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Showing posts from April, 2025

Remembering the Red Tape of Requiring People to Learn Hokkien Before Learning Mandarin

  It's no secret that I had bad grades in elementary and high school. There's always this distinction between huan-a (which may no longer be offensive, and refers to anybody of the Malay-Indo race ) and the lan-nang (our people). However, I prefer to call myself hua-lang (華人, Huárén) over lan-nang. Early last year, I wrote about why the old Sin Jiang textbooks were written the way they were . Barely anything can be understood by the non-Chinese speaker! It's funny but true! Honestly, we were even forbidden from romanizing, and we had to use Zhuyin Fuhao--something no longer applicable with Standard Chinese! Taiwan is still left using Zhuyin. Zhuyin may be best rendered as obsolete as the Alibata for standard writing or inputs. The Chinese schools in the Philippines all operated under a single standard. Learning Chinese was often characterized by the "死記硬背 sǐ jì yìng bèi" or "Memorize to the point of death" mentality (read here ). People had to learn Hokk...

April 1 Humor: When Chicken Restaurants Create Some Funny April Fool's Ads

It's April Fool's Day, and what's April Fool's Day without some friendly humor? Here's some crazy stuff I found on Facebook: This one is way too ridiculous. I confess I'm a fan of Bok Korean Fried Chicken. However, I still prefer Bonenone Korean Chicken at A.S. Fortuna, Banilad, which still tastes better IMHO. My only problem with Bonenone is the difficulty in getting a parking space. However, Bok in IT Park can be a quick fix. So far, no restaurant should be stupid enough to give free chicken, for bringing a live chicken .  This Mang Inasal ad made me think, "Cool, there's mocha ice cream." However, the description from the Facebook page made it a clear joke. Looking at the caption, "Pwede ring hindi." meaning "Maybe not," with the laughing icon proves it's just a joke! This one would be totally a joke. Hopefully, Dairy Queen will offer mint chocolate after this joke. It's definitely not advisable to swallow toothpaste....

The Filipino First Policy Caused the Philippines to Succeed!

High School Philippine History Movement Yes, you read it right! I found a hidden gem that I should've read years ago! It's the book Nationalist Economics by the late Alejandro Lichauco, who is part of the magnificent IBON Foundation. It's a shame I refused to read it. I should've read Lichauco's book instead of the late Lee Kuan Yew's book From Third World to First . What a shame that I didn't look into the details that LKY was a dictator, that Flor Contemplacion was indeed innocent, and that Singapore is a state comparable to Nazi Germany. As I bought my copy of Nationalist Economics from the Trust Me Bro School of Economics--I'm now convinced that the Filipino First Policy caused us to succeed! LKY ruled Singapore for 31 years, meaning it's a frightening thing indeed! Six years is the magic number ot establish a benevolent rule!  Who should we all listen to? Should we listen to foreigners or should we listen to our fellow Filipino? We must think st...