The Road To Australia

You may dish me like how many did Jim Paredes—-pop icon and music legend—- about several months ago, and if I am famous enough, as I wish I am that much, I might be flooded with scornful comments for this, and vitriolic emails too, yet I dare say that the road to Australia begins.

So one might ask what has gotten to the head of Major Tom this time that he have finally decided to head for the Land Down Under? Had he failed to love his homeland that much that now he becomes too unpatriotic to migrate to a foreign soil?

Wait a minute. Who says about migrating? Nobody’s migrating here.

I just thought that since last Saturday, my eldest son Sef-Sef was selected by his school to represent in a mathematics contest conducted by the Math Teachers Association of the Philippines (MTAP)—-one among 12 in his grade level, I thought that maybe, just maybe, he could be so good at it and end up an international competitor one day. And I for one know that most often, international math competitions are held in Australia. I don’t know why but Australia seem to have become a situs for math Olympics and I am not sure why but students from Zamboanga, particularly from Ateneo de Zamboanga and Chong Hua High School, as well as City High, have often done well in such competition. It is one for the books I guess. There must be something in the diet of Zamboangueños that make them good at numbers. Or perhaps the environment has some influence on the mathematical mind—-I do not see anything unique in the local environment though, so it remains a mystery.

So last Saturday, me and wife went full force, along with all the kids, to the posh and gleamingly new highschool building of Ateneo de Zamboanga in Tumaga in support of Sef-Sef, hoping and wishing that he would do well enough.

And perhaps Australia is well in sight—-hopefully. Parents do go along with their kids don’t they when they go to Sydney…or Melbourne…or Wales (Is Wales in Australia?). I have to inquire on MTAP about this.