Monday, August 30, 2010

Hurricane Katrina five years ago

One of the scenes from the news I mostly remember was the dome that was so filled to it's capacity- young and old, rich, poor crying getting col and hungry having lost their homes and their things. Residents wandering the streets littered with garbage and floods everywhere. It didn't look like America.

New Orleans looks to have recovered. The people have risen from the ruins. Resiliency being their weapon.

Nola.com has stories of ruins and recovery: five years after Hurricane Katrina

Wednesday, August 25, 2010

Manila, After The Hostage

Filipinos working in Hong Kong getting the brunt of the residents anger after that hostage tourist bus tragedy. I can't really blame the reactions of the HK residents both here and in HK. Of course they're angry. 8 are confirmed dead and several others are in in critical conditions.

One policeman's grievance's against being dismissed which caused that officer his job and pension and retirement benefits triggered the craziness in his head.

What he did was wrong. How the Police handled the situation had lapses too. C'mon, we're a third world country okay! Our policemen doesn't necessarily have the training and equipment and other know hows on how to handle such crisis.

The whole thing was like 'Speed' the movie. The situation is somewhat the same in some aspects. Difference is that there was no bomb planted on the tourist bus that that crazy policeman took over and held hostage 28 tourist from HK. Instead an m 16 and I don't know what else.

Hostage situation lasted 12 hours that ended in a rainy day assault of the bus killing 8 Hong Kong nationals and wounding the other hostages. That crazy policeman, fired shots and killed the hostages.