I hate the EDSA MRT. If you have been following me on Twitter, you probably have noticed that most of my tweets are complaints while I am in the system. I don’t even want to call it a system as to a public commuter such as myself, I think the stations are poorly planned and the trains are taking in more than what it could handle. You can clearly see how flawed it is compared to the LRT-2 which started construction almost at the same time as the EDSA line and yet have properly designed stations and efficient fully-automated trains.

What made it even worse are the people. Although majority of the passengers are disciplined, as with every place in this world, there are some people who are uneducated, rude and arrogant that ruin the supposedly peaceful commute from home to work and vice versa. Some of these “characters” are described here so that you are prepared the next time you ride the MRT during rush hour.

The Right-Hand Drivers

The MRT stairway in most stations is usually divided by chains to separate those who are coming in from those on the way out. During rush hour, the line on the right going in can be so ridiculously long that it actually overflows to the street causing an insane amount of foot traffic. Some people, who obviously think that they are royalty therefore deserve to come in the station without much hassle, climb up the other side. Now when a train arrives and passengers get off at that station, the dimwits have already blocked their way causing yet another insane amount of foot traffic upstairs. Next time you encounter these kind of people, feel free to push and let them fall down the stairs. They are better suited lying against the pavement.

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So I was walking home yesterday listening to Shout Out Louds, lost deep in my thoughts when all of a sudden I saw something lit thrown in front of me. I was taken a back and without much time for me to figure out what it was, it let out a huge BANG making me squeal like a cat whose tail just got stepped on. Firecracker. Before I get the chance to assemble myself, the kids who did the throwing hurriedly ran off to avoid the wrath that I might have inflicted on them. I happen to have taken this quiz and found out that I could take on 15 five year old kids at once.

Seriously, who thinks that firecrackers are essential to having a wonderful New Year’s eve celebration? Do anyone really believe all those voodoo-drive-away-the-spirit crap? How about welcoming the new year with an amputated hand, do they think that’s lucky? And oh, don’t even get me started on these so-called PVC pipe gun which not only lets out a huge bang that could give an old lady an immediate heart attack, it also can give you an extra crispy burnt face. Ever since I was a kid I have always hated firecrackers and never even touched one. The whole point why boys at that age try to play with one is so that they can prove that their all tough and brave and I grew up not caring what people around me think.

Of course, parents are all to blame in this. They just let their kids go off and do whatever they want thinking those firecracker-related accidents shown in the news won’t ever happen to them. And as far as I can tell, most people who actually light up and play with firecrackers are those who can barely eat three meals a day and yet they go off and buy the loudest and most dangerous firecracker that they can afford.

I might be going out on a limb here in saying that I appreciate what the local media is doing to let the public know the dangers of firecrackers. I also did not have the knowledge before that the Department of Health is working towards to make the Philippines firecracker-free by 2010. Until then, I’m taking a cab home, at least until after new year’s day.

If you know me personally, you probably already know that I am planning to take up my masters in Sweden next year. If not, then yes, I’m just crazy that way and as with most students wanting to study abroad, I want to be exposed to a culture totally different from ours and live by myself in a foreign land.

Enough about that, this entry is really about PhilPost or Philippine Postal Corporation. If you believe all the stories of lost and extremely delayed mail and parcels, you have to be an idiot to trust sending items of value through them. But I’m different, I tend to think that only people who have negative experiences are the most vocal about it and the majority who did not have any problems at all would think nothing of it.

According to studera.nu, the site where you can apply for most universities in Sweden, you have to send your documents by regular mail. I may be overanalyzing it but I think they mean no couriers since the address is a PO box. Having planned this for months, I did my research and was overwhelmed by the horror stories people have about PhilPost. Even my friends are saying that their office are just filled with corrupt postal workers who just use all our mail as scratch papers for computing their ridiculously overpriced charges. Despite all of that, I have decided to trust them with my future (I guess, you could call it that) and use the service.

After my documents are ready and sealed in a brown envelope, I took time off work to head to the EMS branch of the Post Office in Pasay. Luckily, it’s just a single jeepney ride away from where I live. They told me that it will cost around 1500 pesos and will reach Strömsund in a couple of weeks. Sounds reasonable enough so I gladly paid and they handed me a receipt with a tracking number.

The PhilPost website seems to be stucked in 1999 so I never expected to find a page where I can track my mail. The Track & Trace section under Customer Guide just shows you a lame ‘under construction’ graphic and as far as I can remember, it’s been displaying that for more than a year now. I don’t mean to brag but I could probably get that up and running in less than a week, probably even a day.

So, it seems that the only way I could track my mail is wait for it to reach Sweden and get scanned by Posten. As I can be a little OC about this, I keep on checking the site almost every 30 minutes if it will show up there and not be collecting dust in a back room at PhilPost.

2 weeks have passed and there is still no sign of my mail. I got really worried and thought about just sending another one through DHL which will be horrible as I have to deal with my previous school’s bureaucracy all over again. I later found out that there is a problem on Posten’s english version of the site and entering the same tracking number on the Swedish site bears a result. Turns out, it was delivered to the recipient only in only 5 days! I let out a huge sigh of relief thinking my documents are in their hands now, ready to be judged.

I am not saying that the horror stories about PhilPost are not true. It’s just that the few times I have used them, including sending and receiving huge packages with items of value to and from abroad, my experience have been very pleasant and they deliver mostly on time. There may be corrupt workers stealing valuables from our mail but there are also honest and good ones like Mr. Floro “Pol” Camote from this Inquirer story published in October. I bet most people chose to ignore that when it came out.

Image Credit: Walang Magawa.com

Twitter, the wildly popular micro-blogging platform, has a growing number of Filipino users. As an avid Twitter myself, I can say that Twittering on the web is only half of what is it all about. The other is, of course, sending and receiving tweets on your mobile. Unfortunately for us, enabling this feature costs a lot as we have to send our tweets through a UK number. This workaround will allow you to text your tweets from your mobile for only P2.50 ($0.05).

Get a TwitterMail address
Go to TwitterMail.com and login with your Twitter username and password. You will be given your own TwitterMail e-mail address. Take note of this address as all messages sent to it will be posted as Tweets.

Use Smart’s Text-to-Email Feature
Compose a new message on your mobile phone in this format:
    <TWITTERMAIL ADDRESS> <TWEET POST>
    i.e. abcdefg@twittermail.com My first mobile tweet!
Send this to 200.

You will receive an SMS saying that your message has been received. Save the sender’s number as this will be unique to that address. The next time you tweet, just compose your message without the e-mail address and send it to that number. Each message sent will cost only 2.50 pesos. Pretty cool, right?

Enable Mobile Phone Notifications (optional)
If you want to be able to receive tweets from the persons that you are following, you need to enable phone notifications. Login to your Twitter account and enable mobile phone notifications under the Settings menu option. Send a text message with the code to the number posted on the screen. This will cost you around P15.00 but it will just be a one-time thing, unless you change your mobile number. You won’t be charged anything to receive an international SMS.

Awesome Add-ons
After being an official mobile twitter user, you can now use some of the services that will prove to be extremely useful for that forgetful brain of yours. There’s a full-featured to-do list at RememberTheMilk.com and the Timer Twitter bot. I personally use the Timer bot as it’s extremely simple. You can also check out MySmart and TwitterMail’s how page to find out some even more stuff that you could do on your mobile.

I am pretty sure that there is a Globe alternative to Smart’s text-to-email feature but I’m too lazy to search for it. If you know what it is, leave a comment and I’ll update this blog entry.

I love my Moleskine. I have the pocket reporter’s notebook as I think it’s perfect for on-the-go writing, being it in vertical orientation and you can hold it in one hand. I always have it with me to the extent that it replaced my wallet by using the back pocket as such, holding few bills and an ID.

Another thing that I love is the G-Pass. It’s an RFID chip the size of a quarter which allows you to ride the MRT and pay for your fare using your mobile phone. I’m quite surprised that only a few people who ride the MRT everyday actually use one and they would rather fall in numbingly long lines to buy their tickets. Hey, for those who didn’t know, it’s actually people who sell you tickets here and not machines unless those people are robots which isn’t unlikely considering they’re always stiff and grumpy.

Combine those two together and you have your very own M-Pass. Hey, who says you can’t put an RFID chip in a Moleskine? All you need is some strong adhesive (a tape will do) and stick your G-Pass chip on the lower back of your Moleskine. The chip is thin and small enough to be unnoticeable so don’t worry about adding some extra bulk. I have actually tried putting the G-Pass chip in the back pocket but I just have too much stuff in there that the reader have a hard time finding it. Putting it outside makes it much easier to interface with the reader and you won’t hear the dreaded “tsk” from the person behind you as that one-second delay is very important in their extremely busy lives.

The next time you ride the MRT, proudly tap your Moleskine on the reader and watch the faces of other people wondering what was that cool thing you just did. Well, okay, you can stick it on a bunch of other stuff but Moleskines are just plain cool, don’t ya think?