Visiting Tahanang Walang Hagdanan

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              I, together with the members of the DOTC Task Force on Accessibility and some PPA employees visited “Tahanang Walang Hagdanan” in Cainta, Rizal on March 15, 2012 as part of the Women’s month celebration.  It was an opportunity to give briefings on what the government, particularly the DOTC, has been doing to support persons with disabilities (PWDs) and hear actual experiences on how our brethrens in wheelchairs earn a living on their own despite their situation.

                Some of the PWDs shared their incidents on how it still hard for them to use public transportations despite the country’s disability law because of the drivers’ refusal due to boarding inconvenience.  They were asked to file a written complaint if such situation will happen again. There was a suggestion for the task force to conduct an actual experiment by apprehending those drivers who refuse to transport PWD-acting task force members.

                After the short briefing, we toured the compound that houses the working facilities and products made by the PWDs.

11th APA Sports Meet

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        The Philippine Ports Authority recently hosted the 11^th ASEAN Ports Association (APA) Sports Meet from February 25 to March 1, 2013. Some 500 participants came from the nine member-countries of Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam and the host country Philippines.

                Indonesia was declared overall champion of the five-day tourney winning the most number of gold medals from Futsal, Badminton, Golf, Marathon, Table Tennis and Bowling.

                The PPA made the year-long preparation and coordination to make sure that the event will be successful most especially on the security aspect. 

                From the welcome, the opening ceremony held at the Rizal memorial stadium to the closing ceremony at the Manila Hotel, everything went smoothly as scheduled. There were of course some unavoidable minute hitches mostly on the requests of going to places of interest and game venues but looking at the faces of the participants from our neighboring countries, they really had fun in the Philippines.

                The PPA chorale interpreted the  APA sports hymn and represented the Philippines during the cultural presentation singing the Filipino song that also became popular with other ASEAN countries, “Anak”.  The number was a hit.

                The Sports Meet is being held every three years and is being hosted by each member country.  The next sports meet will be held in Vietnam.