Guimaras Island- Mango Capital of the Philippines

Have you heard of Guimaras Island in the Philippines? When I was growing up in the Philippines, Guimaras island was still a part of the province of Iloilo -my province of birth. It became an independent province only in 1992.

My fathers roots ( K(C)atague surname) are from Guimaras. Today I have still relatives in the island. The video below from Living Channel Asia is a must view if you want to know more about this small province in the West Visayas Region of the Philippines

Guimaras is a fourth class island province of the Philippines located in the Western Visayas region. Among the smallest provinces, its capital is Jordan. The island is located in the Panay Gulf, between the islands of Panay and Negros. To the northwest is the province of Iloilo and to the southeast is Negros Occidental.

The province consists primarily of Guimaras Island, and also includes Inampulugan, Guiwanon (or Guiuanon), Panobolon, Natunga, Nadulao, and many minor surrounding islands. Geologists have concluded that the island once formed one landmass with Panay.

Philippines Schindler's List

The movie Schindler's List that I posted in my blog the other day reminded me of the following article I wrote about four years ago, about the Philippines participation in saving more than a thousand European Jews from the Holocaust.


A friend from the Philippines forwarded this article via e-mail today. I was 5 years old when this was the news. I barely remember it from my parents conversation about World War II. Anyway, if you are a Filipino or Filipino-American, you should read this and be proud of the Philippines.

Monument in Israel honors Filipinos, For saving 1,200 Jews from Holocaustt, By Volt Contreras, Philippine Inquirer dated August 24, 2010.

"MANILA, Philippines—Before Schindler’s List, there was another document—the Philippine visa—that saved hundreds of Jews from the gas chambers and mass graves of the Holocaust.

In 1939, two years before World War II reached the Pacific, the Commonwealth government under President Manuel L. Quezon allotted 10,000 visas and safe haven to Jews fleeing Nazi Europe. Some 1,200 Jews made it to Manila before the city itself fell to Japanese invaders.

Before sunset on June 21, 70 years later, the first ever monument honoring Quezon and the Filipino nation for this "open door policy" was inaugurated on Israeli soil.

The monument—a geometric, seven-meter-high sculpture titled "Open Doors"—was designed by Filipino artist Junyee (Luis Lee Jr.).

At the program held at the 65-hectare Holocaust Memorial Park in Rishon LeZion, Israel’s fourth largest city south of Tel Aviv, the mere mention of "Taft Avenue" by one of the speakers brought Ralph Preiss to the verge of tears.

Preiss, a father of four now in his 70s, later explained that Taft Avenue was where a synagogue-run soup kitchen provided the first hot meals he had as a refugee. He was eight when he arrived from Rosenberg, Germany, with his parents at the port of Manila on March 23, 1939.

"If I stayed in Germany I would have been killed," Preiss, a retired engineer living in Connecticut in the United States, told the Inquirer in an interview.
"My cousin who lived in Berlin and whose father was a lawyer went to Paris [instead]. The Paris police handed them over to the Nazis, and they were sent to Auschwitz and got killed," he recalled, adding:

"I’m very grateful to the Philippines for opening the doors and letting us in."

‘Salamat sa inyo!’

THANK YOU, RP In gratitude for the Philippines’ ‘open door’ policy for Jews escaping persecution in Nazi Europe, a steel monument of three doors was unveiled last week in Israel. VOLT CONTRERAS

My Formula for a Lasting Marriage

Today is an excellent time to repost the following article I wrote last year on Valentines day! Happy VD to All!

TODAY is Valentine's Day. A day for lovers, young and old. This is the best time to write Part 2 of my article on the Formula for a lasting marriage. I wrote my first article on my formula for a lasting marriage about a year ago. I did receive several positive comments on that article. In that article I emphasized that open trust and communication between the husband and wife is a must for a lasting marriage. Another point I discussed in that article was accepting the flaws as well as the strength of your partner is a must for a lasting marriage. This new article (Part 2) is inspired from two incidents that I experienced recently.

The first incident occurred while my wife and I were waiting in the patient lounge at the diagnostic laboratory for our normal six month interval blood work check up. A couple seating near us mentioned that they have been married for 63 years. I asked the guy, if he has a secrete formula for their lasting marriage. He jokingly answered "I do what she wants pointing to his wife". His wife heard it, she smiled and reply, that is not true because I also like to please him whatever he wants almost all the time. The lesson here is the "gave and take" is still one of the formula for a lasting marriage.

The second incident happened while I was in line at our friendly local bank cashing a check. The line was long and the bank had only two clerks because it was about lunch time. The wait was about 30 minutes and to get rid of boredom, I started a conversation with an elderly lady next in line. After a few pleasantries, she mentioned that yesterday was her 54th wedding anniversary with her second husband. Her marriage with her first husband lasted only about a year, because both of them were young and immature. So I asked her if she has a formula why her second marriage has lasted for more than 54 years. Her quick reply was, my husband and I just laugh a lot. If we have problems we talk about it and just laugh about it.

To me this means that to have a positive attitude and not taking problems seriously is another formula that helps guarantee a lasting marriage.

So my dear readers if you have been married for more than 10 years, can you share with me and my readers, your formula for a lasting marriage. I will appreciate it very much and thank you in advance for sharing. Again, Happy Valentine to You All!

An Imelda Marcos Musical Update

Last year I posted a short article on the musical, Here's Lies Love based on the life of Imelda Marcos. Here's an update for your information, in case you have not seen it. Enjoy!

First Lady Imelda Marcos, was born on July 2, 1929. She is the widow of the deceased and former Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos and forms half of their so-called conjugal dictatorship. She is remembered as a symbol of extravagance during her husband's twenty-year rule because of her collection of more than a thousand pairs of shoes.

Imelda began her career as a local singer and model in Manila before meeting her husband Ferdinand, who would later be elected as President. After the declaration of martial law in 1972, Imelda began holding positions in the national government that allowed her to travel the world and accumulate artwork and property. The couple consolidated their power allowing them to transport funds from the Philippine treasury into offshore accounts, such as those within banks in Switzerland. Accusations of corruption and human rights violations against them would culminate into the assassination of Benigno Aquino, Jr. that would lead into People Power Revolution which forced her family out of office and into exile in Hawaii. After her husband's death, she and her family were given amnesty by Corazon Aquino. Her return to the Philippines has since allowed her to restore her political dynasty and she was elected in the House of Representatives in 1995 for Leyte and again in 2010 for Ilocos Norte.

Despite facing numerous cases involving alleged corruption, she has yet to be imprisoned and she continues to wield power. She remains one of the most enigmatic figures of both the 20th and 21st centuries. Her qualities of grace and beauty along with her ability to survive upheavals has led her to be called the "Steel Butterfly."

Schindler's List Movie

Its about time to enjoy an award winning movie in case you have missed it.

The Nieva Clan of Marinduque-Chapter 1

One of the many joys I experienced as a blogger is to share writings of other writers in my blogs. The following series of articles is written by Rene Nieva- my wife's( Macrine Nieva Jambalos) first cousin whose roots are also from Marinduque. At the end of this posting is a short biography of Rene.


AN INFORMAL HISTORY OF THE NIEVA FAMILY: ( First Draft by Rene Nieva*)Chapter 1


The first Nieva in Philippine History

It is not known whether the Nievas are descended directly from him but the first record of a Nieva in Philippine history was of a certain Spanish priest named Domingo de Nieva. De Nieva was born in Spain in 1563 in the town of Villoria in the province of Castilla northwest of Madrid. He entered the Dominican Convent of San Pablo in Valladolid. It would be a source of pride if he was our ancestor because, by all accounts, Fr. Nieva was a remarkable and admirable person.

It was in 1587 that Nieva, who was still a deacon at the time, joined the group of priests and deacons who sailed from Spain via Mexico to propagate the Catholic faith in the Philippines. It was only 66 years after Ferdinand Magellan first landed in the Philippines in 1521, followed by Ruy Lopez de Villalobos in 1543 and then Miguel Lopez de Legazpi in 1565 who finally succeded in colonizing the Philippines and putting the islands under Spanish rule.

Man of Great Virtue and Ability

According to Father Diego Aduarte, who wrote a history of the Dominicans in the
Philippines, Deacon de Nieva's first assignment was in the then newly-established vicariate of Bataan along with three Dominican priests. Father Aduarte singled out de Nieva as "a man of great virtue and ability", aside from being hard-working ("an enemy of sloth") and "with a great aptitude for languages". He learned Tagalog fast and before long was preaching to the natives in their own tongue. But being still a deacon, he could not hear confessions. Hence, upon reaching the requisite age of 25, de Nieva was ordained a priest in September 1588.
In 1590, the then Superior of the Dominican Province in the Philippines, Fr. Juan Cobo, assigned Fr. De Nieva from Bataan to the Parian mission in Manila to strengthen the said mission and hasten the conversion of the Chinese immigrants to Catholicism. Fr. de Nieva also learned Chinese very fast as he did Tagalog before. This again made him more effective in preaching to the Chinese community and convincing many of them to join the Catholic faith.

Helped produce first book in the Philippines

In 1593, Fr. de Nieva earned his place in Philippine history when he and another Dominican priest, Fr. Francisco Blancas de San Juan, produced and printed from wood blocks the first book in the Philippines, the Doctrina Christiana. They were assisted in doing so by a Chinese craftsman named Keng Yong, whom the Dominican fathers converted to Catholicism and given the Christian name of Juan de Vera. It was de Vera under whom Tomas Pinpin, the first Filipino printer, took apprenticeship and mastered the art of printing.

Helped found University of Santo Tomas UST

Fr. de Nieva went on to write and publish several devotional treatises in Tagalog and Chinese. In 1603, in recognition of his capability, he was elected Prior of the Santo Domingo Convent in Manila. In 1605, he and
another priest, Fr. Bernardo Sta. Catalina, helped the then Archbishop of Manila, Archbishop Miquel de Benavidez, in founding a seminary for Filipinos wanting to study for the priesthood.

The archbishop bequeathed P1,500, a huge fortune at the time, and his personal library which served as the nucleus of the seminary which opened six years later in 1611. The seminary was initially named Colegio de Nuestra Senora del Santisimo Rosario but was later renamed Universidad de Santo Tomas in honor of the foremost Dominican theologian St. Thomas Aquinas.

Died on way back to Spain

At the end of his three-year term as Prior, Fr. de Nieva was promoted Procurator of the Dominican Province in Manila and Rome. He set sail to go back to Mexico and on to Spain and Rome in 1606 after nineteen years in the
Philippines. However, he died on board the ship at the still young age of 43, the cause of which has not been recorded.

As earlier stated, it is not known whether the Nievas of today are direct descendants of Fr. Domingo de Nieva as it was not unlikely during those times for Spanish priests, being just human, to take on native women as mistresses and have children with them. Firstly, they were lonely, being far from their home country. Secondly, they were in the Philippines at an age when they were still in the height of their sexual prowess. Third, the native women must have been attracted to them being so tall, fair and and powerful and influential in the community. So it would not have been surprising if Fr. De Nieva had children by women from Bataan and Parian where he was assigned, one of whom would have been among our progenitors.

But if he was the ancestor of the Nievas, it comes as no surprise as many of his descendants seemed to have inherited his qualities of being competent and industrious and with an aptitude for writing and speaking in different languages, as he was described by his fellow Dominicans. I'm quite sure if it turns out he is our ancestor, we would be very proud of him. And even if we were not related to him by blood, we still would be proud that a man with the same Nieva surname lived once upon a time in the Philippines and played such an important and beneficial role in our history.

(Next Chapter. From Albay to Marinduque)

* Rene Nieva, is chairman and president of Perceptions Inc.,a Public Relations (PR) company organized in January 1987. Rene is an experienced PR professional who has worked with leading PR agencies in Manila and New York.

Today Perceptions is considered one of the country's leading PR and corporate communications agencies, counting some of the country's leading companies and the world's top multinational firms among its clients. It has won numerous local and international PR Awards, including the top PR award in the Philippines, the Grand Anvil Award, in 2003 and 2005.

Rene is now semi-retired and the daily management of Perceptions Inc. is under the good and capable hands of his son, Noel.

Time for Some Andre Rieu Music

It is time to enjoy some Andre Rieu music. In case you have not heard about Andre Rieu, do some Internet search and you will learn a lot about this Dutchman concerts all over the world. Enjoy!

Have You Heard of Mikey Bustos?

For some reason or another, This is the first time I have heard of Mikey Bustos. So I did some Internet search, and here's what I learned.

Bustos is born from Filipino parents in the Weston neighbourhood of Toronto. Before Canadian Idol, he worked as a temp at the Bank of Montreal. He attended St. Michael's College School in Toronto.

Bustos placed seventh runner-up in the finals of first season of Canadian Idol in August 2003, despite Chart magazine's prediction: "If we were to lay our bets today, ChartAttack’s money would be on Toronto contestant Mikey Bustos, a slightly strange-looking young man with a shaved head and the voice of an angel. From his very first audition where he floored the four judges, he established the largest fan base early in the competition, and made headlines all over the country.

After competing on Canadian Idol, Bustos began performing throughout Canada and the US at many events and showcases at top venues. Mikey also had special guest appearances and interviews at numerous radio stations including CHUM FM, CFMT, Z 103.5 FM, Flow 93.5 FM, Mix 99.9 FM, AM 680 News, CHIN Ottawa FM, CKMS 100.3 FM Waterloo, and has several times appeared on CTV (Etalk Daily/ Canada AM Live), CBC Quebec, and local stations like Omni1 and Rogers .
I enjoyed very much his YouTube satires on the Filipino culture and way of life. Very funny,indeed!


Kundiman is a genre of traditional Filipino love songs. The lyrics of the Kundiman are written in Tagalog or other dialects of the Philippines. The melody is characterized by a smooth, flowing and gentle rhythm with dramatic intervals. Kundiman was the traditional means of serenade in the Philippines.

The Kundiman came around to be an art song at the end of the nineteenth century and by the early part of the twentieth century. Its musical structure was formalized by Filipino composers such as Francisco Santiago and Nicanor Abelardo

Santiago and Abelardo sought poetry for their lyrics, blending verse and music in equal parts.

Scholars and historians believed that the Kundiman originated from the Visayas . Dr. Francisco Santiago was considered to be the "Father of the Kundiman Art Song".

Do you know of other Kundiman songs? Do you have a favorite?

Where in the Heck is Socotra Island

Dragon Blood Trees of Socotra Island

Recently, I was reading an article about the Dragon Blood tree from Socotra Island. To my amazement, this is the first time that have heard of the tree and also of the island. I did some Internet search and here are two videos I found with a short description of the island from Wikipedia, Enjoy!




Socotra (Arabic: سُقُطْرَى‎ Suquṭra), also spelled Soqotra, is a small archipelago of four islands in the Indian Ocean.

The largest island, also called Socotra, is about 95% of the landmass of the archipelago. It lies some 240 kilometres (150 mi) east of the Horn of Africa and 380 kilometres (240 mi) south of the Arabian Peninsula. The island is very isolated and a third of its plant life is found nowhere else on the planet. It has been described as "the most alien-looking place on Earth". The island measures 132 kilometres (82 mi) in length and 49.7 kilometres (30.9 mi) in width.

Socotra is part of Yemen. It had long been a part of the 'Adan Governorate. In 2004 it became attached to the Hadhramaut Governorate, which is much closer to the island than 'Adan (although the nearest governorate was the Al Mahrah Governorate). In 2013, the archipelago became its own governorate.