PARADOXICAL

Shaky Month

Early October has become such a shaky month. My usual droll, even facetious, self, would have said the Philippines is like Shakey's pizza and we are back to the late '80s dancing to "Shake, Body Dancer," but no, earthquakes are no laughing matter. 

While areas of Luzon were reeling from massive flood from the quick succession of typhoons (Mirasol, Nando, Opong) together with the usual habagat (monsoon rains) that makes everything sopping-wet, a 6.9 earthquake shook up parts of Cebu Is. and another, far weaker one in the Taal Volcano area. The ancient church of Daanbantayan was in ruins, and the McDonald's Bogo City branch ended up like a crushed tomato. Almost 70 people died including athletes practicing inside a gym or dome of sorts with one man pinned down, meeting misfortune in the twinkling of an eye.

The quake was reportedly caused by a previously unidentified fault offshore, which was ultimately connected to the Philippine trench.

The morning a day before that, our roosters at home crowed one after another nonstop for about four hours straight. It was unprecedented, something that struck me as abnormal or unusual (can't decide which word is better). What a curious coincidence, together with the sudden appearance of earthworms and centipedes here and there in our yard. Other residents echoed the same experience with their dogs, cats, cattle...

The next few days would prove the roosters and other creatures right, because an intensity 4.8 earthquake shook Baguio City and La Union and the next day an intensity 7.4 temblor shook the shore off Davao Oriental, then another one with an intensity of 6.7 or something struck exactly the same area. (I learned that earthquake intensities can be downgraded afterwards upon review.) These earthquakes, of course, caused widespread anxiety, panic attacks, and trauma. (Being a constant sufferer of these maladies, even for a laughable intensity 1, mainly due to the ensuing reaction from panicky people, I feel that I am not alone.) ...Not to mention the appalling destruction of public infrastructure and private properties, especially those charming homes built out of decades of sacrifice of Filipino overseas workers -- all erased, or in journalese, "gone in a jiffy."

Life is indeed such a fragile thing: here today, gone tomorrow. Through these shaky shockers, may we all find some meaning, something profound, from these puzzling tragedies deep within us.

And may everyone and everything that fell down get up and rise up quickly or soon in every possible way.

A number of netizens posted photos of people in their old or present version draping their arm on their child version, like a mother-and-daughter or father-and-son pose. The picture is odd but lovely to look at. There must be an app being used for it. I am reminded of the healing the inner child retreat I have attended which I found extremely helpful to my mental health. I highly recommend it to everyone who had to deal with multiple traumas growing up. I define trauma as any un-grieved grief, unprocessed psychological material, and unresolved issues that a person is unaware of but manifests in irrational behaviors or neuroses.

On October 2, a massive fire engulfed a district in Davao City and another fire broke out in CDO. Then I saw someone's post showing three lines of photos showing massive flooding in Luzon on top, earthquake destruction in the Visayas in the middle, and large-scale conflagration in Mindanao.

Primatologist Jane Goodall passed on to eternal Eden. Naturally, I remember her for the movie "Gorillas in the Mist" starring Sigourney Weaver.

Actress Rosa Rosal was falsely announced to be dead. What a shame or embarrassment. It must be distressing for her family to see all those premature announcements in the news. Turns out some naughty creature who peddled the fake news pretended to be Rosal's daughter, the former TV host Toni Rose Gayda. The normally mild-mannered Toni Rose was, of course, livid.

A bridge in Alcala, Cagayan collapsed. Since the bridge, called Piggatan Br., looked a lot like the Romulo Br. in our town, the news was a deja vu moment for me! I can't forget that day when media people from local, regional, and national entities were calling me up nonstop all day long to inquire about a bridge I knew nothing about that I had to do a quick research on it, only to find nothing except oral evidence or eyewitness accounts. They were barking up the wrong tree. The bridge is under DPWH jurisdiction, and it was built, it turned out, in the early 1980s, not in the 1950s as reported.

Fox News: Israelis take to the streets of Jerusalem and Tel Aviv to celebrate the end of the war in Gaza after Hamas accepts President Trump’s historic peace plan to free all hostages.

Other Oddities

Unthinkable shameless act: A man urinated at the altar of St. Peter's Basilica in front of hundreds of horrified pilgrims and tourists.

A Virgin Mary statue somewhere blazed for some reason.

Two female climate change activists, it was reported, threw blobs of red paint on a painting of Christopher Columbus in a museum in Spain.

A brief drone footage gave us a glimpse of the utter destruction of Gaza City after President Trump offered a peace plan that Hamas found palatable. Let's not forget how divisive this issue is: As many people who view Israel's action as an act of aggression and therefore applaud this latest development, other people view Hamas' provocation as coming from a desire to erase Israel from the map. If you are a neutral observer, what would be your thoughts on the matter?

Cong. Barzaga staged a rally in front of Forbes Park, and observers said that the stunt quickly turned into a dud or a mere meowing of a cat trying to be a tiger.

The slender-billed curlew was officially declared as extinct even if it was acknowledged that its distribution and ecology remain a mystery.

Mayor Vico Sotto inquires on FB how to make use of various font faces on FB, and it went viral.

Hollywood actress Diane Keaton died of pneumonia at age 79. I liked her as that spider-phobic woman opposite Woody Allen in that cerebral movie of his.

The American late-night comic Conan O'Brien was in Manila! But why?!

posted by Resty Odon  # 7:16 PM