2017 Year in Review
Fifty years may seem like an eternity. But when these 34 batch-mates reassemble from around the world after half a century, time has certainly not kept them apart.
The Class ‘67 of Cebu Velez School of Nursing enjoys a very rare kind of friendship. The 34 of them who have confirmed to come home for a reunion – out of 68 – is not bad, considering that the majority have built new lives in the US, Canada, Europe and Thailand, and relatively few in the Philippines.
The fact that class members have since spread throughout the globe make annual reunions a bit of a struggle. “But when we do meet, we easily pick up where we left off as if it was only yesterday” says the former class president Liz Siozon (now Andersson).
Liz recalls, “The core of this very special bond evolved during our student years as we had to live in the school dormitory for the duration of our education. We were assigned to different sections in the dormitory with bunk beds, shared one toilet with a shower found in each section and a small space between the bunk beds. That kind of living conditions, those three years of shared challenges and dedication to succeed, brought us close together like siblings.”
True, it’s often in adversity that meaningful relationships are formed. “We shared laughter, tears, heartaches, food and even clothes,” Liz continues. It must have been reassuring, as well, to have supportive and caring friends to share experiences with.
“Some days were harder than others due to the rigid discipline of our head nurses,” she relates. “We only came to appreciate this ordeal after graduation; it truly prepared us for the future as registered nurses.” Liz is honest enough to admit that “while some of us chose the nursing profession as a true calling, in all honesty, most of us were more or less pressured by our parents who saw it as a stepping stone to a bright future abroad.”
To this day, thousands of medical professionals find jobs abroad every year, and Filipino doctors and nurses are widely recognized for their skills, dedication and hard work.
Liz was the very first of the class to emigrate as she got married to a Swede and moved to Stockholm, Sweden right after our graduation. “But, wherever we moved and wherever we worked and built our families, each one of us felt the satisfaction that we had reached our goals – this was the reward of our quest in life,” she points out.
On January 26-28, next year, the “Golden Girls” of Cebu Velez School of Nursing Class ’67 come together in Cebu City to celebrate their Golden Reunion. Various activities have been scheduled – tour of their alma mater, enjoying the local food they’ve missed a lot, visiting local places of interest, having fun, giving back to the community they were once part of. Most of all, these three days are about reliving that time 50 years ago that continues to bind them together – forever!
If describing the Cebu 2017 tech circuit were to be summed up in one phrase, it would read something like this: This year, Cebuanos did not trivialize technology as much as they did in the past.
Here are some of the proofs that this year Cebuanos did more than just snap selfies or tap on like buttons. Framework in sending short chat messages through wireless mesh networking protocols.
This meant that the app connected person A to person C and person B to person D by piggyback-riding on a mesh network that was made by persons A, B, C and D. Basically, the app worked because an active number of users made a messaging network using their mobile devices and the app.
Though the app did not exactly resolve all messaging-related concerns (there were, after all, users who said it did not work for them), the fact that Cebuanos were one in finding a solution to keep in touch with each other happened early on in the year.
2017 saw more Cebuano content creators produce more videooriented content, marking the year as a “pivot-to-video” period.
From bloggers gaining a following with “vlogs” (video blogs or video web logs) to print media outfits producing more videos and publishing them online, 2017 pretty much prefigured the many progressive changes that are to be expected from Cebu’s digital content creators and media outfits in the year to come.
For its part, The Freeman strengthened its roster of online features with #thefreemanCONVERSATIONS – a live-streaming talk show hosted by The Freeman’s online editor Joeberth Ocao. The series had its kick-off in October 2016 and has since been gaining a steady following.
The well-received #thefreemanCONVERSATIONS was backed by the launch of Banat News’ #BANATanay Live na Live! talk show in July and #MARKado LIVE in August.
Needless to say, The Freeman also bolstered its WATCH, LOOK and LIVE features published online and in social media channels in 2017. These short features dipped into breaking news reports, current events, weather updates, live interviews and all else in between.
Outside of its live streamed video offerings, 2017 also witnessed the launch of The Freeman’s #quickFOCUS short video series in March, the stop animation-themed #whiteboardFEATURES in July and the #inFOCUS feature series in September. These text-on-video features drew attention to local events and happenings that fell under the soft news vein.
A total of over 140 episodes of #thefreemanCONVERSATIONS, #BANATanay Live na Live!, #MARKado LIVE, #quickFOCUS, #whiteboardFEATURES and #inFOCUS was produced by The Freeman and Banat News this year.
The tail-end of 2017 saw Cebuanos develop content that dipped into augmented and virtual reality.
From panoramic photos that covered a 360 degree field of view to videos captured using special imaging devices then posted online, the eagerly anticipated features of AR and VR in 2016 became a reality in 2017 for Cebuanos.
Though AR and VR content did not exactly take over online channels in Cebu by storm, content of this caliber was more nuanced this year compared to 2016.
Not one to be left behind in ongoing advances, The Freeman had the launch of the #inFOCUS VR series in December – a short virtual reality video series that brings viewers “into the scene” of various happenings and events.