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President Arroyo presents a presidential citation to the world bowling champion Rafael 'Paeng' Nepomuceno, conferring on him the Order of Lakandula with the Special Class of Champion for Life (Photo/OPS).

It was awarded to Nepomuceno in simple rites during his courtesy call at Malacanang Palace's Music Room, Thursday. He presented to the Chief Executive the trophy he won in the South Pacific Classic in Melbouorne, Australia last October 2007.

The South Pacific Classic is Australia's most prestigious annual tournament which Nepomuceno first won in 1984, the first non-Australian to win the tournament. "Now, 23 years later, and having won it again, I am the first non-Australian to have won the tournament two times," Nepomuceno told the President.

"Congratulations, the Filipino people are very proud of you," the President replied, citing his extraordinary contribution to Philippine sports and his outstanding achievements in bowling competitions.

and you are right Madam President! We sure are proud of Mr. Paeng Nepomuceno for his extraordinary achievement.

The Champion for Life honors was created by the President to give credit and recognition to the Filipinos who have attained outstanding achievements in international sports, beauty and similar fields of competition, fostering extraordinary national pride and inspiration toward excellence. Those who received similar outstanding citations from the Chief Executive were boxing hero Emmanuel "Manny" Pacquiao, Miss International beauty queen Precious Lara Quigaman, billiards king Efren "Bata" Reyes, and Mount Everest conquerors Romy Garduce, Leo Oracion and Pastor Emata.

Recently, Nepomuceno was declared by both houses of Congress as the "Best Filipino Athlete of All Time" for his six prestigious world bowling championships, making him an international bowling Hall of Famer. Nepomuceno is listed in the Guiness Book of World Records as having won the most number of World Cups and has recently been designated Ambassador of Goodwill by the United Nations last July 11. In addition to his long list of well-known achievements as a world champion in three decades, Nepomuceno truly has been and continues to be an extraordinary ambassador for Filipino sports. He is the only bowler who had received the prestigious International Olympic Committee (POC) President's Trophy and was the first to be enshrined in the International Bowling Hall of Fame in St. Louis, Missouri in 1993. In November 1999, the Federation Internationale des Quilleurs (FIQ) named Paeng as the "International Bowling Athlete of the Millennium."

- Pacific News Center International

Mike Cohen, Pacific News Center Correspondent 04.JAN.08

Labels: Current Events, Red

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As of date, Davao City, Philippines has World's Most Modern Airport and the safest one at that.

An Australian engineer named William Krelle said that even if your aircraft is crippled with only one engine flying and you try to land in the middle of a storm, you can still land safely in Davao's International Airport. - from Bernama.

Very few people know the fact that Davao is "undoubtedly the safest airport in the world".

Davao's landing facilities are the latest and are state of the art computerized equipment that were installed by a Norwegian airport systems engineer that are being used by some of the world's biggest airports.

Most facts from Bernama.

Labels: Current Events, Red

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International Survey shows that women are breaking barriers in the Philippines and that they hold half of all senior management positions, and even one of the highest levels in the world.

Of course you would probably guess by then that our country is being run by a woman - President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo.

Women hold half of our senior management jobs in our country, representing 81% of the world economy, the highest rate in the study of 32 nations. Also, 97% of businesses in our country have women in senior management positions, actually the highest in the poll.

Men in the Philippines are actually used to women in authority. There are less sexist here so women can really say what they want to say and do what they want to do without the fear of being discrimanated just because you are a woman.

According to Dina Salonga from an article in VOAnews:

"I think that the Philippine society is basically a matriarchal one," she says.
" And that men don't really mind reporting to a higher authority who is female.
So that in the home the children, sometimes even the husband, would take orders,
if that's right word for it, from the wife. So they don't really mind reporting
to a woman manager."
The Philippines is often portrayed as having a macho
culture in which men dominate. But Salonga says this is only a façade and women
control things from behind the scenes.
"I think from the outside that's what
the men want the other people to perceive them to be. But inside the home I
think it's really the woman who enjoys the power," she says. "And sometimes they
just make the husbands feel that they are the ones who are powerful. So they do
it in a really subtle way and they get their way around it."

Even the Philippine Labor Department says women have outnumbered men in executive positions for several years.

from VoaNews:

Dan Roces, chief of research for People Management Association, says women are accepted in business.
"There really isn't any discrimination," he says. "We really tend to trust our businesses with [to] females. Our culture is more maternalistic. We tend to trust our women more because we were taken care of by our mothers. So we really don't mind if we take orders from them."

Labels: Current Events, Red