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I would have waited for Tuesday (July 8, 2008) to write about this post as I normally do other things on weekends. But Tuesday is still four days away and, I thought that if anyone would be interested to help, the sooner I post this the better.

If you have ever heard of the famous “Ati-atihan Festival” in the Philippines, this is where it came from: the town of Kalibo, Aklan. The following pictures are from Kalibo. But no, these pictures are not about the festival.

The Municipal Building and grounds of Kalibo, Aklan, Philippines

These are about the effects of Typhoon Fengshen (locally known as “Frank”) which pounded the mid-section of the country with 170Kph winds last June 26, 2008. More than a hundred deaths have already been counted for the whole country to this point and the list is expected to grow longer as it also sank a ferry boat carrying some 800 passengers off Sibuyan Island in Romblon.

Both Kalibo and Sibuyan are in the same path of Typhoon Fengshen in the Philippines. Only a few of the passengers had been rescued and the bodies that couldn’t be found are just washing into the shorelines.

But that sensational part of the story has already been published many times over, so let’s get on with the pictures that were sent via MMS. I don't recall seeing these in the papers.

These are the Public School buildings in Kalibo, Aklan

If you want figures of the damage here is a copy of an earlier message as sent via text:

Partial mdcc report re: tropical cyclone frank as of june 27 at 10am affctd brgys -16 w/ 65886 population (13465 households); # of families affctd 8189; # of prsons affctd 34026; # of families evacuated 1354; # of evacuees 5577; # of casualties 103- 4 dead 99 injured; houses totally damaged 3171; houses partially damaged 4148

Note: mdcc is Municipal Disaster Coordinating Council.

They were trying to get this man to safetly

If any of our readers came from this town or province, you may want to check with your relatives as many of them didn't have means of communications until lately. Or, if for any reason you would like to help, please get in touch with their local Chief Executive, Kalibo Mayor Raymar A. Rebaldo. Their mobile numbers are as follows: 09202860188 and 09099437243. Please remove the first zero (0) digit and add 63 prefix to the numbers if you are calling from outside the country.

In his initial call for help, Mayor Rebaldo said they needed medicines, food, potable water, communication equipments, etc.

Here's how it looks in another part of town

Before starting to write this post, I sent an SMS to somebody I know in Kalibo and asked about the last time they had this kind of experience. The reply came back saying never before have they had anything like it.

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COLORS OF THE WIND: BLEAK

July 4th 2008 00:00

Up till the very last minute of my self-imposed deadline, I could not decide on what to write for today’s post. Well, until a song started playing inside my head. But no, I have not suddenly turned into a lyricist or anything like that. This post is still about making money and sometimes about losing it.

Done with preamble. Now, let’s go to business. It still fluctuates, maybe to give credence to the author of the Elliot Wave Theory, but the price of oil practically does nothing these days than to go up. Day after day, you read about it hitting new records, then sliding down, then going up again to punch a hole on the ceiling of the last record price it made.

The money managers who lost their nerves in using other hedging instruments found a new haven in that black commodity and they might as well be calling it “heaven” than “haven.” And why not, when they are doubling or tripling their money while millions are hitting the gutters, starving to death?

Of course, if you are the money manager, you can claim that you are only doing the right and sensible thing to protect the assets under your management. And you will be right. But you see, while you are doing it, and while the likes of you are multiplying because of the lure of more of those assets (the dollar sign, pleaseee!) which your clients will probably need a dozen of their greedy lifetimes to spend, millions of those who can hardly afford one lifetime are practically spilling into the streets!

Oh, but let’s not worry about it, one of these days, some of your clients will take their materialistic eyes off their hoard of newly acquired expensive “non-essentials”, take a glance into the surrounding, notice a number of “poor little souls” who cannot take-care of their own (because they have been fired from their jobs time and again due to the ever rising cost of doing business, which is a direct result of the ever escalating price of oil), and so the client will organize a donation campaign to raise funds to feed the “needy.” Maybe help them “stand on their own two feet.”

Because the clients have a lot of friends who are pretty much like them, the campaign donations will pour in and run into hundreds of millions, and because they have a golden heart, they will give those millions not just to a few “poor little souls” but to thousands upon thousand of them and they will feel very good about this deed because they are able to give to the unfortunates, what… a few measly dollars worth of food that will last them – maybe, a day!

Now, isn’t that a lot better than just letting the price of oil alone? But why not take advantage of the opportunity to utilize a very effective instrument for protecting your client’s assets? Why not squeeze blood out of a turnip? Why allow the hapless individuals to continue working? Why not make it a little bit harder for the other industries to continue producing goods?

Come on guys, there are still remaining automakers which have thousands of workers! The transportation industry and those small retailers are still able to eke out a living, let’s quadruple the price of oil some more so they can fire thousands more of their employees and fold up those retail stores! Darn, this opportunity will never come again for the next couple of years the moment it stops!

Now, let me just see that line up. If we keep buying oil: we bring up the price of transporting goods, people and machinery. We bring up the cost of producing power, we jack up electricity bills, we increase the price of producing goods, food prices go up, inflation go up, we make it harder for people to buy their daily essentials, margin of profit shrinks, companies that can no longer hack it close shop... people stop buying appliances, cars, non-essentials…food.

Very good! Then, we can organize another feeding campaign…

Sheees! Didn’t I start this post with a title of a song…? Oh yes, Colors of the wind! Now, what about it? Well, it was the song that started playing inside my head while I was thinking about what to write for today. Remember that? It was the theme in that movie Pocahontas!

Err…ah, that song is related to this post because….? Well, there is a line there that goes: “And we are all connected to each other, In a circle in a hoop that never ends…”

Now, isn’t that a nice line? Come on! Let’s buy some more of that oil! There is no other hedging facility that works, right? It is really good in protecting our assets!

By the way, in case you missed the news… Here in the Philippines, the oil companies have just announced that their under-recoveries for June alone have reached P7.00/ liter. And the most recent price increases in the commodities market have not yet been factored in.

Start adding that number in the price of your petrol guys. It is being adjusted here every week! No. Don’t think about world market prices for July, yet. It will continue to be used as a hedge to protect assets, remember?

Aaaarrrgh! Good. Now, you start seeing the colors of the wind?

P.S. This is not intended to malign other posts. This is just the way I see things at the moment. Well, not exactly. I’ve already made reference to the use of oil as hedging instrument last April.

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15 HOUR TRIP FOR A DIP

July 3rd 2008 00:00

Maybe this is just for the “hardcore” travelers. Or maybe, for people who have just gone thru a lot of whatever and just want to disappear to wherever so they can have a time for themselves without a care for anything even for a few days.

Not too many requirements here. Just that you have either: a car, an SUV or a truck in perfectly good running condition (any of which, you can rent here). You love driving. You don’t mind sitting behind the wheel for hours on end. You appreciate the responsiveness of your vehicle’s engine every time you push the gas pedal to overtake or, quite simply, to gather some speed. You take pride in your ability to negotiate the sharp curves and long and winding roads.

You relish the idea of being able to drive endlessly, away from the madding traffic jams. And most important, you take pleasure in the though that you can be all by yourself (or be with your ever dearest) in a quite and comfortable beach resort that will remind you of nothing but the beauty of being close to mother earth.

If you find this proposition enticing, then your destination for this trip should be the golden brown sands of Pagudpud, Ilocos Norte.

Off season at Pagudpud Beach, Ilocos Norte Philippines

Pagudpud is in the Northwestern most part of Luzon. A leisurely drive in your own vehicle can get you there in about fifteen (15) hours from Manila. Shorter, if you are impatient and you like to hurry. But what is the point of going on a long vacation if you will be driving around as if you are in some “Indy” race?

If you are the truly adventurous type, you might want to plan your trip in such a way that you are able to explore the other places of interest while you are en-route to Pagudpud.

Your first stop could be the town of Capas in Tarlac (in case you’ve heard of the “Death March” during the 2nd World War) or you may opt to have a look inside the crater of the volcano that made the world’s largest eruption in the 20th Century.

There are a number of people in Capas who are arranging trips to the top of Mt. Pinatubo where a lake has formed, which became a new tourist destination.

From Tarlac, you can visit the Hundred Islands in Dagupan, Pangasinan and then, you can go all the way up to Baguio City, these places are almost practically along the way.

There are many other interesting places where you can swing by to, but if you don’t have that much time, you can aim for a sleep-over in Laoag, the capital town of Ilocos Norte, from your take-off point in Manila and have an early morning drive from there to Pagudpud. That last leg of your journey will only take about an hour or so.

You’ll know you’re near the town of Pagudpud when you begin to see these wind turbines sticking above the trees to your left.

These power generators are actually located in Bangui, Ilocos Norte

It might be a good idea to bring along a local guide who is familiar with Northern Luzon but if you are used to traveling on your own, a map that you can buy from a local book store can easily bring you to your destination. The road condition is good all the way thru.

Pagudpud Beach. Wind Turbines in the far distance

The first time I went there, I just hired a “Tricycle boy” (usually a man driving a motorcycle with sidecar used for ferrying passengers) when I reached the town of Pagudpud. And all I asked him to do was to drive his small contraption ahead of my truck so I can follow him to the beach-resort. That cost me less than .50c USD.

Some of the facilities in a Pagudpud beach resort.

Bring your diving gears, if you are into it. Or you can bring just the small expensive personal pieces. Here, you can rent the rest.

The closer you get, the more Wind Turbines become visible

Then you will be in your own peaceful haven for the rest of your stay.

Sometimes, even for a moment, it's nice to be without a care in the world

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WHY JOIN A MARKET HARAKIRI?

July 2nd 2008 00:00

Pardon this newbie’s stupidity today, but somehow, I feel that logic is not working in many places these days. To understand where this stupidity is coming from, let’s have a bit of history...

Back in the days when the subprime borrowers and collateralized debt obligations are the rage, organizations like Moody’s, S&P and all the financial institutions that rate the performance of other companies and debt instruments are like the gods that declare who can be and who cannot be trusted

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WATCHING GOD CREATE(?) –UP CLOSE!

July 1st 2008 05:09

While uploading posts to Orble’s Travel Channel, I noticed that many entries from other writers feature beautiful man-made places around the world. So, I raked my brain for man-made places in the Philippines that I can write about. But that’s not what I found.

What I found was a “creation” in progress - though I am not sure if anyone will ever agree that, that is what this is

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GETTING IN AND OUT OF MARKET

June 30th 2008 01:50

One of the most confusing things for a stock market beginner is the question on when to get in and out of the market. Well, that is if he is already done grappling with the question on which of the thousands of available stocks in his chosen market to buy.

If an investor already has a bit of understanding about the stock market, he might agree that the most opportune time to get into the market is when everyone is scampering out of it. Not necessarily at the beginning of a market downturn, but at that particular time when most have already dumped their stocks and nobody still want to come back

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BE SCARED OF FEAR

June 27th 2008 00:00

Listen boys, and listen good! Tis here is the real world, better know exactly where y er goin n ya better know how ya get there!!!

In a battle, if you are a combatant, it is dumb not to be afraid. Reasons: you throw all the cautions to the wind, you become careless. Probability: you end up dead. In the marketplace, it could be the opposite. You allow yourself to get scared, you panic, you throw-in the towel, you dump your shares, you lose the money. Probability: you might want yourself dead.

I suppose the difference between the battlefield and the marketplace lie in the nature of business you will find yourself in. In a physical, bullets flying, grenades and bombs exploding war, the competition is trying to get you killed. In such a situation, you can study the battlefields, your enemies and all the books in warfare and you still cannot tell if you will live in the end

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TRAVEL DOWN SUBIC MEMORIES

June 26th 2008 00:00

To many American G.I.’s who traveled the world this will be a trip down memory lane. Destination: Subic Bay, Zambales, Philippines. About three (3) hours drive North of Manila.

The old Subic Bay US Naval Base. Pic source: Wikipedia

For decades, the largest U.S. Navy installations outside of the United States, the former Subic Naval Base has been successfully transformed into a busy free port and a tourist destination

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ARE WE SCARED YET?

June 25th 2008 00:00

Should we be scared?

Illustration pic sourced from this site
So, the DJIA sank another 3.8 percent last week. Dang, in terms of NYSE investments, that means one helluva lot of money! The last time China’s SSEC fell by 4 percent in one day, the whole investing world went epileptic. Now, following all those months of bad news, are we supposed to be scared yet?

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AN ISLAND GET AWAY

June 24th 2008 00:00

The Philippines is a country of some 7107 islands (depending on what time of the day you asked and whether it is low tide or high tide) and surely, there are quite a number of those islands that present themselves as a perfect island get away. One of the world's famous islands frequented by tourists in this part of the globe is the Boracay Island in the Province of Aklan. But that is not what this post is all about.

This is about another island with pristine white beaches in the northernmost tip of the Province of Cebu. It is called Bantayan Island. It is in the Province of Cebu but not in the same island as Cebu City. Just like the way Mactan (where Cebu International Airport is located) is in another island

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July 2008

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June 2008

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May 2008