Spell B-i-t-t-e-r

Blame it on those social networking sites. You get connected to your ex-es whether you like it or not. You’ll get to see updates about him and the new friend he adds or the new photos and his current relationship status. “Married” it says now…

Thoughts on MBS2

25th October 2008, General Santos City — the 2nd Mindanao Bloggers Summit was conducted and concluded with flying colors, thanks in large part to Avel Manansala and his team. The bloggers of Soccsksargen really made a fantastic showing! But let’s not forget that a blogger from Zamboanga City, Ryann Elumba, made a big contribution by [...]

long live the queen!

I’m back in Iowa City after my pilgrimage to Chicago to see Madonna live in concert. It was the culmination of a 23-year journey which started in 1985 -the year I first saw Miss Ciccone in the iconic Borderline video.
I left Iowa City on Monday at 10:35 in the morning. The bus ride to Chicago took almost six hours. Heavy traffic started to build up in Naperville until we reached Chicago. I rushed out of the bus as soon as it stopped at the W Harrison Station, took out my Google map, and began sectioning the city like a general calculating a precise military operation. Thanks to my impeccable sense of direction, I was able to find my hotel on Halsted in ten minutes. I checked in, deposited my backpack in my room, freshened up, and put my wallet, camera, and ticket in my belt bag. The concert ticket said ‘no camera’ but I just prayed that I might get lucky. (The security was tight. Bag inspection at the gate. Good thing I put my camera in my socks after taking photos outside of the venue.) I consulted my map again. Four blocks to Madison and then head right and walk twelve blocks. I wasted no time. In case my homing device failed I have ample time to search the city.
I arrived at the concert venue, the United Center -home of the Chicago Bulls- at half past five, so I was way too early.

There were about a hundred of fans waiting outside. A United Center rep said that the venue wouldn’t be open until 6:30. It was freezing. We waited. I got to chat with a couple who, sensing that I was turning into a chocolate frozen delight, offered me a cigarette. “I don’t smoke. Thanks.”

“Are you from around here?”

“No, I’m from the Philippines. But I’ve been in Iowa for more than two months now. And you?”

“We flew in from Puerto Rico. If Madonna doesn’t come to us, well, I guess we just have to find our way to her.”

We were let in at 6:30pm. I checked out the venue. It was huge. According to information on their website, it can hold a crowd of 23,000 for concerts. Whew! I was hungry. Excited for this event I forgot to eat the whole day. So I pigged out on a box of French fries, nachos and diet Coke. I was afraid that I might pass out when the party reached a hot, wild point. I needed an energy boost.

By 7:30pm I went to look for my seat. Left side of the stage, about 100 feet away. At 8pm my heart was racing. The concert was about to start. Fifteen minutes later the tech people were still doing mike checks. By half past 8 they were testing the lights. To pass time I checked my program. 20 songs. People starting to get impatient. They were whistling. Hello, a diva is entitled to be fashionably late. By 8:50, the lights dimmed and the music started playing. Everybody rose from their seats to pay respects to the Queen.
Madonna opened the concert with Candy Shop, a song from her new album, appearing in her throne with a big M on the background. It featured the cute and lovable Pharell Williams on the video screen. It was followed by Beat Goes On in which a classic white convertible car rolled onstage.
One of my favorite acts was Get Into the Groove (photo above) where she came on stage playing with a jumping rope. The Keith Haring graphic design of the set was so cool. The Japanese DJ was awesome.

Manny Pacquiao would have loved Die Another Day in which two dancers performed a nicely choreographed boxing inside a ring.

Madonna’s music career spanning more than 25 years now was encapsulated in She’s Not Me. Four dancers impersonated Madonna and portrayed the different stages of the Queen of Pop’s music history. On the video screen were splices of all her music videos -from Borderline to the present.

Hamutsun Serve, a Japanese act that mixes a marvelous mix of original music and original dance, performed a fabulous dance in their shiny kimonos to the instrumental tune of Here Comes The Rain by Stylistics. At the end of the stage, a cloaked Madonna emerged standing on top of a grand piano singing Devil Wouldn’t Recognized You, enclosed in a cage of light.

In Miles Away, a video showed images of different journeys. I couldn’t help but think of my own journey. I waited twenty three years for this to happen. Everyday I moved closer to it. 534,000 hours. Or 32,040,000 minutes. I had to cross an expanse of more than 8,000 miles to reach my destination.

We went wild when she sang Like a Prayer. La Isla Bonita featured, among other things, a bearded fiddler. Then suddenly she slowed down the pace with a deeply moving rendition of You Must Love Me. My tears flowed.
The concert was a good two-hour show, with an audience participation portion. Madonna asked the audience which song (not included in the program) would we like her to sing. She picked Dress You Up from the fan choices and sang the first few lines before passing the microphone to the audience.

Although the Sweet and Sticky Tour was tamer compared to her previous concerts, like Confessions on a Dance Floor, which featured her on a cross, Madonna’s personal and political convictions were still very pronounced in the tour. In a video Get Stupid! we were treated to images of global warming, elephant tusk poaching, the Darfur crisis, armed conflict everywhere, Adolf Hitler, and John McCain – problematic stories. On another video, the mood was hopeful with images of U2’s Bono, Mahatma Gandhi, Al Gore, and not but not the least, the next president of the USA, Barack Obama. The crowd in Chicago roared.

For her finale she sang Give It 2 Me. We all danced and partyed with the Queen as if there were no tomorrow.

It had been a wild, crazy, unforgettable journey. For now I rest. Another journey will begin.

jess fur peyn

Writing from Linamon, Lanao del Norte. Just few kilometers–like nearby–are Kolambugan and Kauswagan–the towns recently stormed by the Moro Islamic Liberation Front rebels headed by Commander Bravo. Next week, I will be in Tawi-Tawi and Zamboanga, th…

Life for Sale

div style=”text-align: justify;” Last Friday I learned two things. First, that sometimes doing your job well can cost you your life and second life can be bought by a mere couple of bucks. I’m getting ahead of my story, here’s what happened.br /…

MBS2 featured in Business World and Sunstar

We are really on the roll!

In their paper and online editions for today, October 22, 2008, both Business World and Sunstar featured the upcoming 2nd Mindanao Bloggers Summit, which is just three days away.
Thanks to my writer friends (and fellow bloggers), Edwin Espejo (http://eeportal.com) and Bong Sarmiento (http://bongsarmiento.com) for the free publicity.
For the Business World [...]

imbestigatib mong mukha mo

Ayaw kong sanang mag-blog pero sobrang tagal na nitong kagagahan na ito. I mean, yang entry sa baba. Isang linggo na yan at tapos na ako sa episode na yan. Bago na naman sana pero di ako makapag-sulat. Hindi ko ma-gather ng maayos ang aking thoughts. A…

Birthday Gift

p style=”text-align: justify;” class=”MsoNormal”I love giving gifts and surprises to my friends and loved ones. I admit that I have an ulterior motive for doing this, I want to receive gifts and surprises too and I hope that by doing it, they’ll do i…

yellow…

D,This is kind of sooooooo frigging off.First, I know sumemplang ako. Second, I sort of don’t know whether to really explain or not–especially that this is one of my most embarrassing semplangs. Ever.Then, there is this nagging concern whether it is r…

She’s wide awake – Gaisano Mall of Davao’s expansion

Mall investors from Metro Manila are now flocking in Davao City. Gokongwei’s Robinsons Land Corp is half way through the construction of their first cybergate mall in Mindanao. A Cybergate mall is RLC’s new line of malls which is a combination of a BPO building and a retail complex. Robinsons Cybergate Complex in Pioneer Mandaluyong [...]

Whatever happened to class

No. This is not about the battle of the dirt poor against the filthy rich. That one is a struggle that many are inspired to join in as they find the wide gap present right smack dab in the middle of their own lives. Talk about misery loving company or …

at the crossroad again

div style=”text-align: justify;”I am yet again at a crossroad. Those who know me might say “Raine, you’re always at a crossroad”. That’s quite true especially when it comes to what I want to do with my life. I am thinking again of quitting my j…

Egyptian Museum

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This museum is home to the most extensive collection of ancient Egyptian antiquities in the world. Of course, it should have the most extensive collection since it’s in Egypt for crying out loud.

Established by the Egyptian government in 1835. They exhibit more than 120,000 collections. This is located at Tahrir square, Cairo, Egypt.

It’s also the first big museum, I’ve ever been too. Photographs are not allowed inside, so I can’t show what’s inside the museum.

It contains a lot of coffins (made out of granite, limestone or covered with gold), statues, tables, jewelries, the treasures found from King Tutankhamen’s tomb, weapons, instruments, chariots, and other stuffs .

Of course this is where you will see the mummies – they have a Royal Mummy Room and you have to pay for another extra to go inside. We did not get to go inside because almost everyone’s itching to get out of the place – medyo mainit rin ang museum plus everyone’s tired.

This is also where one of the scenes in the blockbuster hit movie “The Mummy” was shot.

Golden Age of Multimedia

I have always wanted to learn more about video production. And, I did venture to that once or twice in our Multimedia Class and another one when a friend of mine asked for help. But, I stopped since I need to focus on what I have at hand. But, one day.. I will go back.

Talking about multimedia and video production…..

I know of this group of people ( Chicago Video Production ) who can produce videos for you. Be it for corporate, training, trade show, recruitment, marketing, sales, tv or promotional video. They can even hire the actors for you!

Richter Studios can shoot the scene in any format from any location. Or, if you already have the footage, but need that special post-production touch to bring out the magic – they can do that as well. They have world class editors and animators who can help you with that. They have an award winning team that can make your video production an attention-grabbing masterpiece!

They don’t just deal with videos! Other services they offer are Web and Interactive Production Services.

A lot of their clients usually requests for web version of videos, and so to cater their client’s need and the constant demand of those web version of videos, they have extended their services to the World Wide Web. And to make sure that you are really dealing with PROFESSIONALS, here is the proof:

Richter Studios created the award-winning Pinehurst Virtual Tour, which features over 70 videos, dozens of animations, PDF’s and interactive slide shows – all created in-house by the Richter Studios team.”

An All Digital Workflow + World Class Talent = Richter Studios

http://www.richterstudios.com/

Go check their website now and look around specially at the portfolios part. :)

Looking up

MONTEREY, California — I’d like to believe that things can get better for Pinoy newspapers because we can move to the internet in ways that perhaps no US paper can. Here they have been overtaken by online rivals who have taken over much of the information dissemination duties. With internet penetration still relatively low in [...]

Perspective

MONTEREY, California — It’s a matter of perspective, Laith Agha, one of the Monterey County Herald’s reporters, said as we drove back to the newsroom after making two unsuccessful attempts to find out more about a murder victim. I had gone with him to see how a US reporter works, and as it turned out, [...]

Jamming in the dark

SALINAS, California — Believe it or not, there was a rather long power outage here in Salinas on Tuesday night that lasted almost seven hours. Salinas, located northeast of Monterey, is where my older brother works on weekdays (he drives home to his family in Los Angeles on weekends), and since this is close to [...]

How upbeat are the BPO and ITes industries in Davao City?

How upbeat are the BPO and ITes industries in Davao City? These facilities may give you an idea.
BPO and IT Parks/Centers in Davao City
1.)
- NCCC Mall IT Pavilion
- home of Western Wats
2.)
- Luisa Avenue Square
- home of Sutherland Global Center. Also home of PeopleSupport Recruitment and Training Center.
3.)
- DAMOSA IT Park
- home of Concentrix and [...]

What made Abreeza unique from the other Ayala Centers in the country?

What made Abreeza – the upcoming Ayala Center of Davao different from other existing Ayala malls in the country?
Unlike Greenbelt, Glorietta, Trinoma, Bonifacio Highstreet, and Ayala Center Cebu – based on the developer’s plan, Abreeza will have two BPO buildings and a mall. And based on the existing developments of Ayala Land, this will be [...]

The price of a virgin

While waiting for a cab in a waiting shed beside Davao Doctors Hospital one rainy night, I overheard this conversation between a group of students in white–perhaps nursing students–and manong, a vendor who sells balot and cola.Girl1: Kuya, tagpila an…



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