Buktot Beach (Mansalay, Or. Mindoro)

Summer’s just around the corner and I find myself wishing to be at the beach, or wanting to go swimming under the sun.

Entrance of Buktot Beach

Rock Formations

The place was a delight to visit and I for one cannot wait to return and walk along the white sandy beach and experience the beautiful sunset with the warm clear waters around my ankles.

Mini Cave

White Sand

Blue Skies and Clear water

Is there anything more relaxing than lying on the beach and having the stresses melted further away with water massage. 

This is such a relaxing experience.  Stretch youself out on one of the paddle of small boats and the smooth, gentle ride along with the spectacular scene will certainly render you to a state of serenity.

It was just the sort of place I liked for relaxing, somewhere few people stayed, and the beach was all to ourselves.

Panoramic view

I wish I would make it so that every single person on earth gets to experience the beautiful beaches of the Philippines including this beach in my hometown (Mansalay Or. Mindoro). Given that I may have bias, of all the beaches I've visited, Philippine beaches remain on the top of my list when it comes to beauty. No arguments there.

'In His Steps' Medical Mission - Mansalay, Oriental Mindoro

Patient outside Medicare Hospital

Eyes and fingers probed the chainlink fence surrounding Mansalay Gymnasium, Mansalay, and Oriental Mindoro. From the air, the hundreds of people gathered in the sun looked like a town fair. In reality, they were in the middle of a multi-day wait for free medical and dental care.

The Team

In one day, a team of 50+ doctors, nurses and supporting volunteers from United States, Manila, Iloilo and Mansalay performed 100+ surgeries, invited 1000+ patients into the medical mission area and Medicare Hospital and provided 200+ people with dental care. The main stakeholder for this mission is the “In His Steps” medical ministry from Texas, U.S.A. with the effort of our very own Doc Celia Maliwanag and of course the local government.

Doc Cel Maliwanag

Aniway Cusi, a member of Mangyan Hanunuo tribe and a mother of two-year-old Mikoy, said she and his son waited for hours to get into the free medical mission after traveling about a half hour from their home in town proper. She pointed at Mikoy’s face, which had a minor case of scabies and white patch near his eye. The sun had irritated it.

Aniway and her son, Mikoy

Now that they were entertained, an answer was near. A simple check-up, injection and medicines would solve what a quack doctor had told them many months ago he could not treat.

“It’s a relief having doctors come here that can do what the doctors can’t do in Mansalay,” Cusi said. “I just want the doctors to be able to fix it so my son’s illness can grow up and be healthy.”

Volunteer Doctor from Africa

Mikay’s story is one of thousands. There is the old man who walked hours to gain sight through free eyeglasses, and then returned after few hours year just to say thank you. There is the teenage girl who had her hands tumor removed after years of agonizing it so badly.

Collecting Patient Data

Taking Vital Signs

Each resident’s vital signs were first taken before they could proceed to the doctor. Medical complaints ranged from fever, cough or colds to hypertension or diabetes. There were also varied patients, from a day-old baby to an eighty-ish grandmother. After the doctor examined them, they were given the appropriate medication. Or, if they needed more intervention, they were referred to the nearest hospital via ambulance. Some clients however went to the medical mission without any ailment to complain. They said that they were just there to ask for multivitamins which they have rightly received.

Ongoing surgery

Working doctors and nurses

After a few minutes of resting, we went back our posts. I am assigned to surgery. Cries burst and tears flowed as the vaccinations began and blood pressure apparatus pumped and whistled. It was a bit tiresome but all worth it. The smiles and the words of thanks are all you need to wipe the sweat dry and boost you energy back to normal. These are the times when I definitely tell myself I love my profession.

Senior citizens

“We have found that much of the need exists in the countryside where people don’t necessarily have the money or cultural inclination to go into the big cities,” said Medical Mission Director. “As a result, those needs are unmet.”

Team Nurses

It’s weird but it’s amazing how on the mission field and doing God’s work everything seems to disappear. Worries, anxieties, and things that seemed to matter don’t really anymore. God has a funny way of reprioritizing your life but if we’re honest it never really stays like that after the God rush is gone.

Medical Volunteers

Team RNHeals 

Team Manila Nurses

New Friends

Access to healthcare should never be exclusive to those who can afford and to those who are living near the source of medications, etc. So, clap clap for activities like this. I’m so looking forward to the next. Everyone can make a difference in his/her own little ways. I hope to start changing the world. -shernan

I look Forward to Summer

Puerto Galera, Philippines

Summertime in the Province

The warm breeze that remains until dusk. The sunsets that steal your breath and never give it back. The way her eyes sparkle from the rays of light peeking over your back and stealing a moment to gaze into them. The overall happiness, laughter, and exchange of love. 

Puerto Galera

Snorkeling 

The way jealous grains of sand seem to cling to the whole world as you know it. The fresh feeling of being awakened by excited flashes of sunrise through your blinds. 

Deira, Dubai

Fish Sanctuary, Romblon

 The wonderful exposure of skin. The cool forests and refreshing, nude afternoons in the creek. The sun-kissed noses. The way our palms get sweaty after our fingers have been intertwined for solely a minute. 

Baguio City

Romblon

The callouses on your feet due to the vow of leaving your shoes for good. The aura of the stress-free environment to meditate in. The inspiration. The falling asleep on the burning hoods of cars with shirts over your face. The beautiful people. Ohhh, all the beautiful people.  -refillingholes

Batangas

Mansalay, Oriental Mindoro

Caesar’s Café, Makati Palace Hotel

Caesar’s Café, Makati Palace Hotel

Take the quickest yet most unforgettable treat at Caesar’s Café, Makati Palace Hotel’s signature restaurant.   

The Makati Palace Hotel, located in the spectacular cosmopolitan Makati, is lavishly adorned with elegant, fully furnished guestrooms designed to give comfort and convenience in style. The hotel is located on the corner of Caceres and P. Burgos Streets in Makati City, just blocks or minutes away from the city’s most happening places, classy shopping centers, the business district and even the airport. 

You needn’t have the same meal twice with the vast variety of options and choices. Newly refurbished eatery offering an unlimited eat-all-you-can buffet, good service and a warm atmosphere in which to dine. Eat as much as you like. Authentic Italian pasta. Live cooking by top chefs guaranteed for a visual feast

Chef on the go

Indulge in multicultural mixtures or pick a particular pabulum to patronize, bearing in mind that the buffet is unlimited while the chefs cook in front of you, thus the ideal opportunity to experience live cooking at its best.

You can choose from a selection of the best pasta dishes in town. 

Seafood Pasta

All Cheese Pasta

Vegetable Pasta

We ate 4 types of pasta (many kinds of pasta to choose from). Deliciously made by the chef right in front of the diners. Diners can also tuck into a vast array of spicily various vittles. 

Makati Palace Hotel also boasts of its wonderful dining facilities designed to satisfy the most discriminating of palates. -shernan

Feeling inspired today..

I get very excited about the possibilities, and where life will take me and where others can go with their life also. It is a dream come true for me that I am actually able to have the opportunity to help others realize that the sayings are true, nothing is impossible. If you can dream it, you can achieve it. People need to give themselves a better chance at achieving what they really long for. All they need to do is believe it can happen.

What did you want to be when you were younger? I always fantasized of moving to the US and being a doctor or doing something really big with my life. Being able to help the world. Make a difference. But I grew up in a small country town and it just seemed like it was only meant for ‘the lucky ones’ or the people who were already rich. This isn’t actually true. Success in any area, of any industry, comes down to your imagination and your willingness to believe that you can actually make it happen. It’s start with you, why you want to do it, believing it can happen and then making it happen. These are simple questions I have asked myself previously, How do you feel today about where you are, where do you want to be? Where would you prefer to be? Who do you want to be spending time with at this very moment? What would you prefer to be doing today if what you are doing is not your ideal day? What is your family doing? Are they going about their days in their ideal way? If they weren't, wouldn’t it be nice to be able to change that for them if it was possible? Well, it is.

I am not exactly where I want to be right now, but I’m taking steps each day towards bigger goals than what’s happening in the present. It is important to still enjoy the present, but if nothing changes in your day to day life, nothing will change in the future. In 5 years time, do you want to be where you are now? Do you think you will have made progress?

Courtesy: http://kate-martin.tumblr.com/

Institutions, Power, and the Ego

An institution’s sole existence is power. All functions of an institution aim at providing more power to the adhering individuals. Institutions serve no other purpose. While the benefits might seem obvious the disadvantages of institutions are not. One clear and apparent result of the information age is true power created by the lack of structure and institution.

Old institutions warp your mind. it plagues one with the perception of comfort and stability. Time tested results with statistically proven methods. An institution can take the creative mind and lock it to an eternity of structure and repetition.  Yet there are always new methods being developed by those who play outside the boundaries of institution. More efficient methods that do not adhere to the previously proven laws. The natural transfer of power and evolution of thought. The structure of nature.

The ego repels the natural progression of change. Change implies lack of control, uncertainty, doubt, and fear. One must ask: fear of what?! The irrational extent in which the ego will manipulate situations in order to keep power is worrisome at best. Distressful. In the face of a truly superior model turn cheek and return to the safety of certainty. Risk is solely for those worthy of reward. Institutions will fall.

To truly unlock the potential of human development and ability we must remove our institution and rely on a more concrete idea: constant change.

A quote from Circles by Ralph Waldo Emerson:

There are no fixtures in nature. The universe is fluid and volatile. Permanence is but a word of degrees. Our globe seen by God is a transparent law, not a mass of facts. The law dissolves the fact and holds it fluid. Our culture is the predominance of an idea which draws after it this train of cities and institutions. Let us rise into another idea: they will disappear. The Greek sculpture is all melted away, as if it had been statues of ice; here and there a solitary figure or fragment remaining, as we see flecks and scraps of snow left in cold dells and mountain clefts, in June and July. For the genius that created it creates now somewhat else. The Greek letters last a little longer, but are already passing under the same sentence, and tumbling into the inevitable pit which the creation of new thought opens for all that is old. The new continents are built out of the ruins of an old planet; the new races fed out of the decomposition of the foregoing. New arts destroy the old. See the investment of capital in aqueducts made useless by hydraulics; fortifications, by gunpowder; roads and canals, by railways; sails, by steam; steam by electricity.

 Courtesyhttp://omnivorousego.tumblr.com/

Find solutions to some of life's difficult problems

      

 We live in troubled times, from personal issues to world crises, economic challenges to challenging relationships. Stress has become a common part of our everyday lives. Some individuals manage to cope and keep things in healthy perspective. For others, these challenges can result in unhealthy reactions like anxiety, depression, and even alcohol abuse. However, it's often hard to judge when normal feelings of worry, fear, and stress cross the line and become a serious condition that impacts both your emotional and physical health. With proper evaluation, anxiety disorders are treatable. Through medication or psychological therapy, or both, they can be brought under control.

     The good news is that there are real solutions to these serious issues. Understanding why someone is anxious, depressed, or abusing alcohol is the first step. Knowing the treatment options—both medical and therapeutic—is critical to resolving these difficult problems. If you have ever suffered from depression or been close to someone who has, you know that this illness cannot be wished away or relieved at will. Depression can have enormous depth and staying power, but there are a variety of medications and treatments that provide real help. A recent study showed that for those who stuck with treatment, depression lifted completely in seven out of 10 people, and others experienced relief of many symptoms. But discovering which treatment options work best requires knowledge and perseverance.