It was the early years of the eightes and I just graduated from High School at the famous Bamboo Organ church in Las Pinas City. It was then a province of Rizal and more of Rural part of the area. It was a rice field area where there re still padies. I grew up in an area where your nearest neighbor is aound 20 meters away and the nerest store is around 50 eters away. I remembered our firstmyear there that we dont have commercial power and used a kerosene lamp at nightime to study our lessons at school. where we go to school on muddy and unpayed road, where we got stuck in a daily basis to push our car to go on our road trip. My Dad was already an ofw and I was preparing for College. More than the usual activities I did when I was younger, I was using my first computer dad bought from abroad for me to learn programming, a Commodore 64 pc. Just then I took a short course at ama in Makati learning the basics of programming. though at that stage in time, even big corportion doesnt have a pc. I was too advance for the matter. Like a kid that I was, most of my activities are playing the game of galaga, where programs are loaded using a cassete tape rather than a hard disk or a floppy. To be able to load a program, it can take you 30 minutes before you can play a game. I used the pc playing the game until dawn and soon after it became unusable for it was still an electronic device and is succeptible to get ruined. At that time, a pc technician can be found nowhere and so I was forced to study and lern how to fix it The only school offering the course was in Pasig. It was in Ultra, where I studied computer technology. For two years, I studied fixing my computer. It was my vocation. And that is why I studied Electronics and communication in College. I enrolled as Engineer in Mapua as a Freshman. Being the eldest, there where nobody to guide me. Away from other relatives, an with my father working abroad, I entered the school of life in general, as a curious lad that , I experienced social life in full. find my self joining fraternities in college. And enoyed hving Lot of friends because of having my first car. I learned so much about cars because of my Dad's interest in them. I learned driving t the age of twelve. assisting my Dad in parking to our garage capable of accomodating five cars simultaneos even experienced running over a person and almost experienced jail time at the age of 17. I am not proud of it , Its just worth mentioning here. When my Dad retired, He want to venture in Bakery mking the famous pandesal. Something we have no background and experince about. we bought all the equiptments and opened multple branches at once. And since the social fabrick in kowing your eployee, particularly the baker, we cant fnd a reputable one. And so the business failed. I want to dedicated this blog of mine to my beloved Dad because this experiences defines how legendary truly he is. I was task supposed to find an ncome for myself and the family, since I was the eldest of all. I taught about working as a driver or a fastfood crew. But even a service crew at mac donald are elite students of Lasalle who have their own cars. Copetition ws so stift. Our father was the one who made way for the 3 of y siblng brothers. As he regularly Roa around the Divisoria area, he introduced e to an electronic shop. So I was roaing around the rea particularly reina regente, I was introduced to Bytes and chips. A privately owned shop owned by a chinese engineer. As I visit his shop, I noticed m, otherboards of apple 2e motherboards, since I studied computer repairs, I was familiar with its appearance. Eng kiong go knows there are few people who knew what he knows about computers so he was quite interested abouut me. At once, I asked him if, he need somebody to help him. But immediately he said know I told hn I can just work s ajanitor clearner because I know handle his motherbord which was stocked there aounting already to hundreds. I told him I will work for free just to live ad be able to sleep there.So he tried to ccomodate me. In a weeks time I befriended his buu nephew who is a previous drug dpendent and undergoing rehbilitation thru his care. fter bout two weeks, eng kyong Go, asked me juust to teach his nephew and he will pay me 60 pesos a month. That was my starting slary. There I learned very mch, just using his books specially te IC aster. the bibble of IC I learned how to solder and desolder better tht the laboratories at school. My friends and classtes encourage e then to tke for a board exam so I can take the board review for my course in Engineering, But my priority is earning. I have transferred to five schools already because of y activities. Schooling the was very hard for me. Soon, Eng kiong was entering into supplying pc for Income. It was then becoming a trend for businessman, especially chinese. I began delivering and assembling business, to the area , until I saw nothe job openning in a comercial building in juan luna. They were outsourcing pc because their services are on doing Lan Networking
, when windows was just a stand alone and lan tehnolgy ws just peer to peer and using additional card as a pheripheral or additional from the basic setup.
I was fortunate enough to find out tht the HR Manager was my schoolmate who was ahead of my batch nd her siser was my batchmate. Though I still needto passt through no books nnan interview with their chef technical head, the copetion was very stift since they only need one for hundreds of applicants from prestgious schools. Wioe no official course of this dicioline is still availble. the best candidates are Electroncs engineer because it was its fondation because of trnsistors and the IC technolog. I was shortlisted with one individual fro lyceum, who was fll scholor nd genius. He looks like nerd and wears a thick prscriptio glasses. I came to encouter him to the elevator for our final interview. That is how I learne about him and the final interview was a prctical one. He told me that tie tht he get 100 percent on the theortical nd design exm but I got the reommendation because of my exoerience nd maybe ecause the HR Manager was from my school in high School. The interviewer ws so impressed with me because of my zctual knowledge of the matter, for no school taught such know how and no boos was ever published. When he asked me how I knew everyting I told him about Eng kiong nd I worked there. because of his chinese origin, He knew about the guy and was surprised about being entrusted. He was then forced to recommnd to hire the two of us to hire because of it. The other engineer became my kumpare i. the end because we were forced to get a place to sleep because the use of the amount of work we have to deal with. The industry is just booming and we serve as the pioneers in the industry. Right then our job securty have been established cause every time someone hire us, our salary is douled salary because of the scarcity of our skll sets, wit just a year I was offered a job i Jeddah, saudi arabia from one of our client in nai, a piot of sudia airlines with a salary of 1,000 usd. That is already eqivalent to 80,000 pesos monthly, and I was sof happy. It is a privately owned copany of the pilot faily and offered me to fly with him asap on a business class. It was first time to fly by plane and it was already a business class. The flight was eight hours and initially was in Riyad, the city, so I got to ride a lcal plane going to Jeddah. I got shocked riding that plane for the passengers are locals and they carry baggaged was live animals. Once I landed in Jeddah, I ws fetch by a limousine car by the brother of the pilot. It was my first time riding a limousine and I feel really special. There I met my fficeate on the office. I suddanese engineer an the senior technical person who is my boss who was an egyptian. For one I was only an asian, 2nd was the only christian, And they want me to live with them. I realy ant beear their hygiene and smell and their food are relly strange for me, and so I ask my boss to gie me my housing allowance so I can get my own flat. As I was sourcing out, people in the streets do not know how to speak engliah, so I try to do sign languge , just to find out from the filipino friends I met that, its really har to find a place there if you are not married and hoe owner who do rent a place there ask for your ikma for proof of your status, which I do not have, because I surrendered it to my employer. And so,I find myself roaming around and living homeless ike a paurper. I also experience temporarily living at flats with other friends because it is owned by their coaony and they have no rights, to rnt it to others. I never experience such lifestyle ever in my life like washing off my used clothes on public toilets just to get buy with my daily activites. It was very difficult, but I learned ironing the clothes effectivy because of that's experience. I was in the state of very religous, ad the Lord really took care of me. I aso lifed like a fugitive because I wsnt able to witstand my egyptian manager that I reesort to physicaly retaliating after all the bullying I never thaught I can commit such crime but luckly it was just a physical assault. And so I find myself hiding with a nother filipino collleague who I happen to work with while I ws in Binondo. Lukiy too, the unle of my girlfriend was also there and helped e through his arabic boss helped me n the situation and helped me, return back to the Philippines. It was my worse experience that it became one of my trauma in my life. That was the reason, why I never tried working abroad again and beng an ofw. when I was ble to return back home. was too ebarrase because I promissed my girlfriend that I will marry her in june when I returned. I remember it was already january at that time and I still have 5 months to go. So I went back to my previous employer in juan luna i Binondo. where the hr manger was my schoolmate. They then hired me back and I ws now the technical manager of the company. While I was workng , since I know all by now the sources of the parts in doing the pc machines. ws able to be businessminded and offer the service as a freelancer.. During that tme my good kumpadre was working with Uniwide sales. He is working there as the IT guy. And they have a requirement to buy PC of about 20 units. Since I kow many sources ad suppliers I know where to get it cheaper. I was able to negotiate and buy it with a 20, 000 mark up and find myself earning about 400,000 pesos. Enough to get married. And so the married life was never halted I got arried and my IT carrer continous to flourished. My next IT project was the Information Bulletin in Ayala. The touch screen technology. I was sent to Malaysia to be trained about it. ng I was IIt was the start of my career bom a was pirated continously after I met people who trusted me of technical know how to lead on new projects particularly on telecommunication, which I was able to train to the States to pioneer the internet in the philippines. While training in the I was offered to work because I was training the much coveted skillset of a network Engineer in Cisco. The pay was $ 8,000 a month but I was just starting a family, and a good friend entrusted me with his precious name that recommended me to his uncle that hired me and entrusted me of leading the new project. Ang because of the traumatic experience with my father, I ont want my son to experience the same fate as we did. And so I decided to go back and honor my promise. And I never regret it. Work have been very good to me and my family and enjoyed the fruits that it brought to me.while, working learning new technologies have been embeded to my character. Since most of my job are technical management. Most of the authority is me and even the top management or company owner, trusted whatever judgement and recommendation honor my idea. Even overpaid consultants usully european expats are my equals, in terms of technological development has no endings until I was forced early retirementical. My company was bought by its competion and because I was connected from that compony before and I already avail retirement from them I an not elligible to be absorbed. So that was my fate since. .My son nows continue my skill set because he study the same dicipline. And we contines to explore posibilities. Though my health is in Question, we re considering Agriculture combining with Ai. So now, that is what our current situation.
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