From PhilStar:

“South Cotabato Rep. Arthur Pingoy, chairman of the House committee on health, is recommending to Speaker Prospero Nograles the immediate holding of a congressional inquiry on the standard operating procedures and practices of the DOH in containing the virus.

“The DOH gravely endangered the health of our employees by keeping us in the dark. I think that the House should conduct an inquiry,” Pingoy, a doctor by profession, said.” read the rest of the article here.

Oh. Come. On.

I may not be Sec Duque’s number one fan – not even close – but I seriously think that he’s doing a neat job with the whole A(H1N1) situation. If you’ve monitored how DOH is handling the whole thing, you can actually see the balance between getting people informed and calming them down.

(for instance, when things are just starting, he’s honest enough to give full details. And he always repeated what to do to avoid the virus. Then when things became so serious and people started to get really paranoid, he changed his ‘announcement’s angle’ from ‘the number of cases confirmed’ to ‘the number of cases fully recovered’)

C’mon congressman, the whole country does not rotate around the House of Representatives.  The least thing you can do is let the man do his job.

Tas, there was this:

“Parañaque Rep. Roilo Golez agreed with Pingoy’s observation as he pointed out that, unlike schools and universities, the House is an institution with implications on national security”

Sure. Never the mind if students die and get infected with A(H1N1). As long as the congressmen -who passed HR 1109 amid public outcry not to, btw – is safe and healthy.

Do i see some eyebrows raising?

“Magkano daw yung dog tag?” tanong ko sa kanya. Medyo pa-cool kasi ako, gusto ko rin makiuso minsan.

“120 daw.”

“120?!?!” gulat na sabi ko. “Hala naman, 40 pesos lang yan kahapon ah!”

“Teka, sasabihin ko.”

Naghintay pa kami para sa sagot ng kaibigan nya. May nag text na.

“100 na lang,” binasa ng best friend ko ang text. “Mura na yun. Ang hirap kasi kumuha nun, di ba, tsaka sobrang rare nung dog tag. Di ba? Di ba?” pagpapatuloy na pagbabasa ni best friend.

Tapos, nag-enlightening phase bigla yung utak ko. Bigla akong nagising.

Epektibo ba ‘tong Ako Mismo?

read more.

Thanks Kuya Ederic!

I’m keeping the column title ‘Drop Cap’, the column title I used whenever I write a column for a school project. I used the same title for my first Journalese column.

Here’s a background of the name: whenever I pas a writing assignment when I was in college, I always put a drop cap – the first letter of the article is really big – to make it appear… different (Novia’s done it as well, I think. And she’s dividing the paper in two columns to make it newspaper-esq).

Drop cap-ing always gave me such good grades. haha

(read this first to get the whole picture)

So, one day after I sent a ’suggestion letter’ to Jollibee, I received an email from them: 

Dear Ms. Aika Pascual,

Thank you for the feedback dated June 15,2009. We are saddened by the unfortunate you had at Jollibee Bustillos. Please accept our apologies for whatever inconveniences that incident may have caused you.

At Jollibee, we are committed to providing you with quick, accurate and friendly service to ensure that we provide you 100% customer satisfaction. It appears though that for this particular occasion, we have let you down. I regret for that untoward incident.

I have forwarded your feedback to the concerned parties. Rest assured that corrective actions will be taken so as to avoid similar incident from happening again.

We do appreciate your effort of bringing this to our attention. You have given us the opportunity to improve our services.

Sincerely yours,

*name*
Customer Care

So yeah, I felt the sincerity. They accepted that they have done something wrong. No excuses, just apologies.

Hours later, my phone rang and this dude from Bustillos was so apologetic about what happened. I told him that it was not a formal complaint, maybe they can just tell people to do better next time.

He was too honest naman to tell me that because of the tight competition, they can’t afford to lose a customer, and some more stuff like that.

S0 he asked for the info’s, like the cashier’s name and the the time of the transaction and all. I provided it to him when I got home.

Tas minutes ago, the manager in charge that night called my, asking for my address. I asked her what for. She told me, she’s going to send a token or something. I insisted that she need not do that, but she really wanted to know my address. She said that’s part of customer relation and all.

So there. If there’s one thing you need to know about me, is that I forgive easily. I am terrible if I’m angry or disappointed and that would be completely gone after some time. SO I am a terrible ‘complainant’.

I really appreciated the effort of Jollibee Bustillos. I just wish that when they said that ‘they’ll improve their service’, they will really do. Mico told me nga to check out the outlet if there are really improvements. Maybe I’ll do. Not in the near future, though.

to: Jollibee masters
from: a really annoyed costumer
subject: suggestion on how to improve your sloppy and extremely frustrating service.
cc: the rest of the world

hi Jollibee,
first things first. I love Jollibee. I grew up eating your magical CHickenjoy and Jolly Spaghetti, and adoring your lovable red coated bee.

Ok, your food is awesome.

Sadly, your service is dragging you down.

Let me share my dreadful experience with Jollibee. Well, not all branches are like that, I bet. I love the Quiapo branch (the one nearest to Arlegui), but this branch is really REALLY disappointing.

I’m talking about the Bustillos branch. Ever since its recent renovation, it has been the worst Jollibee outlet ever.Come to think of it, the horrible stuff happened even before the place remodeled.

The worst part, it’s the branch nearest to where I live. Bummer.

Case #1: so, i ordered five of those 39-er meals. They told me ‘ise-serve nalang’, which is quite agreeable since I ordered a lot.

The first 10 minutes of waiting was ok. 15 was tolerable… but 30 minutes? Fine, i told myself. I’ll wait a little longer. 15 more minutes passed when I saw five styro, waiting to be served. That’s gotta be mine, I convinced myself. SO I waited for someone to serve it to me.

But 5 minutes had passed, and no one’s picking it up. I didn’t want to do it myself, since I really was not sure if those were mine. So I waited more.

What seemed like eternity drifted. There went one hour of my life waisted for something bragged as ‘fast food’.

I was getting really impatient (which is a big deal for someone like me). So I went to the counter, didn’t care if the food’s mine or not, got the plastic, placed everything inside myself, left the number thingy and left.

The whole time, a crew was staring at me. He did not even bother to help.

Good thing was, the food’s mine.

Case #2.I didn’t return to Jollibee for some time because of that incident. But I was craving for some fries (this happened last week) so after my LRT trip, I immediately entered Jollibee and ordered two of those super large fries with dip.

The dilemma started when I have to repeat my order gazillons of times before the cashier get it. I thought I was the problem, since I don’t speak that loud. At the end, we understood each other – he got all my orders right.

He asked me to wait since the fries are not yet ready. Ok, i said.

more than half an hour passed, and I was still waiting. Good thing I was busy texting so I didn’t notice the time. BUT THIRTY BLOODY MINUTES FOR SOME FRIES!?!?!? you’ve got to be kidding me.

but apparently, you knew no humor.

I was looking really pissed when I realized the situation, one of the crew, GOD BLESS HIM!, noticed this and looked at the my number thingy. He came less than a minute later with my fries.

So, all this time, it was just sitting there, waiting in agony? There, we have something in common.

Case #3: So, I was about to send a complaint letter already after the second incident. But some friends suggested that I don’t. They were right, I thought. Maybe they were just having some bad day. I was willing to give the outlet another chance.

Actually I did.

So, tonight, I went there again and ordered the same thing I did the last time I was there. So I ordered the fries and some dip. Plus an Ice craze – which is pretty awesome, btw.

Everything was doing well at first. The crew was jolly and the movement was fast. In less than a minute, she got my orders – my fries, my ice craze , and two dips. Thing is, I ordered four dip – two cheesy cheese and two salsa cheese. I was waiting for the salsa cheese dips

She told me she’s just gonna serve the two dips in pending. So i said ok. They are JUST dips. They would not take THAT long, right?

BLOOODY WRONG.

Like the 2nd case and the 1st case, they let me wait for a VERY VERY VERY long time. the first two, I can understand. five 39-er meals, and super large fries could take some time to prepare. BUT TWO SMALL SERVINGS OF FRIES DIPS!??!!??!?!?! What’s the excuse??!?!??!

I grew tired. I knew I’m going to send this letter the moment I got home. So I followed up my order and expected to be out there in less than five minutes.

But the crew asked my to wait a little longer. I wore my ‘really irritated’ facial expression already.

They let me wait for some more time, then a crew walk up to me and said ‘ay mam, wala na po kami nung salsa, ok po bang yung cheesy cheese nalang?’

From that moment on, I know I’m NEVER gonna eat on that branch again.

You see, I am not sending this as a complaint letter. That would bring the issue nowhere. This is a SUGGESTION letter. FOR YOU COMPANY’S SAKE, TRAIN YOUR PEOPLE REALLY WELL!

TEACH THEM WHAT ‘FAST FOOD’ MEANT.

I’m not really harsh when it comes to fast food service crew since my cousin’s a manager of one fast food chain and I can feel her pain and agony when it comes to customer relation.

But what’s disturbing is that these mishaps happened to me in ONE outlet. That’s gotta mean something, right?

I know I can’t take back all those time i spent waiting for my fast food, but i hope these stuff didn’t, do not, and won’t happen to other people. You must keep in mind that some people may be really patient, some are not.

I love Jollibee, but not all the time.

Aika Pascual

JOLLIBEE REPLIED! Click here

“Alam mo ba ang pinagkaiba ng mga bulag at ng mga nakakakita?”

“Paningin?”

“Hindi alam ng nakakakita kung kailan sila bulag”

- Kapitan Sino, Bob Ong

(not the exact words, but the same thought)

more Alabat Island photos here.

“Napakahaba po ng struggle ng magsasaka, ngunit walang imposible kung manindigan lamang at magkaisa. Pero napakasakit isipin lamang na kung noon ay galing sa Maynila ang batas, dalhin mo sa baba, at ipaalam sa magsasaka na ito ang batas ng ating gobyerno, ngayon baliktad po. Mas may alam ang magsasaka sa batas, dinala niya papunta sa Maynila upang ipaalam sa ating gobyerno – “Ito po ang batas niyo.” Napakasakit isipin na ganoon…”

- Rene Peñas,
in his speech after the screening of Ditsi Carolino’s Lupang Hinirang

(checkout the recorded speech @ GMANews.tv )

Peñas was shot dead Friday midnight. He was 51.

“He came home on May 30 and was so jubilant when the Carper has been passed on Wednesday and quoted his father saying “Nidaug na ta!” (We have won!). 

Humanity, as we know it, is soooo doomed.

Why do people do these things!?! Why do they have to kill people?!

Coward bastards.

Isa sa pinaka kinakatakot ko, bukod sa pagtungtong ng A(H1N1) virus sa Sampaloc*, ay ang mahalal ulit si Erap sa pagka-pangulo.

Bakit?

EDSA Dos.

Sana walang makalimot nun. Sana walang makalimot na minsan, galit na galit tayong pumunta sa kalyeng yun at nakipaglaban sabay sabay. At nanalo.

Sana tuloy tuloy lang ang pagkapanalo nating ‘yon. Sana tuloy tuloy lang rin ang pakikipag laban.

——–

* Nakarating na sa Taft yung deadly virus na A(H1N1). Ok, napaparanoid lang ako. Deadly sya in a sense na sa 20,000+ na confirmed cases eh less 100+ lang ang namamatay. So, di naman talaga sya dapat katakutan diba?

But… basta nakakaparanoid.

Feeling ko nga matagal na syang nandito sa Pinas, pero dahil yung symptoms nya eh parang common flu lang, akala natin, talagang common flu lang sya. Di narereport sa DOH.

Sana humupa na ang outbreak. Nakakahiya kasing umubo, suminghot at humatsing sa pampublikong lugar, baka bigla kang pandirian.

—-

sa mga nagtatanong… OO AKO YUNG NASA 24 ORAS HAHAHAHHAHA!

—-

May nabasa lang akong isang quote na saktong sakto sa nararamdaman ko sa HR 1109, o yung house resolution na tinutulak ng mga representante NYO sa kongreso para mapalitan ang saligang batas sa pamamagitan ng constituent assembly. (ay basta hindi ko sila representante… baka san’yo).

Eto yung nabasa ko:

Represent, they don’t

could’t agree more.

——

Natutuwa talaga ako ke Darlene Custodio. Sya yung maliit na ale na nakalaban ni Pacquiao sa pagka kongresista noong 2007.

Napanood ko kasi sya na inaagaw yung floor (not literally) sa House Speaker nung nagtatalo sila sa HR1109. Tumatakbo takbo pa sya nun papuntang podium. Haha. Ang kyut!

Tas naalala ko dati yung ibinasura naman yung impeachment. Isa sya sa mga bumoto for it eh tas nakatayo siya kasama yung iba pang pro-impeachment. Haha, para syang batang naligaw lang dun!

Lalo na pag me laban si Pacman, tas iniinterview sya na parang hagard na hagard dahil mukhang nagtatatalon sya sa tuwa.

Basta, nakakaaliw lang sya panoorin. Siguro dahil kahit mukha syang batang paslit ay napaka agresibo nya at handa syang kalabanin ang mayorya sa mga weird na bills (ei., HR1109) na pinapauso nila.

Thank goodness for people like her. Basta, aliw lang ako sa kanya.

——-

Mas aliw ako sa Duque! Hahahaha! Hindi ko alam kung bakit, basta aliw na aliw ako sa kanya. Ang perky kasi ng boses na eh hahahaha! Peace, secretary!

—-

galing lang kaming Quezon nitong weekend. po-post ko yung mga litrato sa mga susunod na araw pag di na malamig tas mas gusto ko nalang pala magresize ng picture kesa sa matulog.

—-

Nagpakulot ako. Chens, wag mokong papatayin.

A.) X-Men Origins: Wolverine

I am kindov an X-Men nerd, but not really. I love the animation and tried to watch every episode (the super old version where Jubilee’s power – firecrackers coming out of her hands – seems awesome, and XMen evolution), but I never really read any of the comic books. Plus, I loved the three big-screen versions previously released.

And I absolutely hate this movie.

The only things worth watching maybe are the opening credit, Hugh Jackman’s hotness, Remy LeBeau’s awesomeness, and Deadpool’s sword-cutting-a-bullet scene.

The movie started in the 1800-ish. The young James (aka Logan, aka Wolverine) killed his father because he didn’t know he was his father. And he did it with some fatal skeleton claws sticking out of his hands.

Freaky much.

That’s what his mother thought (i can only assume it was his mother). She told him ‘what are you?’ with so much disgust and the young James ran away with his brother Victor (aka Sabertooth) and happened to figure in numbers of wars ( let’s see… Civil War, WWI, WWII, Vietnam… hmmm) without aging and became ultra hot.

Ok, I partly blamed SM Sta. Mesa cinema 1 for the bad movie experience. The sound quality of the theater sucked BIG TIME, so I can’t really hear what they’re saying in the movie. And they turned the lights off half-way through the flick. WHAT CINEMA HOUSE WOULD TURN THEIR LIGHTS OFF IN THE MIDDLE OF THE MOVIE?!?

You can’t count too much on the story. It was all about revenge and anger and bad people and personal gain. Look around you – we’re living the story of X-Men Origins.

The movie itself? Well, it sure was funny.

a.) You know that typical shot when a protagonist’s loved one – say, his dah’ling- died on his arms, and the protagonist screamed to the heavens and the camera zoomed up from above his head, and it’s like his ‘NOOOOO!!!!!!!’ echoed around the world?

and you know the fact that that typical shot does not work in the 21st century anymore? turned out the film maker forgot to take note of that.

Gawd, I hated that part. I was like “please don’t scream then zoom out! please don’t scream then zoom out!”

then, he screamed, and the camera zoomed out.

I am not even talking about THIS

b.) you know that typical shot where something is exploding in the background of the protagonist while he calmly, proudly and casually walked away? You can see that in the movie too.

What’s really bad, is that MS Paint could do a better job with the effect.

c.) you know the shot where a triumphant but sad background music is playing and the protagonist is walking towards the sunrise while everything around him is sooo wrecked, showing that in fact the crazy things going around is finish and he can finally rest?

I think that shot happened to this movie twice. Thrice tops. I stopped counting, actually.

That. Was. Way. Beyond. Hilarious.

This movie is baaad, only because I was expecting too much from it. And the cinematography.

Seriously, dudes??? The explosion on the background??? The sunset??? The zoom out????

Interesting trivia: Did you know that Hugh Jackman and Liev Schreiber (Victor) both casted on another movie, which was totally different from this genre? I think they’re also relative there.

The movie? At the end of this post

B.) Star Trek

There’s one reason why Mikay and I watched this flick: Zachary Quinto. And we were not disappointed!

hearts. fades. live long. prosper.

The whole movie was awesome. Sure, you can get confused with the story and the whole time travel and black hole thingies, but thanks to the witty one-liners, awesome effects and some hilarious scenes, the movie was saved!

I tried persuading my friends to watch it, but they said that Star Trek is such a nerdy movie. Well, you’ll be surprised. I don’t know a single thing about Trek and I completely enjoyed the movie. 

PS. Try watching it in an awesome cinema house (read: Not SM Sta. Mesa cinema 1) with blasting stereo surround sound and big screen for maximum movie experience.

C.) Angels and Demons

Here it is. Years after The Da Vinci Code was screened, Angels and Demons finally made its way to the cinema house nearest you.

A&D is about the fight between science and faith. Religion, i mean. Science and religion.

A very power stuff – the anti-matter – was stolen from a lab, then held hostage a whole country – the Vatican. The canister which held the anti-matter is feared to drain its battery until midnight. And when that happens, the Vatican (and part of Rome, I heard) will be one whole -REALLY REALLY BIG- crate. 

Illuminati, a group shunned by Roman Catholic, was assumed to be non-existent, until four cardinals – who are favorites to replace the recently succumbed pope – where kidnapped. The group claimed the kidnappings. And to add a little spice to the chase game, they claimed that they’re going to kill each of the Cardinals every hour.

And so they did.

Robert Langdon, with the really pretty Vittoria now try to chase down the centuries-old group, try to find the canister and save day.

I like A&D better than TDVC because it’s more exciting.

Sure the movie was entertaining. The opening of the movie was impressive, presenting clearly the situation – the pope died and needed to be replaced. I was a little emotional on that part, I have to admit.

When I read the book, Pope John Paul was still alive and I can only imagine those stuff that Dan Brown was talking about. A year later, I was able to see what Brown has described – including the voting of the new pope – in the television because of the passing away of the Holy Father. It was a really sad opening for a movie

Anyway, I think the movie lacked substance – which what made the book awesome. It forgot the little details (that the priest/scientist killed in the former part of the movie was Vittorias’ father. He was only stressed as her ‘partner’; and that Camerlengo was the Pope’s son. Those small details are quite important, methinks.)

Ok, so I get it. You cannot fit the whole book in the movie. Maybe that’s what makes this movie work and TDVC didn’t. TDVC rely too much on the revelations of how Jesus was married and totally forgot that movies must be intertaning as well. A&D focused on the fun, that’s why this movie is a lot better. If we want revelations, we’d watch Star Talk. Duh.

I was just disappointed with this part where they show the statue of “The Ecstasy of St. Therese”, referred to at the movie as “Fire of St. Therese” or something. It’s the Bernini piece where there’s an angel looking at St. Therese. St. Therese’s eyes are closed and it’s as if she’s having an orgasm.

If you don’t find that interesting, then you are a really boring person.

The statue was not explained in the movie. But I am not complaining (that much). There’s really nothing I can do about it, but those stuff are awesome.

Now let me explain how they ended the movie – NOTHING LIKE THE BOOK’S ENDING.

So, I was in the cinema house, and the movie was going quite well – just like that of the book. Then nearing the movies end, thing didn’t turn out as I have expected.

*spoiler*

- the scene where Ewan McGregor (soooo adorable. I can help but picture his BigFish character) – he played the Camerlengo- ran down to ‘find’ the canister
Aika: wait… they should know already that the Camerlengo IS the bad guy, right? Why is he not acting crazy or something???? this is baaaad….

- the scene were the Camerlengo drove the helicopter to the sky WITH robert
Aika: WHY IS ROBERT LANGDON NOT ON THAT HELICOPTER!?!?!?! WTH!? 

- the scene where the Camerlengo parachuted back to the ground – alive.
Aika: HE IS NOT SUPPOSED TO LIVE!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 

I was already formulating the blog entry on my head, of how disappointing the ending was – then the movie redeemed itself.

*/spoiler*

the next scenes were the ‘revelation’ parts. The director completely changed the ending, as if saying to the audience who read the book “screw you! Hahaha! you didn’t see that one coming, did you!? HAHAHAHAH!”. but the ending’s not something to complain about. It gave me something I was not expecting.

To wrap this, A&D is not the kindov movie worthy to be placed in ‘my favorite movie’ category, but it sure was worth the money for the ticket. The witty script, quasi-impressive chase, and better casting (not to mention, Tom Hank’s Robert Langdon now is more believable than the TDVC version) made it a worthy watch. 

D.) Night at the Museum

Night at the Museum 2 is a lot more hilarious than the first one.

two word: Hank Azaria

that guy stole the movie away.

Totally not a skirt

_______

So, which movie did Wolverine and Sabertooth both star and did not try to kill each other with each other’s claws?

Kate and Leopold!

It is a romantic-comedy about Liev being a time traveller, and accidentally bringing Hugh back in the 21st century New York. Liev’s ex lover, Meg Ryan fell in love with Hugh (who wouldn’t?!!??!?!) and Liev was missing in most parts of the film because he was in the hospital because he fell down the elevator shaft… because Hugh invented the elevator and he can’t invent it if he’s in the 21st century, can he? Common time travel newbie mistake. Happens all the time.

I think Liev is the descendant of Hugh in the movie.