Face masks, anyone?

From Manila Times:

The Department of Health (DOH) said that the first case of swine flu in the Philippines has been “contained.”

Health Secretary Francisco Duque 3rd announced on Thursday evening that the first case involving a 10-year-old girl—a Filipino who arrived in the country on Monday after traveling to the United States and Canada—tested positive for the A(H1N1) virus that causes swine flu.

But the Health department allayed fears of an outbreak.

“The DOH would like to emphasize that there is no community level outbreak in the country and measures are being done by the government to prevent transmission, starting with the quarantine of household close contacts,” the department said in a statement on Friday.

More: Philippines’ first killer flu case ‘contained’

Racy, deadly

So while everyone is feasting on leaked videos of Hayden Kho screwing a couple of chicks (including a popular starlet, a Brazilian model, and a doctor-cum-commercial endorser), a massive landslide, in the meantime, is wreaking havoc on a hillside community in Cordillera, killing 26 and leaving hundreds homeless.

Related: Katrina Halili to visit Senate, plan legal actions vs Hayden Kho | Porn vendors cash in on ‘Hayden video’ scandal | Philippine landslide death toll hits 26, 6 missing

In relation to the Hayden scandal, it is interesting to note how the “proliferation of sex scandals involving celebrities in the Internet… could benefit a government that wants to muzzle its citizens” (via gmanews), which couldn’t get truer (and scarier) if this is any indication. And speaking of landslides, they have become so common, a nation is desensitized enough not to care anymore.

Parkour will not save your life from Manila’s jeepneys (maybe)

Questions that do not necessarily beg any decent answer: (1) Considering the physical nature of urban Manila, isn’t it a tad too redundant to pay $30 just to learn Parkour? and (2) Isn’t getting around the metro itself an advanced form of Parkour?

From NTDTV:

A new sport is getting more and more popular in the Philippines. It’s not exactly a team sport… but the thrill of the jump is attracting many.

It’s an urban workout like no other – Parkour – which translates to “the art of moving” – is becoming increasingly popular in the Philippines with enthusiasts signing up across the country.

More: Roof Jumping Gains Popularity in the Philippines| Plus, totally not related but worth sharing: Human landscapes from above

Bembol on boogie: ‘What the hell?’

Currently on repeat mode: “Boogie Mo” by Bembol Rockers.

Plus, something from John Mayer: I couldn’t get Taylor Swift on my record so I found the world’s greatest impersonator, Laura Jacksheimer, here.

This culture of irrational touchiness (and a hint of political grandstanding)

Why so touchy? There are a gazillion things needing to be addressed pronto in these parts, yet local politicians would rather dwell on inane quotes from some comedian than do what they’re being paid for, and for what? Yes, your guess is as good as mine. Ultimately, either somebody needs to take a chill pill or know for sure what the definition of a joke is. And when you have a brain-dead official like Bong Revilla threatening “mayhem” over what is clearly a farce, then you get a glimpse of what the real joke is: Philippine politics and legislation.

From Monsters & Critics:

Alec Baldwin, the Long Island thespian famous for many film roles including “The Cooler,” “Married to the Mob” and “The Departed” and for his Emmy winning role in “30 Rock,” won’t be vacationing anytime soon in the Philippines.

Baldwin allegedly cracked wise about ordering a Filipino mail-order bride on the May 12th The Late Show, telling David Letterman that he would love to have more children, and was “thinking about getting a Filipino mail-order bride at this point … or a Russian one.”

More: Alec Baldwin’s TV joke falls like Ricky Hatton in the Philippines

And possibly related: This incident has proven so funny, even a retarded celebrity blogger like Perez Hilton had to blog about it, here.

A confused (and possibly bored) city council, plus the cost of political incorrectness

“Akala nyo Igorot ako, hindi ako Igorot, tao po ako.”

— Candy Pangilinan, whose joke above at a gig in Baguio prompted the summer capital’s council to declare her persona non grata.

Of course Baguio as a modern city has a slew of problems of its own — not the least being massive environment degradation, overpopulation, overdevelopment, poverty, corruption, and illiteracy, among others — but its city council would rather act swiftly on a comment by a showbiz personality that hurt their sensitive ego than do something more productive like, say, lay more budget on books for schoolchildren. Pangilinan has already apologized to the Igorots on national TV, for crying out loud, what more could this city council possibly want?

Related: Bloggers won’t forgive Candy | Candy apologizes on TV

And speaking of politicos with too much time in their hands (and nothing much between their ears), a timely reminder from Jay Contreras, of all people:

Tell us something we don’t know

In a serendipitous moment of sheer brilliance, PAGASA finally musters the courage to declare something only the dead didn’t know:

“The Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration (Pagasa) yesterday officially declared the onset of the rainy season in the western section of the Philippines, which includes the Ilocos Region, Central Luzon, Southern Tagalog, Metro Manila and Western Visayas.”

More: PAGASA: Rainy season is here

On a totally related note, it’s funny how the the phrase “as unpredictable as the weather” doesn’t ring true anymore, especially in light of how predictable the weather has been the past two months. For one, it’s never been easier to predict when it’ll rain: surely in the afternoon, it will. This phenomenon might clearly spell out the forthcoming irrelevance of weathermen, but it also stresses one of the most fundamental concepts of modern existence: dealing with a world on the verge of a disastrous climate change. But while it is true that climate change poses a bleaker picture of things to come, it still morphs nonetheless into a hip catchphrase for both the cool and the politically ambitious. In RP’s most recent celebration of a little funny movement called Earth Hour, for example, Ria Tanjuatco-Trillo, host of Studio 23’s News Central, proclaims, “Filipinos are finally aware of global warming.” Either the girl is hallucinating or just has a low neuron count who happens to earn a keep reading the idiot board, nobody knows, but one things is for sure: impoverished Filipinos are not the ones who should be force-fed concepts on human-induced climate change, but rather citizens of gas-guzzling nations whose greenhouse gas emission per capita sucks everybody into a world of harsher, most times deadly, and ever more predictable weather. Maybe Ria should take a breather and drown herself in the afternoon rain?

Lame representation

Rankings of the best universities around has for a long time been a source of spirited arguments, not excluding the most recent QS Top Asian Universities survey,  where RP’s top schools fared very poorly. UP, DLSU, and ADMU all clinched a spot in the top 100 at 63rd, 76th, and 84th respectively, but this is still lame, given the marked improvement in rankings of Thailand’s and Indonesia’s top universities. Then again, one can always howl at the validity and accuracy of the study’s methodology.

Misappropriated and misplaced

The National Tourism Policy Act of 2009, aka the Philippines’ much-hyped about “buffer” against the onslaught of the global economic crisis, was finally signed into law yesterday by PGMA, along with RA 9593 “declaring a national policy for tourism as an engine of investment, employment, growth and national development.” The new law “reorganizes the Philippine Tourism Authority into the Tourism Infrastructure and Enterprise Zone Authority mandated to designate, regulate and supervise tourism enterprise zones and to develop, manage and supervise tourism projects in the country.” Tourism secretary Ace Durano said the Tourism Act “gives the DOT and the sector a broader policy support and expanded budgetary support system.”

More: GMA signs into law national tourism policy bill

But while cabinet officials are quick to paint rosy predictions in relation to the promulgation of the new law, they fail, and rather predictably so, to address dubious provisions in the law itself. According to IBON Foundation, an independent think-tank group, “the reclassification of lands for tourism means only one thing for rural families: the large-scale physical and economic displacement of farmers and fisherfolk communities.”

“The government’s apparent fixation on tourism is merely another illustration of how skewed and anti-people its economic policies are,” IBON adds. “While government allocates billions of pesos to infrastructure development to support tourists and potential investors and promotes tourism for foreign tourism corporations, it encourages the displacement of agricultural communities and continues to default on their much-needed support and subsidy.”

More: Tourism Act 2009: More land grabbing, more displacement

Talk about depressing

How does it feel like to be a 21st century global pariah? Here:

“…it would take the Philippines between 132 years and 241 years — depending on the indicator being measured — to catch up with the living standards of industrialized countries at its current pace of economic growth. The disparity in per capita income was far greater than in the other indicators of living standards. Even if the calculations were off by 10 or even 20%, the gaps remain dismayingly wide.”

More: Philippines: Around 2 centuries behind

And totally off-topic, but totally relevant nevertheless: “Know Your Enemy” by Green Day, the most effing swell single to surface in MTV in a really long while. One doesn’t live a full life without hearing Green Day perform this song live.

Silence is the enemy / Against your urgency / So rally up the demons of your soul