MEDIUM RARE Jullie Y. Daza Pia Hontiveros, CNN Philippines anchor, gathered three political analysts/campaign strategists to talk about “new alliances in 2022” – and they all agreed with one another. If there was a difference of opinion, I didn’t catch it. Truth be told, I found myself...
MEDIUM RARE Jullie Y. Daza Finally, an admission from DILG Usec Jonathan Malaya: “ Nakakalito .” He meant “confusing” and he was talking about the various Q’s that we’ve had to live with and under, locked in and locked down, for the last 18 months. Not that the new Q-less grades are any...
MEDIUM RARE Jullie Y. Daza If there’s anyone who’d decline to R.I. P., I imagine it would be the exceptional Joy or Joya, Ma. Josefina to you. Joya, 61, passed away on Sept. 7 after a six-hour dialysis session followed by cardiac arrest. She had spent the last few weeks of her topsy-turvy,...
MEDIUM RARE Jullie Y. Daza At 11:32 p.m. precisely on Sept. 1, I heard my first carol of the year, “White Christmas.” Twelve hours earlier, Pedro, a father of four, put up his Christmas tree and pulled out box after box of ornaments. Later in the day, TV5 launched the network’s Christmas...
Medium Rare Jullie Y. Daza The stage is set for the Fight of the Century! In the blink of an eye, the Clash of the Titans! (Drum roll) In this corner, Sara Duterte, defending champion of poll surveys! In the other corner, Leni Robredo, challenger! The signs are all there. The drama no longer...
MEDIUM RARE Jullie Y. Daza This business of wearing a mask as a weapon against the deadliest virus of our time has other virtues going for it. For one, it imparts a mysterious air to its wearer. It also hides his or her imperfections from the bridge of the nose down to the chin, in that way...
MEDIUM RARE Jullie Y. Daza Stop calling them heroes but treating them like beggars. Pushing them against the wall, taking pleasure in their desperation, waiting for them to make good their threat to quit en masse. On National Heroes Day, doctors and nurses and other frontliners came out in small...
MEDIUM RARE Jullie Y. Daza Before CNN and the worldwide web, news did not travel as fast as light. As it was an unknown entity, the name Afghanistan stood for anything that was strange, unfamiliar, far and far away. In short, Afghanistanism was the catch-all for whatever seemed or...
MEDIUM RARE Jullie Y. Daza Break, break, break! Too much already! Did we take one step forward, only to take two steps back? After an unending series of monotonously named lockdowns, it feels like we’re back where we started on March 15, 2020. True, more vaccines but also more deadly variants....
MEDIUM RARE Jullie Y. Daza To retire or not to retire from the square ring of boxing? That sounds like the question of the day being bandied about by analysts, while another batch of curiosity seekers wonder if Manny Pacquiao should throw his hat in the three-ring circus of the coming elections....
MEDIUM RARE Jullie Y. Daza To illiterates and innumerates alike, the universe is founded on numbers. The numbers that Ugas in Vegas beat out of Pacquiao after 12 rounds read 115-113, 116-112, and again 116-112. Numbers are the foundation of a predictable world, specially when your profession is...
MEDIUM RARE Jullie Y. Daza An alternative headline would have been “The last Q” (for quarter), but where’s the romance in that? Quoting the president of the biggest federation of business clubs in the Philippines, “Spare the last quarter.” Henry Lim Bon Liong was okay with the Aug. 6-20...
