May 29, 2009

Priorities

On the way to the office this morning, I rode with a woman and her (elementary) school-age daughter who were into some sort of argument over the opening of classes. The girl recited her must-haves: scissors, eraser, ruler, construction paper, etc.

The mother was unconvinced. They'll buy the supplies, she said, when they are already needed. Or when the teacher asks for them. She launched a (redundant, I suppose) spiel on times being krisis-laden and all and that the daughter should make do with left-over supplies from last school year.

AND THEN, as an afterthought, she told the girl to ask her dad for money. "Humingi ka ng pera sa daddy mo ha? Ipa-straight natin ang buhok mo."

I swear, it was an effort to keep a straight face. SO much for priorities, huh?

May 21, 2009

Incommunicado

My phone met an unsanitary death while we were out on field, and for something like two days, I was cut off from the digital world.

For two days, there were no urgent "txt bak pls" messages, no truncated, virtually indecipherable SMS, no calls at the most incovenient hours. I was incommunicado. And happily so.

I would have preferred a much longer mobile-phoneless existence. The thing is, even this little corner of the universe that I call home also operates on fast-forward mode. There's always something "urgent" cropping up: some meeting, some accident, some document that needs to be signed, some "issue" that needs to be resolved. And so I had no choice but to reconnect.

Getting a new phone is easy. But rebuilding a directory--reconstructing lost contacts--takes some doing. I should have learned my lesson in "back-upping" the first time I lost a phone. Or the second and third times. Alas, I am now on to yet another replacement phone, and I am none the wiser. :p

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Still on the subject of being incommunicado, I've been out of the (blogging) loop for a month now--and I haven't realized this till now. Life has been one busy swing after another. And it's only now that I am catching my breath.