Filipinos & the World Cup

Living in Europe, you can’t help but feel obliged excited to watch the World Cup. And as this and this article mention, Filipinos are mostly absent from this football craze. Though for me, it's a different situation, It’s almost halfway through the games & I’m happy to say that I’ve been brainwashed into this football watching/screaming/vuvuzela-ing (?) supporter.

FILIPINOS FOOTBALL? We can draw inspiration from Paulino Alcantara, Spanish-Filipino striker of FC Barcelona and is the highest scorer in FC Barcelona's history. (horrible background music btw)

And I’m actually getting into it well and enjoying the experience (I’m watching Brazil v. Cote d’Ivoire while writing this entry).  And I think more than the excitement of the actual games, the social aspect of watching one is what attracts me the most.  Like last night, I spared the usual going out to party for some cookies, curacao and the Denmark v. Cameroon game at my friends’ place. And when you do game fixtures then watch the games with loads of people in pubs or in someone’s flat, it gets better. Though recently, I've been enjoying  mocking the French team. J

Belgium is not playing, but expats in Brussels plus the Belgian francophones & néerlandophones cheering for France & Netherlands respectively have put the usual life into standstill. If you want to watch games in public places in Brussels, I would recommend to see it in Place Luxembourg or some pubs like The Old Oak or Hairy Canary in the Schuman area. Most are expat-filled places, though I'm interested to get the feel of  watching with Belgians, so do write them up if you know one.

I’m ecstatic and for sure will be following the games up to the finals. People usually ask who I’m cheering for, at the moment, I don’t have any. I hope that one day – I can watch the games and actually support the Philippines. When it will happen, I don’t know – and I know it takes more than just training good players but probably re-shaping our sporting culture.

A toute!

So how do you think Belgian music sounds like?

A concert in Botanique Nuit is a good way to enjoy Belgium’s and some of the world’s indie music scene. Staged on the beautiful glass building of Jardin Botanique, this 2 week event gathers indie bands (and some popular names) within Belgium & its neighbors.

I went last Saturday to see Absynthe Minded, a Belgian band that I recently just started listening. The concert was great. Absynthe Minded fused together classical instruments into pop-rock music. Bass Violin, violin, piano & trumpet are instruments that I have never seen since yesterday in a rock concert. However, I agree with a friend of mine who mentioned that their songs are somewhat a bit pop. Though, I don’t see anything wrong about it. Don’t know if this is how Belgian music generally sounds like.

It’s also nice to see a mainly Belgian crowd & actually watch my first only-Belgian band in concert. And what's ironic even is that the band somewhat reflected the current structure of Belgium – they’re a Ghent-based band (so they’re Flemish), who spoke to the audience in French & sang their songs in English. Only in Belgium, my friends.

See a video from the event (the video’s not mine)

Belgium: The second country I call home

Living in Belgium for more than a year & a half, I have grown to love & enjoy this small yet wonderful country. And I can't summarize how thankful I am that I got lucky that I managed to get matched in Belgium. It may not be as touristic as France, as lively as Spain nor as charming as Italy - but Belgium for me is one of the countries I can truly and won't regret to call as home. :)

Longer version:

Here comes the sun

In the immortal words of Paul, Ringo, John & George - 'Little darling, it's been a long cold lonely winter, little darling, it feels like years since it's been here".

And having survived 2 long winters, I became myself, like the dudes who made this song, a sun fan! I just love the sun. And this weekend was practically the sunniest weekend we had in months. The skies were so blue (partly due to the European airspace closure) that it would be a sin not to go out.

If the sun would have had a facebook fan page, everyone would have 'Liked' it, (I just checked - it actually does). And it would this weekend one of twitter's trending topic and would have kicked Justin Bieber's ass. However, as on everything, not everyone loves the sun.

I spent Saturday afternoon at the Woluwe Park, one of Brussels most beautiful park. And Sunday, I spent the entire afternoon on Brussels second most beautiful park, our garden. Everyone was outside, except my flatmate Simon, who spent his entire weekend at home. I already sent him an invite to the I hate the sun facebook fanpage.



And thanks to the sun, I manage to keep myself away from unproductive things like the internet. Aside from being with my friends, I was also with my new girlfriend - Lisbeth Salander. We spent so much time together. She kept me excited, and I can't deny that this weekend wouldn't be as fun without her.

The weekend like this should come more often. But as this is Belgium, I think it won't be the case. Ho-hum. And yes, tomorrow it's already going to be cloudy.

While we're at it. Make sure you read this article as well.

• Benefits of moderate sun exposure

for the sake of updating

there comes a time in every blogger, despite having lots of ideas what to blog, he becomes just lazy to do it. And then he stupidly comes up with a meaningless entries like this - with no additional value whatsoever.

Today's the time.

Perhaps this will motivate me more to update the blog.Well, just look at my cool new layout, ain't it sweet?

ON JOURNALISM: A good read: End of the world as we know it

Following a journalist’s twitter account (@codybrown), I stumbled upon this commentary by Robert Thomson on what it is to be a ‘professional’ journalist in this digital age.

Quoting him – “Journalists have to be flexible, they have to understand that readers' lives have changed and that unless we are responsive to those changes, and tailor content for these new templates, journalists will have made themselves redundant.”

The advent of the so-called ‘citizen journalist’ and real time’ information sharing through online social networks like facebook, twitter challenges conventional journalists on speed of information sharing and on establishing a valuable (and real-time) dialogue to the audiences. So now that everyone can become the transmitter of news, and can be faster than how newspapers (even their online versions) publish their news, does this signal the end of the professional journalist?

It does not. – Robert Thomson says why and how we can make ourselves stand-out.

He explains that today’s journalists have the advantage, which is our knowledge of fundamentals: proper reporting & writing, copyediting, beat specialization & ethics. Though he emphasizes that practitioners should adapt to the digital age. And this is where, he mentions, journalists of today & tomorrow should invest. We need to be in a state of continuous learning – starting with the basics such as knowing how to do your own multimedia presentation, learning how to maximize tools such as facebook, twitter & linkedin, opening ourselves to new online trends and trying it out.

The technology is here (and ever growing) and it’s up to today’s journalist to maximize the use of these online tools.

Anyway, be sure to check out his article. A must read.

The next big thing

Blogging About Rome

You might not know but I'm also keeping a blog solely for my travel notes. Here's a recent entry about my trip to Rome last June. Be sure to also check out my other entries particularly on my big trip to Morocco.





Cheers!

Film Français et la musique

Since I moved here in Belgium, I developed this tendency to like and enjoy movies and songs that are in French. I guess it's part of integration to the Belgian society. Though, it will still be a long shot before I start understanding what they mean and I at the moment I still have to rely on subtitles and translation.

We watched the movie La Vie En Rose (La Mome) earlier in a French channel. It was in French so I didn't understand the movie but I will definitely watch it soon. It's a story about Edith Piaf, a famous French singer in the 40s-50s. It was the first time I heard of her name but she's particularly gained worldwide acclaim from her song La Vie En Rose.

Here's a youtube link of her video, s'amuser et à toute à l'heure!

Jerick Travels to Essaouira

I manage to quickly do a blog entry on Essaouira from our trip to Morocco last June. Click on the link below to check it out.



After a day in the hot and steaming desert, what better way to cool off than to go to the beach. So, of course, we thought and did something about it. READ MORE.