Where I come from, denying climate change is not an option. No, not when it is affecting the lives of millions, and we are facing it with our scarce resources as a third world country. We can prepare for it, or we die pretending it isn’t real. But to those privileged enough to look away,...
Manila, Philippines: I can name three things many Filipinos are extraordinarily passionate about: Basketball, karaoke, and Miss Universe. Today I’ll tell you a story about the third. When I was eight, the Philippines hosted this worldwide pageant. Back then, my family lived 12 hours away from Manila, in a province where it’s common to meet...
Where I live, zombies are everywhere. They fill the busy city streets, all of them in a hurry to be someplace else. I have sat (or more often, stood) beside them on the crowded bus, or the even more crowded train. I have seen them munch on sad-looking burgers on the ride home, their tired...
It can be hard to do good, writes Jennifer a week ago. I must add, it gets harder when the platforms through which well-meaning people try to do good become co-opted by the powerful to protect their own interests. Microcredit is a perfect example. What is microcredit? At its core, microcredit is a mechanism that...
“Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.” I vaguely remember seeing a version of this quote two decades ago, printed on a poster that’s attached to the wall of my Grade 2 classroom. Like most children in the...
Manila, Philippines: I have, on many occasions, entertained the idea of playing host to intelligent beings from elsewhere in the Universe, who came in peace to learn about our planet. I imagine being asked the following questions, and already I am composing answers in my head: What do Earthlings need the most to survive? Food....
I come from a beautiful archipelagic country in the Pacific called the Philippines. As of this writing, my homeland is inhabited by 100 million people who belong to a brave, hardworking and strong-willed race that has survived over 300 years of colonization. I am a Filipino, and I say this with immense pride in my...