PARADOXICAL

October 2025 Recap

(A quick rundown of things I couldn't help noticing even if I wasn't paying attention that much.)

October has become such a shaky month, with a significant earthquake sending shivers all over the country's spine literally... every... single... day, from Babuyan to Sulu -- except Palawan, it turns out. (See my separate post on it because I hate repeating myself.) Unprecedented is the word, at least in my lifetime. Meanwhile, Mt. Kanlaon erupted while Taal Volcano spewed ash, and we instinctively connected the dots.

People have become so paranoid with the supposed inevitability of the big one finally hitting us that one governor, former TV news reporter Sol Aragones of Laguna, suspended F2F classes and sent schools shifting to WFH or something.

Uploaded videos of that recent shocker in Thailand were certainly the culprit of panic attacks, especially in my case. Seeing a video of lot of people in a similar quandary was consoling somehow.

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I noticed a number of netizens posting 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 retreats I have attended which I found extremely helpful to my mental health. I highly recommend it to anyone who had to deal with multiple traumas growing up. I define trauma as any un-grieved grief, unprocessed psychological material, and unresolved issue that a person is unaware of but manifests in irrational behaviors and thought processes (neuroses).

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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 rows of photos showing massive flooding in Luzon on top, earthquake destruction in the Visayas in the middle, and large-scale conflagration in Mindanao. Wow, I know it is wrong to think it, but the post sure made us feel like God was punishing our entire country by sending fire! hail! brimstone! literally, all at the same time.

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

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Actress Rosa Rosal was falsely announced to be dead. What shame, what 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.

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A bridge in Alcala, Cagayan collapsed. Since the bridge, called Piggatan Br., looked a lot like 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 levels were calling me up nonstop all day long to inquire about that danged red bridge whose history I knew nothing about that I had to do a quick search on it, only to find nothing except oral evidence or eyewitness accounts. The media people 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.

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Israelis took to the streets of Jerusalem and Tel Aviv to celebrate the end of the war in Gaza after Hamas found palatable President Trump’s historic peace plan to free all hostages. Wow, finally, sanity! How about Ukraine and Russia? Suddenly, the unthinkable and unprecedented happened: Trump was overnight a Nobel Peace Prize contender. (Did just I hear vomiting en masse?)

A brief drone footage uploaded online gave us a glimpse of the utter destruction of Gaza City after the Trump peace plan. An unbelievably sad sight.

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' original unprovoked 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? My unsolicited advice to kids of today? Don't be surprised if other people don't share your opinion on the matter and then start calling them names (the usual ad hominems) and threaten cancellation of subscription. Not everyone thinks as you do and that's partly because not everyone is able to have access to the big picture. If I don't have the big picture, I'd rather shut up/keep mum/clip my mouth.

In other news, thousands of people across America joined the 'No Kings Day' rally against Pres. Trump.

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Other oddities, as though wars aren't enough: 1. I woke up one day this month to an unthinkably shameless act: A man urinating at the altar of St. Peter's Basilica in front of hundreds of horrified pilgrims and tourists. 2. A Virgin Mary statue somewhere blazing for some reason. 3. Two female climate change activists, it was reported, throwing blobs of red paint on a painting of Christopher Columbus in a museum in Spain. The height of cancel culture gone wrong or a kind of historical corrective? Your thoughts?

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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.

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The slender-billed curlew was officially declared as extinct. Congrats, humans! You did a great job! That it was acknowledged that its distribution and ecology remain a mystery gave me hope, however.

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Mayor Vico Sotto inquired on FB how to make use of various font faces on FB, and the thing went viral. This tells us how wildly popular he is.

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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.

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

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More than 400 teachers in Palawan were scammed for a “master’s degree” they took in a school in Maguindanao.

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Little under-the-radar stuff: 1. New study reveals consistent exercise can cause the brain to forget traumatic memories. Apparently, I need lots of it. 2. When hungry, the human body consumes itself, clearing away sick and aging cells. Apparently, I should go hungry as often as I can. 3. The human brain isn't made to multitask; it's designed to excel at one thing at a time.

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A little consolation to those who dig beauty pageants: Miss Grand International 2025 winner is a Filipina. Every time the country is down in the dumps, a Filipino or Filipina makes it big abroad -- no kidding.

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Meanwhile, in France... A heist in The Louvre led to the theft of Napoleon-era jewels in about 8 laughable minutes flat. Laughable because the thieves are so smart and an institution of such import could be so deceived. Turns out the lowlifes took a route where there are no CCTVs.

At about the same time, France’s ex-president Nicolas Sarkozy became the first former head of an EU state to be jailed, after the right-wing leader from 2007 to 2012 was found guilty of seeking to acquire funding from Moamar Kadhafi of Libya for the campaign that saw him elected. Sarkozy proclaimed his innocence as he entered a Paris prison.

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Cong. Barzaga was not content with his stunts. He next released a video calling for Mindanao to secede from what he described as a corrupt government. Isn't that plain sedition?

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"Fire hit DPWH office in Quezon City amid corruption scandal," and everyone was thinking same thought: Hokage moves or what?

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"Pope Leo XIV will name St. John Henry Newman a patron saint of Catholic education in a document to be published on Oct. 28 for the 60th anniversary of Gravissimum Educationis, the Second Vatican Council’s declaration on Christian education. The Holy Father will designate Newman as an official co-patron saint of education, together with St. Thomas Aquinas, during the Vatican’s Jubilee of the World of Education from Oct. 27 to Nov. 1, which is expected to draw 20,000 pilgrims. The saint will also be declared the 38th doctor of the Church by Leo at the jubilee’s closing Mass on Nov. 1, the solemnity of All Saints."

Wow, imagine that -- you being declared a patron saint and a "doctor of the church." It sure sounds like it has the weight of a thousand honoris causas.

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Avant garde artist and filmmaker Kidlat Tahimik's wife, the German Katrin Mueller De Guia, passed on. She turns out to be a star in her own right, for she was an independent-minded "author, visual artist, academic, actress, and costume designer." A little reminiscence in connection is in order: As a volunteer student assistant in UP Baguio once upon a time, I helped process her enrolment paper for her MA on psychology. I didn't know then that her study would someday soon lead to a landmark study on the Filipino concept of pakikipagkapwa. She and husband Kidlat and their two little boys were often seen around the campus and wherever there is an art event in Baguio City. I wish I could read that book of Katrin's: "Kapwa—The Self in the Other: Worldviews and Lifestyles of Filipino Culture Bearers," which views us Filipinos unexpectedly positively -- and on hindsight, truthfully.

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I am not sure whether this is the kind of buzz the producer, director, and actors wanted. Ricky Quezon Avanceña, a grandson of former president Manuel L. Quezon, spouted some choice cuss words to vent his offended feelings about the film "Quezon" by Jerrold Tarog, starring Jericho Rosales. The Internet exploded with people taking sides or airing their own reaction to the movie and to Mr. Avanceña's move. Even without having seen the movie yet, I found myself agreeing with the likes of Van Ybiernas, Clarence Aytona, and Eliseo Art Arambulo and less with Ambeth Ocampo and others who gave the movie a more positive review.

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Somebody killed someone inside a church in Cebu. Something similar happened in our town, Bayambang, decades ago, when a gunman shot a resident, Mr. Ricafort of Del Pilar, while the latter was hearing mass. He died on the spot. We were all thinking, "Could the murderer not wait until the guy got out of the church?" The parish priest had to lock up the church for a period to atone for the sacrilege.

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The Christmas Island shrew, Australia’s only native shrew found only in remote Christmas Island, was officially declared extinct by the IUCN. Great job, Homo sapiens: Well done!

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Aljur Abrenica singing trended, but for the wrong reason.

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High-profile personalities accused of corruption in the PDAF scandal were suddenly acquitted. That was fast! Why does it feel like the rug has been pulled out from under us?

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A music group that I presume to be Korean filled the Philippine arena to the rafters. I have never heard about the group -- named TWICE in all caps, so this tells me that I have been out of touch with popular culture even though I feel trapped in my, say, 30s, har. The fact that I didn't have any interest in researching the group's songs shows that I have matured a bit.

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Kris Aquino seemed suddenly feeling better since she was able to attend a fashion designer friend's birthday celebration and even got seated right next to the First Lady, who we all know is from the Araneta clan -- no big surprise there (you know what I am trying to hint at, of course).

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Kim Atienza's daughter died of suicide, and it became the talk of the town, triggering discussions on depression, online bullying, childhood trauma, and the like.

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Another historical event: The pope and the king of England praying together. If you don't know why, review your world history and get to know why the Church of England became the Anglican Church.

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Double Olympic gold medalist Carlos Yulo won gold at the 53rd FIG Artistic Gymnastics World Championships vault event in Indonesia.

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England's Prince Andrew relinquished his Duke of York title following new allegations about his ties with convicted American sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, including some scandalous details with what appears to be a woman of ill repute.

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New Minstrels singer Louie Reyes passed away in America. Actor-turned-politician Patrick dela Rosa also died, and also in the US where he had immigrated to. Jeremiah's vocalist also died.

posted by Resty Odon  # 7:16 PM