Update Lang

Just a quick entry. I saw Mark Herras last Friday night. I was celebrating my birthday with Raissa, Bon and another one of Raissa’s officemates, Chad, in a bar and billiards place along Tomas Morato. Raissa thinks that Mark looked better in person than in TV. He did look cute that night, but I think he was feeling kinda uncomfortable while playing billiards with his friend (and a couple of girls who looked like sluts. Hehe. I’m just jealous.) Maybe he’s still not yet used to being in the limelight.

Anyway, his face was so fair and makinis I got really envious. But it would have been a better birthday gift if he was with Jennylyn (Mercado). Or even if only she was there. Mark’s cute and all, but I heard Jennylyn is really really really beautiful in person. Maybe if we saw her, I had the guts to come up to her and ask for an autograph. Although I seriously doubt that she hangs out in places like that.

Okay, so this isn’t a quick entry after all. Hmm… Aside from our Starstruck encounter, something else happened that night. I don’t want to divulge the details, too complicated and a tad embarrassing. But after that incident, I realized I am not easy (you know what I mean, and no, this isn’t about Mark Herras. Asa pa ko!). I may have a liberal mind, but I am not liberated. I still have respect for my body and more importantly, my dignity. Whew. Four years in Manila and I still have my values intact. Well, at least some of them anyway.

Graduation is only a couple of weeks away. I’m happy that this hell sem is about to end, but I’m petrified of what’s going to happen next. After a month or so, I will be joining other fresh grads (or fresh meats) looking for our very first job. In other words, I will be officially unemployed. *sigh*

Oh, Paolo mentioned in his blog that his teacher said working abroad would actually be beneficial for our country because of the dollars (or euros or sterling pounds or dinars) coming in. On the contrary, it would actually wreak havoc in our economy. According to Sir Dumlao, more foreign currency coming in would appreciate the peso, making our exports relatively more expensive in the international market. Local manufacturers and exporters then couldn’t compete because of the higher prices, causing our some of our industries to incur losses and eventually collapse. In economics lingo, this phenomena is called the Dutch disease (but it didn’t really originate from the Netherlands).

Philippines had already experienced this due to the over-exploitation of logs. Because the peso appreciated against the dollar, some of our industries like shoe-making, toy-making and textiles, couldn’t compete anymore in the global market. So even if we had high-quality products, foreigners wouldn’t buy them because they were expensive. Anyway, since we have no more rainforests to cut down, we’re not experiencing this “disease” anymore. But because more and more people are going abroad to work and sending their earnings home, we might be in the brink of another Dutch disease. We’re actually exporting humans rather than logs.

Sheesh. I hope I didn’t bore you with that. And we all thought that OFWs and caregivers are the saviors of our economy with the dollars they bring in. Apparently, life isn’t that simple. Welcome to the real world.