Top 10 Emerging Influential Blogs for 2007

The results are out. Glad to know that at least one of my nomination was judged as one of the top 10 emerging influential blogs for 2007. 🙂

Fruityoaty made it to the list and also took home at US$100 for blogging about it! How lucky could this blogger get?? The list of the Top 10 Emerging Influential Blogs for 2007 are as follows: 

1. An Apple a Day
   The Philosophical Bastard
2. The D Spot
3. CokskiBlue
4. Make Money Online with a 13-Year Old
5. Culture Shiok!
   Utakgago
6. Kubiertos
7. FruityOaty
   PinoyBlogero
8. The Dork Factor
   The Anitokid Chronikos
9. Gibbs Cadiz
10. Confessions of a Hopeless Romantic

The following bloggers are US$100 richer. 🙂

1. Maryrose
2. Sofia for BiSEAN
3. J Angelo Racoma
4. Heneroso
5. Fruityoaty
6. Annamanila
7. Webbyman
8. Marie Casas
9. Mira
10. Jehzeel Laurente

As with all successful writing project on the blogosphere, there were suggestions and few observations regarding the blogs nominated and even the bloggers who participated. Shari was complaining a bit on the representation of blogs. She argued that most of the bloggers who participated were Filipinos and most of the blogs were owned by part or full blooded Filipinos.

Actually, when I blogged about it, I was afraid that it will not get much international coverage when it became evident by week 3 that most of the bloggers and even the nominated blogs were Filipinos/Filipino owned. However, if the contest was only dedicated to Filipino Top 10 Emerging Influential Blogs, I guess there might be a few choices despite the growing number of Filipino bloggers.

But hey, this is just the first year of this writing project. Who knows what will happen next year? Well, I hope that more bloggers will participate and this will be one of the most “popular” popularity contests on the blogosphere after the bloggy and other award giving “bodies.” 🙂

Last post from home

This is my last post from home here in Thailand as we prepare to leave for Perth. We’re off to the ISP provider to cancel our subscription. We’ve almost completed saying goodbyes to friends here in Thailand.

We’ve fallen in love with this country and its people and we would definitely miss everything about it–even the coups. 🙂 Well, I know we’ll do fine in Australia and we look forward to good friends welcoming us and new friends that we’ll build along the way.

Hopefully I could do liveblogging while we travel on Monday. 🙂

Watch this site as I blog about Australia news and our adventures. 🙂 Cheers mate!

Bad Filipino traits I’d Wish to Change

I’ve been lagging behind my tagging responsibilities that I got tagged thrice now. This one’s from Chuckie, then there’s another one from Sir Sonnie and another one from Alma (sorry guys it’s still in the draft, but it will come out in a few weeks). Before my hiatus I had 28 drafts, well I was able to release some only to accumulate two to three more drafts so I still have a few more drafts again. 🙂 (30 to be exact). 

Australia becoming more Asian — census

That’s exactly what the headline says on Inquirer.net. So, what’s the buzz surrounding this issue? My first thought was that they are afraid, they are very, very afraid. Why? Well, another race is overtaking true-blue Australians.

Forgive my ranting but I’m speaking from experience as a random victim of a “sporadic” racism in beautiful Australia back in 2004. While some might consider the cases that I’ve been through as mere coincidence or as nothing serious, it made me think twice whenever I walk the streets of the very quaint and peaceful Newcastle, Australia.

First case. It happened during my first quarter as a student in this developed country. I checked the mail as I usually do and one flyer caught my eye. It was from a certain political group. The flyer was full of Asian bashing arguements like Asians are taking over our jobs, Asians cannot assimilate in Australian culture among others.

The flyer was distributed at every house in our suburb. The following night, stones were raining on our house that we had to call the police for assistance. We saw some youth running away apparently from where the stones are coming from and identified the house where they sought refuge.

We saw the perpetrators but no arrests were made as the parents of the teenagers claimed that they were fast asleep inside the house during the supposed time of attack. We believe we were targetted as we were the most vulnerable Asian in the neighborhood–our house is in a street corner.

I wrote a number of authorities and attached the flyer that I saw and reported our experience. Among those I wrote was Prime Minister John Howard, the secretary of foreign affairs, University officials including Australian Embassy staff in the Philippines. No action was taken as they deemed it as a simple case of random mischief.

Second case. Simple to others but it was a big deal to me as I was shaken a bit–a group of youth on a car followed me and shouted “go home asian!!” which I did, I went home (to our house, which was nearby anyway). 🙂

This experience had shaken me and I just tried to shurg it off after my first experience in the first case. I was warned that I’ll be treated like that someday anyway.

Amazing how some people can be intolerant of others and they ask why there’s murder, rape and terrorism. Or I’m just being too sensitive??? I might be. enough said.

The long overdue underpass came to pass

When I read this news about the comletion of an underpass to QC Circle, it certainly brought back memories when we still resided near the area. My daughter was barely two years of age then.

Every weekend, our usual routine is to spend time strolling around QC Circle. We considered it the last frontier, the only spot (aside from UP) where you can confidently… inhale and exhale (well at least the air is clear in that part of the city). However, before you could do your stroll in the park, you have to brave the road and cross pass speeding motorist, most of whom don’t have any regard whether you’re on the pedestrian lane or even if the traffic light says red (meaning the pedestrian could walk, well it was that bad).

I remember one motorist giving me the finger sign and yelling at me “are you out to kill your family?!!!” while speeding past us–this was even it was a red light for them. Oh well, I might never get to use the QC Circle underpass in the near future but I’m glad that it’s up and running now. Hopefully, Quezon City will be able to maintain it like the underpass in Makati City albeit no airconditioning. 🙂

Immortalized

Death in the Philippines is big time. It is the end so make it memorable anyway. Filipinos usually parade the dead on a hearse with loud music, either the most favorite song of the deceased or a classic line-up provided by the funeral services. There would also be a big photo of the deceased sparking more curiosity among kibitzers (well, including me). The last time I remember the trend of music was more on upbeat–a celebration of life.

I remember as a child just staring at a passing hearse wondering how that person lived his life. That was decades ago. Now, you can just blog hop, learn, be amused, be surprised at how people lived their lives be it for goodness or for worst.

When US Peace Corps Volunteer Julia Campbell was reported missing, most people went online to find out who this Julia Campbell, why did she bother to leave her nice work in New York anyway? People learned more about her in her blog and realized that she is a good person. Days later she was found dead.

 More photos of her work in Bicol

Julia’s blog immortalized her and left a legacy for more people to think about volunteerism in the Philippines (and think about the need to increase security not only for expats but locals).

Recently I learned about another death of a blogger, this time a Filipina and an awarded poet. She was a wife, a mother and a teacher. It’s just devastating to learn about these deaths more so if you found out that this person was so important to many people. I may not know her personally but reading the blogs about her, she lived a vibrant life.

Blogs has served its purpose of immortalizing the people behind it whether they want to remain obscure or are certified A-list bloggers.

Rest in peace.

Hell boy fails to enter Catholic school

A boy surnamed Hell has been banned from an Australian Catholic school according to a report on the Inquirer.net. The ban was imposed apparently because of the boy’s surname. The boy’s father was originally from Austria.

The boy’s parents approached St. Peter Apostle School to enroll him as their son was being bullied in his current school. The school offered the boy a place in the school after the boy’s parents agreed to use the mother’s last name, Wembridge. However, the school backed out of its promise after the parents changed their mind and offered the child another school.

The parents, however, decided to take the child to another school. Hell in Austria means “bright” 🙂

While not related to this news article, this article reminded me of a tourism campaign initiated by Australia sometime in 2004. The accompanying TV ad, however, earned the ire of conservatives in England that it was banned from being aired–WHY?? Because of the hell word plus the adjective of blood–So, where the bloody hell are you?!

 

To some, it seems like an ordinary phrase but if you translate it to American English one might understand it this way–So, where the f*****g hell are you?!, thus, the buzz.

Taking up Lorelle’s Blog Challenge: Describe Blogging

I’m baaaaack! 🙂

Thanks to those who checked out Blogbastic for any update these past few days. I am glad to inform you (and I’m much relieved) that the last major meeting that I helped organize at the office is finally over. Next stuff will be report writing and, of course, return to my blogging routine. 🙂

This is my 100th blog entry and I think it is just but fitting to take on a blogging challenge as a celebration. I’m supposed to write this post last June 22, so this is a late reply to Lorelle’s blog challenge. Her challenge is to describe blogging (better late than never??:) ). She cautioned bloggers, however, not to take the task lightly as she’s not only looking for a text book definition but a personal conviction of what blogging is. This challenge is almost similar to what Jayvee of abuggedlife has placed long ago–describe your blogging passion.

So, I’m taking on both challenges.

I remember when I was an elementary student, I was a member of a certain religious group. We were required one time in that religion to write a daily journal, something we can look back and meditate on. Back then, I hated writing manually as my handwriting can’t keep up with what I’m thinking (so, my handwriting end up so bad as in really bad–ever heard the comment, you write like a doctor!–and sometimes I end up composing a bad essay)–I prefer to write using a typewriter back then. It was the rule (write daily) but I couldn’t comply because my hand hurts when I write long journal entries (unless I’m really psyched up to write a nice hand-written article).

It was only early last year when I discovered blogging and it brought new life to my passion for writing. Being a trained journalist I needed some outlet–reason that I became a freelance journalist once. But most of the time as a correspondent (and maybe the reason I wasn’t able to submit so much stories) I just wanted to speak my mind even if it doesn’t make sense and I just wanted to express my outburst about something. So, after just writing for a fee then discovering blogging I blogged at Friendster, Point of View to Padayon, then moved to WordPress, where I became Blogbastic!

Blogging, to me, is writing/broadcasting in general but could specifically be taken as history, autobiography, news article, column, novel, comics, radio/video broadcast (podcasts/video streams) among others. It has become a stress-reliever for me–a way to meet my mind and be at peace with it. I’m doing this for free and, as I’ve said before, stats doen’t matter but it certainly gives me a different high when it’s high. 🙂 Comments are also a welcome note.

I haven’t experienced any cyberbullying or anything (and hopefully will not) but I found good friends online from Massa P., Alma, Chico, Jun, Sir Sonnie, Jaypee, Sir Danny, Paolo, Raymond to even better known personalities such as Sir Howie, Chuckie, Yuga, Joey, Erwin among others. Blogging has expanded my social network virtually and I can say that it’s not only limited now to Friendster, Facebook or Multiply. It has also improved my ranking on Google!

Blogging as a life changing experience? Well, I’m definitely blogbastic and a certified blog addict so maybe these are the changes that occured but hopefully these are not detrimental–I kept on reminding myself, with great power comes great responsibility. Blogging has empowered me to be heard and write my take on various things. This power, however, has also kept me vigorously reminding myself (as what Massa P used to say, which I think she’s consistently reminding me–live life and never let blogging swallow it).

Blogbastic is currently a news blog where I try to blog about my host country’s news and its Philippine connection. I also try to blog about most pressing issues around the world and also try to look at seemingly trivial news that may not land on the first page of new media or traditional news channels. It still is my pseudo-personal (if I may borrow the term from Jayvee 🙂 ) blog. I believe Blogbastic also serves Filipinos around the world to connect with their roots in the Philippines.

I’m blogging while I still can and while I still have the sanity and presence of mind.

Someday, I will be looking back and I’m quite optimistic that I’ll be cherising the posts, comments (good and bad) and will be appreciating that I made the move to sit down and blog. 🙂

Busy…

I have 28 draft posts on the line, some of them are history. However, with months becoming weeks and soon becoming days before we leave for Australia, I’m currently very busy working on my last hurrah at the office. So, please bear with me, although I believe some of you can’t stand it–my stats are going down this week!

I’ll be back in two weeks–PROMISE!!! But if there’ll be any urgent blogs that I need to post, I surely will post them in 5 minutes (as I always tell my wife–and she doesn’t believe me I can do a post under 5!?) 🙂

Oh well, this is one of them. Ciao!

By the way, please visit Massa P., she’s got an interesting rendition of Myblog in her recent post! 🙂 

Philippines on watchlist on worst human traffickers

The Philippines is known to be an exporter of skilled and professional manpower, however, it has recently landed on the watchlist of Big Brother US as one of the worst human trafficker countries as reported by CNN.com. In its report on human trafficking, the US spared no one even listing vital friendly states as worst offenders.

New worst human trafficking countries included Kuwait, Malaysia, Qatar, Bahrain and Saudi Arabia. The US also listed Burma (Myanmar), Cuba, Equatorial Guinea, Iran, North Korea, Sudan, Syria, Uzbekistan and Venezuela among the worst offending countries according to the CNN report.

I believe part of the Philippines reaction to this report and in response to alleged irregularities among immigration employees, the Bureau of Immigration recently dissolved its monitoring and enforcement unit at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport. Apparently there are still good souls within the Bureau that the unit was dissolved on its alleged connivance with human traffickers.

Worst human trafficer countries have 90 days to clean up their acts or face sanctions. Those in the watchlist, which included 32 other countries including China, the Dominican Repulic, Egypt, Mexico and Russia, are given one year to act on the evaluation or face another assessment and possibly sanctions.