I like long titles. It explains what my blog is all about in an instant. I don't care about SEO or analytics. Just upvote my blog and enjoy. LOL. Just kidding. No need to upvote. Please only enjoy and give feedback in the comments section. It will help me grow as a writer and you will be able to sleep soundly at night knowing that you have said your piece on how I can improve.

The Weather

It used to be a cliche of an icebreaker during awkward conversations in parties your friend invited you so that he or she will have an excuse to escape, just in case it is needed, or a wing-man, if the timing calls for it, too. Now, it's all I ever think about and talk about with friends whenever we get the chance to have a chat. How hot it was at their new place? What is the current heat index? When is it going to rain? Predictable. Yes. But, up-to-date, current, interesting, highly charged conversations revolve around this topic.

And if you are curious about it, it's a bearable 36 degrees Celsius now. Lower than yesterday, because it is a cloudy day. Thank God. And, that is my intro. Too trite and unoriginal; I know, but too stressful to some to ignore altogether. Jump to the next topic.

Plot twist: it rained while I was writing this blog, and I'm really grateful for the assist from the universe that I am able to finish this post.

Puto at Kutsinta

So, I caught up with Manong Tindero; the puto vendor who shouts, "putooooooo....." with a certain likable melody. In between, he honks the horn he carries around, which is a good thing because not everyone likes his "singing", plus he will benefit from resting his voice while honking his horn.

Puto is a fluffy rice cake made out of glutinous rice. It's a traditional snack served with coconut shavings while Kutsinta is another version of puto but with a gelly-ish and more chewy consistency. It is sweeter than the traditional white puto but just as popular. The traditional white puto that Manong sells had a small slice of cheese on top, so that's an added bonus to the already good snack.

I remembered the sweet old lady that used to make these snackaroos when I was a kid in my hometown. She cooked suman, puto, kutsinta, sapin-sapin, and other treats that made it bearable walking the 1.5 kilometer distance on my way to school. Back then, it was good to walk, especially in the mornings. The air was fresh even when one is walking on the side of the road. There were trees all around and the sound of birds chirping made you feel warm inside. Those were the days.

Netflix as a Resource for Financial Education

I believe in edutainment; or using games, media, and fun experiences to convey educational content to the audience participants. Watching film is one of the easiest things to do to be educated about something that we are interested in, or something that can impact our lives in a big way. Being financially literate is a life skill. Having it will help in making good decisions about money, and all the things associated with it; which is almost all of the things in our life. From the moment we wake up to the time we fall asleep.

Having a Netflix subscription already lessens the cost of education, and since you may substitute the watch time you allot to other shows to the ones where you can learn about stuff, then it doesn't really cost much to use this media as a readily available educational tool to further your knowledge and understand how the finance-crypto world.

Trust no One: The Hunt for the Crypto King is a 2022 film about the rise and fall of Canada-based exchange QuadrigaCX, the death of its founder Gerry Cotten, and the loss of millions of dollars believed to have been stolen from the customers. It is a fascinating deep-dive into the world of crypto. Back in the time when the public doesn't really know what it is, how to get it, deposits and withdrawals, and how to look at exchanges from different points of view.

Personally, I think that it should have gotten a higher mark than the 34% Rotten Tomatoes rating and the 6.3/10 on IMDb. Heavily theatrical reenactments made it more dramatic than what it really is, but that's just to get more people to watch. For me, the lessons lie in the fact that the people do not really know what they were getting into when dealing with this entity. Back then, few people knew the difference between a centralized and a decentralized exchange, or how to check the wallets where the customers' funds were stored, or how to track the transactions on a particular token or coin.

For sure, it's a conspiracy-filled movie with the knack for the dramatic. But one can easily see how the users were duped into using the exchange. Using the timeless tactics of greed and FOMO to lure unsuspecting people into depositing their hard earned cash into the exchange. But, hindsight is always 20:20 vision and these people trusted the people behind the exchange to their sad loss of funds that will have now become a very expensive lesson in trust and financial education. Hopefully, we can gain a few insights that might help us avoid such a tragedy while navigating the deep and murky world of crypto.

That's it for today's blog. Keep safe and well informed.

Love and peace.
@juanvegetarian 😎

*_{I edited the following Canva templates for this post. Check it out if you are interested. (1) Puto image, (2) Kutsinta image, and (3) Movie image.}