Updated: Please Help the People of Aklan =(
Updates:
Thanks to those who sent help. We were able to gather 40 boxes of clothes, food and medicine. Maraming-maraming salamat po. 
Also, a lot of the people in our community are also doing their best to gather relief for the people of Panay Islands (Antique, Capiz and IloIlo).
—-
On the morning of my birthday last Monday I received bad news that my aunt’s house in Aklan was destroyed by the typhoon Frank. Water rose up to the roof. Saturday afternoon they had to transfer to my Tita Baby’s elevated house while holding on to a water hose. Water level rose up to six feet high, people where on top of roofs for their safety. My kababayan’s are located in Brgy. Cerrudo, Banga, Aklan which is only walking distance from Aklan River which overflowed during the typhoon.
There have been much coverage of the destruction of typhoon Frank in Iloilo but not much on Aklan. Aklan was badly damaged too. People have completely lost their homes. Help from the governemnt have been slow. There are no banks, groceries, water, electricity, communication, hospitals.
On behalf of the people of Banga, Aklan. I am appealing for donations. My uncle (Ciril Rentillo) has a trucking service that will transfer the goods directly from Manila to people of Banga, Aklan. The incumbment Vice-Mayor of Banga, Aklan, Melanio Rentillo is my uncle so if you have any relatives in the area that you have tried to contact with no success we maybe of help in trying to locate them. My contact information is indicated below.
I’m appealing for donations of:
- - old clothes, specially kid’s/baby clothes
- - canned goods,
- - shoes, slippers
- - noodles
- - medicines
- - blankets
- - rice
- - water
- - sleeping mats (banig)
You can also drop off your donations to my unit in:
Unit 1111
Cityland Pioneer, Highway Hills,
Pioneer, Mandaluyong
If you’re in Muntinlupa/Ortigas/Mandaluyong area, you could contact me to pick up your donations:
0920-9085407 / 0915-866-6117
desiree.mendoza@yahoo.com
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Sincerely,
Desiree R. Mendoza
—-
Here is a documentation of the what happened in Aklan
http://kyrienne.wordpress.com/2008/06/25/aklan-and-typhoon-frank-2/
Typhoon Frank’s Destruction
These pictures are courtesy of Nester Anne Andrade-Templonuevo through http://lcn516.multiply.com/photos/album/2/
Photo Cortesy of Marco_Agt
Random Shots of Happiness
Wake up and smell the roses…
Hmmm. Ghirardelli 60% Cacao Bittersweet Chips + Andes Creme de Mente Chocolate Chips equals…
…Chocolate Mint Cookies.
This is how you start a brand new day.
TDP Send Off
Last Friday’s TDP send off was overwhelming. It moved me to tears — like a gallon of them and at least its not just me who cried 
Muchos Gracias to everyone who gave thoughtful farewell messages. Thank you for the cheesy “We cannot spell the Design People without D-E-S”. It was cheesy but in a good way. 
Everyone prepared and brought alcoholic drinks and I had to stay away for my own good. LOL. Thank you to my happy bunch, the Lunchies, specially J, who I know orchestrated the whole surprise.
I was trying to hard not to cry during the morning but when the clock striked 3:00 pm Beng started crying, kainez. Hands down the best part was the highlight of the gifts…I will let the pictures tell the story.
Is it a wabbit?
I hadn’t even opened the wrapper but one touch was enough to figure out what was the content.
Literally, rolling out the floor laughing and crying. I can’t breath. Kaloka.
Now what on earth is this? And who is Sister Guia?
What’s Sr. Guia got to do with it? With all due respect to this person who has been subject of this weird fixation.
For almost five years we always had our lunch at Megamall. Part of the lunch routine was withdrawing money from the ATM near the Food Court. While waiting for everyone to go through their transaction there is about 5-10 idle minutes to just observe. Unfortunately I always fixate my observation to a novelty store located just across the ATM machine. The store sells a lot of wooden novelty stuff that I would never put in my home. Haha. They had really cheesy stuff like avant-garde looking Disney characters, Last Supper frames and souvenirs with odd messages. Then there was this unusual wooden plaque with an image of a nun prominently displayed by the window. I was over analyzing it every freakin’ day and what it meant that it became part of my daily habit. Every now and then we would discuss and formulate the story behind the wooden plaque of Sr. Guia.
Who is Sr. Guia? Why would anybody want an award from her? Was there a saint named Sr. Guia (I was never good at saints)? Was this some sort of plaque of appreciation? Did she keep a stock of this so every time she wants to thank a person she draws out a trophy from her bag? It came to a point I seriously wanted to have one made for the TDP The Design Person monthly awards. I even took pictures of it and showed it to random people in the office and asked what they thought of the “design” of the new TDP trophy. Wouldn’t that be cool and fun in a weird way. Imagine the best employee awardee expressing…”thank you …but what the eff is this?”
Now I would like to commend among my Lunchie’s the brave soul who bought the wooden plaque. J, being the decent man that he is apparently said something along the lines of “tangina…I can’t believe we’re doing this”. He then excused himself and went to Fax and Parcel and had some collage printed. I think it was Preck who asked the sales lady how much was it. The sales person said there was minimum order of 50-100 pieces. Oh wow what to do with 100 Sr. Guia plaques?! HAHAHAHAHAHA. They initially thought they wanted a batch made and they were asked in great curiosity “Kilala nyo si Sr. Guia?” Hahahaha. The sales person was baffled why the hell they wanted to buy this wooden plaque when they had no association with Sr Guia or the institution she represents. Intervention had to be made, they had call the owner because they didn’t want to sell it. The persuasion worked and thus my gift. It’s now proudly displayed in my work table. LOL. Every now and then I should be prepared to tell the story of Sr. Guia.
Thank you J, Preck, Joyce and She to go through all that weird trouble and entrusting me to take care good care of our Sr. Guia.
Special thanks to Mike and Tiger for the food and drinks and for giving me the opportunity to work with The Design People. Did you guys know it was a choice between me and another designer. J didn’t want to hire me (you bastard). But I think god made it happen for a purpose. TDP will always remain an inspiration to me specially the story of its humble beginnings in a tiny apartment. It was wonderful that Tiger can still remember my interview and he said he remembered asking me that time where do I see myself in five years. I answered, I wanted to have my own business.
Thank you all the departments - AI, Dev, Designers, HTML/Flash, IMD, Night Shift Dept. and the Aquarium peeps.
I will miss many daily routines. Breakfast in the morning, monthly awards, drunken nights at Stir, design psychological warfare, manita ng late (LOL), my Lunchies, eating, more eating, TL meetings, Owtee’s morning greetings, cooking for my Lunchies, fashion anecdotes with Alex and Camille, crazy TDP Christmas parties (where there is always one drunken casualty), “solid with gradients”, yun crush ko, hehehe and just goofing around.
I will be jogging near that area (Gold Loop) so I guess I’ll see you around.
And in true spirit of Sr. Guia - in gratitude, xoxo, Des.
Protected: The Truth
New Life :)
Valerie, My Pal-erie
Valerie is one of our project managers in LA. Today is her last day in TDP LA. She will be moving on to greater things in her career.
—-
Sweetie, sorry if I was in a rush to say goodbye in the video conference this morning. I had to do some business in the bank for my future that involves outside of work There’s no way I can beat J’s farewell to you today. Hahaha. So I just want to say my best of luck to you my dearest friend. Remember the fun YM conferences we have, you teach us Bahasa and we teach you Tagalog — thanks to you we know how to goreng anything. LOL. Me and J loves you so much. You know that
Forgive me for stealing this picture from your Friendster account. It was a toss between this and your kiddie picture.
Love,
Des
Protected: :(
You’re still goin’ strong
“I don’t wanna go back working in the cubicle and contribute to someone else’s vision.”
Jillian Lewis
Designer/Illustrator for Ralph Lauren
Project Runway 4 Finalist
John and I haven’t seen each other for a month. I dropped by the school, brought food and we spent the rest of the afternoon just catching up. I was surprised to see him so tanned — “Nice, I love it…I see we’re going for the refugee look.” He me gave a sharp eye and condemned me to go hell. His slightly toasted sun burnt complexion was a result of his first surfing lessons in La Union. He wants me to tag along next time. I was kinda apprehensive because my ex was a surfer and he frequents that area and this was the ex I avoid like a plague that once I had to hide below a bookshelf in a bookstore. He said I need not worry because the waves around this season is perfect for beginners. Right. It was the same thing he told me when we played badminton in Meralco Ave., that people who played there were non-professionals. Non-professionals meaning they were just training to be one.
John was an oracle and he told me - “You looked stressed , and I mean not physically — you’re emotionally stressed”. Told him not to worry as June is almost near. Both of us were busy struggling with our own life complications for the past couple of weeks . His visit to La Union turned out be great and me visiting him gave me a little boost that I needed that day.
John’s aura and life perspectives have been so different these days. He was so just damn positive. The sun, sand, sea and surf had this overwhelming effect on him. We chatted about business, about how everyone starts small and how he made the right decision to stay here in Manila instead of working overseas. We talked about visiting places this year, going back to La Union, hopefully French-Embassy-willing Paris and if Paris doesn’t work out, Australia.
This is the big difference when your talking to single or gay friends versus married friends. Married friends talk about life insurance, educational plans and brands of diapers. When I talk to my single or gay friends, it’s always about traveling, investments, shopping and other random fabulousness.
I also met Jen, one of John’s students. Jen has a small business making customized denim jeans. About a year ago she was also in the same predicament as I am. She just knew in her heart that she was ready to go establish her own business and staying in a confined cubicle was driving her mad each day. She quit her sales job at a top telecoms company and decided to go full time in her business endeavors. It was the one of the best decisions she made in her life. She still encounters business problems every now and then but that’s part of this whole new ball game. Talking to Jen and comparing parallel notes as designers, as business women and quitting a secure job to pursue a calling, was more than enough encouragement and validation that I know I am doing the right thing.
Protected: Jack
Heath Ledger, 1979-2008
This is so heart breaking, Australian actor Heath Ledger was found dead in his New York apartment. Sources say it could be accidental drug overdose. I loved him in A Knight’s Tale and he made me cry in Brokeback Mountain.
Bye Love 
Photo: Michael Caulfield/Associated Press
Pre-divorce Michelle Williams & Heath Ledger, Oscars 2006. Awww. Michelle William’s dress was fantastic!
Photo: Lucy Nicholson/Reuters
Viral site for the The Dark Knight movie, WhySoSerious.com also made this nice and subtle tribute. Damn, it would be so creepy to watch this Batman installment since his interviews tell a premonition of his untimely death.
