Catching up

It's been a good six years since I wrote on this blog. During that time, so many things have changed that are worth sharing. I will be doing more writing in the days to come.

Come to the STC QC 2009 Homecoming!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S-ZuGqkhEtM

Come home, Batch 1984!

St. Theresa's College, QC Batch 1984 Yearbook Silver Jubilee Edition is online

STC QC Batch 1984's online yearbook is now up at www.stcqc84.org!

Creating this online yearbook was a virtual trip down memory lane, and it was good to find old batchmates in different parts of the world. It was great to once again work with my online sisters Cate, Pen, Ginger, Terry and Sarge. We were able to manage the work among ourselves from four different timezones without face to face contact. Minutes before our e-blast, we assisted Cate, who was uploading the files as she was peeling an onion and slicing tomatoes, because the site nearly nearly crashed. (She also managed to splatter tomatoes onto her keyboard, LOL) It was such a joy that within seconds after the e-blast was fired (and the crash aborted), the campaign monitor showed batchmate after batchmate going to the website, all within minutes of each other.

Within a day, we had gathered practically the whole of batch 1984, as well as girls from other batches, into the site.

I do hope that this would inspire more of our batchmates to make the trip home this January as we celebrate our Silver Jubilee. As for me, I'm meeting up with Sarge and Pen in the Bay Area next week, our first meeting after 25 years!

There's so much I have to thank STC for, but dear friends are definitely among them.

STC Batch 1984 Website Goes Live!

Our batch website is up and I'm mighty proud to be part of the team that worked on this! We worked gratis et amore countless days and nights from three different timezones to come up with this treasure trove of memories. To think, the last time I saw these girls (with the exception of Terry) was a quarter of a century ago. None of the girls in the STC Batch 1984 website team were my classmates in high school. Ginger, Pen and Terry went with me to UP for college, but I don't think I saw any of them after the first sem in the state university. The last time Cate and Michelle became my classmates was in grade school! Yet when we worked, the chemistry was just perfect! I have never worked with a team this competent and great!

Check it out: www.stcqc84.org

Mother's love worth $117,000 per year, study says

(This wire article is interesting although I am not too comfortable with it. Just want others to share with other parents out there. Since when did a mother's love have a dollar equivalent? Oh well....)   

  BOSTON, Massachusetts (AP) -- If a stay-at-home mom could be

 compensated in dollars rather than personal satisfaction and unconditional

 love, she'd rake in a nifty sum of nearly $117,000 a year.

  That's according to a pre-Mother's Day study released in May by

 Salary.com, a Waltham, Massachusetts-based firm that studies workplace

 compensation.

  The eighth annual survey calculated a mom's market value by studying

 pay levels for 10 job titles with duties that a typical mom performs,

 ranging from housekeeper and day care center teacher to van driver,

 psychologist and chief executive officer.

  This year, the annual salary for a stay-at-home mom would be

 $116,805, while a working mom who also juggles an outside job would get $68,405

 for her motherly duties.

  One stay-at-home mom said the six-figure salary sounds a little low.

  "I think a lot of people think we sit and home and have a lot of fun

 and don't do a lot of work," said Samantha Russell, a Fremont, New

 Hampshire, mother who left her job as pastry chef to raise two boys, ages 2

 and 4. "But they should try cleaning their house with little kids

 running around and messing it up right after them."

  The biggest driver of a mom's theoretical salary is the amount of

 overtime pay she'd receive for working more than 40 hours a week. The

 18,000 moms surveyed about their typical week reported working 94.4 hours

 -- meaning they'd be spending more than half their working hours on

 overtime.

  Working moms reported an average 54.6 hour "mom work week" besides

 the hours they spent at paying jobs.

  Russell agreed her job as a stay-at-home mom is more than full-time.

 But she said her "job" brings intangible benefits she wouldn't enjoy in

 the workplace.

  "The rewards aren't monetary, but it's a reward knowing that they're

 safe and happy," Russell said of her sons. "It's worth it all."

Yummy and cheap paella!

P78 for a serving of paella?

Trust a foodie like Nancy Reyes-Lumen (editor-in-chief, Cook Magazine) to know the greatest food finds around Makati. The few times she talked about this really yummy paella down Dela Rosa Street, near the riles ng tren, I wasn’t really listening. Anything Nancy recommends would surely burn a hole in my pocket, I thought. She did mention that one can have individual orders for less than one hundred pesos, but that didn’t register.

Until, of course, that man com meeting last month when Nancy, who was celebrating her birthday that day, sent us this huge paellera filled with really tempting Paella Valenciana. We all helped ourselves to the wonderful paella, bursting with the most succulent prawns and clams and the freshest veggies, the moment our chairman adjourned the meeting. When Nancy dropped by, we all thanked her for taking the effort to whip up this really delightful paella. But she was quick to say she didn’t have a hand in the preparation of the rice dish. Again, she said, she ordered the paella down Dela Rosa Street, near the riles ng tren, from this hole-in-the-wall where a former Casa Armas chef lives. She couldn’t exactly recall the name of the place, she said, but she just paid P1,400 for that paella that 15 of us wolfed down.

The next day, Nancy treated her staff to paella during their weekly meeting and I was lucky enough to be summoned to the room just as lunch was being served. This time, they had Paella Negra on the table. Again, it was so yummy, the rice cooked to the right softness and bursting with the flavor of the squid ink. I was so absorbed in my paella to understand what the meeting was all about. All I remember was Nancy saying that she got the Paella Negra again for P1,400 thereabouts, from this carinderia down the street.

The following day, I was on a mission. Braving the heat of the sun, I walked down Dela Rosa Street in search of this carinderia. My husband, intrigued by my paella stories the past two days, walked all the way from his office near AIM to join me in my carinderia hunt.

It didn’t take us long to find Paella Atbp. The carinderia, housed on the first floor of an old apartment, was probably just 30 steps from the corner of Dela Rosa and Chino Roces Avenues. Inside were around six small tables and a counter where the chafing dishes containing various dishes – pork liempo, chop suey, grilled tuna, soup -- were arranged. At the center was a big paellera bursting with Paella Valenciana.

We immediately lined up to order paella, a serving of which cost P78. The server told us that we had to order a viand as well if we wanted the paella. We asked how much the other viands would cost, but no, he clarified, that would be part of the P78. How could we complain?

Excited, I opted for the pork liempo while Noel went for grilled tuna. It wasn’t long before we were served our paella with the additional viand. Noel immediately devoured the tuna, which he noted to be fresh and cooked just right. I had to wait a bit longer because the pork liempo was still being cooked, but it sure was worth the wait. The meat was flavorful, tender and went very well with my paella.

All in all, we spent less than P200 (we each bought soft drinks for P14 per bottle) for our lunch that day but we were more satisfied. Sure, the airconditioning wasn’t strong, and the smell of food stuck to our clothes and hair, but this was not what we came for, right?

People I Admire: Kenneth Cobonpue

(Published in Personal Fortune Magazine, January 2006)

More than Kenneth Cobonpue's artistry, it is his understanding of the importance of branding that I found noteworthy. I also found him very laid-back and humble, despite the success he has met.

Cebu’s treasure trove of wonders has inspired many an artist. Its gleaming waters -- home to the lushest sea grasses, the most ornate of shells, and the most stunning marine creatures -- and its emerald hills and mountains, resplendent with dazzling greenery, create a glorious spectacle that nature itself finds hard to replicate.

Of course, people can at least try. Furniture designer Kenneth Cobonpue, current toast of the Asian and European furniture design circuit, has attempted to bring these images to life in his works – with superb results. Using natural fibers, mainly rattan, Cobonpue has thoughtfully crafted luxurious, curvy furniture with novel hand-made production techniques. The result: playful and refreshing takes on the shapes and images of nature.

This design philosophy would unexpectedly catapult him to the big league. The 37-year old designer first made his mark at the Milan furniture Fair 2001, when he showcased his works with that of other Philippine designers in a joint show called Movement 8. Newsweek took notice of the “remarkable stuff” made by young “Southeast Asian designers rethinking steel-and-leather minimalism with breezy, tropical charm.”

Kenneth has since gone up several notches in the furniture design arena, with “Wallpaper” magazine recently nominating him as one of the icons of contemporary design, alongside leading lights Philippine Starck and Antonio Citterio. His works have appeared in the 2002, 2004 and 2005 editions of the prestigious International Design Yearbook, curated by Ross Lovegrove, Tom Dixon and Marcel Wanders, respectively. Kenneth is a seven-time winner of the Japan Good Design Award, and his list of awards continues to grow. His list of clients includes Bradd Pitt (who bought the Croissant chair, Pigalle chair, Voyage bed and doughnut bed) and Warner Brothers, which commissioned him to do the casino set for the movie Ocean’s Thirteen.

Kenneth’s quick ascent is by no means a mere stroke of luck, but the result of years of hard work and discipline. As a child, he witnessed how his mother, Betty Cobonpue, started a furniture business right in their own backyard. “I’ve always envisioned myself making things, like building boats,” he relates. Hoping to follow in his mother’s footsteps, he went on to study Industrial Design at New York’s Pratt Institute, before apprenticing for a leather and wood workshop in Florence, Italy. He then studied furniture marketing and production at the Export Akademie Baden-Wurttemberg in Germany under a private and state scholarship program.

Kenneth could have chosen to stay on in the United States but the recession made him decide to head for home in 1996. “It was not so good in the US then,” he recalled, and he thought it would be good to help out in managing the family business, called Interior Crafts of the Islands. It turned out to be a propitious move.

Back in his studio in sun-blessed Cebu, Kenneth perfected designs that would win him international acclaim. His trademark curvilinear designs and rounded look had a character that many appreciated for their freshness and uniqueness. His first design was called the Yin and Yang, whose see-through look was meant to showcase the elements of nature. It also featured the detailed hand techniques that would mirror his careful attention to detail. Yet Kenneth does not let design get in the way of functionality. “There is nothing superfluous or decorative about my design,” he points out.

Using fastening techniques culled from traditional boat building, Kenneth also experimented with an array of natural and synthetic materials from his native Cebu -- carbon materials, bamboo, sea grass, leather, stone, paper and naturally, rattan. Half of the materials used in his designs are sourced from within the Philippines; the rest are imported. His carbon chair, for instance, uses high tech material fashioned by local craftsmen. “The application is limitless for a thing that is well made,” he says.

Such cutting-edge designs do not always come to Kenneth in a flash. Though most of his designs are inspired by nature or more mundane items (the much-awarded Lolah chair was inspired by a can of coke), Kenneth admits that designs necessarily come by design. A design, he says, is something that one has to work on. “Design is a discipline. It’s important that you spend time for it. You really just have to make it happen. Sometimes it comes, sometimes it doesn’t.” He reveals how a design can take as long as a year or two to complete. “If it doesn’t work, we come back to it and find a solution.”

What differentiates Kenneth Cobonpue’s creations from other Philippine-made furniture, however, is the very brand it carries. “Philippine furniture is usually sold under a different name. There is no real value other than the manufacturing component which Vietnam and China can easily copy,” he notes. To ensure the integrity of his designs, Kenneth took the route that no other Filipino designer has done before: “I branded it.”

In branding his furniture, Kenneth sees himself creating the “model for the future of the industry.” The idea, he says, is to “sell Filipino culture, to make it truly global.”

Today, Interior Crafts of the Islands employs 3 craftsmen and 50 weavers, all trained by Kenneth, who help him stock showrooms across the globe, from Shanghai to Madrid to New York. Kenneth Cobonpue is one of the few furniture makers that publishes its own catalogue. He admits a certain pride to have someone like Bradd Pitt buying his works. “It’s flattering that he can choose anything in the world and he still chooses these things.”

Kenneth, though, sees beyond the glamour of his celebrity buyers “Fame from Brad Pitt buying (my works) is one thing, but respect from my contemporaries is more fulfilling.”

He is proud to be able to exhibit his works alongside those of Marcel Wanders and Ross Lovegrove, and professes an admiration for the works of Philippe Starck and Issey Miyake. “I’d like to do to furniture what he did for fashion,” he says.

A pragmatist, Kenneth recognizes the difficulty of selling his own brand in a world dominated by major brands. “It’s difficult selling a Philippine brand but we do it anyway,” he says. That, of course, will entail building the name. “You build the brand—brand is not about furniture, but about the lifestyle.”

.

Certainly, there is no stopping Kenneth Cobonpue from turning over new stones and in advancing Asian design. “I always want to reinvent myself, surprise myself, and carry the look further.”