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Add fun to a vacation in Japan - look for beautiful manhole covers
These manhole covers in Himeji City feature cranes/egrets in flight.In our first vacation in the western part of Japan recently, we found something novel that added more fun to our tour of the UNESCO...
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Enjoying Ginza without a shopping bag
Hokoten or 'pedestrians heaven', Sunday afternoon, on Ginza's main street.It was truly 'pedestrians heaven' when people invaded Ginza on that Sunday afternoon we were visiting the place. They were...
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Asian high school students shone at the 2016 Intel International Science &...
ISEF 2016 participants during the shout-out of the opening program. Front row, left: three members of Team Philippines. Photo from the Facebook page of Society for Science & the Public.Two high...
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Going up and down six floors of the massive Himeji Castle of Japan
Main Keep (right) of Himeji or White Egret Castle.The cold spring weather was just fit for the climbing. It was not tiresome though because going up and down six stories of the Main Keep of Himeji...
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Changing of the guard in my hometown
The newly-elected mayor, vice-mayor and seven members of the Sanggunianng Bayan during their proclamation by Comelec on 10 May 2016 . Photo by the author.In the recent May 2016 elections, a woman was...
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Birthing pains of the K-12 education reform program
It's the first day of the implementation of the senior high school program in the Philippines. It happens to be the day after the commemoration of the 118th anniversary of country's independence from...
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Diwata, a new metaphor, in the 105th graduation rites of UP Diliman
The installation art by Toym Imao is inspired by the sarimanok."Ako ay isang diwata. Lahat tayo ay diwata. [I am a fairy. All of us are fairies.] We, the graduates, have the potential to soar through...
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After the Award, are you going to Scarborough Shoal?
Source: Philippines V. China: Arbitration Outcomes at https://amti.csis.org/arbitration-map/The fishing folks of the northern towns of Zambales and Infanta, Pangasinan could have felt a strong sense of...
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Duterte's ASAP: As SONA as possible
I missed the mass action on Commonwealth Avenue during the first State of the Nation Address (SONA) of President Rody Duterte on 25 July 2016. I saw him speaking though on the large TV screen at the...
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Urban art objects in Salem, MA: electrical utility boxes & street drains
Salem. Massachusetts is already familiar territory after several long visits there during the past two decades. It's called the Witch City being associated with the Witch Trials of 1692 (the Witch...
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Figureheads
Figurehead of the USCG Barque Eagle.It was open house of the US Coast Guard Barque Eagle on the last day of this month [July 2016, its sails down and furled, at the Salem Wharf of Salem, Massachusetts....
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Discovering the Lopez Family of Balayan, Batangas in Boston, MA
The Lopez ancestral house, Balayan, Batangas. Photo taken by the author in 2014.My fraternity brother based in New Haven, CT and I were on our way to Copley Square of Boston, MA when, out of curiosity,...
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Philippine dignitaries in the history of New York's ticker-tape parades
It's not a tourist attraction in New York City: the series of granite plaques inlaid into the sidewalks on both sides of the city's most famous Broadway Avenue. These bear names and dates inscribed in...
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Japan Overseas Cooperation Volunteers: 2016 Ramon Magsaysay Awardee
The Ramon Magsaysay Award. (Source: http://rmaward.asia/)We have not encountered Japanese Overseas Cooperation Volunteers (JOCVs) except through the cinema. In the recent Japanese Film Festival Eiga...
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Philippine coral reefs at the California Academy of Sciences
We had to be in San Francisco, CA for a close look at marine life in Philippine coral reefs without donning a diving suit and a breathing apparatus. For the record, we had a camera whose shutter speed...
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Did Jose Rizal leave his heart in San Francisco?
Many Filipinos entering the United States for the first time through San Francisco may be surprised to know that national hero Jose Rizal preceded them here more than a century ago. From Tokyo, he...
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9/11/16: Remembering the Twin Towers
The first thing we had in mind when we got to New York recently was visit the National September 11 Memorial & Museum (9/11 Memorial in short), which opened on the anniversary day five years ago,...
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First learning encounter with sculptor Auguste Rodin
We viewed the special exhibit 'Rodin: Transforming Sculpture' at the Essex Peabody Museum in Salem, Massachusetts the day before we flew to San Francisco simply because we just wanted to see the iconic...
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Mary in the stained-glass windows of Santo Domingo Church
It's October in Quezon City! It used to be 'October in Manila!' in the fond memories of the late National Artist Nick Joaquin of the fiesta of the La Naval in Intramuros, the old Manila. The Santo...
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Human art forms in MANILART 2016
Retablo with ostrich eggs bearing carved religious icons.Opening night. We were first drawn to a retablo reminiscent of preserved/conserved altars of Philippine churches that date back to the Spanish...
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