sibol gathering NYC style

this past saturday, ozzie purugganan ('82) hosted the hardly annual nyc gathering of sibol friends. in the mix were myself, jake hofileña ('84), and jobet gauna ('89) who drove all the way from scranton, PA (that's where "the office" is set, FYI).

masarap ang kainan (thanks ozzie for the feast), kwentuhan at tawanan. some business and planning were done as well. below are the 10 random thoughts/plans/next steps we came up with.

1. US carolling.
sir pagsi himself had brought it up. and would be cool/nice to get it implemented here as well. funny thing was that it turned out na 4 kaming tenor 1 na andun. SO, calling all other voices and other musically inclined out there. kahit hindi, we have a year to plan things out. ozzie's in charge of gathering the troops (tama ba?)

2. sibol-hesus.
more questions discussed for this item really. for example, demographics of faculty, students, etc. also, success stories, etc. since then, i've reached out to current faculty to get those details. and also have reached out to may ubaldo, a student we had taught on the school's first year and who eventually graduated from the ateneo as a SHS scholar (and now works for BPI). more on her story soon, but in the meantime, click on image above for some sibol-hesus quick facts.

3. fundraising.
2 points discussed here. 1 is figuring out the target. and 2nd is the logistics of it. i can speak for the logistics—i am in the middle of partnering with another US-based non-profit that will allow donations to be done online (that covers the convenience part) AND allows US donations to be tax-deductible (that helps donors somehow). more on that soon.

4. archiving.
dondi dionisio ('87 and based in the west coast) brought up the idea of creating a sibol wikipedia. NYC hearts that idea. especially with all the facts here and there that i didn't know and all the songs that i myself hadn't heard of. so paging dondi, let us know how we can help facilitate your brilliant idea.

5. bday videos for sir
would be nice to have bday greeting vids from us overseas sibolistas to send over in time for sir pagsi's 83rd (?) birthday. will iron out the logistics. but possibly it'll be a youtube channel i'll set up and people can post their vids there.

6. regular videos of sir
considering the "success" of sir's youtube video debut, wouldn't it be nice to have a regular video of sir? well, i'm on it. with the help of igo gonzalez ('07), we're hoping to launch some sort of sundays with sir youtube channel where you'll see/hear sir's musings and reflections and "by gum"s and "hanep"s. coming soon. hopefully very soon.


7. sibol directory
would be nice to know the who's where and the where's who. i'm still trying to figure this one out. but my initial idea (and i think it's brilliant coz i'm biased that way) is to set up a sibol census site of sorts. it's really just a fancy way of saying a sibol registration site. that way we'll have everyone's info so we can spam you with all the useless info in the world. no, i'm joking. we'll send only emails for when we'd like to crash into your city/country. cura personalis alumnorum it is.


8. alay kay pagsi song
some years ago in the new york sibol group's life, we had a similar gathering as well. that time, there were more of us. we had it at eugen palma's. and if i'm right, ozzie, jake and i were there. plus getty atienza, ray guinoo, manoling francisco and ding yson (the brains behind "shalom). that night, mano and ding yson had made us listen to their song, "alay kay pagsi". nice song, obviously but we never heard of it again. SO, we're hoping to track it down. i've sent an email to mano and have barok gutierrez ('96) to hunt him down as well.


9. regional gatherings
here's where the new yorkers bring out their new yawk attitude. we're calling out the sibolistas of other states and other corners of the world to have their own sibol gatherings. nah, it's not really a challenge, it's really a hope and invitation. coz it's really fun being able to have no connection whatsover with "random" people yet realize that though you may be batches apart, you share the unifying experience called sibol. just make sure to share with us how your gatherings go.


10. sibol ski trip: feb 20th
yup, you read it right. we're going skiing. mens sana in corpore sano (tama ba pagkakaalala ko?) so far, jake's family is in. i'm in. ozzie's in. and hopefully eugen too. we'll take the metro north to thunder ridge. and the invite's open to all in the tristate or nearby. just leave me a message and will include you on the list. no previous skiing experience necessary (sige na, para naman hindi lang ako ang aanga-angang first timer lampa na andun).

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that's it for now. quite a bit to chew. but if you have thoughts of your own, feel free to comment below.