Breakfast Kiddie Meals

We do not close our eyes to the problem of malnutrition and its direct effect on learning. In our country, the brighter students are always the richer ones because they get to have full stomachs before reaching the school. Academic performance is then a product of financial capability.

It used to be that breakfast was the most important meal of the day. In fact, it was more than a meal, it was the very symbol of a loving and adequate family. Nanay would lovingly prepare the meal. In the Philippines, it doesn't take long to prepare: fry some rice from last night's leftovers, slice up some fresh tomatoes, and fry some dried fish or (if there's any) corned beef. Before eating, Tatay would lead the prayer of thanksgiving for another day ahead. It was a time when the whole family can be together.

Photo: Associated Press/Aaron Favila 

For all its good intentions, this bill advocating free breakfast in all public elementary schools cannot replace that. The state cannot be too overreaching in its role to take over the family. A people that so evidently places a premium on the family -- kapamilya, kapuso, kabarkada, etc -- cannot in good conscience relinquish the institution of breakfast to the government. It doesn't do anything to strengthen the Filipino family.

It is a band-aid solution to the bigger problem of joblessness, which is a direct symptom of corruption. We cannot pretend to be a welfare "nanny" state when the government is far too corrupt a nanny. It will do our legislators a lot of good if they focus on the fight against corruption while it is gaining much momentum now thanks to Pres. Aquino. As custodians of our taxes, the government is yet to prove itself responsible before it starts buying breakfast kiddie meals and flirting with other socialist policies.

Mozilla Fires Chief

Picture: truthrevolt.org

The debate on "Equality" versus "Freedom of Speech" is long and daunting. Just when a workable guideline has been drawn for these two seemingly opposing principles, the practical implications can still be utterly dissatisfying. Even silly, like forcing the creator of Javascript (!) to resign from an open-source foundation because of his personal views. Silly, and for us conservatives, very scary.

Personally, I believe there is equality among people, but there is an obvious hierarchy to their ideas. Ravi Zacharias puts it well: "Respect the individual while engaging the idea, so that we keep people in their equality but ideas in their hierarchy." So while you and I have equal value, when you and I believe in different things, only one of our ideas can have greater value with respect to what is true.

Of course this all assumes there is Truth. And if you reject that, then there's not much point in engaging ideas because then we can both just be equally right.

In the end I hope we can all get along. But this notion of having to abandon all our personal beliefs so we can get along cannot be good. It is a cop out. It can only produce equal people who don't believe in anything. Or anything of value.

UP Naming Mahal

Having sung it for eight straight years, it is only recently that I am realizing that UP Naming Mahal is a very sad song. It almost sounds like a dirge. It begins with a plea to be heard, then a promise of faithfulness despite the allure of foreign lands. Sure it celebrates university pride, but at its slowest pace and on its lowest notes.

Last Friday, I sang it again with UP High School students, having spent the whole morning with them discussing their future careers. Some of them were as young as thirteen, children bearing the weight of their families' dreams on their tender shoulders. And if the song is to be believed, the whole nation's too.

As we sang each brave word, it almost felt like the slow fanning of invisible embers. We sing to strengthen the hope that will chart the future of our great nation.

Vhong and Deniece

The national topic these days remind me of what CS Lewis talked about 72 years ago:

"Now suppose you come to a country where you could fill a theatre by simply lifting the cover so as to let every one see, just before the lights went out, that it contained a mutton chop or a bit of bacon, would you not think that in that country something had gone wrong with the appetite for food? And would not anyone who had grown up in a different world think there was something equally queer about the state of the sex instinct among us?

"They tell you sex has become a mess because it was hushed up. But for the last twenty years it has not been. It has been chattered about all day long. Yet it is still a mess. If hushing up had been the cause of the trouble, ventilation would have set it right. But it has not. I think it is the other way round. I think the human race originally hushed it up because it had become such a mess."

Or in the beautiful words of Switchfoot: "Look what a mess we made of love [sex].”

The Blame Game Begins

No one could have prepared for this. If the President ordered the whole of Leyte evacuated, everyone would have thought he's crazy. And even then, Yolanda would have gone easily north to Samar or south to Mindanao.

In the same way, no disaster relief operation will ever be satisfactory. Even if we have 300 C130s on standby, there will still be at least one old lolo we cannot reach on time. And you and I will still be up in arms for the sake of that one lolo. And that is understandable.

It's never quick enough, never prepared enough, never coordinated enough. It was never so for the US, for Haiti, for Bali, for Japan and it will never be for any other country. People have died and are dying, and you and I are frustrated. We want someone's head to roll for this. And guess who's head is the easy target?

You and I are trying to make sense of this calamity by looking for a villain. There has to be one, right? It has to be the President, right?

It's not. And the sooner you and I get over that fact, the better we can cope with the reality that no person will have the singular honor of being blamed for this mess.

Repacking Best Practices

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I've seen how relief goods are being repacked all over the city and I think efficiency can be improved. Even the Philippine Red Cross near Fuente says it's having a very hard time with repacking. I'm not the best Process Engineer, but I have a simple 3-step process proposal for repacking relief goods. There are so much donations coming in, but if we don't address this crucial part of the relief operations, it will just be a bottleneck.


You can tweak the process however way you want. Obviously, variations on this process will depend on the number of volunteers you have and what kind of final product (relief box) you are thinking of. I think we will have to get inputs from those who are really on the field to know which configurations work best when handing out packs to those who need it.

I also think the Segregator role can still be improved. I imagine it might be a bottle neck, and I'm willing to give that role to the donors themselves. As long as the Segregator's flow does not go in the way of the Packer, it should be fine.

Process Improvement Engineers, please help of ways to improve this please.

Hopeful Leyteños

Hopeful Leyteños assembled for a chance to ride a military C130 flight to Leyte this morning today in Cebu City. The unmistakable sound of the Waray dialect filling the hall -- strong, deliberate syllables in rapid succession. Everyone looked so tired, undoubtedly from lack of sleep. Some eyes still red from crying from hearing news that comes in trickles. These are our brothers and sisters. Their hearts are broken and ours break too. Yet not for long, the time for sweet homecomings will be soon.

Godspeed, our friends. We send you not only medicines, bags of grocery and bottles of water, but also our heartfelt prayers and caring thoughts. God will rebuild your quiet cities, our brave neighbors from the east. Hug your families for us.