Song

If anyone is in my YM list, they’ll probably notice that I usually put snippets of a song as my YM status. Well now I’m posting the whole song lyrics in my page. I don’t usually do this because I avoid lyrics bombarding my page but since this one particularly brings a smile on my face, I am adding it as a separate entry.

Thanks to my team lead and friend Mark who gave me a copy of the song. Now, I can’t stop listening to it! Hehe. Oh and when asked what does this mean to me, as I always tell Klea, ‘kanta lang yun…’

Lying here with you
Listening to the rain
Smiling just to see the smile upon your face
These are the moments I thank God that I’m alive
These are the moments I’ll remember all my life
I found all I’ve waited for
And I could not ask for more
Looking in your eyes
Seeing all I need
Everything you are is everything to me
These are the moments
I know heaven must exist
These are the moments I know all I need is this
I have all I’ve waited for
And I could not ask for more

I could not ask for more than this time together
I could not ask for more than this time with you
Every prayer has been answered
Every dream I have’s come true
And right here in this moment is right where I’m meant to be
Here with you here with me

These are the moments I thank God that I’m alive
These are the moments I’ll remember all my life
I’ve got all I’ve waited for
And I could not ask for more

I could not ask for more than this time together
I could not ask for more than this time with you
Every prayer has been answered
Every dream I have’s come true
And right here in this moment is right where I’m meant to be
Here with you here with me

I could not ask for more than the love you give me ‘Coz it’s all I’ve waited for
And I could not ask for more
I could not ask for more

Song: I Could Not Ask For More
Artist: Edwin McCain

Rainy CFC 25th Anniversary

OK so we didn’t have the best weather the whole day. It was raining going to Quirino grandstand, it was raining while we were in Quirino Granstand, it stopped raining when we went back to the parking lot to eat our shared lunches, only to find out that it will rain again on our way back to the venue. Rain rain rain, go away…. come again another day….. I even had to change clothes three times to avoid being sick from the heat then the rain then the heat then the rain again.

But despite and in spite of the weather, I actually thought my Sunday was well spent. First because I was able to ride the truck again. And this time I was with Joe. Hehe. I didn’t figure her as someone who would be comfortable with that set-up. I was chatting with Line the night before and she said Joe would be riding with her because there’s still space. So I thought, ‘ok, I’ll just see her in the venue then.’ But I got her text message that Sunday morning informing me that she was already in San Andres ready to ride the truck. To quote Kate from The Lake House, ‘Can this be happening?’ (Hahaha! Anything to add that in!) Hehe, another pleasant surprise from her. Second, the day was well spent because I spent it with my chapter mates. It has been a while since we had an SFC-related event where most of our chapter members would be present. This event was one of them. The initial count from us was 33 attendees. We got an almost 30 attendance. Better than good for me. Plus I thought the attendees represented the different batches from our chapter – The upper wisdoms, the older than my batch (Wilson, Jun, Joenel etc), my batch, and the last 2 batches of CLP graduates. This is probably the most represented attendance in terms of batches from our chapter. Hehe. In addition to the second reason, we had a good bonding as a chapter. The lunch was great. It was pot luck and we were all so full. Walking around the venue as a chapter also felt nice. Follow the leader leader leader. Hehe. Then we went to mass somewhere else as a group then ate dinner together. It turned out to be a chapter fellowship after all. Haha! We ate at this place in Robinson’s Metro East called Star Carrots. I’ve been seeing that place for a long time but was not really interested to eat there. Since we wanted to try out something different, we came in and virtually closed the place. Their menu is actually quite good. I think I’ll come back to that place again.

I went home tired, sleepy and happy. We were not in the most perfect situation but we took what we have and made it worthwhile. Thanks guys!

Man for Others

From one Atenean to another, Tito Tony (haha. feeling close!) is one great inspiration to me and to this country. Here’s the link to his address during the commencement exercises for the Ateneo’s School of Humanities and School of Social Sciences on March 25, 2006:

The Eagle will not fly without the poor

Great read for ALL!

Loaded Wednesday

Wednesday seemed to be a weekend day for me because I had to attend to so many things. At work, I had to compress what I was doing and finish earlier because we had a townhall meeting at 2pm. While working I also had to juggle with some ‘extra-curricular’ stuff. By that I mean I had to prepare for the ‘celebration’ of all the June celebrants in our team. My project sets aside some budget so that the team can have a get-together for birthday celebrants each month. When all the commotion is done at work, I, with my IC group, went to THX Theater for our townhall meeting. The meeting brought a lot of good news for us. More bonuses announcement to look forward to. Yahoo! After the townhall, we stayed to watch this movie called ‘Date Movie’ It was so horrible. It was supposed to be a comedy film but I find the humor in it too gross. Maybe it’s the long sleeves I was wearing that made me too old for the movie. Hehe. I didn’t even know why I stayed up to its end. After the movie, I went home and ate dinner. A few minutes after, I went to my upper household in Allan’s place. We only opted for a service meeting to prepare for the upcoming CFC anniversary. Guess what time we finished the meeting. 1 AM! Waaahhh! This is ‘Lagare’ in its truest form. Hehe. Oh well, I’m not complaining!

PS: Congratulations to Liza for that great hosting stint. I just wish you had some spotlight. Hehe.

Father’s Day

I woke up on a Sunday with little sleep. I greeted my father a happy father’s day and immediately took a bath. I spent my whole day with my dad and mom since I know that I am always away. This is one instance that I need to give time for family. We celebrated father’s day by purchasing things. Haha.

First we went to Gilmore and bought a new PC. The PC is nice I tell you. Then we went home and ate lunch with my sister. Since I am valuing my sleep more and more these days, I decided to invest on a nicer mattress. We went out and bought one. The moment I finished the sales transaction I immediately wanted to go home and put the mattress on a test drive. Hehe. Of course I didn’t since we still had other things to do. Then my mom bought my dad cologne for father’s day. We bought pizza and pork steak for dinner afterwards then proceeded to attending the mass at night. After the mass, we watched this movie… Argh! I feel so uncomfortable not remembering the title!

So that’s father’s day for me – a whole day with the family. Thanks Pa for being one heaven of a great father to us!

Cheriboys ‘Tour’

After the Global GK congress, JM, JB and I went to Shangrila to eat dinner. We proceeded to Vista Verde to support JM in his talk in the Karangalan Chapter CLP. PA and Ryan followed soon after. So there we were. Complete again. It seems that the word is spreading. When JB and I entered the CLP venue, Ice said, ‘uy Cherifer!’ I was quite surprised because I didn’t expect her to know about us. Oh well, I’m not complaining. It’s actually cool that people know. But take note, we dropped the ‘fer’ and opted for just Cheriboys. Hehe. Anyway, after the talk, we went to the CLP graduation of the Brookside chapter, PA’s chapter. We were introduced to most of the members at the back. We conversed and ate a little then proceeded to the session proper at PA’s house. They moved house again so the place was again new to us.

That session I think was the most personal for the group so far. In our past conversations, it would usually be someone’s turn. One or two guys would be the topic or center of attention for the night. This time all of us had our share. Yes, even I. I had to be honest with the one thing that I’ve been avoiding to discuss in our upper households. Hehe. We discussed not only each other’s personal lives but also the friendship transpiring in the group. Looking back, I think I might have asked a lot of extra-personal questions. Things that should never really come out if we wanted peace to prevail in this world. Hehe. Maybe it’s the ‘extra strong’ effect on me. Hehe. Don’t worry guys; I have no history of breaking the trust of good friends. Hehe.

I thought that was one stirring session. Yes, I might have gone home still quite tipsy (I had to rely on Ryan a bit in crossing the street. Hehe) but at the end of it all, I really felt good about that night. I guess it’s one of those times when you realize that the camaraderie has moved a lever higher.

Global GK Congress

Last Saturday, I attended the Global Gawad Kalinga Congress at the Ultra. It was the gathering of all the people involved in the Gawad Kalinga effort which is basically comprised of the whole CFC community and ministries, partners, beneficiaries, government agencies/officials and whole lot more. The venue was jampacked and the congress was very moving but at the same time very fun. The entire CFC chapters assigned to all GK sites paraded at the beginning of the program. This included those in Metro Manila, Philippine provinces and those outside of the country. The talks given mostly by the CFC council were very empowering and reassuring. It was a good source of refueling for those tired bodies, minds, hearts and spirits of the countless GK volunteers who were fortunate to have the opportunity to listen to the talks. Even the presentations were very amusing and entertaining – the AVPs, production numbers, Shell choir singing and who could forget that four-year-old boy who was so good in playing the drums that his talent made the whole Ultra holler. Overall, the event was more than a success.

Being done with that, what I actually wanted to write is this:

I am quite disappointed with the turnout of attendees from our chapter. The night before, I came from the wake of my former team lead’s father. Anto texted me that night and asked me how many will attend the congress. I replied that from what I know, it will only be me, my sister and Chin. I came home at around 1am and woke up at 6am to go to our meeting place. When my sister and I got to Mercury Junction, the only people I saw were Anto, Chin and Rhoan. So basically, there’s only seven of us (with Jonas and Ate Lannie already there because they had an earlier call time) from a now relatively bigger chapter. While listening to the talk, I thought to myself that I wish that my chapter mates were here to listen to these great talks. I know that if they just experience how it is here then I know their involvement in GK would increase. But at that moment, the lukewarm participation of our chapter in GK activities continues.

I mean surely I am no perfect servant. I actually had apprehensions in attending the congress because I didn’t feel worthy. I am only a Sector Editor for GK News Bureau and will act as PMG of our new site. That’s nothing compared to the full-timers who basically gave their all for this act of nation building. Or to the partners who gave huge amount of monetary support to build those GK villages. Little as I think my service is to Gawad Kalinga, I eventually decided to attend. Call it obedience to a higher calling. Even during the talks, there are times that I would feel guilty in the honoring done by the talk givers and embarrassed in shouting ‘Kasali ako diyan!” So you see even I wasn’t that much comfortable and at home with the situation. But I think these feelings get easier if we have strong support. There is indeed strength in numbers. If we, and I mean including myself… If my chapter only gives the same effort, participation and energy that we pour in all those conferences and parties, then I think our service to GK would be so much better. I mean that’s not just for this particular congress alone but for the whole GK service in general. I mean yeah, the fun and excitement isn’t that upfront but then again, the joy that one gets in serving our less fortunate brethren transcends the word “fun.” During the congress, I thought that if our members could only see what we are seeing now… If they could only experience what we are experiencing, then maybe they would understand the need to be involved. I guess the bigger responsibility also lies in the heads – chapter heads down to the household heads. And again that includes me. We have to be immersed in the many works of Gawad Kalinga first before we can even try to invite our members to attend. While they haven’t been to any GK activities, we, the community heads, must be GK’s representative to them. They must see in us how great it is to be involved before they actually get interested. In short, we have to be believable. That struggle for heads is another story.

Even with all this, I am not losing hope. I am actually optimistic of all the possibilities that my chapter can do. Our last 2 CLP batch graduates are very enthusiastic about attending SFC activities (that’s 12 + 9 new members). We just need to guide them to follow the path of service, in whatever way they can, in Gawad Kalinga. Our chapter is also opening a new GK site in Simona. This is a great opportunity to bond in service and find a deeper meaning in the concept of ‘Bayanihan’ because it will only be us this time. No other chapter to cover for us. In the end, I know that the work that we will do in Gawad Kalinga will be perfect because that will ultimately be God’s work and God’s will.

PS: I still love my chapter and still feel so much blessed for being a part of East A1B! I do not intend to step on anyone’s foot. This is just the cariño brutal part of loving. Hehe. Anyway, this should be all for our betterment. Peace!

The Path to Conversion

….. is very short! I don’t know what got into me yesterday but I felt like I needed a change. This is what happens when your team had a successful deployment of a major release at the end of the week. The Monday after, you have nothing to do. In my case, its almost like that. I was assigned to analyze/investigate the event log entries in our Production site to check if there are any errors caused by the application we just released. After going through 2,257 logs and realizing that I still have to go through 34,000++ logs, my mind wanted to explode! I was so bored and my eyes were aching. Waaaaaahhhhhhh! I needed something to break the monotony. My break: blog hopping! As I read on Kate’s blog in blogspot, she mentioned transferring blogs for the nth time. Now this girl is a blog veteran. She has “stuffs” in 360, hi5, friendster, multiply, myspace, ringo and the list goes on. Reading her transfer again made me think. Transferring is a good way to escape those readers who doesn’t have the decency to let you know that they are reading your page and then gossiping about what they read. At least let me know by asking me the URL, mentioning reading my page when you get a chance, dropping me a note, putting a post comment or linking my blog to yours. Actually, I really don’t have an issue with that. I’m just saying it made me think. Additionally, I YMed Kate asking why she is transferring and she said that blogspot is no longer allowed in her office. How many times have I heard that?! Hmmm…. So anyway, i thought about it and here are some ‘reasons’ (if you can all it that) I have for making the switch:

1. BlogSpot was the initial choice because it was user-friendly for first time bloggers. It’s a great site to start one’s blog life. Now I might want to try something else since there are so many options that the World Wide Web offers. I browsed through the different blog sites out there and got a little dazed on which one would suit me.
2. I just realized that I have a number of blogmates that now can’t read my blog because their offices disallow it. Being an IT grad, I have a number of these friends who work facing the computer daily and it is usually a common trend for companies to disallow blog sites, friendster etc apparently so that their employees can become more productive. So what happens is a one-way stream. I can read theirs but they can’t read mine. We have to make blog reading convenient for the most number of people. So since I decided to change sites, I have to go for those that it usually is still not blocked. My choice basically boiled down to xanga or wordpress.
3. This is a baby step to that thing called making a change and deciding to go for it. I’ve been pressured lately…. OK fine, not pressured, just asked. I’ve been asked lately why I haven’t decided to make a move on something that I have already discerned as something that is for me (wait, this should be contained in a different post. hehe). So I made this a small step on decision making 101 on my life’s personal aspects.
4. Why the hell not!? I’m in ‘petiks’ mode! Bwahahaha!

I figured I wanted to use xanga just to be different. I created an account and was quite ok with the site’s usability. What I didn’t like was the ads. My blog site has this big banner of ads that I can’t remove unless I pay for the ‘premium’ account. Ads for me are a no-no. I don’t want commercialism bombarding my personal space. So it’s down to wordpress. I was about to back out since I am not that available to manually migrate all my post from one site to the next. But Kate mentioned that exporting past posts was very easy because wordpress has this conversion/migration functionality for blogspot posts. Yahooo! It was so easy! I was done in 10 minutes. I have a new blog site with all of my past post. It was great that I got addicted to fixing my new site. I went home at 10pm because I enjoyed managing the new site. I even convinced my team lead, Mark, to make the switch. Hahaha! Perhaps that is what I missed. Blogspot was simple that it became too simple for me. I wanted some challenge. But don’t get me wrong. WordPress is very easy to use. Plus it supports pingbacks and trackbacks. I don’t want to bore you with the technical details of this but it just means that more people can comment on your post because this site supports the newer way of external commenting (BlogSpot only has trackbacks.) Thanks BlogSpot for the memories. I will leave you and move on to a new life. I am deciding to make a change this time (yuck, what am I saying. hahahaha!)

So there! This is my new page! It is still in progress but it looks pretty good to me! Again, welcome to my life!

Object Oriented Design

After a long drought, I finally found some time to train! Yahoo! Well actually it was my manager, Chris, who enrolled me in it. She sort of forced me to take a break and train. Hehe. My work capacity is usually full this fiscal year so I am unable to look for good training and find free time in our team calendar to be away in the office. Even for this one. I didn’t know I was enrolled until I got the enrollment confirmation. Hahaha. What makes this training great is that this particular training is something that I’ve wanted to take. It’s a good training for Application Designers (sorry for the IT jargon) but I need to be away for 1 whole week for this. Hehe. That didn’t really sit well with my supervisors’ plan so I really needed to ask for this training ahead of time (a month ahead). And I did. Added to this, only senior developers were allowed to take the training since it is assumed that only their roles are the ones designing software applications. Since I was already doing this as part of my job, I asked my senior team lead if I can still take it because it will really help me and benefit the project in the long run. And so they made a request to take me as an exception to the rule. Eventually, the professional development unit approved. And so I was ready. The first time I was approved to take the training, it unfortunately got cancelled due to low enrollees (see, teams don’t want their people being away that long. hehe). What?!?!?! After all that!? Talk about luck.

And just when I have accepted that I might never get to take this training, the enrollment confirmation comes. Alright! Added to this, the June 12 Holiday will fall in between this training so I have a longer break (training is from June 7-14). The training was awesome! It was a nice break from my team life. I gained a lot of insights, learning and skills. But most importantly, I gained a lot of weight! Hahaha! There was mirienda in the morning, heavy lunch and another mirienda before we leave… all for free! Plus I was able to go home at 5:30PM with the sun still up! I get home early, rest, take a bath and attend my SFC activities at night fresh and rested. All without hurrying and without the stress of traffic. This is too much. It’s like a dream. Hehe.

Then just like all dreams and all good things, it had to end. But it was ok. It was good while it lasted. I came back to work rejuvenated, more alert and smarter. Oh, and what’s the name of the training, just look at the title of this post. ;p

Highlights

Sometimes we underestimate the impacts that moments have in our lives. Moments are those little things/events that happen to us or we encounter that when given insufficient attention simply passes away. We must learn to recognize the power that moments have in us. Just one moment can totally alter our life’s perspective, make us laugh boisterously, cry quietly or reaffirm truths we’ve forgotten. When we learn to recognize a moment, it sort of becomes the highlight of an event. We just have to be open and observant. Here are some things that happened to me lately and their highlights. In short, this is ‘Update Attempt’ # 2 with some fancy introduction. Hahaha!

CLP Baptism
>> I was the praying partner of my fellow head who happens to be a facilitator for this CLP – Allan. After the baptism/pray over of this particular participant, I was suppose to accompany him to go back to his seat. When our eyes met, I saw tears dripping from his face. It didn’t look like he was sad or remorseful. He actually looked happy. At that moment, I was reaffirmed that what we are doing in this thing called CLP actually makes a difference in other people lives and transformations. Forget the fact that Ryan, Chin and their service team are making a lot of sacrifices, going the extra mile and doing all these for free. As long as participants experience the happiness in Him that most of us feel in this community, then it’s all worth it.

CFC Pentecost Rally
>> The African priest! Who could forget him?! He is like a ball of lighting. When he stepped on the stage and started speaking, you wouldn’t know what hit you. I know I’ve been tagged as part of ‘energy’ (the younger ones in the community as supposed to ‘wisdom’ who are the elders) but this one is the epitome of energy! I couldn’t keep up with him! Asking us to stand then sit again then stand again. His talk was anything but boring. After his talk, I really felt empowered, assured and of course energized!

Crocodile Grill Dinner
>> The dinner itself was the highlight. It was supposed to be a dinner for all my chapter mates working in the Makati area. I even invited our chapter mates in other places if they wanted to join us. The result – only five of us attended. Hehe. Even so, I really enjoyed all their company and we had great fun – this time without talking about any service-related activities. Just us being single, young professionals. Oh, and the seating arrangement was a highlight as well. Hopefully a vision of things to come. Hehe

CLP Graduation
>> The participants’ presentation is a great moment for me. First they had this mini satire followed by this spoof of the song ‘Narda’ and finally their favorite SFC song as a batch – I Give My All. Wow! A batch with noticeably close relationship with each other singing ‘I Give My All’ on their dedication night… Very inspiring. I actually took a video of their singing but since I am all-writing in this blog, you’ll just have to ask me personally for that. Hehe.

Village Fiesta/ Neigbor’s Baptism
>> The realization that we really live in a small world. During the fiesta of our Village, our neighbor asked my sister to be the Godmother of their son. It happened that the brother of our new member, Vicky was also asked to be the Godfather. So Vicky and I were like extras in the Baptism rights. Hehe. When I saw the face of Vicky’s brother, it all fell into place! I frequently tell Vicky that she looks familiar but I just can’t figure out where I’ve seen her. When I saw her brother Voltaire, that’s when I knew! We were former bus mates back in the days when I was a High School student in La Salle and she in OB Montessori. We started conversing about all the common acquaintances, experiences etc. All this time she perfectly attended all the 13 weeks our CLP and I never realized that she was that little girl that used to be my bus mate. We like in small world with intertwined relationships.

Angeli’s Debut
>> We were invited to attend the debut of Hazel and May’s younger sister. When I entered the venue, it felt like I entered into an all-girls school. There were so many 18-year young ladies! I felt good and bad. Good because I am one of the few eligible guys around (you could just imagine the hidden stares that I get. hehe). But bad because I felt old. Some of these girls haven’t reached 18 yet so I could be sued if I do anything mischievous. Hehe

McDonalds at 1 am
>> After Angeli’s birthday, I didn’t want to go home yet so I asked some guys/girls to go grab some coffee. We could find an open store on a Sunday night so we ended up at McDonalds. The highlight for me here was my blooper about the pregnant lady. It was really funny to me and I was extremely embarrassed. Oh well, me and my loud, big mouth. Hehe

Freedom Build at Simona
>> The heads of my chapter went to our new GK site, Simona, for the very first time to profile the households there and to get a feel of the place. The highlight for me was the last interview. I actually met the oldest living settler in the area (at least that what the neighbors are saying). He was a 70-plus-year-old blind man who was very accommodating and polite. I wanted to interview him further but we were out of time so we just stuck to getting the information we need for the profiling. He is like a walking history book of the place and I am sure to go back to interview him. It’s that news bureau blood pumping again.

Swimming at Pat’s pool
>> One of my frustrations in the CLP that I headed was that I didn’t get a chance to get to know the participants personally during the CLP. I was always the one talking in front but it was the facilitators that got to talk to them personally since I was occupied in handling the overall flow of the CLP and I didn’t want to concentrate on a group to seem that I play favorites. Of course, I more than made up for that because I have good relationship with them now. With this last CLP, I was given a chance to get to know the members a little bit better because there was no team lead pressure anymore. One of these times is the swimming at Pat’s residence. The highlight – well, just the bonding itself. It’s like meeting new friends. Great group. I enjoyed their company. Plus I enjoyed the pool. Hehe

My Tobit’s Weekend

Last May 27-28, I, along with almost all the heads of my chapter, attended the Tobit’s weekend in Tagaytay. It’s like a retreat/conference for the Couple’s for Christ community and was opened for attendance of SFC leaders. Initially I thought that it was just going to be an ‘OK’ event for me. I didn’t expect anything great to happen since it’s a CFC activity and most of the CFC activities I attended in the past don’t really relate much to my life (because it talks of family life, marital problems, nurturing children etc). But to my surprise, I was deeply affected by the Tobit’s weekend. I really can’t explain the exact talk or sharing or prayer that did it for me. Perhaps it was just the total experience, including the many things I participated in:

First there was the PowerSlam. Initially I was not really supposed to join the group. The directive was to have 3 participants per chapter. Since there was initially four household heads in our delegation (I, Ryan, Klea and Chin), I chose to give the three heads a chance to experience this different kind of service. But since Chin became unable to attend due to work-related constraints, I had no choice but to join PowerSlam. After seeing how very little participation we got from the sector (there was a time when only 9 practiced when we were aiming for 25 people), I became more willing to participate. I wanted to help Jane because I knew that she is also struggling to make the presentation work. During the presentation day, I was less nervous than most of the group. Call it the ‘veteran’ effect but I was actually quite calm. I knew that we would have mistakes and the presentation wouldn’t be perfect because we didn’t really have time to practice in the actual venue but I thought we would be OK. To be honest, I felt like an old soul. I remembered how it was when I was just new in the community and participated in my first Bounce competition. Back then I was freakingly nervous. Years after, I am still here. From that first group, it was Jane and I that were still left there. But even with that feeling, I still gave my best. I knew I was not doing this for anybody but the Lord. If it was just me, I would just be comfortable watching these dance presentations. But I know that I have this little blessing of coordinating my mind and body with a particular song, so I responded to His call.

And then there was the sharing. When my father asked me if I wanted to share in the talk ‘Tobit’s son’, I said OK thinking that I will be just like the usual sharing that I give when my father delivers his Christian Family talk. Little did I realize the impact of what I was going to do. From the briefing I got from Tito Edwin, I realized that I would have to open more to give the talk more meaning and to be able to fully maximize its intended effect. The first time I entered the venue I thought, ‘mukhang napasubo ata ako.” Hehe. There were so many people! And a lot of the CFC I’ve seen there knows me and my father. I became more nervous knowing that I would be talking about a man whom most of the listeners know about. When I was able to sneak in some quiet time for myself, I prayed to God to empower me and to use me as the vessel of his message. I was sure I couldn’t do it alone but I was surer that I am not doing it alone. He is there. Anyway, the sharing itself was weird. It was my first time to talk in a large audience with all the works of a big gathering. It felt like giving a monologue to me – I couldn’t see a face because of the bright spot light and in effect I couldn’t see the reaction of the people. I couldn’t even hear a thing because my voice was the only thing reverberating in the all the corners of the auditorium. I was a bit distracted by those things but then I just kept on talking – saying things about my life that I have not really shared with anybody. Now, I am sharing with the whole sector! I didn’t know if I made any sense. I tried to follow the outline I prepared the night before but in the end, I just followed my heart. I just hope that I gave justice to how I knew my father and how instrumental he is in changing my life and my perspectives in it.

Lastly, there was my Chapter and my Cherifer. Hehe. I think it’s the first time since we fondly called ourselves Cheriboys that we were together on a major community activity. This time we were not on a gimmick, nor some club nor drinking for that matter. At that time, we were just brothers in the community all trying to contribute to the success of the event – JM, Ryan and I in PowerSlam while JB in the production crew and that theatrical presentation. It was good to see all of us serving in whatever way we can. Plus, these guys are super supportive. I didn’t really expect JM and JB to pass by the area where my chapter was seated just to wish me luck on my sharing. Then there was JM’s story on his conversation with PA’s mom. Very inspiring. As with my chapter, I feel really blessed to a part of it. All of us heads have a very close relationship. And that relationship was further strengthened in this Tobit’s weekend. Thanks to Anto, Ate Dedeth, Jonas, Ate Lannie, Line, Klea, Ryan and also to the heads who were not there namely Kuya Robert, MacMac, Beth, Allan and Chin. All of you guys played a huge part in my growth in the community and in service.

We went home on a Sunday not really feeling tired but actually more able and empowered to go about our CLP Baptism that night.

Tagged

My old friend and now fellow diver, Kate, posted this open tag on her page. I thought the topic was interesting so I chose to respond. Here’s the topic:

Name ten (10) of life’s simple pleasures that you like the most

Here’s my list:

1. Laughing – If you know me, then you know that I laugh hard. It makes you look younger; just look at me ;p
2. Sleeping or resting in my bed – This is a luxury for me. But I love sleeping when I get a chance
3. Listening to Hip-hop or RnB while bouncing my head and body – Yep, I’m that kinda guy; not really your Rock Star; maybe Porn Star. Hahaha!
4. Having great conversation with friends – I go on gimmicks not because of the gimmick place but because of the people I’m with. As long as I can have good conversation, I’m OK anywhere.
5. Dinners or lunches with family on a weekend – what can I say, I enjoy talking to my family. We’re like a barkada
6. Eating Jolibee’s chocomallow pie, or KFC’s chocolate mousse or McDonald’s hot fudge sundae – sweet tooth!
7. Getting a good sweat on a challenging badminton game – Badminton is good for the mind and body. Believe me.
8. Attending SFC activities namely conferences, praise fests, household meetings and GK builds – Need I expound? Hehe
9. Meeting new friends and discovering new places – It’s harder to find genuine friends as we get older, that’s why meeting new ones is such a delight. It’s also fun to see new places; i guess it’s that traveler in me kicking in.
10. Alone moments with her – Yep. I like it when it’s just me and her…..

Since this is my first tag, I am sharing it with everyone. So I am tagging you! Yes, you! The one reading this post! All the people reading this are tagged! TAG!