Forget protocol

While waiting for a mass wedding ceremony in Sogod, Cebu, two couples kill time by feeding their baby (right) and nibbling each other. (Sunstar.Cebu -Photo by Alex Badayos)

I was not going to open my blog until Saturday as I am just dragging this week but I just had to share this with ya'll. I love simple, carefree people.

Forget protocol.

Bubba's happy and so is Inday.

Karaoke Crazed

I am so swamped at my real job and interview assignment for my writing class but I just had to share this Sunstar.Cebu news article with ya'll. It is not funny because a life is taken but at the same time, I find humor in it. Filipinos love to sing, regardless that some of us may prefer that they don't.
One case in point: Last night I had to get a quick-fix (been so long without Arnel)so I sneaked in to Youtube to see if I could find some video clips stealthily taken of Journey and Arnel Pineda in Europe. There are a lot, but,ruined by people trying to help him sing. Folks, he's fine, he doesn't need your help.

My 70-year old friend Jane called me the other day and suggested if we could just "kidnap" Arnel. And then what are we going to do with him after we capture him? She said, "We'll just put him in the corner and let him entertain us with his signature smile - he does not even have to sing." Oh Jane.
Anyway, let me stop my bad self. Here's the Sunstar piece.
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Sunstar.cebu.com
BECAUSE he couldn’t have his way, a man shot and killed his cousin in a Mandaue City videoke bar after the latter kept him from singing Frank Sinatra’s “My Way.”

Not knowing his end was near, Elmer Tantan, 38, reportedly refused to hand over the microphone to his cousin, Niño Monroid, SPO1 Reynaldo Inot of the Mandaue City Police Office told Sun.Star Superbalita.

Monroid then allegedly pulled out a .45 and shot Tantan inside the videoke bar in Barangay Omapad past 3 a.m. yesterday.

“Ganahan naman kaayo mokantag ‘My Way’ unya wa gihatag ang mike (microphone), mao tong gipusil (He was raring to sing ‘My Way’ but his cousin wouldn’t hand over the microphone, so he shot him),” SPO1 Inot said.

The slug tore through Tantan’s heart. By the time he was brought to the Mandaue City District Hospital, there was nothing doctors could do but declare him dead on arrival.
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Crisis in Cebu

Yesterday, on the Drudge Report, in red and on top of the page it says : 100,000 may have died in Myanmar (Burma) cyclone.
While a Cebu paper carried the headline : A TEAM from the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) Computer Crimes Division will be in Cebu today in a mission to identify who uploaded on Youtube.com. the video depicting the removal of a body spray canister from a patient’s rectum.
Notice the difference of the two headlines on what matters to some people?
I've heard of kids swallowing all kinds of stuff. But an adult with a canister up his rectum? Why? and who stuck it up there?
A month or so ago, this same paper reported about this Jan-jan, the guy from Cebu whose boyfriend (yes, boyfriend) stuck a perfume canister up his anus. When I read it, I didn't think it was funny. Constipation is not funny. At least, I don't think it is. So can you imagine a canister stuck up there? I don't care how small.
So Jan-jan went to the city hospital to have it removed. And it was removed. Not just removed but "happily removed." The medical team who did the procedure were clapping and laughing.
And what's a happy gathering without someone capturing the moment. The moment was frozen in time and was even uploaded on YouTube. (YouTube always gets you in trouble, like getting everyone addicted to Arnel Pineda). So the legal saga began when Jan-jan found out that his arse was up on Youtube. He sued the hospital for 6million Pesos! Also, there were talks of possible revocation of the teams licenses - for jeering. No, jeering is ok, just so you don't do it on Youtube.
I went to this hospital four years ago with my Australian friend because she runs a charitable foundation that helps this hospital. While there, I saw 2 cats lethargically walking and casually licking on dead bodies in one room then leisurely walk over to another room to visit the maternity patients. A 3rd cat too tired to walk but with moon eyes, was coiled and relaxing on the lower level of the medicine cart while a nurse in crisply ironed white uniform smilingly pushed it around. She must be a fresh graduate. I asked my friend, "Is this ok with the doctors here?" She looked at me funny. "With the few and overworked doctors we have, do you think 3 malnourished cats would bother them?"
As I was reading Jan-jan's story, I thought, maybe one of these "few" doctors did the procedure. But the newspaper said that there were as many as 14 medical personnel in the OR. Did these corrupt government officials hire more doctors since I was last there? I doubt it.
Because I only read bits and pieces of the whole story, I don't really know the whole truth. But here's my perspective on this news bit. Here in America, we have stores everywhere selling sex toys. I even passed by one the other day. The building looked like a church were it not for the sign that says it was not. So we can assume that there are people who "really" use these toys, or that nice building wouldn't be standing there. Anyone who has kids or has been around kids knows that anything could happen to any toy. It could malfunction or you could have a malfunctioning playmate. Imagine US taxpayer's ire and horror if Dallas Morning News carried the headline that the FBI are on the hunt for the techie who uploaded the video of some malfunctioning sex toy.

Please don't get me wrong. I understand that doctors should be held to the highest degree of accountability and that patients are due the utmost respect regardless of their ability to pay or lack thereof. Jan-jan should not be put through the public humiliation (he was already humiliated in private... and in private parts). But to go to an extreme measure of bringing in the NBI to Cebu? With the current rice crisis? Who pays for their food, hotel and transportation not to mention the bar tabs? I could just hear their drunken conversation discussing the days progress: "So, you got any leads as to who uploaded the video on YouTube?" "Naah, but I got the canister. I think I will post it on eBay."
You understand my frustration here? Mark Twain is right : If you don't read the newspaper, you are uninformed. If you read the newspaper you are misinformed.