One cannot find metal buildings in the Philippines, except in Manila. This one and only all steel building standing majestically in Plaza del Carmen, C.M. Recto, Quiapo, Manila, is the Basilica Minore de San Sebastian, popularly known as the San Sebastian Church. Its Gothic architecture is patterned after the Great Cathedrals of Europe erected by craftsmen and masons during the medieval period and made out of stone. That is why because of its architectural design and looking at it from a distance, one would never think that the San Sebastian Church is entirely made of steel.
According to history, from Belgium batch upon batch of prefabricated steel were transported by sea to the Philippines and put together to form the neo-Gothic structure of San Sebastian Church. The construction was completed in 1891. UNESCO has recognized San Sebastian Church as the only all steel Church in Asia, and In 2006, it was included in the Tentative List for possible designation as a World Heritage Site.
The Church was built and is still being maintained by the Order of the Augustinian Recollects. But while the Church is all-steel, its parking lot and carports are made of cement and concrete. They could not possibly think of making metal carports during that time. Bambit and I made a stroll to Quiapo sometime last May and the San Sebastian Church was one of our destinations. The picture at left was taken by Bambit.
One common problem in most urban dwellings is the lack of space for landscaping and natural greenery. You are in a concrete jungle and everything around you is steel, concrete and plastic. In an urban setting, the planting of evidence by rogue policemen is much easier than that of planting plants in your house. Unless you live in a bigger house in the middle of the city with a large front and backyard, planter and planters are no problem for you.
In this situation, most city dwellers adjust by making use of various Indoor Planters as well as Outdoor Planters. An Indoor Planter, apparently holds plants which you would like to put inside your house. Outdoor Planter is quite similar to a Garden Planter. Only that, Garden Planters hold much more plants, as its name suggests, it is designed as a garden.
There are also other High End Planters, like Decorative Planters and Window Box Planters. A Window box planter hangs from a window or placed along the edge of a window. While a decorative planter are designed to be more conspicous and for display purpose. But the high cost of urban living makes one prudent in spending money for more basic needs than for a high end planter. If the purpose is simply to give our urban dwelling a greener perspective, used tin or plastic containers can be utilized to serve as improvised planters.
If the planters are already fixed, the next basic problem for a greening project in an urban setting is where to get the soil for planting. But alas, gardening soils are now also available and sold in grocery stores in the city. Just wondering if there are also such item as a high end soil.
I have had this blog since 2004. It was all for fun and a sort of therapeutic activity where you relax and get to practice the craft called writing. I didn’t realize that one can really earn by blogging. Though I heard about it before, I didn’t actually believed it. It was only just recently that I realized earning while blogging is indeed a real thing. Try and visit bloggerwave.com and you’ll know what I mean. You blog and at the same time make money. Isn’t that fun?
I have a friend who had this penchant of changing furnitures, interior designs or the landscaping of his house everytime he sees a new one that he’d like. Everytime he’d see a modern furniture displayed in the malls, on the lobby of a five star hotel or in one of his friend’s house, he would, by impulse, instantly change the ones he already had in his house. Even if the modern furniture does not fit his house’s interior design, he would insist on installing it for the simplest reason that he wouldn’t want to be left out with what his friends have. A simple case of keeping up with the Joneses.
This is a common case among those who wants to flaunt a newly acquired social status. Another term for this case is the conspicuous consumption. It is the lavish spending on practically anything mainly for the purpose of displaying income or wealth. In the mind of a conspicuous consumer, such profligacy serves as a means of attaining or maintaining social status.
This has become a common trait acquired by those who had made one step upward in the social heirarchy of a consumerist society. And in order for other people to recognize this achievement, conspicous consumption comes to the fore. In the Philippines, this has become a common trait among young urban professionals, celebrities, families of OFWs and of course our politicians, both the old and new trapos. That is why in our age and time, there seems to be an unsatiable craving for goods like new gadgets and gizmos, modern houses, modern lofts and condos, modern furniture, cars, guns, etc…and also even on services like spas and vacation packages.
Everything now is for sale. Anything can now be traded, including principles.
My late Dad kept a collection of memorabilia, from old photos, his World War II campaign medals to his ID Cards. He had a cabinet full of potpourris of this kind. When he died, his collections were distributed to those interested among us his sons. Being the first Mason among my siblings, it had become my obligation to keep all of my Dad’s Masonic stuff. Among other things, I also inherited from my Dad his penchant of collecting sundries for keepsakes.
As a kid, I started collecting a wide array of stuff, from photos, coins to toys, my school ID cards and even some of my notebooks. In high school, I had kept a considerable collection of soccer-football posters, posters of my favorite folk-rock group, and etc…Some of it I still have, but a lot had been misplaced or left somewhere else.
Recently, I started to collect covers of movies in DVD.In addition to my Dad’s collection, I am now starting to gather my own collection of various Masonic stuff .I plan to reconstruct my old collections again and hope that I can complete or find replacements of those which were already lost. Its time to take a trip down the thrift and antique shops or just click on the mouse to stroll the internet for other sources. Shopwiki for one, offers a lot of store for Collectibles and Memorabilia.
At the time when I entered my first job in the late 80’s and the early 90’s, office equipments were still not that complicated to operate. Early Personal Computer printers require only a ribbon for an ink. It was not much of a hassle to change a ribbon from a dot-matrix printer. But the transition from one ancient form of equipment to the next most modern one was fast and furious and it seem to happen overnight. While we were sleeping, new gadgets and equipments invaded the world.
In the morning we found ourselves sweating over the simplest of tasks, that of changing the toner cartridges of a laser printer. We, the older citizens, took sometime to understand how these new gizmos work. We suddenly find ourselves in a world were every piece of equipment and gadget shrunk but its functions became more complex. What once was a cabinet-sized copier, suddenly shrunk into an equipment that can occupy only the one fourth part of a table. Not only did it shrunk in size, now it assumed at least three tasks into one machine. Amazing how a fax machine, copier and printer is now rolled into one.
Amusingly younger people can handle these equipments easily like they’re just playing with toys, while we sweat and labor hard just to replace inkjet cartridges or toner cartridges. The next time we find ourselves becoming experts with these machines, a new and more complex machine was just delivered into our offices. It’s a Hi-tech world and a low drag me.
