staying in my dream hotel of long ago

dati tinitingala ko lang ang Heritage Hotel sa kanyang kagandahan lalo na pag pasko sa nagsasayawang mga christmas lights at palamuti and i was asking myself ano ba meron sa hotel na ito at palaging puno ng tao? mahal kaya tumira dito? ano kaya itsura ng mga kwarto? makakacheck-in kaya ako one day dito?

So can you just imagine my excitement when i was invited to the AYAD programmatic workshop and knew i will be staying in Heritage Hotel? you bet i was so looking forward to it. and so the first thing i did entering the room is to look at the window and this is the sight of Roxas Boulevard that greeted me. surprised gid ko kay indi maayo katraffic unlike before. i love what Bayani has done to the streets of Manila.

dining in Heritage restaurant. masarap ang food nila which was buffet style, love the varities as well but i would still prefer the buffet table of Richmonde Hotel in Ortigas.

with my boss, Mavis, and Meagan, current AYAD volunteer assigned in Ateneo.

the killer activity of the program. presenting our output and what the Foundation is doing 19 times because there were 20 organizations in all so it was like a critiquing presentation where afterwards the audience will give you feedback and throw some questions.

group picture before we all head back home

with Joy of Christian Foundation for the Deaf and Blind

finally! it's over and done. ;-)

death penalty

I just saw a poll at AOL.com that said that 85% of respondents supported the death penalty. Are you among them? Do you think we should kill people in order to stop people from killing people?

The question on the survey was straightforward enough: "Do you support the death penalty?"

I clicked on the NO icon, then on the VOTE icon, which I knew would show me the results of all the voting on this question. I don't know why, but I expected to find the majority voting "no". To my astonishment, not only did the majority vote "yes"--but the spread in favor was overwhelming.

Over 3,000 people had voted by the time I saw the poll, and more than 2,700 of them voted "yes."

God, what kind of country are we living in? Or am I living in, I should say. I am aware that many readers of this blog are from outside the U.S.

I know this Death Penalty thing is an old subject...but how can anybody who is civilized believe in the death penalty...? What kind of barbaric society would imagine that authorized killing is an antedote to unauthorized killing?

Am I really that out-of-sync with the world in which I live?

Albert Einstein was reputed to have said (and I paraphrase here): You cannot solve any problem using the same energy that created it.

You cannot solve the problem of violence with violence, you cannot solve the problem of anger with anger, you cannot solve the problem of impatience with impatience, etc. All you are doing is throwing fuel on the fire.

Again, I ask, for the third time: How in the world can a civilized society kill people as a means of convincing people that they should not kill people? Am I the only one who sees a direct contradiction here?

from Neale's blog

well, what about you? are you in favor of death penalty.... or not? an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, what do you get out of that? i hope Filipinos do not share the same thoughts of the Americans. not for this one please. ;-)