MANILA - Local stocks surged anew on Wednesday as a modest overnight gain in Wall Street spurred follow-through buying.
The main-share Philippine Stock Exchange index gained 27.10 points or 0.76 percent to 3,593.41.

FISHERMAN Gavino Ringel, 44, a grade school dropout, admitted that he used to butcher dolphins in Tablas Strait between Pola town in Oriental Mindoro and Marinduque.
Ringel, who lives near the Bacawan fish sanctuary in Barangay Bacawan in Pola, had captured and butchered a dolphin thrice, village records show.

MANILA – Amid Hong Kong’s outrage over the massacre of eight Chinese tourists during a botched hostage rescue in Manila last week, the Philippine Catholic Church is urging the Filipino faithful to storm the heavens with prayers for healing and forgiveness.
The Archdiocese of Manila’s Ministry of Liturgical Affairs issued two short “Prayers of the Faithful” to be recited for a week during Mass.

MANILA – The government has started implementing a new family planning marketing strategy designed by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID).
The “May Plano Ako” program, conceptualized by the USAID’s Health Promotion and Communication Project, or HealthPRO, is in line with the country’s Millennium Development Goals, or MDGs, especially those on population control and reproductive health.

MANILA – Memorizing a deck of cards in precise chronological order under one minute may seem like a superhuman feat because it has been accomplished by only less than 1 percent of the world’s population.
But it’s not because they are naturally gifted, according to memory experts. The feat simply has only been attempted by a few.

THE TEMPORARY quarters of actress Chin-Chin Gutierrez, located in the compound where her house was razed four years ago, was hit by a fire past midnight Tuesday.
SFO2 Fortunato Alde of the Quezon City Fire Department said Gutierrez was not around when the fire broke out at around 12:26 a.m. in her house at 115 B. Gonzales St., Varsity Hills, Loyola Heights, Quezon City.

DEEP IN THE backwoods of Villasis town in Pangasinan, a congregation of nuns is making its own version of the Biblical Garden of Eden.
“The Garden of Eden existed at a time in history when the Earth blossomed, when it was full of life and every living thing had a home of its own,” says Sr. Anne Bellosillo, 70, one of six members of the Medical Mission Sisters who have made Sitio Maburac West in Barangay Capulaan their home.
