The air conditioning switches on and groans loudly. The temperature of the room turns from tepid to freezing in seconds. I reach for my alarm clock. It reads 3:30. I am certain the air conditioning is off. I make my way to the hall. I check the air conditioning. Though the screen reads off, it takes several attempts before the system actually switches off. My sleep is interrupted and I am annoyed. This is the second night I have found myself awake in the early hours of the morning.

One rainy Good Friday afternoon in Iligan City, Philippines 1987 the silence of the 2 o’clock solemnity was disturbed by a car that crashed near the house of my uncle.

And he witnessed everything that happened that unforgettable day. He was up on the terrace on the second floor of their house when suddenly a car turn turtled right in front on the house, sending the father off into the air and dropped flat on the road and his whole body just went into seizure then stopped moving.

When you think of mummies, you may think of reanimated, ancient, preserved men bent on fulfilling some prophecy, or carrying out the fine print of an ancient curse.  Of course, this is a Hollywood invention, a means to frighten and entertain.  But when I was in Egypt I saw a mummy that was both real and alive.

 December 17, 2011 around 1 a.m. in the morning a great flood took away thousands of life in Iligan City, Philippines. Communities were destroyed, livelihoods were washed away, and families were ripped apart, never to see each other again.

Two statues. Two grieving husbands. History suggests that the first statue was created by Augustus St. Gaudens. He had been commissioned by Henry Adams to create the statue for Adams' wife, "Clover," who had committed suicide after the death of her father. Years later, a second man by the name of General Felix Agnus bought a replicated statue to place his family’s grave – first his mother, then later, for his wife, Anne. He had commissioned Edward L.A. Pausch to create the duplication, but when widow of Gaudens discovered the replication she demanded the statue be taken down.