Finally read a Marquez novel

I had a great time last night. We had dinner in Acha Pizzeria instead and then afterwards we went to the Breakfast Club in I.T. Park since Acha was a bit crowded and noisy.

We talked about a lot of things - of course, mainly about love, and many more naughty things besides hehehe...

I'm really thankful this club was realized, because it gave me the opportunity to meet a lot of very nice people.

For next month we will be reading The Myth of Sisyphus by Albert Camus and A New Earth by Eckhart Tolle. The first one is an essay and the second one is a short non-fiction book, so I guess we will be able to discuss them together next month.

Sisyphus... that's heavy existential stuff. Probably will make for a lot of interesting discussion. Our facilitator is a teacher of Literature and Philosophy, so I've heard, so this should be great! Eckhart Tolle... that will be my first book from the guy. Don't know what its genre is exactly (spirituality?). Whatever it is, I hope it's not New Age stuff...

I hereby congratulate myself for finally having read at least one Marquez novel!

Later today we leave for San Remegio for some beach and fishing, and, of course, reading.

Book Discussion: Love in the Time of Cholera

WHAT: Dinner + Discussion for "Love in the Time of Cholera"
WHEN: Feb 23, Saturday
PICK-UP: Dimsum Break area, BTC @ 6:15PM
VENUE: Ananda Marga Wellness Center, Pagsabungan, Mandaue City
DINNER: Vegetarian Buffet (with a Caribbean flair) @ 90.00/person only
OTHERS: Yoga demo, brief orientation on the center's services

Friends who might be interested to try the vegetarian buffet are welcome to join the dinner. Just sign them up.

Hapit na amo book discussion for this month. Actually, ugma na hehe. This gathering is open to the public, provided you have read the book; but you can come just for the dinner (if you want to try a vegetarian buffet).

Haven't finished the book yet; I'm down to the last few pages already.

Great lecture

Our lecturer for Medical Surgical Nursing refresher review last week was awesome. A very intelligent and articulate guy. And to top it all off, a stand-up comedian! Hehehe. What a great combination for a lecturer. It was a treat to just listen to his discussions. I tell you, we started at 9 in the morning and ended at around 7 in the evening every day for two days, and there was not a moment that I got bored!

Today's PIBJ episode: Entrepreneurship

Today's Preacher in Blue Jeans episode is about enterpreneurship:



Bo is interviewed by enterpreneurship students from Assumption.

His advice on those who want to start businesses (to summarize):

1. Discover and develop your core gifts (talents/ skills/ unique attributes that you have). What are you good at? Or, what are your passions? What are the things you like doing? Singing? Dancing? Making/mixing music? Writing? Speaking in public? Theater? Selling? Reading and collecting books? Cars? Bags? Fashion? Wellness? Foods? Travelling? We can pursue them. The idea, I think, is to follow your passion; the money will just follow.

2. Never say you've learned enough. Continue learning. Read, study, listen, observe. He used one of the interviewers as his example. She plans to open a restaurant someday. Bo's advice: Work in a restaurant. Know everything there is to know about the business. Work as a cook, cashier, marketer, manager, bartender, and yes, waitress. His other advice is to find a mentor. One who is successful and who has been in the business for many years. It doesn't matter if you have to fetch him coffee every morning, as long as you learn a lot from him.

3. Know the true purpose of wealth. The true aim of business, Bo says, is not to amass profits but to serve. Money can be used as a tool to help and enrich others. When you do that, you are truly rich!

PIBJ's Valentine's Day episode

I used to watch Bo Sanchez's Preacher in Blue Jeans almost every day. Now I rarely do. But watching it daily is a good habit to acquire. It can nourish your soul!



I'll try to write down my insights for every episode, just so I can remember them.

The above show was aired last Valentine's Day, and the topic was about - what else? - love. Bo talked about two kinds of love: eros and agape. Eros is romantic love while agape is a deeper kind of love, or what he referred to as "true love", because it is the one more lasting. Agape requires sacrifice.

My date last week was thousands of miles away - in Davao. So I was all alone, and she was alone. But it was okay, we were used to it hehehe. That's the surprising thing about our relationship: we've been geographically apart for almost two years now, and somehow we managed to cope. So we haven't spent Valentine's for two years now!

One thing I remembered with Bo's talk is that honesty is really essential in any relationship. He said he "quarrels" (small "one-minute" tensions/ conflicts) with his wife at least 5 times a day! He might just be exaggerating. I guess that's just normal, and healthy. Better to have 5 small "quarrels" a day than to have a huge one every week or every month, because then it will be like seeing a volcano explode, with all the repressed hurt, misunderstanding, wrong assumptions, and failed expectations that each spouse hides inside him or her. So it's better to have an open relationship, one wherein you can freely say to you partner, "Ouch, what you just said hurt me," or "I don't agree with you on that," etc. etc. Then you talk it over and settle your differences. We can be too polite with our partners sometimes, afraid that we might hurt him or her. Tension and conflict can be healthy if handled properly.

Love

"If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not love, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I should have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not love, I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not love, it profiteth me nothing.

"Love is patient, is kind: love envieth not, dealeth not perversely, is not puffed up, Is not ambitious, seeketh not her own, is not provoked to anger, thinketh no evil: Rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth with the truth: Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things."

1 Cor. 13: 1-7

Happy hearts day!

Badian

I will really miss our duty in Badian; it was our group's last district assignment, so no more out of town trips and week-long stays in creepy dormitories together. Sigh.

What I will miss most is the freezing shower in the dead of night. We wake up at around 11 every night. The hospital was just 2 minutes' walk away from the dorm, so we had plenty of time. Going to the bathroom takes so much effort. I always felt a hint of panic, because I always did not get enough sleep during the day. But when the icy water hits my skin, though, all anxiety fades away, and I hum to the tune of the RnB music our C.I. always plays in the background. She played it so often that we were all able to memorize the songs by heart, and their sequence.

It wasn't very much busy in the ward because most of the patients are asleep during that time. All we did was monitor the vital signs every four to two hours, prepare the medications and write the SOAPIEs. After that we go to the library and get some midnight (not exactly) snack. Then we carefully prepare the chairs and benches where we are to nap. Hehehe...

Those of us who didn't want to sleep entertained ourselves with reading patients' charts (as if that's entertaining), reading a book, or watching movies on an iPod. I saw portions of Snakes on a Plane. Ate R had a Freudian slip when I asked her what the movie's title was: "Sex on a Plane".

On our last day an old man was brought to the ER because of gunshot wound. He was already dead. They said it was politically-motivated. The shooting occured in Moalboal, over an hour's drive from Badian, at around 11 in the evening. It was already 4 AM when he arrived.

The play

The play was, um, okay. I don't know, but I didn't enjoy it as much as I've expected. It's probably just me. I have a few things sort of bothering me lately, so maybe I was not in the right mindset when I watched the play.

I was more moved by the book.

But Bart Guingona and the guy who played Morrie were really good... Maybe it was the dialogue that at times were not very clear, or which were garbled a bit.

The theater was filled to capacity. Majority of the audience were students from Sacred Heart School.

In half an hour I will be preparing for my trip to Badian. We will have our second week of clinical duty there. I haven't slept. I spent the rest of the night editing the final copy of our thesis.

Badian is a very nice, quiet little town. There's a very old church beside the district hospital. I'm not sure when it was constructed; probably sometime in the 19th century.

We're staying in a dorm just within the hospital compound. It's really creepy. The hospital itself was built in 1911, if I'm not mistaken. In fact, it's rumoured to be haunted. But no ghosts appeared last week, though. This week, well, I'm not terribly excited of seeing one.

They say that the room below our dorm is actually a morgue. Horror of horrors, I know.

Tuesdays With Morrie theatrical adaptation

You probably already know about this. Premiere theatre group Repertory Philippines will be staging an adaptation of the bestseller Tuesdays With Morrie by Mitch Albom. That's tonight at SM Cinema 2.

I got my tickets yesterday. I'm going with my cousin and my ermats. I'm very excited!