[Birthday celebrant Gerardo C. Valentin, Jr. aka Gerry V. is shown in this photo cuddling his favorite granddaughter, Ryanne. In September 2013, Gerry V. was appointed as LIQUIDATOR of RUBY INDUSTRIAL CORPORATION, a corporate entity which owned a 5.4 hectare realty in the heart of Mandaluyong City. Gerry V., despite the fact that this was his maiden engagement as LIQUIDATOR; proved his worth and mettle in seeing through the successful forging of a compromise between the rival groups of stockholders which have been at odds and so fiercely adversarial against each other for over 30 years. YOU’RE THE MAN! HAPPY 58th BIRTHDAY GERRY V.!]
He’s a LIQUIDATOR1 par excellence,
That’s proven by RUBY’s2 dramatic DENOUEMENT;
For THIRTY-FOUR years there was no FINIS3…
‘Twas good under his watch, it ended with a KISS!4
As though GERRY is an orchestra conductor of a SYMPHONY,4a
The music was wiped off with the taint of CACOPHONY;
And the principal parties to the protracted LITIGATION,
GERRY found basis for the case’s long-awaited CESSATION!
Indeed, like ZUBIN MEHTA,4b GERRY gave it all—
Never giving up as he is truly guided by a protocol;
Every detail, GERRY would meticulously check and master…
Even engaged “forensic auditors”4c as though assaying some alabaster4d!
Being born on November 8, NINETY FIFTY-NINE5…
He’s a SCORPION possessed with a TOLERANT MIND,
He has a deep sense of knowing how other people FEEL;
Having him as a FRIEND is quite a STEAL6!
He possesses much greater WILL POWER…
He prefers to tread the PATH that’s CLEARER;
He dislikes almost every CHANGE,
He’s BOLD — a great RESEMBLANCE7, at almost full RANGE7a!
As one born under the PIG8 zodiac sign…
He is a trusting person; indeed so BENIGN—
He puts much HIGH VALUE on FRIENDSHIP…
For a friend in need, he’ll not abandon the SHIP!
Those born under the sign of the PIG,
Is a motley of personalities so really BIG…
OLIVER CROMWELL9 is one among them,
SCHWARZNEGGER10 is the other who’d perhaps brought much MAYHEM11!
And as a friendly advice to dear GERRY,
He ought to pay attention to some AUGURY12;
Per the Chinese zodiac sign that’s in CYBERSPACE13…
His fondness for smoking seems NOW to be OUT-OF-PLACE14!
But as your health horoscope speaks truly good TOO15…
I won’t insist making your SMOKING a NO-NO—
Though I am not a true-blue SKYGAZER16,
Just don’t get too exhausted at the FAIRWAY BUNKER!17
[Gerry V. is shown in this photo, talking to his former colleagues in one of the meetings of the association of retired personnel of PILIPINAS SHELL & PETROLEUM CORPORATION (“SHELL”). Gerry V. availed of an optional retirement program at SHELL in March 2010 but has remained active in affairs and activities of the association of retired personnel of SHELL.]
HAPPY BIRTHDAY GERRY!!!!
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[Legend: 1 – On September 20, 2013, Gerry Valentin was appointed by the Regional Trial Court of Mandaluyong City (Branch 211) as LIQUIDATOR of RUBY INDUSTRIAL CORPORATION (“RUBY”), a corporate entity previously engaged in glass manufacturing and which started to have liquidity problems in 1983 compelling it therefore to file a petition for suspension of payments with the SEC in December 1983. This case of RUBY, due to the seemingly irreconcilable differences between the “fiercely adversarial” stockholders, reached the Supreme Court for a record FOUR (4) times. Thus, the Supreme Court eventually felt obliged to order the liquidation of RUBY. Still however, the two (2) groups of stockholders (i.e. majority and minority) seemed not as yet so keen to arrive at a compromise settlement. But the tact and diplomacy possessed by Gerry V. who is similarly endowed with a communicative sway, which is the very essence of a compromise; finally brought the “fiercely adversarial” groups of stockholders, to ultimately make peace with a “KISS”.
2 – RUBY is RUBY INDUSTRIAL CORPORATION. It was a pre-war corporation earlier named as CHUAN HUAT Corporation. RUBY was engaged in the glass manufacturing business particularly bottle-making with Pepsi-Cola and UNILAB, among others, as its principal customers. In 1983, after being confronted with liquidity problems brought about by the recession (and the peso devaluation) during that era and the jacking up of its payables particularly dollar-denominated loans pertaining to imports, RUBY was compelled to file a petition for suspension of payments with the SEC.
3 – FINIS means the END.
4 – KISS- The original meaning of the word “KISS” is EMBRACE or RECONCILIATION. It was a most awaited RECONCILIATION between the Majority and the Minority stockholders of RUBY.
4a – The orchestration done by GERRY into arriving at a happy compromise between the principal parties to the liquidation proceedings could be likened to the famous American resident of a symphony conductor, the Indian-born ZUBIN MEHTA, who gives it all—his forceful but gracious gestures and his total focus on the musical rendition. By analogy, GERRY totally immersed himself into the goal of arriving at a compromise by wiping-off any trace of cacophony (i.e. the disagreements between the principal parties) and still keeping the dignity and honor of the personalities among the principal parties in tact. By way of an aside on this famed orchestra conductor MEHTA… a supposed critic said that: “Mehta brought to the conducting of the score a kind of bedazzlement that has no peer in recent times….It was a lunging, teeming, breathless performance that still had plenty of breath.”
4b – The conductor ZUBIN MEHTA was born in Bombay, India. His father was Mehli Mehta, a violinist who was the founder and conductor of the Bombay Symphony Orchestra, and he gave Zubin his first musical education. At age 18, after short period of pre-medical studies in Bombay, Zubin left for Vienna in 1954, entered the Akademie für Musik there, learned to play the double bass in order to join the Academy’s orchestra, and took conducting lessons from Hans Swarowsky. He graduated from the Academy in 1957 and made his professional debut in Vienna, guest conducting the Tonkünstler Orchestra. In a London appearance in 1961, Mehta became the first Indian to conduct a major British orchestra. In 1968 Zubin Mehta also became Music Adviser to the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra and was made Music Director of that orchestra in 1977. In 1981, he was made Music Director for life. Zubin Mehta has conducted over two thousand concerts with this extraordinary ensemble including tours spanning five continents. In 1978 Zubin Mehta resigned his Los Angeles post to succeed Pierre Boulez as music director of the New York Philharmonic Orchestra. Zubin Mehta made his debut as an opera conductor with Tosca in Montreal in 1963. He made his debut at the Metropolitan Opera in New York on December 29, 1965. Since then he has conducted at the Vienna State Opera, the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, La Scala Milan, and the opera houses of Chicago and Florence as well as at the Salzburg Festival. Since 1985, he has been chief conductor of the Teatro del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino in Florence. Between 1998 and 2006 he was Music Director of the Bavarian State Opera where he conducted more that 400 performances. Since 2007 he is the President of the Festival del Mediterrani of the Palau de les Arts in Valencia. In 1990 Zubin Mehta was asked to conduct the first of the now-legendary Three Tenors concerts. Mehta proved a highly appropriate choice, being one of the few conductors with the charisma to match the well-practiced stagecraft of the three star tenors. The concert was a huge success. When the phenomenon was repeated in 1994 from Los Angeles, Mehta again conducted. Zubin Mehta’s list of awards and honours is extensive and includes the “Nikisch-Ring” bequeathed to him by Karl Böhm. In October 2008 Zubin Mehta was honoured by the Japanese Imperial Family with the “Praemium Imperiale”.
4c – GERRY V. was compelled to engage the services of the so-called “forensic auditors” as there were missing documents from the files that the SEC transmitted to the Liquidation Court. Though the term “forensics” actually denotes scientific tests for the detection of some possible crime; in the case of GERRY V., it centered most particularly in determining the legality of some corporate activities of RUBY in the face of its December 1983 filing of a petition for suspension of payments. Thus, in the avowed intent to procure significant documents; many files, records and documents that were eventually procured came from virtually unconventional sources.
4d – ALABASTER is actually the composition of many artifacts starting from those dug in the Egyptian caves mostly as archaeological findings.
5 – Gerry V. is a SCORPION being born on November 8, 1959 and by encoding his birth date in a PC, you could read through and peruse via INTERNET his horoscope on both the conventional zodiac sign as well as the Chinese zodiac sign. Gerry’s Chinese zodiac sign is the PIG zodiac animal. Further, with regard to Gerry’s horoscope, I relied on these websites for details on his horoscope, personality and traits as well as advice on health: http://www.thehoroscope.co/birthday-analyser/November-8-1959-horoscope-and-zodiac-sign-meanings-3607.html and http://birthdayscan.com/1959/november/8/.
6 – “STEAL” in this BLOG was used to mean as a GOOD ACQUISITION; actually a GOOD FRIEND. Indeed, Gerry is described as a very SOCIABLE person.
7 – In the website http://www.thehoroscope.co/birthday-analyser/November-8-1959-horoscope-and-zodiac-sign-meanings-3607.html, Gerry’s being BOLD is said to be a great RESEMBLANCE to one who is born on November 8, 1959.
7a – In the website of THE HOROSCOPE.CO, an enumeration of personality trait descriptors is therein indicated. And being BOLD, is shown therein as one personality trait descriptor that describes a person born on November 8, 1959. Truly, within the FULL RANGE, as Gerry V. showed his BOLDNESS in weathering out the fiercely adversarial stances of the two (2) groups of stockholders of RUBY into an eventual compromise. The resemblance almost reached the FULL RANGE of FIVE BARS, actually FOUR and a HALF bars.
8 – Being born on November 8, 1959; Gerry V. is governed by the Chinese zodiac animal sign of the PIG.
9 – Perhaps for Gerry’s BOLDNESS, he could by analogy be compared to OLIVER CROMWELL. OLIVER CROMWELL was an English military and political leader best known for making England a republic and leading the Commonwealth of England. Nicknamed “Old Ironsides”, Oliver Cromwell demonstrated his ability as a commander and was quickly promoted from leading a single cavalry troop to being one of the principal commanders of the New Model Army, playing an important role in the defeat of the royalist forces. Oliver Cromwell is one of the most controversial figures in the history of the British Isles, considered a regicidal dictator by historians such as David Sharp, a military dictator by Winston Churchill, but a hero of liberty by John Milton, Thomas Carlyle, and Samuel Rawson Gardiner, and a class revolutionary by Leon Trotsky. In a 2002 BBC poll in Britain, Cromwell, sponsored by military historian Richard Holmes, was selected as one of the ten greatest Britons of all time.
10 – Perhaps for Gerry’s BOLDNESS too, he could by analogy be compared also to ARNOLD SCHWARZENEGGER also. Arnold Schwarzenegger who was born July 30, 1947, is an Austrian-American actor, producer, businessman, investor, author, philanthropist, activist, politician, and former professional bodybuilder who holds both Austrian and American citizenship. He served two terms as the 38th Governor of California from 2003 to 2011. Schwarzenegger began weight training at the age of 15. He won the Mr. Universe title at age 20 and went on to win the Mr. Olympia contest seven times, remaining a prominent presence in bodybuilding and writing many books and articles on the sport. Arnold Schwarzenegger is widely considered to be among the greatest bodybuilders of all time as well as bodybuilding’s biggest icon. Schwarzenegger gained worldwide fame as a Hollywood action film icon. His breakthrough film was the sword-and-sorcery epic Conan the Barbarian in 1982, a box office hit that resulted in a sequel. In 1984, Schwarzenegger appeared in James Cameron’s science-fiction thriller film The Terminator, a critical and commercial success. Schwarzenegger subsequently reprised the Terminator character in the franchise’s later installments: Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991), Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines (2003), and Terminator Genisys (2015). This is perhaps the best analogy between ARNOLD S. and GERRY V.: ARNOLD is TERMINATOR but GERRY is LIQUIDATOR.
11 – MAYHEM is used here to mean RIOT. In Schwarzenegger’s TERMINATOR series, ARNOLD’s role really brought much RIOT and MAYHEM in those fantastic movie scenes.
12 – AUGURY means NOTICE or ADVICE.
13 – CYBERSPACE actually refers to the INTERNET and all things about computer or the notional environment in which communication over computer networks occurs.
14 – OUT-OF-PLACE – Well, with the recent issuance of Executive Order No. 26 which is entitled: PROVIDING FOR THE ESTABLISHMENT OF SMOKE-FREE ENVIRONMENTS IN PUBLIC AND ENCLOSED PLACES, smoking has strictly now been totally banned in public places. Thus, that makes SMOKING effectively OUT-OF-PLACE.
15 – Per http://www.thehoroscope.co/birthday-analyser/November-8-1959-horoscope-and-zodiac-sign-meanings-3607.html, specifically under CHINESE ZODIAC HEALTH; it is indicated therein that those born on November 8, 1959: “has a quite good health condition”.
16 – SKYGAZER is used here to mean an ASTROLOGER or HOROSCOPIST or SOOTHSAYER.
17 – GERRY V. is a skilled golf player who does the rounds of ambulating through the fairway and, at times, the fairway bunker… regularly doing a swing, a drive, a putt; with a par, bogey, birdie and even an eagle almost every Saturday at the ORCHARD Golf and Country Club in Dasmariñas, Cavite. ]
