The Quackroom

Watch here.

For details please contact the Secretariat at (054) 4750630,
Email secretariat@paglaomalliance.com
or log on to the organization’s website

at http://donaldbercasio.blogspot.com/.

see ya’.

PLEASE HELP THE VICTIMS OF SUPERTYPHOON REMING…

Allow me first to take you out of your comfort zones and together let’s journey through what is left of Bicol, particularly Albay, Legazpi City, Camarines Sur, and Naga City after Supertyphoon Reming ravaged our place. Here are some photos –

This girl lost many of her relatives due to the mudflow 

Adrian Bagasala attends to his wife, Ivy,
whose leg was amputated after their home collapsed in a mudslide in Legaspi.
She was seven months pregnant, but the stress caused her to give birth
prematurely, and the baby died.

Josephine Anonuevo mourns after identifying
her brother’s body at a makeshift morgue in Guinobatan. Her brother was killed
when a typhoon-triggered mudslide hit his village in Albay province.

An aerial photo shows damaged homes and
buildings in the town of Guinobatan, southeast
of Manila. Philippine rescuers worked Saturday shoveling debris and mud in an attempt
to recover bodies after mudslides swept through mountainside villages.

Rescuers recover bodies of victims of a
mudslide from the slopes of the Mayon volcano in Albay province, the
hardest-hit area. The winds, which reached 165 mph, and the torrential rains
triggered the mudslides.

Children in Camarines Sur province recover
an image of Jesus from piles of wreckage

So many bodies arrived at this
funeral parlour that they were left on the road outside in Daraga town.
Saturday Dec 02  2006 – Geoff Mackley of www.rambocam.com

A villager digs up a dead cow in the
shadow of Mayon Volcano, this photo illustrates the vast width of the mudflow,
where there is now mud there used to be villages and a forest. – Geoff Mackley
of www.rambocam.com

A house buried up to its roof. (courtesy of www.rambocam.com)

The Ayala Young Leaders Alliance (AYLA) has begun to collaborate with Ayala Foundation, Ateneo’s Simbahang Lingkod ng Bayan, Ayala companies, schools, organizations and institutions in launching a relief campaign to aid the victims of the super typhoon. We are one to encourage you to take part in this relief operation and be a channel to urge as many people to help.

Below are options to send in donations:

1. Thru Ayala Foundation’s G-Cash:
Type
DONATE_amount_mpin_AYALAFOUNDATION and
send t0 2882.
Example:
DONATE_50_1234_AYALAFOUNDATION and
send to 2882.

2. Thru Direct Deposit Payment:
Deposit your cash donations to
Ayala Foundation - Social
Development, BPI account number 0011-
1490-22.
Please fax us a copy of your
deposit slip at (02) 813-4487,
Attention: Operation Reming.

3. In Kind:
Donations in kind such as:
Rice, noodles, canned goods, coffee,
sugar, medicines (vitamins,
paracetamol, mefenamic acid); bath
and laundry needs (hygienic materials
and detergent bars).

For Metro Metro

Manila

schools/companies, please advise the
Ayala Young Leaders Secretariat of
preferred dates for pick-up schedules.
Manila Water Company’s Sagip Buhay
Team has once again expressed their
willingness provide vehicles to pick-
up donations.

Relief drive until December 15,
2006.

"Remember, if Christmas isn’t found in your heart, you won’t find it under a tree."

~ Charlotte Carpenter."

Thank you very much in advance. Dios po an magbalos!

Sincerely,

Ayala Young Leaders Bicol-Uragon (AYLAB-U)

thru yours truly, Donald Bercasio, Regional Coordinator

and

Ayala Young Leaders Alliance (AYLA)

thru
Ralph Reuben C. Morales, Alumni Relations Coordinator

even if some people think that he/she is a little too ’small’ for a ‘territory’ traditionally dominated by ‘giants’…watch…

Nate (5′9") and Yao (7′6") as, yes, you bet, the proverbial David and Goliath of this particular game.

It happened on the hardcourt; it could happen over and over and over and over again in a tough game called basketball, and I definitely believe, it could also happen in a tougher game called life…

"What lies behind you and what lies in front of you, pales in
comparison to what lies inside of you." - Ralph Waldo Emerson
(1803-1882) American Poet, Essayist

And by the way, quite obviously — I do love this game…

…including Yao and of course, the greatest of all, MJ…

Of course, without setting aside our traditional ‘mission’ and ‘role’ in the social development arena, I believe, Development Communicators can really thrive and even shine in the business world. 

I wish to share my reflections on this in my future posts.

Meantime, enjoy the rest of the day everyone.

And by the way, I have been to Ateneo de Naga’s ADAAF (Ateneo Digital Arts and Animation Festival) and what a show! The students’ works are amazing! 

So kudos to the entire DACA Faculty, student body, and the entire digital community!

Keep Ateneo de Naga University on the top of digital animation education and training in the Philippines!

Almost two years have already passed since I graduated from Ateneo de Naga University with a Development Communication degree.  Until now, I still look back at how I got into the course some years ago with fondness and intentness.  I started out in college as an accounting student, with the dreams of passing the board, becoming a topnotch CPA; and then eventually proceeding to take up law to become a hotshot lawyer.   But as fate would have it, I ended up traveling to Manila to begin a rather premature career in Network Marketing, Business Development, Sales, and Training in one of the tall buildings along Ayala Avenue (Rufino Towers); going around the jungle that is Manila and some other  places outside of it; returning here from that adventure or misadventure(?); transferring from my old Alma Mater to my new one; and shifting course from Accountancy to Development Communication to start my life here anew.

I am not going into the details about what transpired from the time when I temporarily dropped out of school to accept an offer to work in Manila to the time when I decided to go back here in Naga. I would not also talk about the reasons why I changed courses and took up Development Communication, nor would I talk about just what in the world was I thinking during that time when I accepted that offer in exchange of my studies, my editorial duties (as Managing Editor of our college publication) and my outside job(s) that time (I was an independent guy as early as I turned my back from those good ol’ but callow high school days). All of these deserved separate posts.

What I would like to throw out this morning is that, firstly, it dawned on me that the journey I am into right now which has been dependent on and sustained by faith, hope and vision has been one exhilarating ride - a roller coaster  haste, a life-changing cruise, an eye-opening campaign.

It has not been easy, but it has been worthwhile.  I still feel that the place I long dreamt about, or the place promised to me by my dreams if I may put it this way, is still somewhere over that skyline and it could still be a long way to go. But for me, it’s okay. 

As long as I don’t stand still, as long as I become a better person along the way, as long as there are still some little sparks of hope that I could always hold on on some darkened days and nights, as long as I could still breathe and live, as long as my reasons are still intact and right, as long as the vision of a good ending still looms on the horizon ahead, I only got three words for the ‘gods of fate’ - BRING IT ON!

Secondly, in my opinion, Development Communication, combined with my past experiences with the jobs I had and the further studies that I have taken since I graduated, has been a perfect fit to what I do now and what I intend to do in the future.   

This leads me to think of some things - and if you may, I am sharing them to everyone who might be interested.

We all are at the threshold of defining changes that could take the world by storm in a matter of seconds, or a push of a button, and having been educated on, and inspired by how we could harness the boundless power of human communication to usher in a better world (or the opposite of it) for everyone brings me mixed feelings of great confidence, excitement, and fear.

Nowadays, many forms of communication media have once again been shaping and reshaping the way people live their lives - and the way they live their dreams.  Phenomenal changes have been occurring  inside and outside of us that are being brought to us by these revitalized and new breed of communication tools (i.e. art films, digital animation, digital photography,

edgy advertisements, a more creative and bolder public relations, more sophisticated mobile phones, blog, virtual chat, 3D chat, on-line gaming, social media and video, interactive tv, and others) and who knows what is going to happen next.

At the end of the day, I believe that the ever-powerful media would be as noble or as evil as the one who use it.  A great sense of responsibility, selflessness, oneness-with-the-world, and conscience is therefore more needed now than ever as the power of communication media and processes becomes more advanced and in a lot of ways, efficient, thus, for me, mightier; and as the world becomes smaller because of this , thus, for me, more vulnerable or reachable  depending on which side you are at.  That is where the principles and mission of Development Communication would be most critical.

People, especially communication specialists and media practitioners, should learn how to strategically harness the vast power of communication media and measures to bring about social and economic improvements, especially in developing countries like ours. Having said that, the same should not allow other people to utilize the same power to bring about the opposite for all the wrong reasons.

These people in whose hands this power has been ‘entrusted’, including myself, a DevCom grad, believer and practitioner, a community worker, and a Marketing Communication officer, and those who will, in one way or another, be engaged in some forms of media or communication works in the future, should take their journey up to a whole new level - with a vision not only for themselves but for others. 

Sabi nga nila, kung hindi pwede ang BAYAN MUNA, pwede bang kahit papaano’y BAYAN DIN?

So what differs Development Communication from other communication-based perspectives or courses? For me, simply put, it’s communication with a vision, with a heart, with a purpose, with a greater sense of responsibility.  In business, it could be likened to doing business with a social conscience or pursuing business while espousing and championing the Corporate Social Responsibility and ‘profit with honor or dignity’ concepts.   

Development should be the goal.  Development of the human spirit and potential. Development of economic and human conditions. Development of the arts and culture. Development of local and international understanding. Development of vision and value-based leadership. Development of the other intricacies of life vital for the betterment of the human society.

I just hope Development Communication would someday enjoy the attention and the respect that, I believe, it truly deserves in this fast-paced, technologically-advanced, highly-wired, greatly-connected, yet oftentimes impatient, indifferent, troubled, and angry world.

(For comments, please email donaldbercasio@gmail.com)

I have been shying away from posting anything on this blog.  And for some reasons, I just could not find the drive to start my own blog on any of the blogging sites around, or whatever you call those sites, despite the encouragement of a lot of my friends and colleagues.  Ironically, I enjoyed ‘googling’ people’s names and reading their blogs if they turned out to have these - and of course, if I find them worth reading. 

Just awhile ago, another friend, someone whom I greatly respect for his passion for social and development causes and ability to make things happen in the communities that he opted to engage himself in, revealed to me that he has just started his own blog as a way of sharing his reflections on the issues he is so passionate about and a tool to espouse his advocacies.  He then encouraged me to  reconsider my position or my notions about blogs and blogging.

I think that encounter made me think a lot about this blog of mine here in friendster.  Isn’t it ironic that I called this spot "quackroom’ yet this has always been void of "quacks" from the Ducks,err, the man behind it?

Hmm..allow me to step back now.  You’ll hear from me again soon.

My meeting’s about to start in a few.

In honor and reverence of; with prayers for the Holy Father, I am setting his photo taken March 30 as he gives his blessing at his studio window overlooking St. Peter’s Square as my primary photo for some time.

I had the privilege of seeing him at close range when he visited the Philippines during the 1995 (or was it 96?) World Youth Day.

I remember we just arrived then at the far left side of the Quirino Grandstand after a long and exhausting walk (cars and other forms of transportation could not be used due to the great number of crowd that had come from different nations for the event). And most of us were just sitting and resting, though some were trying to catch some sleep, when we heard people shouting that the Holy Father was coming towards our location. And so very quickly, we all got up and started running up to the side of the road.  I recall running then with only a slipper due the panic caused by our desire to see him up-close.

And when we saw him, we were all like so stunned for moments even after his Papal Mobile Car had already passed by. His presence was really something. He’s really a Holy Man.

I am not a very religious guy, but for me, the Holy Father is really different, and a constant source of inner strength and inspiration. He has never failed to move me every time I stumble upon his works and messages on the tv, newspapers, the internet, and other media. And what I like best about him is that unlike other preachers and church and political leaders out there, he leads by example - he walks the talk; he teaches not really with his words, but by the way he has lived his life; and he constantly pays homage to our faith by the way he deals with all people regardless of their own faith, ideologies, and personal biases. Remember how he dealt with the Muslims, Jews, the Orthodox Church, and peoples of other faiths? with dictators and communists? Remember how he dealt with the very person who tried to kill him?

Astig di ba?

Read the news now, and you can see that even non-catholics, non-christians, and yes, non-believers are praying for him, and have nothing but praises for him.

It’s really amazing how he has inspired a lot of people - non-catholics, non-christians, and non-believers included - and drew a lot of them closer to God, by his life and his work.

And now at probably the last moments of his life, he is showing us how to face the inevitable coming of death - that is still with awesome courage, openness and calmness of heart and spirit, obedience to the will of God and faith.

How many of us can beat that?

At any rate, I really honor this man — not only for what he has been for the world and all of us, but more importantly how we, and this world of ours have become because of him and his ministry.

Indeed "to Catholics, he is universal shepherd;to world leaders, he can bring moral support or stinging criticism; non-Christians around the globe have welcomed him as a holy guest; poor nations consider him their advocate in the halls of power; and for nearly everyone, he’s been a voice of conscience on issues like war, abortion and the death penalty."

Here’s to an extraordinary papacy! Here’s to a saint who lives among us! Here’s to a hero to many young people in the world! Here’s to a world moral leader and inspiration!

Ito’y para sa pinakaastig!

SALAMAT LOLEK! DIOS PO AN MAGBALOS!

(Let’s continuously join the entire world in praying for the Pope. Walang bibitaw.)

ehem..test blog. test blog =)