iBOONDOCK

Well, we’re sure you know that we’re not a fan of Baguio Congressman Mauricio Domogan (note: we used to like him when he was starting his political career) but we’re giving him credit for putting up a website which provides details on where his pork barrel is going. So let’s give the Congressman points for transparency. We hope that other Cordillera officials are just as transparent with their use of public funds so their constituents can see where these are being spent.

In the case of Congressman Domogan, click here if you like to see where he budgeted his pork barrel.

Now, it’s up to the people of Baguio to investigate if the projects listed by their Representative are worth the money that were supposedly poured into them. If they are, then we should give more points to Morris. If the projects turn out to be “for compliance only”, then we should deduct points from him.

What do you think?

IMAGE CREDIT: morrisdomogan.com

Mom rues loss of OFW daughter to insurgent attack in Kabul
By Frank Cimatu/Inquirer

Herminia’s sweet little girl is coming home but it is not the homecoming she wanted for her daughter. Zennia Aguilan, 31, a physical therapist, was killed with five other people on Monday when armed men stormed the Serena Hotel in Kabul, Afghanistan.

Her 60-year-old mother, Herminia Aguilan, was not sure when her body would be brought home. “She’s short and very sweet,” said Herminia, a retired teacher at Saint Mary’s School in the tourist town of Sagada in Mt. Province.

“She called regularly and the last time was when she greeted me ‘Happy New Year,’” she said by telephone.

Zennia, the fifth of seven children, was still small when her father died.

Her only sister is the eldest and a nurse in the United States so Zennia was her mother’s little helper, said her aunt, Mary Padilan.

“She’s very loving especially with kids,” said her cousin Shirley Lebeng. “Zennia wanted to help her family and I don’t think she had a boyfriend. She always gave us gifts,” Lebeng said.

“My daughter is very thoughtful,” Herminia said.

Although originally from Agawa village in neighboring Besao town in Mt. Province, Zennia and her siblings had to stay in Sagada to be with their mother. Read the rest of this entry »

Thanks to our tipster from Canada who wrote us about the achievements of Nick Domalsin. Here’s what he said:

I would like to contribute something to the article First Igorots to achieve…… in BodyBuilder category. The first Mr. Philippines is Nick Domalsin Sr. in 1962 and he is from Barlig Mt.Province. He founded the Baguio Health Club and the older Ayochok was his student & kabagian also from Barlig.

With that tip, we did some research on Nick Domalsin. Thankfully, we found photos and more information about him which you can see after the jump.
Read the rest of this entry »

Our condolences to the family of Zennia Aguilan especially to Ma’am Herminia. Our thoughts and prayers are with you.
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From GmaNews.TV: Relatives and friends describe 31-year-old Zennia P. Aguilan as daring, adventurous, kind-hearted, and bright. With this attitude, Zennia left her hometown in Sagada, Mountain Province after completing a course on physical therapy in 2004 to work in Taiwan.

Two years later, she moved to Dubai, then to Afghanistan in July last year.

Little did she know that her adventure in Kabul would end her life. Zennia passed away on Tuesday after sustaining serious injuries from explosions when suicide bombers attacked Monday night the only five-star Serena Hotel in the Afghan capital where she worked as a spa supervisor.

Wire reports said at least eight other persons died in the attack.

Shirley Lebeng, Zennia’s cousin residing in Baguio City, described her as modest and a very bright child since her elementary days at the Anglican-run St. Mary’s School in Sagada. “She was good and kind-hearted.”

Lebeng said Zennia’s employer, a European who owns Spa Resources International at the Serena Hotel, telephoned the OFW’s mother and assured her of the repatriation of Zennia’s remains as soon as possible.

Herminia Aguilan, Zennia’s mother, is a retired school teacher in Sagada. She appealed to authorities to help bring her body home soon.
Read the rest of this entry »

Ramon Tulfo is not my kind of columnist but he does have interesting “exposes” sometimes. In his December 22, 2007 column he writes about a Cordillera official who is reportedly selling Baguio ancestral lands.

Hah! If Tulfo’s story is true, we are totally clueless as to who this official is but maybe some of you know.

From Ramon Tulfo’s On Target:

During the time of President Marcos, a judge of the defunct Court of First Instance approved the titling of Burnham Park in Baguio City to a private person.

Up to now, that kind of scam is going on in Baguio City.

There is reportedly a racket in the Department of Environment and Natural Resources where ancestral lands of native tribes are auctioned off illegally.

The Court of Appeals recently nullified land auctions conducted by the DENR in Baguio, calling them scams.

An official of the Cordillera Autonomous Region, a professed close friend of a former Cabinet secretary, is reportedly selling ancestral lands of Igorot tribesmen in the City of Pines.

Secretary Lito Atienza, please look into this matter!

SOMEWHAT RELATED POST: The Biggest Landgrabber of Them All

INFO SOURCE: Inquirer.

From Time Magazine/August 13, 1945

In the steep Caraballo Mountains of northern Luzon, a battalion of the 127th Infantry Regiment last week came upon a vast road block—a chasm blasted by retreating Japs.

A battalion commander, Lieut. Colonel Powell A. Fraser, had his jeeps dismantled, called for native bearers. Scores of volunteers—sturdy, brown-bodied Igorot women —eagerly picked up wheels, engines and other parts, carried them along paths which at one point soared 2,000 feet above the road. On the other side of the chasm the jeeps were reassembled, and Fraser’s men sped after the Japs. The Igorot women stayed behind to help the engineers rebuild the road.

Related Posts:
It Was Also a Women’s War
Those Gallant Igorots

Here’s a story we found at the San Francisco Chronicle. It is a good and interesting read.

Averil Pooten Watan and Mark Watan: The pull of ancestors
By Louise Rafkin/San Francisco Chronicle

In 1995 they were teenagers. Mark Watan, 18 and a native of San Francisco, and Averil Pooten, 16, a Londoner, were youth delegates to a world conference for Igorots in Los Angeles. An indigenous tribal people from the mountains of the Philippines, Igorots remained independent in the face of the Spanish colonization and, as a result, had a unique history. Both Averil and Mark, second-generation Igorots, hailed from families who convened every few years to preserve their rare cultural and spiritual traditions.

The world of second-generation Igorot expats was small. Fewer than 20 families had settled in England and not many more than that in California – and both thought of those in their local populations as siblings, or cousins. So finding each other, with a shared passion for ancestry but without sticky family ties, well, that was interesting! Averil found Mark hilarious and loud, yet sweet. As for Mark, Averil was spunky and gorgeous. At the close of the conference, Mark scrawled out his e-mail address.
Read the rest of this entry »