This Rugged JoyFull Home

Behind The Glass Partition Domodedovo Airport, Moscow, the Russian Federation. I got up from my seat and dragged my weary body out of the plane, where I had sat for almost five hours of a peaceful flight from Dubai. Pacing myself, I walked straight to the long tube that led to the long queues, which led to the immigration officers who would stamp my PILIPINAS passport, granting me access to enter this bolshoi nation—a place I sometimes fondly call Mother Russia. Moscow that evening had a welcoming temperature of -3 degrees Celsius, and I thought that it was not so bad, coming from +27 degrees back home in Manila. As I stood there acclimatizing myself to the weather, I realized that the temperature inside the airport was actually rather toasty, as always. I stared at the people's expressionless, perfectly contoured faces and tried to mentally rehearse what to do next when my turn came. First, I would remove my eyeglasses; second, I would approach the immigration officer and give he...

In my recent blog posts, I briefly shared my insights on the seasons of togetherness and separateness . It's a process, an ongoing journey that I embrace wholeheartedly, as underscored by what's going on in the world now. Every country is on a preventive COVID-19 lockdown. It is important to mention that as I labor and pounce on the keyboard, my husband, my children, and I are in three different geographic locations, namely Moscow, Batangas, and Mindoro. What a way to illustrate "separateness" and "growth" when you are actually living it! I think that I will never be the same once this pandemic is over. Businesses were closed and millions of jobs were lost. Then, suddenly, we found every student homeschooling and most workers at home — working. Words like "social distancing," "quarantine," "hoarding," "panic buying," "flattening the curve," and "lockdown" have become just a few of the operative wor...