Orlando Peralta Peña, or Orly Peña, has written his life story to provide others with the inspiration to write their own story, for he believes that everyone has something to contribute, which need not be a literary masterpiece but lessons which others could learn from. In sharing his journey, or My Rainbow Run as he calls it, he shares insights and learnings that will surely enrich the reader’s view of his own life, his career, his people, his country and his God.

The Maoist-inspired Communist Party of the Philippines celebrated its 37th anniversary on December 2005. It marks a long history of violence, terror, and instability in the archipelagic country of 87 million people, causing thousands of casualties among government troops, insurgents, and including civilians. This study seeks to find a lasting solution that will finally bring to a close the final chapter to insurgency in the country. It was approached from a historical point of view by studying the events that lead to the birth of the movement in 1932 until its defeat in 1954. A new chapter of the Maoist insurgency started in 1969 and this movement emerged into a formidable guerrilla force that became the primary threat to the nation’s security. This paper tries to analyze how that insurgency persisted to challenge the government this far and what went wrong with the government’s response. It will attempt to answer the primary question: How to defeat the communist insurgency?

Since 1994, the ground-breaking Young Blood column in the Philippine Daily Inquirer’s Opinion section, giving voice to the love and loss, the highs and lows, the victories and disappointments of Filipino twentysomethings and younger. It has become required reading for the youth and a rite of passage for the aspiring young writer. Since then, the best of the Young Blood essays has been collected in anthologies; the Young Blood books are now in its 7th incarnation. After 2020’s Young Blood Omnibus Volume One collected the first three out-of-print volumes in electronic form, Young Blood Omnibus Volume Two collects 2012’s Young Blood 4, 2015’s Young Blood 5 and 2017’s Young Blood Six digitally for the first time. The personal, authentic, well-crafted essays in Young Blood Omnibus Volume Two chronicle the continued experiences of young people in the Philippines but are relatable to young people anywhere.