Storm Causes Extensive Damage

Techcare Chief Mr Melvin Bueno reports that the storm hit Dagupan and left extensive damage. Electric posts were knocked down, causing extensive power outages. Our telecoms antenna was also knocked down so some of our circuits may not be working. We will know for sure come Monday.

Extensive damage were reported in blown roofs from a lot of buildings.

Open Source Angst

Washed and Dried

Penman for Monday, May 19, 2008


THIS SAGA began with me booking our airline and hotel reservations in Dumaguete a month in advance, on the Internet, as soon as I knew I was going to be a panelist in this summer’s writers’ workshop in that southern city. (That’s typically me doing the predictably Capricorn thing; with 2008 shaping up to be the busiest year of my life travel-wise, I’ve made online bookings for flights, hotels, and shuttles all the way to December; that way I lull myself into thinking that all these nice things will actually happen as they should, without a wayward asteroid or a bathroom fall to spoil the fun.)

So I had every reason to believe that the universe would simply follow the dictates of the Internet when I chose to fly to Dumaguete early in the morning of May 12 on PR291 (Air Philippines, ticketed by Philippine Airlines), in time for me to catch the writers’ workshop at 9:00 am—where, jolted by two cups of coffee, I would launch into the usual disquisition on plot and character before a roomful of fellows probably even sleepier than I was. At least that was the plan.

As it turned out, it took less than an asteroid to remind me that Nature (as Thomas Hardy suggested) was indifferent to man and the Worldwide Web. About a week before May 12, I got a call from PAL Reservations, telling me that PR291 had been canceled for unspecified reasons, and that Beng and I had been moved to the afternoon flight, PR293, departing at 1:00 pm. I was mildly annoyed—I prefer to fly early in the morning, to avoid the midday traffic and to be able to enjoy a full day in a new place—but not surprised; with luck I could still catch the afternoon session and earn my day’s keep.

On May 10, I got another call from PAL, saying this time that our 1:00 departure had been moved to 2:40. There goes the workday, I thought, but at least I could just stroll along the boulevard in the late afternoon, chug a couple of beers, and enjoy the sunset.

By 11:30 am of the 12th, Beng and I were checked in (I’m also one of those early-bird freaks; being claustrophobic, I try to get an aisle seat as close to the front as possible). Holding Seats 3E and 3F, all was well with the world—at least until about 2:15, when, instead of a boarding call, we heard an announcement saying that PR293 was canceled, because of bad weather in Dumaguete. It looked sunny right where we were, at least until that moment, but I wasn’t about to argue with how the Almighty dealt the weather cards (“God has his reasons,” a friendly fellow passenger named Eric would say to me, shrugging his shoulders).

We all moaned and groaned, but thinking ahead I had Beng collect the baggage while I made a beeline for the Air Philippines ticket office, where they said we would be rebooked for the next available flight the next day. I felt proud to grab something like Stub #3 in the waiting line—only to be told, when it was my turn to be served, that I had to go to the PAL office across the hallway, since my ticket had been issued by PAL. Cursing under my breath I dashed over to the other queue—and got Stub #822; I looked up at the monitor; they were still serving customer #741.

Flash forward to a couple of hours later. Glassy-eyed from monitor-gazing, I’m finally talking to an agent, who tells me that all flights to Dumaguete are booked till May 15; but—for a surcharge—I could go via Cebu early the next morning, and take the ferry from there to Dumaguete via Tagbilaran. The idea appeals to me; I’ve become obsessed with just leaving, period, and getting to Dumaguete has now acquired all the urgency of one of those TV-trekker challenges.

Beng and I go home to Diliman, shower, work, then suddenly it’s 1:30 a.m. and time to scoot back to the airport. Maybe it’s just really dark, but I can’t see a drop of rain. Our plane takes off as scheduled at 4:30; I’ve texted some friends for help, and as soon as we step out of Mactan at 6:00, a van comes along to scoop us up and bring us to the ferry terminal, which we catch with more than a few minutes to spare. We settle into our seats, I text the workshop folks to announce my now-certain arrival, and at 7:00 the Weesam fastcraft revs up for the commute to Tagbilaran. A light drizzle is falling, but I think it’s just pretty.

Midway through our two-hour journey it becomes clear that the weather gods are feeling naughty, and our ferry starts pitching and rolling in huge arcs; through the portholes the ocean looks like a sudsy carwash. People start praying and puking; the crew hands out barf bags. Highlights from my 54 years flash before me (ie, my tomcat Chippy when he was a baby). We straggle into Tagbilaran and everyone cheers in relief—at least until the crew announces that the onward leg to Dumaguete is now canceled, because of bad weather. We could try again tomorrow.

I don’t know whether to laugh or cry. I’ve already lost a day, but then I remember Eric’s line and decide to take things in stride. Beng’s never been to Bohol; it’s too rainy to see anything like Baclayon or Loboc, so—after checking into a cheap hotel near the pier, beside a funeral parlor—we do the next best thing and hit the local mall. At the Book Sale, I find the perfect companion to my Crime Fiction course, and Beng picks up a P200 pair of Harry Potter specs. We’re happy campers—at least until we return to our hotel, to find that a karaoke marathon has just begun beneath us.

We stroll along the waterfront, and find a dampa-type resto called Joving’s By the Sea. I order the local tinola, and one slurp of the smoky fish soup tells me why we were delivered here. A light rain starts falling peacefully in the gathering darkness, but I say, it’s just God giving us a final rinse.
The next morning we’re back at the terminal, and take another rollercoaster ride to Dumaguete. Our hotel, Bethel Guest House, turns out to be a clean, well-lighted place—but our room’s on the fourth floor, and the elevator’s out of order. We march up, then down, then an SUV comes by to bring us to the workshop, which is taking a break that day at Antulang Beach, about 30 kilometers away—the last ten of them on a dusty, corrugated road that wrings the last drop of perkiness out of me.

“Hello, fellows,” I mumble when we get there. “I feel like a dirty sock that went through the washer on the ferry, then the dryer on the road!”

I’m Now on a Semi-Dedicated Hosting

Last November 2007, I made a switch to paid hosting account from enjoying almost a year of service from my free host for worries of losing my site as I’ve experienced from my previous free hosts.

Recently, this blog and my whole hosting account were on hiatus. I had experienced two account suspensions from my web host (WebHostingBuzz) and as I’ve already stated, site suspension is one of the worst nightmares a blogger could experience. The suspensions were due to server (CPU) resource abuse. Apparently, some poorly-scripted WordPress plugins that I’ve been using caused most of the server resource abuse. It’s painful to see how my blog income abruptly fell from it’s usual over $10 per day to only $6 per day. This has made me decide to upgrade my account to a semi dedicated hosting. It costs me $35 per month, it’s way more expensive that my previous hosting account which costs only $6/month, however the security and assurance of not experiencing another blogger’s nightmare is worth the cost.

What Are The Advantages of a Dedicated Server or a Semi-dedicated server?

The advantages of a dedicated server can best be described by the following analogy:

Suppose you wanted an automobile. You could not afford to buy one for yourself, so you decided to go in with four friends and everyone would own a piece of the automobile. This meant that although it was cheaper for everyone, they all had to share the car. A schedule would be worked out and everyone would abide by the schedule of when they could use the car.
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Rootkits on routers threat to be demoed

Local Government Development Foundation - Online

LOGODEF is a Manila-based non-stock, non-profit organization established on March 21, 1989 for the purpose of providing professional services to local governments in support of central government efforts to promote the continuing development of Philippine local authorities.

The Foundation is one of the major institutional partner of the Konrad Adenauer Foundation (KAF) in strengthening local political institutions in the Philippines. The organization is also an advocate of interlocal cooperation. It’s main objectives include helping local governments help themselves is the basic philosophy of the Foundation in the promotion of local autonomy and self reliance towards the attainment of effective decentralization.

Konverg.com

Konverg is a Business Technology company dedicated to helping businesses owners get empowered with the latest web technologies.

It aims to provide the best and most relevant business applications with the lowest total cost of ownership to small and medium enterprises. In a competitive business world, Konverg believes in creating an “equalizing” force to small businesses by providing latest business tools for Customer Relationship Management (CRM), Financial Management, Salesforce Automation and Business Intelligence that are otherwise available only to large enterprises with their huge IT Infrastructures and budgets.

Konverg is a private company with offices in the US, Middle East and the Philippines.

ASP.NET for Clan Garments’ Website

By Aurelie A. Peralta

CLAN GARMENTS has been in the manufacturing business for the last fourteen (14) years. It has once been a provider of company uniforms to EPSON INTERNATIONAL GROUP OF COMPANIES AND UNILEVER PHILIPPINES. In addition, CLAN GARMENTS has been the toughest provider in terms of school uniforms in the largest scale within the province of Pangasinan and even reaching as far as other provinces like Banaue, La Union, Tarlac, Pampanga and the Ilocos Region. It specializes in the creation of personalized t-shirt designs. In other words, CLAN GARMENTS provides the product based from the clients design and preference.

CLAN GARMENTS maintains a wide stock inventory of assorted colors of CVC cotton materials where stocking is normally based on the average monthly demand of clients. This set-up actually alleviates their clients’ stock inventory maintenance of raw shirt materials and gives them an edge to serve their clients’ minimum volume order at the shortest lead time. Visit their newly revised website at http://www.clangarments.com.

The all new Clan Garments website was developed by PS Ventures Philippines using ASP.NET masterpage and System.Net.Mail functionalities for the Inquiry Page with enhancement from a CSS file courtesy of Free-CSS-Templates.com.

The Moss Mystique

Penman for Monday, May 12, 2008


I’LL WRITE about them at greater length another time, but let me just announce that tonight and tomorrow night, one of my favorite singing groups—the UP Singing Ambassadors, led by conductor Ed Manguiat—will be holding farewell concerts before they embark on their next European tour. The concerts (at Teatrino in Greenhills, San Juan on May 12, and at the Church of the Risen Lord in UP Diliman on May 13, both at 7:30 pm) will help defray expenses for this prizewinning group, the only Asian group to win the 2001 Grand Prize in the Guido d’Arezzo competition in Italy. Catch them while you can! (Tickets at P300 and P500, half-price for students with IDs.)


I'M NOT an art critic, but I have this pedestrian conviction that the best art of whatever kind speaks to you across all times and spaces, and says something not just about the circumstances of its creation but also about who, where, and what you are, right now.

I’m always prepared to be surprised and entranced, even enchanted; I like to think that I’m as hard-boiled a writer as they come, with few illusions left about the harshness of life, and I don’t respond well to art that tries to pretend otherwise. On the other hand, if all the artist does is tell me what I already know, and make me feel even more miserable than before, then I don’t feel enriched or enlightened, either. If I start smiling despite my dourness, or look at a piece for more than a few minutes—whether it’s a bronze fish by Brancusi or a father-and-son pastel by Roel Obemio—then something’s happened, and I’m in touch with something far larger than myself.

That’s what happens every time I look at a painting by an artist I’ve known since he was in his teens, and whose work I’ve followed ever since. Jason Moss put up his first exhibition in 1993, when he was only 17; last Saturday, he opened his 18th show (which he tongue-in-cheek calls “Debut”) in 15 years, a testament not only to his prodigious energy but also to his unflagging vision. Exactly what that vision is is something that art-studies theses and dissertations will be written about, and it’s best appreciated up close—or rather, as a cluster of paintings on a wall, from about 15 feet away.

Jason’s work blends grotesquerie—his manifest suspicion that our world is beset by demons of one kind or other, some of them within the self—with humor and wit. His latest collection, Jason says, “pokes fun at the superficialities of the age,” but there’s no doubt that Jason himself is having fun, no matter how dark his view of life may be. I don’t usually bother much with the titles of art works, but it’s hard to resist taking a longer look at anything titled “The end of the word organic,” “The Dull and the Dutiful,” “Play this game by yourself,” “It will kill you to trust me,” and “What some gay folks end up with.” (In the last piece, two men hold up a blue-headed, pink-bodied baby between them—except that the baby looks like a happy hybrid between a dog and a dolphin.)

When Jessica Zafra first encountered Jason Moss’ work 12 years ago in his second one-man show, the first word that sprang to her mind was “Europe.” She would later describe it with more specificity as “Berlin of the 1930s, cross-pollinated with goth-rock: Kurt Weill meets X-Mal Deutschland, Lotte Lenya meets Siouxsie and the Banshees.”

I bought a pastel piece (high praise from a UP professor with a pauper’s salary) from that show that Jessica saw titled “Mother and Child with Faun,” and to this day it hangs in my office, an inexhaustibly enigmatic triad that makes me want to write a book around it. Most recently something of the reverse happened. When my new novel Soledad’s Sister was being readied for publication (it should be out by the time you read this, courtesy of Anvil Publishing’s Karina Bolasco, who had patiently waited for over seven years for the manuscript to be finished), there was no doubt in my mind whose artwork I wanted on the cover, to capture all the dualities in the text. I’ll leave you to guess—when you go and see the exhibit (at the Blueline Gallery on the 4th floor of Rustan’s Makati, entrance at Glorietta 4 near Starbucks, running from May 10 until June 7)—which work might best represent the dark comedy that I had in mind. “Dark comedy” might not be too bad a description for Jason Moss’ work itself. He doesn’t let one element get way too far ahead of the other.

The Moss mystique also made itself felt to the late writer-painter Andres Cristobal Cruz, who invited then 20-year-old Jason to exhibit some of his own early Picasso-inspired works alongside Andy’s in a show at the Lyceum. “The young students immediately found themes in Moss’ paintings familiar,” Andy would recall in mock lament. “They identified more with him than with me and my landscapes and mass protest images.” (Pointedly, one of Jason’s pieces in that show was titled “No More Pablos.”) Painter Marcel Antonio was “struck by the nature of his themes, most of them transgressive in a genuine, non-contrived way that dares to push the borders of the limits of taste. He’s evidently an artist who helped redefine certain grand narratives in art, at least in the local scene, and puts into question what constitutes taboo for one person yet is liberating for another.”

Those are fine words to be said of anyone, but again the best test is in a personal encounter with the work of the man. (It’s a poor substitute, but you can also go online and check them out at www.weloveintimidation.com/jasonmoss.) It’s sometimes hard to reconcile the painter of “Manners and Etiquette” (showing a restaurant full of dead monkeys, with the only one left alive, in the foreground, suffering a nosebleed as he contemplates eating a crab on his plate) with the passionate illustrator of children’s books that he also is (he has also been, at one time or another, an editorial cartoonist, a bartender, and TV art director).

But it’s one and the same complex sensibility, this fusion of power and charm that sets off Jason Moss as one of the most original and compelling Filipino artists, in this casual gallery stroller’s eye, of our time.

Shorts and Slippers Allowed

Penman for Sunday, May 5, 2008

This came out in last Sunday's Travel Section in the STAR, but I was out of town and didn't get the paper, so here it is now.

TECHNICALLY SPEAKING, Honolulu was the first American—indeed, the first foreign—city I’d ever been to. It was September 1980, and I was 26 years old, winging my way to Washington, D.C. on my first trip abroad; our flight stopped over in Hawaii, and I took the opportunity to step into my first American restroom. I’d pass through Honolulu again a couple of times after that, but never went beyond the airport. I actually had a chance to study in Hawaii—the PhD program in Manoa had accepted me—but I felt that Hawaii was a bit too close to home, literally and climatically, so I opted to freeze out in the Midwest instead.

But everybody dreams of going to Hawaii. You can’t escape it; it’s one of those fantasies hardwired into the 20th century mind, generated by wobbly hula-girl figurines and Elvis serenades beneath the palms. I remember having a favorite Hawaiian shirt when I was a small boy—or maybe it was my mom’s favorite, because she kept dressing me up in it—and what fascinated me about it were its coconut-shell buttons. Now and then my mom also served up something called Hawaiian Punch out of a colorful can. On truly special Christmases we ran into a box of Hawaiian Host chocolate-covered macadamia nuts. When Ferdinand Marcos got shipped out in 1986, we all thought he deserved a sorrier outcome than exile in Hawaii; it didn’t seem right, since Hawaii’s supposed to be a reward, not a punishment.

“Rewarded” was certainly how I felt a few weeks ago when a message dropped out of the sky sending me to Honolulu to check out the award-winning service of Hawaiian Airlines—which, after almost 80 years of shuttling people around the South Pacific and to the US mainland, was inaugurating its Manila-Honolulu route. It seemed a bit overdue, considering how many Pinoys populate the Hawaiian islands and how long they’ve been there, but better late than never—which was also true for this one passenger in Seat 40C.

It’s a ten-hour flight to Honolulu, and it helps those easily disoriented by time zones and jetlag that Hawaiian Air’s four-times-weekly flights (Mo-Tu-Th-Sat) leave Manila at 7:00 pm, touching down in Honolulu at 11:15 am—of the same day! (That’s right, you actually go back in time.) So it’s just like sleeping the night away, something easy enough to do in HA’s spacious cabin. (A big guy like me often has to ask for the bulkhead seats to hang loose; this time, I didn’t have to, and had enough space to work on my laptop.)

Our hotel turned out to be the 101-year-old Moana Surfrider, the so-called “First Lady of Waikiki,” whose only sign of age was its exquisitely preserved frontage and lobby (and the huge, triple-trunked banyan tree in the back, fronting the ocean). Ah, yes, the ocean—you stepped out the back door and it was right there, a broad sweep of blue flecked by sailboats and surfers, and fringed by a creamy curve of sand called Waikiki, with the famous Diamond Head at the far end. I got my feet wet, but never did get to swim in the water, preferring to observe, uhm, the local beach culture, which seemed to involve a minimum of fabric and a maximum of skin. (It’s hard to be an old man on Waikiki beach.)

After a day of contemplating navels (not mine) and convincing myself that there was more to Hawaii than Waikiki (of course there was, but I pointedly avoided calling my university contacts, to imbibe the tourist experience), I joined my Hawaiian Air group on a visit to the USS Arizona memorial in Pearl Harbor and, the next morning, to the Polynesian Cultural Center across the island. I have a nearly morbid fascination for war memorials and museums, but the one thing that impressed me about the Arizona—whose hulk remains embedded in the mud below the elegant white memorial that now crowns it—was how oil continued to bleed from its tanks 67 years after it sank, casting a rainbow sheen on the water.

The Polynesia Cultural Center, on the other hand, showcased the major ethnic groups of the Pacific, and here (as on the tour bus) we realized that every guide in Hawaii calls their visitors “cousin”; our guide himself was “Cousin John,” a Samoan Mormon ex-missionary who spoke fluent Tagalog. It was at the PCC that we got treated to the inevitable (and why, indeed, avoid it?) luau.

A famously finicky eater (translation: I avoid things most normal people enjoy, like cheese and curry), I didn’t think I’d like the food, especially after an initial encounter with fish dipped in coconut batter and a swig of coconut beer (strangely enough, I love coconut, all by itself). But I discovered, at the luau, that I could live on Hawaiian staples forever—okay, maybe not the sticky poi, but the Chinese “chicken long rice” (dried chicken sotanghon, to you and me) and the imu roast pig (lechon served in strips).

On the way back to the hotel from the Arizona, the bus let us off at the Ala Moana Mall, and like a homing pigeon I went straight to the Apple Store and picked up my Hawaiian souvenir: a USB-Ethernet adaptor for my MacBook Air. I successfully resisted buying an aloha shirt, despite the tremendous pressure to do so; the only ones I really liked—those that came in pure silk or cotton with just the barest hint of a bamboo or a vegetal curl on them—cost over a hundred dollars. (Why is it that the simplest looking things always cost the most?)

It’s easy to dismiss much of the Hawaii we saw as a tourist trap, but if you’re a tourist, there are worse fates than being trapped in Waikiki, watching the sunset with a cold beer in hand. Waikiki was indeed teeming with boobsy babes, Pat Morita lookalikes, ABC Stores, barrel-chested Samoans, Filipino shop clerks, and camera-toting tourists like us in cargo shorts and flip-flops, living out their memories of Hawaii Five-O and Magnum, P. I. The killjoy academic in me kept thinking what a different experience the first Filipino sacadas had when they came over to the islands in 1906, and what it must feel like today to be among the 1 percent of pure Hawaiians left in the population.

But whichever Hawaii you’re looking for, Hawaiian Air will help you find it, and if you book before the end of May, it’ll cost you less than $500 round-trip (plus taxes) to see Hawaii for yourself. And the tourist hordes aside, any place where they still give up their seats for old ladies on the bus can’t be too bad.

(More pics from Hawaii on my Flickr page here.)

Orientation Trip to Singapore

Picture shows farmout and bitstop staff on their orientation tour of Singapore. The picture was taken at the entrance of People’s Park

Microsoft Hosting Conference

Pictures from the conference:

The departure area of the Bangkok International Airport

JJ Jager of SWSOFT in one of the technical sessions showing off billing and hosting automation provisioning:

Mr Alvin Lim, Director, Hosting and Software Services, communications and Media Sector, Asia Pacific with Mr Wilson Chua, President, BNS

bittersweetness

A Message to the Graduates of 2008

My congratulations to the graduates of the Pangasinan State University Eastern Cluster College of Engineering and Architecture and Institute of Information and Communications Technology Urdaneta Campus.

In this century it is a must for the graduates to possess the updated knowledge and relevant skills more particularly in technology in order for them to become globally  marketable. They have to keep on learning new technologies and develop their skills further in order to match the present needs of the industries and companies worldwide. Our rapidly changing technology, more particularly in the application of computers, makes learning for an individual a truly continuous process.

I am proud to say that your Alma Mater has given you adequate knowledge and trainings that you need to cope up with what is really demanded by the national and global workplace. I hope that the education you acquired from PSU successfully molded you to become holistic professionals.

I encourage you to keep on pursuing lifelong learning to further improve your skills and competencies as a whole. Make your Alma Mater proud of you by making a good name in each field of specialization you are into after your graduation. But most importantly, try your best to practice your professions for the upliftment of our reputation as Filipinos.

Mabuhay PSU Urdaneta Graduates 2008!

AURELIE A. PERALTA

Dean, Institute of ICT

PSU Eastern Cluster

Blogging Guidelines: Know the Do’s and Don’ts

Some basic guidelines on blogging, if you use a service blogger.com they have their own terms and conditions for posting content. You can’t just post anything, so always read the t&c’s. If you don’t follow their rules, your blog will probably get deleted.

If you host a blog on your own hosting account, using software like WordPress. You have full control over the content you post, so your blog won’t get deleted.

What are the DOs and DON’Ts of blogging?

First the DOs:

• Do put pictures and multimedia sources to enhance the content. Could either be a vlog, photoblog, etc.

• Do base your posts with a good category structure to make it easy to find content for a particular topic.

• Do put paragraphs and sub-ideas. It’s not entertaining to read one block of manuscript. Digest it into pieces.

• Do create mutual communication between you and your readers. Answer queries without leaving your readers hanging for an answer.
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I Was A Teenage Bot Master

ejabberd

Recently been playing with eJabberd and XMPP. The thought of being able to create my own IM server and client is so much fun.

Graveyard Regulars in WoW

My Rogue character is a regular graveyard customer in WoW. While my Hunter hardly die even in dungeons.

Unswitchable

Free Nine Inch Nails Album: The Slip

Currently downloading the free Nine Inch Nails album The Slip. Hope it’s as good as Year Zero.