hello from manila 26

there has been no rains for more than a week since i arrived from bangkok and i am challenged with manila weather. i feel like i am inside the dry sauna. i had to shower every so often and drink tons of water. hahaha

i spent the day with a college friend who invited sister sledge and me to attend a seminar on insurance systems. i was not particular about it before but since seven years ago, i soon realized that i will free myself of the cash burden if i get for myself a system that would take care of expenses should anything happen to me like accidents, health emergencies and all.

in a developing country like RP, health and life insurances are not in the top of the list of household expenditures. but i think all the more that people should invest on it. i asked myself these questions, can i afford it if i live very long? if i deposit that extra one thousand pesos to the bank today, how much will it cost tomorrow? with inflation, taxes, and currency crisis, this may very well be below the initial amount. but with life insurance, it will clearly be more than 100 times or the amount of the premium i paid for. so that was it, i decided to buy my future, again. i bought my second life insurance. next week will be the final week in the country, and i shall attend a 3-day training for ensuring people's future through proper investment of their disposable income.

later during the day, i bought some printed materials from filipino masters. i hope that the japanese market will appreciate them for they are beautifully crafted.

i had a splendid dinner with friends whom i have not met for so long. i was pleased to meet all of them particularly one who had an abdominal operation some few years before. he did not seem at all to have suffered from such an illness. he looked better than before. i also admired them because many of them are engaged into sports like badminton. i probably should get back to my favorite sport.

together with a friend, i visited malate and was surprised to see that there were not so many people on a friday night. was it because of the economic difficulties, or are there other more attractive places to spend fridays?