Monday, December 19, 2011

Unexpected Aftermath

Typhoon Sendong passed through the southern part of the Philippines over the weekend.  Weather alerts were issued as soon as the storm entered the Philippine Area of Responsibility or PAR. However, we never really learned any lessons after Ondoy and the recent Pepeng which destroyed a lot of properties and claimed a lot of lives. The latest count puts the dead at 662 and hundreds more missing.  The local government officials of the affected areas particularly Cagayan de Oro, and Iligan did not even make the necessary precautions that should have been automatic once your area is placed under a storm signal.  There were no flood warnings issued and the floods came in the dead of the night.

Nevertheless, we cannot bring back time and destruction is already upon us. I just pray for strength, especially for the people who were badly affected by this calamity.  May they remain strong and faithful to be able to weather this storm that has literally and figuratively destroyed their lives.

There are a lot of pictures of the devastation that TS Sendong did and I do not need to post it here.  What we need now is to help our fellow countrymen to be able to pick up the pieces and continue on with their lives.

Courtesy of Philippine National Red Cross

You can go to the webpage of Philippine Red Cross for information on how to donate.  I believe television networks are also accepting donations in cash or in kind for the 88,000 or so evacuees.  There are also a lot of other NGOs and private organizations mobilizing to help out these people in need.  Water, food and clothing and blankets are what they need the most now.    I hope we can share even if a little bit of our blessings to these people who have lost everything.

Friday, December 16, 2011

Rainy Holidays

This is a really very seldom occurrence.  Davao City is placed under a storm signal.  DOST-PAGASA has placed the city together with other Mindanao provinces like Cotabato, Zamboanga Provinces and Lanao Provinces under Signal #1.  Tropical Storm SENDONG is still at the sea and will make a landfall at Hinatuan, Surigao del Sur.  

Here's the latest picture from DOST - PAGASA weather services

 
For more updates, you can visit the website of PAGASA.  Stay safe and dry people!

Tuesday, December 13, 2011

Christmas Wishlist #1

We were at the mall yesterday when we saw this nifty gadget while browsing the Samsung store.  My husband was not that happy when he learned about it.  You see, he just bought the Samsung Galaxy SII which cost him a lot and is now costing him more because of the excess GPRS charges brought about by letting the boys use it.  To date, his excess charges already reached almost 2K because the kids were downloading games from the Marketplace.  We do have wifi here in our house but sometimes, it does not reach the room at the back where they sometimes play.  Unfortunately, the little one found a way to activate the data via GPRS thus the excess usage.

Back to the gadget we saw yesterday... It was the first time we saw the Samsung Galaxy S wifi only.  It was like an IPod touch but only with bigger screen.  It's screen size is the same as the newly released Galaxy Note. I believe the screen is about 5" but of course, it is not as sophisticated as the Note. The great thing about it is that it only costs around P13,000++.  With the amount my hubby bough his SII, he could have already bought 2 of the S wifi and not have any problems with excess data charges and erupting wars every now and then on who gets to use the phone to play.  Howell....  I was suggesting that he sell his unit since it was fairly new and he can buy 2 new gadgets! Hahahahah....

However, I am still an Apple fan so I am still dreaming of owning an IPad someday.  Maybe I'll wait for IPad 3 to be released.  Rumor has it that production is already ongoing for its components and release of the product will be sometime April of 2012.  It's a wait and see game for Apple fanatics and semi-fanatics like me =)

What's on your wishlist?

Image courtesy of http://cdn.androidcommunity.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/sgs-wifi5-main.jpg

Specifications of the product can be found here

Samsung Galaxy S WiFi 5.0

Samsung

POPULARITY


Daily interest
3.9%
Total hits:
912827

VOTING RESULTS


Design
7.6
Features
7.4
Performance
7.5
  

Votes:
686
Tablet with no support for GSM voice communication, SMS, and MMS.
This is not a GSM device, it will not work on any GSM network worldwide.
GENERAL2G NetworkN/A
Announced2011, February
StatusAvailable. Released 2011, May
SIZEDimensions141.3 x 78.2 x 11.9 mm
Weight-
DISPLAYTypeLCD capacitive touchscreen, 16M colors
Size480 x 800 pixels, 5.0 inches (~187 ppi pixel density)
MultitouchYes
 - TouchWiz UI
- Optical trackpad
- Touch-sensitive controls
SOUNDAlert typesN/A
LoudspeakerYes, with stereo speakers
3.5mm jackYes
 - SoundAlive enhanced sound engine
MEMORYCard slotmicroSD, up to 32GB, buy memory
Internal8/16GB storage
DATAGPRSNo
EDGENo
SpeedNo
WLANWi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n, Wi-Fi hotspot
BluetoothYes, v3.0 + HS
USBYes, v2.0 microUSB
CAMERAPrimary3.15 MP, 2048x1536 pixels, autofocus, LED flash
VideoYes
SecondaryYes, VGA
FEATURESOSAndroid OS, v2.2 (Froyo)
CPU1 GHz
SensorsAccelerometer, compass
MessagingEmail, Push Mail, IM
BrowserHTML, Adobe Flash
RadioStereo FM radio with RDS
GPSYes, with A-GPS support
JavaYes, via Java MIDP emulator
ColorsBlack
 - SNS integration
- 8h video playback
- MP4/DivX/XviD/WMV/H.264/H.263 player
- MP3/WAV/eAAC+/AC3/FLAC player
- Organizer
- Image/video editor
- ThinkFree document editor (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, PDF)
- Google Search, Maps, Gmail,
YouTube, Calendar, Google Talk, Picasa integration
- Voice memo
- Predictive text input (Swype)
BATTERY Standard battery, Li-Ion 2500 mAh
Stand-by
Talk time
Music playUp to 60 h
MISCPrice group

Source:  GSMARENA.COM