Morning Coffee Thoughts: It Finally Has a Home

While having coffee this morning, and thinking about what I posted last night — about why I don’t write in Tagalog — it got me reflecting again on where I place my thoughts and how I present them.

This blog started as a space for quiet reflection.

Nothing fancy. Just me, writing what I felt — about aging, memory, politics, life in the Philippines, and the weight of silence. Then one day, I lost all my freelance clients. No projects. No contracts. Just time — and a growing pile of thoughts I didn’t know where to put.

So I wrote anyway.

No readers. Not even my friends or family bothered to click. But I kept showing up.

Then Threads happened.

At first, a few kakampinks followed. Then more people started to come in. I was clear from the start:

I’m anti-Marcos. Anti-Duterte.
Pro-truth. Pro-hard facts.
Anti-corruption. Pro-good governance, accountability, and honesty.

And I drew the line early on:
DDS are not welcome in this space.
Doon kayo magkalat sa sarili n’yong bakuran.

That post — that unapologetic boundary — brought even more people in.

Someone suggested I open a Facebook page. So I did. That was just a week ago.

Now it has over 8,000 followers — wild, considering I’ve always thought of myself as a nobody. Just someone writing what most people were too afraid or too exhausted to say.

And then, the inbox started filling up. Messages. Topic requests. Comments. Questions. Words of encouragement. Stories from strangers who, like me, were just trying to make sense of the mess.

And I try to reply to everyone. I really do.
But I’ll admit it — I’m outnumbered.

Now I understand why some of my clients used to hire social media managers. Because if you want to keep a space alive, you have to keep showing up for it. Every day. And that takes time, energy, and presence.

With that growth came something else: expectations.

Normally, when someone follows you on Facebook, that someone wants something from you — to educate, to validate, to confirm what they already believe. And if you don’t deliver, or if you say something they don’t like, they unfollow you. Or cancel you.

But that’s not how I see this space.

You didn’t follow me because I promised to entertain.
You followed me because you saw the vision. You saw the advocacy.

And just as you have expectations from me, I have high expectations from you too.

I expect you to believe in facts.
I expect you to argue using facts.
I expect you to read, not just react.
I expect you to disagree without being disrespectful.
I expect you to avoid behaving like a typical DDS — loud, hostile, allergic to logic.
And I expect you to remember that this is a space built on truth, not ego.

If I see you acting like a rabid dog in the comments — spreading lies, picking fights, or derailing the discussion — I will ban you.

It doesn’t matter if you donated.
It doesn’t matter if you’ve followed me since the beginning.
It doesn’t even matter if you claim to stand for the same causes I do.

If you act like trash in this space, you’re out.

Because this isn’t about popularity or reach.
This is about protecting a space where truth still matters.

A few days ago, some of you sent donations.
I didn’t expect that. I never ask for it. But when it came in, I promised myself I’d use it for something meaningful.

So I made a decision.

Instead of building a separate site from scratch, I changed the domain of my existing blog.
What was once ginoborlado.org is now officially:
www.morningcoffeethoughts.org

The blog was already built. Now it simply carries the name it was meant to have.

Morning Coffee Thoughts finally has a proper home.

And not just my home — yours, too.

But here’s the thing about websites:
People don’t really like clicking links — especially here in the Philippines.
Most Filipinos take their news directly from Facebook. And when I say that, I mean literally. We’re a nation of headline readers. A caption becomes the entire context. A meme becomes the whole truth.

And that’s dangerous.

Because the more we rely on captions to shape our opinions, the easier it becomes to manipulate the public. The harder it becomes to talk about nuance. And nuance is where truth lives.

The problem is: if you want to share something factual and detailed, you need space.
But if you want people to read, you have to compress everything into something loud and short.

That tension is what I’m working through now.

The website will hold the long form — the full thought, the full story.
Social media will continue planting seeds. Sharing pieces. Starting conversations.
But if you really want the full picture, you’ll find it here.

To those of you who donated — thank you.
You didn’t just fund a domain. You gave Morning Coffee Thoughts a future.

And now, all of us have somewhere to return to.

Watch out for the space.
Something honest is brewing. ☕️