You only live once, and if it is good enough, then once is enough.The paths of life are too many to choose and it is your call to create your own. The journey might not be favorable at all times, but it is worth enduring for if you enjoy it and learning from it.

Kumusta steemians! It is my second opportunity to formally introduce myself again into this wonderful community of bloggers and professionals where self-expression is more free and learnings are apparent. I acknowledge my friend @ivancuyag for introducing steemit to us his friends and especially to @ned for making the platform. Everything that I discovered in steemit within weeks of exploring it has proved to me that this platform is not created for nothing but is a very innovative social media for everyone. Aside from being able to express your ideas, share your thoughts, and learning from others, you can possibly earn from doing it. There is no doubt why this website is so successful.

SO WHO AM I?

I am Jebern Vergara, not so special but of unique personality. I am from one of the towns in Cebu, an island in the Philippine archipelago. I am a proud Filipino. I grew in a lower class Family where life is hard and survival is the utmost priority. At young age, I learn to do some basic carpentry since my father is a carpenter. Among the siblings in our family my father chose me to be his associate in his work when an opportunity came in. Well, he figured out that I can learn the basic skills quickly. I love to be with my father’s work because aside from helping our family financially I also learn with what I do, and most of all I had a great bonding with my father.But even with the financial difficulties in life I never think of quitting from my studies and not pursuing my dreams.

Me and My Family

We used to be a complete happy family. I have one elder brother and one elder sister. I am the youngest. There is no perfect family but it will be a great one if it is full of love. My father grows up with a love to music. From his childhood he started playing guitar. Whenever there is an acoustic singing contest in our place, he was always invited by the contestants to be their guitar player. We build up our bonding every time when we are all together in the house and when my father started playing and singing for us. The bonding comes in especially when we all sing together. Going to beaches and to a falls just a few kilometers away from our home are our other ways of nurturing our relationship as a family. Since we are Catholics, going to church every Sunday to attend the Holy Mass is always our priority to show our devotion to God. Although problems and misunderstanding came, we consider it as trials and never break off. With a very considerate and a loving mother and an industrious father as the pillar of the family, our family overcame those challenges.

But as nothing would last forever, everything that we enjoyed as a complete family became good memories. The most depressive thing happened to me and until now the pain existed as long as I remember my father. Almost three years ago he lost his life by a motorcycle accident. A sudden misfortune that affected much of myself. It was just a day after I went home from a couple of month- long stay in the City due to my studies. Life is very cruel to me by that time. Just when I finished the first year of my college course and have the opportunity to be with my parents again for the summer vacation, I lost my father. The toughest storm ever had hit me. It was the time when i thought that life is so unfair and selfish. To be with your loved ones is the most precious moment of your life and having them suddenly taken away forever is very heartbreaking. Emotions that I’ve never felt before begun to take over myself and leads me to depression that I almost think of dying rather than enduring the pain. My smiles were replaced with teary eyes expressing the grief that I felt inside. A weary self is now what I have.

As years goes, Prayers and faith keep me to sustain the grief caused by the tragedy. Me and my family help each other to stand up again and be strong not just for the rest of us but also for my late father. I realized he will not be pleased and will not completely rest to eternity seeing us having not moved on and not accepting with what God has allowed to happen. Most of us dreamed of him wearing a happy face. I did not forget I dreamed of him being with children where they all wear white shirts and my father is singing happily for someone. As nothing would last forever, the wound caused by the tragedy is slowly healing but the mark of it will stay forever. I am now getting up again for the rest of my love ones.

WHAT I HAD DONE AND WHAT DO I DO?

A year with Don Bosco Technology Center (DBTC)

After high school, I got a scholarship to study Vocational Course at Don Bosco Technology Center Vocational Department in Cebu City. I grab the opportunity since a degree course is too expensive for me by that time. I took up Industrial Electricity, a one year course with a National Certificate level II privilege if you pass the assessment thereafter. And fortunately, at the same time I got another scholarship offering Computer Hardware Servicing, still bearing National Certificate level II, and had a financial allowance in addition. I never regretted for the skills that I am choosing to acquire. I am passionate with electricity and with their fundamental ideas of working. The school never lacked of providing the best training they could to the students for us to be competitive in the industry or in the fields related to it. Our learnings were driven by the ideology of engaging the thing theoretically and through applications in order to comprehend it sufficiently. My studies went well.. In Don Bosco, they do not just taught you a certain skill, but they also encourage you to share it into someone unfortunate of not having the opportunity to obtain it. I share my knowledge to my friends who are interesting with electricity and who are interested with the basic techniques in residential wiring installations. Although the teaching is not that formal and is usually through casual talks, it is evident that they got an idea afterwards. In our house, I was confident installing a new electrical system during a slight renovation with it.
The department heads who are priests and soon to be priests were very kind and passionate with the youth. They are also very talented. They love music. They can sing and they can play a variety of musical instruments. My passion to music as well as with the musical instruments was stimulated by them. Every morning before the class starts, we are encouraged to participate in the Holy Mass. Sometimes I am requested to play the drums for the choir whenever the regular drummer is not around. I am happy with it. Aside from attending the Holy Mass, I can also offer my talent and service to God as a drummer. Me and some of my classmates decided to form a band since they also know how to use some of the musical instruments. Sometimes, during lunch time we rent an instrument set within the school to have our practice. We had participated some ‘battle of the bands competition’ within our department and partake during festivals in Don Bosco. My stay in that school is a big part of my life. It helped me mold my personality especially in mental, emotional and spiritual aspects. After the one year course, I took the two National Certificate level II Assessment for Building Wiring Installation and Computer Hardware Servicing and was blessed enough to had passed it.

My years with LEAR Corporation

After graduation I applied to LEAR Corporation Plant Lapu-Lapu, an automotive electronic parts manufacturing company in MEZ-1 Lapu-Lapu City, Cebu. MEZ means Mactan Economic Zone and ‘1’ stands for the location since there are two or three MEZ in Cebu. At first I was an On-the-Job trainee. After the six month period OJT I was offered a probationary status for 6 months. With no hesitations, I grabbed the opportunity. Then, fortunately after that I was hired as a regular employee. I was assigned as a machine operator and later on I was transferred to HR Department as a Training Aide. I co-facilitate specific training and conduct specific lectures and tours within the plant for the newly hired employees. The company is an ISO certified firm. It follows and maintains high standards. Everyone within the plant is guided with the principle of providing the best service he/she could to produce the best quality product possible. Before each newly hired employee especially the production workers can directly engage with their assignments, it is a company policy that they must undergo lectures and trainings within the first two weeks of their career. For production operators, their first week is all about orientation and lectures. The second week is for observation and hands-on with the process. After a specific number of hours of operating the process as a trainee with the aid of older process operators, I am one of the two personnel in the plant who will decide for their competency to operate a certain process. Through written and hands-on exams, they will be judged according to the results and if they do qualified we issue them certifications as a go signal to operate the process . For the older operators, they need to be re-certified every six months or annually to ensure that standards of doing the process are always followed.

I enjoyed the work. The nature of my work encouraged me to learn more. I participated with the lectures and trainings conducted by the top Engineers in the plant and even with the Engineers from Machine Suppliers from other Countries as well as with the electronic experts outside Philippines. Due to this, my mind opens to the world of electronics engineering. I started to think to pursue my study with a degree level in the field of engineering. But I have to think clearly and wisely. I already have a good job and abandoning it would not be that easy to decide. I planned to study in the morning and work in the afternoon. I opened my plan to my superiors and they supported it as long as it could not hinder my responsibilities in the company. But just a week after during that time, the Company is in urgent need of more production workers to provide the demand by the customers. It means we have to work overtime every day in order to cater the large number of the newly hired employees. It was still enjoyable meeting new people. Since then I chose to cancel my enrollment and focus with my job where my service is really needed. I planned to pursue my studies the next enrollment. My family encourage and supported me to continue my plan to make a quest in Engineering degree .The next year after a thorough thinking, I decided to resign and to pursue it.

My years studying Bachelor of Science in Electronics Engineering

I am now a 4th year Bachelor of Science Electronics Engineering student at Cebu Technological University Main Campus, one of the state universities here in Cebu. I was lucky enough to be one of the students granted a full merit scholarship by the Commission on Higher Education (CHED) region seven. The scholarship helps me a lot as a student financially so I am trying my best to be worthy of it. Engineering is not an easy profession. It takes enough dedication and discipline to be successful with it. The approach to solving a problem must not just be by a step by step engineering solution only but it must also be accompanied with a passionate heart in order to dwell and understand the problem effectively. Though most of the teachings are limited to theories and principles and only a handful of area provides laboratory for better understanding, technology nowadays improves learning especially through the use of computer simulations.

Fortunately, I was chosen to be one of the participants in the Saitama-Cebu HR Monozukuri Development project held at another university in Cebu. It is a linkage between Japan and Philippines Universities. In total, It was approximately a three week course with the entire course divided into three phases. The first and second phase is about lectures and activities with some of the topics discussed. University Professors from Japan provided lectures in different areas of Engineering and of technology. They also shared their culture and shared how Japanese’ principles help them grow. Different Japanese’ companies also provided an overview about their respective companies and their respective products through presentations. The project offers a possible employment after graduation in a Japanese firm locally or in other countries where they operate.

The third and last phase of the project is an opportunity to visit different Japanese companies within Cebu province. The photo above is in Cebu MinebeaMitsumi located in Sabang, Danao City, Cebu. The company provided an overview of their products and gave a tour to selected production sites.

MY HOBBIES AND INTERESTS

Sports

Basketball is one of my favorite sports. Since childhood until high school where free time is not difficult to avail I play the game everyday with my friends and/or classmates. I grew up with affection to this game and until now the passion keeps on pushing me to play. I play forward or point guard depending on the game situation. Here in the Philippines basketball means a lot to Filipinos or even Filipinas who are also starting to like it. The creativity of Filipino players comes out when it comes to playing basketball. In urban areas players utilize pathways as a basketball court just to have a space to play the game. In rural places, even a not concreted land area is use as a basketball court to express the passion to the sport.
I also have interest to different games such as volleyball, soccer, billiards and most recently I would like to engage lawn tennis. In online games I only play Defense of The Ancients II (DOTA 2).

Guitar Playing

As Influenced by my late father’s passion to music, I learn to play a guitar but I am not as good as he was. I rarely touch a guitar but sometimes I play it when i have a free time.I was invited by a relative to join a band in our province. I first performed as a lead guitarist in our place during the OFW’s (Overseas Filipino Workers or Balikbayan) or Balikbayan’s night as our Municipal Festival is approaching. In music, I love almost all of the genres and have no preference among it except rock and reggae.

Playing Drums

A life without music is like a body without a soul. Playing drums is my most favorite way to express my passion to music. I discover my love on the instruments since elementary and I only got the opportunity to start playing it during high school. It was the time when Cebuano musicians especially rock bands started composing songs that uses our native language as lyrics. Although older Visayan songs that were composed couple of years prior to the emergence of these new visayan songs were already heard, the latter shows a greater impact and influence to the Visayan people especially to the teenagers. Many Visayan bands then dubbed ‘Bizrockers’ emerged and imparted their talents through compositions of more bizrock songs. ‘Bizrock’ is a coined term. ‘Biz’ comes from the Visayan word ‘bisaya’ which means from Visayas or the language in Visayas especially in Cebu. ‘Rock’ is obviously an English language referring to the genre of the music( although some songs are of different genre and not only rock musics). Me and my friends then formed our own band and started practicing. That was during my last months in high school and we ‘d got a short time to pursue it since some of them are going to different schools for college and some are going for a job. It was in Don Bosco where I got more opportunity to develop the skill independently. I still play drums today whenever friends and new friends invite me for a jam.

Exploring different places

Exploring different places is one of my lifetime goals. The beauty of nature and the creativity of the people are just too precious to miss. In Cebu, there are still many beautiful places that I have not been into. This serves as one of my inspirations as I am still pursuing my engineering degree.

Motorcades

I love to join motorcades. During my working years, with my fellow employees, we go for a motorcade in the southwest part of Cebu where one of them resides. I and my brother also explored the southeast part of Cebu through motorcade. For now, I have been inactive in motorcades and plan to resume my involvement with it when I graduated.

Military

To serve my country through being a soldier is one of my dreams. I got interest into military since I was a child. During first year college I preferred ROTC over CWTS program in order to explore the world of being a soldier.One of the days as an ROTC cadet, we were given an opportunity to visit the Philippine Air Force Mactan Air Base. There displayed some of the obsolete and decommissioned aircrafts used long time ago by the Philippine Air Force. The very important thing that I got from ROTC is self-discipline. I believe this to have a great impact into everyone’s life no matter what your profession is. I wish that someday I could work in the Armed Forces Of the Philippines as a Military Engineer or as a regular Military Personnel.

Other interests

My other interests include making projects with arduino board,an open-source hardware and software microcontroller. I like its platform and now starting to know it more. I hope I can also share it here as I go along with it. Other things where I am interested in is photography, reading, politics, history, technology ,investing in Bitcoin and most of all reading posts here in steemit.

So Why do i Join STEEMIT?

I see steemit as a very clever medium for disseminating useful information. Unlike other social media where you are not rewarded for your work, steemit inspires you to do your best as a creative, authentic and idealistic individual. I have never done a blog to any website and only Steemit pushes me to do so. I have read content-rich posts here and i believe that i can acquire more if i go along with this community. I also want to help new members like me who are aspiring to be a successful steemian.

Expectations about my blog

I like to share unique and content-rich posts here through extensive research. I also like to share beautiful story of my life as i go on with my journey. My everyday mingling with the world would also be one of my subjects to posting.