RIP Cardinal Jaime Sin

Another notable Filipino lost to the ages: Cardinal Jaime Sin has passed away. Cardinal Sin, as we called him in jest, was former Archbishop of Manila and Primate of the Philippines, and played a key role in the EDSA Revolution of 1986, using his formidable clout to help foment the peaceful, bloodless uprising against the kleptocratic Marcos dictatorship. He would again play a key role in Edsa II, the second uprising against Erap, which placed the current president, Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, in power.

Being a fencesitting church-state-separation Baptist, I wasn’t always sure that Sin’s active use of his position as Archbishop and Cardinal to influence Philippine political affairs was the best course, especially in the constitutionally dubious context of Edsa II, or in his very Roman Catholic opposition to contraceptives for population control. Nonetheless, having been reared among Jesuits and trained in liberation theology, I can see where Cardinal Sin was coming from, with regard to his push for social action and involvement as a means to empower the poor and underprivileged, of which the Philippines had many. The Filipino’s life is a bit richer for his work, and now a bit poorer in spirit for his passing.

(And we lost one of the best witticisms history has ever given us: a cardinal named Sin. It doesn’t get much better than that.)

Update: Fr. Reuter remembers Cardinal Sin at EDSA. Read it quick; Philstar’s website is still stupid about story archiving, and it may be replaced with a “File not Found” any minute now. The article is not without some chucklers, for example:

“Mother, get all your nuns into the chapel, and have them pray before the Blessed Sacrament, with arms extended… Pray for peace in our country…Pray that the grace of God will fall on us now!… And do not eat until I tell you!”

“The Cardinal called out the people, but the power on Edsa was the grace of God, coming to us through the Virgin Mary…..”

“Chino looked at the Cardinal, and grew at least three inches.”

Oh, that Father Reuter. One of my favorite Jesuits.

Skydeck Panorama


(searspan1 uploaded by brownpau.)


(searspan2 uploaded by brownpau.)

One of the fun things about putting my photo albums on Flickr is that I can upload these huge panoramas and not worry about my own local storage, bandwidth, and layout issues. Click on the thumbs above and go to “All Sizes” to zoom in. The views are looking north and south from the Sears Tower Skydeck.

Back from Chicago

Got back from Chicago late Monday night. I carried 20 pounds of tuna from Virginia to Illinois, watched my brother graduate from his MBA, checked out his new apartment, reconnected with the family (nuclear and extended), visited Hamburger University, stumbled into a cool Polish market somewhere deep into the Southside inland, rode The “El” all by myself, went up to the viewing decks of Sears Tower and Hancock Center, met Linnwood, learned about The Curse of the Billy Goat, and got lots of photos. Oh, and I checked out two airport chapels. Here are the photosets, courtesy of Flickr:


(Souvenir Pens uploaded by brownpau.)

Chicago June 2005 Travel Log Summary:

Friday:

– Saw Amy off at Union Station

– 3 hours at work

– Off to Dulles

– Walked to Terminal B

– Checked out the Chapel

– Shuttle to Terminal C

– Ugh

– Walk to Terminal D

– Ate Chinese

– Walked back to Terminal C

– Flew

– Landed in Midway and El’d to Bryn Mawr

– Dinner with Family – salmon and shrimp

– Sleep, had vivid nightmare and sleep paralysis episode

Saturday:

– francis’ graduation

– tour of hamburger university

– dinner at pho 777

Sunday:

– father’s day

– hamburger university

– wally’s polish market

– father’s day bbq

– brought mom and dad to o’hare

– walk around millenium park

– go up hancock observatory

– cheesecake

Monday:

– francis’ office

– to loop on my own

– sears tower

– met up with steve

– midway

– go home

Approaching Chicago


(Chicago Skyline from the Orange Line uploaded by brownpau.)

This is my second time in Chicago, and yesterday was my first time to use the El all on my own. Lovely city, but kind of vertical, which I’m not used to anymore. I suppose the verticalness is accentuated by having the loop go through downtown. Right now I’m in the very picturesque Bryn Mawr historic district, just a couple of blocks from the lakeside.

Taking Up the Trail of Tuna

So Mom caught tuna — a lot of tuna — while she was in Cabo San Lucas. She had it gutted, sliced, and frozen, and has been carting several pounds of it around the country in an insulated freezer bag, cooking up scrumptious fresh tuna dinners for friends and family in San Francisco and Washington.

She left for Chicago last night, but forgot the tuna in my uncle’s freezer. It now falls on me, as I leave for Chicago tonight, to bring the tuna after her. Right now, I’m off to pack the fish into the insulated freezer bag and take it to Dulles Airport. It’ll be extremely interesting to stop at security and explain why a young Asian male is carrying several pounds of foil-wrapped, quivering, red flesh in a freezer bag.

This’ll be fun.

Update: The insulated TunaBag is packed and nestled comfortably in my larger suitcase. Follow its adventures via my Flickr photostream!

Update: I have arrived safely at my brother’s apartment at Bryn Mawr in Chicago, and so has TunaBag.

Days Off as the Family Gathers

Mom is coming to DC tomorrow, and Amy is here to visit as well, so I’m taking a couple of days off from work. Then, this weekend, I go off to join Mom and Dad in Chicago to see my brother graduate.

Right now, Mom’s in transit, somewhere between San Francisco and DC. Looks like tonight’s earthquake hasn’t interrupted any travel plans so far. Dad is still in San Francisco, though, so I’m hoping nothing comes of those tsunami warnings.

The Ong Incident, Redux

This is a followup to The Ong Incident, though now I’m thinking that “incident” is too grand a word for such a botched non-event as that was. Lots of links and analysis from Manuel Quezon III, and Inquirer columnist Conrado De Quiros has two columns on what should be done about the president: Curiouser and Curiouser, and Alternatives. Amando Doronilla says heads must roll.

I especially like ultraelectromagnetic’s take:

I mean, Ong does know that even though people call her “Queen of Philippine Showbiz” she (Susan Roces) isn’t really a queen, right? I wish she had turned him down, just to see if Ong would ask Dolphy next (because, you know, he’s the “King of Comedy” … And then I wish Dolphy would turn him down so he’d be forced to ask every other celebrity, and they all turn him down until Ong is forced to ask someone like Jay-R, who’s the “Prince of R&B”.)

Fortunately Susan Roces showed herself to be strong and sensible, refusing to be used by the opposition as a destabilization tool.

The Pioneer Anomaly

The Pioneer Anomaly. Something’s up in deep space: the Pioneer spacecraft, now out of contact, have shown an unexplained Doppler drift, indicating sunward acceleration, effectively decelerating the probes cumulatively. The effect may be be nongravitational, and could be explained by any number of factors: an undiscovered twist in Newtonian physics, localized cosmological contraction issues, or just venting gas. Other deep space probes may have experienced the anomaly as well, and a new mission could explore the puzzle; but for now, all we have is past Pioneer data, and that’s stored on old 9 track tape which can only be read by antique readers. What’s to be done? (Also see Pioneer Odyssey for a nostalgic romp through those early days of deep space exploration. And NASA, bring back the original Pioneer home page plz, kthx.)

Followup link: Planetary Society’s Pioneer Anomaly FAQ.

[Crossposted to Metafilter.]