Passionately M

Many people in the UAE are excited to welcome September 2022 and this excitement, for almost half a year, has greatly rippled that definitely stretches outside the country. Few months ago (April), the UAE Cabinet approved some visas with a new system of entry and residence, which is considered to be one of the biggest overhauls in the visa residency system in years, according to "The National ".  The aim is to attract and retain global talents and skilled workers. It further says that flexible visas will boost "competitiveness and flexibility of the job market and foster high sense of stability among UAE residents and families".   People on visit visa can stay up to 60 days, instead of 30 days only. A f ive-year multi-entry tourist visa was introduced in addition to the regular tourist visa. The tourist can stay in the country up to 90 days in a row, and can be extended for another same period, so total of 180 days in a year. No sponsor is needed. A proof of havi...

  Those with at least a basic gadget that can connect to the internet, are privileged to have an access to unlimited information available on the web. Everyone is a student who can learn many things in the Information Age. The challenge is how to filter that vast information so that what comes into our minds are verified true and correct, particularly if they have something to do with important / critical / sensitive issues. Since childhood I have been hungry for information and when I learned how to generate money at an early age, I used to subscribe to some leading newspapers and Reader's Digest. I am interested in current events and creativity of advertising agencies when they put their AIDA concept in print (get the a ttention, i nterest, d esire and a ction of target buyers) . Some of my roots were / are authors / writers and as such, it runs in my DNA . Writers read a lot to know more about life and their subject / s.  To come up with a newspaper, printed or digital or b...

  I set my alarm clock at 8 AM, as it was announced that the funeral mass for a dear friend, would be at 2 PM, Philippine time. She died on 4 August 2022, after several hours in comatose. The cause was a bleeding in the brains after she got out of balance in the toilet and fell down on the floor. I do not know yet the exact medical findings as of writing. There was no online funeral mass. I just said a silent special prayer with a heavy heart. Few days back, my son always told me to go home, repeatedly saying the same line. He did not say other words to me. Perhaps it was the time that the mother of his close friend who was like an elder brother to him, was in a critical condition, and he was feeling his pains.  He did not tell me anything related to this. I learned the news from my youngest daughter who advised me to talk to my godson, for comfort and strength, while the mother was fighting for life in the hospital. It was a devastating news. Last month she celebrated her 71s...

One of the laundry challenges in a shared flat is the once-a-week schedule of washing clothes. I have few pieces of clothes only (the Filipinos call it 'PirmaNa' brand  -- always wearing them) so if I cannot wash on my scheduled day, I have to repeat wearing lightly soiled clothes. I am chubby so I perspire a lot. My room has a huge glass window and the building has an idle lot beside it, so there is no structure to block the sunlight coming from the east. Put something on the wall, and later it will be cooked in summer days. The kitchen has no hood over the gas stove. There is no electric fan for proper ventilation so I sweat a lot when I go there to cook (not to mention the smell), hence, there is a need to change clothes after going there. Sometimes I just hang them in my room for reuse when dry when I have not taken a bath yet. We were asked to choose our preferred day in a week to wash our clothes. My friend and I wash our clothes separately, so we got two (2) days, Monda...