Finally getting out the shackles of the educational system is great! I’ve never been more alive in my life. Basically, most of my days currently is -> Wake up during the late afternoon, Be in front of the computer for straight 12 hours, meals in between of course, search for nice torrents to download (movies/music/tv shows), sleep for 12 hours again. I must admit, this is what I’ve been dreaming of being able to experience but reality is slowly sinking in.
The College Education That Blogging Bought Me
I started putting Google Adsense ads on my blogs in January of 2006 but it wasn’t until three months later that I got my first adsense check and three months more that I got them every month, this was the time that I started Explore Iloilo (http://www.exploreiloilo.com). In 2007, I was able to earn a few hundred dollars a month. I was still in my third year in my Bachelor of Science in Nursing course in West Visayas State University – College of Nursing.
Connor Cunnings – Swabelicious
Here’s a video me and my friends made for a contest in school during the Valentines Season. I was one of the camera men and was the one who edited the video. We won in the contest by the way, beating the entry of the Mass Com ^_^
Enjoy the first ever video of the Saga of Connor Cunnings:
Canon 450D – Medium Term Wishlist Item
This January 2008, Canon has just released a new model for its entry level SLR. Dubbed as the Canon EOS 450D or Canon rebel XSi, it is the successor of the ever popular EOS 400D. I’ve been waiting for a few months that Canon will release a new entry SLR that has Digic III processing and now that it has finally arrived, I’m uber excited in being able to own one.
Photo by Ivanimages
Read the rest of this entry »
Kongkee Siopao saved a girl from hipfracture
I was reading through my technorati subscription to the keyword “Iloilo” when I read about this funny story by Ilongga Cook on how a kongkee siopao saved her friend from hip fracture when she was hit by a motorcycle on the highway. For those who don’t know, Kongkee is one of the popular old restaurants located in downtown Iloilo serving siopao as their specialty.
Interesting Finds – October 09, 2007
- Peso to hit P25:$1 in 5 years – A presidential economic adviser made this forecast based on the increasing dollar inflows by OFWs. He seemed quite optimistic about it and said that exporters should improve their competitiveness on their own and not rely on gov’t subsidies. For me, there’s a lot more industries that will be adversely hit if the peso further strengthens to that level, which is almost half its current level. A strengthening of the peso isn’t necessarily a good thing for the economy, what investors and businessmen generally want is a stable currency because a fluctuating currency means higher risk. A higher risk will definitely turn off investors. A strengthening of the peso would also mean that the value of the dollar will decrease and this in turn will decrease foreign investments in the country (including “sunshine” industries such as Outsourcing and Call Centers) because investors would get less pesos for every dollar they invest. OFWs will also have to suffer getting less pesos for every dollar they send to the Philippines and less pesos means less spending power of OFW-dependent families and less money circulated from the spending of these families. My income from online advertising will also be affected since most advertising programs use dollar to payout publishers, too bad for me :( My take on this is that most of us has been adjusted to the level of the peso that we have now any abrupt changes will have a negative impact on a lot of industries in the economy, not just exports.
- RP’s first: Iloilo town bans, criminalizes plastic-use – This is a really good development. I hope the whole country will adopt what Santa Barbara town is doing. Even the U.S. uses paper bags for purchases instead of plastic ones.
- Power problem saddles RP | Camp Delgado PECO bill reaches P2M mark, electric bill 4 months unpaid – The high price and unreliability of power is one of the biggest problems of Iloilo, the rates is one of the highest in the country at P9+ per KW hr.. Even gov’t offices are having a hard time catching up to the high electricity bills, what more the average Ilonggo? I hope our Gov’t officials esp. will do everything in their power to uphold the best interest of their constituents.
- I’ve read in Skyscrapercity that a greenwhich branch will open Iloilo Supermart – Mandurriao branch. I’m so happy with this development since it’s just 5 mins away from my house.
Explore Iloilo Updates – October 07 2007
I’m currently on the continual process of improving Explore Iloilo. I’ve just finished some of SEO modifications in the title, meta tags, post tags, and comment pagination of the site. I’m also slowly updating the watermark of most of the pictures at my flickr account to prevent other people from posting them without giving credits.
I’ve also added a Dinagyang 2008 section in the main page to prepare for the said event and is testing if “Text Link Ads” will be able to give me some extra income.
After reading this post, I’ve gained more ideas on how to improve Explore Iloilo such as:
- Online Surveys
- Subscribing to more SEO and Monetizing Blogs
- Links Bait
- Making Videos
- Social Networks (friendster, myspace, multiply)
- Create paypal account, which means I have to get a visa/mastercard first.
I hope they work, but more important I hope I’ll be able to do all of those in just a short period of time.
Heritage Conservation Society Serminar
This November 9, the Heritage Conservation Society, which I have recently become a member of, will be conducting a seminar entitled: “Philippine Towns & Cities: Reflections of the Past, Lessons for the Future.” The event will be held in Sarabia Manor Hotel and time is unsure to me yet.
The seminar is aimed to teach local government units the proper care and utilization of heritage structures. It raises the issue of some heritage structures being (even unintentionally) destroyed because of modernization.
November 9 is a friday, which means I have a scheduled class in the morning and afternoon. Attending the seminar is important to me because I really want to be an active member of the HCS. Being absent in class isn’t an option for me, so I’m I just hoping that it’s going to start in the evening or late afternoon or that it will be sembreak by them.
Inquirer.net has posted an article about the said event and the article tackled about “recycling” heritage sites. It mentioned originally non-socially relevant old structures that have been transformed into productive heritage sites.
In London, a decommissioned power plant along the River Thames has taken a new life as the popular, elegant Tate Gallery of Modern Art.
In Mexico City, the Cemento Azteca plant is now an environment-friendly children’s museum—El Papalote.
Singapore has salvaged a cluster of decrepit shop houses, turning Boat Quay and Clarke Quay into an eclectic mix of high-end restaurants, al fresco dining, dazzling bars and pubs. [The Daily Inquirer]
I’m raising this issue because there is a heritage building in Iloilo that is threatened to be demolished to give way to a P350M Government and Convention Center. I’m talking about the Iloilo Rehabilitation Center (IRC), the building beside the Iloilo Provincial Capitol. It was built without aesthetics in mind but the functional purpose of being the provincial jail. Now that the IRC has transferred to a new building in Pototan, the old one building has become quite useless, so utilizing the lot in a more productive way seems apt. To an Ilonggo point of view, even though heritage conservation is important the old IRC is a non-socially relevant building. It would have been a totally different scenario if a very important historical figure spent some jail time in the old IRC but I guess it’s just not the case.
Getting in context on what’s happening outside Iloilo (even outside the country), where a old power plants are being recycled as art galleries and cement plants as museums, the old IRC could have other alternative uses too like being an extension of Museo Iloilo, which is in need of a bigger space to display its exhibits. The Gov’t Building and Convention center could be built in some other place, where there is ample space (esp. parking space).
It would be a shame to lose part of our heritage, even if it just seems to look like a “dot”. I hope I and many officials in LGUs will be able to attend this seminar.
Flickr Pro rocks my socks
I’ve been a flickr member on December 2005, that’s almost 2 years since that I’ve remained a sub-user of flickr. While my basic need to have a place to host images has been satisfied, the limitations of being able to see just the most recent 200 pictures has made it quite hard to manage my gallery.
Fortunately, someone has noticed my dilemma too and out of generosity told me that I was going get a account as a gift. Thank You Wilnora! This will help a lot, as in!
You could just imagine the excitement I had when I was about to open my pro account for the first time. OK … I was able to open it successfully and as I opened the my gallery I found out that it contained “1,751 photos / 31,683 views“. I was shocked to find out that I’ve uploaded that many pictures of Iloilo these past few years. I was worrying about how long it would take to organize them.
At first I made an intricate classification process but after hours of getting into it, I barely organized 100 photos. So, I settled for a simpler classification system, which is to just sort them by location. I’ve managed to finish organizing btw, you cancheck out my photostream here.
Finally, we’ll be able to see all the photos I’ve uploaded in flickr ;p
Another issue why it was important for me to get the pro account was the ability to replace the photos that I’ve uploaded. My photos have been stolen a lot and used without my permission. At least now, I can update the watermarks of the older photos.
Minimalist Lifestyle
Thank God I found this blog. It’s called Zen Habits and it’s about minimalism, which I define as a philosophy of living life will less. If you noticed in this blog, it’s quite plain and simple. I don’t consider it boring though, I picked this theme because I found beauty in it’s simplicity.
After reading some more of the posts on Zen Habits, I realized that there’s really a lot to improve upon when it comes to stripping down to the essentials and it very much applies not just in blogging but also in life. My friends would maybe not fully understand (even ridiculing) me about how I react to things but I dont mind because I believe that “simple questions need simple answers”, and that’s “a very nice thing”.
I find myself unhappy sometimes because I’m not satisfied with how I live my life, because there are issues that I just cannot deal with and they just pile up on top of each other. I believe this is because there is so much clutter … I just have to sit down and think about what I really need (to do) and what I don’t. Hopefully, this can clear my head up and I’ll be able to deal with them one by one.
Browsing the archives for the Life Journal category
Finally getting out the shackles of the educational system is great! I’ve never been more alive in my life. Basically, most of my days currently is -> Wake up during the late afternoon, Be in front of the computer for straight 12 hours, meals in between of course, search for nice torrents to download (movies/music/tv shows), sleep for 12 hours again. I must admit, this is what I’ve been dreaming of being able to experience but reality is slowly sinking in.
I started putting Google Adsense ads on my blogs in January of 2006 but it wasn’t until three months later that I got my first adsense check and three months more that I got them every month, this was the time that I started Explore Iloilo (http://www.exploreiloilo.com). In 2007, I was able to earn a few hundred dollars a month. I was still in my third year in my Bachelor of Science in Nursing course in West Visayas State University – College of Nursing.
Here’s a video me and my friends made for a contest in school during the Valentines Season. I was one of the camera men and was the one who edited the video. We won in the contest by the way, beating the entry of the Mass Com ^_^
Enjoy the first ever video of the Saga of Connor Cunnings:
This January 2008, Canon has just released a new model for its entry level SLR. Dubbed as the Canon EOS 450D or Canon rebel XSi, it is the successor of the ever popular EOS 400D. I’ve been waiting for a few months that Canon will release a new entry SLR that has Digic III processing and now that it has finally arrived, I’m uber excited in being able to own one.
Photo by Ivanimages
Read the rest of this entry »
I was reading through my technorati subscription to the keyword “Iloilo” when I read about this funny story by Ilongga Cook on how a kongkee siopao saved her friend from hip fracture when she was hit by a motorcycle on the highway. For those who don’t know, Kongkee is one of the popular old restaurants located in downtown Iloilo serving siopao as their specialty.
- Peso to hit P25:$1 in 5 years – A presidential economic adviser made this forecast based on the increasing dollar inflows by OFWs. He seemed quite optimistic about it and said that exporters should improve their competitiveness on their own and not rely on gov’t subsidies. For me, there’s a lot more industries that will be adversely hit if the peso further strengthens to that level, which is almost half its current level. A strengthening of the peso isn’t necessarily a good thing for the economy, what investors and businessmen generally want is a stable currency because a fluctuating currency means higher risk. A higher risk will definitely turn off investors. A strengthening of the peso would also mean that the value of the dollar will decrease and this in turn will decrease foreign investments in the country (including “sunshine” industries such as Outsourcing and Call Centers) because investors would get less pesos for every dollar they invest. OFWs will also have to suffer getting less pesos for every dollar they send to the Philippines and less pesos means less spending power of OFW-dependent families and less money circulated from the spending of these families. My income from online advertising will also be affected since most advertising programs use dollar to payout publishers, too bad for me :( My take on this is that most of us has been adjusted to the level of the peso that we have now any abrupt changes will have a negative impact on a lot of industries in the economy, not just exports.
- RP’s first: Iloilo town bans, criminalizes plastic-use – This is a really good development. I hope the whole country will adopt what Santa Barbara town is doing. Even the U.S. uses paper bags for purchases instead of plastic ones.
- Power problem saddles RP | Camp Delgado PECO bill reaches P2M mark, electric bill 4 months unpaid – The high price and unreliability of power is one of the biggest problems of Iloilo, the rates is one of the highest in the country at P9+ per KW hr.. Even gov’t offices are having a hard time catching up to the high electricity bills, what more the average Ilonggo? I hope our Gov’t officials esp. will do everything in their power to uphold the best interest of their constituents.
- I’ve read in Skyscrapercity that a greenwhich branch will open Iloilo Supermart – Mandurriao branch. I’m so happy with this development since it’s just 5 mins away from my house.
I’m currently on the continual process of improving Explore Iloilo. I’ve just finished some of SEO modifications in the title, meta tags, post tags, and comment pagination of the site. I’m also slowly updating the watermark of most of the pictures at my flickr account to prevent other people from posting them without giving credits.
I’ve also added a Dinagyang 2008 section in the main page to prepare for the said event and is testing if “Text Link Ads” will be able to give me some extra income.
After reading this post, I’ve gained more ideas on how to improve Explore Iloilo such as:
- Online Surveys
- Subscribing to more SEO and Monetizing Blogs
- Links Bait
- Making Videos
- Social Networks (friendster, myspace, multiply)
- Create paypal account, which means I have to get a visa/mastercard first.
I hope they work, but more important I hope I’ll be able to do all of those in just a short period of time.
This November 9, the Heritage Conservation Society, which I have recently become a member of, will be conducting a seminar entitled: “Philippine Towns & Cities: Reflections of the Past, Lessons for the Future.” The event will be held in Sarabia Manor Hotel and time is unsure to me yet.
The seminar is aimed to teach local government units the proper care and utilization of heritage structures. It raises the issue of some heritage structures being (even unintentionally) destroyed because of modernization.
November 9 is a friday, which means I have a scheduled class in the morning and afternoon. Attending the seminar is important to me because I really want to be an active member of the HCS. Being absent in class isn’t an option for me, so I’m I just hoping that it’s going to start in the evening or late afternoon or that it will be sembreak by them.
Inquirer.net has posted an article about the said event and the article tackled about “recycling” heritage sites. It mentioned originally non-socially relevant old structures that have been transformed into productive heritage sites.
In London, a decommissioned power plant along the River Thames has taken a new life as the popular, elegant Tate Gallery of Modern Art.
In Mexico City, the Cemento Azteca plant is now an environment-friendly children’s museum—El Papalote.
Singapore has salvaged a cluster of decrepit shop houses, turning Boat Quay and Clarke Quay into an eclectic mix of high-end restaurants, al fresco dining, dazzling bars and pubs. [The Daily Inquirer]
I’m raising this issue because there is a heritage building in Iloilo that is threatened to be demolished to give way to a P350M Government and Convention Center. I’m talking about the Iloilo Rehabilitation Center (IRC), the building beside the Iloilo Provincial Capitol. It was built without aesthetics in mind but the functional purpose of being the provincial jail. Now that the IRC has transferred to a new building in Pototan, the old one building has become quite useless, so utilizing the lot in a more productive way seems apt. To an Ilonggo point of view, even though heritage conservation is important the old IRC is a non-socially relevant building. It would have been a totally different scenario if a very important historical figure spent some jail time in the old IRC but I guess it’s just not the case.
Getting in context on what’s happening outside Iloilo (even outside the country), where a old power plants are being recycled as art galleries and cement plants as museums, the old IRC could have other alternative uses too like being an extension of Museo Iloilo, which is in need of a bigger space to display its exhibits. The Gov’t Building and Convention center could be built in some other place, where there is ample space (esp. parking space).
It would be a shame to lose part of our heritage, even if it just seems to look like a “dot”. I hope I and many officials in LGUs will be able to attend this seminar.
I’ve been a flickr member on December 2005, that’s almost 2 years since that I’ve remained a sub-user of flickr. While my basic need to have a place to host images has been satisfied, the limitations of being able to see just the most recent 200 pictures has made it quite hard to manage my gallery.
Fortunately, someone has noticed my dilemma too and out of generosity told me that I was going get a account as a gift. Thank You Wilnora! This will help a lot, as in!
You could just imagine the excitement I had when I was about to open my pro account for the first time. OK … I was able to open it successfully and as I opened the my gallery I found out that it contained “1,751 photos / 31,683 views“. I was shocked to find out that I’ve uploaded that many pictures of Iloilo these past few years. I was worrying about how long it would take to organize them.
At first I made an intricate classification process but after hours of getting into it, I barely organized 100 photos. So, I settled for a simpler classification system, which is to just sort them by location. I’ve managed to finish organizing btw, you cancheck out my photostream here.
Finally, we’ll be able to see all the photos I’ve uploaded in flickr ;p
Another issue why it was important for me to get the pro account was the ability to replace the photos that I’ve uploaded. My photos have been stolen a lot and used without my permission. At least now, I can update the watermarks of the older photos.
Thank God I found this blog. It’s called Zen Habits and it’s about minimalism, which I define as a philosophy of living life will less. If you noticed in this blog, it’s quite plain and simple. I don’t consider it boring though, I picked this theme because I found beauty in it’s simplicity.
After reading some more of the posts on Zen Habits, I realized that there’s really a lot to improve upon when it comes to stripping down to the essentials and it very much applies not just in blogging but also in life. My friends would maybe not fully understand (even ridiculing) me about how I react to things but I dont mind because I believe that “simple questions need simple answers”, and that’s “a very nice thing”.
I find myself unhappy sometimes because I’m not satisfied with how I live my life, because there are issues that I just cannot deal with and they just pile up on top of each other. I believe this is because there is so much clutter … I just have to sit down and think about what I really need (to do) and what I don’t. Hopefully, this can clear my head up and I’ll be able to deal with them one by one.
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What is Ambot-ah?
In the Philippine Ilonggo dialect, ambot ah literally means "I don't know." After graduating in college, I decided to hold off pursuing my profession and embarked on a free spirited journey of adventure and self-discovery. My travels have led me to many places across the Philippine Islands and South East Asia. I don't know where this path will take me but I'm certain I'll get a lifetime of stories out of it.
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