Surviving the December stress

Christmas and New Year traditions live forever. Changes take place with the material things, the people around us, the ways of expression but the twelfth month of the year calls for a fitting end. We all feel the urge and the desire to salute a year's ending as befitting as possible because during a whole year, some dreams came true, new people entered our lives, and even if there were unhappiness at times, we took them as valuable lessons and became wiser.

December is full of traditions but to be a slave to tradition is another thing. A little Christmas stress is allowable if we have the inclination to do something we find pleasure in, like piling presents under the Christmas tree, preparing a big Christmas dinner with delicacies - some of which are done well ahead of time, having all the colorful lights on and the decors that make the home a fantasy land. The centerpiece is really the Christmas table and the Christmas tree. They have to be beautiful.

The unwanted stress usually comes from work, from last minute things-to-do before taking off for a two-week holiday. But there are those who cannot take similar holiday breaks- like people working in the medical and geriatric care. When you are responsible for other peoples' lives and well-being, you forget your own needs.

Holidays are not happily granted to healthcare personnel who want to go on holiday, hence many call in sick. And this is where the real stress and frustration come in. No substitutes are available at such short notice. A care team looking after some 25 to 50 old and sick people is forced to cope with a diminished work force. Some have to extend their working time from eight to twelve hours. At the end of that shift, there is no more energy left for anything else.

How does one recover from December stress? It is an important health question that needs to be answered. It is not just a private concern, but an employers' responsibility as well. According to Sweden's Previa - a company that deals with corporate problems of work environment-related sickness, it is very important to find time and space to break away from all work-related matters for one's own self-recovery. Never become a slave to tradition if you don't find pleasure in doing so. Do something more pleasurable and forget the unpleasant ones.

Previa even warns employers to be extra meticulous in detecting overstress among the employees and to take burnout signals seriously. It is less expensive for the state to be more generous and attentive to the employees than to pay for a long-term rehabilitation care. Norway gives a taxfree December salary, which is a good gesture of appreciation. Others give away baskets of foodstuff, boxes of goodies and flowers. But in these days of tight budgets the material rewards at the end of the year are few and seldom. There are no fringe benefits and few words of gratitude.

Recovering from December stress becomes a private concern. As for me, I forget the workplace the moment I get out of its doors. It does not exist any longer because it carries a lot of unpleasant reminders. The only things I care about are the people I love, the friends who are there for me when I need company and conversation, especially the ones who never stop sending cheerful and loving SMS messages, even as early as seven in the morning. When the heart is happy, love is never far behind. Caring and being cared for are the best medicine against stress and burnouts.#

The tale of the lost Christmases

Christmas is like love that defies definition. It evokes a multitude of emotions arising from a breathless anticipation of surprises that wrapped packages and homecomings create. It is the presence of family belongingness, of blood kinship that fills the heart with paramount joy and satisfaction. Because unless Christmas is shared with those you love in abundance, then there is no meaning in the ritual of the Holy Nativity.

Christmas celebrations have changed through the years and for more than half the population of this world, the earlier Christmases were more authentic and family-oriented. It did not matter that the Christmas table was not filled with an array of delicious foods one only sees on such occasions, or that the stockings hanged by the bedside only had a few candies and cookies. Happiness exceeded the poverty of allowable choices.

There is a deep nostalgia among those who remember how Christmases were happier then, because of the children's voices filling the room, their running feet echoing the corridors and their laughters and giggles overwhelming the silence of the night. Santa Claus was real to the children, a beautiful tale told and re-told through the ages.

Today, many of the Christmas tales handed down from generations before have all died. They were killed by the real time powers of the television, the Internet, the mobile phones and the digital cameras. There are no more tales to tell and no more visiting Santa Clauses. Yes, the children have become adults too soon, to care about tales from a distant past they cannot relate to.

These days of highly sophisticated technology, family reunions especially on Christmas eve can easily be replaced by digitalised appearances on the Internet. There is no longer that strong feeling of wanting to be home with parents and siblings because absence can be bridged by a digital presence. This is a reality that parents are trying to understand and accept about their children whose lifestyles have changed dramatically. Probably there are still many who follow the tradition, but in general the old ways of Christmas celebration are dead and gone. #

A Filipino foundation is born in Stockholm

In a world of deepening inequality of resource ownership and distribution, a foundation serves as a channel for humanitarian help to marginalised people, especially in poor countries in Asia and Africa. There are many philantrophic organisations and wealthy donors that have contributed enormous amounts of money into well-deserving causes in the field of research to fight deadly diseases such as AIDS, as well as into economic and educational programmes to fight poverty.

Last Dec. 12th, the Philippine Embassy in Stockholm launched a new foundation to be called Philippine Education Foundation, or PEF with the single purpose of helping well-deserving Filipinos to acquire college or vocational education geared towards job opportunities in Scandinavia. The initiator of the project is the current Phil. Ambassador to Sweden and Denmark, Maria Zeneida Angara Colllinson.

Swedish-Filipino organisation leaders were invited to the launch to agree on the proposed constitution and by-laws. Through several fund-raising events in the past, the Embassy ( along with the Filipino community's participation) have succeeded to raise sixty-five thousand crowns as seed money of the foundation. It is an honest start that hopefully will increase in the near future.

The Filipino community started with a small number of immigrants that settled in Göteborg some 30 years back. They were pioneers who were employed in the shipping companies, who chose to settle down in Sweden. Today, informal sources claim that there are as many as 30,000 Filipinos in Sweden, and the number is increasing. Most of them are family members and relatives of earlier immigrants who came and got married to Swedes. Others arrived as au-pairs employed in Swedish households, and a few are professionals in the nursing and academic fields.

I suppose there is a point in adjusting one's education to qualify in a particular labour market and this seems to be the case behind the foundation's objective. Amb. Collinson announced during the launch that Swedish Labour Minister Billström plans to visit the Philippines. The date and purpose of the visit have not been specified. The Swedish government announced recently that it is granting working visas to qualified professionals who can fill certain needs in the market. It does not seem so optimistic these days when thousands of workers are losing jobs because of the economic crisis. Unemployment in Sweden is expected to hit 6.5 percent next year.

The foundation, if it works properly would be a good project to support. There have been many fund-raising activities in the past by Filipino organisations in Sweden, but they were mostly oriented towards acute disaster assistance. What the foundation should aim for is the involvement and participation of Swedish companies and philantrophic organisations with links to the Philippines and the Filipinos. Funding for education is a mammoth undertaking when one takes into consideration the growing population of young Filipinos getting out of schools and universities with nowhere to go but abroad, in search of job opportunities.#

A tenuous road to peace talks

"Social conflict may be defined as a struggle over values or claims to status, power, and scarce resources, in which the aims of the conflicting parties are not only to gain the desired values but also to neutralize, injure, or eliminate their rivals." (Coser, 1968)

I was in Oslo, Norway in the weekend of Nov. 29-30, this year for private reasons - to meet with old friends Joma and Julie Sison, as well as Fidel Agcaoili, Luis and Connie Jalandoni and Nonoy Palima. The last time we saw one another in person was during the ECOFIL Conference held in The Hague, Netherlands in 2001. Joma and Julie have been family friends from way back university days, long before he founded the Communist Party of the Philippines in 1969.

I have been a renegade in the nationalist movement, a drop-out, according to the regional commander of the New People's Army (NPA) I interviewed in Davao city during my days with Far Eastern Economic Review. In a way, I admit to both after exhausting myself in the media struggle to bring to light the abuses of the Marcos dictatorship. When I moved to Mozambique, Southern Africa in mid-1983, and later to Sweden in 1988, I distanced myself from Philippine politics, and from further disappointments over the deterioration of my birth country's political and economic situation.

I did not anticipate that being in Oslo - in the NDF's working room, for such a brief period would bring back an avalanche of memories I thought were laid to rest. I listened to terminologies creating several interpretations such as ceasefire, which I know is a pre-condition to peace talks and conflict resolution. But ceasefire is simply keeping the status quo where both parties desist from any violent actions and harmful political-military propaganda. It definitely does not mean surrender of arms or "returning to the fold". When one party coerces the other into giving up weapons or territorial gain, then it becomes a suppression technique in conflict resolution.

What I understood from my outsider's seat in Oslo was that, Government of the Philippines (GRP) panel did not even have the mandate to sign a Joint Statement to Resume the Peace Talks in Oslo early next year. And that the purpose of the gathering that weekend was purely "exploratory" and "creative". The proposed Joint Statement is quite clear on the NDF's position - that any conflict resolution is meaningless if arrests, killings and false propaganda are being utilized by one party, in this regard the government as pressure points. How about using USD17 billion in foreign remittances of overseas Filipinos as a more effective pressure point, if only those remitting can persuade their beneficiaries to reject the government that does nothing for them?

I also find it rediculous that the "terrorist" labelling of the Communist Party of the Philippines has not been rectified. As a Swedish journalist wrote: " A terrorist in one country is a freedom fighter in another." If the labelling remains, then why hold peace talks which bestows political legitimacy upon belligerent combatants? And what sort of intermediary role is the Norwegian government performing, aside from footing the bill for trips to Oslo? At some point, and a very crucial point - an intermediary must be able to bring contending actors to accept that "scarce or incompatible values can be managed in ways that are advantageous to both parties."

The Oslo meeting unfortunately was just a prisoner's game, no winners no losers.

"A Motherless Generation"..Indeed!

The latest Time magazine issue of Nov. 24th has featured the Philippines in its Society section with an article titled "The Motherless Generation", in reference to the thousands of Filipino women leaving their homes, family and children for better work opportunities abroad. Around 10 percent of the country's 87 million population are overseas workers and remitting much-needed hard currency back home. Last year alone, the total remittance was USD 17 billion is cash, a hugely significant contribution to an oil-dependent country like the Philippines.

Without the remittances, Philippines will collapse instantly a University of the Philippines professor was quoted as saying and everybody knows this, not just in the country but internationally. The country is surviving at the social cost of 9 million motherless or fatherless Filipino children and even if the Philippine government regularly commends the contribution of the Overseas Filipino Workers or OFWs while it pays lip service to the moral vacuum it creates, the government is powerless to stop the trend. Exporting cheap Filipino labour force has become the country's only viable industry.

It is without forgetting that aside from a growing motherless generation, the trail of broken homes is as long as the distance between Manila and Madrid. The old traditions of family and marriage have been forced aside in favour of job opportunities one can find, anywhere in the world. A majority of Filipinos going abroad for work are women and the untold stories of failures and tragedies outnumber those of success. It is indeed a very high price to pay but the Philippine government is not complaining. It is only the little children who are crying for their mothers, who are growing up with an education in beautiful homes that have all but mother's love."

What Obama's win tells the world

Barack Obama's election to the presidency of the United States has inspired hearts and minds toward new idealism emerging from the wreckage of a material world buried under its own weight. America needs a leader for a change that will not be ordinary, but one that focuses on ordinary people's hopes and dreams. When the trappings of a modern world have corrupted our ideals, it is time to go back to the basics of the life we want to live.

America found the right person to bring back idealism into the hearts of everyone, at the same time that most of the world re-examines its own set of ideals in a wasteland of economic devastation. One can say that the financial chaos that greeted America, and the rest of the world in mid-September was a crude awakening to our lack of conscience and common sense. We have allowed ourselves to be led by political and economic leaders whose sole motivation is self-interest and preservation of a system built at the expense of ordinary people.

If the Americans can wake up one day and realise that they need real change, and then elect the best person they believe capable of leading them towards change, why can't other nations do the same? The only other historical moment of this magnitude - that awed the world - was when Nelson Mandela after being held in prison for many years, became the first democratically-elected President of South Africa. He led his country towards democracy and freed his people from the politics of racial segregation.

How many nations today suffer from political systems that perpetuate corruption and a social cancer that feeds on the ignorance of the people, on their religious beliefs that poverty and over-population are mandated from heaven. The Philippines, has had one shining historical moment of what is now commonly referred to as "People's Revolution" in 1986, and wherein a woman- also historical in itself - became president and replaced a dictator who fled at the height of the popular street uprising. At that moment, there was a singular voice among the people who called for change. The mandate of leadership was given to Corazon Aquino, widow of the slain politician Benigno Aquino. But she faltered, lost the vision for change and in the end, old politics returned with merciless vengeance.

There were other nations that also experienced illustrious historical moments, as did happen in Poland with Lech Walesa and the Solidarity and in Czech Republic with Vaclav Havel. They were social agents that brought about change beyond national borders, change that inspired others to follow a better path for humanity. Many changes took place at the tremendous cost of human lives. However, looking at America just now, the change that is going to make or unmake a great nation rests upon a charismatic young leader with a vision of what the country needs in terms of shared purpose and common goals, the empowerment of ordinary citizens in a world without wars.#

Falling in...and out of love

The cycle of beginnings and endings happens every second, every minute in any part of this planet. There is birth to celebrate and there is death to mourn. When a relationship dies, do we fall apart or feel unshackled from pain, deceit and lies. Deception because we have led ourselves to believe in the fairy tale ending of "living happily ever after", and lies because loving comes with having to lie sometimes, in order to avoid distress and distraction.

Basic truths are however a must in any relationship. It is important to differentiate between falling in love deeply, being strongly attracted (to someone) and just having a fun time while waiting for the right one. In each situation, the degree of pain one suffers with separation varies from mild to tsunami-like aftermath. When love that has deepened with time is corrupted with goals no longer shared in common, separation is a surgical necessity that brings pain during operation but eventually relief with recovery.

Even short-term love affairs are not easy to deal with in terms of endings that shield us from self-loathing and regrets. The time one invests on even short romantic affairs are also precious and tedious as those placed in long-term relationships such as marriages and lifetime companionship. It must be devastating for anyone to go through the process of ending a relationship that has held its ground for many years, only to discover that the foundation is faulty.

There are no wise words to soften the impact of a separation. The heart bleeds and life's motion comes to a stop until a new momentum is found. The healing process differs according to how badly the heart has taken the blow. There are those who never recover from the loss of someone and in most cases, women suffer more than men. There are also those who require a complete change in one's lifestyle and place of living, even a new country in order to avoid running into bad memories. Whatever it is and wherever one takes abode, the important thing is to keep the heart healthy, so that it can give and receive love without the obstruction of a sordid past.#

Winter, a time for spicy stews and bubble baths

Winter has arrived and will stay over the next four to five months. It is hard to guess in these times of unpredictable weather changes caused by global warming, how long or short the zero-to-below zero days will be, particularly in the Nordic region. Even as we brace ourselves against the impact of a worldwide recession, so do we even more against the cold winter days. Winter calls for cozy homemade dinners especially spicy meat stews that warm the body after coming in from the cold. It calls for soft music, a glass or two of wine and a nice bubble bath. Have many candles of different sizes lighted and you'll have an evening to enjoy.

Creative meat stews come in different varieties that one can personalise according to one's mood. The basics are: beef or lamb, or even pork preferably with some fatty parts, cut into cubes and fried to slight brown with generous chopped garlic and onions. Having done that, put the meat to a slow boil and season with salt and pepper. Add beef bouillon, 3 to 4 laurel leaves, a teaspoon of ground cumin, a teaspoon of blended Provence dried herbs and a teaspoon of soy sauce. Boil slow for 1 to 2 hours and start preparing whatever vegetables you wish to have separately on the side. You can have slightly boiled haricot beans with sliced mushrooms, or broccoli, carrots and zucchini. Spicy stews need a neutraliser and the best is marinated thinly sliced cucumber salad with chopped parsley.

Watch the stew that it does not get dry and burned in the bottom. When the meat is soft, choose what you want to include: potatoes, white or black beans, sliced mushroom and before turning off the heat, add sliced red chillies and paprika. You can use fresh chillies, powdered or homemade chili oil. Taste and adjust, according to what is missing, be it salt or a pinch of sugar. To add a variation to this basic stew, use half a cup of red wine and a can of tomato sauce, instead of cumin which is best combined with curry. That's another stew variation that comes closer to curry dishes. If you are in the mood for lamb curry, don't forget hot curry powder, ginger- fresh or ground, cumin and a can of coconut milk. Along with garlic and onions, add one chopped tomato to the lamb pieces you are frying to slight brown.

Choose a good red wine of the Syrah variety. I usually go for the South African red wines - a habit formed after living close to South Africa for five years. While you are cooking, get marinated yourself with the wine you've opened and listen to your favourite music. That will create the right mood for a cozy home dinner, with or without a fireplace. There's always room for two in a fragrant bubble bath with candlelight.#

Confronting our ghosts and demons

One is supposed to be scary as a ghost for a Halloween party on All Soul's Day. It is an American tradition that has been adopted by many countries. I don't know the origin of ghosts being so frightening because they could also be beautiful in an apparition they choose to be seen. The tradition has become commercialised, like all others that the scarier and uglier the masks for Halloween, the better they sell.

I want to take ghosts and demons away from the Halloween gaiety and bring them into the real lives of people who have difficulties confronting them. How often do we hear someone say: "I have my own demons plaguing me and I don't know how to deal with them." Or perhaps it is like this: " The ghosts of my past keep trespassing into my present and I am held hostage." These are terrible burdens to carry on and they affect one's capacity for enjoying life and love, for giving and for sharing them.

I have a friend who met and fell in love with her perfect man. He was everything she wanted for a lifelong partner. But somewhere in the relationship, something broke irreparably. So she married someone else who was a good person, but she had no closure with her love of her life, and she failed to give herself to the man she married. They separated. Up to now, that closure hangs in limbo.

Then there's the story between a mother and her daughter. She was young when she had her. And when she left for Europe to find a new life, she left her daughter to the care of the grandmother. When she was ready to take on her duties of mothering and reclaimed her daughter, she could never make her love her as a mother. They became enemies.

Another example. A close friend came home early from her shopping tour in the city and stumbled upon her diplomat husband with another woman in their marital bed. She was devastated. She wanted instant divorce. But they were both middle-aged and if separated, they would be losers. She claimed that she could never trust him again which is understandable. But on the other hand, she failed to accept that she probably forgot he was a man instead of just being the husband who brought home the bacon. And he, a middle-aged man succumbed to the flattery of a younger woman's seduction.

Still another example and it is about a boy of eleven whose mother died so suddenly. He was perplexed, numbed by the thought that someone so young and vital as her mother could die so suddenly. And he said: " I had many things to ask her but now I will never be able to do so." This is almost as traumatic as another case where the son said upon hearing of his father's death: " I will never be able to tell him that I really loved him." Or a wife who said: " I never told him how much I really loved him and he died without knowing my true feelings for him."

These are traumatic experiences that many are forced to live with because they cannot confront, or exorcise the ghosts and demons of the past. They maybe defeated for a while in an environment of trust and affection, but they can resurrect all at once in any unguarded moments. "The answer is out there," quoting a popular TV series. But how does one find those answers. Should one seek, or should one wait for time to bring the answers. Would it be too difficult to forgive oneself for one's own sins of omission, and for other's wrong that left a broken heart? Unless there is grace and humility to accept and make amends for wrongs done to oneself and to others the ghosts and demons will lord over the present and future of one's lifetime.#

Redefining human boundaries

The coming of winter is now evident as the temperature slides down to zero and darkness engulfs the horizon. Living in wintertime becomes a philosophy. We curse the weather for being unfriendly and rainy and cold, but we don't really answer the fundamental question of why we have chosen to be in a place where there are four seasons demanding changes in lifestyles. We come face to face with boundaries which we make ourselves, and those imposed upon us by the social and natural order of things.

I live with boundaries in my world because the opposite would be utter chaos and disorder. I live alone, like more than a thousand others, but it is not a nomadic life. I am bound by social rules and traditions that help create balance and order. My sense of balance with the outside world and what I feel is right for myself, is mine alone to determine. I choose the boundaries I can live with, allowing certain limitations to be flexible enough for change and growth. For instance, I can say that being born an Asian has equipped me with values entirely different from westerners, but after having lived in Sweden for 20 years, I outgrew some of my Asian beliefs and allowed great western values of egalitarianism and equality to enrich my outlook in life.

What are the boundaries we live in? Obviously it is in the realm of human relations where different kinds of boundaries exist. It is in this sphere that we can make our choices, most of them anyway.We decide how much is ours as individual persons, and how much is given to family, friends and the rest of the world. Blood ties are sometimes restrictive when they result in a border between "Us and them", and a boundary excludes others from the outside world. It is not a porous border that enables one to move in and out the "Us and them" paradigm, without fear of losing one's sense of belonging. Think about having a relationship with someone of this cultural background and being considered an outsider.

There are certain societies that strictly adhere to the "Us and them" rule. If you do not belong to the blood kinship, then you will always be an outsider. This is not the case in the western world where there is greater openness and where family relations are extended beyond blood ties. There are no boundaries for human relations to extend and multiply. Most Asian societies are clannish when it comes to considering who's family and who's not. But it is well-known for being the most extended in scope.

My family is extended beyond geographical and cultural boundaries. Having been married to a Swede gave me the opportunity to embrace his own family relations. Now I have children being married to, and having relations with persons coming from countries like Japan, Australia and Lebanon. The extension has created an expansive cultural experience for everybody, an affinity that defies distance and cultures. If that is not enough, I have also added my sons' friends in gymnasium as extended family. Hence, a Portuguese son who is more British and two Brazilian sons who are as affectionate as my own.

The trickiest boundaries to deal with are those in the field of human emotion - the man-woman relationship where social roles influence decisions on the limits of boundaries. Take a single parent, who maybe a man or a woman and who is also a parent to children. The first boundary that comes up is, what percentage of time is yours and what percentage belongs to the children. Then comes the career boundary, where one's professional life consumes almost 100 percent of one's time. There's nothing left for the other but excuses and loads of SMS that do not justify waitings and failed dinners. These are movable boundaries that one has the ability - given the determination to do right - to redefine and to re-adjust in order to achieve a balance between heart and mind, between duty to others and to one's self , and least of all between the spiritual and the material.#

Remembering the dead

Life is a precious gift one cannot afford to ignore or squander away because once it passes though the gate of eternity, there is no recovering what had been missed in one's lifetime. What makes All Soul's Day a heavy moment of reflection is the magnitude of recollection that comes with remembering the dead. As we honour our departed loved ones, we contemplate on the richness our lives have once been when they were part of the living and mourn the joys lost with their departure.

One experiences many kinds of death in one's lifetime. The unexpected ones are the hardest to accept because they catch us off-guarded, like when a close family member is murdered, or dies in a car collision or plane crash, or was hit by a suicide bomber, or simply fell down unconscious. We die a hundred times more than the death we mourn because we are caught unprepared for the loss.

Some deaths are expected, especially when an illness has taken an irreversible path of no return. We count the days, the hours, the minutes left for us to hold on to the bare thread of life that ties us to the person we don't want to let go. And when the inevitable happens, we hold the hands of our loved one for as long as it takes until they become cold and lifeless. Even an expected passing away is difficult to accept, and we somehow die ourselves.

Each time we honour the dead on All Soul's Day, we rationalise on their dying and on their departure from the sphere of life they once shared with us. Some deaths take a longer time to accept because they leave behind a deeper hole of emptiness. Maybe the heart has been shattered into tiny pieces that mending it is near impossible. Maybe the emotional destruction caused by death is the same magnitude as the ruins left behind by a world war where the possibility of becoming a whole person again is almost impossible.

As we light candles for our dead, we also seek the same light for our darkness, so that we might find ourselves safely out of the tunnel of sadness. The empty heart is difficult to fill again because it seeks the same purity of emotion that had once inhabited it. That is why happiness is elusive for those that have lost a great love.#

Lonely hearts and the magic world of cruises

How do you break away from a social isolation not of your own making but that fate played a cruel trick on you. A separation from a long-time companion, a divorce that ended a cycle of love and hate, an untimely death that claimed the love of your life, or just plain indifference to the noble functions of the heart have destined many to a life of murderous loneliness.

Sometimes it is none of the above that exile people to the barren life of common trivialities, to a deafening monotony that is punctuated only by the changing of television channels, as one desperately searches for programs that abbreviate the gap between something and nothing. Many couples married for a long time find themselves saddled in a routine of television watching where conversations are no longer relevant and silences become excusable.

At this particular time when the world is gripped by unstable finances and shaky employments, the feeling of anguished uncertainty over life and the attainment of happiness becomes so untenable and desperate. How does one get away from these crippling emotions of desolation? How does one break away from an externally-imposed social isolation when money is scarce and hard to earn? How does a lonely heart find a cure for its constant ache?

For people living in the Nordic countries, there is the gift of the sea. An abundance of archipelagic waters have given life to cruises. One can choose from a number of cruise programs: whole-day cruise to Mariehamn, or 36-hours to Åbo, Finland or the two-nights on board, one day city sight-seeing cruises to Helsinki, Finland, Tallin, Estonia or Riga, Latvia. Name it and the cruising ships of Viking Line and Tallink/Silja Lines are there everyday to make dreams ( some, anyway) come true, even for a borrowed time.

A long time ago, cruises were a luxury and affordable only to those in the upper social class. Think of the classic Agatha Christie Nile cruises where beautiful people cavort with one another and pretend to be someone else other than their real selves. To go on a cruise was to leave behind a wretched life and enter the magic world of make believe where there is music, dancing, dining, flirting and partner-seeking. Life becomes fatalistic. Live today or tonight because tomorrow you could be dead. Carpe diem!

The Nordics are truly egalitarian in the sense that the myth of Agatha Christie's elite crowd of dress-to-kill people on a cruise ( with an agenda to murder ), has been subverted by proletarianism. Cruises are for all, the different kinds of humanity that inhabit this wonderful region of equality between men and women in the pursuit of elusive happiness. In these ships that silently weave through the endless waters of the archipelago and the Baltic sea, men and women pursue with fierce equality the dream of dancing away the night with a Prince Charming or a Cinderella, and not run away at midnight and lose a golden shoe.#

My autumn fashion delights

Financial crisis has hit the global economy, in particular the United States where it all started. It had taken more than two weeks for the United States congress to hammer a USD700 billion bailout plan, which was rejected first but approved later after some sweetening measures. Hence the gloom of autumn's darkening horizon is aggravated by deep uncertainties that now plague every sector of the economy, in particular the labour market.

These are days of suspended animation among major stock exchanges in the world, like a pendulum or the Sword of Damocles that swings threateningly from depressive lows to slight recovery. So, do we all grieve over Wall Street's profligacy or find other ways to enjoy the pleasures of autumn. For one thing, autumn is the most beautiful season of the year. Nothing beats the glorious myriad of orange, yellow and red colours of an autumn landscape. Every piece of Sweden is a painter's masterpiece.

Autumn - notwithstanding its rains and chilly winds - is my favourite season, my holy pilgrimage into the fashion world. I love the contrasts between the neutral black and grey suits, jackets, pants and the striking opposition of reds, oranges, purples, pinks and greens in scarves, blouses, belts, shoes and handbags. Ever seen the latest high heels, the one where Prada models stumbled on the catwalk recently. Great looking shoes esp. from Top Shop (Made in Brazil), if one can manage the balance. I wouldn't recommend it on icy roads.

After returning from a two-week physical wellness retreat, where I also journeyed into the history of Gdansk, in Poland, I decided to seek out the pleasures of autumn. I went around the newly-refurbished Vällingby shopping center, in particular the fashion house K:Fem, the two-level structure that has a wide range of choices in designer apparel and accessories. My favourites are Mango, Top Shop, Best of Brands, Footlight, and Gina Tricot. I 'm not mentioning the designer luxury brands. Top Shop has gorgeous half boots - those that make you feel like a million dollar babe, as long as you can walk with the right balance.

Fashion shopping calls for sensible choices and the designer clothes and fashion accessories do not always guarantee style if you cannot put them into an elegant package. You can combine H&M blouses with Filipa suits, Max Mara or Versace with Mango and look as hot as Carrie Bradshaw or any of the babes in "Sex in the City". So I assembled my personal autumn choices out of cuttings I made from K:Fem's magazine in the photo on this blog. I am not getting involved in the top luxury designer jewelries because it is sinful and aggravating at this point in time. But a Bulgari or Cartier watch may not be totally immoral, is it?#

Gdansk monuments to humanity's cause

Nations and peoples erect monuments to honour triumphs and defeats, fallen heroes and triumphant conquerors. Many countries that have gone through a violent, often bloody path to freedom and democracy build monuments to commemorate defeat and loss of lives sacrificed for a nobler and greater cause of humanity. As generation marches on to peace and progress, monuments are living reminders of what it took to reach the future.

To go around Gdansk historical places was the most humbling experience I have had since many years. It was an emotional trip that took me close to mothers and wives who lost their husbands and sons in the Second World War, and to the workers' uprising in Gdansk shipyard in December 1970s; even closer to the Polish people who contributed so much to humanity's pursuit of peace, even as it suffered horrendous loss of human lives and properties, not just on one war but several historical periods of its nation-building.

Gdansk history goes back to 980, although written accounts of 1412 state that it was awarded to the Teutonic Knights. Then it became the Free City of Danzig, a growing fashionable area for the wealthy Germans who built manors and health resorts. In the 20th century as part of the Prussian state, universities and hospitals were constructed,as well as main thoroughfares that connected it to its present two sister-cities of Sopot and Gydnia. During the WWII, the Germans occupied Poland and Gdansk became a German territory until the invasion of the Red Army that left Gdansk in total ruins. Gdansk was levelled to the ground, pulverised into non-existence.

The monument to the fallen Polish soldiers at Westerplatte is not to commemorate death and loss but to remind all, the Polish people and the world of the heroic defense made by a few against the powerful Nazi German army. It was here the first shots of WWII were fired. History tells us of the contributions made by the Polish soldiers who fought and died so that Europe may live in peace.

Another emotional trip went back to the 70s, the uprising of the Gdansk shipyard workers against the rising food cost and severe economic problems under the Communist era. The first death in December 1970 was in Gdansk shipyard, but in neighbouring Gydnia, 18 lost their lives. The labour strikes continued into the 1980s and led to the creation of the Solidarity movement under a charismatic leader, Lech Walesa. He became the inspiring leadership during a long period of dissent against the Communist rule. In 1983, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for Peace.

The people of Gdansk took the initiative to build a monument to the fallen workers just beside the shipyard. It consists of three towering crosses that appear to guard the whole of the city. In 1999, world dignitaries like US President Ronald Reagan and Pope John Paul II paid their respects to the contributions made by the workers and the people of Gdansk. Lech Walesa became the first democratically-elected President of Poland and remained so until 1995.

Today, Gdansk is a city re-built by the Polish people. Most of its important buildings and institutions are re-constructed although the scars of the WWII are still visible. Its most important church, the Cathedral of Saint Mary in the Old Town is rebuilt, as well as other historical buildings that were destroyed during the war. The most lamentable place that remains to be brought to life and productivity is the Gdansk shipyard. It is a vital economic artery that is laying in waste and neglect.

As a member of the European Union, it would be an important task to give Poland the economic assistance that it deserves, if the European political leaders remember how much this country has lost and given, so that Europe may live in peace and prosperity. No other European country has suffered so much destruction, and contributed so many lives in the name of freedom and democracy. Now is the time for a just and proper recognition. On 2012 it will host the European Football Games. It will need a huge assistance to build its roads and infrastructures and this is an EU challenge, not Poland alone.

Autumn of discontent

Autumn has arrived with rains, cold air and grey to black skies. All at once the joys of summer with its long bright days, lazy strolls along the waters and landscapes of green trees and flowers are fading into a shadow of depressed moments as we stare at darkness and the embrace of long cold nights. Unto each heart comes an inner sorrow over something lost.

Why do we feel sad that autumn has arrived and that soon it will give way to winter? What's in the change of season that makes us reflect at our own lives. We fall in love during spring, not necessarily with a person in particular, but with the idea of simply falling in love with love. And if it so happens that there is an object of affection, why is the thrill so much greater in springtime than in autumn or winter? Do people fall in love in autumn or fall out of love. Does a depressed heart respond to love's calling?

It is a paradox why during autumn we spend time to reflect on our emotions and relationships we have. We rationalise our spring fever. What was it that made us fall in love with a particular person. What was the attraction. Is it strong enough to withstand the autumns and winters of life? Can two people suffering from autumn blues comfort each each other?

Autumn is not just a matter of weather change. The larger world is not encouraging at all with political and economic issues that hit individuals in different ways. People lose jobs because the industries and companies cut budgets to insure greater year-end profit. Is recession making a bigger bite at corporate profit and therefore many must lose their jobs. The bigger the company, the greater the danger of cutting down on manpower. And who are the most affected? Not the management people. Just the workers.

And when the most respected of Swedish authorities make a muddle of its own statistical calculations that affect every person's well-being, it is not surprising that depression becomes a disease instead of just a temporary feeling. What relationships can withstand the onslaught of economic problems brought about by sudden unemployment? Where can we find joy when we come home from work tired and stressed and there is no one there to ease the worries of the day. It is just evenings of deafening stillness, like the the sepulchral silence of the cemetery. And autumn of discontent made unbearable by the infinite distance between night and day.

The lures and pitfalls of London holidays

I was in London recently for a well-deserved holiday and most importantly to visit my youngest son and his beautiful girlfriend. They live in Highgate, an interesting hub of shops, women boutiques, restaurants, espresso bars and pubs. I have been visiting London since the late 70s, when I worked as Philippine representative for Financial Times. Its like coming home.

The summer sales were still on and the huge inviting signs of 50% off were plastered on show windows. It is always interesting to check how cheaper designer goods are at half price and how perilous it gets for the wallet when the desire to acquire becomes an untamed beast. My city tour was not so exciting except when my son and I had a dim sum lunch at Pingpong restaurant. It was superb! That was the day's highlight.

At Cadbury street, we came inside a perfumery because I wanted to buy some Crabtree and Evelyn products. I love the rose smell of these products, especially the lotion. We also tested perfumes and EDTs and ended getting a Prada which was truly expensive. It is something one wears only with sexy Victoria Secret for special person occasions. A wishful thought though not far from truth.

Since I couldn't find clothes and accessories I liked in the heart of London itself, I explored all the shops and boutiques in Highgate. True enough, I found very interesting shops with trendy clothes and accessories at half prices. It became a genuine shopping spree. My plastic cards were never before as assaulted as they had been in Highgate. I begun to entertain the idea of changing my identity after this trip.

Aside from women madness things, it was the bookshops I never failed to visit where the offer was three books for the price of two. It is truly amazing to see so many new books and authors in the market. When I compare book- buying in London to Stockholm, the latter really pails in comparison. Londoners are great book lovers. You see them all in the underground train reading a book or newspaper.

The other great thing about being in London are the newspapers especially the weekend editions, how thick they come with supplements on several subjects like lifestyle, fashion, health, holidays and food. To sit in the kitchen, drinking tea or cappuccino and having a smoke..oopppss! The feeling of being immersed or submerged in reading has a sustained orgasmic thrill. The truth is, it is perilous for both the purse and the heart to be in London often even if the British pound got cheaper against the Swedish crown.

Undoing one's burnt-out feeling

Never has shopping become as addictive as when one is clawed by a combination of all psychological factors resulting from bad organisation in the workplace, especially where leadership is faulty and weak. Many workplaces in Sweden, particularly in the health care sector, lose track of their commitments to life caring. So many blundering mistakes even by educated medical people. It gets worse when you add the multiracial diversity factor - people coming from many cultures working together.

Just then, you hit the deepest low of your own well-being and gets advice from a psychologist who tell you to find joy, even for thirty minutes a day. In this state of bad well-being, we have friends - close and real friends who understand the need to let out the steam and will give you the time, their precious time, to listen to you, to comfort you with words of sympathy and even invite you to get out and hit the city. See a movie, like "Sex and the City", and feel the joy Carrie, Miranda, Charlotte and Samantha felt over love lost, and found again. Or "Mama Mia" with a different cadence to ABBA's undying songs. If you don't cry over how Meryl Streep sang "The Winner Takes it All", then you are definitely a lost case.

A depression attack could find more than thirty minutes of joy in a sea of summer bargains. Take for instance the popular high-end NK department store where sales of named brands fell by 50%. A favorite shop inside NK is Kriss, a Swedish clothing brand that sells women clothes, as women clothes ought to be - feminine and alluring. In these days, there are sprawling shopping malls in every Swedish suburb that compete with what one can finds in the inner Stockholm city.

Take Vällingby for instance. The clothing and accessories are fresher than what one finds in the inner city. K:Fem, which is the latest addition in the mode world has shops for all kinds of wallets. A favorite is "Myself and Friends", "Best of Brands", "Sisters" and "Mango". The summer bargains created a 50 to 70 percent price reduction that made shopping so enticing, so exciting and so sexy. Yes, sexy because there is that element of orgasmic thrill at finding something beautiful and affordable.

But the best thing that happens when one is feeling low is that good friends think creatively to help erase the blues. How about a girls night out on a very pleasant evening when the air is sensual and talking from the heart eases the hurts. Some hurts have not found any closures and they continue to nag the present and future. When one has friends who care to listen, who can talk openly about anything from failed love affairs, to unfinished novels and doctoral dissertation, to new hopes and prospects - if only we allow them to happen, then who really cares about a thirty- minute joy when you can have hours and days of lovely moments.

Ending one's life sustaining system

Euthanasia is not allowed in Sweden. It is illegal and can be seen as murder. Even the acceleration of death through pain-alleviating medicine is illegal if " it accelerates death more than it alleviates pain", wrote Hans Thorstedt of the Faculty of Law, Stockholm University. On the other hand, passive euthanasia " in the form of forbearance to initiate life-sustaining treatment in a hopeless case is legal". But the Swedish state of law is not that clear when it is legal or illegal to terminate a life-sustaining system. The issue lies on the border of what is active and passive euthanasia.

I came face to face with the problem of euthanasia. But no one will admit that the decision to end a patient's life-sustaining treatment was in fact an act of euthanasia. In this particular case, it was the children of the patient who asked that their mother no longer get life sustenance through the tube. This decision was made clear to the nursing staff. It would have been just another case of palliative care except that some objections were raised by some staff members who saw the decision as an act of passive euthanasia.

It became a strong psychological issue to get involve in a passive euthanasia case. Several care staffers refused to be involved and a feeling of mental illness slowly affected the working place. When the issue was raised to the leadership of the nursing home, one division chief stated that the decision to end the patient's life sustenance was a deviation from the practice of caring after a patient until his/her life span comes to a natural end.

There have been publicized cases of euthanasia although not in Sweden. For instance, a 35-year old Swede who went to a Swiss euthanasia clinic. Often, they are patients suffering from extreme pains following an accident or a terminal illness like cancer. The patients themselves ask to end their life-sustaining treatment. But when they come face-to-face with death, they change their decisions.

In any case, when this particular issue had infected seriously the working climate of the nursing home, the decision to start the process of ending the patient's life sustaining system became a medical one and no longer the expressed wish of the patient's children. The problem with the medical diagnose is that, there was none in the beginning. There was no medical investigation to substantiate the decision to remove the food tube for sustaining life. The palliative care consisted mainly of morphine and water, supposedly to alleviate pain which the patient may or may not have suffered from.

Euthanasia, whether active of passive are generally in the domain of hospitals. So that when it had happened in a long-term nursing home, one can imagine the magnitude of digression that had taken place. The patient may have found peace and an end to a life without cure, but the psychological and mental discomfort it had created among those who were involved against their will last a long time.

"Viva Espana! " and all that football jazz!

It was back in Maputo, Mozambique in the mid-80s that I got introduced to football and became addicted to it. The Mozambican television was not yet working but there were some diplomatic homes that had access to South African TV. Way back then, I remember how we cheered for the Swedish and Danish teams. "Danish dynamite!" was a favorite cheering slogan. I don't particularly recall if it was then when Sweden took the bronze. Football became a social energizer in many boring diplomatic events.

I watched all the matches in the recently-concluded Euro 2008, cheered the Swedes for all "love of country" sense of patriotism and was indeed proud when they kicked in two goals against Greece, last season's champion. Good start for the Swedes, the football fanatics said. The second match against Spain was a tough fight but which the Swedes heroically brought to a 1-1 goal. We watched from Sheraton's bar and had neglected the Philippine independence ball upstairs. A last minute goal by Spain ended Sweden's quarter final aspiration.

There were disappointments and lots of surprises in the UEFA Euro 2008 series. For us who admired how the elegant French players had been in the past, only saw rough collisions and yellow cards. Some matches were rather dull like the one between Croatia and Germany (2-1). But matches played in by Turkey, Russia, Holland, Spain and the Czech republic were thrillers. The biggest surprise came from the Russian team who were young, quick, hungry, daring and innovative. For a while, I thought they would win the coveted EU championship after overwhelming the Swedes. But when Spain gave Russia a 4-1 goal, it became clear that Spain was going to become the new champion. Germany never got a chance!

Now that all the football matches have been played, we are once again back to crime investigation on American and British television. Where do we our evening excitement and thrill. A big question mark especially after your friends have departed from the living room, the bar, Sergels Torg - exhausted from all the yelling,cheering and flag- waving. What comes next? Four years is a long wait.
(Photo Credits: Reuter/Dagens Nyheter, 2008-06-30)

Sex and butterflies in the stomach

In the Dagens Nyheter's Sunday magazine today, my attention was caught by a very interesting article entitled "Så håller du pirret vid liv" which roughly translates into "Keeping butterflies in the stomach". I wish to translate some very exciting and relevant observations made by Eva Sanner on keeping sex and sexuality alive in relationships. It is strange how a whole society is influenced by sex in whatever definition it goes.

The excitement in sex tends to disappear with time in long relationships. And it does not help how much Viagra and sex toys are available in the market. The absence of sexual lust does not have much to do with one's lack of erection but something else that is missing, like romance, passion and the butterfly in the stomach feeling of anticipation, the article says.

Maybe we live in an erotic unfriendly society. Or we are too stressed for sex, have too much to do, preoccupied with children or just plain too tired. Or maybe gender equality and safe sex has become too boring and unpalatable? How can one re-discover sexuality and sexual lust for each other, keep butterflies alive in the stomach and blend the ridiculous with the sublime in everyday living. Because sex when it is good, makes us healthier, happier, calmer, kinder and more insightful.

I agree with the author's observation that a healthy sexual life brings out the best in us and we become better in our relationships with other people - with friends, co-workers, employers and the whole world. One time, at a planning session I attended, the lecturer was speaking about the importance of human touch with patients, especially the old people. She said: "Utan beröring, inget liv!" It means without touch or caress, there's no life.
We laughed but the truth is, who cares to live a sterile life, a life dying in sexual celibacy.

Eva Sanner is soon coming out with her book "Kåt, glad och tacksam", meaning "Lust, joy and gratitude". Lust is an everyday word that carries a lot of wisdom because it is not exclusive to sex but to the whole attitude towards life, the curiosity that drives us to seek knowledge and experiment something new. To have lust not just for sex but for life itself, and to be thankful of what one enjoys out of it or gets out of life through seeking and sharing. How many are there who wallows in grief and negative thoughts instead of living a thankful life one has.

As food for thoughts from this insightful woman, she advises the following. When the erotic glow cools down it does not mean that love is dead. Those dying embers must have some air to breathe otherwise there is no fire. Erotic love takes time and knowing each other because it is a part of longing and hoping, of having new mysteries, ideas and allowing unexpected things to just happen.

It is not those latest sex techniques that keep lust alive. No, the key to intimacy and the ability to create love over and over again in a relationship are: communication, distance and time. Communication needs because we want to be seen and understood in order to have the lust for love. Distance needs because separation is a condition for meeting. And if we will have those butterfly feeling in the stomach there needs to be a distance between parties. Time need is essential because sexuality is a perishable commodity. Love in a hurry is simply boring. Getting into bed with someone is easy but developing a sexual relationship takes time and caring.

( With thanks to Eva Sanner and Astrid Johansson for their excellent guidelines in our journey into the often troubled waters of sex and sexuality. Photo credit: "Butterfly trapped" by Sonora Ocampo Åkerfeldt)

Is it " love actually?"

I just got an SMS message from my son - who's jumping in and out planes between Hongkong, Taipeh and Saigon that his girlfriend now has "a rock on her finger". A happy news to hear from someone whose heart has been broken twice. I was indeed very happy because he found his soul mate, someone who understands him - his strengths, weaknesses, needs and dreams. How good it feels to love again!

As a mother of three sons and one daughter, I cannot remember how many times my own heart bled when they told me about a relationship that ended, and the hurt that pierces deep into their hearts magnifies into mine because no amount of loving words can comfort a bleeding heart or stop the pain, or the tears. As the cliche goes: " Love hurts or sucks!". Also true, plus all other curses that come to mind in moments of desperation, anger and regret.

One often asks oneself, have I given all of myself that left nothing more to shield me from an unwanted separation ? Or as the Dalai Lama wisely said: "Has your need exceeded love?" There are more than a hundred ways why love dies, sours up, turns into hatred and even bitterness. But there are also as many ways it turns up when least unexpected, when we are close to committing ourselves to a self-built cloister of aloneness. And just when we have made peace with that settlement, that life goes on without any person to care for, the most unimaginable situation happens and shatters the protective wall of indifference we built around ourselves.

I find it very difficult to define love. Very often it is associated with instant chemical reaction wherein two people like magnet are drawn to each other, either at first sight or after a long period of friendship. When a strong emotion hits like a thunderbolt, we say it is love. Is it actually? I never had the pleasure of a thunderbolt-like emotion at first meeting, but I know that some kind of chemical reaction has passed though my system enough to allow that meeting to continue its course. And I often say to friends that I have a strong instinct with people. I either like or dislike someone instantly and nothing exists between those two extremes of black and white.

Should we be good friends first and fall in love later or should we fall in love first and be friends later. Can we be friends and lovers at the same time? Are words necessary to express our emotions as well as deeds? When love is not expressed in words, how does one know that there is even that love hidden inside the protective wall we built? Is sex an expression of love between two people reacting to the same mutual attraction? Or is it just a means to fill an emptiness, a longing for something that we do not even know exists.

However "love actually" is defined, it is only in the private sphere of one's emotion. But it is definitely a joy to know that there is someone out there who thinks of you, as much as you think of that person and that time becomes a tiresome waiting for the next call or SMS to come, especially if you don't want to seem too needy. Love is a game of balance, of knowing how much to give of oneself at various stages of its development. Even after marriage, yes, especially after marriage does love and courtship need more nourishment so that it does not thirst for anything.

(This blog piece is specially dedicated to Sarni and Toshi on their recent engagement.)

War, women and a wasteland of empty promises

Men rule and make wars. Women lose husbands, brothers, sons, homes and their dignity when they become spoils of conquests. One may think that conflicts are in fact anathema to this period of human development when nation-states have already been formed. And yet, ethnicism, religious fanaticism and excessive political power continue to fuel conflicts and the victims, by a large majority are women and children.

The Swedish women organisation "Kvinna till Kvinna" or Woman to Woman came out with a timely criticism on the absence of women's role in the reconstruction effort of war-ravaged countries, in particular, why the Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt - who played a significant role in the EU peace and reunification effort of Bosnia and Herzegovina, has hardly mentioned women in his statements concerning Sweden's and even EU's role in the re-building and democratization of countries like Iraq.

This is no surprise to me at all because the same political miscalculation characterized the EU Administration of Mostar, EUAM when it undertook its task of reconstructing the bombed-out old city in Bosnia-Herzegovina. During a three-year period, I visited Mostar, Sarajevo, and its adjacent villages and I saw at close range how EUAM did the arduous task of unification and reconstruction. While there were advisers for different spheres: economy, education, infractructure, health and refugee - there was none for women affairs. And to think that the main survivors of the ethnic conflict and cleansing were women and that the greatest number of dislocations were among domestic refugees.

I was doing my masters thesis on "Nationalism and Ethnic Conflict" with EUAM as the empirical part of it. But my heart burned for some involvement in helping the displaced women who lost their relatives and homes, their work and their livelihood. At that time, there were not so many NGOs, particularly women organisations in Mostar. Women victims could not go anywhere to sit down, unload their psychological and emotional burdens, talk to others in similar situation. They were like zombies in a city emptied of life and joy.

Then I finally succeeded to gather some women representatives who were prepared to organize themselves and get some re-training program for livelihood. I brought up the idea to the EUAM Administrator Hans Koschnick. This was after two years ofEUAM work in Mostar. Koschnick gamely came along and sat with the local women, listened to their problems and they waited for an answer. None came, no promise of funds to create a women livelihood program. Then Koshnick told me: "Where have you taken me?" I replied: " Sir, to the heart of your reconstruction project".

When I brought up this women project with the Swedish Development Authority, or SIDA, I didn't get very far. The priority was the upkeep of the Swedish peace-keeping forces and the rehabilitation of women lives through education waited and waited. At that time, "Kvinna till Kvinna" was administratively weak and thinly spread in several conflict areas.

It is with the same pessimism that I view the UN and Iraq government's re-building project because whatever the final document says on respecting women and minority rights, it is half-hearted and cosmetic. Women organizations will have to work very hard in order to be heard, in order to count in the re-making of their society. And they have to do it without any help from men.

Stockholm hosts Int'l. Conference on Iraq

The red carpet rolled today in Infracity in Stockholm to welcome major political actors in an international conference on the reconstruction of war-torn Iraq. It is the biggest political event that Stockholm has taken on since a long time. Helping to put back Iraq on its feet has become a pressing world concern.

But not all agrees in Stockholm's hosting of the Iraq conference because critics say it legitimizes the war that the United States started and for which reconstruction and the problem of refugees that staggers Europe should be undertaken more by the US. The Swedish media reported positively on the Swedish government's decision to host the conference, even if it is clear that Washington has the greater responsibility especially in relation to refugee reception. Dagens Nyheter's editorial today says that, it is not reasonable that Europe should take on more responsibility for accommodating refugees than USA itself.

However, the editorial adds that it would be short-sighted to lay the burden mainly on the US. One has to accept two considerations: that USA's invasion of Iraq was wrong but the world has an important role to play in its reconstruction. Even if the state of violence has tapered down, the risk for escalation of conflict looms in the horizon. A devastated Iraq has repercussions on the stability of the region which does not lie in any one's interest.

It is reported that the international conference will not take up the issue of invasion but focus more on the future. It does not benefit anyone to dwell on the morality of why US invaded Iraq. After the US elections on November, it is expected that the Iraq issue will be treated differently in matters of foreign policy.

The conference is actually chaired by the United Nations in close collaboration with the government of Iraq. The major political actors that have arrived in Stockholm are US. Foreign Minister Condoleeza Rice, UN's General-Secretary Ban Ki Moon, the UN representative to Iraq and Foreign Ministers of Iraq, Iran and Great Britain.

While the conference has placed Stockholm and the Coalition government in the limelight, Swedish Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt is going to need a good balancing position in order not be seen as supporter of US Pres.Bush. Sweden has no ambition to play a big role in the conflict-ridden issue on how the UN and the international community will handle the conflict management and democratization of the Iraq. Stockholm hosted the conference as a neutral country upon the admonition of UN and the Iraq government.#

Gabriel Garcia Marquez on a Tallin Cruise

De'ja-vu, the strange feeling of a life moment in the past re-enacting itself in the present happened on a recent cruise to Tallin, the capital of Estonia. It seems that my fate is irreversibly linked to cruise ships, if not presidential yachts. Cruises to Tallin, Riga, Helsinki and Mariehamn from Stockholm are affordable luxuries whenever a need to get away hits the soul.

During my recent escapade to Tallin on the Queen Victoria 1 cruising ship, something remarkable happened. I don't mean having a Premium suite to myself - instead of a narrow cabin with two or four beds. On this particular cruise I met a woman, who like me was travelling alone. She was sitting by herself near a piano bar listening to a pianist's rendition of old 60s and 70s music. She was reading a book, " Love in the Time of Cholera" by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. My heart skipped a beat. I was holding a copy of "The Autumn of the Patriarch" by the same author. I read her book earlier and fell in love with the tale of Fermina Daza and Florentino Ariza. What a strange coincidence, I thought.. to see someone reading my book and listening to piano music.

I sat on the chair opposite her and gave her a smile. Then we looked at the books we were holding, and we both laughed. We started talking. Strange though, it seemed like we knew each other from somewhere like a lost friendship hidden in the pages of Gabriel Garcia Marquez' novel. She said that she likes travelling alone and leisurely like on cruises after her husband passed away. I bit my lips because she took away my own story for being alone.

Obviously, our conversation fell on the books accompanying us. I told her that Gabriel Garcia Marquez is my favorite writer and that "Love in the Time of Cholera" and "Hundred Years of Solitude" were to me his best works. It is a tale of a love story that makes one re-examine one's own. How great was my own love story? How long has that love lasted. We became pensive as we separately sunk into our deep memories.

Then she told me what Fermina Daza taught her about love and being a woman. That Fermina Daza the woman was lost in all the roles she played to perfection: from being a dutiful daughter to being a dutiful wife and mother. She took on the stress imposed upon her by the society she lived in. Until Florentino Ariza, having waited half-a-century for her, declared his love on the same day Fermina's husband died. As the proper lady of the house, Fermina was revolted by Florentino's audacity. But as a woman of 72 years, she was shaken by the ardour of her old suitor. Then she finally agreed to get away from her suffocating social world, and into a Carribean riverboat with Florentino. In that boat and in the face of a ravaging old age, Fermina became a woman she had not been for many, many years.

My new acquaintance had a glint in her eyes when she narrated that part of "Love in the Time of Cholera" - Fermina's discovery of her lost sexuality. I travelled deep into mine searching for what I lost in the years gone.

Loving, losing, living...

How does one immerse oneself from a universe of grief over the loss of a loved one? Pain is always lurking around, ready to bite with every rush of memory of what had been, what should have been, if life continued to flow into the lost person's being. How does one celebrate a death day without feeling anguish once again cutting into the innermost of the soul. Last year on May 16th, someone I dearly loved passed away. There has not been a moment when I accepted that loss. I took it as something inevitable, that death is a part of life in all of us. But a personal rebellion against the injustice of an untimely loss persists, no matter how much one rationalises death.

My husband Bo Kälfors lived a meaningful life and made a career out of helping people in distress. His diplomatic work took him to countries where there was civil strife and unrest such as Lebanon, Mozambique, the Philippines and Bosnia. He was in Lebanon in the early 70s, when war broke out; in newly-liberated Mozambique where a civil war and anti-apartheid conflict raged; in the Philippines during a communist insurgency and Muslim separatist wars; and in Bosnia during the worst period of the Yugoslav federation's break-up.

Before becoming Refugee Adviser to the European Administration of Mostar (EUAM), he served in the same capacity as Migration and Refugee Adviser to the Swedish Foreign Minister. It was a task that took him to troubled spots where refugees threatened to overwhelm Europe: Kosovo, Macedonia, Bulgaria, Albania, and the former federal states of Yugoslavia. The problem of refugees and asylum-seekers tested the strength of a European Union, not just in bringing an end to the conflict but of accommodating the thousands of homeless fleeing from war and ethnic cleansing.

I saw the man my husband was, as someone who believed that diplomacy could equally share the burden of conflict management and peaceful resolution; who could help in the human resettlement of the displaced in Bosnia and promote some ethnic co-existence amongst peoples battered by a century of hatred and ethnic loathing. He missed a few live mine in his fieldwork in Mostar and a bomb that landed on Hotel Ero where the EUAM was headquartered. The threat of death dogged him in many of his diplomatic assignments, such as the bombings in Lebanon in the early 70s, and the raging apartheid war in South Africa at the time he was Charge'd Affaire in Botswana.

That he managed to cheat death in real war death traps were acts of divine intervention. And that he had years left to enjoy with his family and friends - as he reminisced on his many diplomatic adventures was a blessing. It is young to die at 74 years but long enough to leave behind a lasting contribution to humanity.

Today, let me share the wisdom of the Dalai Lama on a death day celebration. His instructions for life follows:

1. Take into account that great love and great achievements involve great risk.

2. When you lose, don't lose the lesson.
3. Follow the three R's: respect for self; respect for others and responsibility for all your actions.
4. Remember that not getting what you want is sometimes a wonderful stroke of luck.
5. Learn the rules so you know how to break them properly.
6. Don't let a little dispute injure a great relationship.
7. When you realize you've made a mistake, take the immediate steps to correct it.
8. Spend some time alone every day.
9. Open your arms to change, but don't let go of your values.
10. Remember that silence is sometimes the best answer.
11. Live a good, honorable life. Then when you get older and think back, you'll be able to enjoy it a second time.
12. A loving atmosphere in your home is the foundation for your life.
13. In disagreements with loved ones, deal only with the current situation. Don't bring up the past.
14. Share the knowledge. It is a way to achieve immortality.
15. Be gentle with the earth.
16. Once a year, go someplace you've never been before.
17. Remember that the best relationship is one in which your love for each other exceeds your
need for each other.
18. Judge your success by what you had to give up in order to get it.
19. Approach love and cooking with reckless abandon.
If you spread this mantra to as many others, your life will change according to everything you have
ever dreamed of.