Books, books, books and more books!
That’s right, we are celebrating National Reading Day or Araw ng Pagbasa as declared by the Department of Education. It aims to promote reading and literacy among learners and motivate them to learn from the lives and works of eminent Filipinos. Araw ng Pagbasa has become an annual advocacy to commemorate the birth of martyred senator Ninoy Aquino Jr.
I remember the times I introduced my kids to reading. Started on Nissa as early as one year old by buying sturdy picture books that would help her identify objects. By the time she was in grade school, I gave books to her as gifts for Christmas, birthdays and any important occasion in her young life, same thing I did with my son Josef. They have established their reading habits early and I noticed that my son was more inclined to read Science and Discovery books and yes, those costly comic books that he collects until now. My daughter is into inspirational, chick lit, romances and even the latest craze nowadays, vampire stories. Anyway, the important thing is, they read and I appreciate it. Reading has somehow helped them in their studies .
When we are all at home, I sometimes laugh that we are in each individual corner reading a favorite book, if not, we are grouped together in the dining room watching a DVD or a favorite film on TV.
By the way, the sketch you see above is a gift from a friend who loves to read, write and has an excellent passion in drawing. She has now her own published e-book. Here’s a toast to more reading and to more lovely books!
Dreams And Escapes 
Excellent to hear about Araw ng Pagbasa. I am looking for a recommendation of a great Filipino book that has been translated into English to include in my global reading project next year (http://ayearofreadingtheworld.com/). If you have any suggestions, I’d be really interested to hear about them.
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Why not try NOLI ME TANGERE for a start? It was a novel written by our beloved National Hero, Dr. Jose Rizal. There are excellent writers here in our country and English is a common language, spoken in all areas of the archipelago.
Thanks for dropping by.
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I stumbled upon this post when I typed in National Reading Day for my most recent post. I was closely following it, a culminating activity of the month-long celebration (if there ever was) maybe, but it turned out that I was waiting for a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. Needless to say, I was disappointed about this futile effort of naming a day for nothing. I appreciate your positive take on this, though.
moderndaughter.wordpress.com
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Oh, there are still lots of people who read out there. I am a member of a book club called Flips Flipping Pages organized by one of our friends in the group. There are monthly book discussions, book tours, meetings etc. etc. We even exchange books.
The problem I see is we don’t have public libraries which we could visit and where we could spend time reading. Here in our town alone, I am not even aware if there is one. I’d love to see the day when, you could borrow books in public libraries or even order a released one just for reading pleasure.
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