Tony de Jesus Arts Collection

09/07/2026

My wife went to Vietnam for a FNA (fine needle aspiration) of her breast yesterday. She left at 3AM, and landed in Ho Chi Minh city at 5:45 AM. She went to a public hospital at 9 AM and finished treatment before lunch. Total spent was 2,108 in Philippine pesos including the doctors fee and 3d ultrasound.
We tried our local public hospital first before deciding to go to Vietnam. 2 weeks of falling in line just for a blurred print of the ultrasound that the doctors said should be repeated with a clearer print. She paid 1,200 pesos for that blurry print and wasted so much time in queues and still no treatment. Our hospital equipment are all obsolete and public hospitals are supposed to be free. Vietnam has overtaken us. They are progressive while we regress.

04/07/2026

29/06/2026

Just to record. Trangkaso day

14/06/2026

Nice place and excellent food.

10/06/2026

Continuation...,

Years passed. For us, we didn't need to contact each other often. The coming of the smart phone and messenger became convenient and we chatted. Not often. Sometimes we drink while we chat. We talked about family. i even made him ninong of Michael.
Our friendship was never affected by religion. He was an Iglesia ni Kristo and I don't go to any church. He was so devoted to his religion that he never misses a mass. He had always been straight forward when it comes to his beliefs. I don't go against it. As long as it makes you happy and it gives you a peace of mind, I am for it.
I invited him to come over to Lipa, probably 12 years ago. He always loved the weather here. I learned that he was already living alone back then. We had drinks at my lanai. It was the time when we had an earthquake. I can't remember when that was. We even joked that the wine must have been quite strong because everything seems to shake.
His wife and children left him for America. He didn't want to tell the entire story. But i suspect the same reasons wives leave husbands (money). I told him to get another woman. Lol. I told him; "for all i care you are already Free!" But he said that his kids are girls and he didn't want bad karma come to them. Heck I said, get a sexy maid. You don't need to touch her, i said. But his will is strong. He said that it wouldn't feel right.
In one reunion of "The Mareha Goons" he attended. It was somewhere in Binan Laguna. Back then he was working in a call center. Our Mareha group meets every 5 years. Some members are all over the world now. But if you can't join the reunion, you get a video call.
We all experience family problems. I had mine too. I chat with Mar when i need an ear. He was always there. I showed him my paintings and gave his inputs. Also with my page "Isko d Papet", he was a number 1 fan (until Meta unpublished it). He was into hospice care with his cousin then. He felt sorry for their patients with ungrateful kids. He said that it was as if the kids just wanted to get rid of their parents. Little did he know that he would suffer the same fate.
Two years ago he said that he was always feeling sick. Then he was diagnosed with cancer. He loved to eat and his cousin indulges him with treats at expensive restaurants. I guess his cousin also sensed that Mar had always been depressed. He was always excited whenever he's expecting a chat with his daughters. But he admitted that it was getting rarer. His wife doesn't even want to chat with him anymore. I believe that the depression did alot to lead to cancer.
I continued chatting with him. I still talked to him about painting projects that i had in mind. He was undergoing chemotherapy already and was given 4 years. I told him to hang in there and keep on swinging. But bad luck kept on nagging him. His Face Book page was hacked. The hacker studied him...or probably me. Mar had a scheduled therapy that day but the hacker said that Mar's money was short. The hacker even joined our group chat "The Mareha Boys". Our group raised more than 100 thousand pesos to send Mar. But Mar didn't get a cent from it.
It bothered Mar alot upon learning what happened. We all had hints that it wasn't Mar begging for money because it was unlike him to do so. But if it were true, then what are friends expected to do? We only realized that it wasn't Mar when the hacker deleted Mar's Face Book page. It was such a heartless thing. All memories of him are gone.
This is the reason why I'm writing this. For my friend to leave something behind. To record that Mar had touched my life and had influenced me somehow. He had stayed awake 3 days before he died. He told me that he was afraid that he might not wake up. June 8, 2025 when his sister Marthie said how Mar struggled through the night. It was past noon of June 9 when my friend left.
I searched for Mar on the internet and found nothing. Someone said that if your not on the net you don't exist. Well, you exist in my heart man. This is for you.
Good bye ole' buddy.

10/06/2026

This is Abrimarte's Story.

I have known him since 1979. We were freshmen together at UPLB. We weren't room mates at first because i was billeted with my cousin Bobby in room 1 where i was with 7 other guys. Our rooms were spacious compared to modern accommodations. But luxuries like air conditioning or even screened windows doesn't exist. We survived.
I guess it was during my sophomore year when Mar and I stayed in a room together with 4 other guys. My memory is not very clear since it was 46 years ago. I forgot their names. But Mar and I always shared our coffee breaks together. Ci******es and coffee were our sustenance and that Oishi cracker we bought at "Dakota" - a carinderia we named after seeing Wally (the gay seller) uses his hands to pick up your food.
We were hungry most of the time but we were expected to at least pass our grades during exams. So nights were long spent on doing assignments and review. Should you hear someone shouts "Dakota!!!", it is an invitation to eat because it was quite a walk going there and it was kinda dark.
We talked during breaks from studies and that was where our connections jived. We shared our fantasies and frustrations, dreams and difficulties. We imagined what would happen if suddenly we became the handsomest guys in campus that girls would faint when we walk past them. We only dreamt of girls because we've accepted the fact that we weren't good looking. And besides, we weren't rich to afford a date with any girl we had a crush on. We even made a "UPLB Totoy's Club". There were only two members. Me and Mar. Lol.
The most significant influence Mar had on me was when i did my thesis. He helped me with the statistical analysis of my data. I couldn't have done it by myself. I think I thanked him in my forewords of the book. One time i got so sick that he volunteered to give me a back massage with vicks v***r rub. I think that was the time i barely slept typing my thesis draft. We only had two typewriters in the entire dormitory and so their use had to be scheduled. Mine was 2 - 4 AM.
After i graduated college, we kept writing each other. we were penpals. He became part of the Pasig River rehabilitation department. Quixotic was his description of it. Lol. I was into poultry raising with my father. I invited him to Lipa once and we laid out the positioning of our hog cages. We drove pegs on the ground an pulled plastic twines to mark where everything should be dugged up.
Mar introduced me to the hobby of model making. I built WW2 fighter airplanes. I have a collection of them. Some got broken, some were given away by my dad. But most of them are still in my office.
The advent of the internet was weird for us. We still wrote snail mail. We didn't text each other. I couldn't remember ever texting him.
To be continued.....

09/06/2026

Remembering a friend. His page was hacked. The hacker asked his friends for money since Mar is undergoing chemotherapy. The hacker then deleted Mar's account after getting a significant amount of cash from us (his friends). Now everything about my friend is gone.
Let this be a lesson. Don't put everything on Facebook. Every post, picture, ideas, my friend had is gone.
I will write about him in my next post. His life, his simple joys, his honesty, the way he values family...
And to the hacker, may you live a miserable life.

07/06/2026

This is a safe page to put in my opinion about what's going on in our sorry excuse for a government.
The senate is now divided. One is made to cover up the flood control anomalies and the other is there to prosecute them. One is pro-Marcos and the other is pro-Duterte. At least that is how they see it.
There are two claiming to be senate presidents positioning themselves to be president once Marcos is unseated. Each claiming to be legitimate.
The administration is supporting the Gathchalian bloc because they are doing everything they could to stop the flood control investigators. They are also trying to impeach the vice president. It is becoming obvious that they are all guilty of getting bribes or pocketing the people's money. Most, if not all the senators in this bloc received suitcases full of money. The most hated of them is Erwin Tulfo who heads the Blue Ribbon committee but is said to be buying women and one of the biggest beneficiary of the flood control scam. He is even threatening other senators to his legitimacy as the true blue ribbon head.
It is very difficult to love the Philippines because we have the worst leaders. There are so many talented Filipinos who aren't given a chance because of our corrupt system.
Well, this is how I see things right now.

07/06/2026

Watching the local news makes you hate this country.