Briathrail // Albert 2MNG

On Travel, Programming, Books, and Food

, , , , , ,

Let’s talk about what’s what this month

Albert 2MNG

•

November 9-15, 16-22 2025

I absolutely hate these “soft language”. They are deceptive at best and patronizingly devious at worst. And maybe the worst of all, these “soft language” almost always creep into marketing.

When I wrote this, I thought that Globe was in a similar position as the ABS-CBN position years before Duterte got into the presidency. Back then, ABS was the king. Almost all the TVs on the buses I rode from Quezon City to Makati switched to ABS-CBN by 9am, because ABS had the more entertaining post-morning shows. They were the first ones who prominently dipped into digital TV. They had the biggest stars on their payroll, many of the best journalists on their news, and they have a firm hold on the airwaves for the whole country. A very, very strong position.

And all it took to dethrone that king was their TV congressional license got shivved right while still on air. May 5, 2020, at 7:52 PM standard PH time. They never really recovered from that mortal wound.

Same with Globe. They have a strong standing right now. They’re seen as equals with Smart (just saying, Dito ain’t in that air yet), and they have GCash. But in a rapidly evolving IT market with PLDT/Smart making gigantic Phelps-like waves in the pool, Globe must do it best to keep within distance or else, they’ll be elbowed out of customers in rapidly saturating relevant markets. One way to do that is to leverage their existing services to entice customers to stay in their sphere. Or acquire other services. Or branch out like PLDT did many years ago with Vitro in 2000. PLDT is well aware that customers will mostly prefer to stick with providers that can sell them the most conveniences, and they’re on it. Globe should think and do the same. I think customers will always gravitate towards subscriptions that offer the most services.

Well, the idiot who traded Luka Doncic away for Anthony Davis and freebies is still at the helm, and Cooper Flagg might want to assess what his team is now and what it could be. Dallas will definitely build around him, Kyrie (when he gets back), and Davis, but the remnants of the team built around the offensive genius of Doncic is still around him. That’s why I used the Ferrari figure earlier – Doncic is a goddamn supercar of scoring. Now that they have Davis, the idea that the idiot had was to start building a stifling, menacing defensive identity. But they are pulled in two directions – Flagg is a scoring prodigy with a Swiss knife’s adaptability with multiple positions, and Davis is a defensive presence that also moonlights with scoring when needed. Either they adapt to scoring with defense on the side, or they adapt to defense with scoring on the side. Their choice. But I get the nagging feeling they are driving a tank. Not “tanking”, just a plodding, heavy M1 Abrams tank.

I think Amazon SEA should take a lot of pages out of Shopee, Lazada, Alibaba and Pinduoduo’s books. Don’t get me wrong, if you look hard enough, there are some great deals to be had on Amazon’s Black Friday sales. But key phrase here is “look hard enough”. The big Asian sellers try to make that friction as less of a hindrance as possible.

For example: if you want to look for great 11.11 deals on Shopee for, let’s say hair cream, Shopee will trip over its own dick to push things to the top of the list. They’d list products who are either “Selling Fast”, a hefty discount if you buy 2, a flash sale that has a discount that ends in an hour, items with limited-time “special price” to them, items with “free gifts”, the whole shebang. And most of them have touting stats like “-33%” cost, has “5k+ sold” with “4.9 stars” and “Free Shipping” plus “Shopee Vouchers” that ships “Tomorrow”. Users don’t have to look past 20 on the top of the list to find some nice deals. There’s always a And notice, it’s geared towards Asian preferences of speeding up the process by having the needed info up top, and maximizing eye view by utilizing whitespace efficiently. Unlike Amazon’s. Their product listing is so obnoxiously Western. Big panel for just one product on the list. Their maths and explanations aren’t helpful as well. What do they mean by “Save 10% on 2 when you buy 3”? Do they expect common customers to quickly discern what amount will they save? What’s this “FREE delivery [date period here] on S$60 of eligible international items”? Is my item eligible? Why is the product panel on the list taking 75% of the page width? The more the customer scrolls down, the more likely they’ll just dip out and go back to Lazada where they can see 4 items in one line of the product listing.

Also, Amazon’s Black Friday (around the last 10 days of November) falls behind the artificial 11.11 sale by the major SEA sellers. Yes, Amazon still technically participates in 11.11 though Amazon Singapore, but they just run their own promotional campaigns rather than matching the massive sitewide flash sales seen on Shopee and Lazada. By the time 11.11 is done and Amazon starts to set up shop for their own Black Friday flash sales… not only Shopee and Lazada also host their own Black Friday sales that match approximately or surpass (for most of) the same discounts Amazon does, most of the whales and sale aficionados have already blown out their budgets on 11.11 and only have dregs to spare for Amazon’s. That’s why I called it a “loser’s sale”. My ten cents on this is, Amazon should adapt to the market instead of forcing Western stuff and hoping people adapt to it. Go blow the big bazookas for sale discounts on 11.11 instead, and keep Black Friday but stick to normal holiday sales for it.

I am only saying this because national politics tend to creep in local politics. Some LGU mayors and governors tend to play favoritisms for political favors, such as having senators and presidents (to whom they are allied with) do social works with great photo ops, while the mayors and governors get some national exposure, parlaying it to possible congressional or senatorial aspirations. The downside to this is that their constituents will never get the full benefits they deserve. For example, if someone in the non-administration party wants to donate stuff or launch a social works event at an LGU whose mayor is allied with the administration, and they get denied, the constituents would be deprived of the benefits that person might be bringing with them. We don’t need that shitty excuse.

So for me, I admire those LGUs whose mayors and governors admit every social-related event regardless of political affiliation (at least outside of election season) – their constituents enjoy every benefits that comes their way without fear that their leader’s political affiliation is depriving them of goodwill coming their way.

I made this comment in exasperation. The current legislative and executive branches of the government are in such a weird state.

On one side, the executive branch is a battered and mast-less boat with holes. They’re outgoing and badly at that – Marcos has at least two years left on his mandate, his vice president has left him long ago, one of his relatives is embroiled in a corruption controversy, his sister is firmly in the opposition side, and he has more enemies in the legislative side than allies.

On the other side, election season for the presidency is coming, and the legislative side’s piranhas and butterflies are starting to make their moves. They know the Marcos side of the political spectrum is nearing its Valinor-esque voyage back to Ilocandia, and they are trying to stamp out the biggest name that could possibly run for president next season, and then ally themselves to the next one in line. Likely the opposition there would try to move heaven and earth to convince Leni Robredo to run again, but their other problem is that Leni fell in love with being Naga City’s mayor and has little intent to step in again to national politics.

For me, I am always amazed at tourists that leave sanity and decency behind at home. Come on, hostels are cheap in Singapore if you dig a little deeper in the Agoda search results. They have money to fly in for F1 weekend, surely they have the money to spare for a simple bed at night in Singapore.

I wish that passport applications come with mandatory exams that measure an applicant’s physical and mental fitness to manage their own travels before handing them a passport, but oh well.

I say this because my own country makes it a lot more difficult for OFWs to enjoy local tourism. It should be frictionless for native citizens like me. For example, I wanted to go to Cebu sometime to have a good holiday, but I shudder to think of the extra effort I have to do to have the vacation as frictionless as possible.

I wish the government would tap into the bountiful possibilities that tech and automation would provide the citizens, but our country is far, far behind other countries that already figured their shit out.

I wonder what these people at the ICI are still doing there. I do think they are just sitting ducks – just waiting for the merciful release of being disbanded and dismantled after doing their “purpose”, whatever warped intent that might be. Because after a while of observing what they are really doing and what their end goals supposedly are, I have zero confidence that they are here to complete and close the investigations. They’re a fig leaf, housed in a building.

No offense, but for the two times I’ve been to Japan, the most annoying, obnoxious, uncaring entitled tourists I have encountered are all Chinese tourists. First time I went to Japan in Kyoto, I was unfortunate enough to be in the same bunch as a lot of them in the upward climb up the Fushimi Inari-taisha trail of torii gates, and they were just so boorish. They kept bumping people like me, trying to get to the best photo spots faster, speaking loudly, eating chips, leaving their drink bottles by the trail’s sides, shouting a lot. I wished I had earplugs. I came for a good morning up a nice trail, not a fucking produce market. One unpleasant encounter I saw was a couple of Chinese grannies trying to talk to a hapless shrine souvenir shop attendant in Chinese, and the attendant looked so lost. Second time I went to Japan, this time in Nara, and I was also unfortunate that I went to Tōdai-ji with at least 8 buses full of Chinese tourists (saw the parking lot along the way). The temple was almost packed, and the bussed tourists had zero appreciation for peace and quiet.

Maybe now that the Chinese government has been trying to dissuade their own citizens from doing tourist stuff in Japan, maybe I can enjoy peace and quiet now. I am torn on whether to pursue a Japan trip next year, but the news of the deluge of CN tourists slowing down has whetted my appetite to see Japan again.

When I was doing research for where to stay in Bali, all of my friends who had gone to Bali has told me to strictly limit myself to big hotels – the more established, the better. I ended up booking a Marriott-owned hotel. Their reasoning was, big hotels are the safest bet in staying healthy in Bali. And they all said if I was to book one of those hostels or simple hotels, they told me to always buy my own bottled water and take care of what I eat. Well, after seeing that news of the woman that died in a mass poisoning incident in Bali, my friends might’ve saved me a trip to the hospital.

Pages: 1 2 3

Leave a Reply