Reality Checks

Of the 296 stories we posted in 2013, the one that continues to garner high readership numbers is "Why the Philippines Needs a Divorce Law" by Philippine-based lawyer Evalyn G. Ursua. Obviously the issue resonates with a lot of Filipinos. This week, Evalyn talks about annulment as a way out of a miserable marriage—a complicated and expensive option, true—but a real one nonetheless. Read her informative piece, "Of Annulment and 'Annulment'".

Environmentalist Gregg T. Yan tackles another sensitive issue, the growing regional appetite for one of the Philippines most popular fishes.  In "A Fish Called Lapu-Lapu", Gregg exposes what the burgeoning trade, especially for the leopard coral trout (the red one), means to the country's marine life.

Our Motherland series about young Filipino balikbayans volunteering to do good in their parents' homeland continues with Henry Motte Muñoz, a French Filipino who has teamed up with his friend to set up Bantay PH, a nonprofit that exposes corruption wherever it happens. Manila-based writer Aurora Almendral, who incidentally is my daughter,  talks to Henry in "Sweating the Small Stuff".

May your lives be filled with hopes and dreams to make you soar, and enough reality checks to keep you grounded.