Hello Everyone,

I've browsed around this forum for some time now, and thought I should join and introduce myself to y'all. My name is Simon. My wife and I moved here from New York City in March of last year -- we love it here and are planning to stay here for the foreseeable future. She's from Bacolod. We met in New York in 1988 and were married that same year. I worked as a computer programmer, and she was a social worker (the administrator of a large home health care program in NYC). We're both retired, but are both hoping to find some appropriate work here in Dumaguete, probably/hopefully at Silliman.

I'm an amateur musician -- I play some guitar, compose some little instrumental pieces, and mess around on other instruments. For the last 6 years, I've been studying North Indian (i.e. Hindustani) Classical vocal music -- it's very difficult music, so I don't really aspire to be good enough to perform, but I love learning about it and listening to it. I'm also way into joining others in playing and singing pop/rock songs, just for fun. I'm also up for more serious or intensive music making if anyone's interested.

My other major interest is literature -- my main man is Proust, but lately I've been pursuing Shakespeare and Samuel Johnson. For about 10+ years in New York, I ran a weekly reading group, where we read very closely, spending a year or more reading aloud and discussing each work in its entirely. We covered Proust (first 1.5 volumes), James Joyce's Ulysses, a few Shakespeare plays, Sidney's Astrophel and Stella, John Donne, and a few other things. If anyone is interested, I'd love to get a similar group going here in Dumaguete.

I'm known to have a beer or a cocktail of an evening, so if anyone would like to meet for a drink, give me a shout. I guess that's enough for now. I'm very glad to say hi to you all and I look forward to participating here.

yours truly, Simon