Hoy, Pinoy, Here Are Some Tips About Red Wine

Hoy, Pinoy! So okay, you are used to drinking tuba^ (coconut wine) and San Miguel beer and it is only during special occasions such as Christmas and the New Year (also birthdays, anniversaries, etc.) that red and white wines flow freely.

Based on Pinoy misconcepcions on wine drinking and tips from a French mentor, here are some tips you should know about red wine:

Red Wine Tip #1: Novellino is rubbish. So is Carlo Rossi and Paul Masson. They are not the traditionally made, oak-barrel stored wines, but are cheap factory-made wine sold en masse. Unless you treat them as a better alternative to softdrinks, you can never be proud serving these so-called wines to a more discerning wine drinker.

Red Wine Tip #2: Real red wine goes off as soon as you pour it out and oxygen comes in, so consume it within 2-3 days. The air that you see inside the bottle between the cork and the wine is nitrogen which is why it goes pop when you open a bottle of wine.

Red Wine Tip #3: Never put ice in your glass of red wine. It destroys all the beautiful intentions the wine maker has put into his wine. Drink red wine at room temperature. Chill your bottle of wine only if you have to store it, then bring it up back to room temperature when you are about to drink it again. Cold wine loses its aroma and tastes flat.

Red Wine Tip #4: Red wine goes with red meat, white wine goes with white meat, and tastes better if poured in a rounded wine glass than straight smack into a flat-bottomed regular glass.

Red Wine Tip #5: Red wine has a calming, therapeutic effect, thus you sleep better and could live up to a hundred years. Which is probably why countries whose people drank wine and tea make stronger nations because their citizens are healthier.

Red Wine Tip #6: If you have to keep red wine for your nightly therapy, it is best to get a four- or five-liter cubi (short for cubitainer or cubic container or box) which has a tap or faucet from where you just open to draw a glass of wine. Inside the box is a plastic bag which collapses as more wine is being drawn out, thus preventing the oxygen from entering for the wine to keep for 2-3 months.

Red Wine Tip #7: Don't be fooled by buying a glass of red wine from half-full bottles stored in a hotel wine bar stand. It is probably 3 months old already and if you remember Red Wine Tip #2, good wine only lasts 2-3 days. If the wine you bought still retains its flavor long since it's been opened, you can be sure it's packed with preservatives, you'd be better off with a freshly opened Novellino.

Red Wine Tip #8: If you can't tell which wine is best, just remember countries like France, Australia, Portugal, Spain, and Chile where they grow one of the best grapes for their wines. Avoid Italy (they could either be best or worst), South Africa, Argentina, or the U.S.

Red Wine Tip #9: Choose up to only 12% alcohol content. Beyond that, it could knock you off and lose the appreciation of the taste of raspberries, traces of oak, flavors of different nuts, hints of lemon, the sweetness of honey, and all the wonderfully mind-boggling glossal sensations you are supposed to discern when enjoying your glass of wine.

Red Wine Tip #10: Red wine tastes best if it is drank in the place where it is made. So if you want to have a taste of the best French wine, drink a glass only in France!

So, Pinoy, what would your next glass of wine be?

White Carabao Just Gave Birth!

White carabao -- albino water buffalo -- is not considered sacred like the white elephant. Back in the ricefields of Ma-ao, Bago City, this beast of burden, normally black in color still gets to work like everybody else.

It was a particularly lucky day when we arrived in Ma-ao and chanced upon this white carabao that just gave birth to a white carabao calf. Too bad we came just moments late from the actual giving birth.


As can be seen in the picture, the mother white carabao's birth canal is still oozing with fresh blood and placenta.


The interesting about the baby carabao is that, like baby horses and other babies of the same family, they can already stand on their wobbly feet to reach out to their mother's breasts.


Out in the fields, the carabao has a symbiotic partner, the tulabong (tu-LAH-bong) or egret, some hovering about, and some actually riding atop the carabao's back. It's an you-scratch-my-back-and-I'll-scratch-your-back arrangement. The tulabong "scratches" the carabao's back by feeding on the flies pestering the carabao to its relief.

Carabaos have "birth certificates" called credentials, sort of like land titles showing the name of the owner. Instead of thumb marks distinguishing one person from the other, carabaos are identified by their unique nose prints.

SEO Your Articles Easy

SEO simply means "search engine optimized". This is because of the vastness of the internet, your article gets lost in a sea of gazillions of other related articles. Thus you use a search engine to literally search for these articles. Here are some simplified tips to SEO your articles easy (painting by Nonoy Etabag-I, a social realist artist whose painting themes usually focus on social commentaries about poverty and politicians).

SEO Tip No. 1. Use Key Words Positionally - When you arrive at a search engine, say google or yahoo, you type in your key word. For example your key word is "poverty". Position your key words so that it is search engine optimized: as much as possible, make it the first word of your title, the first word of your paragraph, sprinkled all over your article, and the last word of your article. Forget redundancy. The rule here is REDUNDANCY. The more redundant you are with your key words, the more search engine optimized your article is, thus it will most likely land at the top of the search engine results page. Creative writing license also takes into a new direction by challenging you to twist your article to start and end with a key word, but still read-worthy as well as search engine optimized.

SEO Tip No. 2. Ratio Your Key Word Ratio to at Least 10% - So that if your article has a word count of 300 words, make sure that 10 or more key words (e.g. "poverty") are well spread throughout your article in order to be search engine optimized. There are dirty tricks like spamming your article with all key words or hiding 1,000 key words by coloring it white against a white background in a desparate attempt to be search engine optimized, but these are illegal and your account will be deleted for this. Remember also that CONTENT IS KING. Not only is your article riddled with search engine optimized key words, but that it has also good content, spelling and grammar checked, so that it will have a professional look and credible image.

SEO Tip No. 3. Set Your Key Words to Bold Typeface - For obvious reasons, in order to be more search engine optimized. You may have already noticed by now why the bold repetitions of search engine optimized key words in this blog.

SEO Tip No. 4. Use Key Words in Attention-Grabbing Titles - "Understanding Poverty" is understandable, but it will not get the attention of your readers even if it is at the top of your search engine results. Why not make it more graphic, like: "Poverty: Sucking the Blood Out of Poor Juan Dela Cruz", or "Poverty: the Pinoy Politicians' Legacy", or "Poverty: How to Get Rich in the Midst of Financial Depression". The more appealing your title, the more it is likely to get clicked on search engine results.

SEO Tip No. 5. Use Key Words in Bullets - Articles in bullet form are easier to read as well as search engine optimized. Even in bullets, make sure your key word is there. Notice the deliberate effort in putting the SEO key word in every bullet. That is how to increase readership in your blog and generate more traffic by making your article search engine optimized.

Vermicompost Fertilizer: Vermicomposting Made Easy

Vermicompost fertilizer may look ewwy but this technology in organic farming may just save the world.

What is vermicomposting? It is the process of producing organic fertilizer (vermicompost) using agricultural wastes through the disgetive action of earthworms, and not just your ordinary garden earthworms (because it does more harm than good to your garden top soil) but the African nightcrawler (eudrilus euginae).



According to Dr. Rafael D. Guerrero III and Mrs. Lina Villegas, vermicompost is a high quality organic fertilizer that contains up to 8%-7%-1% of NPK (Nitrogen-Phosphorus-Potassium), as well as trace elements, depending on the quality of the substrate.

Here are the easy steps in vermicomposting:

Vermicomposting step #1. Site Selection - must be shady, free from flooding, near a water source, cool, and near a material source.

Vermicomposting step #2. Bed Preparation - Prepare wormbeds 1m x 4m x 2ft high or compost heap style. You may also use old or unused basin, pots, sack or any suitable container for backyard vermicomposting.

Vermicomposting step #3. Gathering of Materials/Substrate - They are basically from two sources:

• Carbon - grass, sawdust, leaves, coconut husks, corn stovers, stalks, rice straw, paper, boxes, etc.

• Nitrogen - peanut, hagonoy, ipil-ipil, madre de cacao, centrosema, malunggay, katuray, baging-ilog, and all animal wastes except human, dog, and cat excrement because of the presence of e-coli bacteria.

However, eucalyptus leaves are not advisable because of their bitter taste.



Having gathered your materials, consider this as your Day 1 in the stages of vermicomposting. Afterwards you are ready for the next stages:

Vermicomposting stage #1. Anaerobic Stage (Day 2-15) - Mix a ratio of 3:1 Carbon-Nitrogen (CN) chopped or shredded substrate, sprinkle with water if the mixture is too dry. Place inside a sack and tie it up, or place inside a big can and cover it. Store in a shady area and leave the tied sack or covered container unopened for 10-15 days.



Vermicomposting stage #2. Aerobic Stage (Day 16-45) - Place the anaerobically decomposed substrate on the prepared beds 6 inches thick, unpressed. Sprinkle with water and maintain cool temperature of the substrate (ideally 5-7 drops of water when squeezed). Put the worms the next day.



Vermicomposting stage #3. Migration (Day 30-45) - If substrate is 80-90% consumed, processed and decomposed, allow the worm to migrate in orchid net/onion bag with the anaerobically-decomposed substrate in it.



Vermicomposting stage #4. Harvesting (Day 45-60) - Pull out the substrate where the worms have migrated and place in vacant beds. Manual picking of remaining worms is recommended. Do not water the bed a week before harvesting. The by-product of the process is vermicompost and earthworm biomass.

Vermicomposting stage #5. Storage and Farm Consumption - Air dry the vermicompost up to 30% humidity and seal in plastic bags for sale or for personal use.

Apply your vermicompost directly in the field as any other organic fertilizer or foliar fertilizer using vermi-tea.



Vermicompost is also used as one of the ingredients for "bukashi" which is made of basura (garbage), chicken manure, rice husks (must be made into charcoal) and vermicompost.

Arnis, Soon to Be the Philippines' National Sport

Arnis, according to historian Joseph L. Galleon is the Chabacano for the Spanish word arnes or armor.

Arnis is a Filipino martial arts using sticks in fighting, as against empty-handed Filipino combats such as panantukan or dumog.



This year, two bills, "An Act Declaring Arnis as the Philippine National Sport" introduced by Senator Juan Miguel F. Zubiri, and "An Act Declaring Arnis as the National Sport of the Philippines" introduced by Sen. Manuel "Lito" M. Lapid are being consolidated into one comprehensive bill before approval, eliminating the words kali having no no real and clearly documented or historical basis and "modern" in "modern arnis" to avoid misinformation.

Department of Education Assistant Secretary Jonathan E. Malaya cited that there is no existing official national sport in the country, and that sipa, or sepak takraw, is obviously "baseless and incorrect". Furthermore, Mr. Ed Robles of the National Commission for Culture and Arts added that the NCCA agree that Arnis should be declared as the official national sport of the Philippines.

I happened to chance upon an Arnis tournament at Robinson's Place, Bacolod and noticed how the Arnis practitioners use Filipino language and tradition in the sport.

I noticed that they used the Philippine national colors in their Arnis uniforms. The opposing teams wear blue and red uniforms called bugaw (blue) and pula (red).



So I made a little research about Arnis as I felt national pride surge in me as I witness how the children engage themselves in the soon to be the Philippines' national sport, Arnis.