I condemn the Ampatuan massacre

yesterday, 21 people were killed in Maguindanao. people were on their way to the COMELEC office to file a certificate of candidacy. they never made it. along the way, 40 were taken hostage and 21 of them found dead. the massacre is being blamed on Gov. Ampatuan, a new Maguidanao dynasty, but one not afraid to abuse its power.

I condemn these killings. I condemn any abuse of political power. I condemn the culture of impunity in the Philippines. I do not know what my condemning it can do. But I want my government to know about it. I want my people to know about it.

24 hours post-RP submission

it has almost been 24 hours since i submitted my research paper (11/11, 4:21AM) and the disbelief of coming up a master's paper still amazes me. technically, we had five months to research and write. but discipline has always been my problem. most people began taking the task seriously september, when supervisors started asking for details of field research and data-gathering.

despite:
15 days of travel
endless movie nights
frequent facebook checks and posts, including mafia wars every three hours
livestreaming television every hour
the greatest halloween party ever
'disturbing the peace'

i made it. i did it. and on time. wow.

of course i could hardly assess the quality of the paper. my supervisor liked the idea, but that never really is a gauge of a final grade. but what the heck!!! i don't care. i achieved something i never imagined i would ever do. and i enjoyed the process of discovering the value of my research. maybe not to the development studies field, but to myself. i've learned things that i wanted to do eventually.

i'm just happy to be done. happy to be free!