March time

The month of March this year is especially significant. With the onset of summer, we were amid the 40-day Lent or Cuaresma; school days are almost over, with students preparing for their final exams and graduation days for high school and college seniors and then vacation time!

Historically, for the Philippines, March 3rd marks the liberation 67 years ago, in 1945, of Manila from Japanese occupation, followed throughout that year with the eventual liberation of the rest of the country.

In the Philippines, March is celebrated as Women’s Month “as a venue to highlight women’s achievements and discuss continuing and emerging women’s empowerment and gender equality issues and concerns, challenges and commitments.” March is also observed as Women’s Role in History Month. The first week of March is Women’s Week and March 8th, yesterday, was Women’s Rights and International Peace Day, a working special holiday known as National Women’s Day.

In Cebu City, Women’s Month opened with a 10-day photo exhibit at the Ayala Center of 100 Cebuana Trailblazers, an initiative of the Cebu Provincial Women’s Commission through the Legal Altrnatives for Women Inc. In the special program to introduce the event, Dr. Ester Velasquez, former president of Cebu Normal University, and now a consultant for the Cebu provincial government, spoke of the rationale of the activity. This was followed by the ribbon-cutting ceremony led by Vice Gov. Agnes Magpale.

Fellow Cebu Daily News columnist Madrileña de la Cerna wrote at length on women’s thrusts, concerns and activities in her March 4th column, “The Essence of Women’s Month.”

Last Monday, a flag-raising ceremony was held at the Police Regional Office-5 as part of the police’s celebration of Women’s Month. Then yesterday, an information caravan was held to raise awareness on the Magna Carta for Women. Activities based on the theme, “Women Weathering Climate Change: Governance and Accountability, Everyone’s Responsibility,” included wellness services at the Plaza Sugbu for barangay women.

Tomorrow, more activities and thrusts for Women’s Month will be taken up on“Women’s Kapihan,” which I anchor from 2 p.m. to 3 p.m. on station dyLA. Do listen in.

Meanwhile, in Quezon City, a historical marker was unveiled March 3rd at the birthplace and tomb of heroine Melchora “Tandang Sora” Aquino, the Grand Lady of the Katipunan, now officially a national shrine on Banlat Road in barangay Tandang Sora. The Quezon City Council has declared 2012 as Tandang Sora Year. Tandang Sora was born in 1812 and died in 1919 at the age of 107.

This week, as the live coverage of the Corona Impeachment Trial took a break to return on Monday, analyses of and opinions about the conduct and possible outcome of the trial have been written or aired by media practitioners. But interestingly, it was private prosecutor Vitaliano Aguirre’s silent covering of his ears in response to Senator-Judge Miriam Defensor-Santiago’s shrill berating of the prosecutors that I found humorous: a man’s silent reproof (did they term it “disrespectful”?) of a woman’s vocal disapproval. That he got just “a slap on the wrist,” not confinement for the “disrespect,” topped it all for me. Abangan ang susunod!

And now, we look forward to the canonization of Visayan Blessed Pedro Calungsod on Oct. 21st with many Cebuanos led by our Archbishop Jose Palma preparing to go to Rome for the blessed event. Blessed Pedro’s image is the subject of veneration at the Cebu Archbishop’s Palace, and a life-size one at the Calungsod Parish Church in Cantabaco, Toledo City, the very first church in Cebu dedicated to Blessed Pedro Calungsod. It was established six years after the beatification of the martyr on March 5, 2000. Our Alliance of Two Hearts Parish Church in Banawa has images of both San Lorenzo Ruiz and Blessed Pedro Calungsod.

As time Marches on, we realize many we know or know about, also pass on. Last Friday, Philippine Daily Inquirer publisher Isagani Yambot, hailed as “a PDI grammar cop, press pillar and pal” and mourned as “a loss to journalism” died at the age of 77. Purita “Babes” Sanchez, a fellow board member of our Cebu Women’s Network that is responsible for our “Women’s Kapihan” where she usually appeared as one of our panelists, and an active advocate for women’s and children’s rights, died last month. Unfortunately, I knew only about her passing away through a death announcement in the papers, as also for Telly Java Ampatin, a friend, an educator, and wife of media colleague and educator Nick Ampatin. I also heard the sad news from a Manila resident niece of mine who visited me on her way to Bacolod in a business visit, and informed me. Telly was a faculty member at St.Theresa’s College and Cebu Institute of Technolgy, and is fondly remembered by former students, coteachers and friends. Do include them all in your prayers. Tomorrow through Monday, our Cebu Girl Scouts Council is hosting the Regional Committee Meeting or Visayas Executive Meeting at the Be Beach Resort in Lapu-Lapu City, where we of the GSP Cebu Council Board have been invited for dinner on Sunday. Then on Monday night, we of Zonta Club of Cebu I are holding our General Membership Meeting, followed by dinner at Jive Resto Bar in barangay Apas. Then, even as I wrote this last Wednesday, Zonta I president Stella Bernabe informed us regarding Zontian Gloria Escaño being admitted at Chong Hua Hospital for an operation. For her we also request your prayers.

Well, with summer now upon us with its unusually sizzling heat (after all the rain we’ve been having recently!), the Department of Health warns us against “heat stroke and other diseases by limiting time spent outdoors; drinking plenty of water; avoiding coffee, soda and alcohol; and wearing wide-brimmed hats (how about umbrellas?) and long-sleeved clothing when outdoors.” Good for those with air-conditioning; I live in front of the moving electric fan indoors. When I sit out on my porch, I get uplifted watching my flowers, little yellow butterflies, birds (a sole dark one with white-tipped wings and tail returned the other day after a long absence!) and a bumble bee to boot.

Summer time is also time for sports, and Cebu is in with it.

In closing, congratulations to Sportsman of the Year Henry Radaza and Cebu City Sports Commission chairman Ed Hayco, himself a multiple SAC awardee, seen at the recent SAC-SMC Cebu Sports Awards at the Terraces of Ayala Center Cebu!

Till next week, then, may God continue to bless us, one and all!