My Kind Of Town

2006-03-07T20:25:00.000+08:00

Our town, Asingan, Pangasinan, is celebrating its fiesta 18-24 April. I am part of the Executive Committee overseeing the celebration. We will have a Miss Asingan and a Mrs Balikbayan, as we do every year. My contribution so far is to offer my own English translation of the valedictory poem of Jose Rizal for a declamation contest. Through the fiesta, we are going to raise funds and allocate such for some projects we would agree on for the benefit of the people. We are also trying to be honest with the funds. That's my kind of town.

2006-01-24T12:48:00.000+08:00

Manny Pacquiao, National Hero
& Recah’s Mistake

‘Congratulations to the people of the Philippines,’ wrote Tom Thompson (TigerBoxing.com) the day after the fight. Your new national hero didn’t let you down. Thank you, Tom; you’re another journalist hero of mine (the other is James Fallows, ‘A Damaged Culture,’ The Atlantic Monthly, November 1987). Pacman is not just our national hero in sport, like you intimated; he’s our national hero, period. Manny Pacquiao is not heavyweight; he’s only super-featherweight, but when he loses, he loses big – a nation mourns. When he wins, he wins big – a nation celebrates.

Thomas & Mack Center, inside the campus of the University of Nevada, Las Vegas: My new hero was the irresistible force that knocked down the immovable object. Manny Pacquiao of General Santos City, Philippines mowed down Erik Morales of Tijuana, Mexico on the 10^th round of a scheduled 12-round junior welterweight non-title fight 21 January (Saturday night live in Las Vegas, 22 January, Sunday afternoon in the Philippines). Morales had never been knocked down before. This time, Filipino idol knocked down Mexican idol.

Fallen idols don’t celebrate because they can’t. Tim Dahlberg of Associated Press heard Morales complaining: ‘I was tired because of making weight and I was tired because of all the tough fights I’ve had.’ El Terrible making terrible excuses. Tim said those 130 pounds is where Morales should have been more comfortable. I say except for his pride, his over-confidence. Pacman landed power shots after power shots to the head and body, like 32 shots in the 6^th round to only 8 of Morales, Between rounds, Morales’ legs were hurting and his cornermen kept rubbing them. Tim saw Morales’ ‘face was a mess of welts and he had lumps on his forehead and head after taking the beating of his career.’ Terrible. Pacman had the fight of his life, and so did you, loser. Morales, where’s your sportsmanship? Take the bruises on your face like a man! Admit that you were beaten by a better fighter. Better than you. Better than himself the last time. Doug Fischer (MaxBoxing.com) said Pacman was ‘bigger, stronger, smarter and more focused.’ He was. Instead of a one-handed fighter (with his power left), he was a two-handed fighter this time. Morales, Fischer said, was simply ‘beaten by the better fighter.’ Morales is a Mexican hero, but he’s no national hero like Pacquiao is. You can’t beat a national hero.

Morales, last March, Pacquiao lost to you in a 12-round decision. Actually, Pacman lost to himself, to his promoter, to his taxman, to his gloves.

Pacman is a southpaw. In an earlier story (18 January), Ronnie Nathanielsz (BoxingScene.com) said the game plan was really to use ‘head movement, feint, box and use foot speed’ and outpunch Morales, and that’s what happened. Nathanielsz said Pacman was going to ‘use his boxing skills.’ Actually, Ronnie, this time Pacman used his head. The first time he fought Morales, he used his boxing skills – he lost.

So, how many won when Manny won? I can count 6 and my wife can count 1; that makes 7 winners.

My winners are: Trainer/coach, exerciser, aides de camp, Manny Pacquiao himself, his manager, and his promoter. My wife’s winners are Pacman’s backers, those who bet on Pacquiao to win.

My point here is that in fact, there was only one winner, and that was TEAM MPB: Trainer, Exerciser, Aides, Manny, Manager, Promoter, Backers. You can’t win a fight without a team. The winner is always the team. Freddie Roach, chief coach. Lito Mondejar, coach. Shelley Finkel, manager. Gary Shaw, promoter (‘Promoter of the Year’). Joe Chavez, Buboy Fernandez, Nonoy Neri, aides. Justin Fortune, exerciser (for strength and conditioning).

Early January, Recah Trinidad (Philippines Daily Inquirer, 9 January) thought Morales would win, because he had trained longer than Pacman, sparred twice as long, and was coming in from a loss and should be more motivated to win. Trinidad was like taunting his countryman: Pacquiao’s camp was trying to learn from their mistakes while Morales’ camp was trying to learn from their victory.

A better view of things? Goran Dragosavac (Eastsideboxing.com): ‘What did it for Pacquiao was a whole package of things. He used his entire offensive arsenal of lightning quick and power shots, plus his lateral movement was pivotal in both, his attack and his defense.’

Edward Lura, according to Jack Henson (Philippine Star), said that the secret to the victory over Morales was the new technique concocted by Roach in the gym. The technique involved Pacquiao stepping in to throw a combination, then spinning out at an angle to Morales’ right to avoid a counterpunch. In explaining Manny’s delicious victory, Recah Trinidad (Inquirer) said, ‘Power, not improved skills, provided the big difference in the main contest. Pacquiao prevailed because he landed more power punches, some of them ax-like digs to the rib cage.’ Punches thrown: Pacquiao 537, Morales 321. Punches landed: Pacquiao 171, Morales 107. Recah’s Manny Mistake. Recah, that’s good math, but not good boxing. Punches don’t count, winning does. It wasn’t Manny who won; it was his Team MPB. You are looking only at the boxer, not the boxing. Boxing is a team sport. Or rather, all sports are team sports. The athlete gets the gold for himself and the team. The champion is the star; the team makes the star.

And that’s a lesson for the Philippines to become a winner in the global arena of bruising economic competition: Be a team!

Pacquiao heard mass at his suite at Wynn Las Vegas at noon the day after the fight, the mass said by Fr Marlon Reof of Palawan, now based in New York. He said before the mass: ‘I will climb the ring and fight (again) if only it can help forge unity among Filipinos. That’s why I want to thank the Lord for giving me the strength to fight.’

Jack Henson (Star): ‘For nearly two months, Pacman sacrificed living without his family in training like a workhorse for Morales in Los Angeles. He knew he had to be in the best shape of his life to beat the Mexican.’ At the Wild Card Gym in Los Angeles, Fortune supervised Pacquiao’s exercises, like using wooden sticks to strike Pacquiao’s arms and midsection and condition him to pain. Fortune said of Manny, ‘He wanted to win this fight for the Philippine people and he did it. He pushed himself to the limit. He never complained. He went out to do a job and got it done.’ If we Filipinos want to win in the global arena, we must imitate our hero and sacrifice a lot. Let’s stop complaining. Let’s push ourselves to the limit. If anything is worth doing, it’s worth doing well. Together.

2005-12-27T04:57:00.000+08:00

Finders Keepers

The name I shall give my Internet café in my kind of town will be Finders Keepers.

And in my kind of Internet café, instead of Internet games that do not lead to more and higher learning, you will find these unique services:

1. Guided Internet surfing – Seek and you shall find. We can teach you to be the finders yourselves. You have to learn ‘Advanced Search’ and we will give you other practical tips for more fruitful searches. If you have no idea what you’re looking for? You came to the right place! We will help you do your own searches at no extra cost and so you don’t waste time on searching for the right commands. For instance, on the desktop of every PC we will place shortcuts to everything that you can easily click on. Nobody else is providing this kind of service. They want you to work slower so you spend more time and pay more. They’re thinking quantity of service you need to pay, we’re thinking quality of service we need to give you.

2. Pay per search – You can see us for specific, definite searches big or small, and we can do it while you wait.

3. High-quality typing – Every Internet café offers typing per page, but nobody checks your grammar and your spelling for you, or nobody does it well enough to be good enough. If speed is what you want, we will have it; if you want accuracy on top of speed, you will get that as well. Your word is our command.

4. Writing – If you need help in your writing, we will help you find more materials, more ideas, more insights. All you have to do is ask – when we’re done, then you can keep it. We will be the finders, you will be the keepers.

5. Editing – If it can be put into the computer, we can edit it using your software or ours.

6. Desktop publishing – No sophisticated software necessary. You can ask us to do the publishing for you, or we can teach you using software you are very familiar with already. Publishing in Finders Keepers? Yes, you will find our desktop publishing top of the world, first class. It will be as fast as you want it, as good as necessary, as accurate as can be.

7. Service anywhere, service on call – You can send your raw data or drafts and photos via the Internet even while you’re abroad. Locally, we are yours on call to your office or home anytime.

2005-12-27T04:20:00.000+08:00

It’s the thought that counts

A sleepy town, that’s what Asingan, Pangasinan is. My hometown. Either I’ve been away too long (45 years), or I have changed so much it’s not my kind of town anymore, but it will have to do for the time being. I was born there; I grew up there. I studied up to high school there. I almost got married there.

My kind of town is in my mind. I want to move on from realized to idealized, from the old to the imagined new. The new must be imagined first before it can become.

For me and for many of my townmates, I’m thinking of self-reliance, and I’ve read The E-Myth by Michael E Gerber, which shows how anyone can be a successful businessman not with luck but with pluck, by being methodical right from the start. So I’m thinking of entrepreneurship, although I’m nowhere an entrepreneur; I don’t have money either. One project I’m thinking of right now is putting up an Internet Café in Asingan. A very different Café Internet:

· WiFi, instant Internet connection all the time. Pay once a month.

· No games. Hah! None whatsoever. Games are for kids, no matter the age, but usually high schoolers and collegians. What happens is you are luring them away from their studies.

· Internet café with a library of books and magazines and CDs of all kinds for the browsing, for the reading.

· To feed on my Internet café, a mobile school to propagate my Internet faith: knowledge knows no walls, no borders, no limits.

The Internet making a mockery of schooling I see everywhere, from Asingan to Los Baños to Urdaneta. From sleepy town to suburban to urban villages.

Was the Internet invented for millions of children playing games simultaneously all over the world day-in and day-out? No. Was the internet invented so café owners can make US$1,000 a month net in a suburban village in the Philippines? No. But big people with big money will always take advantage of little people with little money, because little minds don’t think big.

And Internet cafés like that will always entice students who will always look for something easier to do than study their lessons or do their homework, including house chores. That’s because:

· Most books are boring anyway.

· Most teachers teach unimaginatively anyway.

· Most schools don’t care anyway.

· Most students don’t care anyway either.

· Most information capitalists (the new entrepreneurs) appreciate more the language of money than the language of learning anyway.

In education, the problem is the education of the learners as well as the teachers.

In writing, the problem is the inspiration of the writer. If your Muse eludes you, look for her in the Internet. Look there for the one thought that counts, that triggers the flow of the creative juice. In the Internet are a million thoughts in one place, then another million, and then still another million. You go to the Internet when you want more thoughts on a subject, when you want to check your thoughts, when you want new thoughts you’ve never met before, differing thoughts. Inside the Internet or outside, it’s the thoughts that count and in your writing it’s the thought that counts.