Here and There
Good news for home-grown singers from a San Fabian doc
By Gerry Garcia
HERE are encouraging words from Dero Pedero, doctor-columnist of Phil Star’s Health & Family section who is from San Fabian of this province: Singing is good for your health.
Bulletin correspondent Jun “frustrated Elvis” Velasco, especially, and his coterie of fellow-habitues at Vicar Restaurant’s video karaoke bar will get a big kick from Dero’s delightful proclamation.
Jun, who loves to belt out renditions ala Elvis style, has a broad waist-line indicative of his craze for the bottle and a reason to dread one of the possibilities of obesity, should be convinced by now he’s singing not for just the heck of it but for his health. And he would be doing it in the company of fellow addicts in the government, like MMDA’s Chairman Bayani Fernando, Energy Sec. Angie Reyes and former Sen. Joey Lina, all home-made tenors. Even Marikina Mayor Marides Fernando, Bayani’s wife who thinks there’s something about singing that makes you focus on your performance and makes you forget your many problems.
Comedian-entertainer Willie Nepomuceno finds “singing one Beatle song after another with a live band . . . is one of the greatest stress-relieving moments of my life.”
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This city’s first ever Diner Bistro serving the finest steaks in town in an ambience highlighted by video of nostalgic pop concerts flashed on a panoramic screen, opened Saturday last week with guests led by leading Councilor Farah Decano, consisting of local media leaders Jun Velasco, Mortz Ortigoza, this writer, Cesar Ramirez and a couple of media camera men.
We missed the participation of fire-fighter columnist Gonz Duque who wrote the initial story of the Bistro’s eventual opening in his column last week.
It was also via his column that we learned Marlene Espino Ocampo, owner of the Bistro, is a cousin of incumbent Gov. Amado Espino.
Video offering on the giant screen will include by the way, concerts from the US, Europe, Japan, etc.
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Citywide lighting in Dagupan City’s main streets this early is extra luminous and expectant of the homecoming of hundreds of balikbayans from the US, especially Milpitas City where the mayor is a former Dagupeño, Jose Esteves.
Meanwhile Engr. Fidel Ginez, regional director of the DPWH who had been a promising student of this writer at the University of Pangasinan in the early 60s, has announced the P1.249 Billion-Dawel-Lucao highway will be opened in March this coming year. This includes the 4.897 kms Pantal bridge, probably the longest bridge in the entire Luzon island costing P903 million funded by a loan from the Japan Bank for international Cooperation.
Speaker Joe de Venecia Jr., one of the project’s main proponents, has agreed to provide the P10 million supplement to the additional P16 million needed to complete construction of the highway.
(Readers may reach columnist at sundaypunch2@yahoo.com. For past columns, click http://sundaypunch.prepys.com/archives/category/opinion/here-and-there/ For reactions to this column, click “Send MESSAGES, OPINIONS, COMMENTS” on default page.)
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