Message:

 Dear Patrick,

 A couple of months back I was wondering what I could do to help more people find the Phoenix Journals. As a first little step I decided to republish a Christmas story: http://christmasstoryblog.com in blog format with a link back to the journals. I also thought this would illustrate to you another way the journals might be published, as blogs and RSS are alternative distribution channels to the website PDF\'s and would attract a different audience, so that is a suggestion to think about if you wish. While PDFs are a convenient way to read, they are not friendly to the search engines such as Google. Anyway, that is just an idea. As I try to earn a living online, I will let you have other suggestions should I have them.

 As for the story "Why Won\'t Santa Visit Poor Children?", you are welcome to publish a link to it. The follow up story, which I conceived 2 or 3 years ago but not got around to writing yet, brought a revelation to me as Di, the little girl central character, discovers something world changing which I had never even considered before, and had not been part of "my" story. I was surprised myself by the twist the story took as I thought about it, but now I have read some of the journals (which also contains the same revelation I had \"imagined\" more than 2 years before reading them) I know who gave me that inspiration for the new story. I hope to write it in 2009.

 God Bless you and your family with a very Happy Christmas.

 Warm regards,

 Roy Thomsitt

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As much as Americans and Britons may believe he is, Santa Claus is not confined to their countries. Santa does not “belong” anywhere; he is universal. When I moved from England to the Philippines, I had no idea I would find Santa Claus was known here just as he was back home. It had certainly never occurred to me that, not only was Santa Claus known here, he may even have come to grief and died here in Palawan, in the South West Philippines, where I lived at the time.

Why Won’t Santa Visit Poor Children?

A Christmas story from the Philippines by Roy Thomsitt

This story will be republished one or two pages a day, so please subscribe to the RSS feed to receive further instalments.

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Start of “Why Won’t Santa Visit Poor Children?”

"Di, dressed in her Santa’s Special Helper outfit, and glowing like Rudolph’s nose with all the pleasure bubbling inside her, waited just inside the door as Tina showed in the first child. It was a little boy of Di’s age, his wide dark brown eyes opening wider still as he stepped inside.

“Wow,” he exclaimed, looking at the mass of neatly wrapped gifts before him, the top of the pile way above his head. Di was already reaching down for his gift, and was so delighted to hand it to him. This was what she had been waiting for from the moment she saw the gifts when she woke: the face of the little boy broke into an enormous smile as he took hold of the very first Christmas gift of his own that he had ever received.

“I know you’ll like that, James,” she told the little boy. Inside the large box was a large toy car, a red Porsche. Di did not know it was a Porsche, but she did know it was a super looking car that any boy would just adore.

James wanted to open it there and then, but Di reached out with a gentle hand to stop him, directing him with her eyes to her Ma, who was waiting to usher him around the gifts to leave by the other door. James, dwarfed by the mound of boxes and Christmas wrapping, stepped gingerly along the wall to the waiting Maricel, who guided him out into the garden.

By the time James was outside, the next child was inside the other door. Well, this time it was a......."  READ MORE AT:   http://christmasstoryblog.com/