Jumping like Jack, my 4-year-old nephew slipped and hit his mouth on the center table yesterday. That hurt, bloody hurt. After the blood had stopped gushing, his lips swelled the size twice his original. But he couldn't stop crying.
The crying didn't last for all eternity, though. As soon as the pain subsided, the crying turned to whimper and the whimper turned to silence.
Finally, the adults turned to the other boy, the 2-year-old saying: "Kuka, wawa, Kuka!" The younger boy hugged and kissed the injured. "Mamerman CD, Kuka? CD Kuka, Mamerman?"
Peter Parker came to life. For the nth time. And the jumping and howling resumed. Oh, KIDS!!!
I came home to see the still ugly swell on the lips of the 4-year-old who carried on like the fish pout wasn't there. He gobbled up Jollibee Ube Ice Craze with a vengeance.
After dinner, Nanay and I got to share that dishwashing moment talk. She was complaining about the boys' hyperactivity attacks. Oh how different we were as kids!
And I go, "'Nay, times have changed. We've moved to a house in a subdivision so divided squarely there isn't room to grow."
I reminded her of the old house located at the end of the earth where our playground was as far and wide as the eyes could see. That regardless of the season, we, kids, had paradise for playground. At pre-planting time there were trees we could climb and skin our knees and elbows with. There were mango trees that gave unrestricted radius of shade under which we could spread mats on to sleep in the sfternoon. At planting time, we had watersheds and patubig along rice fields to bathe and fish in. At harvest time, we had wide beds of haystack we could jump up and down, roll on and on, and build playhouses with.
There were endless things to do outside we were dead to the world when we came home. Those times, children slept through TV shows.
The boys have too much energy in them, there is not enough space to fling them to.
Today, in lieu of real space, kids are sent to virtual worlds, without leaving the house, butt stuck on the seat infront of a Mac. On weekends, they go to malls with artificial playground with artificial animals and artificial trees. The tiled playground won't skin their knees; the rubbered floors won't break the shells. But you pay too much for the simplest things that are supposed to be free. The children are kept captive when they are supposed to be outside, are covered when they are supposed to be outdoors.
Thus, the kids meet accidents at home. Too much fire on a too wet wood.
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
Tuesday, September 28, 2010
Gabriel Garcia Marquez and Isabel Allende Sounding Like Ignazio Silone
That's what I get reading Wally Lamb's I Know This Much Is True.
And bits of Kate Chopin and Sylvia Plath, too.
Magic realism and stream of consciousness. You get that two together you have a fat book only people with sleeping problems can digest.
I'm on the 759th page of the total 894.
I remember my literature professor saying, "Be happy when you get out of college. You have all the time in the world to read without your teacher telling you what to read and asking you questions about it." I love that teacher. He has led me to the truth about literature: "It is a power to be possessed and not a body of objects to be studied."
I have in my possession a power to make insignificant nights without time.
And bits of Kate Chopin and Sylvia Plath, too.
Magic realism and stream of consciousness. You get that two together you have a fat book only people with sleeping problems can digest.
I'm on the 759th page of the total 894.
I remember my literature professor saying, "Be happy when you get out of college. You have all the time in the world to read without your teacher telling you what to read and asking you questions about it." I love that teacher. He has led me to the truth about literature: "It is a power to be possessed and not a body of objects to be studied."
I have in my possession a power to make insignificant nights without time.
Friday, September 24, 2010
Filipinos Are So Much Better Than That
"P-Noy’s responsibility is first and last to his people. P-Noy’s concern is first and last his people. P-Noy’s priority is first and last his people." That is according to Conrado De Quiros in his PDI column yesterday which had me thinking while taking a bath this morning. Can you imagine that? Me having this much interest in Philippine politics? Hey, I'm the girl who dies for shoes!
De Quiros is among those plenty who are irked by P-Noy's move to give the Chinese government and its people the first crack at the IIRC report. He further wonders, "Truly you have to wonder what kind of people P-Noy has surrounded himself with." Exactly my sentiment.
But I digress from this one.
Everyone who criticized P-Noy about his decision to send to the Chinese government the IIRC report first has forgotten this. P-Noy is Filipino first before he is President.
What is a Filipino? What sets us apart from the rest of the world? Before laws and rights, we have traits and culture first. These two, the bases of our Constitution, the reasons for our madness.
Why do we save the best blankets and pillow cases and take them out because a guest happens to be in the area and asks if he can stay for the night? Why do we not touch the only fish on the table when we have visitors for dinner? Why do we open the blue-sealed canned goods that we proudly put on display in our "estante" and serve to Tatay's officemates one weekend they decide to show up?
When the children of my sister's friends come to visit, they get to play my nephews' newest and "bestest" toys while our nephews look on wondering perhaps, "Spiderman ko 'yun, ah. Bakit binigay ni Tita sa bata?" "Umba, beebee! Beebee, umba!"
When I was a kid, I asked my mother why my cousins get to sleep in our room and we at the living room. She answered: "Eh kase, mga bisita sila." My inquiry didn't end there. But the bottomline is visitors come first.
Those Chinese tourists were our visitors. We gave them hospitality not because they deserve it. They were given it because we are Filipinos. And as Filipinos, we have this crazy trait of hardcore fresh-linen-and-best-pillows hospitality. Whether you like it or not.
Filipino first and we have the blood of these Chinese tourists in our hands? Instead of the best reception, we gave them multiple murder. Instead of the best and choicest fish, we had them eat bullets.
Filipino first? That is so un-Filipino, if you ask me. Do you know what is being Filipino? It is bowing our heads when we pass when people are talking. It is the mother eating only what is left by her children in their plates. It is the mother taking only the smallest part of the fish. It is the first-born taking care of her siblings and sending them to school. It is the neighbor passing a bowl of calderata over to the fence of the other neighbor, "Mare, pasensya na. Nagluto ng konting caldereta. Eto, tikman nyo."
Filipino are never known to have the "Me first" mentality.
Don't, just don't confuse our people with others.
De Quiros is among those plenty who are irked by P-Noy's move to give the Chinese government and its people the first crack at the IIRC report. He further wonders, "Truly you have to wonder what kind of people P-Noy has surrounded himself with." Exactly my sentiment.
But I digress from this one.
Everyone who criticized P-Noy about his decision to send to the Chinese government the IIRC report first has forgotten this. P-Noy is Filipino first before he is President.
What is a Filipino? What sets us apart from the rest of the world? Before laws and rights, we have traits and culture first. These two, the bases of our Constitution, the reasons for our madness.
Why do we save the best blankets and pillow cases and take them out because a guest happens to be in the area and asks if he can stay for the night? Why do we not touch the only fish on the table when we have visitors for dinner? Why do we open the blue-sealed canned goods that we proudly put on display in our "estante" and serve to Tatay's officemates one weekend they decide to show up?
When the children of my sister's friends come to visit, they get to play my nephews' newest and "bestest" toys while our nephews look on wondering perhaps, "Spiderman ko 'yun, ah. Bakit binigay ni Tita sa bata?" "Umba, beebee! Beebee, umba!"
When I was a kid, I asked my mother why my cousins get to sleep in our room and we at the living room. She answered: "Eh kase, mga bisita sila." My inquiry didn't end there. But the bottomline is visitors come first.
Those Chinese tourists were our visitors. We gave them hospitality not because they deserve it. They were given it because we are Filipinos. And as Filipinos, we have this crazy trait of hardcore fresh-linen-and-best-pillows hospitality. Whether you like it or not.
Filipino first and we have the blood of these Chinese tourists in our hands? Instead of the best reception, we gave them multiple murder. Instead of the best and choicest fish, we had them eat bullets.
Filipino first? That is so un-Filipino, if you ask me. Do you know what is being Filipino? It is bowing our heads when we pass when people are talking. It is the mother eating only what is left by her children in their plates. It is the mother taking only the smallest part of the fish. It is the first-born taking care of her siblings and sending them to school. It is the neighbor passing a bowl of calderata over to the fence of the other neighbor, "Mare, pasensya na. Nagluto ng konting caldereta. Eto, tikman nyo."
Filipino are never known to have the "Me first" mentality.
Don't, just don't confuse our people with others.
Monday, September 20, 2010
The Anatomy of a Single Mom
At age 38, my friend gave birth to her first baby. A girl. Her boyfriend whom she met only in December is back in Italy. She gave birth with only her father and a house help by her side from 10 PM until 6 AM the next day. Her OB assured her of a normal delivery, but on the eleventh hour, her doctor called for a CS.
I came to see her and the baby at the hospital the same day. She was OK, with two cellphones in her hands, calling and texting home for instructions - stuff to be sent to the hospital, hospital bills to be paid, etc. And she lying in bed with inches of sewn vertical wound on her stomach. Hell, it was painful. I could see how she'd stop to draw some deep breaths to ease the pain. Some tube stuck on her somewhere so she could pee without leaving the bed. One would see the shade of her liquid wastes.
Damn it! And she was alone with this sleepy girl barely out of her teens acting as her aid. But what does a girl know?
She could have NOT gotten herself pregnant, but she wanted a baby, a child she could call her own. And for what? For this? This loneliness in the time when a woman should be celebrating her womanhood?
No, I would not give credit to the father of her child for calling and calling and calling while she was near-death giving birth. The least he could have done was fly back to this OFW-infested country and be by her side to hold her hand those long hours of birth pains and birth hells. OFW-infested. That is the only time when something is infested and the pest is not on or in the host.
There are no excuses for any man not to be with the woman he has impregnated the time the woman gives birth. Any male human who does that can never claim to be better than male non-human animals.
She said he would be back in December for their wedding and the child's baptism. Big deal. He could have gone home now and get married. Ano siya naghihintay ng Pasko?
Stupid, stupid male. Why is she even marrying him?
My guess, that is what friends are for. To be with their friends when they have no one else. And deliberately fade in the background when things pick up. And back again when things screw up.
I cannot tell her not to marry him. I'm not her mother. I'm just her friend.
I came to see her and the baby at the hospital the same day. She was OK, with two cellphones in her hands, calling and texting home for instructions - stuff to be sent to the hospital, hospital bills to be paid, etc. And she lying in bed with inches of sewn vertical wound on her stomach. Hell, it was painful. I could see how she'd stop to draw some deep breaths to ease the pain. Some tube stuck on her somewhere so she could pee without leaving the bed. One would see the shade of her liquid wastes.
Damn it! And she was alone with this sleepy girl barely out of her teens acting as her aid. But what does a girl know?
She could have NOT gotten herself pregnant, but she wanted a baby, a child she could call her own. And for what? For this? This loneliness in the time when a woman should be celebrating her womanhood?
No, I would not give credit to the father of her child for calling and calling and calling while she was near-death giving birth. The least he could have done was fly back to this OFW-infested country and be by her side to hold her hand those long hours of birth pains and birth hells. OFW-infested. That is the only time when something is infested and the pest is not on or in the host.
There are no excuses for any man not to be with the woman he has impregnated the time the woman gives birth. Any male human who does that can never claim to be better than male non-human animals.
She said he would be back in December for their wedding and the child's baptism. Big deal. He could have gone home now and get married. Ano siya naghihintay ng Pasko?
Stupid, stupid male. Why is she even marrying him?
My guess, that is what friends are for. To be with their friends when they have no one else. And deliberately fade in the background when things pick up. And back again when things screw up.
I cannot tell her not to marry him. I'm not her mother. I'm just her friend.
Kawawang Gobyerno
Too fast for HK lawmaker. The Incident Investigation and Review Committee report that is.
There really is nothing we can and will do that will satisfy them, is there?
"Why China first? Solons ask Palace."
The National Union of Jounalists of the Philippines (NUJP) "warns government about haling media to court over hostage crisis coverage."
There really is nothing this government can and will do that will merit a tiny bit of positive outlook, is there?
There really is nothing we can and will do that will satisfy them, is there?
"Why China first? Solons ask Palace."
The National Union of Jounalists of the Philippines (NUJP) "warns government about haling media to court over hostage crisis coverage."
There really is nothing this government can and will do that will merit a tiny bit of positive outlook, is there?
English for our Boys
My nephews are learning English! Yey!
Our home is a "No English, Please" zone. We don't speak English because there are two impressionable boys in the house: one is two years old, the other is four.
I want them to master Filipino before they are corrupted by side street, Eat Bulaga English.
At first, the parent of the younger boy would throw English phrases to the wind like, "Don't eat that. Dirty." And I would follow up saying, "O, huwag mo daw kainin kase madumi." At times, the mother would say, "Baby, don't cry." And I'd go: "Tumahan ka, wala kang Jollibee."
Finally, the parents of the kids got the message. If the aunt, who has a degree in the English language and a master's degree in English literature, would not speak to the kids in English, why would we?
But unknown to us a troop of English teachers find themselves into the living room: HBO, Spiderman, Spongebob and Patrick, and Lightning McQueen.
Now, the kids say "shark," "no," "listen to me now!," and two pages worth of words more. The kids don't have yayas, only enslaved uncles and aunts. And the slaves won't badge to speak English.
One time, the older boy asked my brother what the conversation was about between two soldiers in the Combat series. My brother said: "Manood ka lang at makinig. Maiintindihan mo rin yan." Even translation isn't allowed. Get the message through context clues, that's our approach.
Language acquisition is really more effective than language learning. Say what? The first one allows the non-native speakers to immerse themselves in the language through day to day interaction with the native speakers of the second language. The latter teaches the non-native speakers the rules by translation and textbooks. Language acquisition is used for survival, meaning without any help anchored by one's native tongue. Here, the basis is mostly "utile." In language learning, it is academics.
When kids are made to learn things for purely academics gain, the result, which is knowledge, may not be so positive and long lasting compared with having the kids acquire the skills, which are purpose-driven.
The boys are learning English! Next step is for them to read Moby Dick.
Our home is a "No English, Please" zone. We don't speak English because there are two impressionable boys in the house: one is two years old, the other is four.
I want them to master Filipino before they are corrupted by side street, Eat Bulaga English.
At first, the parent of the younger boy would throw English phrases to the wind like, "Don't eat that. Dirty." And I would follow up saying, "O, huwag mo daw kainin kase madumi." At times, the mother would say, "Baby, don't cry." And I'd go: "Tumahan ka, wala kang Jollibee."
Finally, the parents of the kids got the message. If the aunt, who has a degree in the English language and a master's degree in English literature, would not speak to the kids in English, why would we?
But unknown to us a troop of English teachers find themselves into the living room: HBO, Spiderman, Spongebob and Patrick, and Lightning McQueen.
Now, the kids say "shark," "no," "listen to me now!," and two pages worth of words more. The kids don't have yayas, only enslaved uncles and aunts. And the slaves won't badge to speak English.
One time, the older boy asked my brother what the conversation was about between two soldiers in the Combat series. My brother said: "Manood ka lang at makinig. Maiintindihan mo rin yan." Even translation isn't allowed. Get the message through context clues, that's our approach.
Language acquisition is really more effective than language learning. Say what? The first one allows the non-native speakers to immerse themselves in the language through day to day interaction with the native speakers of the second language. The latter teaches the non-native speakers the rules by translation and textbooks. Language acquisition is used for survival, meaning without any help anchored by one's native tongue. Here, the basis is mostly "utile." In language learning, it is academics.
When kids are made to learn things for purely academics gain, the result, which is knowledge, may not be so positive and long lasting compared with having the kids acquire the skills, which are purpose-driven.
The boys are learning English! Next step is for them to read Moby Dick.
More on Save More
My sister and our 2-year-old nephew (the one who ate the good chocolate bar) went to Save More yesterday to return the wormy one. We thought it best not to take the poor, hapless victim.
No one was manning the Customer Service Counter when we got there. It was close to 11 AM. It being a Sunday, they opened at 9 AM. Then a female with the INFORMATION sash came.
I told her about my complaint. I was only halfway through my speech when she cut me short and asked me to wait. She wasn't smiling. She wasn't accommodating. Oh, I forgot, she was only Ms. Information. I wanted to strangle her neck for being so rude! You just don't do that to someone who comes to you to complain. You don't do that to a customer. Period!
Then a more pleasant employee came.
She asked me to write on a complaint form: details of it and some suggestions, recommendations for Save More and my complete contact details.
She then gave me a tape "MR Deduction" worth P17.50 I could use to buy something else.
Then, I forgot about the insolent Ms. Information. I am that cheap and easy to please.
Because, I don't hold grudges (I just blog), I did another round of grocerying and ended up buying close to a thousand peso worth of goods so I could use the P17.50 tape. My sister who was with me got a kick out of it.
I bought a Sanyang TV holder which I intend to use as a bedside table worth P679. The sales clerk who assisted me was polite and there was nothing to complain about. The clerk told us to pay the goods at the counter and that he would deliver the item to the customer service counter where I could claim it upon payment.
When I did, Ms. Information was at the customer service counter. She better behave, I silently prayed. Ms. Information was still not smiling. Did she have a really bad night?
The item I bought hadn't been deposited to the counter to be claimed so she used the announcement mic to call the attention of the Sanyang clerk. A minute later and the guy with my TV holder came.
Then a one-sided cold war took place. Ms. Information dressed down the clerk about some procedures. In front of me and my sister. The reprimand was not about the item, as far as I could see. It was about Ms. Information not in that shift, etc. etc. The clerk said, "Mam, wala po kase yung in-charge sa Sanyang kaya ako yung nag-assist." Hello! Do we have to see this, this "culture of excellence"? We were stunned. But Ms. Information rattled on, unmindful of us serving as their audience. The clerk endured it all, even looking apologetic at us. I was close to defending the guy, but since I had no business with their business, I shut up.
Ms. Information is young, in her mid-20s perhaps, presentable. But her rough behavior puts witches to shame. Tsk!
Two days in a row. SM has shown me that indeed SM has got it all for me. Lousy service, damaged goods, uncaring employees - even to their own.
We arrived home and Mother gave me the doctor's bill from the clinic across the street - Php 250 including doctor's fee, CBC and stool tests. The doctor asked us to buy some meds, too. Overall, we spent less than P500. My nephew is OK now. Do I go back to Save More Alabang to reimburse and be subjected to another poor customer service? Tell you what, I'm not really a huge fan of masochism.
To this date and hour, September 13, 2010; 12:30 PM, I have yet to hear from them. No phone calls, no nothing. Just the P17.50 deduction they issued last Sunday.
Some years ago, I bought a Dunkin Donut with a staple wire in it. I called their customer service to complain. I bought the donut in Makati where I used to work. When I got home to Laguna from the office that evening, my mother told me two employees from Dunkin came and delivered a box of donuts and a letter. My brothers ate all the donuts, but I got to read the letter of apology from Dunkin's Vice President.
Now, SM with all its malls and mini-malls and banks and we've-got-it-all-for-you businesses, is just a kariton-pushing business entity compared to Dunkin. What a shame!
No one was manning the Customer Service Counter when we got there. It was close to 11 AM. It being a Sunday, they opened at 9 AM. Then a female with the INFORMATION sash came.
I told her about my complaint. I was only halfway through my speech when she cut me short and asked me to wait. She wasn't smiling. She wasn't accommodating. Oh, I forgot, she was only Ms. Information. I wanted to strangle her neck for being so rude! You just don't do that to someone who comes to you to complain. You don't do that to a customer. Period!
Then a more pleasant employee came.
She asked me to write on a complaint form: details of it and some suggestions, recommendations for Save More and my complete contact details.
She then gave me a tape "MR Deduction" worth P17.50 I could use to buy something else.
Then, I forgot about the insolent Ms. Information. I am that cheap and easy to please.
Because, I don't hold grudges (I just blog), I did another round of grocerying and ended up buying close to a thousand peso worth of goods so I could use the P17.50 tape. My sister who was with me got a kick out of it.
I bought a Sanyang TV holder which I intend to use as a bedside table worth P679. The sales clerk who assisted me was polite and there was nothing to complain about. The clerk told us to pay the goods at the counter and that he would deliver the item to the customer service counter where I could claim it upon payment.
When I did, Ms. Information was at the customer service counter. She better behave, I silently prayed. Ms. Information was still not smiling. Did she have a really bad night?
The item I bought hadn't been deposited to the counter to be claimed so she used the announcement mic to call the attention of the Sanyang clerk. A minute later and the guy with my TV holder came.
Then a one-sided cold war took place. Ms. Information dressed down the clerk about some procedures. In front of me and my sister. The reprimand was not about the item, as far as I could see. It was about Ms. Information not in that shift, etc. etc. The clerk said, "Mam, wala po kase yung in-charge sa Sanyang kaya ako yung nag-assist." Hello! Do we have to see this, this "culture of excellence"? We were stunned. But Ms. Information rattled on, unmindful of us serving as their audience. The clerk endured it all, even looking apologetic at us. I was close to defending the guy, but since I had no business with their business, I shut up.
Ms. Information is young, in her mid-20s perhaps, presentable. But her rough behavior puts witches to shame. Tsk!
Two days in a row. SM has shown me that indeed SM has got it all for me. Lousy service, damaged goods, uncaring employees - even to their own.
We arrived home and Mother gave me the doctor's bill from the clinic across the street - Php 250 including doctor's fee, CBC and stool tests. The doctor asked us to buy some meds, too. Overall, we spent less than P500. My nephew is OK now. Do I go back to Save More Alabang to reimburse and be subjected to another poor customer service? Tell you what, I'm not really a huge fan of masochism.
To this date and hour, September 13, 2010; 12:30 PM, I have yet to hear from them. No phone calls, no nothing. Just the P17.50 deduction they issued last Sunday.
Some years ago, I bought a Dunkin Donut with a staple wire in it. I called their customer service to complain. I bought the donut in Makati where I used to work. When I got home to Laguna from the office that evening, my mother told me two employees from Dunkin came and delivered a box of donuts and a letter. My brothers ate all the donuts, but I got to read the letter of apology from Dunkin's Vice President.
Now, SM with all its malls and mini-malls and banks and we've-got-it-all-for-you businesses, is just a kariton-pushing business entity compared to Dunkin. What a shame!
SM, Shape Up!
September 11. SM Save More sold to me a bar of chocolate reeking with worms, live, kick-ass worms.
I went to that SM-operated Save More Supermarket at Festival Mall in Alabang for some groceries. Because of my two nephews, I had to pick up some pasalubong, too. I decided to get two chocolate bars - 35 grams, brown packaging, rice crispies with Bon Bon in the label.
Fastforward to home. I handed the bars to my nephews - a 4-year-old and a 2-year-old.
I went up to my room to change when suddenly my brother, the father of the 4-year-old shouted at the stairs' landing. "Ate, yung tsokolate, may MGA uuod!"
Hurriedly, I went down. My brother handed me the chocolate bar. There in my hand, a bar of chocolate with squirmy, squiggly, wriggling worms, jumping, almost flying out of the bar. I haven't seen so many active worms coming from one source. My hair stood on end.
My 4-year-old nephew had just put that abominable thing in his mouth and ate and swallowed a bite of it! Whoever caused that to happen should go to hell!
I should have video-d it. But I decided against it. Why expose others to the experience of something so gross? All because a multi-billion-peso business is downright careless and inefficient?
I called Save More Customer Service to report the incident. The usual stuff. They're sorry for the inconvenience but I can return the item and they will replace it with the same or another with the same price: P17.50. I know I'm a Scrooge, but I know my money's and my family's worth. Fine!
That's it? I was poisoned by a quarter of a bowl of stir-fried noodles from this resto chain a few months ago and there was not a trace of worm in it. What more with this chocolate bar with an over-population of worms in and out of it?
That I observe my nephew within 24 hours and if something happens...What the hell is that suggestion?
I told the customer service rep that I was not willing to just observe. That I would have my nephew sent to the doctor for check-up before any cause for alarm shows up.
Then Save More has to pay for that check-up.
The rep talked to another at the background. It was OK to proceed with the check up. If results from the test show that the cause of my nephew's illness (granted he got sick after that incident) is the chocolate bar, they will have their "nurse" verify the results. Double WTF!
One thing was clear, they would only pay for the doctor's fee if my nephew could prove that he got sick because of the chocolate bar with worms he's eaten.
What I mean is, I will have to send him to the doctor when there isn't supposed to be any need to, but because he ate your wormy chocolate bar...
I was getting impatient getting my message across.
After a decade, they got the message and told me I can send the bills to them and they will reimburse! Hallelujah!
Unbelievable! SM is one of the most successful businesses in this part of the world and they have this kind of standard operating procedures when they mess up!
SM runs its business like a sari-sari store. With all due respect to the Aling Nene's, 2 Sisters' and Basta Sari-Sari stores out there.
Yes, I agree, all companies mess up at one time or another. All businesses have bad days sometimes. The company I work for isn't an exception. But SM is so up there, so rich up there, so successful up there, and yet. And yet they couldn't come up with decent replies to customer complaints. Food rots. Food gets stale over time. They should have perfected handling and storage, more than anything else. That's the pillar of their business. But even in an almost perfect environment, food does spoil. And SM needs only to prepare a sound how-to-deal-with-customer-complaints procedures and a good script of apology when shit happens. I guess, SM will not be bothered with that anymore. They have reached beyond-god status. So they think.
The next day, I returned to Save More only to be exposed to another unbelievable experience yet again.
That on the next blog.
I went to that SM-operated Save More Supermarket at Festival Mall in Alabang for some groceries. Because of my two nephews, I had to pick up some pasalubong, too. I decided to get two chocolate bars - 35 grams, brown packaging, rice crispies with Bon Bon in the label.
Fastforward to home. I handed the bars to my nephews - a 4-year-old and a 2-year-old.
I went up to my room to change when suddenly my brother, the father of the 4-year-old shouted at the stairs' landing. "Ate, yung tsokolate, may MGA uuod!"
Hurriedly, I went down. My brother handed me the chocolate bar. There in my hand, a bar of chocolate with squirmy, squiggly, wriggling worms, jumping, almost flying out of the bar. I haven't seen so many active worms coming from one source. My hair stood on end.
My 4-year-old nephew had just put that abominable thing in his mouth and ate and swallowed a bite of it! Whoever caused that to happen should go to hell!
I should have video-d it. But I decided against it. Why expose others to the experience of something so gross? All because a multi-billion-peso business is downright careless and inefficient?
I called Save More Customer Service to report the incident. The usual stuff. They're sorry for the inconvenience but I can return the item and they will replace it with the same or another with the same price: P17.50. I know I'm a Scrooge, but I know my money's and my family's worth. Fine!
That's it? I was poisoned by a quarter of a bowl of stir-fried noodles from this resto chain a few months ago and there was not a trace of worm in it. What more with this chocolate bar with an over-population of worms in and out of it?
That I observe my nephew within 24 hours and if something happens...What the hell is that suggestion?
I told the customer service rep that I was not willing to just observe. That I would have my nephew sent to the doctor for check-up before any cause for alarm shows up.
Then Save More has to pay for that check-up.
The rep talked to another at the background. It was OK to proceed with the check up. If results from the test show that the cause of my nephew's illness (granted he got sick after that incident) is the chocolate bar, they will have their "nurse" verify the results. Double WTF!
One thing was clear, they would only pay for the doctor's fee if my nephew could prove that he got sick because of the chocolate bar with worms he's eaten.
What I mean is, I will have to send him to the doctor when there isn't supposed to be any need to, but because he ate your wormy chocolate bar...
I was getting impatient getting my message across.
After a decade, they got the message and told me I can send the bills to them and they will reimburse! Hallelujah!
Unbelievable! SM is one of the most successful businesses in this part of the world and they have this kind of standard operating procedures when they mess up!
SM runs its business like a sari-sari store. With all due respect to the Aling Nene's, 2 Sisters' and Basta Sari-Sari stores out there.
Yes, I agree, all companies mess up at one time or another. All businesses have bad days sometimes. The company I work for isn't an exception. But SM is so up there, so rich up there, so successful up there, and yet. And yet they couldn't come up with decent replies to customer complaints. Food rots. Food gets stale over time. They should have perfected handling and storage, more than anything else. That's the pillar of their business. But even in an almost perfect environment, food does spoil. And SM needs only to prepare a sound how-to-deal-with-customer-complaints procedures and a good script of apology when shit happens. I guess, SM will not be bothered with that anymore. They have reached beyond-god status. So they think.
The next day, I returned to Save More only to be exposed to another unbelievable experience yet again.
That on the next blog.
Wednesday, September 8, 2010
A Memo for Noynoy
The Dear Noynoy letters have gotten old. The courtship and honeymoon days are over. It is now the time to work. So here's a memo instead.
TO: Benigno Simeon C. Aquino III, President of the Republic of the Philippines
FROM: Bronze Athena, Stakeholder and Citizen
DATE: September 8, 2010 (The Birthday of Mama Mary)
SUBJECT: Next Steps for Contemplation
TO: Benigno Simeon C. Aquino III, President of the Republic of the Philippines
FROM: Bronze Athena, Stakeholder and Citizen
DATE: September 8, 2010 (The Birthday of Mama Mary)
SUBJECT: Next Steps for Contemplation
The August 23 incident was an acid test. It was a test you didn't deserve. It came too soon, too harsh, too much. Compared with this, your mother's 9 coup attempts were walks in the park. The August 23 nightmare ought to have been GMA's punishment for failing miserably and stealing shamelessly. Given to Erap, that would have been injustice.
You apologized when you shouldn't. You should have fired all three of your communications managers for incompetence; your Executive Secretary for being an imbecile; the DILG head for being clueless; the DILG undersecretary for being useless; the PNP Chief for being shameless. And because you can't fire the mayor and vice mayor of Manila, you should have...
Then and only after then you should have apologized. Apologies before action are Macs with dual-boots.
What's done is done. But pick up the pieces. Then stand upright and do the following:
1. Fire your communications managers. Replace them with competent and highly experienced corporate communications professionals. Do not get someone from the media!
2. Fire your chief of staff. Replace him NOT with a classmate nor a batchmate nor a schoolmate nor a relative nor someone that you already trust but with someone you and the people CAN trust. This person has to earn it.
3. Fire the DILG mascots. Jollibee would have made a better man that day. No, not Binay. I already hated him his first week in office.
4. Abolish the PNP. Replace them with ROTC cadets and the Boy Scouts of the Philippines. At least the Boy Scouts are always ready and know how to make various types of knots and be creative and resourceful without being funny. The ROTC cadets can march and not duck.
5. Suspend for a month ALL local broadcast media networks and outfits that covered the hostage-taking live as if it were a Pacquiao-Mayweather fight. Then fine them equivalent to our average annual Gross National Income.
6. Stop apologizing to China and Hong Kong. Whimpering, we've been black and blue, kicked and spat on by a quarter of the world. If dolphins, whales and sharks could speak, they most likely would have joined the bandwagon. You have also apologized for smiling! So enough already!
9. Continue the investigation, fair and square, but not to satisfy the world and the Chinese. Do it because it is the right thing to do. Dignify poetic justice.
10. When you have replaced all who need to be replaced, do not commit the same mistake of putting them through a seminar on how to deal with media. It was utterly useless and a waste of tax money the first time. The second time, it will already be impeachable.
On August 23, hell broke loose and you found yoursef in the center of it. It was one test no other Philippine president known to Filipinos has gone through. Our naked ugliness bared to the world in high definition CNN sound and color. But God is a perfect God. He knows what He's doing. Consider yourself blessed. This is grace. This is an opportunity of a lifetime, a very important part of God's great design.
May God bless you more!
TO: Benigno Simeon C. Aquino III, President of the Republic of the Philippines
FROM: Bronze Athena, Stakeholder and Citizen
DATE: September 8, 2010 (The Birthday of Mama Mary)
SUBJECT: Next Steps for Contemplation
TO: Benigno Simeon C. Aquino III, President of the Republic of the Philippines
FROM: Bronze Athena, Stakeholder and Citizen
DATE: September 8, 2010 (The Birthday of Mama Mary)
SUBJECT: Next Steps for Contemplation
The August 23 incident was an acid test. It was a test you didn't deserve. It came too soon, too harsh, too much. Compared with this, your mother's 9 coup attempts were walks in the park. The August 23 nightmare ought to have been GMA's punishment for failing miserably and stealing shamelessly. Given to Erap, that would have been injustice.
You apologized when you shouldn't. You should have fired all three of your communications managers for incompetence; your Executive Secretary for being an imbecile; the DILG head for being clueless; the DILG undersecretary for being useless; the PNP Chief for being shameless. And because you can't fire the mayor and vice mayor of Manila, you should have...
Then and only after then you should have apologized. Apologies before action are Macs with dual-boots.
What's done is done. But pick up the pieces. Then stand upright and do the following:
1. Fire your communications managers. Replace them with competent and highly experienced corporate communications professionals. Do not get someone from the media!
2. Fire your chief of staff. Replace him NOT with a classmate nor a batchmate nor a schoolmate nor a relative nor someone that you already trust but with someone you and the people CAN trust. This person has to earn it.
3. Fire the DILG mascots. Jollibee would have made a better man that day. No, not Binay. I already hated him his first week in office.
4. Abolish the PNP. Replace them with ROTC cadets and the Boy Scouts of the Philippines. At least the Boy Scouts are always ready and know how to make various types of knots and be creative and resourceful without being funny. The ROTC cadets can march and not duck.
5. Suspend for a month ALL local broadcast media networks and outfits that covered the hostage-taking live as if it were a Pacquiao-Mayweather fight. Then fine them equivalent to our average annual Gross National Income.
6. Stop apologizing to China and Hong Kong. Whimpering, we've been black and blue, kicked and spat on by a quarter of the world. If dolphins, whales and sharks could speak, they most likely would have joined the bandwagon. You have also apologized for smiling! So enough already!
9. Continue the investigation, fair and square, but not to satisfy the world and the Chinese. Do it because it is the right thing to do. Dignify poetic justice.
10. When you have replaced all who need to be replaced, do not commit the same mistake of putting them through a seminar on how to deal with media. It was utterly useless and a waste of tax money the first time. The second time, it will already be impeachable.
On August 23, hell broke loose and you found yoursef in the center of it. It was one test no other Philippine president known to Filipinos has gone through. Our naked ugliness bared to the world in high definition CNN sound and color. But God is a perfect God. He knows what He's doing. Consider yourself blessed. This is grace. This is an opportunity of a lifetime, a very important part of God's great design.
May God bless you more!
Monday, September 6, 2010
Nothing Gold Can Stay
By Robert Frost
Nature's first green is gold
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf's a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.
The Outsiders
C. Thomas Howell -- Ponyboy Curtis
Matt Dillon -- Dallas Winston
Ralph Macchio -- Johnny Cade
Patrick Swayze -- Darrel Curtis
Rob Lowe -- Sodapop Curtis
Emilio Estevez -- Two-Bit Matthews
Tom Cruise -- Steve Randle
Leif Garrett -- Bob Sheldon
Diane Lane -- Cherry Valance
Johnny's Letter to Ponyboy:
Ponyboy,
I asked the nurse to give you this book so you could finish it. The doctor came in a while ago but I knew anyway. I keep getting tireder and tireder. Listen, I don't mind dying now. It's worth it. It's worth saving those kids. Their lives are worth more than mine, they have more to live for. Some of their parents came by to thank me and I know it was worth it. Tell Dally it's worth it. I'm just going to miss you, guys. I've been thinking about it, and that poem, that guy that wrote it, he means you're gold when you're a kid, like green. When you're a kid everything's new, dawn. It's just when you get used to everything that it's day. Like the way you dig sunsets, Pony. That's gold. Keep it that way, it's a good way to be. I want you to tell Dally to look at one. He'll probably think you're crazy, but ask for me. I don't think he's ever really seen a sunset. And don't be so bugged over being a greaser. You still have a lot of time to make yourself be what you want. There's still lots of good in the world. Tell Dally. I don't think he knows.
Your buddy,
Johnny.
They don't make movies like this anymore. Our generation has been pampered. Today's youth, well...they have Bella and Edward and that wolf character. They also have the internet and facebook and i-pod and i-pad and cellphones and the list goes on and on.
But WE had gold.
Nature's first green is gold
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf's a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.
The Outsiders
C. Thomas Howell -- Ponyboy Curtis
Matt Dillon -- Dallas Winston
Ralph Macchio -- Johnny Cade
Patrick Swayze -- Darrel Curtis
Rob Lowe -- Sodapop Curtis
Emilio Estevez -- Two-Bit Matthews
Tom Cruise -- Steve Randle
Leif Garrett -- Bob Sheldon
Diane Lane -- Cherry Valance
Johnny's Letter to Ponyboy:
Ponyboy,
I asked the nurse to give you this book so you could finish it. The doctor came in a while ago but I knew anyway. I keep getting tireder and tireder. Listen, I don't mind dying now. It's worth it. It's worth saving those kids. Their lives are worth more than mine, they have more to live for. Some of their parents came by to thank me and I know it was worth it. Tell Dally it's worth it. I'm just going to miss you, guys. I've been thinking about it, and that poem, that guy that wrote it, he means you're gold when you're a kid, like green. When you're a kid everything's new, dawn. It's just when you get used to everything that it's day. Like the way you dig sunsets, Pony. That's gold. Keep it that way, it's a good way to be. I want you to tell Dally to look at one. He'll probably think you're crazy, but ask for me. I don't think he's ever really seen a sunset. And don't be so bugged over being a greaser. You still have a lot of time to make yourself be what you want. There's still lots of good in the world. Tell Dally. I don't think he knows.
Your buddy,
Johnny.
They don't make movies like this anymore. Our generation has been pampered. Today's youth, well...they have Bella and Edward and that wolf character. They also have the internet and facebook and i-pod and i-pad and cellphones and the list goes on and on.
But WE had gold.
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