an officemate and another call from a friend working in
Italy until June next year. It always feels good to know that one has
friends.

So, I might not have done tangible things to show for this
month but November 2005 provided me the opportunity to get in touch
with a lot of friends. I guess that intangibles like relationship and
friendship matter more.

sayong
11-30-05

my stay at Delos Santos

Today marks one week since my surgery.

thank you

Hallo friends,

I thank you all for your prayers, greetings, emails, text
messages, calls and visits to the hospital. I finally got home by
noon today after some reminders from my gynecologist, especially for a
follow-up check-up on December 1. At least, I am assured that I need
not worry about cleaning my wound :)

I am only sorry not to have been able to visit Delos Santos
Memorial Center's chapel after the operation that removed the
endometrioma cyst in my left ovary and before I left the hospital.

Those who thought that I was brave to go through the
operation, I am telling you that I am not. But I know where to get
enough strength to go through what I have to.

While seeking inspiration at 4am of Tuesday (day of
operation), my Bible study guide Sabbath opened at the page Healing by
the Roadside. It analyzed Jesus' healing of a blind man.

In summary, it said:
1) The blind man was healed because of his passionate
desire to be cured.
2) It was the blind man's day with the Lord, his time to
receive mercy.
3) Jesus had to stop his discourse to respond to the blind
man's cry for help.

So even before I went to the chapel, took a bath and was
brought to the operating room, I already knew that I would be healed.
It was my day with the Lord :)

And I thank you all again for being with me :)

sayong
11-25-05

how to prepare for an operation

God, our Healer

Just one more day...and it will be my operation.

Happy Weekend

Happy Weekend is a dreaded word in our office unit.
Whenever anyone of us is greeted Happy Weekend, work will surely
follow us that weekend.

I told Carl of Appointments Office to take back these words
when he called me last Friday night, to follow-up on a speech the
following day. But it was too late...the curse has been said.

So on Saturday afternoon, Appointments people were calling
us for a statement to be taped 30 minutes later. It was a rush job
that could have been avoided.

Today, for the first time in several months, we were asked
to attend the coordination meeting. Of course, it was a late
reaction to what happened last Saturday.

sayong
11-14-05

living life to the fullest

What you are is God's gift to you
What you will be is your gift to God.

We only live once.

This is the summary of the sermon of our priest during mass tonight.

11-13-05
====================
Shang Yi

Credo in unum Deum
For He that is mighty has done great things for me - Luke 1:49

circle of love

Who can predict what will happen tomorrow?
I certainly can't.
But one thing I am sure of, there will always be family and friends.

in the wrong class

Our teacher said that our mid-term exam would be relatively easy.

As it turned out, it was really a distant relative of difficult :)

I perfected it, got einspunktnull (1.0) and I think, so did
my classmate/officemate Tranqs.

At least, other classmates got 1.0 even if their exams were
not perfect.

Our teacher is quite generous :) If the German Embassy
could just be like her…

Our teacher said that our two-year foreign language training
is jointly subsidized by the Philippine government and the German
Embassy. And I believe, the other seven foreign language courses at
the Foreign Service Institute are also subsidized by the corresponding
embassies.

We were informed by other classmates that the French class
would spend a month in France. The French Embassy also sponsored a
trip to France for the graduating French class last year. Well, the
French do spend a lot for their cultural relations.

Perhaps, I should consider taking French when I finished German :)

sayong
11-10-05 10:40pm

German reasons

I don't want to go through another transrectal ultrasound.
In two words, it hurts.

The attendant in Manila Doctors Hospital told me to breathe
through my mouth to lessen the pain. It so happened that I still have
some colds so it is harder to breathe.

And I thought, women in the process of labor must suffer
much, much, more.

To distract myself, I tried to recall German words in
superlative. Tomorrow is my mid-term exam in Deutsch (German) 3. I
should get top marks. After the operation to remove the cyst in my
left ovary, the next time I could attend class would be on the day of
our final exams.

I already told my OB-gyne in Delos Santos Memorial Center
that I intend to take the final exams on December 8.

Meine Lehrerin (my teacher) in DFA told me that she could
give me a grade of Incomplete just so that I wouldn't force myself to
attend class when I should still be resting. But I don't think I'd
like to mar my record in Deutsch. It's enough that my lower abdomen
would be marked for life :(

Some classmates suggested that I postpone my operation to
the third week of December. But I am a creature of habit. If I
postpone until December, I wouldn't be able to attend Simbang Gabi
(the novena mass at dawn, December 16-24). Then, I wouldn't feel like
it's Christmas. Then, I wouldn't be able to be as active in the New
Year.

If 2005 hasn't been that good to me and my family
health-wise, then at least, I want to end it well and look forward to
the coming year with as much optimism as possible :)

sayong
11-09-05 11:30pm

almost set

"You are a pig and not a chicken," teased my officemate
Danny. He thought he heard me say 45 days instead of 4 to 5 days stay
in the hospital.

I am almost ready for an operation to remove the cyst
(endometrioma) in my left ovary. My OB-gyne already filled out a form
for my HMO's approval last Saturday. But I haven't submitted it yet
as I still want to get one more opinion. But if the findings were the
same by Thursday, I'd file the request for hospital admission and
surgery on Friday at the latest. I was told that the approval usually
takes a week. I have to be admitted the following Monday if I would
be operated on November 22. My OB said it would either be on the 22nd
or the 24th.

sayong
11-08-05 10:40pm

karma

Today, I am. Tomorrow, you will be.

These words were inscripted in Latin on the skull of a
monkey owned by Fr. Nolan's friend. Fr. Nolan celebrates the 6:30pm
mass at SM Megamall and is dean of the San Carlos Seminary. And his
sermon last Sunday dealt on preparing for after life. As an
introduction, he narrated how his friend loved his pet monkey so much
that when it died, he displayed its skull on his table. The skull was
a reminder of his pet and what's bound to happen to all of us.

I was thinking of the humor of this inscription when I got
off the San Miguel jeepney at the corner of Arias St. and across Gate
2. I was looking at the approaching SUV before crossing to Gate 2
that I didn't notice that the jeepney from where I just alighted was
backing to get a better view of Arias St. (where there could be more
passengers). In short, it bumped me a little. Then the driver drove
off.

Of all types of drivers, I feel for Filipino jeepney drivers
the most. They are usually cursed and get into word-fights with
passengers because they sometimes fail to return change of as little
as 25 or 50 cents.

But when one rides a taxi, the taxi driver would expect you
not to get any change at all. When I went to Delos Santos Memorial
Hospital just last Saturday, I gave the taxi driver a 100-peso bill
for my 65-peso fare. He returned a 20-peso bill telling me that his
only smaller bill was 50 pesos. I asked him for the 50-peso bill and
gave him 15 pesos in coins. I didn't give him tip for trying to cheat
me.

LTO requires all taxi drivers to have a change box and of
course, to have loose change in it. The usual reason of taxi drivers
for not giving the exact change is lack or absence of loose change or
coins.

But some jeepney drivers really need to be disciplined. If
the jeepney were just backing fast, I'd be sooner in the hospital than
the date of my operation this late November. Fortunately, it was
backing slowly, and I was able to shield my upper body with my right
hand. So now, I only have some scratch on the back of my right hand.

I was supposed to get the plate number of the jeepney to
alert the PSG but its plate number painted on its side was almost
erased and it drove off soon.

So as I was walking to our office building, I was thinking
that God would take care of him. Today I am, tomorrow, he will be :)

sayong
11-07-05 11:45pm

Shang Cinema

My memory failed me.

I thought that the Medical City in Ortigas was the Capitol
Medical Center I was supposed to go to. So that my fare and effort
will not be wasted, I just went to Shangri-La Plaza Mall. From there,
I called Manila Doctors Hospital. Just as well that I did because
our health provider's coordinator said I should just go there on
Tuesday.

It was too late to watch the German Film in Podium so I just
went to watch The Legend of Zorro in Shangri La's Cineplex. It was
the first time I was able to watch a movie there. A ticket in Cinemas
1-4 costs 150 pesos and for Premiere, 295 pesos. The screen is so
wide that it wouldn't matter if you were sitting at the side. But
it's best to sit further up. I sat at G20 which is beside the aisle
of the center row.

In the end, it doesn't matter if my memory failed me for I
finally saw Zorro and enjoyed watching it, too.

sayong
11-05-05

sassy girl

Two of my favorite TV series ended tonight, Sassy Girl Chun-hyang and 24 Season 3. This leaves me with only Encantadia to watch at night.

E. Rodriguez

"Where have all the flowers gone? Long time passing..."
says an old song.

I passed by E. Rodriguez Ave. today on my way to Delos
Santos Memorial Hospital for another ultrasound. This has been my
route to/from the office and to/from the hospital. But this is the
first time in years that I remembered Kuya Je. He was one of my
bestfriends after college.

He took one of his precious time for review to accompany me,
first, to a bar with officemates from my first job and then, to a
resort in E. Rodriguez Ave. to meet with my orgmates. Where can one
find a willing escort so easily?

For that, he failed the architecture board exam :) Well, he
finally passed it the second time :)

sayong
11-03-05

Sacrificial fish

It is said that a pet dies when something unfortunate is
about to happen to its owner or when an owner gets very sick.

Whenever I get sick or anyone else in our house, my fishes die.

I had my first aquarium in 1999 and have been keeping fish
as pets since. I have three aquariums of various sizes.

On October 16, I bought 12 goldfishes from Bioresearch in SM
Megamall for my 15-gallon aquarium. Of that 12, nothing is left. On
October 17 alone, seven of them died.

On the night of October 18, I had severe abdominal pain that
I thought I should be brought to the nearest hospital and had very
little sleep.

I didn't know that my check-up since October 19 would reveal
myoma and endometrioma.

With only 5 fish remaining from the original set on October
16, I asked my nephew Timboy to buy five more goldfishes to make 10.
Three fishes died. I thought that the water could be contaminated so
I asked my nephew to clean the aquarium. When I got home from work
and class in the evening, only one fish remained.

I asked him to buy me another set of five to make six
goldfishes. I also bought two janitor fishes. One goldfish died on
Monday, one janitor fish, yesterday and the remaining janitor fish,
tonight.

This morning, a big goldfish from my 45-gallon aquarium died.

And on Sunday, just before we left for Violago Parkwoods, I
found one of the hammerhead sharks in my 10-gallon aquarium dead.

It's almost a plague and I don't think it will stop until I
had the cyst in my left ovary removed.

sayong
11-02-05

at Violago Parkwoods

I spent the last 2 1/2 days at my cousin Malen's place in Violago
Homes Parkwoods. Its only claim to fame is that it is where 1996
Atlanta Olympics Silver medalist Mansueto "Onyok" Velasco also lives.
Anyway, my family usually goes there whenever there's a long weekend.
And every time, we visit, it is truly encouraging to see how the place
grows albeit slowly.

sayong
11-01-05