Boxing Day

MANILA, Philippines — Manny Pacquiao can’t match up with Floyd Mayweather who must serve three months in the slammer, but today is “Boxing Day.”

It is December 26, the day after Christmas, when those who have feasted and opened their presents the night before gather unwanted gifts and left-overs and “box” them in care packages for the poor.  If you don’t want them, do they rate among your good works?

Ambassador Maria Cleofe Natividad is “caroling” from Berlin about the warm chemistry between Foreign Affairs Secretary Albert del Rosario and his German counterpart FM Guido Westerwelle when they signed the updated cultural agreement.

Former German State Secretary Minister Hildegard Hambrücher held that in the field of culture, there are no developed or developing countries, but all peoples have something to contribute to the universal Good, the True, and the Beautiful.

Philippine-German relations are too important and wide-ranging to be held hostage to Fraport and NAIA3; and both sides are hopeful of light at the end of the tunnel.

Team Philippines (embassy, attached services, and honorary consuls) gave Secretary Del Rosario power-point presentation of their projects (including scholarship program) and Vickie Villar drove all the way from Frankfurt to Berlin with the Filipino community to provide entertainment.

Madame Gretchen del Rosario graced the formal opening of the Philippine Consulate in Dresden.

Germany operates two-way cultural engagements.  It doesn’t only send Bach, Goethe, and Fassbinder, but also welcomes the Bayanihan, Madrigal Singers, Raul Sunico.  Goethe Institute-Philippines restored the classic Noli me Tangere film as its gift for the 150th anniversary of Jose Rizal and a Brillante Mendoza film is in the Berlin filmfest.

When he comes to Germany, a piece of the Berlin Wall awaits President P-Noy  –  the logical heir of his mother’s EDSA People Power.

39 NGOs AND COUNTING.  Beginning first with a “Tawilis” self-help program in Batangas, former Japanese Ambassador Tadeo Tanaka now counts 39 NGOs in the Philippines.

We had a pre-Christmas dinner when he visited to work on his 40th and 41st NGOs. He doesn’t believe in charity but teaches a man to fish to maintain his dignity, to help himself, and to learn to help others.

This is Tanaka-san’s second visit this year.  He usually comes three or four times a year; but funds from his donors were directed at a time to Fukushima.  Now that the crisis has ebbed, the funds for his Philippine NGOs are coming in again.

WORK HARD, PLAY HARD.  Like most Japanese, Ambassador Tanaka appreciates the TLC care of Filipino nurses and knows that the rigorous language test is an obstacle course.  But the Japanese government faces a strong Japanese nurses lobby.

He would find time to drive to Tagaytay for a golf game; but I begged off because I am a hazard on the course.

Ambassador Tanaka says Ambassador Manolo Lopez is appreciated equally by the Gaimusho and the Filipino community.

Ambassador Lopez sent his Consul General Solphie Confiado in line of fire to help in Fukushima, especially the Filipino residents.

RE-WEDDING.  None the worse for the experience, Solphie and his wife Precie celebrated their 25th wedding anniversary the other Saturday at the Church of Jesus the Healer with nears, dears, and CfC.

They’ve come a long way from start-up in a 70 sqm flat with a black-and-white Zenith TV with video (but no sound), later supplemented with a Radiowealth TV with sound (but no video)  —  the perfect metaphor for just-married couple become one.

SAY THAT AGAIN?  It is sophistry to say that former President GMA as a detainee is not entitled special privileges and may, therefore, not be given Christmas furlough.  Isn’t that precisely because she is a detainee that her lawyers apply for furlough?  Pasko naman, ibigay mo na!