Richard Rafael

The old and the new in Ilocano culture are both featured in this year’s Kannawidan Ylocos Festival -  the festival of Ilocos Sur that celebrates it's being a separate province and it's being a treasure chest of traditions and culture.   Held in the Heritage City of Vigan from January 28 to February 17,  the festival opened with the residents’ expression of gratitude to the blessings of God on January 28.  Government workers from national and local offices, public officials and members of non-government-organizations united in the Holy Mass concelebrated at Saint Paul Cathedral in this city and the procession afterward. As people of faith in the Christian world, Ilocanos are gathered in their religious events on special feast days of patron saints. To show  this deeply-rooted culture of the people of Ilocos Sur, 40 icons of the Catholic Saints were part of the procession. During the opening of the festival on January 29 at Kannawidan grounds in Barangay Tamag, an ethnic d

My life is changing. The life that I've had, It's changing forever, But no need to be sad All of us experience change in our lives. Change is the only one constant in our lives. There are changes that we look forward to and change that we fear. However, one thing is for sure. Things will not stay the same no matter how much we would like them to. When a life change occurs, we have two choices in how to respond. We can despair that a change has come and assumed that things will be worse, or we can look with excitement at the new possibilities for personal growth and change in self that the change presents. You’ll never experience the best parts of life if you avoid things that are new or different.  Focus on the positive outcomes, and remember that you’re never stuck. From one student to another, here are a few suggested ways to make a change: 1. Start your own project . Sometimes, it’s as simple as that; if you see something you want to change,

Today is not just another “today” but the first of the clean pages of a whole year waiting for what we will write into our lives and what greatness we’ll pull from within. -Tabitha Blue New Year is the time or day at which a new calendar year begins and the calendar's year count increments by one. This is also the time which we make our new year's resolutions and we tend to improve ourselves. We tend to change our doings and not to do again the mistakes that we did in the other year. But frankly speaking, we fail to do the resolutions that we had made. We always return to the things that we used to be that became the reason why we do things that are wrong. "A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step." -Chinese Proverb To start your new year, think positive first. You should always start a day with positive thinking. A positive attitude helps you cope more easily with the daily affairs of life. It brings optimism into your life and makes it eas