Stormed and Flooded, Still Here!

What year is it now? It's been like century if not forever that I haven't updated my blog, I have so many thoughts, but it seems to me that those thoughts can't find their way to blog post. Aside from the repost dito, repost doon, and copying my statuses from my Facebook, I haven't really have a real blog entry.

So awake, and arise and shine! Naks, parang scriptural terms or nakikipagdigmaan. Hehe

After PEBA 2010, there is just too much work to do, and so much things to attend to especially now that my lady is carrying our 2nd child and she is having a hard time with some pregnancy related extra curricular activities! Forgive my terms, I am so out of thoughts with regards to that. Haha

I will be back soon, with my powerful windows mobile phone, I can do blogging even I am at work. 

Someone said, "I guess you are happy in your life." I am? I asked with a smile. How do we define happiness? Really? Sabi ko nga sa Facebook status ko one time,

As I grow older (oh my, I have to admit it! :) I realized fame, learning, beauty or riches doesn't define success and happiness - it's in planning and prioritizing things.

  

I have had a lot of experiences lately, and some of them are not so easy to bear. The Thoughtskoto's been to a lot of challenges and trials and yet we are here surviving, trying our best to endure, because nothing is really over until we stop trying.

I remember we have this really old electric fan back home when I was a teenage boy. The fan was broken and was sewed by  copper wire. The cover bend and straightened. It was a typical small electric fan that was beaten, fall several times, and yet the amazing thing is that - it is still usable! it is still working!

Life is like that. Sometimes we are tried, tempted, beaten, wearied, and yet we endure, we persevere, we hold on because we believe that life is not just about surviving, it is enjoying. There will be times we maybe sad, we maybe down, we may be tempted, we fail,  but it doesn't mean we will give up. We are still around, we may be quiet, but we gather strength and we face the world again with a smile, not minding those failings and bitterness we have had in life.

Anyway, plug-in ko lang po, ang latest ko na entry sa the Kablogs Journal Online Magazine. Hope you will keep reading and contributing sa TKJ. If you want to support, 

please email: thekablogsjournal@gmail.com

"For love is not assuming, it is free of anything. It is giving. It is making other person happy. It is bringing out the best to people. It is inspiring, it doesn’t seek for glory or return, it is without condition, description, or qualification – who and what you are does not matter anymore. What matters is that you are happy, and most importantly the one you love is happy."

Belated happy hearts day sa lahat!

©2010 THOUGHTSKOTO

Random Thoughts and Quotes

We won't be here (OFW's) for a lifetime. For me, wherever I go, so long that my family is with me, it's fine. That's our promise. To be together, here and forever.

-Mr. Thoughtskoto

"I don’t see any possible solution for an Overseas Filipino Worker and for his/her family back home to maintain a strong relationship of love and trust than to communicate in any possible means, constantly reassuring each other of the promises they made before the eyes of man, and the eyes of God, and that they will be together till death, and beyond."

My wife and I were taught of the “chastity before marriage and fidelity after marriage.” Our vows are not just to last till death, but for all time and all eternity. Knowing that, even if we are physically separated for now, we are doing every possible means to be together, in the voices of our heart, and the thoughts in our minds.
For true love is never waning and never failing, even a thousand miles apart.

Mr. Thoughtskoto

- From the Kablogs Journal Entry, "For Married OFW's"

"I hope the day will come that there will only be one nation, and no visa rules to follow, I hope the world will value families. And all families won't have a reason not to be together. Family should be forever and should stay together in this life and in the eternities."

- Mrs. Thoughtskoto

‎"In our lives, we will constantly meet 3 different kind of people. Those who are happy living a simple and quiet life with their love ones, those who find happiness in selflessly losing themselves in the service of others, and those who are happy and preoccupied by the praises of men and vanities of this world...There is always a human instinct within us- a longing to matter - to reach out - to serve."

-Mr. Thoughtskoto

From a talk delivered one friday morning at Saudi City, Jeddah

"God hears and answers prayers even those that go unspoken. He listens to the prayers of our hearts."

- Mrs. Thoughtskoto

"Someone told me that people, when they become richer and/or wiser, and/or older, they become prouder, unteachable, and easily offended. I wonder if he's right..."

- Mr. Thoughtskoto

"Some... but not collectively. This is what we call pride cycle, in humility we find success and our pride becomes the reason for our downfall."

Mrs. Thoughtskoto

"The easiest way to find love is to give love, the quickest way to end it is to hold it tight but the best way to keep it is to let if fly." - Mr. Thoughtskoto

"When the world evolves just around you, you'll feel miserable. But if the world evolves around the rest of us, you'll see the bigger picture, you'll be enlightened and then you'll have a greater understanding. There are people who talk and talk, wear sunglasses at night and earplugs all the time, figuratively speaking, are people who are miserable."

- Mr. Thoughtskoto

And no matter what others say, or testify, it is only thru the Spirit of God that we will know if these things are indeed true. How marvelous a simple sincere prayer can do....

-Mrs. Thoughtskoto

Sometimes, I have this weird thoughts. I'll live my life so that those who hurt, maligned, belittled and trampled me regretted doing so. Sometimes, I want them to see who I become because of what they did. In short, I am strengthened and become better because of challenges posed by people like them. But it is not healthy. Not good. I should not harbor hatred, but instead, forgive and forget.

Mr. Thoughtskoto

"Life isn't perfect, but the thought that you have a wonderful family, a loving husband and sweet daughter, makes everything worth it. And no matter how imperfect some things maybe it still feels a bit of heaven on earth."

-Mrs. Thoughtskoto

‎"You are just one person, you can't do anything." Well, thats a sad thing, but you know what, if this one person can influence a thousand, you better be ready. You never ever underestimate the ability and the capacity of one simple person. You might think he's a fool or a loser, but one day, he is the one who live a happy life, and more successful than you."

-Mr. Thoughtskoto

"Wrong notion of many: Didn't get an education because we're only poor. Would want to help if we're rich. The kids are behaving like that because the family is not well-off. Would have done this and that if am a millionaire. not having enough finances is not an excuse, its not the first and last option to be able to do things you want."

-Mrs. Thoughtskoto

"As we get older and become wiser, we realize that beauty fades with the years, but kind heart lives forever. So when we look at a person, do we see "beauty" within and the kind of heart he has? The problem is we are so blinded or perhaps wicked that we cannot see ones heart. For me, the only ugly person is those who sow ugliness"

-Mr. Thoughtskoto

"They say there are three kinds of people, the stupid who makes mistakes, the smart who learn from his mistakes, and the wise who makes mistakes, learn from them and never did the same mistake again."

-Mr. Thoughtskoto

"What do we have to prove? Why so many people are so concern with what others will say or think about them, rather than what they can do to make their lives better and then serve others well? Just a thought, way too deep, but so true as well."

-Mr. Thoughtskoto

©2010 THOUGHTSKOTO

Deafening Silence

Have you experienced a moment in your life when you hear nothing, not even the honking of cars, or the humming of birds simply because it's so silent that its almost deafening?

We all have those moment of time when we are alone and we meditate or reflect about life and its purpose. I just have that experienced that past couple of days. 

I was sick.

My small muscles and lanky frames yielded up to the freezing winter that went as low as 9 degrees Celcius the days after the Hajj Eid holidays. I have running and swelling and redded nose, which remind me of Rudolph the red-nose reindeer. Mrs. Thoughtskoto joked that I have a big nose, which I quickly corrected, 'No honey, it's not big, I know that already, maybe you mean, enlarged nose!' 

I have a severe sorethroat, a headache and flu. 

But this things are normal. I usually get sick twice a year, when the winter is around and when the summer is coming. So there's nothing to worry.

Babytots also got some cold and runny nose, because even though how much I hide around the house to get no nearer to her so she won't get my colds, her cries of Papapa, and Dadadada, and our almost ritual playtime right before bedtime makes it impossible for me to not mingle with them. But the good thing about babies is that when they have cold, they just sneeze and sneeze and the cold's phlegm just come out from their nose. 

You just have to quickly wipe them or they will put out their tongue and taste it.

Yuck!!! 

Anyways, I will be back to work today. Hope things will be back to normal. I feel okay. There is still a little cold, and coughing but this is going to be okay.

There are times in life when we are alone that we feel the silence to be deafening. Those are the times we can clearly feel the beating of our heart, or the pulse in our hands. Those are the moment in life where we can reflect what's matters most and what's imperative.

I have known people who are driven by their desire to earn lots and lots of money. I have meet several of them questing for treasure, jeopardizing their eternal destiny in exchange to the worldly wealth, fame and glory. I have known also many people, simple, and seemingly contented in their lives, with small dreams and modest means. I know what they wanted. Those who desire for richest and those who seemingly content have one old common goal.

HAPPINESS or the higher and nobler version of it, JOY.

But I believe, as I reflect and ponder about happiness the past few days. It's all a matter of choice. A matter of individual choice. You can be rich and choose to be happy. You can be simple and still be happy. Money, richest, fame, glory or depravity and the lack of material things doesn't mean happiness or doom. It's all depend on us.

©2008 THOUGHTSKOTO

WORK OR LIFE IN SAUDI ARABIA?

3 Basic links that you must visit before working or living in Saudi Arabia

The Wikipedia about Saudi Arabia, which details information about The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia or KSA as the largest country of the Arabian Peninsula, the CIA Factbook Saudi Arabia, that features map and brief descriptions of the geography, people, government, economy,

 communications, transportation, military and transnational issues and the Royal Embassy of Saudi Arabia which all details current information including news, press releases, government, culture and arts, economy and industry.

Now if you're an LDS or a Filipino or Pinoy LDS and contemplating of working or get a basic view of how is LDS's life in Saudi Arabia, you should come to our site

Googling LDS or Mormons in Saudi Arabia will give you THOUGHTSKOTO, our blogsite and links around the blogosphere as the No. 1 resource in the web. If you are a Filipino or Pinoy LDS and are preparing to embark in your journey to the land of the sand and oil and golds, and making ready to feel the hottest temperature that go up as much as 51 degrees Celcius or the coldest one in the Middle East at 1 Degrees C our site will be available just a click away to support you or help you the day you landed in Saudia. Email us.

There are many myths about what it’s like to live and work in Saudi Arabia.  While it’s true that the culture in the Kingdom is very different to that which particularly Western workers are used, and that there are very strict rules and laws governing behavior for example, it is not true that if you go to work in Saudi Arabia you will be unwelcome or unsafe.

 

Saudi Arabia is governed through the principles of Shari’ah which are set out in the Qur’an, the holy book of Islam.  Anyone interested in taking employment in the Kingdom should take time to understand the basic principles of Islamic law and in particular how Western and foreign workers in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia are expected to behave.

By taking the time necessary to arm yourself with the facts about the people, religion, culture and society in Saudi Arabia, you will be better prepared for your new life in the Kingdom and you will get far more out of your stay, and whether you find work yourself in Saudi or are sponsored by your employer to relocate to the Kingdom, you can expect an adventure, a challenge and a completely new way of life during your time in the country. 

For a foreigner to enter the Kingdom they have to be sponsored by an employer.  Typically Western workers come to work in the oil, teaching or medical industries and are very well rewarded, financially speaking, for their work. 

The low cost of living, the fact that accommodation and meals etc., are often all paid for by an employer and that taxation is not deducted from a pay check lead many Western workers to take on at least a short term contract in Saudi Arabia.  The financial incentives are obvious and high!

There are between five and six million foreign residents living and working in Saudi and many Westerners live on compounds and often enjoy a frenetic social life!  The compounds are often lavish affairs provided by employers; they usually have excellent facilities included for the direct benefit of resident foreign workers and their families. 

Because there is little for workers to spend their money on there is an awful lot of disposable income to go round for spending on social events, shopping, diving trips, tennis lessons etc.  And most of those who go to work in Saudi Arabia find that they enjoy an excellent overall quality of life. 

It’s worth noting that many businesses in the Kingdom close during the five official prayer times daily...sometimes Westerners get caught out by this and they soon get into the habit of checking the daily papers for details of the prayer times!

If you have secured employment in Saudi and have your sponsorship in place, you will be required to present your passport, which must be valid for at least 6 months, your employment visa and also a health certificate on arrival.  Your visa will have a period of validity and you must enter the country within that period. 

Further documentation required to enter the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia for work include the following, the list is not necessarily exhaustive and is subject to change.  Your employer or employment agency will be well used to assisting foreigners coming to work in Saudi and will supply you with the most up to date requirement list: -

Authorisation to enter the country from the Saudi Ministry of Foreign Affairs
A medical certificate from a recognised medical authority
Your letter of sponsorship from your company which should be dated and have your visa number on it
Your employment contract from the Saudi Arabian company for whom you will work
A police clearance certificate
Copies of all of you relevant academic qualifications and any relevant work experience for the job you’re about to take - this is especially relevant for anyone embarking on teaching or medical work
And if you’ve been working previously in Saudi you have to have ‘a letter of no objection’ from your previous employer which basically proves you’ve been released amicably from your last contract.

With all these things in place the bureaucratic process is fairly straightforward if a little intense, and shortly after entering the country and taking up your assignment you will settle into your new life in Saudi. 

Go with the right attitude, accept and embrace the cultures of the country, respect the laws and religion in Saudi Arabia and be prepared to have the time of your life for the duration of your contract.  Working in Saudi is a slightly surreal experience for many as the way of life on a compound and out on the Saudi streets is very, very different to what most people have been used.  If you go with a completely open mind and a strong resolve, you will get all you can from the experience.

Please note that practicing a religion other than Islam publicly in Saudi is prohibited and that women should wear their abaya when going outside their compound.  Also worth noting is the fact that the sale or consumption of alcohol in Saudi is prohibited as is gambling.

Thoughtskoto - weblogs about reality and opinions.

Rants and observations and musings about faith, hope as well as life and love.

©2008 THOUGHTSKOTO