Raid and shop

Last Sunday morning, at least two truckload of police confiscated unauthorized Nike shoes and Louis Vuitton bags inside the Greenhills tiangge.

Since they were already there, some members of the raiding team also decided to do some shopping – trinkets and stuff – for their loved ones as well.

* * *

There’s talk that Wellex Group chairman William Gatchalian has made a date with Commission on Elections chairman Benjamin Abalos to play golf at the Wack Wack Golf & Country Club on July 1.

Wack Wack’s membership committee originally wanted to expel Mr. Gatchalian after he had, uh, a physical disagreement over some golf etiquette or another with another member on the fairways.

That decision was, however, amended into a two-year suspension, which was further shortened by Wack Wack’s top man, Mr. Abalos, to the end of this month.

In all the years that he has played with Mr. Abalos, Mr. Gatchalian has never won a game.

By the way, Wack Wack just recently sold 100 associate memberships (that entitle the members the right to play golf only) at P1 million a pop. A proprietary membership, which also gives the member country club privileges, currently has a market price of between P5 million and P6 million.

* * *

Did you know 1: The Food and Nutrition Research Institute has yet to find a private sector partner to commercially produce a nutritious snack branded Nutrimo for children that deliverately tastes like junk food.

The snack, which can potentially wipe out competition at a retail price of P1 per pack, is lentil-based. That means eating three packs of this stuff every day (which is no hardship, really, when it is, say, barbecue-flavored) provides a child with his/her daily protein requirement aside from the usual vitamins, iron, and iodine that other snack manufacturers fortify their products with.

Nutrimo’s one drawback is that it has a shelf life of only two months (after which it tastes "old" or makunat).

* * *

Did you know 2: Globe Telecom president Gerardo Ablaza Jr. must have put some mommies in his new product development unit headed by Nicanor Santiago.

Proof? A new product that works like a collect long distance call. The targeted user is a teen-ager who needs to call home to be picked up or to ask permission to go out with friends but who has run out of load.

Naturally, the user of this new service needs to register the names of people – parents are on top of the list – willing to accept the collect call. And the recipients of the collect call must also confirm their willingness to foot the incoming call.