a bruise, by any other cause

Bruises come in all configurations and locations.

This one here, sported by an OR colleague, was obtained while playing wargames, one of the fast becoming popular hobbys some young men in Dumaguete are engaging in. Ronald assured us he didn't mind getting these bruises (he had two more elsewhere) as even the pain is worth the fun he had.

Looking at these bruises though, remind me of other bruises obtained in not so fun ways.

Like double black eyes after frontal craniotomy.

Or the hematoma on my Lola Agre's whole arm after a blood extraction when she was diagnosed to have aplastic anemia.

Or bruises of victims of domestic violence.

Or other equally gruesome etiologies.

kungfu panda

A must watch movie!! Such fun! I'm going to watch it again.

Here is Po, the Panda who is a kung fu fan and a food fanatic.


Master Shifu. Peace, Man!

fueling up

These people here, including me, would like to fuel up. But to our dismay, fuel prices have gone way, way up.

my oh my muay thai

Jab.

Straight.

Jab.

Hook.

Jab. Jab.

Straight.

Left hook.

Right uppercut.

Huhh. Huhh. Hmmphh.

Oh, yeah. That's what Jaja, Jinjun and I have been doing this afternoon. We went to the Muay Thai gym along Meciano Road, just down the street where I grew up. And we had such a super great time, I am campaigning for everybody to go find a similar gym tomorrow, wherever you are! It is such a fun way to keep fit and work out aggressions and frustrations. ;p

Here are some sample moves:

straight

right upper cut

meet our scholar

In less than two months it will be Silliman University's Founder's Day once again. And SUHS Batch '78 will be celebrating our 30th grand reunion. We had such an awesomely wonderful time during our four years in Silliman High School that we decided to help a deserving student experience what we had before - learning in and out of the classrooms, finding solid principles to live by and most of all, building friendships that have grown stronger and deeper through the years.

To all my batchmates who have not met our scholar yet, here she is, Sarah Ingrid A. Francisco.





To HS Batch '78, my sponsor:

First of all, I would like to thank you for the support you've given me these past two years. I wouldn't be here, studying in Silliman, if it weren't for you.

I remember that when I was still a sixth grader how badly I wanted to continue my studies at Silliman High School. But because we can't afford the school's tuition fee due to my older brother's medical condition, that dream somehow seemed impossible. Plus, I still have a younger brother who just started going to school. Much to my surprise when one day, my father told me to apply for a sholarship in high school. I was nervous because to me the word 'scholar' meant a smart, studious person who's always at the top. I started thinking of negative things like: I won't be a scholar 'cause I lack the skill to be one; I might not live up to their expectations; and I'm simply bot worthy to be one. I was really shocked when I found out that I was chosen as a scholar by Batch '78 and I was really happy because I'm finally going to continue my studies in Silliman.

My first year in high school was a bit hard for me. Since I was new to this "scholarship thing", I really had to adjust my study habits. I did my best to cope up with the hard lessons. During second year, I was able to balance my time with my friends, family, studies and free time. I am now a junioir this school year and I'm planning to double my efforts 'cause I don't want to let all of you down.

None of these would have happened if you hadn't chosen me as your scholar. This really helped me a lot and I can't think of a better way to express my gratitude than to tell you two simple meaningful words: THANK YOU!


Sincerely,

Sarah Ingrid A. Francisco (Signed)

the bigger picture

I know the campaign for the American presidency is in full swing now but an Obama poster in Sibulan? Is this for real?

Hmm. Looks suspicious.

Oooppss!

same birthdays

These two babies have the same birthdays. And they were both born under modern circumstances. In sterile hospital settings. Today.


I wonder how it was when my Lola Agre was born more than a century ago, in 1907. Surely it must have been quite different.

How does one say happy birthday and I miss you to a memory?

Lola Agre and Lolo Cente

tbr summary

This has been a heavy week, or rather, last week has been a heavy week for the blog rounds as three editions were published in a span of 4 days! Check this out:

TBR 12.5/12.75, hosted by Meloinks , topic: the PMA and us, Posted: June 17, 2008

TBR 13 , hosted by BoneDoc, topic: Why do we blog? Posted: June 18, 2008

TBR 14, hosted by Em Dy, topic: Doc Hollywood, Posted: June 20, 2008

So, don't we have other things to do or are we having fun yet? Nosebleeeeeed!

So we're all going to rest this week as BoneDoc whips up his special group emailing system as well as let Manggy, who I espied is going to host TBR 15, formulate his topic and guide questions for the next round.

Meanwhile, those who have not finished their (blog) rounds yet, go na.

another boat

After a power outage from 8 am to 8 pm, I go on-line and read that a boat has sunk yesterday after leaving Manila en route to Cebu. This just leaves me cold and numb. I used to take a lot of boat rides, having gone to school and lived in Manila for many years. I don't feel like writing tonight. So much sadness around.

a river runs through it

On sunny days, which is most of the year, two mini dams called overflows and two bridges traverse the Banica River so people can cross from the south side to the north side of the city. I happen to live on the south side of the river while all the hospitals are on the north side. Thus I have to cross the river, at any of the four points, to get to work.

The past couple of days have not been sunny. This was the Banica River today at the bigger upper Overflow. There should have been a road from where the kids are standing (gray asphalt on the foreground) up to the right upper corner of the image but instead there is water, water everywhere. A river runs thru the road...

nagmistulang karagatan ang dati-rati'y isang daanan

uliuling kumukulo putik choko tubig bundok

Nobody dared to cross that mighty roiling river at the big Overflow so I went to the other smaller overflow downriver. The white building in the background is part of Foundation University.

There was a car in front of me and I thought, if he can make it, then so can I.

Thankfully, the water was shallower and the current not so strong at this overflow. Again you can see that this is literally a case of "a river runs through it" as the River (Ri) and the Road (Ro) are almost one and the same.

Meanwhile, there is a lot of grief all over the country. Typhoon Frank has left thousands homeless and destitute, including here in Negros island.

It is almost midnight as I end this post and the rain's pounding and the wind's howling outside just seem to be increasing.

candles in the storm on a palabok night

It's been raining, and raining hard, the past few days. I thought it was just the rainy season coming around again. But it turned out that there is a tropical depression named Frank that has just intensified into storm status. And storm signal number one has been declared in several provinces in the Visayas.

Yet in spite of the rain and the storm, the crafts team met today to make more decorative candles. Production was rather slow today as some of our raw materials (the balloons) were not of the best kind and they had a propensity to burst when dipped in the warm melted wax. So we weren't able to make a lot of candles. But we still had a lot of fun. And food!

Pancit palabok

Fresh papaya chunks

These tasted really good. Nutritious, too. Yum!

comments on House MD

...are going to be brief.

1. He did not get an informed consent before doing a spur of the moment hysteroscopy on a patient undergoing an abdominal procedure.

2. He did not wear a cap and mask in the OR.

3. Of course, he did not scrub either.

4. His diagnostic methods are freaking far out.

5. His interpersonal methods are freakier farther out.

I rest my case.

p.s. He does not shave.

the reel deal on the boob tube

Ok, ok. I'm going to finally admit it. The reason it took me such a long time to write this entry is because... ahem... it's because... I don't watch television. Shocking ba masyado? Okay, how about, I don't watch television a lot? Actually, I can go without turning on the TV for weeks and I'd be perfectly happy with that.

The reason for this is that perhaps something happened along the way between childhood and adulthood: I lost the appetite for television. Which is a bit strange because I used to be a TV and movie freak. I couldn’t do any homework if I wasn’t sitting in front of an open TV and I would scrimp and save for weeks so I could splurge one weekend on movie marathons.

I think what turned me off about television were the commercials. Aside from the irritating way they interrupted the shows, I had this feeling that what they were purveying were just not true. For example, ads would make us believe that the only way to be in/up, hip/cool/hot was to be fair skinned, silky haired, with Barbie doll face and figure, eating all those yummy junk food, having the latest technogizmos, and other such fallacies. And the scary part is that the commercials are so well made that they are getting the dubious message across very powerfully.

Even with the advent of cable TV and no-commercial movies, I couldn’t re-engage with TV watching again. Maybe I’m one of the few (and maybe weird) Filipinos who do not watch PBB or GKNB or Lobo.

As for movies, I like watching (no commercial) movies but I try to avoid watching movies that are about doctors or medicine. Like Doc Joey, I tend to notice the flaws in medical scenes and I get frustrated that the production team did not make an effort to verify if their scenes were realistic or believable. So now I prefer to be entertained by non-medical films so I can thoroughly relax and enjoy the movie without fearing that the illusion of the movie's reality will be shattered by a jarring medical blooper.

And so, because I wanted to join the Blog Rounds 14th edition , I got a copy of House M.D. Season 4. My comments on House:


(will have to be continued later as it has been a long day and am so sleepy na... -_- )

12.75 beta

That's TBR 12.75 beta and it's finally up over at Meloink's. This is quite a heeeaaavvey topic with a lot of discussion going on here and there and some bit of nosebleeding here and there, too.

Is medicine a business?

The Ateneo School of Medicine thinks so. In fact their medical course is a double degree program wherein their graduates earn two degrees at the same time: Doctor of Medicine and Master of Management. I think this is a first in the Philippines. Check it out here.

Another medical school is thinking of offering a double degree program, too, where students graduate as Doctor of Medicine and Master of Public Health. They believe community medicine has not been given enough emphasis in our medical schools when in fact it is what is greatly needed in our country.

Is medicine making a living out of other people's problems?

I want to look at medicine as a way of helping people who are ill. Doctors have that extraordinary privilege. Payment received is very much welcome. But our true satisfaction should be in the fact that we did good medicine. Whether we get paid or not. (I hope none of my patients will be reading that or surely they'll take me to task!) "Doc, bakit discount lang, sana libre na lang lahat!" O_o Oh, yeah. There are all kinds of patients. ;p

Is medicine a noble profession?

What makes a profession 'noble'? Is teaching a noble profession? How about being a pedicab driver? Or a girl selling e-loads? What determines whether a profession or career is noble or not? What if your profession does not belong to the 'noble' category? Would the opposite of noble be ignoble?

Noble:

Synonyms

3. highborn, aristocratic. 4. honorable. Noble, high-minded, magnanimous agree in referring to lofty principles and loftiness of mind or spirit. Noble implies a loftiness of character or spirit that scorns the petty, mean, base, or dishonorable: a noble deed. High-minded implies having elevated principles and consistently adhering to them: a high-minded pursuit of legal reforms. Magnanimous suggests greatness of mind or soul, esp. as manifested in generosity or in overlooking injuries: magnanimous toward his former enemies. 6. grand, lordly, splendid. 11. peer, aristocrat.

Antonyms 3. lowborn, base.

Ignoble:

Synonyms 1. degraded, dishonorable, ignominious, contemptible. 3. lowly, obscure, plebeian, peasant.

Antonyms 1. honorable. 2. superior.

___________________________

As for TBR 14, Doc Em, in the making... hopefully, will be posting it tomorrow.

house calls

Ssshh! I'm (still) watching House M.D. for TBR 14. :-)

happy father's day to all dads (and moms acting as dads, if that is possible)

Finally,we got to try out the newest and most talked about restaurant here in Dumaguete - Gabby's Bistro in the quiet residential neighborhood of Florentina Homes in Piapi.

First thing: The place definitely has that most sought after "ambiance." One doesn't eat and run there. The manicured garden and the Mexican inspired art and curio shop lend to lingering and chatting. Inside the airconditioned main restaurant, the decor just totally takes you away from Dumaguete. It is a scene straight from old movies featuring the American South: spotlighting, upholstered "booths", tangerine walls and posters framed with black and white checked background, reminiscent of Elvis Presley and Grease days. The decorative bottles perched on near ceiling ledges, murals on the glass and cement walls and poster caricatures of Oprah and other celebrities in the unisex washroom all make one think "done by an artist, done by an artist"! And no wonder. I later learned that the owner is a painter herself. Coolness.

Second thing: The chef, Gabby, is the son of the owners, Mr. and Mrs. del Prado. Gabby doesn't wear a tall, white chef's hat but a red baseball hat instead. I heard he's a Culinary Arts graduate from La Salle University, which must have been in the recent past because this young lad looks barely twenty five years old! We had beef/chicken/fish teriyaki, teppanyaki, cajun chicken, and adobo chicken. We had lots of food because there were plenty of us there, fourteen to be exact.

Incredible thing: For drinks we had iced tea, soda and mango shake. For me, I had the mango shake, too. But before I could bring the corrugated straw to my lips, the waitress accidentally dumped the entire contents of the tall glass on to my abdomen, lap, feet and floor! What an extraordinary experience! This was the first time something like that happened to me. The waitress was, of course, mortified at her faux pas so I did not add to her misery anymore. It was one of those things that you wish never happened but do. It was a rather busy night for them, a Sunday and father's day at that. The place was full packed.

When we were about to leave, a handsome young couple arrived. The wife looked very familiar. Perhaps she was a former school mate somewhere? It was so weird because when she saw me, she said her immediate thought was that I looked familiar, too. Well, not a great mystery really, Dumaguete is such a small place, everybody knows almost everybody. These new arrivals turned out to be the owners of the awesome place.

They offered to give us a tour of the place (they also have fully furnished apartelles) but it was quite late already and there were homeworks to be finished yet. So we settled for some brochures instead. I thanked them for bringing such a nice place (apartelle, bistro with ambiance, curio shop) here in Dumaguete.

Overall eval: A must visit and a must-patronize place. Not everyday perhaps because though the prices are very cheap compared to Manila or Cebu, PhP 120 to 150 per entree is a bit steep for Dumaguete's mainly student populace. But an every now and then visit is surely recommended. In the meantime, while you are sitting there, here's a sneak preview of Gabby's Bistro.

by e.e. cummings

The Hours Rise Up Putting Off Stars And It Is

the hours rise up putting off stars and it is
dawn
into the street of the sky light walks scattering poems

on earth a candle is
extinguished the city
wakes
with a song upon her
mouth having death in her eyes

and it is dawn
the world
goes forth to murder dreams…

i see in the street where strong
men are digging bread
and i see the brutal faces of
people contented hideous hopeless cruel happy

and it is day.

in the mirror
i see a frail
man
dreaming
dreams
dreams in the mirror

and it
is dusk on earth

a candle is lighted
and it is dark.
the people are in their houses
the frail man is in his bed
the city

sleeps with death upon her mouth having a song in her eyes
the hours descend,
putting on stars…

in the street of the sky night walks scattering poems

is talk cheap at the PMA?

After that cowardly initial response yesterday, here's my secondary response.

I really, really want to say something good about the Philippine Medical Association. Because I believe that there are two or even more sides to every issue. And because I don't want to think that the thousands of pesos that I am obligated to pay in annual dues will have been and will forever be for naught. But first I have to find that good thing, if any. So I went to their website and found some nice stuff like:

1. The Code of Ethics for medical practitioners. A very important reminder for old and new physicians. If we all followed that code by heart, I'm pretty sure medicine can truly be called noble again.

2. The joint manifesto on the full implementation of the Magna Carta of public health workers that says:

We are concerned about and strongly deplore the failure of local government agencies to fully implement the provisions of Republic Act 7305, otherwise known as the Magna Carta of Public Health Workers enacted on March 26, 1992. Such failure has further aggravated the poor standard of living of most of our public health workers at present who had been shortchanged for so long, and has contributed to our health workers leaving government service to look for greener pasture abroad. (read more...)

3. A position paper on Republic Act 9439, otherwise known as Patients Illegal Detention Act. It is a law that prohibits hospitals from refusing to release patients if said patients cannot settle their bills. The PMA protests this Act citing the following reasons:

*The Act might be subject to abuse and taken advantaged of by some patients who, although can afford, will refuse to settle their obligations to hospitals and doctors.

* It is common knowledge that promissory notes to hospitals and doctors remain as unsettled promissory notes even after several years. Litigations are long and tedious processes and may place hospitals and medical practitioners in a negative public perception.

* A number of patients give fictitious addresses to evade payments.

*There are two forms of indigent patients: the true indigent who can’t afford the medical care and the rich patients masquerading as indigent patients. (read more...)

4. The PMA motto

My rough translation:

United we physicians stand

Good health throughout our native land.

Isn't that true? That if we physicians have a unified stand on issues that affect national health care, we would have a stronger voice and clout than if we are just individual MDs griping in our own little clinics or whining away in our weblogs?

The PMA can be that personality with that big, strong voice and clout. The question is, is it?

is it ok if we talk about the PMA?

My initial response:

When it is so hard to say anything good about something or someone, maybe it is better to say nothing at all.

Ummphhh!

back to school

After two months of summer vacation, I had already forgotten something very important that is related to school days: traffic!! The past two days have been a quite a reminder. Most especially today when the the rest of the elementary schools in the city have opened. The roads were jampacked with mothers, fathers, grandparents, surrogates and yayas who all wanted to see off their kids on their memorable first day of school.

Years ago it was unthinkable for sleepy Dumaguete to have "traffic" as it is known in metropolitan cities. Well, the fact is, Dumaguete is after all dubbed as a "university town" so it is only natural that there are so many schools and students in this city. I saw a lot vehicles though that had only one or two passengers. Such a waste of fuel, I think. We should all carpool, right?

_____________________________

Incredibly, we still do not have internet connection at home. :-(

special gestures for a special person on a special day

Last Saturday, Mrs. PAULINA UY celebrated her 70th birthday with a party at the Bethel Guest House. Mrs. Uy is very fond of cooking and her children decided to do something to honor that - instead of hiring a professional to make flower arrangements for the tables, they decided to decorate the tables themselves using materials that are memorably significant to the birthday celebrant. They used vegetables and spices (carrots, peppers, bunches of garlic, etc.), creatively arranged, as table decorations. Very unique!

And my friend, Agong, brought the house down with her rendition of her contextualized version of "My Favourite Things" dedicated to her mother-in-law. Everybody thought doctors are these super serious people so they were all so delighted to hear Agong sing and 'dance' to her version of ...

Her Favourite Things

ABS Balita, Startalk, and the Buzz

Wrestling, PBB, My Girl, Wowowee

Chronicle, Inquirer are bundled in strings

These are a few of her favorite things.

Coffee and congee, ginamos, inun-unan

Kalamunggay, ampalaya

Bangus and sardinas

Pinakbet, monggos, alugbati, mais

These are a few of her favorite things.

When her tendon breaks

When her flushes strike

When her knees go bad

She simply remembers her favourite things

Then she doesn't feel so bad.

Evista, Cozaar, Lipitor and Arcoxia

Glucosamine, Calcium and Kirklands

Ultrasound, mammogram

DEXA, Pap smear

These are a few NOT SO favorite things.

False teeth and hair dye

And hair that is falling

Back pains and headache

and gums that are aching

Poor hearing, poor vision

Poor memory

That's when she remembers

her favorite things.

When the children call

When the children hug

When she's alone in the room

And then she remembers the great life she's had

Then she doesn't feel so bad.

summer = over

That summer went by FAST. Can hardly believe it. And soon it will be the Silliman Founder's Day and soon it will be Christmas all over again.

But for tomorrow, it will be the first day of school. Hurray! Hurray? Well, hurry up already, post na. ;p

know the symptoms of AAADD

(from cousin Mich!)
______________


Thank goodness there's a name for this disorder.

Somehow I feel better, even though I have it.

Recently, I was diagnosed with A.A.A.D.D. -

Age Activated Attention Deficit Disorder.

This is how it manifests:

I decide to water my garden.

As I turn on the hose in the driveway,

I look over at my car and decide it needs washing.

As I start toward the garage,

I notice mail on the porch table that

I brought up from the mail box earlier.

I decide to go through the mail before I wash the car.

I lay my car keys on the table,

put the junk mail in the garbage can under the table,

and notice that the can is full.

So, I decide to put the bills back

on the table and take out the garbage first.

But then I think,

since I'm going to be near the mailbox

when I take out the garbage anyway,

I may as well pay the bills first.

I take my check book off the table,

and see that there is only one check left.

My extra checks are in my desk in the study,

so I go inside the house to my desk where

I find the can of Coke I'd been drinking.

I'm going to look for my checks,

but first I need to push the Coke aside

so that I don't accidentally knock it over.

The Coke is getting warm,

and I decide to put it in the refrigerator to keep it cold.

As I head toward the kitchen with the Coke,

a vase of flowers on the counter

catches my eye--they need water.

I put the Coke on the counter and

discover my reading glasses that

I've been searching for all morning.

I decide I better put them back on my desk,

but first I'm going to water the flowers.

I set the glasses back down on the counter,

fill a container with water and suddenly spot the TV remote.

Someone left it on the kitchen table.

I realize that tonight when we go to watch TV,

I'll be looking for the remote,

but I won't remember that it's on the kitchen table,

so I decide to put it back in the den where it belongs,

but first I'll water the flowers.

I pour some water in the flowers,

but quite a bit of it spills on the floor.

So, I set the remote back on the table,

get some towels and wipe up the spill.

Then, I head down the hall trying to

remember what I was planning to do.

At the end of the day:

the car isn't washed

the bills aren't paid

there is a warm can of Coke sitting on the counter

the flowers don't have enough water,

there is still only 1 check in my check book,

I can't find the remote,

I can't find my glasses,

and I don't remember what I did with the car keys.

Then, when I try to figure out why nothing got done today,

I'm really baffled because I know I was busy all damn day,

and I'm really tired.

I realize this is a serious problem,

and I'll try to get some help for it,

but first I'll check my e-mail....

Do me a favor.

Forward this message to everyone you know,

because I don't remember who the hell I've sent it to.

Don't laugh -- if this isn't you yet, your day is coming!!

why i write a weblog

I write a weblog because every now and then I get this illusion that I was meant to be a writer and the high that I get with every "your post published successfully" adds to this illusion. That is not to say that each entry that I post is worth reading but I figured (let's do a bit of math, something I'm very good at ;p ) even if in 365 days I only write a handful of profoundly brilliant pieces, it will be worth the 360 drivel and dross exercises the rest of the year. Makes sense, right? Not? Hmm...

I write a weblog because every now and then there come “Kodak moments” in my life that just have to be captured in word pictures. Once in a while, though, there are word images that I cannot publish in a sanitized public weblog. That is why I have a private one for venom rants, censored emo and top secret shenanigans.

I write a weblog because every now and then RL sucks is not too dandy and I need a place to go where I can control font size, background color and comment moderation.

I write a weblog because every now and then when I make hyperlinks or upload photoshopped images and videos from movie maker or from youtube, my old foggy friends think I am Ms. Techie CoolNess personified.

I write a weblog because every now and then a reader writes a comment or sends an email or a text message and that encourages me.

I write a weblog because every now and then I read through the entries of a friend from high school days, Louie, and I get treated to adventures over land, sea, heart, mind and soul written in an eloquent and elegant language that makes one click on dictionary.com every once in a while. His revolutionary weblog, the free radical, has been dubbed “the mother of all weblogs” being that it has been unrelentingly flipped daily for eight years now and that it has spawned and nurtured dozens of other webloggers among his mentees and friends who have become his family as well.

I write a weblog because even if every now and then it feels like I cannot capture art or make sense in a sentence or paragraph, there was that guy Rilke who said:

“You ask whether your verses are any good. You ask me. You have asked others before this. You send them to magazines. You compare them with other poems, and you are upset when certain editors reject your work. Now (since you have said you want my advice) I beg you to stop doing that sort of thing. You are looking outside, and that is what you should most avoid right now. No one can advise or help you - no one.

There is only one thing you should do. Go into yourself. Find out the reason that commands you to write; see whether it has spread its roots into the very depths of your heart; confess to yourself whether you would have to die if you were forbidden to write.

This most of all: Ask yourself in the most silent hour of your night: must I write? Dig into yourself for a deep answer. And if this answer rings out in assent, if you meet this solemn question with a strong, simple "I must," then build your life in accordance with this necessity; your whole life, even into its humblest and most indifferent hour, must become a sign and witness to this impulse.”

And finally, I write a weblog because every now and then there is The Blog Rounds and this is my entry for TBR 13.

why i write

I write because
there are words jostling inside of me
straining, begging to be set free
An indulgent parent acquiescing
I open the door and let the kids/words
tumble out and frolic in the yard/page
Cautiously admonishing

Don't be too loud lest you draw a crowd
Keep your play clean no sense being mean
When you bike pedal up and down the street
Take care tread not over somebody's feet

Perhaps when you're older may then you'll be bolder
But for now you're a child let our convos be mild
While warm blaze the sun gambol glee have fun
And when the air hung heavy with rain
May then you can share some of your pain.

wednesday is craftsday!

For this yesterday's craft activity, our project was to make three kinds of candles: luminaires, boat candles and regular candles.

Regular candles are regular candles.

Boat candles are cup shaped candles that can float on water. Marvelous for table settings and pool decorations.

Luminaires are little domes (made of paraffin wax) with different shaped holes cut into its walls. These domes are placed over regular candles whose candle light shines through the holes cut into the wax domes.

Our teacher, Ted, showed us how to make all three. I will show you how to make the luminaires.

First we melt paraffin wax in a coffee can. We add a crayon to the melting paraffin for color.




The above photo shows the can of paraffin and one crayon melting away. (Gremere is actually doing something which is the last step, which I'll tell you about in a while.)

When all the wax has melted, we remove the can from the fire and let it cool a bit. Then we gather previously prepared small sized balloons filled with water. These will be our mold.




Here are the balloons. That little packet of colorful shiny tidbits on the right side of the photo will be used to decorate the regular candles. (not shown in this post)


The next step is a very crucial one. We had many misshaps here. We dip the water-filled balloon into the slightly cooled wax until a thin coat of wax forms around the lower half of the balloon.




The process is dip balloon, lift balloon out of wax, dip balloon again, lift it out again. Repeat five to seven times, or until desired thickness of the luminaire is achieved. As it was the first time for all of us, we sort of just winged it, each of us making luminaires of different thickness. The tricky part here is if the wax is too hot, the balloon will burst, and surprise (and splash) everyone nearby!



After a few burst balloons, we knew already what was just the right temperature for dipping. That would be lukewarm wax. Too cold wax meant the wax would have began to congeal and you wouldn't get a very good shape anymore.




Shown above is Honey dipping her yellow balloon in the can of melted orange wax. Bebot, beside her, is waiting for her turn. Notice the orange ice cream container beside the Cafe Puro can? That orange container has cold water where the wax coated balloon will be immersed for a while (around two minutes) in order for the wax to set.




Then the water inside the balloon is gently released using a pin or a sharp knife. The key here is 'gently', otherwise, water would splash every which way again.



Here is Queenie holding up some of the almost-finished luminaires. The next step is to cut out holes (you choose what design you like) in the walls of the wax luminaires. Remember that these luminaires will be turned upside down and placed over regular lighted candles and the light from the candle will shine through the holes that we made on luminaire walls.

The first photo shows Gremere doing this cutting-holes-step. And why is he hunched in front of the stove? It is because he is heating his knife. A hot knife cuts clean whereas a cold knife causes some chaffing of the wax.




Voila! Our waxy produce! Gremere's is at the one o'clock position. Mine is at the eight o'clock position and that cute pumpkin there was made by 13 year old Kevin. I used a cold knife for my margin so you can see some 'chaffing' or 'crumbling' on the rim of my luminaire.

Somewhere in between all these steps we had a sumptuous feast of pancit palabok, giant choco cupcakes, two kinds of nuts and assorted breads. YumYum!

And a wonderful time was had by all. :-)

:-(

Hindi na nakakatuwa ang SmartBro. Nakakaloka ang connection. Broadbandits na sila.

ccrrunnccchhh!

Mas malutong pa ito kaysa lechon ni Doc Tess o sa chicharon ni Meloinks. ;-) Pramis. Try?

(from jojo's email)

awww

where did the road go?

There used to be a wide asphalted road in front of our gate. But a couple of months ago, on March 28 to be exact, the wide road was halved. One side was dug up and cemented while the other half of the road served traffic both ways.

Now the cement on the Other Side of the Road, after one month of 'curing', has been declared hard enough for all types of vehicles to pass through. Thus, that part of the road that was closed for the past two months has been opened and it is now the once open part that is closed.

Hehehe. Confused already? ;-)

Anyway, the bottom line of the whole story is: we can't park inside our gate anymore. We have to park across the street, in the big yard of the Bishop's Palace, where the bishop of Dumaguete lives. That will be starting tomorrow, June 2. Let's see exactly when the cement on This Side of the road will be hard enough to handle traffic...

There used to be a road here...

but now there are only sacks of cement...

...piles of sand

... and gravel.

Gravel hill surrounded by sacs of sand

.