THE C CIRCLE

I am saddened by the news over Yahoo that one of Hollywood’s finest actors, Patrick Swayze succumbed to cancer at age 57. I happened to watch two of Patrick’s well loved movies - Dirty Dancing (1987) and Ghost (1990s). However, the latter left a mark in my heart. As it was a movie, even though there was no violence or sex shown in it, but was watched and loved by a lot of people all over the world. I even watched it a dozen of times, if I’m not mistaken and I am keeping a DVD copy of it, too.

Ghost was a story of two people, truly in love with each other but in the heart wrenching end part of the movie had to separate ways for Sam (Patrick’s character) died from a gunshot wound when a robber tried to steal his wallet for the robber thought in it is where the code to a bank account is being kept by him.

Ghost also starred the drop-dead gorgeous beauty Demi Moore, who portrayed Patrick’s girlfriend - Molly and the hilarious Whoopi Goldberg, who played the character of Oda Mae Brown.

Sam’s ghost is haunting Oda Mae (a psychic medium) so that it can forewarn Molly of the danger that might befall her unless she stay away from Sam’s assassin, Carl, who happened to be their close friend. However, because of greediness, money took over Carl’s whole being.

For those of you who have not watched the movie “Ghost” yet, I encourage you to get a DVD copy of it and see for yourself what true love can do even beyond this life.

I have been longing to attend a christian Sunday service. It came to fulfillment this afternoon when I, together with two of my office mates attended New Life’s 2PM Sunday service at The Market Market.

We did not plan of attending the service. However, as it is said, God works in His own time. He made way for us to attend. When we reached New Life Christian Center, we were welcomed by the usherettes warmly. They even helped us to our seats.

The service was already starting with the “praise and worship” part when we came in. It was a different experience when you are with a group of people all mightily singing their heart’s content because they know that they are singing for God.

After the praise and worship part, the sermon started. It was delivered by Pastor Jocel Evangelista. The sermon was all about “The Power of Everyday”. Pastor preached that we have to be thankful and excited everyday for each day is a gift from God and that He has already planned the things that is going to come in our way.

I never thought that the praising song “This is The Day That The Lord Hath Made” can mean so much to me during that day when Pastor preached that since Jesus has already defeated tribulations when He died on the cross to save me, we need to rejoice everyday of our lives.

The sermon also included that we have to strive to bless others everyday and that the things that are ordinary to us could already be a miracle for others.

After the service, having what Pastor Jocel in mind, I wanted to be a blessing to my two office mates and so I asked them out for an early dinner after the service. In which by doing so, I know, God will return the blessings to me tenfolds!

On September 9^th, i-Elev8 Contact Solutions celebrated the birthday of one of its well loved Managers – Mac Herman.

Everybody had their own share in making Mac’s special day an event to remember.

The HR and Training Departments came up with a wacky idea. They collected video greetings from people from the streets who Mac does not even know. Fats connected with his sister in Canada via Facebook just to get her greet him while I stole his best girl friend’s cellphone number just to be connected to her and ask her to come up with a surprise birthday video greetings for him which we succeeded in doing!

We also collected Mac’s photos and put all of them in a powerpoint presentation with one of his favourite songs – We Are A Family (OST from the movie Dream Girls) as the background music.

While Mac was watching the videos, he got teary-eyed.

After the video and greetings presentations, it’s time for the agents to show what they have prepared. The MT/GT/CEP Teams, led by their Manager, Fats, did a dance number to the tune of different dance music. The night shift agents (US Mortgage, Federated, and CEP Outbound) also showcased skits and dance presentations.

To make the celebration of Mac’s birthday wackier, games were also played and everybody willingly participated – even without prizes!

i-Elev8’s President, Sir Ernie Lee graced the occasion.

September 4 is actually the birthday of my youngest sibling, Nheah. However, we celebrated her special day two days after.

I thought of treating her to a lunch so that Mom and Trix (my niece) could also come and enjoy instead of me, buying her a gift. We agreed to have it at Dampa in Sucat (initially) but when we were reaching the place, my office mate suggested to us to try another restaurant joint somewhere in Paranaque (just like Dampa) where we can buy fresh seafoods and have them cooked in the restaurant of our choice.

We bought tiger prawns, squids, oysters, and crab’s claws. For the prawns, we had it cooked in butter and garlic. For the squids, adobo. While we had the oysters and crab’s claws, steamed. We had our stomach really full!

Again, I would like to greet Nheah, a Happy, Happy Birthday!