You’re in the tub sipping your champagne and enjoying the music in the background… then the phone rings. You find yourself fumbling (searching for your robe, bubbles all over you, floor quite slippery) because you left your cordless in the lounge room.

Don’t you hate those telemarketing calls in the middle of dinner or afternoon naps? They seem to know when exactly to interrupt you.

Really don’t mind the calls as employment helps the economy, it’s just the timing and the no-gap spill. Some just does an “Eminem” without asking you first if you if you have time to spare.

What’s more annoying are the one’s “reciting” or who had no idea what they were talking about when you enquire about the product further – you could tell that their only mission is to record the treasured “YES”.

“Good afternoon, Sir. We have this offer at the moment, blah, blah, 14 days, blah, blah, you can return, blah, blah…. Is it okay, Sir?”

All you want is to get back to sleep so in your semi-conscious state you cooperated then you wake up wondering what that dream was all about.

You find what appears to be a marketing package and you ignore it only to find out a month later that you were charged for something you were not aware of. You then decide to call the provider to which you are subjected to the elevator music for 5…10…20…30 minutes. You are now facing a hard decision whether you should call again and sacrifice those 30 minutes, or hang on until someone finally gets your call – thinking you may be looking at wasting another 30 minutes of your life.

Meanwhile, you’re thinking if you should now just start cooking dinner or settle for pizza – but yes, you cannot call the store because you(r life is) on hold.

Someone finally picks up the call only to inform you that you’ve contacted the wrong department and they cannot transfer you because the office is now closed. Of course it is because you only have been waiting for 45 minutes and now you have to wait for the next day, after work to make that important call.

So the cycle begins. The next day, tick tock, 30 minutes later you blame yourself as you should have known better – why don’t you go to the toilet (or comfort room) first? “Will they hear it? Should I?”

Eventually the phone answers and now you’re demanding explanation to the recent charges. Then you find out the package you ignored was a wireless broadband stick you were meant to return after the trial period if you were not happy or had changed your mind. Thank goodness you didn’t throw it in the bin.

You inform the operator that you have no need for it, ask for them to organize pick up and then demand for a refund. They give you a day to pick it up and a time between 9am – 5pm that day. Then you wonder, isn’t that a whole day? Not wanting to sound smarty, you asked for a specific time but the operator cannot provide you one as it can be between 9am to 5pm. So, you decide to organize for someone to be home that particular day so this painful saga ends.

No one turns up.

40 minutes after, you are now asking the lady why they failed to pick up the parcel and quite upset that time has been wasted. Then she is asking for a reference number which was not given to you in the first place. Since you need a reference number, you have to contact another department to do this. Unfortunately, you guessed it; you cannot be transferred because the office is now closed. The next day is a similar story – ring, hold, request pick up, between 9am to 5pm, asked for ref # this time and organize someone to be at home. And since it is the same story, no one picked it up.

Frustrated, you rang and asked for the same thing. It is now day 8 from the time you made your initial call. The parcel has been picked up…2 weeks later. You ended up telling your friend how frustrated you were and found out your friend was given the same offer but he was told he can just drop off the stick in any of their offices.

“How can you trust these people again? How can they be so insensitive?” you ask.

“Who will compensate for those lost time and give you those 8 days back?”

“Shall I pick the phone and complain”? Then you look at your clock thinking.

Chifley voters have a clear choice on August 21. And my choice is Labor. I will go for Ed Husic, Federal Labor candidate for Chifley.

Mr Husic is committed to the priorities of better healthcare along with increased support for training and education.

“In only its first term, Federal Labor moved quickly to achieve things locally – and I’m asking Chifley voters for their support, to be part of a Gillard Government that will move Australia forward,” Mr Husic said.

Federal Labor candidate Ed Husic (left) at Mt Druitt Hospital

“We’ve improved funding for our hospitals, including a $4.5 million funding boost for Mt Druitt hospital, moved to set up local trade schools at Doonside, Evans and Loyola High Schools, returned Medicare services to Mt Druitt, will partner with Blacktown Council to develop a new multi-purpose community centre in Mt Druitt – and we’re working to bring quality broadband access to local businesses and residents that have been crying out for better internet access.

“Long time Federal MP Roger Price put his heart and soul into improving our area and I’d be enormously grateful for the chance to continue this work.

“A lot of people out our way want to have their voice heard and for someone to stick up for them in Government. I’d like the chance to get to work for the residents of Chifley.”

If elected, Mr Husic believed there was a full agenda to pursue locally.

“To achieve what we want to see locally we need a strong economy, and I think a Gillard Government will promote that by bringing the budget to surplus by 2013.

“Off a strong economy we can work to lift support for healthcare, where we’ll fund 3,000 new nurses and 1,300 GPs and GPs in training over the next three years and investing in a comprehensive package of measures to tackle suicide and promote better mental health in our community.

“Making sure our area gets its fair share of future health funding is my top priority – I’ll be standing up to make sure our local hospitals get the right slice of support and resources.

“As someone who’s a proud product of local public schools, I deeply believe that well-funded education helps our country and is a ticket to a better life for our kids – and I’ll work my heart out to see us benefit from more apprenticeship spots.”

I urge locals to support Ed and Labor at this year’s Federal Election.

*** Gil Enzon, his wife Conception and their children Dara and Carlo live in South Blacktown, NSW. Gil is a postal officer and a union official.

“I gather, young man, that you wish to be a Member of Parliament. The first lesson that you must learn is, when I call for statistics about the rate of infant mortality, what I want is proof that fewer babies died when I was Prime Minister than when anyone else was Prime Minister. That is a political statistic.” (Winston Spencer Churchill)

The use of research whether applied to marketing or scientific endeavors that better the human condition is a vital and noble occupation. Advancements in most of the things that people now enjoy have been, in one way or the other, helped out by research. It is a very powerful tool in the pursuit of new knowledge and the improvement of existing wisdom.

Like most effective scientific methods with wide practical utility, research is easily subjected to misuse though, sometimes, unwittingly by one or two of the parties involved in the research.

My own personal view is that it becomes suspect when used in politics, especially in the local context, where the motive of the fact finding is often ill intended.

Is it research when the intention is to corroborate a preconception that puts in a good light the advocate? Is it research if all that it wanted was to bring out a set of results which would be beneficial to specific interest groups? Is it research if the goal was to discredit and besmirch personalities and institutions? Is it research if it falsely tries to create impressions of irreversible trends to sway constituent preferences? Is it research if it is used to help in the deception and in the cover up the ugly truth of personalities and institutions?

Of course there are legitimate political researches. You can include those researches whose results have been used to improve strategies whether logistical and or image related (although a debatable ethical area). Other legitimate uses of research are exit poll surveys (if done properly) who serve a beneficial purpose in that it establishes results in the soonest possible time so that manipulations may be preempted and the early settlement of the outcomes of the election eases the tension and allays the fears of the voting public. Political research is useful to political scientists in the study of electoral choices of different groups and the underlying reasons for their preferences. Sociologists are able to trace the evolution of social issues by studying their shifts. And for the citizen, it allows his voice to be heard and it gives him an idea of how he differs with other individuals and against sectoral aggrupations other than his own.

Good research, bad research. It all depends on the motives of those commissioning the research and the willingness of the researcher to go along with them. There is also the media who may abet the ill intentions of the research by completing the disgraceful cycle when they make the results public.

There is no arguing the right of the research to be published as the constitution guarantees press freedom and freedom of speech, but as in any of the freedoms, it carries with it the responsibility of publicizing only those that are not inimical to the public interest. The harm of malicious research cannot be underestimated as it has the power to sway people’s opinions and create strong emotions that could be injurious to a person or to a state.

Research is too complicated to be fully appreciated by laymen or even from those a rung higher. Statistics has the unfortunate association to lies. Great thinkers and statesmen have remarked about their discomfort with statistics because it has been often used by their detractors and by themselves to make vague the issues that are indefensible in plain terms.

The obvious solution to the problems of political polling is to educate the masses about research so that they may understand the full extent of the information as well as the limitations of the data being shown. They should be able to understand the limits of the inference that can be made of the data and to know the difference between data that may be confidently considered as reliable against those that show a tendency towards an outcome but cannot be relied on. This, of course, presupposes that the research is truly objective and that the methodology is the most appropriate to arrive at the research objectives and that it is free from bias in the design, the sampling, wordings of the questions, the order of questions, the fieldwork’s operations and personnel. The approach to the analyses of the data should ensure that it is exhaustive and no omissions or commissions in the analysis should favor a particular result. It should also make sure that the statistical tests and the advanced statistical methods, when employed, are the appropriate ones.

The education of the electorate is a good thing but it may take a long time in progressing. I would favor the creation of a group made up of professional researchers, political scientists and those in media responsible for the publication of the results of surveys who would scrutinize all research projects that are to be commissioned and those non-commissioned but subscriber supported surveys (syndicated researches) before they are allowed to go on field. This is not censorship of the content of the survey. It endeavors to make the surveys fair to affected parties and personalities by ensuring that it has undergone a rigorous check that will result in findings that are with integrity.

Reprinted from A Matter of Sharing

*** Ed Roa is a retired marketing, advertising and market research man. He now dabbles into poetry and a contributor of emanilapoetry.com

Ronaldo, former president of the Philippine Community Council of NSW, is running as the Democrats official candidate for Greenway

We now have two Filipino Australians vying for the same electorate. The other one is Jaymes Diaz. (See our story posted few days ago.)

I am sending this post on the road, and we will post a story of Ronaldo’s candidacy when I get back to our workstation. *** Calling our community bloggers wishing to post blog entries on 2010 Fed election: Now is an opportune time to be heard by our community and mainstream Australia. // Romy C

High population growth slows down... // TFA Photo

Australia’s population reached 22.2 million by the end of 2009, growing by 432,600 people over the year. Net overseas migration accounted for 64% of this growth, with the remaining 36% due to natural increase (births minus deaths).

Based on preliminary figures, there were 295,700 births and 140,800 deaths registered during 2009, both down slightly on 2008 figures.

Preliminary net overseas migration recorded for 2009 was 277,700 people, down from 301,200 people in 2008. Preliminary net overseas migration for 2009 was the difference between 508,000 arrivals and 230,300 departures.

Western Australia’s population continued to record the fastest annual growth rate of all states and territories, growing 2.7% during 2009, followed by Queensland (2.4%), the Northern Territory (2.2%), Victoria (2.1%), the Australian Capital Territory (1.8%), New South Wales (1.6%), South Australia (1.3%) and Tasmania (0.9%).

Source: Australian Bureau of Statistics

Venus Priest grew up in Iligan City, Lanao del Norte, Philippines. Because of her passion to help people, she enrolled and finished a Bachelor of Science Course in Nursing, and practiced privately for a number of years.

Arriving in Australia in 1995, she attained an Advanced diploma in Accounting with Western Sydney TAFE. She further qualified for Business Management.

Liberal candidate Venus Priest in a tough battle for Chifley

She has lived in Blacktown for 10 years and is a small business owner, running a Grocery Store at Hassall Grove. Having the store allowed Venus to develop a great understanding of people’s everyday needs, from her daily contact with families that come to her store. Their concerns were with the ever increasing cost of living – food, fuel, and electricity.

In an interview with Venus, she said, “Like the First Fleet Australians, I wasn’t born in Australia. But, I am now a very proud Australian, and I also am determined, to build a better Australia – through hard work and commitment. I will be vocal in my call for funding for Blacktown Hospital. Mental health needs serious attention. Studies have found that 1 in 5 people – millions of Australians, will suffer mental illness. Yet, only 1/3 of sufferers receive help from the Health Services. Mental health is in need of big help. I stand before the people of Chifley, to humbly ask for your support. Life is not all about ourselves; it is also about sacrificing for others.”

Venus has a real passion for the Blacktown community and has demonstrated, time and time again, this very commitment through her support and involvement with various Filipino Australian community groups including FAME, ILISA and Banag Banag. These organisations are directly focused on bringing support and understanding of Filipino and Australian customs, values and cultural understanding of both communities and to the wider and immediate community. Venus recently established a new organisation, the Australian Drug Outburst Control Association (ADOCA), to provide education for drug users and their families.

Dumped liberal candidate, David Barker, ran a religious comment against Muslim, Ed Husic. Sydney Morning Herald writer, Erik Jensen, followed a similar tract with his report, “Priest ‘Tough’ on Muslims”. Erik Jensen mentions that she is not involved with the Philippine Community Council of NSW. This in fact is true, but what has not been mentioned, is that the PCC-NSW is an organisation made up of Presidents of Filipino Associations, of which Ms Priest is not. This is a misleading statement.

The same reporter mentions Atoy Sayas, a known Labor supporter, saying that Ms Priest never properly finalised her membership with the Australian Philippine Chamber of Commerce. Venus Priest says that she was a member well before Atoy Sayas became the current president.

Mr Sayas’ meaning when he mentions Ms Venus not being “active politically” remains to be determined. The Liberal party selected Ms Venus because of her qualifications and her capabilities, not simply because she “knows” someone.

Unknown to some people, Venus Priest, like this writer, is a practising Catholic who grew up in a city where Muslims and Christians live in harmony and mutual respect. This harmony is displayed during Iligan City’s annual Feast of St Michael celebrated both by Muslims and Christians. St Michael is the patron Saint of Iligan City. Iligan, like the rest of the Philippines, is a melting pot of different races and religions. Blacktown, like Iligan is a melting pot of different races and religions.

Iligan City is known for its production of Green Energy care of the Maria Christina Hydro Electric Plant, the world’s largest mango fruit as listed in the Guinness book of World Records, and for its famous Suka Pinakurat, known around the world where Filipinos reside.

Filipinos around the world are known to be hard, diligent and honest workers. Venus Priest urges Australians, Filipino-Australians and other groups to leave their political agendas and self interest behind and focus on allowing her the opportunity to prove her words.

Australians love the underdog, the person who has a go. Venus Priest will be a blessing to Chifley.

*** Mitchell Badelles is Sydney-based and an active community leader and an exponent of Philippine heritage including Philippine martial arts.

The freefall of Kevin Rudd in the opinion poll from the 70′s to 30′s satisfaction rate and Labor’s primary vote at 35 while Liberal, 40 got all the knives out from Labor’s factional warlords in an unparalleled political assassination.

In a matter of hours, Australia has a new Prime Minister, a female, Julia Gillard. The threat of losing power, a Labor obsession, (no matter what) is the primary motive for deposing a Prime Minister in his first year of term.

This play in federal politics is a repeat and mirror of NSW and is now taking almost 20 years for the voters of NSW to come out with anger. I hope it will not take that long before the Australian voters learn the NSW lesson. We now have either a Julia Keneally or Kristina Gillard.

. . . . . . . . .

The Penrith by-elections gave an historic 25.7% swing to the Liberals and even if half of this swing is repeated in the coming state elections in March 2011, only 20 Labor MPs will be left in a 93-seat parliament.

I was in a polling booth in Penrith, and the three young Labor workers covered their Labor marked shirts and another one sported a “Worker’s Rights” shirt. These did not help at all, most voters, when handed the Labor how to vote, either said, “you must be joking” or flatly refused to accept the leaflet.

The result in the Penrith by-elections is a bad omen or perhaps confirms that the State Labor government is terminally ill. This long-serving government had grand plans only to be scrapped later. Until now, it is still issuing 20-25 year plans and act business as usual. But NSW voters can’t wait for March, or perhaps in October to vent their anger against the Labor brand.

. . . . . . . . .

P-Noy will be the new President, a great hope for the long suffering Filipinos.

He has a Herculean task to overhaul the government and steer the state ship into a genuine functioning democracy and achieve economic prosperity. The President will be called upon to eliminate the systemic corruption in all levels of government. He needs to bring to justice those officials responsible for the scandals and corruptions in the previous administration. People will not take scapegoats, it must go to the top, to former president GMA and the First Gentleman.

P-Noy also needs to find closures to the “NBN”, “Hello Garci”, Fertilizer scams, and others. P-Noy was elected through an EDSA masked as “elections” and the thousands of volunteers, the yellow army, are on the watch to ensure that this is not a repeat of the previous EDSA people power.

. . . . . . . . .

The Alliance of Philippine Community Organizations’ (APCO) Freedom Ball was impressive in attendance and program. It ushered new dynamics in Filipino organisations. I hope that PCC and APCO can still reconcile or at least move towards friendly working relationships in the interest of the community.

*** Lawyer Jess Diaz is a councillor of Blacktown City Council. More about Jess Diaz…

Last week there were two events which did the Filipino-Australian community very proud. One of these was the staging of “Her Son, Jose Rizal” play on 17 – 20 June 2010 in Mann Theatre in Surry Hills. The play showcased brilliant talents of all those involved.

Bless Salonga has already done a superb blog on the play so I want to talk about the other event which was also successful. This was the launch last 19 June of the ‘The Healthy and Tasty Challenge Cookbook’ which contains recipes submitted by five Filipino cooks in a competition.

The competition was conducted by the NSW Multicultural Health Communication Service [MHCS] and involved the Chinese, Filipino, Italian, Samoan and Sri Lankan [Sinhalese and Tamil] communities.

Over two hundred recipes were received and out of these, with five per community subsequently picked as finalists.

The Filipino cooks and their recipes are: Neria Soliman – Adobo Supreme; Aileen Vidal Reardon – Binakol na Chicken; Eduardo Delaguidado – Pinoy Style Mixed Vegetables, Fruits & Prawn Stir Fry; Sheila Constantino – Lechon Manok with Salad Ilocano; and Maria Andrea Bermudez-Gonzales – Saucy Vegetable Rice Topping w/Sardine Omelette.

Of five finalists per community, a winner with the dish judged to be the healthiest among Filipino recipes was selected and the judges were one in selecting Neria Soliman’s.

The cookbook was formally launched at the Blue Elephant Restaurant at Waldorf Function Centre, Pennant Hills.

It was pleasing to see that the function was attended by a big crowd, with the Filipinos outnumbering members of the other ethnic groups. The Filipino media group was well represented too with the attendance of Michelle Baltazar [The Australian Filipina], Ronald Manila [SBS Radio], Nonoy Perdon [Bayanihan News], Evelyn Zaragosa [Philippine Community Herald News] and Violi Calvert [freelance writer].

At the conclusion of the launch, everyone present was given a bag containing a copy of the cookbook and information about programs conducted by MCHS.

I imagine that the wider Australian community will have access to the cookbook. It is great to see yet another Filipino contribution to our multicultural society.

*** Violi Calvert is Media and Public Relations Officer of the Australian Handball Federation.

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Photo: Maria Andrea Bermudez-Gonzalez, Aileen Vidal Reardon, Winner Neria Soliman, Eduardo Delaguiado and Sheila Constantino // Credit: NSW Multicultural Health Communication Service

During my younger years, I had my favourite “things” such as Maths, Drama, Journalism, Debating and Dancing. I could ace my Trigo exam without even studying but unfortunately History was my waterloo.

I couldn’t see the logic of studying the past when I was a very active child always looking forward to the future. But as I grow older, I have learned to understand the essence of our old Filipino saying “Ang hindi marunong lumingon sa pinang-galingan ay hindi makararating sa paroroonan” translated as “He who does not look back into his past, cannot reach his destination”.

Her Son, Jose Rizal (the play) had not only allowed me to have a glimpse of the past but gave me an understanding of who we are today.

I – The Calamba Scene – reminded me of a typical Filipino family where religion plays a big part in our lives. This took me back to my childhood when the elders used to talk about us kids – our achievements, their plans for us and the times when we would present our talents, the elders being our audience beaming with pride. I found the capture of Dora Teodora symbolic to the imprisonment of our nation under the hands of our so-called foreign “allies”.

II – The Fiesta Scene – provided explanations of our competitive spirits. Fearing for their lives, our ancestors had to do everything to please those people in power in order to protect their lives, survive and/or gain their favours. I admire our perseverance or what others call “fighting spirit” but had now evolved into political strategy. If you think about it, this is still happening in our dear Philippines; those who have access to people in power will compromise their convictions in order to gain cookie points, protect their interests and/or advance their position.

III – The Dormitory Scene – it first took me back to the family system. Soledad symbolizes our playful spirits while Paciano represents our protective older brother/s or sister/s. Pepe’s departure to me shows the plight of our relatives who have the best intentions to improve their family’s lives. Like Pepe, we have highly intelligent and capable people but had no freedom or opportunity fulfil these dreams and forced to seek further education and better career in a foreign land.

IV – Return to Calamba – Pepe’s return to me is synonymous to Ninoy Aquino’s fate. Here we have a soul full of hopes and willing to fight for the truth. We also have our nation represented by Dona Teodora who turned a blind eye on what’s going on in our society today; compromised her faith feeling hopeless due to the sufferings and punishment she received for her courage and values she once demanded from her people.

Deep in my heart, I know we have a lot of Pepe’s out there; who have the desire to speak of the truth waiting to be heard and for unity to summon the moment to rise up. It’s time to say “NO” to those who abuse their power, punish or disrespect our people for what they believe in. We cannot allow history to keep repeating itself.

I wish to thank Kate Andres for the invite to Her Son, Jose Rizal; we enjoyed the play immensely and I was moved by the performance of Belen Mendoza during the Thursday night performance.

I hope the play allowed us to find Pepe’s voice inside each one of us and not let such a brave man, our hero, die in vain.

Tutubing Pinoy

Edd Aragon is a senior artist for the Sydney Morning Herald and a multi-awarded caricaturist/illustrator. Edd’s other interests include painting, photography, writing, blues harp, rock & roll, and jazz.