Comments on: The “outrage” of the not-directly-affected

By: leytenian

leytenian — Mon, 01 Dec 2008 01:22:11 +0000

“Name one Pinoy “hero” who delivered REAL MEASUREABLE RESULTS to the average Pinoy schmoe.” benigno

hahaha!!! you make me laugh so hard.

that would be me.I am a hero :) I have sent at least a few of my relatives to college. Most of them were average pinoys. Now, they are employed and helping their other families. I don’t need to explain the REAL measurable results. The results is like a pyramid. You help 3, the 3 helps another 3 and so on. Many of the OFW’s and the employed pinoys in the Philippines are considered heroes. Why is it always me who will make benigno understand. :)

“Great nations were not built on good intentions. They were built on business sense. Real change in Pinoy society will never be achieved through the “sacrifice” of altruistic “heroes”. True change will be driven by people who find no shame in expecting a buck for their trouble. – Benign0″

Wrong. Great Nations were built on good intentions. They were built on business concept.

Business trouble here and there cannot go on forever. It’s unsustainable. There’s a life cycle for every business just like an economic cycle. One must do the right thing during the cycle. Unethical practices will always pay its tolls in the future. It will somehow gets on the way of growth.

A great example of great nations not built on good intentions : the US financial crisis. :)

By: Attack of the killer shawarmas! | Filipino Voices

Attack of the killer shawarmas! | Filipino Voices — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 23:28:04 +0000

[...] is an especially compelling point to ponder considering a disaster that impacted (specifically ended) 800 lives had a more than ample empirical trail that any effort to analyse and quibble over would have been [...]

By: Truth, justice, and Da Pinoy way | Filipino Voices

Truth, justice, and Da Pinoy way | Filipino Voices — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 00:30:41 +0000

[...] More than 800 lives snuffed out in a maritime accident involving a shipping company that continues to trade despite having been involved in multi-thousand-casualty “accidents” over the last 15 years — including the worst peacetime sea disaster in history. [...]

By: benign0

benign0 — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 01:43:04 +0000

I find it disturbing that our neighbours export to Oz, arguably one of the richest consumers in the neighbourhood, and we have nothing.

Spot on observation sparks. My own observation on the culinary wasteland that is Pinoy cuisine is articulated in my book, where I wrote:

As Thai, Indian, Vietnamese, Malaysian, and Indonesian restaurants flourish all over the world, Filipino cuisine, otherwise equally exotic in taste and variety, languishes in obscurity. There are no business models for marketing it across cultures, no artistic or at least tasteful way of preparing and presenting it, and no wherewithal in the few restaurateurs of Filipino cuisine to expand beyond their ethnic Filipino clientele. At one extreme, the Japanese are known for weaving elaborate philosophies around food preparation and presentation. Filipinos, on the other extreme, have very little if any regard for food presentation. As long as their chow can be contained in big vats and shovelled into one’s maw as quickly as possible along with a fistful of rice, the Filipino gourmet is happy.

It takes a bit of imagination to develop a world-class brand. Whilst Singapore and Malaysia are now world renowned for not just their cuisine but a whole bunch of other things, the "Philippines" stands for no more than street ocho-ocho fiestas and a tired old relic of postwar transportation "ingenuity".

By: datuh

datuh — Sun, 29 Jun 2008 00:18:50 +0000

jonas, maybe the last time you checked, you didn’t check hard enough. yes, you’ll see a lot of action today done by the government agencies concerned. sa lahat naman ng trahedya ganyan sila. they come out in full force, with all these task forces, investigations, etc. but check again later, when all the media hype dies down, and see if significant things were done not just to rescue (i hope there are more survivors) and recover but to prosecute those who are responsible for the tragedy. and while your waiting why don’t you check what happened even before the tragedy. have you seen the news about the GMDSS thing that DOTC bought suppoesedly to enable the Coastguard to guard Philippine seas. if i remember it right, this cost billions, again, but was never functional. so much for your government agencies.
and BTW, i didn’t anything of becoming anarchists.

By: caffeine_sparks

caffeine_sparks — Sat, 28 Jun 2008 23:43:28 +0000

Jon,

Filipino corporations who venture abroad are still courting Filipinos overseas.

The Asian goods aisles in Oz were patronised not only by Asians but by non-Asians. I find it disturbing that our neighbours export to Oz, arguably one of the richest consumers in the neighbourhood, and we have nothing. If we look at our grocery stores here, Australian products have been around for a while. And because of AFTA, there are also products from Southeast Asia. It would be interesting to know if we have any of our products in Malaysia, Thailand, Singapore etc.

By: cvj

cvj — Sat, 28 Jun 2008 19:22:37 +0000

Jon, i think Sparks is thinking of exports that would appeal not only to Filipino migrants but to other nationals as well. IMHO, Jollibee, Chowking & Oishi are good starts but we need to step up to the likes of LG, Samsung, Nintendo. By this standard, even the vaunted Tsinoy entrepreneurs are laggards.

By: Jon Limjap

Jon Limjap — Sat, 28 Jun 2008 18:21:36 +0000

sparks,

I wonder if Jollibee’s “export” of Jollibee and Chowking (rebranded as Yong He King in China) is enough to partially satisfy your craving to see local companies step up to world-class challenges.

I guess in your terms “broad” is Australia. Indeed, I wonder why there isn’t any Filipino products in those groceries, considering the number of Filipinos there? Could we fault the Filipino’s tendency to adapt (or, probably more precisely, “acclimate”) easily to any culture in such a way that he doesn’t create demand for products from his own country despite their numbers?

I wonder.

By: Anna

Anna — Sat, 28 Jun 2008 14:38:41 +0000

“Name one Pinoy “hero” who delivered REAL MEASUREABLE RESULTS to the average Pinoy schmoe.”

Your conditional imperative is a false conditional. I thought Rizal dunit! i.e., if you read statements of politicos measuring their results or equating their words with the heroism of Rizal. They certainly are less than the average Pinoy schmoe (politicos that is)…

By: cvj

cvj — Sat, 28 Jun 2008 08:34:36 +0000

Incidentally, the example of the guava farmers above is one answer to your earlier question in Manolo’s blog:

“Live and learn with the poor?

What is there to “learn” from the poor? How to be poor? :D

The fact remains that they are POOR. Which means somewhere in their lives or among their ancestors, something did not go right.

I’d rather learn from the rich. You learn how to get rich by observing and learning from the rich.

It’s simple, really” :D – Benign0, at April 22nd, 2008, 9:51 am

It is possible, even desirable, to mix altruism with business sense.