Day One

Apparently, today marks the 67th anniversary of the Hiroshima bombing.

Today, I had a great opportunity to learn with people from 11 different countries. The event is a cooperation between institutions in the Philippines, America and Japan. As one of the professors said, "The Philippines used to be the battleground of America and Japan during the war." But today, we were all sitting down and discussing climate change adaptation and disaster risk management. 

Today, I saw three people sitting together in one table: an African, an American, and a Japanese. I'd call their table the "panda table" because as the pun goes, "Don't be a racist. Be a panda. Pandas are black, white and Asian." I mean, come on. Who doesn't want to get rid of the racism in this world?

I am seriously stumped with a bunch of requirements (student responsibilities) and workload (instructor and researcher responsibilities) but I know that this is going to be worth it. It's just Day One and I've learned so much! There are nine more days!

Also, today, I had the chance to visit the Executive House (the official residence of the UP President). It's my first time to see the place after six years of staying in the university. Not everyone gets to be invited to the Executive House so I feel very lucky. The house was beautiful. It was amazing. It had beautiful, expensive paintings everywhere (most of them for sale).  My groupmate said "He has a museum inside his house!"

It had chandeliers made of capiz (shells). 

I have one prayer today, though. I hope the rain would stop or even just lessen. :( I'm safe and warm here in my room. However, I can't help wondering about people who are cold, people who are stranded in their workplace and people who are probably scared of floods reaching their homes and bothered by the fact that they'll have to leave their houses and go to evacuation centers that don't have enough food, water and medicine.