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Specially designed to ensure maximum comfort when stapling a schadenfreude

The Riddle: "Who am I?"

I am your constant companion. I am
your greatest helper or heaviest burden.
I will push you onward or drag you down
to failure. I am completely at your command.
Half the things I do you might as well
turn over to me and I will be able to do
them quickly and correctly.

I am easily managed - you must merely
be firm with me. Show me exactly how you
want something done and after a few
lessons I will do it automatically. I am the
servant of all great individuals and, alas, of
all failures as well. Those who are great, I
have made great. Those who are failures,
I have made failures.

I am not a machine, though I work
with all the precision of a machine plus
the intelligence of a human. You may run
me for profit or run me for ruin - it
makes no difference to me.

Take me, train me, be firm with me,
and I will place the world at your feet. Be
easy with me and I will destroy you.

Who am I?

I am Habit.

Get Involved. Make a Change.

Organization: Haribon Foundation (haribonfoundation.multiply.com).

Haribon Foundation is a membership organization committed to nature conservation through community empowerment and scientific excellence.

Their signature

The logo nine leaves on one tree symbolize the nine ecosystems found in the Philippines: forest, marginal, agricultural, urban, freshwater, mangrove, sea grass, coral and soft bottom.

Key Projects:

• Regular nature appreciation activities, like birdwatching, trekking, and snorkeling.

• Adopt a Seedling Campaign for tree-planting projects.

3 Steps To Get Involved:

• Join Haribon (see www.haribon.org.ph). For a 900Php annual fee, you get a quarterly magazine, discounts, plus special rates for the nature trips. Your fee helps support Haribon and is not a carved-in-stone commitment. You can be as involved as you want.

• Get Green. Support the Adopt-A-Seedling program (email act@haribon.org.ph). One tree costs only 75Php.

and

• “Do small things for the environment.”

Wow, joining is just that easy. So get involved! Make a change. :D

Verde Gyud!

La Salle Academy Iligan celebrated its 50^th Grand Alumni Homecoming last December 29, 2008, which was sponsored by LSA batch 1983. It was heralded as, by far, the most festive homecoming celebration ever attended by co-batchmates, complimenting its 50^th stand.

Talents from various LSA alumni to renowned deejay from de La Salle Greenhills were showcased. Free food was served…though slightly budgeted. Hehe. Batch pictures were posted on the walls where you'd be dining. And booths stood around near the gym. La Salle items booths, hotdog booths, coffee booths, booze booths. It pretty much seemed like a mini La Salle Fair, wala lay rides. Hehe. At the gym entrance, you could see a huge La Salle tarp where you could go picture taking like you’re an actress. Hehehe. At the later part of it, the alma mater song was sung by everyone in seemingly great emotional stress. A choreographed disco was steered by deejay…um, whatshisname?..And one the most exuberant part of it was the 20k worth of fireworks display. Well, it was truly a night that took us back to time.

Four years hence, and a lot has changed in the school grounds. The old tennis court now serves as a gazebo slash terminal for buses, and is being put up with a little Christmas Village. There were two Christmas villages, actually, beautifully lighted and creatively constructed with trees made up of softdrink bottles, which stand up to about 20 feet high. The old high school building is now utilized by night high school students. A new 4-storey building for the “day” which served as our dining area, now stands before the gym. And of course, the old gym is now renovated at long last! Hehe. Bleh :P

Anyway, so here’s how the events took place:

Dec. 29:
1:00-3:00 PM – Mass
3:00-5:00 PM – Motorcade
5:00-8:00 PM – Dining
9:00-12:00 AM – Disco
12:00– (Me not included). People went to Club Zinc

Btw, there was an Alumni Sports fest, the first time ever, held on Dec. 20.

La Salle alumni had free admission, outsiders got to pay 150Php for the entrance

hail alma mater

batch '04

kim, april, kath, me, and our batch frame

La Salle tarp

xmas tree made up of 7-up bottles

The Story of the Pencil

The Story of the Pencil

A boy was watching his grandmother write a letter. At one point, he asked:
‘Are you writing a story about what we’ve done? Is it a story about me?’
His grandmother stopped writing the letter and said to her grandson:
‘I am writing about you, actually, but more important than the words is the pencil I’m using. I hope you will be like this pencil when you grow up.’
Intrigued, the boy looked at the pencil. It didn’t seem very special.
‘But it’s just like any other pencil I’ve ever seen!’
‘That depends on how you look at things. It has five qualities which, if you manage to hang on to them, will make you a person who is always at peace with the world.

‘First quality: you are capable of great things, but you must never forget that there is a hand guiding your steps. We call that hand God, and He always guides us according to his will.

‘Second quality: now and then, I have to stop writing and use a sharpener. That makes the pencil suffer a little, but afterwards, he’s much sharper. So you, too, must learn to bear certain pains and sorrows, because they will make you a better person.

‘Third quality: the pencil always allows us to use an eraser to rub out any mistakes. This means that correcting something we did is not necessarily a bad thing; it helps to keep us on the road to justice.

‘Fourth quality: what really matters in a pencil is not its wooden exterior, but the graphite inside. So always pay attention to what is happening inside you.

‘Finally, the pencil’s fifth quality: it always leaves a mark. In just the same way, you should know that everything you do in life will leave a mark, so try to be conscious of that in your every action.’

Love Defined.

The following is an excerpt from Paulo Coelho’s book, By the River Piedra, I Sat Down and Wept.

With love, there are no rules. Some may try to control their emotions and develop strategies for their behavior; others may turn to reading books of advice from "experts" on relationships but this is all folly. The heart decides, and what it decides is all that really matters.

All of us have had this experience. At some point, we have each said through our tears, "I'm suffering for a love that's not worth it." We suffer because we feel we are giving more than we receive. We suffer because our love is going unrecognized. We suffer because we are unable to impose our own rules. But ultimately there is no good reason for our suffering, for in every love lies the seed of our growth. The more we love, the closer we come to spiritual experience. Those who are truly enlightened, those whose souls are illuminated by love, have been able to overcome all of the inhibitions and preconceptions of their era. They have been able to sing, to laugh, and to pray out loud; they have danced and shared what has been called "the madness of saintliness." They have been joyful—because those who love conquer the world and have no fear of loss. True love is an act of total surrender.

Thomas Merton once said that the spiritual life is essentially to love. One doesn't love in order to do what is good or to help or to protect someone. If we act that way, we are perceiving the other as a simple object, and we are seeing ourselves as wise and generous persons. This has nothing to do with love. To love is to be in communion with the other and to discover in that other the spark of God.

Dog Biscuits!

Nope…not the boring old tasteless kind. Dog’s Goodies in Germany is the only bakery in the world that offers meaty cakes, muesli bars, mint biscuits, and tuna cakes – just for dogs! Chef Janine Saraniti-Legerin told expatica.com that all her treats are non-fattening and free of chemical attractants. First-time doggie visitors are given free tastes, but humans like you and me may want to pass on the canine crunches…garlic cookies are part of the menu. Ugh!