MRT: Mag-ingat sa Riles Tayo

Inquirer.net reported (that Radyo Inquirer reported) that there has been a mishap in the MRT just today when smoke was observed to come out from the front of the northbound train prompting the opening of the MRT's doors followed by people rushing out in panic. This resulted to injuries to at least six passengers.

Days ago, some of the MRT's riding public in the Ayala station also got injured after the escalators inside the station abruptly stopped prompting some to fall down. You could just imagine how difficult it is to avoid such accidents in the station with all the people packed liked sardines-in-a-can during rush hour.

And what did the MRT officials say?

As reported by Inquirer.net:
"MRT officials say these technical issues are symptoms of the train system’s lack of adequate maintenance.
MRT General Manager Glicerio Sicat said earlier this week that this shows how badly the MRT’s fares need to be raised."

They are essentially saying, blame the incidents on the people complaining against the fare increase.

Does this mean, expect no attempt to alleviate the technical issues unless MRT fares are raised? I hope not.
 

2011 Baguio City Tour in One Day: Part 1

I got the chance to go to Baguio with my wife (who is going to that city for the first time) when I was invited to attend an annual convention for a group of Microbiology and Parasitology teachers.

Well at first (prior to saying yes), I was anxious because as you may already know if you are following my blog, I have PKD with episodes of hematuria and anemia already. I also easily feel the cold extremes of temperature which Baguio has compared to other parts of the country. The temperature was recently at a year 2011 low of almost 10 degrees Celsius. I cannot even stand the usual air-con temperatures sometimes so what more Baguio's cool temperature?

But I eventually said yes because of the importance of the task regarding standardization of microbiology and parasitology manuals in Philippine medical schools and to let my wife experience Baguio.

So here is the story from preparation to the fulfillment of the goal to sneak in a one-day tour of Baguio prior to the working convention.

Step one is Research...

Days prior, I searched various websites as to the places to go for sight-seeing and eating in Baguio.

I bought a map of Baguio of course.

I set one day, a Sunday, a day prior to the convention to target a visit to its tourist destinations.

With the help of the net, I found a recommended taxi driver in Baguio which I likewise would recommend. He is Arnel Rodriguez and he is the one  seated on the right with a mustache.

He is driving an SUV, specifically a Crosswind with the name PINE CONE with Plate No. AYS-574 and his cellular phone number is +639172505543.

Do not be surprised if his taxi has no air-conditioning system. All taxis in Baguio don't have aircon most likely because the environment is already cool to begin with. You might even want to close the taxi windows completely to stay warm.

Anyway, Mr. Rodriguez is I believe an experienced driver who knows Baguio a lot and he is very accommodating. He would offer to take our pictures (but then me and my wife bought our own tripod so we can have nice pictures minus the blur and so also we can have our pics taken without other person's help with the use of the timer function) .This driver can pass for a tourist guide.

Here is some tips that I can offer which I hope would be helpful...

Baguio during January is cool and so one has to bring sweaters and jackets to protect you from the cold. But if you are from a warm place like Cebu, you may not have these already and so you have to buy. Jackets and sweaters are expensive and so others go to the "ukay-ukay" to buy second-hand good quality sweaters and jackets at a much lower price than in the regular market.

Prepare your digital cameras and place silica gel in the camera bag so that it will not acquire moisture with a disparity of temperatures from "downtown" going uphill to Baguio.

As I said bring your own tripod, battery charger and enough rechargeable batteries as batteries' power are said to drain faster in the cold.

The above things we did and we brought for the trip uphill something to feed our stomachs for a 6-hour trip more or less (if you are travelling in a Victory Liner Deluxe Bus with own toilet or mini comfort room).

This is how the said bus looks from the inside featuring the mini comfort the room which I saw just for the first time.

Being a PKD patient myself which cannot concentrate the urine well, I frequently go to the comfort room and so this type of Deluxe bus is a must for me. The fare is much expensive at P715 per person. There are two DVD screens showing the latest movies and the seats are well-spaced enough room for each passenger to relax.

The other buses have at least 2 stopovers for meals and health breaks and picks up passengers along the way thus the travel time is said to be 7 hours or more.

Read the next blog entry Part 2 of this post in my Cebu MD blog for the places we actually visited in Baguio in just one day with actual pictures to give you an idea that it is possible to visit most of the important Baguio tourist spots in a single day...

Leg cramps in PKD

In many PKD forums and discussions, leg cramps have been always a common topic, a common problem among those with PKD. Sadly, many PKD patients are also clueless regarding leg cramps occuring especially at night waking them up to sleep.

I remember during my mom's lifetime, she had several bouts of leg cramps at night and she would shout in pain.

Having leg cramps is no joke as many PKD patients will attest. It is one of the most painful experiences for me. Most of the time, it is calf muscle cramps. I myself experienced in the past frequent leg cramps. I just had one this dawn. However, it has successfully decreased in frequency.

This info may help...

Muscle cramps especially in PKD may be caused by electrolyte imbalances like sodium depletion especially due to dehydration, low blood calcium and low potassium. Acidosis is also said to be associated with leg cramps although it is also believed that these cases caused by lactic acid accumulation in the muscle is more of claudication pain which is almost similar to leg cramps, not actual muscle cramping.

Vitamin B deficiencies are associated also with leg cramps although the exact mechanism is unknown.

It is important to monitor serum electrolytes regularly and to correct any imbalance with your nephrologist's help and guidance. In my case, I have calcium carbonate, vitamin B and E supplements, potassium citrate and sodium bicarbonate which may help correct the problem supplying the needed electrolytes and at the same time prevent renal stones from forming by keeping my urine alkaline. Monitoring will tell me if I have too much of the said medications also. Of course, medications should not be taken without your doctor's advice.

From Medicine.net.com:
"For a calf muscle cramp, the person can stand about 2 to 2.5 feet from a wall (possibly farther for a tall person) and lean into the wall to place the forearms against the wall with the knees and back straight and the heels in contact with the floor...Another technique involves flexing the ankle by pulling the toes up toward the head while still lying in bed with the leg as straight as possible."

To prevent muscle cramps, it is recommended to do stretching before exercise and have proper hydration.

Also regular stretching exercises are recommended to prevent rest or night cramps common in PKD. The same stretching maneuver described above held for 10 to 15 seconds and repeated two or three times just before going to bed, can be done even when without a cramp and will serve as stretching exercise. This maneuver can also be repeated everytime one goes to the bathroom at night.

Hope this will help you as it helped me.

If In Cebu, Do not Miss STK Ta Bay

With the entry of the New Year, you expect people to make new year's resolutions and a nice resolution especially for me would be to eat healthier food choices.

I am delighted to have finally dined in STK ta Bay sa Paulito's Seafood House in 6 Orchid St., Capitol Site Cebu City, walking distance from Cebu Doctor's Hospital.

They offer delicious seafoods and among their specialties is the very delicious Baked Scallops and Tuna Panga.

They have big savings at a very reasonable cost. Not only the servings but with their baked scallops, the plate contained enough scallops to satisfy one's craving.

They also have crispy hot calamares like in the picture below:

They also have dishes which are shrimp-based like gambas and shrimp sinigang.

For 3 dishes, we only spent around P550 and we were full. And we even have not tested the other Filipino dishes like tinolang manok bisaya, tinola and sinigang isda as well as kinilaw and also I heard they also have yummy "kilawin". All of these are expected since after all STK stands for 'Sinugba, Tinuwa and Kinilaw'.

On the outside, you would not think it is a place for dining if you have not seen the signboard telling one that it is STK Ta Bay. 

Inside, the atmosphere is "homy" for I think the place was actually a well-maintained house in the midst of a residential area. It is filled with antique collections and in the entrance, you can see photos of celebrities who dined there posing with probably the owner of the place. One gets the idea that a lot of people do eat in STK Ta Bay.

Getting a reservation is advisable before actually going to the place as many frequent the place to eat lunch and dinner. The contact numbers are 2562700 or 2534732.

Crime and Drugs in our Area are on the Rise. Wake Up!

I thought the day would end well for me. I attended the CIM Alumni Day, had good food, learned that my wife after an operation will be discharged and almost won the CIM Alumni Scholarship for children raffle draw (except that I have no child yet so even if my name was the first actually called, having no child disqualified me from the said raffle.)

So we went home and my wife could finally relax....but going home at an already dark 6PM, we found out the lights won't turn on. The TV does not work. The fan the same. Brownout? But all the neighbors' lights are on and working fine.

Investigating further by going outside, this was what I have discovered...

How thoughtful of the criminals, they were kind enough to put electric tape at the end of the cut wires (150 meters long according to Veco).

The result? Brownout, inconvenience and a feeling of being unsafe, unsecure because of the knowledge that the barbed wire was intentionally bent and the electric cable connecting the post to our residence cut.

Being a CSI, NCIS and other crime TV series that I was, I took pictures of the "crime scene" including portions of the wall that were chipped, disturbed soil and even this nearby scene very near the wall where many "habal-habal" drivers hangout in Guadalupe...

I did not post all the pics here but anyway, I showed all the pics I took to the police station where I reported the incident initially.

A cop assigned at the frontdesk took my statement. Looked at the pictures and wrote a lengthy entry at his logbook and you what he said in the end when he was finished jotting down what I said? (I was waiting for him to say, ok let's go to your house and I'll take a look then I was expecting him also to tell his companion, "Grab your gear" like what NCIS' Gibbs does.

But I was disappointed when the cop instead said, "I'm sorry sir but we can only record the incident as a police blotter which you can use when you have the electric line fixed and the power returned.... But you need to pay at City Hall, get the receipt and return here so we can give you a typewritten police report."

But it is a Saturday so there was no City Hall.

The frontdesk cop added, "If you caught someone in the act of doing a crime like stealing, then you can call us. "

Yeah, that's encouraging.

Last time before the recent barangay elections, I reported a past incident of a teenager entering the gate of the house unlawfully and stealthily so I told him my suspicion that the aforementioned teenager is a "nubain" user and the tanods said, "Yah, there are a lot in your area who indeed uses nubain. There was even this child who is a known theft but we cannot arrest them because of this particular law, blah blah."

Why can't authorities do something about this?

I asked the PDEA or Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency but they said they cannot act nubain users specifically because "nubain" is not under their jurisdiction.

In the Buena Hills-Guadalajara area, laptops, wires, grills are being stolen almost every week. Government officials, we should not wait before a life is stolen too out of their criminal actions and drug-controlled minds.

Nubain abuse and stealing other people's property should be put to a stop.Cops should act like investigators and law enforcers, not as mere secretaries or clerks. Clerks don't scare criminals.