After super typhoon Rai, with Phil name Odette, a category 5 storm equivalent to a category 2 Atlantic hurricane, exited the Philippine area of responsibility last Dec 18, 2021, it left behind a huge trail of destruction (9 million people seriously affected, damage estimated at P17.7B, 1.5 million homes damaged, wide areas of communications and power outages in… Read More »
IT’S WORSE THAN YOU THINK Part II Since the publication of part I, THE CLIMATE CRISIS, in the last month’s BALITA, more intense weather events have been experienced unseen in the recent past. Extreme and historical are the buzzwords—colder, more typhoons/hurricanes in the latter part of the year. On a record-setting scale, typhoon Odette’s toll had reached 407… Read More »
On January 17, 2022, a blizzard passed by and covered Toronto with some 55 centimetres of snow. There was nothing like it, perhaps since 1935; although some friends, in phone conversations, quipped that the latest blizzard was pale compared to what occurred in the winter of 1999. From an apartment window the following morning, I was dumbfounded to… Read More »
So glad it’s almost February. Why? Because March comes after February, and March means spring is definitely not far behind. Lo and behold! Not long after, a sign appeared. What did I see in the grocery just yesterday? A glorious sight for our cold-and-snow-weary eyes (and soul) – tulips in all the vibrant colors of spring – pink,… Read More »
Just when everyone thought that things would be better, it got worse! The laugh was on us. I am referring, of course, to the Omicron menace raging around the world. Nope! I don’t think it’s funny. Far from it. I have family and friends back in the homeland where the whole household was sick. They didn’t even know… Read More »
Ang pagbabasa ay isang matuwid na libangan at pampalipas lockdown (partial man o full). Bukod dito, sari-saring pananaw ang maaaring lumantad, na makapagpapalapad at makapagtataas ng antas ng kaalaman sa mga bagay-bagay na may pangakong tulong sa pagharap sa buhay-buhay. Kaya naman nang madaanan ko’t mabasa ang isang sanaysay na naitala ng isang kaibigan sa worldwide web, pinagpasyahan… Read More »
Mary’s Meals is a no-frills charity focused on one goal – that every child receives a nutritious daily meal in a place of education. These life-changing meals attract hungry children into the classroom. It fills their empty stomachs, so they have the energy and opportunity to learn and gives them the chance of a brighter future. The meals… Read More »
IN 1284, AS THE LEGEND GOES, the people of Hamelin, Germany, hired the town’s rat-catcher, a piper, to lure the rats away with his magic pipe. The piper was dressed in multi-colored (“pied”) clothing; hence he was called the “Pied Piper.” He led the rats out of the town and into the sea where they drowned. When the… Read More »
“He could only touch here and there, like lightning glancing on the highest peaks of mountains, but which left the deep clefts of valleys, the oceans and the clamoring rivers, in complete and shadowy darkness.” – Taylor Caldwell, The Final Hour (1944). HERE I feel fine being alone, really, here in my room, where no one bothers me,… Read More »
“How would you live your life differently if you could start over, what would you do, who would you be, where would you go, what would you embrace?” – Susan Wiggs, The Lost and Found Bookshop (2020) We need rituals for without them we are lost. One of these rituals is our list of resolutions for the New… Read More »