“Pilipinas Kong Mahal”: In Cosmo’s On My Mind (October issue)

One girl shares her musings about her love for the Philippines despite, in spite, and because of… by Niña Terol (Originally published in the October 2009 issue of Cosmopolitan Philippines) In many ways, my relationship with my country is like my relationship with my family. There are days when I’m extremely proud to be Pinoy. Then, there are other... [Read More]

The Three Languages We All Must Learn

At the Homeless World Cup, people of all colors, shapes, and sizes converge under different flags that represent different languages, political systems, ideologies, and religions. There are teams from 48 countries in six continents, some belonging to global superpowers whose flags have instant recall and recognition, others to little-known states that... [Read More]

Political lessons from ‘The Dark Knight’

IN his piece on Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight for Time, Richard Corliss writes, “Nolan has a… subversive agenda. He wants viewers to stick their hands down the rat hole of evil and see if they get bitten. With little humor to break the tension, The Dark Knight is beyond dark. It’s as black — and teeming and toxic — as the mind of The... [Read More]

Wanted: A president who can run the Philippines like a social enterprise

Author’s note: This is an abridged version of a blog post originally written for the Young Public Servants website. To view the full article, click on http://www.yps.org.ph/blogs/guest/?p=4 I RECENTLY posed this challenge to some like-minded colleagues: draft a want ad for this country’s next president, then let’s see how we are able... [Read More]

Social Butterfly

“You have xxx friends in your social network.” These days, the number in this statement is (potentially) as important as your credit card limit, your account balance, or your official designation. In a day and age when “virtual” friends are as important as the “live” ones you have coffee with once a week, creating the appropriate online... [Read More]

Seeing Signs

“You’ll never be able to escape from your heart. So it’s better to listen to what it has to say. That way, you’ll never have to fear an unanticipated blow” ~ Paulo Coelho, The Alchemist (To CC and Niño and their art; and to Jean Paul, his music, and the [red] pill.) Before anything else, I’d like to apologize to Mr. Pascasio (Nikko, is... [Read More]