Welcome! This is Giselle General and this is my personal blog, where I document thoughts and perspectives while living in Edmonton, Alberta Canada, as a Filipina-Canadian navigating various experiences!
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Recovering Political Candidate: What I wish I Knew
By: Giselle General Sometime in December 2023, I was contacted by a researcher who is working on a paper asking for the financial barriers faced by women running for public office. Did she ever find the right person willing to talk and vent about this very topic! I was connected to her through a national…
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When Community Service and Self Care Goals Conflict
By: Giselle General Last fall, I had an an eye-opening moment as I went about doing my volunteer activities. During the third weekend of September 2023, I had two activities back-to-back, both outdoors. From morning until early afternoon, I was in my neighbourhood park helping with an annual gathering that includes serving lunch, having activities…
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A Month of Cool Transit Milestones: The Captive Transit User Series Part 13
By: Giselle General This is part of an ongoing series of posts discussion issues I personally encounter while taking public transit in Edmonton. Links to other posts will be added on an ongoing basis: What is a Captive Transit User? I learned about the term for the first time from the City of Edmonton’s website.…
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Memoir Writing Reflections 7: The Boss of My Book
By: Giselle General I can hardly believe it but the time has come. It is manuscript feedback and editing time – first round, that is. Just around the last week of September I finally received the Editorial Letter from the Developmental Editor. I received a 19-page document and I couldn’t help but chuckle. It was…
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Report it on the App: The Captive Transit User Series Part 12
By: Giselle General This is part of an ongoing series of posts discussion issues I personally encounter while taking public transit in Edmonton. Links to other posts will be added on an ongoing basis: What is a Captive Transit User? I learned about the term for the first time from the City of Edmonton’s website.…
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Memoir Writing Reflections #6: The Bucket Analogy
by: Giselle General Through social media posts, blogs on this site, and a few local media interviews, I’ve been sharing my journey in writing this memoir. The more experiences and milestones get documented, the more reassured about doing it in the first place. Not only does it help me have a point-in-time memory captured of…
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The Unusual Birthday Gift I Gave Myself Last Year
By: Giselle General Last year on my birthday at the end of May, I did something that I considered an unusual, but valuable, gift to myself. I officially handed my letter of resignation to the job I had for eight years. Materially, my life is overall comfortable. Also I find shopping for items like clothes,…
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Event Review: Writers Guild of Alberta “Origins” Conference
By: Giselle General This past weekend, from June 2 – 4, 2023 I had the great fortune of attending the weekend-long annual conference organized by the Writers Guild of Alberta. They titled their conference this year “Origins: A Return to Networking, Publishing, Genre and Craft.” It’s a hybrid conference, with the in-person location at Fort…
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Memoir Writing Reflections #5: Marinating Time is Over
After I finished the first round of drafting, I made the deliberate choice to not do revisions on my memoir manuscript since mid-January. Aside from reading the chapters for the reading event in March and organizing sample chapters for funding applications, I haven’t seen all of the other ones. I don’t know why I chose…
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Memoir Writing Reflections #4: Beta Reading is Remarkable
By: Giselle General “Writing is a solitary activity, and it is so important to build your community.” I understand that this is a reason why there are many activities, events and gatherings of various forms that are organized to give artists and writers a chance to get together. From workshops that help people learn specific…
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Construction Zone Bus Stops: The Captive Transit User Series Part 11
By: Giselle General This is part of an ongoing series of posts discussion issues I personally encounter while taking public transit in Edmonton. Links to other posts will be added on an ongoing basis: What is a Captive Transit User? I learned about the term for the first time from the City of Edmonton’s website.…
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Memoir Writing Reflections #3: A Mic and A Stage
By:Giselle General The largest, most intimidating, and important activity of the six-month mentorship is showcasing a sample of the work produced during that time. Since I had a very specific goal, a first draft of the manuscript for the memoir, showing a sample of this is not going to be a problem. Speaking in front of a…
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Memoir Writing Reflections #2: A Thousand Words A Day
Word counts and number of pages heavily influence my approach in writing. From Grade 4 onwards, in multiple classes from Language (English) class and Filipino class, we were required to fill pages upon pages of lined paper with paragraphs on certain topics. Some of them were comically dull, such as “what I did last summer”…
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Memoir Writing Reflections #1: The Brain is a Marvel
by: Giselle General This year, on top of everything else my husband and I drastically changed, I added one more to the list. I finally started working of my first memoir, my first full-length written work. The initial plan was to publish something right around my 30th birthday last year. That got derailed by two…
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The Female Duet that Changed my Preconceived Views
By: Giselle General Earlier this month, a high school student volunteer and I were doing some community service work for my neighborhood. It’s a requirement for her Grade 12 Religion Class. She is a Filipino teenager who is relatively new to Canada and Edmonton, being here for just a few years with her experiences limited…
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Two Small and Impactful Gestures of Two (Former) City Councillors
This time around I am going to publicly name two politicians for what they have done! What a timely post shortly after one year since the most recent municipal elections here in Edmonton. Cue scary noises! Actually, I’m just joking, really! I think it helps that they are both former former city councilors, but either…
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