SCARS OF MY WRECKED SOUL

the birthday she deserves

2007-08-29T15:20:00.000+08:00

This picture could have been instrumental in Timmy's birthday, if not for a struck of fate. It was supposed to serve as a tarpaulin banner for the surprise party I have long-been planning. In my vision, it would be in a private apartelle that I already have had reserved. All her closest friends would be there including her family and long lost friends. I know it would also be extra special because the food will be cooked by no less than her own mother. The children could also go swimming in the apartelle's swimming pool as they all wait for me and the birthday girl to arrive. All of these were already running through my mind that I could already see her walking over rose petals as she enter the room and she would see this banner, beautifully placed in the living room wall. I bet she would be truly surprised. My vision was magnificent and in my mind then, everything were already set except for one thing - the money I needed to do all that.

The party was scheduled 2 days after her actual birthday which was the 23rd of August. I thought the 25th being the Saturday would be a convenient time for me and my accomplices to give us ample time to prepare. Unfortunately, in the morning of her birthday, the money, which was already 5-days overdue during that time still hasn't arrived. Something happened in the bank regarding my name and the recipient's which caused its delay. Finally, that very evening, I have completely lost all hope as her mother, clueless to my own plans, prepared a simple celebration over their place and as if that wasn't enough, almost all the people I was planning to invite in the party that I was cooking up went there. I find it pointless to celebrate the same occasion twice with only two days interval. Making use of what was available, I bought Timmy some flowers, for the very first time, and later on she looked so happy as I gave them to her. It made me feel good and bad at the same time. Good, because she never really asked me for anything material anywhere in our relationship, making me feel really appreciated for every little thing that I can offer. And I think I am truly grateful to have a girlfriend like her, which on the other hand also makes me feel bad because I know she deserves so much more.

At last, on the very next day after her birthday, the money has arrived. It made me feel like having the thing you needed just right after the time you needed it most. It felt like the heavens were taunting me and I really wanted to feel bad about it, but then again I thought to myself why should I feel that way if all I really wanted was to make my girlfriend happy? It would be funny that the very thing I needed to make her birthday special in the first place could make me feel terrible. So on the very next day, the 25th of August, as a promise to Timmy and as a promise to myself, we have made the whole time we have spent together as special as it can be. Now, I can say that that day we were together was one of the most truly exceptional days in my life.

Thinking about it now, though I failed to have my grandiose vision for Timmy's birthday materialized, the things that happened had me realized that showing someone your love and devotion does not really need to be expensive, it just needs to come from where it should be. I always say that there are things in life that we wanted badly that we don't get on the times we wished to have gotten it, but if your intentions about it were that special, it's going to be worth the wait.

PS: To the angels that have made things possible for me, thank you very much. You guys have made my day and I'd like you to know that despite the delay and all the preparation problems that came with it, it was all worth it and I'd like to do it all over again. =)

where's ma'am dang?!

2007-08-20T17:02:00.000+08:00

Philippine General Hospital celebrated their 100th Year Anniversary last August 17. Julius and I (for the first time alone together) joined in the celebration, as we watched Bamboo and several other bands perform despite a heavy downpour on the evening of the actual anniversary date, with my mother and her wild colleagues (who turned Bamboo-fan converts after the concert).

And as part of their celebration, the PGH official photographer, Mr. Ador, who also happens to be sort of a family friend (he did the video and photo coverage of my sister's 18th birthday back in 2001, the photos of which were still yet to be recovered as we still have to pay for the balance which according to Mama was only 4000p, jeez..), did the PGH's official centennial photograph. I am sure damn proud to see my mother's face in this giant tarpaulin banner (I gave up looking for her until she pointed herself, in the picture, to me). It will be on display all over the PGH premises until the end of the year.

The PGH Centennial Photograph

The Ward 4 - Surgery Ward Head Nurse in the crowd

triple seven asalto

2007-07-20T16:26:00.000+08:00

16th of July was my birthday and this year it would be 07/07/07 in numbers. If the Chinese would be believed, triple seven is a lucky number combination and I guess this time, they were right.

I had literally no plans about celebrating my own birthday. For one, I think it would be waste of money, another thing, I didn't think it was really that important to be fussed about and lastly, I would have wanted my next birthday celebration to be celebrated either before or after I got from work and not after I got from school (nor combination, again of both). It just feels annoying to be celebrating your 24th birthday and be still in school.

Now back to the lucky thing, I think I somehow forgot about Timmy's personality. She's the one who loves surprises and though I knew she was cooking up something for me, what happened was something I never really expected.

With the help of my cousin, Joy and surprisingly my own mother, Timmy organized a surprise party for me with a helping hand from my friends from school, my friends from the office and my closest friends.

It was something I only see in movies and TV commercials, and now that I have actually experienced it, I now understand that surprise parties don't only give surprises. It is an overwhelmingly humbling experience that I would surely keep until the last of my days. Thanks to my baby.

On second thought though, I still feel annoyed that I'm still in school.

Birthday boy with: (L-R, Top to Bottom) Timmy, Donna, Julius, Santy, Ian, Beshe, Muriel & Joy

ang taong tinutukoy nila

2007-07-03T20:43:00.000+08:00

Tuluyan nang lumisan ang aking ama sa aming tahanan. Sa takbo ng mga pangyayari sa loob nito, mainam na daw iyon para hayaan naming ang panahon ang syang maghilom ng mga sugat na dala ng kalilipas lamang na kahapon. Napakasarap pakinggan na ito ay para sa ikabubuti ng pamilyang kamuntik nang mawasak na sya rin naman ang dahilan, ngunit tila bakit para sa akin ay mahirap itong paniwalaan.

Lumaki ako sa mundong hindi totoo. Maraming malalaking bagay ang ginawa ko sa buhay ko na dala lamang ng dikta ng ibang tao at hindi ang mga bagay na sadyang ginusto ko. Wari'y bago pa man ako isilang, naka-disenyo na ang landas na aking tatahakin. At nang dahil dito, nasanay akong gawin ang mga bagay sa buhay ko na labag sa tunay kong mga saloobin at kahit anong pagpupumiglas ang aking gawin nang sa gayon ako naman ang syang magpatakbo ng buhay ko, hindi ito naging madali sa isang tulad ko sapagkat buong buhay ko ay sumusunod lamang ako. Gayunpaman, wala akong pinagsisihan sa lahat nang aking mga pinagdaanan. Nais kong ituring na mga aral ang lahat ng ito sa aking pagtahak tungo sa mundong noon pa ma'y syang nais ko.

Ang aking pamilya ay lubos na pinagkakapitagan ng ibang tao. Kung kami'y pag-usapan, animo'y mga banal na kailanman ay hindi marunong magkasala. Makailang ulit ko rin namang naranasang maikumpara kami ng aking kapatid sa ibang mga anak at ni kailanman ay hindi ko ito ikinatuwa. Para sa akin, hindi ako kailanman naging o magiging ang taong sa tingin nila ay ako. Sa aking pamilya, ang aking ama na marahil ang pinaka-tinitingala. Habang ako'y nagkakaisip, napuno ako ng mga papuri na naging mabuti raw ang pagpapalaki sa akin ng aking mga magulang at abot-langit ang paghanga nila sa aking ama na ayon sa kanila ay napakagaling makisama at tunay nga namang napakabuting tao. Hindi naman sa ito'y di ko ikinalulugod, ngunit minsan ako'y napapag-isip dahil minsan sa aking pakiwari, gaya ng pagtingin ko sa aking sarili, ay hindi ko kilala ang taong tinutukoy nila.

Ang aking ama ay lumaki sa hirap at sa kanilang pamilya, siya lamang ang bukod tanging nagpursiging makapagatapos ng pag-aaral. Namasukan sya sa ibang tao bilang kapalit nito at naigapang ang pagtatapos ng kolehiyo nang ako ay nasa elementarya na. Inani nya ang lahat nang kanyang narating kaya't marapat lamang na sya'y ikarangal ng dahil sa mga ito. Ngunit sa kabila ng lahat ng ito, isang katotohanan ang hindi niya marahil kailanman makakayang ikubli, gayundin nang lahat ng taong humahanga sa kanya, sa likod ng lahat ng kanyang natamo. Ito ang katotohanang gaya nating lahat, siya ay tao. Tao na mayroon ding kahinaan at minsan ay nagkakamali rin at may hangganan ang kayayanan. Sa lahat ng kanyang narating, ito na marahil ang mga bagay na hirap syang tanggapin.

Sa kanyang paglisan, di ko mawari kung ano ang aking tunay na nararamdaman. Ngunit sa kabila nito, isang bagay lang ang aking masisiguro. Ipinabaon ko sa kanya ang pag-asang nawa'y sa kanyang pagbabalik ay isang tao nang kilala ko ang aking makakaharap, di nga naman perpekto subalit totoo.

room number 16

2007-06-04T14:17:00.000+08:00

When Timmy and I decided to be together a year ago, many were surprised. Apparently, I seemed to be the unlikeliest person for her and she was also to me. Many were convinced that our relationship was not bound to last. People said we're both just in it for the thrill and what we have could not possibly lead to something serious. But despite all these challenges, we held on to each other and I am so glad that we did. Now that we're still together I, myself was surprised to realize that what Timmy and I have now is officially the longest romantic relationship I have ever been into in my life and having said that, I also wanted this to be my last.

Early on in our relationship, we had the agreement that the two of us are just having fun. She showed signs that she has already resigned to the fact that she is going to live the rest of her life alone with her two kids and I can say she was a damsel in distress when I met her. I can see in her eyes the wanting to be loved and the loneliness she was going through. At that time, I admit that I wasn't certain of my own feelings. I have always looked at her more as a friend than a lover. Besides that, I was never sure if I was the right person for her. Needless to say, she also needed someone who can help her provide for her growing kids - and needs and I knew I just can't be that - yet, at least.

As time went by, we were able to discover new things about each other. We were able to know more things about each other on a more personal level. And that's when I realized how beautiful she really is and finally, that is where I unconsciously let myself open up to love again.

My relationship with Timmy is something that can easily be subjected to judgment. She is 5-years older than I am, and she is a single mother of two. I, on the other hand, is an unemployed student in my early 20's. One could say that she was just desperate to have someone, another could say that I was in it just for the heck of it. These are the kinds of things that I hear, even from my closest friends and sometimes it really hurts but I guess know better than to argue with them. I think they will never know how Timmy in her own special way has changed my life. I have never paid so much attention about my future with anyone else before she came to me and I guess I would never get tired of saying that she makes me want to become a better man each day. She gives me the power to believe the possibility of the existence of beautiful tomorrows and from the very first day I told her I love her, it has already been my dream to see her succeed as it also became my hope to spend those beautiful tomorrows with her.

As a post-anniversary celebration, Timmy and I went to Volet's resort in Cavite (recommended by my school-friend, Sean), one of those memorable trips I think I would never forget in this lifetime. And on an interesting note, we stayed at the very room, my friends from school, Mina and Flip stayed at about two weeks ago, who were also celebrating their own anniversary.

the letter that never saw print

2007-05-28T18:43:00.000+08:00

On April 12, I wrote to FHM magazine in preparation for our very first anniversary, but 2 issues after, I've resigned to the fact that my letter just didn't make it through. Honestly, I don't have hard feelings, but I was just too glad I still have somewhere to give my letter a chance to be published. Here goes:

My girlfriend and I are celebrating our first anniversary this coming May 28. I would very much appreciate it if you could publish this letter along with the picture I attached with it. I would take it as one of my surprises for her for this once-in-a-lifetime event in our lives.

I think FHM Magazine have been sort of instrumental in our relationship. Two months into it, I got involved with a girl in the office who claims to have posed as an FHM Babe. I got into serious trouble with my girlfriend when she found out that I was flirting with this girl, that I almost lost her. Thankfully she gave me another chance and the funny thing is, we've been collecting the magazine together since then.

Timmy, I'd like you to know that you have proven your worth more than enough. I'm sorry for all the bad things I've done and tell you what, you make me want to become a better man each day. Thank you for coming into my life, and no matter how many FHM Babes I meet along the way, you will always be the most beautiful and gorgeous woman for me. I love you baby!! Happy 1st Anniversary!!

Thank you FHM!!

Thanks to you, too Blogger!!

perfect score

2007-05-16T18:08:00.000+08:00

Eleven years (and counting) in Mapua (HS and College), I have been able to encounter different types of Mapuans with different personalities. And if there is one common denominator, that would be the use of OT's or old testaments. These testaments are the quizzes, assignments or even projects of previous students for a certain subject. In time, these OT's have been transferred from one generation to another and the advent of newer technologies have only made it easier.

These OT's are being used as a reference material by the students and if luck has it, quizzes can be exactly the same as those with the OT's. Some professors get too busy to change the questions that come out of the examinations. Though this exclusively Mapuan tradition has been contradicted many times because the students tend to depend too much on these documents - whether we care to admit it or not - that we spend more time looking for them than actually studying the subject matter, it may be considered an already accepted practice, whether the professors care to disagree or not. It is an accepted practice that depriving someone of these OT's can be considered an unbailable offense.

Being an overstaying student for quite sometime, I am having classes now with students from lower batches most of the time. If there are any difference from the students before and the students now, that would be the current students' unfriendliness in sharing OT's as if these coveted documents have evolved especially for them. These kids have also grown to being truly disrespectful to those students of higher batches such as me. And so, I was compelled to go back to the old but more effective tradition - study.

More than half of my classmates in all the subjects I am taking right now are from the lower batches which makes this term doubly hard and challenging for me. I feel being deprived of these OT's and Im getting sick looking for them so I am trying to do everything on my own.

Last week, I was utterly problematic about my upcoming quiz in my Pumps class. The fact that my classmates in that class were very unfriendly made it more depressing, there were no one to study with me so I had to do it all by myself while not being even sure if I actually understand the subject. I spent the whole night before the exam reviewing my notes and even did mock exams alone, refusing a night-out treat from my friends.

On the day the results went out, I came to class late and the quiz papers of those who came in late were on the teacher's table but mine was nowhere to be found. Turned out that my paper was being reviewed by my classmates. I was the only one who got 100.

kids' day out

2007-05-01T17:30:00.000+08:00

As promised, Timmy and I have finally been able to take her children out to swimming. For once again, we have relied to the ever-dependable Sea Breeze resort in Taguig City and it was a good thing that our friends Anette and Ian, with her current girlfriend, Jhamce, decided to come with us. We took turns in manning the cottage, assisting the kids and preparing the food.

Little Chlzy with Tita Anette and Mommy

I must say it was totally a kids' day out. More than anyone else, Chzny, Chlzy and their mischievous cousin, Rein were the ones who truly enjoyed the whole trip. I'm beginning to get a glimpse of how's it like to have my very own family day, especially when Chzny asked me again, rather more candidly this time, if I could be their new 'Dad' while we were playing at the children's pool. More interestingly, Ian and I played the cook while grilling hotdogs and barbecues for them as Little Chlzy playfully looked on, emphasizing more the duties of a father on occasions as such which I was unconsciously providing.

What is more, I am truly delighted that Chlzy and I share the love for water. To the amazement of everyone looking, she had no qualms in coming with me to the adult pool. I was half-believing that she would cry as we get to the deepest part, but she never did and we were only holding each other's hands! As a matter of fact, she seemed to be really enjoying her time while being occasionally distracted by the colorful floaters that some adults even brought to the pool and the airplanes that from time to time pass by the skies and I could swear she was probably the only 2-year old that ever reached that part that even her own mother never dared to. I was glad that she was being brought up to the world not fearing the things that kids like her should not be scared about but more than that, I am glad and truly overwhelmed to get the feeling that she trusted me to take her there.

Chlzy with Mommy and 'Adoo'

unguaranteed decade

2007-04-30T23:25:00.000+08:00

Today, someone has accused me of never having been able to fully accept him as a friend. The simple irony is that the person accusing me was the one who have been with me for the longest time. It was like plainly saying that I was never a true friend. And if being true means having to stand watching another friend ruin his or her life and do nothing, then I guess I would rather be untrue.

In my life, I have people around me who always seek my opinions. I never asked "why me?" and I never bragged about being their chosen confidant. I don't care about what other people may think about what I say, I only base my thoughts on a personal level and I don't impose on anyone the things that they should do, I only suggest and opine what I think is right for the matter at hand. The only thing I would've wanted from others, let alone my own friends, who don't like what I say is respect my opinions and give out their own.

In any relationship, I think the ultimate fundamentals are trust and respect. They almost always never work without the other and if none of them exists anymore, then the relationship is doomed to end. In numerous times, I have let myself open to people and just like many of us, there were also those times that I needed to let everything out, there were times that I needed someone to just hear me out and be a friend. But one thing I've learned is that just because you open up to someone more than to anybody else - and just because someone knows everything about you more than anyone else in the world doesn't make him or her your best friend. It is how he or she keeps these things in private and respects you despite everything there is that does.

Many of us live up to the adage that if a person is a true friend, he or she should accept us for what we are. I don't believe that anymore. There are millions of people in the world and no two have ever been created alike and so there would be certain differences. Differences that we need to work out on. People survive together because they try and adjust with each other's differences. And for me, being a true friend does not only require accepting someone in spite of everything. It is also being able to learn how to compromise and be willing to change to become a more likeable person. You can never expect everyone to deal with and accept you for just what and who you are. If you have found someone who respects your differences and is willing to get on with your lives together despite them and you find yourself willing to do the same, that's when you know you have found true friendship.

As the old saying goes, life has no guarantees. The length of time you have been with someone does not guarantee you with true friendship. There are more to it than just that. At this point in my life, I don't need a friend who would criticize me for everything that I do. I don't need someone who would constantly remind me of my past and the bad things that happened to me and treat them as if a matter of amusement. I need someone who can grow with me and who can be there for me in those trying times and share with me the joys of my life. Life may not offer guarantees, but it can offer you the possibility of beautiful days ahead and I just need someone who can be able look forward to spending those days with me.

Circa 1997

domestic victims

2007-04-09T17:08:00.000+08:00

It didn't come as a surprise. I knew that after my 14-year old cousin, Hansel gave me a photograph of my father's alleged other woman which he have found in his bag that my father asked him to wash a few days ago, my father would do everything to get rid of the kid.

On easter sunday, my mother and I found my father doing his early morning tirade again, a ritual he had religiously been doing since the day my other cousin (also by Mama), Lael arrived from Bicol to stay with us. Hansel followed suit a few months later. My father had to go home with Hansel that morning ahead of us from the church (where he perfectly plays the role of a lay minister almost every sunday by the way). And just probably after having barely taken off his minister's robe, he was picking on the poor boy once again. I heard him accusing Hansel of being sluggish (among others) for not having been able to clean the front garden when he know too well that the boy also came with us to hear mass.

That very afternoon, Auntie Babes, Hansel's mother, picked him up. I knew he had been crying in the bathroom and I felt by the way he looked at me that he would've wanted me to say something, that he would've wanted me and Mama to do something for him to stay. I knew when he arrived at home a few years back, he had in his heart his grand dreams, he had high hopes for himself and the family he had left behind, and I knew that he was a very smart young man to realize in only a few days that the road to where he wanted to go was not smooth, and that the biggest challenge he had to endure at that point was my father. But he never stopped. I can't imagine myself being in the same position he and Lael were in and I don't think I can last a day being mistreated by someone, let alone my own relative, just because I need something from them. I'm sure if they only had the chance to be sent to school by someone else, they wouldn't even consider having to stay with my ferocious father.

Our efforts of changing my father's attitude towards my cousins proved to be frail. For years, my mother and I, and even my sister when she was still here, would be in endless arguments with him about it but he never changed one bit. His reason was that he was trying to discipline them, but for me it was more of an abuse than mere discipline. Melody, my father's immediate niece stayed with us for quite sometime until she graduated in college but she never got that kind of attitude from any of us. She had whatever me and my sister had. She slept in the same bedroom with us, she used the same closet we did, she used the same towel and bathroom soap we used and she sexually abused me. But my father never thought she needed any discipline. For almost three years, she would go to my bed and kiss me and fondle my genitals in the dead of the night up to the day I have been able to have the courage to ask her to stop. I was just about thirteen when she started doing that and she was more than five years older than me.I know my father knows about it. I know he heard me openly arguing with Melody about it one night but he never did anything. I was never able to look at Melody without disdain until the day she left.

Hansel and Lael were the most gentle people our house has ever seen and I think I would never understand in this lifetime how can my father despise them so much. From day one, he never treated them as a family, he constantly reminds them where they should stand. He looked down at them like parasites that I can't stand having dinner with them watching my father separate the food that they are only allowed to touch as my mother looked helpless over her domineering husband. None of the boys' personal belongings were ever inside the house, including their pillows and their toothbrushes after my father threw them outside the house on the night Hansel arrived. Since then, a dilapidated steel cabinet and an old refrigerator served as their closet at the back of the house beside the dirty kitchen where they have found solace during those times they weren't allowed to watch TV in the living room where they sleep. Lael takes the wooden long chair as his bed and Hansel, who is at 5'7", on a folding bed that could barely contain his body.

In spite of everything, I never heard them complain. When they have the chance they would come to me and tell me stories about their everyday lives with big smiles on their faces which pains me more to know that they were coping really well while as just like my mother, I stand weak to help them out of their bitter situation.

As Auntie Babes and Hansel walked away, my mother looked powerless all the more but I can see that she was relieved to know that he would no longer have to suffer living with my father. We both know that it would be best for him and I know she would still continue supporting Hansel's education, a promise she made since Hansel's father, my mother's youngest brother, died when he was barely 4-months old.

And now in only a matter of weeks, Lael would be graduating and would also be leaving. My father may think he was triumphant in kicking Hansel out of the house but he never realized that he has only given us more reasons to believe that it is already futile to keep this family together. He only had me convinced that he will never be able to stay away from his mistress, whether he admits her existence or not. And he had only affirmed me that there is just no point in keeping something from being broken when it is no longer whole to begin with.

Hansel and Lael's 'closet'

practical summer

2007-04-02T17:14:00.000+08:00

We dreamed of Puerto Galera, we fantasized about another Marinduque trip and we even planned about Munting Buhangin in Nasugbu, Batangas but as all efforts in organizing an outing for this year headed nowhere, Jules have finally taken the initiative to spearhead the event to an already familiar but not-far-from-reality location. Our destination: the reliable Sea Breeze resort in nearby Taguig. Less preparation hassle and no financial fuss. Silversoul practical summer.

Me, Donna, Anne, Yeye and Jules

Timmy with Donna and Yeye

On the pool volume 1

On the pool volume 2

good news, bad news

2007-03-24T16:54:00.000+08:00

It must be true that when God takes away something, He replaces it with something bigger and hey, I am not complaining.

The grades are out for the term that has just ended and surprisingly, I had no failing grades. I think my efforts had finally paid off and for the first time, I felt certain that I did the right move in resigning from my job last December. I was just too happy to tell my mother, I knew she needed to hear something to cheer her up for a change.

On the not-so-brighter side however, Engr. Jones, our acting dean, rearranged the schedule I did for myself, extending my graduation to December from September. He even exclaimed it was the perfect subject combination for me. And so after the incoming term, I only have 4 subjects left, one pair of which is a pre-requisite of the other so I would not be allowed to take them all at the same time. Well, I guess it is really the way it is. Nobody can have everything they wanted all at the same time. And so with gritted teeth, I am just taking everything as they come.

no vacancy

2007-03-21T22:42:00.000+08:00

Classes ended last March 15th and I have just been on my 5th job application interview since. I was talking to a job interviewer from Convergys this afternoon and suggested that I talk to my mother regarding my plans whether I will have to stop school or not before I sign the contract. The good guy was giving me at least two days to decide because the position he was offering me was on a shifting schedule (sometimes even shifting location) just like all the other companies that I had to let go (almost all just right before the job offer).

My mother has no idea I've been looking for work again, I think I'm beginning to be desperate to take her away from our home and I kew I would need money in order for me to do so. But since I'm not getting lucky these days, I think the easiest -and seemingly the only possible - way out would be my graduation. And if things go well, I can make it this September, finally.

me day 2007

2007-02-24T19:33:00.000+08:00

Summer officially starts as we celebrate the Mechanical Engineering day 2007, the second time I ever participated (the first time being on the same day as Santy's wedding in 2005). And though everyone seemed to be very disappointed in learning that Luisa Ridge Resort was just actually the renovated Bato-bato Resort (that almost everyone already know of and have been to at least twice in their lives), I can say we still managed to have a good time. Forget that nothing really has changed about the resort aside from the obvious.

Ryan, Otep and Mina

Otep, Me, Sean, Rj and Flip

Fooling around

Milk for adults

cookies in a basket

2007-02-20T14:01:00.000+08:00

I hate to admit, but I sometimes tend to be very unaware of women's need for thoughtfulness. Before Valentine's day, Timmy and I had a discussion about celebrating our 9th month anniversary this Feb. 28 when the issue about the Valentine's day surfaced. Nonchalantly, I asked if we still need to celebrate that when our monthly anniversary is only a few days after it. I forgot it would be our first Valentine together and I never knew she was really looking forward to it.

I never intended to offend her, I sometimes only think so much about the expenses which I failed to point out. So on Valentine's day, we dined out and watched the movie 'Music and Lyrics' together. And I was so glad that we did, I think Timmy was looking her best and I felt certain I had the most beautiful Valentine date that night. She seemed prepared indeed.

Five days later, Timmy made me a basketful of delicious raisin cookies that even my mother loved! I think I really need counseling on being thoughtful.

who's your daddy now?

2007-02-07T22:49:00.000+08:00

I'm not sure how I'm feeling right now. My head is full of questions that I know nobody could possibly answer me as of now. Neither I had a fight with my girlfried, Timmy nor something bad had actually happened. It's deep within, something repeatedly playing inside my head. A thing that I think will never have control over ever.

Tonight I found out that Noel, Chzny's father had added Timmy in Friendster. Before that, he refused any amicable settlement with Timmy regarding their child. And for eight years he never had the initiative to communicate with them until now. The few times they talked after they separated, which is most of the time over the phone, was only about Chzny and on those few times, Noel had only one thing in mind. He would only support the kid, if Timmy would allow Chzny to live with him which I think is far from possible.

It would be very stupid if I'd say I never thought this day would come - when he would be looking for his only daughter but I just don't feel like I have already emotionally prepared myself for something like this. And apparently, out of all the adjustments I did on my end for this relationship, I think this is one thing I missed. I never knew I would actually care.

Just last night, I helped Chzny review for her Religion and Math exams this morning. I'm not sure if she actually learned anything from me but I feel certain she was happy that I was there. In one of my visits, her cousins Rein and AJ who were about the same age as her - about 6 or 7, were arguing in front of me while playing the Playstation. The issue was: if I would be Chzny and Chlzy's next father. One of them eventually summoned the courage to ask me, looking almost certain that I would say 'Yes' but before I can even answer, he added if I would buy Chzny her own Playstation portable in the future and the only thing I was able to say was that Timmy and I could talk about it. To that, Chzny's eyes widened with excitement and even commented that she would have wanted to have a Bratz doll over a PSP. It was only until later that I found out how much a PSP costs.

The younger child, Chlzy (Chel-zee), who turned 2 last December, on the other hand, have already grown to calling me "Adoo", short for 'Tito Andrew'. Of the two, I would say she is the one closer to me as of now. She always looks for me and sometimes when I'm there, I feel like I don't have only one shadow. She follows me everywhere and imitates anything I do. There were even times when I arrive when the two girls would rush to me and would playfully help me untie my shoes, something me and my sister loved to do for Papa when we were in grade school. I think I have already established a certain connection with each of them that sometimes I can't stop feeling truly overwhelmed. I can never be sure if they really see me as their father but honestly, I sometimes wish they really do.

I don't feel mad about Noel adding Timmy in Friendster, I don't mind if they would communicate, as long as it would be exclusively for the sake of Chzny, but somehow I feel alarmed about how I would figure to be someone in the little girls' later life if Timmy and I would be together for the rest of our lives. And if that would happen, I would want to adopt them but would they also want me to do so if they had the choice? And if they do, would they still have to be looking for their own fathers? And if that happens, who am I going to be then in their lives? Would they also see me as a real father or would they only plainly see me as the good old "Adoo" for the rest of their existence? I can't help feeling depressed just thinking about it, and hey things are just beginning.

merry and happy valentine

2007-02-05T15:32:00.000+08:00

(L-R) Back row: Timmy, Me, Kurt - Santy's son (hidden from view), Shiela and her boyfriend, Hector

Front row: Anette, Beshe, Muriel and Julius

As a post-Christmas/New Year cum pre-Valentine Celebration, and as I really needed sometime off, Timmy and I with the rest of the Silversoul had dinner at Masas in Greenbelt 2 and interestingly, with some new people: Stephen Kurt, Santy's 17-month old son, in his first ever Silversoul gimik, and Hector, Sheila's live-in partner.

The night surprisingly turned out to be fun despite the usual late arrivals (Anette and Beshe arrived about 2 hours late), the expected absence of the others and the more obvious reasons. It is a good thing that I have a girlfriend with the finest PR skills that could turn any uncomfortable situation into an affair to remember. And as if to cap the night off, Sheila and I were prodded (separately) to sing at the stage in front of all the other people and though I feel certain my voice broke from the very beginning of my song, ('Knocks me off my feet') I feel glad I have finally been able to sing (live) for Timmy.

Of course, it would definitely be a surprise if the night stops there. We proceeded to Anette's place and did another round of booze before we stayed there for the night.

never the same

2007-01-30T19:25:00.000+08:00

I have my mind set. I wanted to take away Mama from my father. The recent happenings are enough to convince me that the safest place for Mama right now is anywhere but our own home. I think I have also found enough reasons that it is no longer healthy for this family to stay together.

In perhaps the biggest emotional confrontation I have ever been in my entire life, my father neither denied nor confirmed anything. He was just adamant in saying that he has done nothing wrong and I don't understand how he gets the nerve in saying that when everything else says otherwise. The moment he avoided my questions was the most painful experience for both me and my mother, it was a lot more than saying he was guilty. I would have wanted if he he had lied again in front me than just plain brushing off the things I wanted to know, I would have wanted him to try and convince me that the things I've heard and the things I know were not true. But he never did. His refusal to defend himself was like not defending this family that we've been trying to save, for me.

It was the first time in my living memory that I had actually talked to him that way and I have never felt so much anger and hatred. After that, I have only been given more questions than needed answers. And one more thing I guess I would never comprehend is the way my mother acted after that. Only after a few days, things are back again to what they would probably think as 'normal'. A house with a mother, a father and children - normal family. A family that I think I would never look at the same way I have ever done in my life. When my Aunt asked me a few weeks ago if I would want to have a broken family as I search for truth, I told her I would rather have one than to have a family bereft of honesty, and I would live up to it. I rarely promise anything but this time I swear, my quest for what is true has just begun.

The portrait on the living room wall, unnoticed and taken for granted just as the family it was supposed to represent.

breaking the silence

2007-01-04T19:03:00.000+08:00

Whoever said that this year - the year of the boar is not for those who were born on the year of the boar must be the true seer. First day of the year and things have finally began falling to their rightful places. My doubts and my fears have at last been justified. I have finally been able to have the courage to ask my cousins Lael and Hansel if they find anything strange happening inside the house and it surprisingly didn't need any intense prodding for they perfectly knew what I wanted to know. Turns out that they have the answers to the questions I have long been keeping.

My father is having an affair. A few months ago, I have read a text message on his mobile phone saying sweet nothings from an unidentified number. Someone who is certainly not my mother. I have been keeping that number since and have seen it a couple of times after. My father never saves it but he was not too smart to empty his call register. He was even heard a couple of times saying I love you's to someone over the phone while my mother is either in the bedroom or in the bathroom. Perfect timing. I, myself was witness to his flirtations but have been in denial for the longest time. It never occured to me that something like this could ever happen to my own family.

Papa is an adept in maintaining his good image from other people and though I disapprove of most of his actions, I never knew he could actually get this far. At his age of 55, I never thought that it could still be possible. He has been the only man in my mother's life while he had his own children out of wedlock which my mother only learned a year after their marriage. He had the chance to choose between Mama and the mother of his other children when she had the nerve to show up then and at this very moment I wish he had chosen them. With that, I would have not existed and he would not have been my father.

When I was younger, he would take me along everytime she would meet secretly with my half-sister, Arlene. Apparently he wanted me to get close to her but he never really succeeded. I know his intentions were good but I never really find it proper to ask me to lie to my very own mother. He didn't want me to tell her that we were seeing his other daughter. I didn't think it would have actually mattered to Ma, considering the fact that she had accepted him with wide open arms despite the things he have done before, I know she must have already prepared herself for that moment when his children would be looking for him. But then I was helpless. I know it was wrong but what can I do? I felt like I would be in serious trouble with him if I speak. I realized that doing the wrong things makes it feel all the more wrong when the very people you trust are the ones who pushes you to do wrong.

For two occasions just this holiday season while my poor mother is in Bicol, he had brought some girls over the house past midnight, he claims they were his relatives but I knew perfectly who they were. And again in my life, he asked me not to tell Mama. Besides that, he would go home really late almost every night to the point of not going home at all for one time considering that he has no longer any corporate job to attend to. But I never said a word. It was all inside me.

If my father thinks I would still be that little boy who will just stand there and watch him do the things he do behind my mother, he is dead wrong. It would be hard, I know but he'll see. I'm going to stand up for myself and I'm going to stand up for my Mama. I'm just waiting for the right moment for I believe that out there in the dark horizon, the truth will be set free. No matter how long it takes, no matter when, I know it will come and the trail begins by breaking my silence.

the sideshow

2007-01-01T03:13:00.000+08:00

It was the first three hours of the year. I think Mama's absence is finally sinking in. Five hours ago, I was very excited preparing what was supposed to be our new year dinner for me, Papa and my cousin, Lael. My other cousin, Hansel went home to his mother for them to celebrate the turning of the year together with his siblings by her. The food served on our table were the spaghetti and palabok left over from Timmy's youngest daughter's birthday last night. She and her mom had been very nice to let me bring some of the food home after they learned that I will be the one who will be preparing for the dinner. I don't like to imagine what could have happened if I were really the one who cooked for us. Everything on our table were from other people save from the barbecue my father asked me to buy from the mall earlier, in the unavailibility of pizza anywhere. We had left over adobo, menudo and puto also from Timmy and lumpiang sariwa from Joy's sister, Ate Janice.

I have always looked forward to these kind of events, events that are normally shared by families and people who love each other. It has been innate in me to expect something great to happen every christmas and new year only to feel disappointed most of the time. It makes me feel like a small kid, watching a sideshow, anticipating that a magical spectacle is about to happen but only get to see the usual parade of acrobats hovering above, twisting their boneless bodies and nothing more than just that. It is something in me that I have yet to outgrow. I think it is high time for me to accept that moments like this and days like this are actually nothing more than just any other day.

Without the calendar being invented, this day would not have been any special, because after the spectacular array of pyrothechnics overhead across the entire metropolis, after the deafening cluster of fireworks around and after the new year dinner, rigorously and neatly prepared has been consumed by you alone with your dear cousin as your father announced that he is ready to sleep two hours before the countdown only to realize that he is not actually sleeping but talking to someone apparently not your mom over his mobile phone on his bedroom with doors locked, it is just like any other day. It might be the new year, but look around - nothing has actually changed.

Lael and me as we watched the fireworks outside.

enrollment rush

2006-12-29T17:29:00.000+08:00

New term in school starts on January 2. I'm wondering what made me decide to come home with Lael and Hansel when it won't have mattered if I stayed in Bicol until the new year. And as a matter of fact, the registrar's office will not be opened before the classes start so it would be useless even if I have already been able to raise the amount, I would still be a late enrollee.

I'm still about nine thousand pesos short and the remaining balance is for myself to produce. Mama have already given me her ATM card and with all the things that happened recently, she already have much to think about without worrying about me.

Going back home yesterday, I was surprised that I felt optimistic that I would be able to raise the money but with the seemingly unlikely help from my father and my emails to my sister left unanswered, I'm feeling half-hearted. I also don't want Timmy to worry about me anymore. She's already done so much for me and as I hate to admit, three thousand of the money I have in hand was already from her. I knew things would have been easier if I hadn't resigned from my job. I just wanted to give my school more time, but now I feel like I need to go back to working again. I'm beginning to wonder where the hell that optimism came from in the first place when this is the time I needed it more.

my grandfather who doesn't know me

2006-12-26T21:19:00.000+08:00

It had been the family christmas dinner I had in my life with the largest attendance. And in spite of the situation, it had been one of the most memorable for me. Of course, having it at my grandfather's wake didn't make the celebration outright merry but the presence of almost the whole family around made it feel so overwhelming that it didn't matter to me if we were served only small portions of the spaghetti with a loaf of bread to make it enough for everyone. I'm glad no one protested when I requested for another serving. What also made it different from the past christmases is that I took part in preparing. I made a refrigerated cake and I'm just too pleased that everyone liked it.

My grandfather's funeral this afternoon had been, like his death, very peaceful - emotional, yet very peaceful. I played the part of the photographer using Aunt Nancy's camera from the house to the church and finally to the cemetery. For brief moments, I joined them in the parade of following the funeral car, as in tradition, which made me feel glad that I have been assigned to take the pictures and gave me an excuse to keep my distance. The tenacious feeling of the moment was less overwhelming when I'm either far ahead or far behind the crowd. I was very anxious not to cry along with the others.

Lolo Ipe had a strong reputation of being a strict disciplinarian. I doubt if any of his grandchildren had really been close to him because of that. His always-disarming presence and firm principles had earned himself high respect from others and his penetrating stare tells you he's not the right person you can ever mess with. I don't remember myself having even a light chat with him that I recall being jealous with other kids who had close ties with their grandparents when I was younger.

When they got back from the States, after Tita Linda, my mother's eldest sister, died, my grandfather was already diagnosed with Dementia (not Alzheimer's as I was corrected) along with other diseases. He didn't seem to be able to recognize me and never seemed to care about my presence. He also seldom speak. I would take my pictures with him and he's emotionless face would just stare at me after. Mama even told me that he doesn't even remember them - his own children. But something out of the ordinary happened that had me convinced otherwise.

Behind those sternful looking, whitish eyes, I felt certain that he was still the same person he had always been. In one of the visits we made to our relatives long ago in San Fernando, Camarines Sur, I was being teased by one of the elders for being too chicken not to take a shot of a hard liquor he and his drinking mates were offering me. Lolo, who was sitting behind him and who was witness to what was happening suddenly spoke: "Tigilan mo yan, apo ko yan." Everyone around looked stunned.

"I've always believed that the heart can never forget

what even the mind sometimes fail to remember."

- SCARS OF MY WRECKED SOUL, December 11, 2006

With my cousins Hansel and Karen at my grandparents house, morning of the christmas eve.

christmas farewell

2006-12-22T14:58:00.000+08:00

Barely a week after Anette's mom passed away and exactly 6 days after Donna announced that her grandmother in Davao died, it was my very own grandfather's turn.

Apparently, my aunts and even my mother, who went to Bicol ahead of us, didn't have enough courage to tell me that Lolo was gone. It was already evening when my cousin Karen broke the news to me through text when he actually passed away that very morning.

Since we started having plans of spending the holidays in Bicol, I have already planned to do my share for the christmas dinner. It would be the very first christmas dinner in my living memory that we will be spending it there. I even imagined myself doing the spaghetti, something I have never done before. The event would be something special, I'm sure and I wanted to help in making it something out of the ordinary.

But now that he is gone, I'm sure it's not going to be the way I had expected it to be anymore. Fourteen years ago, Hansel's father and my mother's youngest father died on christmas eve. Needless to say, it is no longer something we haven't gone through before but I'm certain it is still going to be as special.

birthday gift for papa

2006-12-18T21:21:00.000+08:00

I could sense by the way my father anxiously wake me up that there was something wrong. But I was too sleepy to get up. Like almost every night in my life, I slept late the night before. I felt certain that someone should pass a bill prohibiting anyone to wake up someone else in a deep slumber.

I caught a glimpse of what was happening in the living room. Someone was putting bandages on my father's left arm but I was too irritated to care. I was told that my father was bitten by Rockstar, my 14-month old Labrador retriever and someone is needed to take him to a hospital or whatever to get an anti-rabies shot. But since my mother have gone the day before with my Aunt Nancy, who arrived from Wisconsin the other day, to Bicol, that someone needs to be me.

I was still feeling anoyed when my father and I headed to a nearby clinic. I didn't even have the nerve to take a look at his wounded arm beneath that poorly arranged bandage. I knew I could have put it on on him perfectly being very much acqauinted with the process being a nurse's son and all but I half-believed it could be that serious. Labradors are known to be gentle on humans and I even secretly blamed him for being so stupid to get in the middle of a dog fight. Rockstar earlier battled again with my half-Dachschund, half-native dog, Goliath.

I was even more pissed off when we found out that the clinic was closed on weekends. We had no choice but to go to PGH, where my mom works. It was only inside the cab that I've realized it is going to be my father's birthday on the following day. What an opportune time to be bitten by a dog. It was also his beloved association's christmas party on that evening. He told me he would wear barong tagalog so his arm would be hidden. Clever.

Arriving at the emergency room of the Philippine General Hospital, I felt how it was like to be a normal citizen (in that respect, at least). Mama wasn't there and so was the usual special treatment. I doubt if anyone would have believed that we were an immediate family of a head nurse working there, I was wearing the very thing I wore in my sleep.

It was also until then that I've realized the severity of my father's wound. I appeared dumbfounded as the nurse attending to us painstakingly try to remove the bandage my father's nephew had placed earlier. There were bits of garlic underneath it as a large portion of his flesh was exposed. I swear I would see his bones if I had the courage to look closely.

I felt so bad after that, I felt like hiding my face in shame. Then I began contemplating on the things I have done against my father, his depression and my coldness towards him. We were never the perfect father-and-son tandem, we never even get close to that. Growing up, he didn't have much time for me that we were never really close. I get jealous of others who brought along their own fathers in father-and son camps in high school while I have my eldest cousin by him as a proxy. We never did the same things father and son do. He was a perfect example of someone literally there, but figuratively never there. For him, there was always a recognizable line between fathers and his children. It never occured to him that we could also be friends. And I've always hated him for that.

At that special moment, I felt the long-forgotten longing I have for him. I knew it was an opportunity for me to make him feel that I also love him. In his usual tirade of speeches over dinner, he would point out that we make him feel useless after he lost his job. But though I knew I perfectly understood where he was coming from, I also know that I never gave the effort to make him realize that and make him feel that he is still the man of the house and he is still as important to us as he was before.

As we headed to the exit, I even felt worse when he thanked me for being there. I didn't feel like I deserved it but he seemed so happy saying that. I felt the need of treating him to a lunch over at Wendy's after we bought his medicines and I just couldn't remember the last we dined out alone together. I just hope it's not yet too late for the two of us. I hope we could still be the father-and-son I have always dreamed us to be.

a love story

2006-12-11T17:33:00.000+08:00

When the clock ticks 12:00 tonight, it is going to be 13 days before Christmas, 312 hours, 18720 minutes before the celebration of Jesus' birth and if the doctors are to believed, it will only take three days or 72 hours before Anette's mom, Tita Loida joins the Lord in heaven. Needless to say, it is going to be the first Christmas dinner for her family without her.

For probably the fifth time in just two years, Tita Loida has been sent to the hospital for different reasons, all stemming down to her heart problem. When Anette told me over the phone, the situation did not seem very critical to me. I didn't find it different from the previous incidents until she told me that half her mother's body was already paralyzed.

Arriving at the hospital with Donna and Joy, we found Anette alone with her cousin Nikki at the room reserved for well-wishers and relatives. We could only see Tita Loida from a diminutive glass window to her room. The rest of their family including Ian, Anette's brother who stayed with their father in Batangas after their parents separated, were not yet aware of her mother's condition.

Having the opportunity, Anette asked me to come with her inside the ICU unit 7 of the Manila Doctors Hospital to see her mom. I was never uncomfortable in hospitals in my life because I almost grew up in PGH where my own Mama works. She would take me and my sister there when we were young everytime we didn't have someone to babysit for us while she and my father go to work.

At that very moment, I was having doubts about my own beliefs. I felt anxious because I seemed to be the only person there to whom Anette can draw her strength from in the absence of her own family. The doctor told me about Tita Loida's condition and even noted that she can no longer identify any of the two of us because the part of her brain where her memory is - had already been damaged. And of all the things she told me about her state, that is the only one I found hard to accept. I have always believed that the heart can never forget what even the mind sometimes fail to remember.

While Anette and I stood on the opposite sides of Tita Loida's bed, I tried to look around. There was the respirator, the pulse-monitoring device with all the graphs - the ones I used to see in movies. I was avoiding any emotional talk because I knew Anette had already been crying too much. We were talking when I noticed Tita's left arm and leg which were tied to her bed, moving at the same time almost frailly. Anette told me her mom was trying to pull the tubes inserted through her nose so it was tied. Then I figured maybe she was moving because she was hearing us so I suggested that she talk to her. And at that moment, I have seen the most poignant expression of love I have ever seen. She asked her mom to hold her hand. And with all the energy she have left against the disease slowly consuming her body, Tita Loida raised her hand and held Anette's in a snug. Then I knew she was fighting her battle.

chapter finale

2006-12-05T23:44:00.000+08:00

It has been the moment I've always dreaded since I've decided to go steady with Timmy. It would have been the moment that could either confirm or refute the things that I have been claiming to be true for the past six months. And I was too afraid to realize that I might just have been fooling the world and myself all along.

When a friend asks me for help, I have always been willing to do so as long as I know that I can. It was something I always looked at as an obligation for me being a friend to help someone in need given that I am fully-capable. But when my cousin, Joy messaged me that she needed me to come with her to see Shiela, my ex-girlfriend (the longest I've been with to date), I wasn't so sure if I still wanted to see it that way. Joy herself had issues with Shiela because they were ex-bestfriends and so she wasn't ready to meet with her alone. Unfortunately I was the only one available at the time albeit I knew that I wasn't ready to see her myself.

It has been the longest time Shiela and I haven't seen each other and until now, four years after we broke up, there are still some people who seem skeptical that I have already moved on at the rate the things had happened before.

For a very long time, I was one of those skeptics myself. No matter how hard I tried, I found it impossible to live up to that old cliche "Time heals all wounds." that I was beginning to think that the 'time' referred to in the phrase could actually mean 'lifetime". But then again, there came Timmy and the elusive magic I have been waiting to come again my way had arrived.

Standing in front of Jools Cabaret and Bar where Shiela performs, I was back to my old-skeptic self again. I have never really thought about how to act when I see her again and I must confess that I have never seen it coming.

She appeared in an utterly revealing red outfit, looking surprised that I came along. She acted so nice to invite us inside to watch her and her band perform. They served me free beer and a cocktail juice for Joy. I almost forgot that Shiela's boyfriend was one of her band members until he joined us in one side of the bar and tried to have a little chat. I knew if it had happened a year ago, I could have had walked out.

But looking at them and talking to her did not seem as extraordinary as I was expecting it to be. I was surprised that I didn't feel the slightest glitch I used to feel just looking at her then. Looking through her eyes and her smile that used to mean the whole world to me didn't seem to affect me the way it used to. None of it matters to me anymore. It doesn't mean anything now than just eyes and smile. She no longer have the spell that used to enthrall me and finally, I was certain. I was freed from my past.

Uncertainty is one of the main reasons why I don't often say the words 'I love you'. I have felt proud in the few times I told Timmy those words and now I feel more proud that I'm sure I meant it.

hacienda marcelo

2006-12-02T17:13:00.000+08:00

Me and Anette

Santy and Anne. Fooling around the Hacienda Marcelo, Jules and I played the part of the director and the photographer respectively as our models strucked their poses very much willingly.

The typhoon Reming didn't stop us from pushing through our long-planned Batangas outing. How in the world did a typhoon come lurking around the archipelago in less than 48 hours before the trip? I don't know but we were already set and far too used at being taunted by storms everytime the Silversoul go out of town to back out. And with the up-to the minute weather updates from Ian straight from Batangas, we knew nothing could go wrong.

The storm was at its peak midnight before December 1 so we figured out that it would have gone to Manila by the time we arrived there. And as luck would have it, our weather predictions were correct. Save for the fallen trees everywhere, there was no sign in the skies that a storm has just passed. The weather in Batangas was very pleasing when we arrived, neither too warm nor too cold and the best part is that we have the whole resort all to ourselves.

proving them wrong

2006-11-22T15:01:00.000+08:00

From day one, I have been constantly questioned about my relationship with Timmy by other people and honestly, though I fully understand why, I can't help but feel hurt. What makes it more hurtful is that sometimes these words are from those people I trusted to understand me, these are people who I consider my friends. I'd like to believe I wasn't wrong in that respect.

I remember meeting with Jules' ex, Vanessa a few weeks ago, who bombarded me with uncomfortable questions as soon as Timmy went out of sight. She was roughly adamant in saying that our relationship is never to last. She said she know very too well the kind of women I want. She said she knows me to be the type of guy who goes out with women I can just 'display'. She, with the help of Ian, implied that while Timmy could be pretty, she was not someone I would most probably end up with. I knew very well what their talking about. Does it really seem impossible for me to love someone who's five years my senior and with two kids of her own? For Christ's sake, Demi Moore had three!

Vanessa's tactlessness and being opinionated is a common knowledge, but I think this is the first time I hadn't answered her usual flair of uneasy questions with yes, ease. It seemed totally pointless for me to defend myself when she already had her verdict. Anette, who was witness to the interrogation seemed to have sensed the tension in my answers that she thankfully, asked if we could leave already.

I know it is not my obligation to explain myself to everyone. But I somehow feel the need to prove these people wrong. But how do someone who have already been sentenced prove himself to be innocent? I know that in my situation it is really easy for anyone to judge me, it is very easy not to give me the benefit of the doubt and it is really easy to conclude what's going on in my mind. It makes me feel like a murder suspect deprived of the due process of law.

Last Monday, Timmy's mother arrived from Saudi Arabia. We have been introduced during Chzny's birthday exactly a week ago, November 15. I was actually expecting worse in our meeting than what had actually happened. She talked to me in motherly fashion and blurted out her own frustrations. I perfectly understand where she's coming from. I know for someone like her it's no longer easy to trust someone like me. And I know that just like with everyone else, my intentions have been put again in question. I feel really bad that she was feeling that way because of me. I seemed to have been unable to say anything but nod, because I believed in everything she said, at this point Timmy needs someone that is not exactly like me. Timmy needs someone who can secure her and her children's future, someone who can provide for them and assure them of a family with permanence and intransience, and someone the kids can call their 'Dad'. I know that that someone is not me just yet.

Timmy's mother never really said that she didn't like me but she made it clear that she could've preferred me not to be there which somehow have hurt me just the same. I think proving my intentions to her is the biggest test my relationship with Timmy will have to go through so far.

And for the future, I gave Mama a hypothetical question yesterday. A neighbor is going out with a guy who is not legally separated and has two kids. I asked her if she would allow me to be in a similar situation, say my girlfriend had her own kids. With a crumpled brow and a slight shake of her head, she said: "Marami namang dalaga dyan." I reiterated by asking if she were never married, she said she doesn't consider someone with kids to be a "dalaga".

It is indeed a long way to go.

stormful october

2006-10-28T14:12:00.000+08:00

It was the worst typhoon we've seen in years, it left more than enough destruction to last in weeks. Typhoon 'Milenyo' left thousands of people either homeless or roofless. In our area in particular, it took almost two weeks before the electricity went back due to the damaged electricity lines and posts along the long stretch of the C5 highway, which apparently distributes the electricity in Makati-Taguig border.

On the day it hit Manila, two days before the start of October, I woke up late in the morning, as usual, to rumbling noise in the skies. It could not be attributed only to the strong rainshowers and the occasional thunderstorms but also to flying roofs and tree branches outside. It was literally unsafe for anyone to go outdoors. It was only me and my cousins Lael and Hansel at home then because the classes were suspended early for a change. Everyone of us, including my parents, had to sleep really late, clearing the house of flood all night after being the last in our street to be penetrated by the water outside, only to get flooded again the next day.

Few days after the typhoon, I had to go back to the school for the new term that I barely felt that I had a one week off. For another time in this lifetime, I have faced the tragedy again. Good thing, the appointment of our new Dean is in transition so the appealing process is faster than usual. I really hate getting this, though I know Mapua could never really get rid of me no matter how many times they kick me out because I already have less than 60 units to take (albeit I still have to go through the entire process again). That's all for the paper works, and most of the time it was only because of my past grades that still have to be computed with my present grades for the periodic assesment thing that still totally baffles me up to now. Students like me who have reached the below-60 units mark are called immortals. Don't get me wrong, I'm not taking pride in that. But I think putting humor into it could at least somehow make me forget that I am actually overstaying in college.

Let me share a word-of-mouth story which explains how this policy began:

A Mapua student with only 30 units left before graduation was kicked out. Of course, like anyone else in the situation, he appealed for a reconsideration but in vain, He shamelessly even tried to take his poor mother to do the begging for him, but still in vain. The duo was forced to look for another university that will take him in. They found home in one of Mapua's rival, strategically located just outside the walls of Intramuros. It was widely known that most of the students from Mapua who were either kicked out or have plainly given up transferred there. It was even sometimes jokingly referred to as the Mapua Annex. Fast forward to post board examinations, our hero aced the test. Mapua claimed that the credit must be given to them because they said they have molded the student from his first year in college. Being grateful that he is, of course our hero has offered the credit to his adoptive university he now calls his home.

During those times I've been waiting for my readmission papers, a certain Magister English Training Center was contacting me and offering another part-time job. I was totally decided not to take it but when I knew that I only had to interview call center applicants and my shifting hours and schedule will be on my discretion and the fact that it would only be for a month, I gave it a try. Magister is a blooming training center which just turned one year this quarter. We have no HR department, no ID's and I have no permanent position. The company sure has a long way to go and it makes me feel great that I've somehow been a part of the pioneer batches. Now I have only a few days left before my (non-existing) contract ends and I never really felt that I am actually working.

women's perspectives

2006-09-09T18:38:00.000+08:00

It's been a while since I last checked my mails on both Friendster and Yahoo. And beneath the piles of spam messages, I found it interesting to note that three of the men in Anette's life messaged me on almost the same day including one of my best friends, Carl. Anette, incidentally, celebrated her birthday just last week. I was glad that she looked so happy that night (even if most of the Silversoul were not, but that's another issue), despite her very recent break-up with Marvin and the responsibility on top of her shoulders right now - she's still taking full time studies while rendering full-time work (ICT Ortigas) to provide for herself and her sick mother, who was left alone with her when the rest of her siblings opted to go with their father in Batangas after their parents separated.

It's great that Anette, who's been with me for nine years now, finally got rid of her immaturity. She has transformed herself to a very smart woman without sheding entirely her playful demeanor and her love for anything mushy and girly. I never intended to write a tribute about her but I was utterly touched by how she handled/handles the things that happened/are happening to her. Who could've thought she could survive such an ordeal. Hats off to you!

Silversoul Pioneers (Jules, Anette and I)

My girlfriend, Timmy had been very generous since day one. Finally, out of her numerous gifts, she gave me something I really really liked - 'Your past does not define your future' book by Bo Sanchez. It is a very inspiring and emotional book tailor-made especially for people who think that they have been a failure for at least once in their lives. The title in itself is a good reminder that there is a better tomorrow waiting for every one despite the scars and flaws of the past, it presses the existence of the possibility that we can be 'healed'.

Finally, here's something from the other part of the world.

From my beautiful Aunt Nancy (Kenosha, WI):

Subject: Summer pictures
September 4, 2006

Hey No! I've been guilty of reading your journals again=) But I guess you wouldn't have posted them if you wanted to keep 'em private... I must say it's a good reading, kept me busy on this overcast, long Labor Day weekend we're having here. I think you got your own soap going=)

I'm glad to know though that you are at this point seem happy and content at least with your love life. A lot of your entries have been dealing with all sorts of turmoil. You deserve to have a great woman who will respect you and love you for who you are and the better man that you'll become. I don't know if Timmy is the one, only you can answer that.

One thing I can say is that Sheila and Menchie are your past, part of them made you who you are today. I don't know any of these girls but just based on what you wrote, Menchie wouldn't have been a great match for you. She didn't trust you. She was constantly checking your cell phone like you've got something to hide, she did not feel secure with your relationship. I'm sure you know that trust and security are some of the fundamentals of making it work.

I believe you had security and trust with Sheila at one point. The problem is, she grew up and became practical. You can't blame her for that, she felt she had responsibilities to her family she needed to fulfill. Unfortunately, your relationship was put on the line. The way I see it is that you weren't meant to be. You can never look at her the same way you did before and that in itself is a very destructive behavior in a relationship. One thing for sure is that you'll never forget about her. It's cliche but it's true, first love never dies. Your lola had Juan Marco, Ate Linda had Lavapye, Ate Norma had William, Pot had John, Jose had Reyna, I had Rogel... the list goes on but I'm sure you get the gist=)

What you do with that experience is something else, you can let it consume you or you can move on... which I think you are on that path, so good job! I have a feeling that you might be a bit of a player, I hope that when you finally settle with someone that you'll give her the respect and honor that every woman deserves. Because to me it takes a real man to commit to one person.

One of your entries talks about you feeling really low to almost admitting yourself as dumb or as you put it "bobo". I could not believe I was reading that. I've always remembered you as a brilliant young kid, and never thought otherwise. Ups and downs are part of everyone's journey. Just keep striving when you hit your lowest low. Don't let it affect your confidence. I think you have great potentials, they wouldn't have given you the opportunity to work at the call center if they didn't see a spark in you. You should give yourself a little more credit.

Anyway, I didn't mean for this to be lengthy, and pardon all the advice for you weren't seeking any. But know that my intentions are well...

Take Care!

Auntie Nancy

PS: These are some pictures we took over the summer... summer here officially ends today (Labor Day).

Very Filipina. My Auntie Nancy.

At least she didn't think I was suicidal, for a change. Kidding aside, I think this is the first time someone has ever commented about the women in my life by the way I write about them and it was extra-special this time because it was from someone I shared a lot of my childhood pictures with (together with my then-skinny sister, Pot/Annalyn), and truly one of the first women I've known. I'm glad that I have been able to impart the message of the things that happened as it did.

It was also the first time I have been given the opportunity to look at the last three women in my life in someone else's perspective. I never sat down and really thought about what happened and why it just didn't work out with any of the first two. With the way she wrote it, it was as if she was there and had actually seen things happen. And looking back, what she said and what she thinks about the things that happened were all true, I was nodding all the time, while reading it, in approval.

Unsolicited advices and encouragements are things that I just can't feel bad about. More often than not, I know these are just the things I need. And also, more often than not, these are just the things we need but hate to admit it. I feel lucky to be surrounded with people who are always ready to give a helping hand or even just to show that they are around reaching out to you, whether near or far.

big daddy

2006-09-01T03:25:00.000+08:00

Good things just happen, you'll never see it coming.

I was afraid a feeling so great won't come my way twice. After Shiela, I never thought that it could just be possible for me to be happy with someone else. But I realized it could only be possible if I let myself be loved. I know I even said that I will never love the same way again and I knew I was right. I could give so much more.

Timmy came into my life in the oddest of times. I didn't even have the slightest idea that we could ever be together. Aside from her status and the 5-year gap, she was just the most unlikeliest person to be my girlfriend. In the beginning, I thought I was just enjoying the time. I was just following whatever happened next. It was Rico who told me to why not give it a shot since I wasn't hitting for other girls at the time and things have gone way too deep since. Now, for the second time in my life, I think I am in love.

Timmy

Timmy and me

It was her niece's birthday when I met her kids, and even with Jules and Donna around with me to sleep-over, I couldn't believe it was harder than meeting any of my ex-girlfriends' parents. I knew it was a defining moment for the girls, and so it was for me. I didn't know exactly how to act in front of them as thay observed me silently with their beautiful young eyes. I'm not really sure if they were aware that I am their mom's boyfriend until I woke up beside them while Chzny, the eldest, was teaching her younger sister, Chlzy to wake me up by calling me 'Daddy'. It was the first time in my entire life that someone had called me that, that I didn't need an alarm clock to get up. For a split-second, I thought I zoomed into the future, having a child with not just one but two! I almost cringed at the thought, but I was truly elated that they were on the process of accepting me.

It instantly became easier for me to deal with the following incidents that they called me Dad. I'm not sure how to describe how I feel everytime they do that, but I know I have already accepted them, too.

I know we've only just begun, and right after Chzny requested me to come with her in their field trip, which I unfortunately can't grant because of my lab class, we've got plans laid out to go out like a big family's supposed to and I just can't remember the last time I felt so excited.

puddle in the mud

2006-08-09T18:30:00.000+08:00

It's been only five days since I left work. I knew I would be terribly busy since, but I never thought I would be this drained - mentally, physically and emotionally drained. It actually feels like I've been more tired now than when I was doing both my work and my school. One moment the situation's totally fine, only to be inversely proportional on the next and become much much more complicated than the reversible process formulas in my Thermodynamics class.

God, I wish I could do stenography.

Looking at the brighter side of things, I'm beginning to pass my quizzes. And as I try myself not to be mis-diverted, I try to keep myself hopeful and believing that I could pass all my subjects this term that in spite of all that's happening in my personal life right now with my relationship with my girlfriend, my friends and other people that at one point or another had mattered to me, I somehow try to remain collected.

I've learned long ago that people need to leave something in order about themselves while everything else is turning turbulent.

kilabot signing off

2006-08-05T21:55:00.000+08:00

It was my last night at work last night.

And this is the part where I should be saying my goodbyes and looking back to the fourteen months I've been with ICT. But saying goodbyes was never my expertise and though there are a lot of things to look back on to my very first corporate experience, I feel very hollow inside right now.

Above anything else, what really matters to me is the friendships I made during my stay. If there will be something I will truly miss about my work, that will be the friends that I've left behind. Of course, I'll be sure to be meeting them again in the future, but it just feels like a big change that we will no longer be going home together in the wee hours of the morning, we will no longer be complaining together that we haven't had much sleep the morning before, we will no longer be having lunch together at midnight, we will no longer be singing together over at Providence after work until the sun goes up, we will no longer be ogling together about our skimpily-clad officemates, we will no longer be laughing together about our grammatical errors and mispronunciations during our calls and also, we will no longer be cursing together our payroll. These habits will surely never disappear, the only difference now is that I will no longer be sharing these habits together with them.

On the other hand, this is one of the very few moments in my life that I felt I've done the right thing. There's no mistake in that. I know I should be giving priority to my studies right now because I'm not getting any younger. A part of me feels overwhelmingly elated that finally I've decided to focus on my studies, however, a part of me feels sad, that I'd be leaving my office and all my friends back there. I always knew that at one point, this time will come and maybe the time is now. I'm moving on, and moving ahead.

Kilabot, as Coco fondly calls me, is now signing off.

the perfect gift

2006-07-15T02:10:00.000+08:00

I just filed my resignation letter minutes ago. Of course, it came as a long and slightly hard decision. ICT has been the very first company that hired me and I will forever be grateful for that. I have also made good memories here that I will surely keep.

About two weeks ago, I was really upset with my supervisor about my schedule, which somehow helped me made the decision, but after I sent in my resignation letter, I think I wouldn't want to think about that anymore. When I look back, I want to see my colleagues as the people who have helped me deal with my first job and as the friends I made, and will always have.

Up to now, the biggest thing that affected my choice is my school. For another time, I failed the last two remaining subjects I had, having dropped the other one a few weeks earlier. I came to a point where I think had to do something (did you say "just now?"), and I know this is the only way. Now, I won't have an excuse to keep myself from studying real hard and I think it's high time I get the focus and concentration I always needed but either refused to or completely never had. The perfect gift I get for my birthday this year is the gift I give myself.

In retrospect, I talked about the things I wanted to achieve when I entered the call center industry more than a year and two months ago. All I wanted was to prove something. To prove what I can do when I really wanted it and to prove that I can make people proud of me because of what I am and not what they think I am, which most of the time I am not. After my stint, I think I've somehow gained the respect and the good feeling of getting credited for the things I rightfully deserve. I'd like to believe that I have somehow served my purpose. After this, I think I have been able to show my parents that I can do something without anybody's help and that I can stand on my own. On the other hand, I know I have yet to prove that I can finish my studies and that's what I will try to work on right now, and hopefully with my undivided attention.

Speaking of my birthday, it will be in a few hours and as of this moment, there is no sign that a celebration is about to happen. On the contrary, things are getting a bit devastating that leaves my forthcoming birthday unnoticed. Just yesterday morning, a cousin of Papa was stabbed to death a few blocks away from my house. It is now under investigation and I was not allowed to go home after work, which ends every midnight (compelling me to stay again at the employees' quarters). Of course it would be selfish of me to still think about myself but with the expected unannounced arrival of visitors tomorrow (which will still be the 15th, but being the Saturday), I think I'll be needing Muriel (who incidentally, also had her birthday a few hours ago, July 14) and my other friends to help me do the cooking. I think my parents will be too busy by then. I just hope we do the spaghetti right.

carpe diem with big momma

2006-06-30T01:52:00.000+08:00

What Timmy and I are having right now is not something I ever asked for. It's neither something I'd rather not want to have. I'm happy being with her and I guess that is what really matters now. I know in time she'll get tired of this, just like everyone else did, but I'll just take everything as it comes until then.

My birthday is in two weeks and nothing has been planned just yet. Every year, I have certain wishes for myself only to forget whatever it was the following year. Right now, I think I have lost the will to do wishes. They don't come true anyway, most of them at least.

an opening

2006-05-30T01:17:00.000+08:00

My hopes of getting to Cebu are completely doomed. The organizer of the Isuzu Fiestacular, an event where I sidelined as a facilitator for all the saturdays of last month, Brand on Demand, didn't text me again after our last stint in North Avenue, QC. The supposed Cebu spectacular was dated May 20. Earning 700Php a day was highly acceptable if we were chosen to come with the group, but I guess they have found out a way to get their own PA's in Cebu even if it was us who were already masters of the trade after three consecutive events. I wished they didn't promise us the project, leaving me and my classmates, who came with me, baffled after not a single text was received by any one of us.

On the lighter side, I have finally reached my regularization in my job last May 26. Who could've thought I could last a year? Out of 14 who went to training in my batch, only three were left. Kat, who is now with the Equifax account, Armi with Washington Mutual, and finally me, with Chase Home Mortgage.

After all the confusion, yes I am now with Chase as my previous program, Dun and Bradstreet, where I stayed for almost a year, transferred to the new ICT branch in Marikina. I could've been titled now as a telebanker if we (part-timers) pushed through with the training for Washington Mutual. The superiors pulled us a out a week after we've started upon realizing that there are no available slots for us, thus we were transferred to Chase.

Now, being with Chase is not the only new thing. I have opened up myself to a new, but complicated relationship once again, I've been seeing Timmy, an office mate, exclusively for a while now. But here's the catch: she is a single mother of two.

What we have is not something that happened overnight. As she put it, she had a hard time in getting me, taking her about 2 months for me to notice her. And what amazes me is that despite the situation, I am happy with what we have right now. She says we should live for the moment, and that's what I've been trying to do since we've begun.

nothing has changed

2006-04-28T16:08:00.000+08:00

Before last term ended, I have come to realize and accepted the fact that I couldn't continue my job along with my studies. I have taken my already poor performance in school to the extremes and I can't continue sacrificing my studies anymore and I always knew that at one point I would have to choose between my work and my school. Call me stupid, but I almost filed for a Leave of absence, not in the office but in school.

I remember writing something like 'With only few units this term, I know things will be easier for me' once. And looking back from now, I can't believe that I have been able to say the word 'easier' when not a single term in Mapua, since I entered the High School back in 1996, had been really easy for me. Every subject I passed was a hard-earned 'tres' in my report card and no matter how long I have been repeating it, I know I somehow deserved to pass, even not because of my intellectual abilities but most of the time, plain familiarity of the course.

One of the reasons why I almost did choose my work over school is because I will be shifted to a regular employee exactly a year after I was employed, that would be this May. But that is just one of the reasons. When I think about it, I have been keeping an above average performance in my work, my name is almost always one of those with the highest ratings in our monthly productivity scores. I can even say that this is what I can do when I really wanted it. Nobody knew how much it mattered to me, I was never in the Top 10 in school in my life.

I don't understand how I can be so good in my work and not in my school when I have been studying almost everyday of my existence compared to my 10-day training with my job. Sometimes I even think that this is the only thing I will be ever good at and that I haven't really learned anything in school, that I feel so dumb.

I tried to persuade my parents to let me stop for this term. I even organized a swimming party with them and some of my friends, funded by me to show them that I can give more if I shift my employment to full-time. It was supposed to be a surprise, but I was actually the one more surprised when none of my parents were able to come. I had to address the matter directly to my mother. The night she, and my father had a fight was my chance. I took advantage of the moment. I knew it was going to be a long discussion and I came prepared with the pros and cons of my gracious plan. She was crying at that time and I didn't expect that the prospect of higher compensation if I shifted to full-time employment fitted the situation. They were fighting about money again and I didn't have a hard time to make her say yes.

Then it dawned to me. I was still scared of the idea of not finishing school. For a few weeks before the start of the summer term, I was already preparing myself for the big change. It was going to be the first time I'll be out of school since I entered kindergarten, but I wouldn't be having a diploma and a toga with me. Not yet at least.

In the end, I have only been able to get 6-units for this term because I was one of the late enrolees. I figured I didn't need to resign after all. Right now, I'm still in school and I still have my job. Nothing has changed... really.

brush with death

2006-03-02T14:01:00.000+08:00

I got stranded on the elevator in between the 19th and 18th floor of the RCBC Plaza Tower where I now 'live', this morning. It was one of the longest 20 minutes of my life and in spite of the recent reports of people who got killed from lift crashes, I managed to stay calm with 5 older men along inside. The look of terror in their faces assured me that I was not the only one who knew about the reports. Every move we made inside the lift caused the whole thing to dangle which reminded us that we are floating in the air and any belt malfunction could be fatal. Damn it was so scary that not even the voice of the woman we buzzed convinced me that everything will be fine until I was back on the ground. I tried to stop it but while waiting for the rescue, I imagined those people with me inside their coffins and I was sure I would be inside one too, if that happened.

I thought it would be really sad that I haven't even been able to update this journal if I died any of these days so I decided to find time today in case something like that won't be a false alarm the next time.

Apparently, things have been really toxic for me. Since my father accepted the post as the new Barangay Police head in our place, we've decided that it's better for me to stay at the RCBC after work since no one will be there anymore to wake me up every morning if I still go home, my body clock has always been in a dysfunctional state in my own bed. I sleep at the quarters on the 18th Floor and every afternoon after school is the only time I get to have to see the house and my dogs and also to deliver my laundry and change or even catch a nap at times. Aside from the bitter fact that I am forced to bring a huge gym bag every day, making me look like an undergrown and overweight athlete, to fit all of my things, the new set up was actually easier for me since my school was only one bus ride away but my own house is becoming more and more of a stranger to me.

January 29 was my Ate Pot's birthday, the first time she celebrated it away from home. It must have been really hard, I know. My parents and I spent that day with another of our family members we haven't been able to see for a very long time, My half-siblings Albert and Arlene. I spent the whole afternoon playing with my two little beautiful nieces by Kuya Al who at an early age, both seemed to love the camera and they really look good in pictures! The visit was an invitation long overdue that we have only been able to grant and basing how my brother looked that day, I bet he was very happy to see Papa again with his kids.

Aubrey and Yvette, my cute little nieces.

My half-siblings, Albert and Arlene

With my parents, and Kuya Al's wife, Jane.

SO MUCH FOR A VALENTINE'S DATE

February is of course the love month, and it is not the first time that it passed while I'm single. I didn't actually feel bad about it but it's only annoying at times to be constantly reminded of what I'm missing right now. On the actual week of the Valentine's, everyone seemed to know nothing else to ask but "Who's your date?" so after I went to Bon's son's Christening (yes, he ended up with Rems), I asked one of the ninangs, and an erstwhile crush, Apple, former Ms. ME, out which turned out to be one of my biggest mistakes.

She brought along two of her friends, jeopardizing all of my plans for the night. The supposed all night trip to the Euro Star was relegated to a 2-hour pizza dinner for four. Though right before the dinner started, I knew already that I will never ask her out again, the abrupt change in plan was not what made it a mistake. A couple of nights after the dinner, Daren, a common friend and one of the girls she brought along, texted me that Apple is mad at me. The date (though we both refuse to call it that) came about after Apple and I made a deal. From my memory, I remember Christian, another common friend, telling me somewhat in a playful manner, that Apple is the kind of girl who won't go for a Mechanical Engineering guy because he said she already knew what kind of people we are. I asked her if it's true and she demanded me to tell her who said it, she said she won't tell anyway. After the dinner ended, she texted me (the only time we actually did talk to each other that night, it almost turned out to be my dinner with Daren, not her) again demanding the answer. I told her but didn't knew she would make the issue so big.

She confronted Christian, and of course, he denied it ever happened. Now Apple is accusing me of trying to destroy their friendship and wanted me to talk to them face-to-face. I already talked to Christian but he's adamant that he didn't say what I said he did. I defended that I told Apple even before we went out that he might not remember because it was not something we really sat down and talked about, it only came in passing.

There was nothing he said that made me take back what I said. The two of us compromised that we should just let this thing pass and forget it happened since with only my memory against his word, we can never prove anything out. I messaged Apple that we need not do the face-to-face anymore since it is leading nowhere. I didn't care anymore because I wasn't planning to see her out again. I apologized to what happened to Christian and her (though they're ok now) but did not take back what I said up to the last minute. But she seemed to have already waged a war against me. She's blown this thing out of proportion and had other people involved now. The thing had lead to one issue to another, it's getting crazy. I stopped texting her now, also at Daren's suggestion but she still presses that if I'm really sincere in apologizing to her, I should talk to her in the face. Wtf?

NATURE'S OFFER

Right after I learned that my parents will go to Baguio on the last weekend of February, I contacted the Silversoul and invited them for an all night movie marathon/pizza party over at my house. The glorious plan was drastically cancelled after the Philippine president declared the State of National Emergency (?). Papa decided to be left behind since we live at the core of the Fort Bonifacio. I had an option to either stay at the house with my father or go to Baguio with Mama and her Nurses' staff. The answer had been rhetorical. At the last minute before we left PGH in Manila morning of February 25, one of the slots in the van was left vacant after one of the staffers backed out. I called Julius up, who was pestering me the night before that he wanted to come, and told him the good news.

After more than a decade, it has been the first time again that I set foot in the Summer Capital of the Philippines. I don't actually remember how it looked then (I only see them in pictures now) but the place is still noteworthy just the same. I only recalled that it's colder there then than now (Global Warming). We tried to go to all the places Ranna messaged me the night before (she actually seemed more excited than I am). The Lion Head, The Palace, Mine's View (I bought a cowboy hat, a knitted bag matching Julius', strawberry wine for Darelle, and some delicacies), Botanical Garden, a convent which name I don't recall and the Burnham Park where coincidentally, the Flower Festival or the Panagbenga was being held, which we were only able to see on the next day.

We stayed at a faculty camphouse inside the Philippine Baptist Theological Seminary that night. The place was really great. It's like we're no longer in the Philippines. There were pine trees and all green everywhere and surely I loved the weather! It's not everyday I could run in a sweatshirt outside and still feel my hands numbing in cold. Jules and I had a room for ourselves with two beds. We could only hope that we have taken the people we have wanted to come with us.

Did Ranna say Brokeback Mountain? (On the night we were at the camphouse, Ranna, taunting me, texted me this: "No two men can stay together, only once in a while. - Brokeback Mountain)

At the great Botanical Garden.

Our group went back to Burnham Park the next day where we caught a glimpse of the Flower festival. The floats were really good though we have only seen 5 out of the 21 participants. I enjoyed watching the young people who participated in the parade with drums and bugles and all. It was a very colorful extravaganza, purely Pinoy. We headed next to La Trinidad, Benguet where the Strawberry Farm is. The price tags of the strawberry wines there did not make my mother smile though, it costed less 30% of the wine we bought at the Mine's view Park. It was the first time I ever saw how strawberries are being planted and it was such a nice experience. At the tourist depot on the side of the farm I bought all my teammates in the office penis-figure keychains. I'm sure they all liked it. LOL. Before we left, I noticed the fog was just going down to the farm. It was a little late I guess, I really wanted to know how it feels like to talk when you see your breath smoking with air.

At the Burnham Park with Mama. One of the last floats of the
first day parade behind us.

The Flower Festival

The Strawberry Field

Picking strawberries.

Our last stop in Benguet was the Chinese Temple. We are with old people who were already too tired so we left right after we have taken pictures. On the way back down, we stopped over the infamous Lion Head, took pictures again and left. We proceeded to the Our Lady of Manaoag Church, the supposed first destination but the driver didn't know. We paid respect, did a last minute shopping on the corners of the church before finally heading back to the real world.

The Chinese Temple

With 'kaibigan'. (One of the nurses' kid who
kept calling me and Jules, his 'kaibigan')

At the Lion head on the way down.

The last stop which was supposed to be the first. Our Lady of Manaog church in Pampanga.

One professor of mine said that we should keep up with our social life no matter how busy we are. I didn't know that it also gives such a different feeling when we keep in touch with nature. It sends off a rejuvinating vibe and a refreshing feeling like it's an all new you. Maybe it's in the weather or the environment, but whatever it is it feels great. I knew I fell in love in Baguio when I was a kid and I think I fell in love with it again. Ttfn!

ironic drawback and the lessons learned

2006-01-10T15:08:00.000+08:00

Like I always say, I was never really good in saying goodbyes. The single thing which makes me and my life simply erratic right now has just ended. I know I should be glad because I can live peacefully now that I am again just like everyone else, (read: Normal). Although I'm used to meeting people only to lose them right after getting laid with them, or being in a dysfunctional relationship which I know would never last a month or so in the first place, this time my adventurous lifestyle has taken its toll on me.

I was hurt. And it's because of a reason I can't seem to comprehend. This is the first time something just like this has affected me this way and it is simply ironic that I have always believed myself adept in this kind of oddly trade. The only thing I can hope from now is a friendship I could always be proud of - out of the relationship no one ever knew existed.

It is the 10th day of the new year and things have just been fine for me. Nothing fatal nor really great happened so far. I was able to get 12-unit load for this term after Mr. Larion finally passed me in the Design class. Thank Heavens, Armi's efforts had paid off. The ferocious Madame Noche on the other hand, didn't spare me the '3', mainly because I, along with some others, were not informed about the remedial exams a day after we have taken the finals thus we were not able to take it. But that's fine, I wanted to start the year positively. I'm taking it up again in her class though most of the students always knew that being enrolled under her is like being given a death sentence. As if there is someone else handling Engineering Eco. Right now, I can only try to do better and hopefully get pardoned this time.

Glancing back at 2005, I think the greatest thing it has taught me is that we, make our own lives. I have had, somewhat forcibly, first brushed with independence and responsibility when I began my first job as CSR last May while I'm still in school. It was the year I had to make the biggest decisions in my life. I've realized that while we may have the very best of friends or an ever supportive family, at the end of the day, it is always the single person in us who can have the last say and completely decide on the path we wish our lives to take. It has also taught me that it is only myself who is responsible for whatever things and consequences I have to take because of my actions and I am the only person who has the power to screw my life up forever or get the most out of every single moment of it.

I remember that line in the Spiderman movie: "This is the time of your life where you become the man you would always be for the rest of your life, so be careful of what you become." I'm not sure but though it really sounds scary to me, I know it is something everyone must have to go through. I have always been the kind of person who depended the big decisions for myself to other people, I was often scared deciding for myself alone. Now I know it's high time to make a difference. Others my age have already began carving out their lives ahead of them and I know it is long overdue that I should start doing mine. After all, I am not yet the person I want to be for the rest of my life.

Now a last glimpse of the last month of the year that was 2005...

December 17 (coincidentally, Papa's birthday), prepping up for
the Exodus (Papa's association) Christmas Party with Muriel and Anette.

At the Exodus Christmas Party held in the Camp Aguinaldo.

With Mama and Jules.

Headed next to the Eastwood City, and these are the only clear
pictures we managed to have. Need help from the Photoshop.

Christmas evening, Muriel with her sister, Daizel and
our friend Mape dropped by the house.

December 28, Anne's sister, Nerissa tied the knot with her
boyfriend whose name I don't remember.

At the reception. We are the only people from
the Silversoul (me behind the camera) who were able to come.
Santy, Cathy(Deborah), Anette and Marvin

I realized I also needed to be in the picture.

patching things up and more

2005-12-15T13:26:00.000+08:00

Finally Margaret and I have been able to patch things up. A few weeks ago, I have decided to remove her from my links after I learned that my suspicions were correct. She was intentionally avoiding me and that was because she thought I would try to make a move on her. Not that I didn't like her, but I already thought that she was my friend and I never planned to court her or anything.

Saturday of last week, over at Jet's place where there had a little celebration that Jet have been saving for- for months, (No, it wasn't a birthday party, not even a graduation party. It was a why-are-we-here? party, nobody had an idea what was the celebration for) , we had the chance to ask each and everyone who'd come from ICT (Coco, Kat, Nix, Marge and me) not-ordinarily-asked-questions and she asked me if she had hurt me in anyway. The question strucked me for it was the first time we actually talked in about two months. I told her, she apologized and now things are fine. She is going to live in New York in a few months and maybe she didn't want to leave any unfinished business behind. Now, I've decided to put her name back on my list.

Another is with my Aunt Nancy, Mama's youngest sister, who have been very distant (literally and figuratively) with me since she moved to Wisconsin when we were little. I inadvertently passed her my blog and web address (I use them as my signature) after I sent her a forwarded e-mail, which gave her way to read through my journal which also contained how I felt about her. In a way, I felt that she was hurt after reading it and she tried to explain her side and now things are fine as well.

In both cases, communication has been the key. I admit to the fact that I frequently close myself to other people especially when I'm mad, including my past girlfriends. I'd rather keep my sentiments to myself than let it out. It's been almost two months since the last time my closest bud, Julius and I talked. Nobody knew what's happenning and nobody asked.

This closure from other people leads me to where I always end up- being alone. For other people, this may come as a shock because I'm rarely literally alone, whether in school or at work, but Silversoul has always been my family and haven't been able to be with them for a very long time now makes me feel alone all the same. There are times I enjoy the feeling but most of the time, I miss hanging out with my friends - and that's where I'm good at, I have the capability to entertain myself with other things just to let the urge of calling any of them pass. Even when it takes me to the wrong side over and over again.

What kept me from posting here was not merely because of my unsuccesful Final exams which ended yesterday. (Did I say having only two subjects this term will make things easy for me?) nor my job, which is the only thing left to blame why I don't do good in my studies aside from myself. It is because of the nature of the things that recently happened to me. Things that I am not sure I'd be ready to divulge publicly.

My erratic behavior had taken its most extreme turn. It has taken me to as far as Sta. Rosa, Laguna overnight and even to a passenger seat of a Mandaluyong police car. I could've enjoyed free media publicity and free lodging in jail if not for a P10, 000 cash (not from my pocket) . I am not talking about one incident here.

Just imagine how my blog will appear if it would seem like a collection of cryptic messages. I found it senseless to have a journal if I can't say everything I think about, I even considered to stop which would also mean that I wouldn't be able to publish this as a book later in life when I become succesful, if ever that happens, so I changed my mind. Maybe when that time comes, I would be able to disclose what is really happening right now.

Now here's something I can tell: Last Sunday was the ICT Christmas Party held in Baga Berde, Roxas Blvd. It turned out to be fun though not all of my team mates came up. Keith Martin and a new hot singer, Mocha came with a surprise appearance. Though the food's not that good, the booze was all over the place, even Armi who don't usually drink helped. She ended up throwing up, cancelling the after party-videoke that she herself planned.

Keith Martin, overjoying the call (center) girls.

Unrotated. The call boys, rocking Baga Berde.
(Jet, Jam, Me)

No one can ever stoop down to Mr. Larion's level. It's too low for anyone to be able to. He's one hell of a monster and I resent the fact that we're all helpless under his belt. Grudgingly, I joined the list who paid him p1700 yesterday before the Finals through an 'asset'. I had no choice because after two sleepless nights of finishing my notebook compilation (at the expense of not reporting to work) for his class, I miscalcuted the time so I have not been able to bookbind it and meet the deadline. It was a good thing to have friends like Armi around, who came to my rescue. With no sleep whatsoever, she rocketed to the school and lend me money impromptu, at my plea. She, by the way, picked me in our exchanged gifts and gave me two CD's; Green Day and Sugarfree's album! Yay! I, on the other hand, picked Timmy who wanted to get earrings organizer. I didn't know where to get it so I gave her a huge Sponge Bob instead. I was glad that her girls liked it.

Clueless to what will happen next and how to end this entry, Christmas will be next week and I just hope that I will be lucky and get to have that Merry Christmas this time. I'll keep my fingers crossed.

my journey

2005-11-23T12:42:00.000+08:00

In my vision, I see me
All alone but free
With the changing of time,
Every moment is mine.

The paradise I see
Will be mine and just for me
Nobody to care
And nobody would care.

I walk past the trees,
Run through the hills,
Drink from the river,
so cold, it makes me shiver.

I can see the flowers,
blooming wildly in the bushes.
I can hear the birds sing,
it wakes me when I'm sleeping.

But in the night I see,
I am alone and I'm lonely.
As the moon peeks at me,
I feel the coldness shattering me.

I walk the trail,
For I shall not fail.
I can feel the woods,
creaking through my veins.

I know there is somewhere,
and someone will be out there.
For at the end of my journey,
someone shall be waiting for me.

/s315. Mapua Institute of Technology
/2003 March 05

in spite of the erratic lifestyle

2005-11-21T03:49:00.000+08:00

My more than a month-long hiatus from posting an entry was not at all intentional. This is actually my fourth attempt in doing so and I am hoping that I can finish it this time. For the first time in my life, I can't seem to put my thoughts into words. Things have been drastically rough and tough so I supposedly have a lot more to say but I can't even start.

My sister, Annalyn, who have been with me all my life, left last October 29 to work and join my other sister, Arlene in Dubai. Sending her off in the airport, while she apparently tried unsuccesfully to look brave and calm, made me feel like an epoch in my life came to its end and perhaps another began.

I never thought it could be really possible that she's leaving until the last minute because I have never been able to imagine our house without her. The night of the day she left was the first for a very long time that I slept without her beside me. I shared the same bed with her almost my entire life and since she boarded that Cathay Pacific aircraft, I knew things will never be the same again.

Still trying to juggle my studies and my work, many people think that I do too much, but as always, that is not what's really hard, trying to do the good thing is. For my standard, I'm trying earnestly to do good in school but unfortunately, two of my quiz papers have been sent to ABET again-in the already familiar category of course: lowest. I think Mr. Larion is living up to what he said to me last term: He would make Design 2 really hard for me.

Take the case of our first quiz early this term. I went to his class about twenty minutes ahead of time to get to choose a good chair. I took the last row, the one by the window because it is common knowledge that we do the quizzes one seat apart. When he arrived, he began rearranging us again, squeezing me in between two students which made me on the wrong seat. Realizing this, Mr. Larion loudly suggested that I take the exams outside. Everyone was mortified but not more than I was. Everyone seemed to be half-expecting that it was a joke but the punchline never came.

Enjoying the stares and the interviews why I was taking the exams outside made by the students and professors passing by the corridor, Louie, Anne's disgusting boyfriend passed by who luckily was sporting his new camera. Taunting me, he didn't fail to capture the precious Kodak moment. Now, whoever said that it pays to be early in class?

humiliation defined

As with my work, I landed the second highest spot in our team's October productivity stats. At least, there are still things that I can be happy about. Last week, I did the groceries for the first time and it was really good that I can now share my blessings with my family. I heard my father earlier that day, obviously wanting me to hear that he was craving for a burger, when I came back home I gave him more than what he had asked for.

The feeling of making my family happy is what drives me to continue fighting my battle, especially Mama. She had always been and always will be my inspiration in making my slightly erratic life a sensible one. She will always be the reason for me to accomplish the things that I still need to and people like Mr. Larion and Louie will always remind of the demons I still have to conquer in order to do so.

standing up for myself

2005-10-17T18:13:00.000+08:00

Since I was a kid, I have always been a passive kind of person. I was never one of those athletic students nor one of the 'big' guys. Thus, there had been a couple of times that I have been bullied in school or even in my own neighborhood.

This somehow gave me the potential to be a victim of different kinds of abuses in this very nasty world. I have gone through a lot of these. I have been abused emotionally, mentally and yes, sexually- but that is not yet what I'm going to talk about now.

It has always been hard for me to say 'no' to anyone. Though I know something wrong 's going on, I always find myself being manipulated by other people (even by strangers) to do something I know I shouldn't. I almost always never have been able to stand up for myself. Say for instance, the jeepney driver has given me my change less than I should rightfully have, I tend to just let it pass or say, when I am in a group work and someone else gets recognized through my work, I also just let it go. I only get the chance to stand up when I see other people, especially those who are close to me, failing to get recognized for their work or getting 5 peso change when they had to get 10, or simply being unable to stand up for themselves. That's when I get the courage to do it, for them. It somehow makes me feel that I have also stood up for myself for all those times that I should have.

But something must be different about this afternoon.

A few minutes after Darelle dropped me off in front of Pier One in Buendia (I took a hitch), I hailed a bus that would take me to the RCBC. When I boarded the bus, at least three men stood up who seemed to be going down. I tried to squeeze myself to the right as I passed through to also let them pass but the first guy was blocking my way. I thought he was just waiting the bus to stop completely, but my instinct (as always) told me something was wrong. For a split second I turned and saw him passing something to the guy behind him and as though insinctively, I pulled the second guy by the shirt and caught a glimpse of my very own celphone before I shouted, somehow passively: "Manong, celphone ko po 'yan." Funny that I even remembered to respect him for his age with my 'po'.

After he gave me back my phone and after the three of them sprinted to go down, I became an instant celebrity inside the bus (hiding my knees which were shaking raucously) before I reached RCBC. The experience somehow gave me pride and such a great but unfamiliar good feeling of standing up for myself.

Almost lost you, buddy.

twisted family

2005-10-12T17:35:00.000+08:00

I woke up this morning as my father announced he was watching one of my favorite movies: Million Dollar Baby (maybe to lure me to get out of bed early). There I found him in the living room, with the TV on, Hilary Swank in action while he's reading his newspaper. Great.

My sister's been too emotional these past few days. She'd cry everytime she receives a text message from our sister, Arlene in Dubai. She was sending her updates about her flight to Dubai which had been moved from the first week of November to October 29. She's scared that it might be moved sooner again the next time Ate Arlene texts her. She asked me if I would also cry when we send her off, I said "Let's see."

I went to see Mama in the hospital today, the first time she reported for work after her Bakasyon Grande in Bicol and after Aunt Nancy and Uncle Jose went back to Wisconsin last Saturday. She was sniffing when I arrived and asked me loudly for the nth time: "Naninigarilyo ka ba?" I wonder what could've have happened if I said yes.

Coming home from work, I noticed a black thing under Hansel, my cousin's left foot as he was sleeping in his folding bed last night. I tried to get a closer look, thinking it was a roach. I've realized it was a black star he had apparently drawn while he was manning the store that afternoon. It must have been so boring. I know.

the new me

2005-10-08T18:13:00.000+08:00

After the tragedy strucked once more, I came to think about myself and the things that repeatedly happened to me. I tried to look back at the things I've done wrong and the mistakes I stubbornly always get fond of doing. Now I came to a hard but long overdue decision: I'm going to leave everything behind and try to start anew just as this new school term has begun (yes, Im still in school after another appeal). I've finally decided to let go of the things in my past that kept me miserable for the past three years and which also kept me from moving on. This time, it's gonna be the new me.

I came to a point where I finally got fed up of failure being a commonplace in my life. I figured I never got used to it and it seems that it's never going to get tired of me too so I better face it with a brave face than just wait for it to strike me right in the face once again. This time, I'll try to make myself a better person and I knew I had to start it with painful but rightful decisions.

And the hardest of that is finally letting go of Shiela. I always say that I needed closure between her and me, but I only say that because I know she won't do it and that I don't want her to. It was like she's keeping me as an investment that if I get to succeed later in life, she will pop out from out of nowhere and it would be easy for her to say that she has loved me all these times and pretend that she'd never really closed that chapter in her life. I'm not really sure about her tactics, but it is how it seems. Japan has made a different person out of her that practicality and no longer emotions dictate her actions and unfortunately, she had made an obsessed masochist out of me but this time I am freeing myself from being her slave. I have already hurt too many people in order for me to conceal what's really going on and it just got to stop. The Shiela that used to love me has died, a fact that I keep telling myself for the past three years but only got to realize it now. I also realized that the fiasco in Batangas where she cried after seeing me and Mench together was not caused by the mere fact that I seemed to have really moved on. It was because it had hit her ego to see me moving on.

The last time I went to her house with Jules and Muriel about last week, I waited for a sign which never came. I waited to see if there's still a spark of connection between her and me, but in vain. After two days of thinking, I've decided to do the closure myself. I sent her an eight-part text message and told her that I am finally moving on. I received no reply I never expected.

The next day, I had my head shaved. It was something I used to do every time I end a relationship when I was younger. It was only with her that I had to do it twice. Now, armed with nothing but just myself, I will move on.

My school has given me another chance to finish Mechanical Engineering. It was the first time for me to enter the Dean's office (along with the others who also received KO status) and promised myself that it would be the last. With only 7 units on top of me (I was a late enrolee so there weren't too many sections open and I was refused to waive the other subjects) for this term, this is going to be an easy start.

Now, all I need right now is the support from anyone who might still believe in me because this is going to be the new me, trying to mend the scars of my wrecked soul.

figment of my imagination

2005-10-04T18:05:00.000+08:00

I have seen no sign of life from Menchie since she broke up with me. I also never had the nerve to call her again or even try to explain why the hell Shiela's picture is posted on my Friendster account. It must have hurt her so much that I didn't do anything to win her back but it was because I knew she would try to hear out my lies and understand me again. I've treated her so badly I think I can never make her really happy. Out of those lies, one thing remains to be true and that one thing is the only thing I said she believed to be a lie. It is that I also loved her and I cared for her. She expressed her fury in the last line of the last message I got from her. She said she wished she had never known me.

I can't help hating myself for treating her that way. She gives love no one can ever match, and I know I would hate myself more if I stayed with her without any assurance that she is the only one for me. I have been brutally unfair for the past three years of that on and off relationship and I think it is with goodbye that I have been really fair with her. She needs someone who can promise her a love that's true and can be seen.

In the series of events, where Shiela, once again got involved with this whole thing, I can imagine myself holding on to Menchie on the edge of a cliff, half of her body's floating in midair. Then all of a sudden, Shiela materialized beside her, holding on to a rock, apparently as helpless as Mench. Now I have the power to choose who to save and who to let go. It was a very hard and painful decision and though Mench said she would understand, she was cursing when I finally let go of her hand.

As I watched her body disappear in the dark of the night, I began reaching for Shiela's hand but all I felt was the coldness of the hard rock she was holding on. It was then that I realized that it wasn't Shiela after all but a figment of my imagination. It wasn't Shiela that came back but the fantasy of being with her again.

Alone again on top of that cliff, I can't help feeling sorry for myself. As the gentle breeze of the midnight air chills my bone, it felt like that the loneliness hovering on top of me have finally found its way to enter my body again. Now there's no turning back, this is where fate have taken me and all I can do is face it with my false bravery and try to explore the horizon that lies below in the darkness of the night, alone as I wait for the rising of the new sun.

With Menchie
Last time I saw her was the first time you saw her here.

the vigils

2005-09-27T17:36:00.000+08:00

Aunt Nancy Vigil, my mother's youngest sister, and her hispanic husband, Uncle Jose arrived Friday afternoon from Wisconsin. They were the only remaining relatives we have there after Aunt Linda, the eldest of Mama's sibling, succumbed to brain cancer a few years back and after her caucasian husband, Uncle Nathan remarried.

Weeks before their homecoming, I have already decided to steer clear of their way in every possible way I can. I did eight hours work so that I won't be home when they arrive and planned to leave right after I come home to change. But my parents, who picked them up at the airport, didn't left me any money so I had to wait for them nonetheless.

It's not that I didn't like them, it's just that I feel they are complete strangers to me now after Aunt Nancy have ignored a favor I asked from her thru a letter one time when I was still in grade school. We we're really close then before she went to the States to pursue College because she took care of me and my sister and I was really hurt about what she did that I never forgot about it.

The intros went swift much to my delight. I have managed to stay out of any long-conversation with them to my father's dismay, who enjoyed watching me speak in English while I talk to them. I really wanted to leave right after that but at their prodding, I went with them to the Market! Market! and bought some stuff. At first, I was slightly taken aback when Uncle Jose asked me what I want but thanks to my irate clients, I have already been used to American's cold way of conversing.

Glory days are over, Don Felipe suffering from Alzheimer's. He was diagnosed with the disease after he lost a great deal of money in a partnership deal back in Wisconsin. He was said to be saving the money to fulfill his dream: Put up a gasoline station.

They bought me, Lael and Hansel new pair of sneakers each. I felt really grateful and wanted to offer something back. I tried to ask them if they already have Khaos anti-pollution device (which later I learned to be a gas-saving device, not anti-pollution) in their cars, that one made by a Filipino inventor which was reportedly being bought by the US for patent rights, and began thinking to buy them one. But after Uncle Jose began talking about SOH-whatever's and things about engines in the US that I have perfectly pretended to understand, I dropped the idea and refused to talk about it any further.

No, that's not Mayon you see. This picture was taken with the Mayon behind me. This is the view of the Mayon Loop from the top. Remember Picnic Grove in Tagaytay?

Saturday morning, we went together to Bicol and arrived there about past seven in the evening. The reunion was a little touching, the sisters cried upon seeing my grandfather, who is suffering from Alzheimer's disease, because he doesn't seem to be well taken care of. We hit the karaoke that night as I took the time to bond with my cousins whom I rarely see.

With my vacationing Aunt, Nancy.

Next morning, we went to the the grand Mayon Loop in Albay with the whole clan. It was said to be the closest tourist spot to the crater of the infamous Mayon Volcano, overlooking the whole town. We had our lunch there before we proceeded to Tiwi in search of the hot springs it has (or had) been famous for. We found out that the hot springs we we're looking for no longer exists after it has been taken on by a geothermal plant so we looked for Amater resort instead, a natural spring we have reached through Aunt Norma's memory. She recalled we went there back in 1988.

With my vivacious Lola Guadalupe and her always-stern-looking, sister.

It was the only time again since I was a kid that I enjoyed being there in Bicol with all of them. Everyone was so nice, not too much of the questions about when I will graduate came, so no rounding up of accomplishments was needed, and everyone seemed to just enjoy the time being together. It is not everyday that my family feels like what families ought to be.

My terrible cousins, with the great Mayon as a backdrop. Some things just don't fit. Hehe..

Much to my regret, I had to go back to Manila right after that for work. Leaving them at the resort, I took the bus with Lael and Hansel, who also had school, from Naga Monday afternoon. At 2 am, I am back to my workstation on the 19th floor of the RCBC Plaza feeling happy for the first time after a very long time.

The Amater resort. I just wish I had more time.

i told you so.

2005-09-22T12:57:00.000+08:00

This is the end of the first term of this year. I will have at least a week to prepare for the next term, if I will be able to enrol or if I would be readmitted again, that is.

Looking back, I think this has been the most perilous term for me in Mapua including my high school since 1996. And once again, I did not emerge victorious against the challenge.

This has always been me, I bravely put myself up to the test and rarely survive triumphantly. I always end up either half or brain dead and now I feel like a multiple-dead rotten animal.

My Aunt Nancy will be home from Wisconsin, with her husband, on Friday. And together with my family, we will go to Bicol over the weekend but I will be home before next week for work. I will also get to have the chance to have the eight-hour shift on the whole of next week and my coach, Tinx and Armi placed a bet if I could do just that.

One thing I still have to worry about is how to tell Mama about my Design 2 subject and my readmission status. Another test, after the other.. and the school's already over. Darn.

wasted

the broken trap

2005-09-20T09:09:00.000+08:00

I could already smell the familiar stench of failure. Things hasn't been going as planned again. Mench broke up with me yesterday after she found my picture with Shiela on my friendster account and I have already given up my Design 2 class.

At this very moment, my classmates are taking the Finals for that class while I couldn't get myself to show up there again after I have decided not to finish the notebook compilation Mr. Larion has required us to pass. I never knew what really happened to his underground deal but I've heard he had canceled it because the issue has been very much talked about this term.

I know it was already a losing battle and I would just be wasting my time if I would still take the exams, let alone giving Mr. Larion another chance to humiliate me in front of the class. I better be ready for my appeal letter for it is now as sure as I-will-be-late-again-for-work-tonight, that I would get another kick-out status at the end of this term.

However, there's s still one possibility that I might not need it just yet. Mama asked me the other day if it's okay with me if I don't enrol next term. She said she doesn't know any more where to get the money to get me to school. And all I do is screw up my studies... I am such an ungrateful son, I don't deserve anything.

If it happens, it's going to be the first time in my entire life to be out of school since I was four years old. Now, I'm not sure if I should be happy that I would be able to give my work more time or I should feel bad that I will have to overstay longer in school. But honestly, I'm still scared of the idea of leaving school without a diploma in my hands.

Barely a few hours after Mench broke up with me, I feel that I couldn't manage to look at her in the eye ever again. She's completely convinced that I have cheated on her-just basing on the picture she have seen on my friendster (I never thought she would ever see my account) and that is just one of the many reasons she could find to stay mad at me and I can never blame her for that.

serbisyong tutong

2005-09-16T11:30:00.000+08:00

Paging Mike Enriquez!!! Engr. Larion is indirectly soliciting P1500 for each student (on a rocky status) for the Design class. I heard he's done that for several times now, but more rampant in the other school he teaches at, Adamson University. Perhaps he'd sensed that it is more unlikely for him to be caught there because he himself is a Mapuan.

Now, I'm torn to giving in or not. Considering also the fact that I only have a thousand bucks left in my card. And more so, I've heard that there were incidents that a student had paid but failed the subject nonetheless. Pathetic. What if that happens to me? Now that he knows me more than any other student in our class after he clashed out on me just the other day, I could be a potential victim.

Jesus Christ. The Design class is a 4-unit subject and I haven't done good in it. And I have given that pig another chance to press me deeper. He's an opportunist and I wish he gets caught.

on the same ground

2005-09-14T16:51:00.000+08:00

I'm not sure which is going to kill me first. Either my school or my job.

I never had a decent sleep for the past five days and I have been struggling with time to keep both my work and my studies. Almost every night, anyone can see me running in the rain as if playing hide and seek with the star-spangled bus, PVP Liner, the only bus line that goes from Manila to Ayala Avenue. Too bad, I was always the 'it'.

In spite of my new Coach's efforts to keep my records clean, by moving an hour or so my scheduled shift every time so that I won't appear 'late', I'd already exceeded the maximum number of absences last Friday because,being the appointed secretary, I really needed an off to give time to make the Student Certificates for the Field Trip class. Thus, I received a memo from my ex-coach, J.Lo, now a supervisor, sending me on a final reprimand status- one step away to suspension.

I got severely reprimanded by Engr. Larion this afternoon. I came in thirty minutes late for my quiz in his class because I had to finish the Design plate also for him. I had a share of his fury right on the Dean's office where he was loitering, almost in affirmation that I'm flunking the subject. He threatened me in front of the whole class, that he would make things really hard for me, as if it wasn't just yet.

I know it's my fault once again. I knew I can't do the plate last night because I didn't have O.T. and instead of directly going home after work, I went with the other agents to the Cable Car, at their prodding, and flirted with Shiela over the phone (I finally have one again, paging hold-uppers!!). Engr. Anastacio once said that we should keep our social lives intact. I don't think that is what he meant by that, keeping pace with your social events while setting aside a school paper, but I think he meant that I should give my girlfriend, Mench at least a quality time, who I haven't been seeing and I have been taking for granted again, for almost three weeks now.

Next week, we're back down to hell again for the Finals and there's just so many things I still have to do, I'm not sure if I'm still alive by that time.

(dis)connecting people

2005-09-03T23:43:00.000+08:00

I went to work today two hours ahead of the time.I came in prepared with biscuits and coffee sachets for the Saturday O.T. The guards on the 19th floor of RCBC were stunned to see me there as I was not surprised to see that I was the very first agent to arrive. It was only a quarter past six.

Armed with Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (I've been rereading it, in the hope that Dumbledore's not going to die on the second read) and my coffee tumbler as I wandered around the RCBC Plaza while also taking advantage of the company phone all for myself.

Twenty minutes before 9:00 pm, I was still the only agent around, one of the guards asked me again if I was certain that we have work tonight, then I remembered Roselle telling me one time that they were being informed thru text if the shifts were canceled. When the clock strucked 9, I knew that I have made another stupid mistake.
Caused by this already shameful incident, one shameful thing has remained widely to be seen: I am the only agent on my entire program who didn't have a phone.

twelve days rail

2005-09-02T13:52:00.000+08:00

My sister is in seventh heaven. She has been going out with a childhood crush for a few weeks now after she finally ended her almost 5-year relationship with John. Though I've never really approved of him before, I can't help feeling sorry for John. He's already 31 and probably thinking about settling down with Annalyn but due to his lack of sense of independence and other unresolved matters, my sister had to make the decision, and though she's not closing her doors in true finality for him, I think that, basing on how she frequently asks me if she looks happy right now (I asked her to ask me without smiling), it will take a very long time if they will ever be together again.

A few days ago, I went to work feeling odd. I had the feeling that something wrong's gonna happen that night. I was on the last chapters of the Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince and albeit Julius tried to spoil Hogwarts again by telling me who's gonna die after I called him up during my break, it didn't stop me for feeling bad about it just the same. It has been a long time since the last time that a book has moved me, and if I didn't remember that I was finishing the book on the stairs of a bank entrance in Guadalupe at 3:00 am in the morning, I could've cried with Harry when Dumbledore died.

I have been denied my supposedly first quarterly bonus. My supervisor accounts it to my failure to reach the 80 percent grade in my scorecard. He showed me that I missed by one percent and it's a little bit frustrating that though I trying to work for eight hours for a couple of times now, I'm still the lowest paid in my team.

Some people are thinking that I should make a choice if I should stay with Mench or I try it out again with Shiela (she's in Cebu right now with her family so my life had been relatively peaceful here in Manila for the past fortnight). I know this is a crossroad, and I don't know which better path to take. After a few days of thinking hard, I gave up and now I'm letting things happen as it is. I don't want to push myself in making a decision if I'm not sure where it's going to take me. I've had my share of mistakes, and actually most of my decisions proved to be mistakes in the end, and I'm fed up with that. And as the old saying goes "Not everything that can make you happy is right for you", I'm trying to face life as it comes to me now, leaving everything to fate like I always did.

field trip class

2005-08-20T17:15:00.000+08:00

My field trip yesterday was utterly boring. I slept almost all the time during the trip while eventually trying to be interested with the book about ancient philosophers (Sophie's Girl) Ross has lend me. We were only 17 people inside the 60-seater bus, the other three sections opted to get crammed up together in the two 40-seater buses than to share with us, perhaps to have closer contact for their hard-liquor drinking.

We went to the Union Galva Steel in Laguna, where indeed most of us were already highly intoxicated, a galvanized roofing company and watched how galvanized iron sheets are, well, of course galvanized and for the other type, colored.

The next stop was the Lamoiyan Corporation, where the Hapee toothpaste is being made. Nothing new, I don't know if I should be proud but we were the first people to see the new Hapee commercial yet to be released and their model once again is Darna.

breakfast in bed

2005-08-10T13:33:00.000+08:00

After Jules told me the things he did yesterday afternoon, there was nothing I can think about but talk to Shiela. He said he had an intimate conversation with the girls when they slept over his house Saturday evening. They shared their secrets and Shiela, once and again made the most shocking revelation.

She said that after she saw the things that happened in Batangas and after she had seen for herself how serious Menchie and I now with our relationship, she came up with a decision. Since the Filipino workers in Japan are having a hard time going back there because of the problem with the new Japanese policy, she said she's thinking about accepting the standing marriage proposal of a 40-year old Japanese man. I know it might seem such a grave thing to think about but knowing her situation and knowing how many mouths she have to feed, it hurts to think that it could be possible.

And right now, I really don't know how I feel, I don't think I'd like to see her getting married to that man but I don't know if there's anything I can do about her family. This is a risky business and I guess Armie (a friend from work) was right, I am in a crossroad. The things that are happenning is making me choose between Shiela and Menchie and I don't think I can have the heart to hurt Menchie after how long she has waited for me and after beginning to be serious with our relationship just recently so. But the thing is, I know just what can make me happy.

When I got home last night, all I wanted to do is text Shiela through my sister's phone and ask if it's possible for us to talk. But she was still up when I arrived and she was flirting with a soldier who is in Mindanao over her phone. I waited for her to sleep but I did first before she did.

In the morning, I woke up to someone kissing me. I thought it was a dream but the first thing that I saw after I opened my eyes was her face... Shiela was there in my bed lying beside me, and Donna was at the corner of the room. They have been waiting for me to wake up and it gave me such a happy feeling to see her, I didn't want to get up. I wanted to stay there beside her for a very long time.

Until the doomsayer, my sister, came barging in announcing that my father might come home anytime and catch us all in the bedroom. I left them enjoying their conversation about pills and condoms while I took a bath.

I was again, thinking about not going to school, afraid that this might be the last time I could have the opportunity to be alone with her again. I waited for her in the terminal while they went back to Donna's home. I gave them 10 minutes, then 15, then 20. I remembered my Thermodynamics, then I went off. In the end, I got to school an hour late so I decided to go this computer shop and type this post instead.

together again

back in the game

2005-08-08T14:43:00.000+08:00

It was already past 6:00 am when we started our stormy journey to Batangas. The original meeting time of 3:30 am in Buendia was, of course, not followed which did not come as a surprise. The bad weather didn't surprise us at all either, but on the contrary, we were already expecting it. It almost never happened that the Silversoul went out of town in a good weather. Whether it be summer or any other season, our scheduled outings often gets stormed. But this time was way too over, and with Shiela and Menchie face-to-face, it was a typhoon.

Almost everyone, except Anette and Marvin were already there at the 7-11 Buendia when I arrived, from Cable Car with my office colleauges without any sleep whatsoever, and feeling greatly relieved that I have been saved from the awkward obligation of introducing Shiela and Menchie to each other again, after 3 years.

Trying to overcome the tension inside the van during the trip, I tried to act normal. And everyone was relatively well behaved, they seemed very careful in choosing the things to be discussed in front of the two to not cause any unwanted damage to the delicate situation we were all in, which after all was their idea. Not that I don't want Mench to be there, but they were the ones who invited her to come even if they know Shiela will be there, too.

I did what I thought I was expected to do, being sweet to Menchie as usual and all but not too much for I don't want Shiela to think that I was just trying to make her jealous and I also didn't want her to retaliate by treating the guy they tagged along, George the same way I was treating Mench. I didn't know that what I was doing was actually causing more harm than good.

Clueless of the right direction, we took the Cavite route, and with only the text messages from RJ to rely on, it took us ages to get to his place in Balayan, Batangas.

Jules, Muriel, Ian, Donna and Shiela (still sober) before they left Jules house where they slept over.

Upon arriving there, RJ and I immediately took off with his motorcycle to check out the prospective resorts, leaving Mench alone with the Silversoul. I had to take her phone with me to update them about my assessments of the resorts.

Drenched in the rain, our first and last stop was the Roponggi resort. RJ claims it was already the best one around but I was honestly disappointed upon seeing the beach. The waves were too strong, unsafe for anyone to swim on and there were broken trees and coconuts everywhere, brought about by the storm. I messaged Shiela's number about it (only the the two of them, ironically, have loaded celphones) and she called me 'Daddy' (a term of endearment she used to call me when we're still together) in her reply.

Save for the weather, it was almost the perfect trip. It was the very first time ever that we didn't have to face financial crisis and there were lots of food and booze enough for everyone, there was a videoke and the pools were almost all to ourselves. Even RJ, who followed a few hours later (because he said he had to cook) with his cousin donated the sumptuous menudo (not caldereta).

My dilemma began when I chose to stay with Mench in the swimming pool while Donna and Muriel were calling me to sing "My Boo" in the videoke with Shiela. In the end, she sang it alone and it served as a music background for me and Menchie fooling around in the pool. It was hard not to feel affected, but I had to keep a straight face.

In our flooded cottage (imagine Villa Escudero), and in my very first attempt to crack a joke about me and the two of them, in a picture together (in the hope of breaking the freezing ice) the typhoon was triggered.

I didn't know she really mind about Mench being there, I thought I was just overreacting, I thought she wasn't affected but to Mench's satisfaction, we saw Shiela broke down into tears by the pool. She cried in Donna's arms, and though I still don't know what it was about, it pained me to see her like that and the things that happened after that made me feel more responsible and guilty.

Shiela got so inebriated and began behaving raucously wild, to the surprise of everyone in the resort and to the delight of the male onlookers. She didn't mind every man drooling over her beautiful body while she became totally uncontrollable as she almost willingly exposed her thing. She looked like a troubled youth and it really felt bad that there's nothing I can do, with Menchie around.

What made it harder is that everyone seemed to think that I am the only one who can make her stop and with Ian's help, I momentarily got rid of Mench. I tried to calm Shiela down but she kept cursing me while running away everytime I come near. I was beginning to feel hopeless until I cornered her by the pool and she broke down again... in my arms.

With every gasp of breath she took, while she cried as the rain never stopped pouring, I felt her pain. I felt the anguish she was unsuccessfully trying to conceal and there she was, letting it all out. I hated myself for allowing it to get to this. If I only knew, if only she said something. If only she told me she still loved me, things could have been different from what happened because I know I still feel that way for her, too. Didn't someone say first love never dies?

As we trail back home, in that cold misty night, I can't help but go back to the time that we use to do this kind of thing before. Shiela was normally the one sitting beside me in that middle part of the very same van and she was not, as she is now, behind me with another guy. I can't stop wondering if she was thinking the same way even if she was probably kissing George.

Our way home took faster than how I wanted it to. I went down with Mench in Espana while the same group that slept over in Jules' house the night before went back to his place again. For one fleeting moment, I was tempted to follow them after I took Mench home but I remembered that just a few days ago, I promised her that I will be more serious about us, now. I guess Shiela was right when she told me when we were at the Cable Car that I wasn't being true to myself but couldn't it be a reasonable excuse that I'm just too scared of doing the same mistakes I've been doing for the past three years all over again?

Alone on my way home, I can't stop thinking about the things that had happened. I needed something to catch my attention to forget about it but it was just too strong, the diversion I wanted never came. I waited for two hours, walking around the Guadalupe but I only found myself feeling more alone and undecided about the things that I should do and filled with more questions than needed answers. I know what I want to do, but I can't figure out if it was the right thing to do.

Before I went to sleep that night, beside my snoring sister, there was only one thing I felt certain about: Shiela has brought me back again to that game she calls Love and I can't deny the fact that she still has the magic to make me fall all over again but this time around, things has just gone a little more complicated.

making up minds

2005-08-05T14:23:00.000+08:00

Nobody knows yet where we're going tomorrow. We had set a swimming outing for the Silversoul but we don't have a clear clue until now where we really are going.

Two days ago, it was Laguna, then yesterday it was Batangas and now it's undecided again. What makes it worse is that the others are backing out only to take it back a few hours later. We are on a tight budget so we need as many people as how many could fit into Santy's SUV which we have rented for 2300 bucks (He's a family man now, you know, he needs the bread). And now, with also the resort fee and the food to think about, we just can't make up our minds.

Rj, my friend from school, offered their place in Batangas. He is already to ask his father to cook caldereta for us but I still can't commit without the guys' approval and I still don't know if that caldereta would be enough to feed us all. Vanessa (also a Silversoul, Jules' ex), who now has a family of her own in Laguna, also has a similar offer and now we don't know which one to take.

The primary problem here again is the money, and some of the Silversoul are shamefully taking advantage not to give their share, expecting someone else to pay for them considering the fact that we have already planned about this weeks ago. I'm sure some of them are thinking about Shiela doing charity, since she's a balikbayan and well, everyone knows what's that supposed to mean, but I will never allow that to happen unless she volunteers on her own without any pathetic prodding.

With this financial problem at hand, I also have to deal with my emotional stress. This is going to be the first time Shiela will come face to face with Menchie as my new girl. The first time they actually met was when I was still with Shiela and Menchie was the other girl, now it's the other way around and I still don't know what to expect and how I should act in front of the two. Shiela, as I've heard is also taking a certain George (introduced by Donna) perhaps not to make the change more obvious.

read between the lines

2005-08-01T14:28:00.000+08:00

House sex - when you are newlyweds and have sex all over the house in every room.
Bedroom sex - after you have been married for a while, you only have sex in the bedroom.
Hall sex - after you have been married for many, many years you just pass each other in the hall and say "F*** you!"
Courtroom sex - when your wife and her lawyer f*** you in front of many people for every penny you've got.

- Sounds familiar?! Why do I feel you know where I got this?

ABET accreditation

2005-07-30T17:26:00.000+08:00

I have black circles around my eyes. I could feel I really look wasted and worn out. I even think I could now be a model for that vitamins commercial where people look older due to stress. I barely slept for the past two days because Thursdays up to Saturdays are the busiest days of my week. I have 9pm to 1am shift every Thursday for work then 7:30 am class the next day then the perilous Machine Design 2 class come Saturday.

With my really tight schedule, I really can't have the time to work on my Design plates or even review my notes. And now that I'm spending a little more time with my friends again, I'm sure to fail if I allow it to become a regular habit just like before.

Mapua (or Malayan) right now, is seeking accreditation from ABET, a widely recognized accreditor of college/university programs concerned with applied science, engineering etc. In line with this, the test papers of students for every quiz or examination are being classified from the highest scores, mid-scores and the lowest scores. Three papers will be lifted from each of the three categories every time and will be sent to ABET in the States and will be studied for the mean, median and mode blah blah.

While it is good to imagine my penmanship (which is a part of me) will be able to go to the States, I wished the situation could have been better. My paper was one of those handpicked by Engr. Larrion of my Design lecture class after the first quiz. He never announced in class which of them will go to the highest or the lowest, but after comparing my scores with some of my classmates, I know for sure I was one of the lowest.

hurdle of fate

2005-07-28T17:23:00.000+08:00

Menchie and I have finally decided to take our feeble relationship a notch higher last Saturday. I asked her if she was still happy with me, and I was devastingly shocked when she said yes because I don't really think we're getting somewhere (She's happy with that?!). I confessed that I don't feel that same way with her. She says we've been together for three years now but honestly, she's still a stranger to me. (Has anybody realized I almost never talked about her in my own blog?!) I know that I am partly to be blamed but I'm sure I always take the extra mile to know her more seriously, if not as a partner, as a friend at least and she knew she had an inkling I already feel that way but she still don't trust me you see. She says she's scared that I just might take her for granted if she lets me see how much she's really into me so she just chose to be just like that.

After a brief and calm emotional confrontation, and after I told her that I don't even know her middle name (to make her realize how much we're missing) and I was sure she doesn't know mine, too, I've finally convinced her that I'm ready to make something out of this thing we have and we settled for a compromise.

Then as fate would have it, only about 12 hours after, there she was again, -in the flesh and teasing my delicate weakness again.... Shiela. She's back. She arrived with Donna in my place, Sunday afternoon, a few seconds after Muriel informed me they would come and see me. Shiela said she's been calling me since she got back from Japan, but since my phone was stolen and she can't reach me, she looked for Donna's number instead who was at that time, enjoying her exile in Pangasinan, not Davao like I've heard.

Shiela took us all out for a treat that night, including my sister, Annalyn with permission from our parents who looked more excited than I am for her arrival. After wasting time going all the way to the Clamshell (WOW) in Intramuros, (since the place was almost deserted) we just had dinner there before heading back to Makati. We went to the Cable Car (reffered by my sister who, I didn't realize, knows a lot of gimmick places) near the Dusit Hotel and finally found a new hub for the Silversoul. It's got almost everything we need! Tako, Bilyar, Videoke at Songbook, Beer and nice food. The moment I entered that place, I knew that won't be the last.

I wasn't expecting myself to feel good with my barkada and my sister's watchful eye being around. That was the first time I've let her go out with us and it was fun. She jammed along and belted pam-birit songs with the Tres Mujeres (yes, Donna hit that I Love You Goodbye again).

Being there, I felt that I have been out of my senses once again. And I know I was taking Menchie for granted again for Shiela was acting like we're still together and I can't help being her willing slave. I didn't even mind kissing her right in front of my sister. I knew at the back of my subconscious mind, something's telling me that she's playing with me again, but the way she caressed my hand, the way she looked at me and the way she kissed me makes me feel otherwise. We did a few duets and the people there hugely applauded us after "Hanggang Ngayon". Very fittingly huh.

I hate it but I think Shiela still has the power to make me go insane. She was being very sweet but if this is her game again, I think I'm gonna play along and make sure to win, this time. DAAAAMNITTT!! I don't know anymore what I'm talking about. She is a total monster but I'm afraid I just might still love her.

Fast forward. Two days after, we're back at the same place again with Julius, minus my sister and Muriel. I called in sick for work just to be with them (or her) again. We did almost the same thing except for the finale open forum and the dares. At one point, Jules lost a bet and the consequence was she had to kiss Shiela, in my very presence. And watching him slowly leaning his face to hers, I was secretly cursing and telling myself that I'm in for no good with her if she lets him do that in front of me and that he's the monumental traitor if he would do it. And he did, they did... she did. She kissed my bestfriend. And who am I to complain anyway?! Game over.

joanne and margaret

2005-07-20T16:53:00.000+08:00

When I first entered the RCBC Plaza last May, I was looking forward to finding new acquaintances, new friends and probably someone new to get intimately connected with. I wasn't a bit surprised to find myself the only guy in my team (considering Nix as an exception again) for our training, I thought it to be an advantage that I'll be having all the girls for myself.

The first person who caught my attention was Margaret. She was seated with Mabel by a round table at the center of the 19th floor pantry, looking apparently excited as I am. She really looked sleek and decent and with her long jet black hair, she has all the makings of a beauty queen.

I was more than delighted when she sat beside me at the training room. And from hour one, I tried to know many things about her as I possibly can, noting her every action while trying to figure out an impression. At first, she seemed very child-like and doesn't even seem to notice it. She throws out statements which makes my jaws drop and which makes her really different from a normal 18 year old girl. She is also extremely friendly, greeting almost every person who passes by her in the hallway and eventually gave a name to the computer she uses for work--'Joyce'. While Margaret is really fun and great to be with she seemed to lack the independence and depth I thought her to have. But later on she proved me wrong, she made me realize that first impressions are too superficial to be relied on and cliched as it is, she has proven that she is more than just a pretty face.

Back to the training room, two girls came barging in the room a couple of minutes after the training proper started. Frances and Joanne. Late in the first day of job?!! What?! I even barely slept because I was too anxious to come in late!!! and now they don't even seem to care?... I never knew a lady in her proper state of mind would come in late on the first day of her first job.

Given that, Joanne, who arrived in a sexy modern-corporate outfit, already gave me an impression. She is a girl who do as she pleases. Independent woman, as they say. On that first day, when everyone else is trying to find a connection with one another, I found an instant connection between me and Joanne- cigarettes. And during our pot sessions, I had the benefit of knowing her a little bit well. I found in her the maturity and experience that there are so many things we were able to talk about. I didn't get the feeling of thinking twice before saying anything because I felt that there was an instant chemistry between us.

As the days progressed, I found out some interesting (even shocking) things about these two ladies I've been observing. I learned some things that made me look at Margaret in a different light. I found out from Ross that Margaret is an orphan. And that explains why she was too happy when we got our first pay while I was on the other hand, infuriated (she used the money to pay for school) upon realizing how small it was. Her mother died of bone cancer a year ago and her father left when she was little. More to that, she is a nursing student (doing interns at the very same Ward, Surgery PGH, where I practically grew up), a student officer, an activist, a UP Maroon Pep squad member and on top of all that, she has a scholarship to keep.

With all these things filled up on me, I can't help but wonder how she manages to do all that. She became my instantaneous inspiration and knowing her struggles (considering the fact that she's a girl and only 18) made me feel ashamed of myself for constantly complaining about my life when she has more reasons to do that and yet she still always have that ready smile on her beautiful face for everyone.

Joanne on the other hand, with my regular schedule of taking her home, became much closer to me. I figured out that I made a mistake when I said she was independent. And as she corrected me, she isn't. While they are of the same age, she has the tendency of being dependent by choice, and Margaret is independent by chance. Almost every night after work, she would call or texty her Daddy that she's about to go home. Her maturity is still intact though, but it gets shielded by her playful behavior which makes her look more child-like in a cute sort of way than Margaret. She is the kind of girl I would usually go out with and I admit that for one moment, I thought of having that intimate connection with her but she seemed already better off with her boyfriend who is in ehem Japan. And of course, (Damn, I almost forgot) I'm still with Mench.

Now that Margaret is sitting beside me after Jeff moved to another workstation and after 'Joyce' got broken, I regret to say that for no apparent reason, we have lost that connection we once had back in our training. There seems to be an invisible barrier between us which makes me feel like we are as far from each other as we are from our clients. Almost all my attempts of a decent conversation with her ended with close ended answers (yes/no), and I don't know why (the smile is still there though). I only think she must be really taken by our work.

Joanne (top) and Margaret (bottom), equally gorgeous, equally stunning.

birthday dismay

2005-07-18T18:23:00.000+08:00

I have always been good about mixing strangers. Silversoul is a living proof to that. It is actually a mixture of my different friends that clicked being together, thus our group was formed.

My belief that I have a capacity to do that ended on my birthday last Saturday. The Silversoul and I actually planned to go clubbing that night after dinner over my house (we had food leftovers, [thank god it wasn't rocking salt and used cooking oil mixed with soy sauce] because they're arrival at the house was supposed to look like a surprise visit, my family was stunned to see that I have visitors after I told them in the morning that I won't be having any), but I had to change that when Bon and Rj requested us to go to Bon's place instead. He promised me that we could do the videoke there, which is actually the reason why they agreed to come.

It was too late when I realized it was a mistake. Roy did a very unwelcomed comeback and the Silversoul felt unwelcomed there, too. There was just no connection between the two groups, and with Menchie and Bon's now-official girlfriend/live-in partner, Rem being around only added tension among the girls.

It felt more sad when someone said that it could have been better if we just stayed at my place. They said my father really seemed to want to spend more time with us and it felt really sad that I have been more concerned about spending my birthday with other people than with my own family.

In the end, the two groups somehow made it to meet halfway. They must have figured out that it was my birthday after all and they tried at least to put that 'Happy' word into it.

great find

2005-07-15T12:16:00.000+08:00

Flipping blogs, I've found this interesting stuff over at blogthings.com.

Your Blogging Type is Unique and Avant Garde

You're a bit ... unusual. And so is your blog.You're impulsive, and you'll often post the first thing that pops in your head.Completely uncensored, you blog tends to shock... even though that's not your intent.You tend to change your blog often, experimenting with new designs and content..

"What's Your Blogging Personality?

bilog ang mundo

2005-07-13T14:59:00.000+08:00

My parents could never be happier. I failed three subjects and my father is out of sorts again. Now, he wants me to resign from my job but I vowed not to, unless PGMA would go down from her post too, so he needs to go to Ayala Avenue and join the hunger strikers there to make sure that she will resign. But since he's a pro-GMA, I don't think he would do that. In this new term, which started officially Monday, I bravely took 13 units, despite the fact that I could be a candidate again for kick-out if my next weighted average would be anywhere lower than 2.9. Gosh! It's too much for me, but I need to take this challange and do good or else.. I'm gonna commit suicide, swear!

For the 5th and hopefully the last time, I'm taking Thermodynamics again (I wonder how many times I've already written that "I'm taking Thermodynamics again" line in this blog) and I'm back to the very first one who flunked me in that subject, Engineer Anastacio. He was smiling when he learned I'm in his class and told me "Bilog ang mundo." He thinks it was funny, but I think he's insane, I wanted to tell him he got food in his teeth.

I haven't been able to catch up with my friends lately. Jules asked me over the phone if I still have a life. Well, for my one-week off from school, my life focused mainly on my job. I'm getting sick staring at my computer screen (or more) every night but I know I need this job and I'm not going to let it go, not in the near future at least. It's a good thing I'm enjoying my colleagues' company, especially when I take Joanne home almost every night. She thinks her life is in danger going home alone at night and she's convinced us that someone must take her home regularly until she resigns on the 22nd of July (her deddy asked her to resign, too) and that someone must be a guy which means that should be me, considering that I am the only one in the team (setting aside Nix). Thank God she's pretty and she's vava-voom. Otherwise, she could have never forced me.

Our recording last week caused a permanent damage in my being. I did a really horrible rendition of Ogie Alcasid's Sa Kanya, I wanted to smash the CD right after it was recorded but after seeing how good we looked on the cover, I changed my mind. It was frustrating though that only four of us in the Silversoul were able to come (Jules, Annette, Muriel and I) and as a result, we still weren't able to tell them about Carl's money. Stupid Santy, on the other hand, showed up few hours after the recording, claiming that he was already in Robplace two hours before the assembly time, it's just that he wasn't in the meeting place (watch my eyes rolling with a sigh). We met with Mench at the Ayala Billiards later that night and gave me another disappointment for a reason I can't make public.

arrival of three

2005-07-01T15:46:00.000+08:00

Finally, my parents came home two nights ago. I could only heave a sigh of relief that they're back coz I don't think I could stand another day begging other people every morning for my daily 'baon'. I've realized this is the first time in my life that I've wanted them back home so badly.

They went back to Manila just about the time Menchie did. The bitch (kidding!) also went to Bicol without having the nerve to tell me. And also because I never called her up (and she has no way to reach me. He-he.) until last night. She brought some pili delicacies for me and Jules which he fetched from the salon were Mench worked (according to her it's odd that Jules have the time to drop by there while I never did, Ho-hum...).

My second pay has also arrived. I've already resigned to the fact that I can never make my salary to 4K because I am always late, if not absent and for the second time, I got the lowest pay in my group. This time, I have to do better because my third pay will be a day before my birthday. Yehey!!!

I don't have classes anymore and I'm sure as the sun will come that I'm going to fail several of my subjects (fingers crossed) AGAIN. I'll be with Silversoul again tomorrow. And hopefully, me and the gang could already get to do the recording and the pictorial (for our website) so I could finally tell them what I should, before I meet with Mench (finally) later in the night.

silversoul reunion update

2005-06-27T14:25:00.001+08:00

I met with the guys around 8 at the bookstore in Robplace Manila last Saturday. The scheduled meeting was actually 6 but since the heavens was pouring lions and wolves, nobody came on time. I was all soaked up and terribly LATE, and I only hoped Julius- who is the most crucial about tardiness- wouldn't make a big fuss about it. Only the ex-lovers, Muriel and Santy were at the meeting place when I arrived. Julius and Ian were strolling around somewhere while Anne and Annette (who was from her and Marvin's monthsary date) were still on the way. Donna, up to the last minute, can't be reached.

Because of the lack of time, the first two levels of my agenda which were, (1) a pictorial (since we never really had a photo op together and we needed it for the reconstruction of our website), (2) another music album (since our first and last CD recording was two years ago) were canceled. We have reserved a recording slot instead before we proceeded with the third which was the dinner over at Roasters.

The primary victim, Annette (enjoying a muffin from her ex's blood and sweat)

flanked by the accomplices Julius and Muriel

The pigs ate to their heart's delight without even knowing whom the money we used to buy the food, is really from. They thought it was from me all along. They didn't care less anyway as long as it's free. It almost felt uneasy that I suddenly became the center of attention but well, I always really did, but higher respect made all the difference. It was totally uncomfortable, it was like something I was never used to. They treated me of significant importance and add to that the fact that the credit should not be really given to me, I really felt like the biggest bogus on earth.

The fake (me) with the other victims, Ian (in uniform), Anne and Santy

After dinner, I really wanted to speak the truth but I can't because the 2 of the 3 schema we're not yet accomplished and we might not be able to if I did. Anyway Jules assured me that the sudden change of attitude I get is not by the mere fact that I already have a job (which they probably think is high-paying). He thinks that we might just already be at the growing up stage in our lives, which I have also considered logical.

On the course of the dinner, though we also talked about the good times and our childish fantasies again, the main topic of our conversation is about jobs. We probably have really graduated from the topics were one of us is the main center of amusement. There was little foolishness but just right humor all through the conversation. Sadly, no mention of Carl's name has been made...

... until we were on the cab (all 7 of us) on the way to the Ayala Billiards. Utterly interesting, that the mention even came from the unlikeliest person, Annette, who was sitting beside me on the passenger seat. We were talking about the good ol' days and she recalled a funny memory of her ex-boyfriend, Cha.

The men of honor

We tried to look for a place where we can hit the videoke before going home but all the KTV rooms at the Ayala were already occupied. So we have contented ourselves over beer and billiards instead. The night ended satisfyingly. No petty quarrels nor any kind of bull happened and not even the storm stopped us from coming. We even walked to the nearby Intramuros and ran together at the middle of the street in the dead of the night before we parted ways and finally went home.

The women of... I dunno', hehe..

My only worry now is, when do we tell them the truth?

chaos all day long

2005-06-24T03:07:00.000+08:00

My day had gone from worse to terrible. I got double zeros in a span of just 12 hours. One was for the take quiz I failed to submit and just now for my QA score after I had a violation while doing my calls.

QA is a monitoring scheme ICT uses for quality assurance blah blah. You get to have your calls monitored by a 'QA' randomly, and of all my calls, I got monitored to that one call where I commited a very silly mistake. It was actually one of the few decent calls I'v ever had and I don't really know what came over me to end the call just like that while my client is talking on the line.

Now I'm facing 9-day consecutive monitoring (source: Jeff, who will be permanently sitting with me while we're on DnB. He's 3-months older than me on the job but I doubt if what he said is true.) which might cost me my quarterly bonus if I don't do good. Talk about professional pressure.

ang taong hindi ako

2005-06-23T12:20:00.000+08:00

Ngayon ko lang naalala kung bakit ko ginustong magtrabaho. Ngayon ko lang naramdaman na hindi totoo ng sabihin kong 'trip ko lang' tuwing ako'y tatanungin. At bukod sa trabaho, ngayon ko lang nakita kung gaano kalaki ang aking pangangailangan.

Tuluyan nang hindi kinaya ng tindahan na buhayin kaming magkapatid at mga pinsan ko sa pag-alis nila Mama at Papa. Hindi ako nakapasok sa school para magpasa ng take home quiz sa ACDC dahil wala akong pamasahe. Kinailangan kong puntahan si Muriel para manghiram ng kaunting barya pandagdag sa natitira naming pera. Sa huli, nabuo ang singkwenta pesos na tama lang upang makapunta ko sa PGH para muli ay mangutang sa katrabaho ni Mama.

Wala daw si Kuya Bong nang ako'y dumating sa Ward 2. Umarte akong tatawag muna sandali at babalik pagkatapos pero ang totoo hindi ko masikmura ang kahihiyan ng sitwasyon ko. Lalo lang akong naaawa sa sarili ko.

Sa pag-upo ko sa hagdan sa ibaba ng Burn Unit, naramdaman kong ito na pala ang pinakamatagal na panahon na napirmi ako sa isang lugar ng mag-isa simula ng ako'y magtrabaho. Nagkaroon ako ng pagkakataong makapag-isip tungkol sa mga patuloy na pagbabago sa buhay ko.

Hindi ko lubos maintindihan kung papaano at kung ano na ang nangyayari sa pamilya ko at kami'y nagkakaganito. Lumaki ako sa isang marangyang pamumuhay at paniwala ko nung bata ako, mayaman kami. Hanggang magising ako isang araw ng wala ng makain at naisip kong hindi na pala o marahil hindi naman talaga at imahinasyon ko lamang iyon mula pa sa umpisa.

Simula pa noon, malaki na ang paghanga ng ibang tao sa aking pamilya. Maganda raw ang ginawang pagpapalaki sa amin ng aking mga magulang at maganda ang imaheng naalagaan nila para sa amin. Kahit saan kami mapadpad, iginagalang kaming parang pamilya ng isang politiko, inuutangan na parang kasing yaman ni Eddie Gil at hinihingan ng payo na parang si Joe D'Mango.

Sa mga okasyong tulad niyon ay di mawawala ang walang sawang pagbibida nila sa aming magkapatid, lalo na sa akin. Ang matatanda'y puring-puri sa akin dahil sa mga kwento ni Mama tungkol sa batang sigurado kong hindi naman ako.

Dito ko naisip ang pagpasok ko sa call center, dito ko napatunayan na hindi ako pumasok doon dahil lamang sa malaking sweldo 'daw' na ayon sa mga kakilala ko. Dito ko naisip na may mas malaki pa akong dahilan bukod dun.

Buong buhay ko, ipinagmamalaki ako ng mga taong nakapaligid sa akin dahil sa mga bagay at mga katangiang wala naman ako. Ngayon ko lang masasabi na maari na nila kong maipagmalaki, kahit di sa aking pag-aaral o kaya'y sa aking pagkatao kundi dahil sa trabaho ko dahil ang totoo, ito lang naman talaga ang alam ko. At kahit sampung ulit kong ulitin ang pag-aaral ko sa Mapua, dito lang talaga ko magaling--ang magsalita. Kahit masakit isipin, ang totoo, bobo ako. Nakikisakay lang ako sa imaheng ibinalot sa 'kin ng mga magulang ko kahit sa loob nito'y inuuod at masangsang na putik ang naroon.

Mula ng ako'y magkaisip, dalawang bagay lang ang nakapagpaiyak sa akin. Isang babae at ang pamilya ko. Pero di tulad ng huling pagkakataon, ngayo'y wala si Santy para sabihin na wag akong sumimangot para di halata, wala si Ian para sabihing "Okay, lang yan pare." at wala si Julius para panoorin at pakinggan ang mga sentimiento ko. Ngayon, ang pader na malamig sa gilid ng hagdanan sa gitna ng PGH ang tanging saksi ko at tanging sandalan ko. Ito rin ang paghuhugutan ko ng lakas ng loob para muling bumalik sa Ward 2 para kunin ang perang uutangin ko.

fugitives

2005-06-21T15:46:00.000+08:00

The Meralco people are hunting us. My parents are in Bicol and won't be back before the 28th and they didn't leave us any money for the electric bill. Now it's unspoken rule in the house to keep the front door closed and keep the gates double-locked, especially between 9am-12nn--about the time those people come to disconnect the electricity lines for unpaid customers, to give an effect that no one's home..

Today is the first close encounter. Just as I woke up this morning, I heard a loud banging on the gates--unmistakably the Meralco people. I know for a fact that Lael and Hansel had already gone to school and that my sister is already up because she was the one who woke me up. I layed still for about 30 minutes while my sister was probably in the living room playing dead on the sofa or snake crawling on the floor to avoid being seen.

I finally got up when my sister entered the room and gladly announced "Wala na sila!!". Her deliberate preparations for the Meralco people's arrival worked perfectly and even Mama's dogs who seemed to have rehearsed came in good use as they were barking extraordinarily wild when those people were there. They might have scared them off for they could have crossed over the gates if they wanted to.

Im not sure until when I could stand this. I just hope we wouldn't be in jail when my parents come home.

talk is cheap, mail is expensive

2005-06-21T15:31:00.000+08:00

Ashley, one of my trainers, was right. Labor in the Philippines is inexpensive. So one must not be surprised that call centers have been flocking all over the entire archipelago. Filipinos are the only cheap good English-speakers these institutions can get.

I got my first pay for my first job in my entire life and hell no, it did not convince me that my job is worth keeping. But now that my school has been destroyed so badly by my new set-up, I need all the reasons I could get to tell my parents why I would fail some (if not all) of my subjects again. Which means I could not resign (just like what almost half of my teammates are doing) as of this moment, in as much as I would have wanted to.

It disappointed me all the more when Much told me that our pay slips ought to be confidential, that is why they were given in the same manner the PUK codes for SIM cards are, which means I cannot post it here though I have long ago planned to. Not in this lifetime would I risk getting myself sued.

Mench is fuming mad again, I haven’t been in contact with her since the last time we have seen each other. She came just a minute after I made my last post and after I took her home that night, she never heard of me again. Jules told me she’s been pestering him over the phone about me.

After half and a month, we finally had the time to get Carl’s letter from his sister’s new house in Paranaque. As usual, Marian was the one who met us, at their new federal-looking abode. I came with Jules and Muriel last Saturday and of course, Marian already knew what to do. She has already prepared the videoke before we arrived so Muriel had not any trouble singing the whole day.

Carl enclosed 60 Canadian dollars and some pictures of him and Lovely along with the letter. I felt a little accountable that it took us that long before we have fetched the letter, for all I know, it would have only taken us hours had Carl told us there was money in it.

Now, we have planned to use the money for some sort of a reunion. We haven’t seen together for ages and Carl asked for our pictures, too so the three of us have set a dinner date for all the Silversoul on Saturday and maybe we can take pictures there. Right now, Jules and Muriel are working to tell our far-flung friends that it would be my first pay treat (the rarity of me taking them out for a treat might work to stop anyone who might decline, especially those with emotional baggages, if they learned whom the money is really from). We have agreed to reveal the truth after everyone’s done eating. I, on the other hand, was assigned to look after the money (like I’m not thief-prone), which up to know, we still don’t know what the exact conversion to peso is. I just hope it would be enough to feed us all. Let’s see who gets to wash the dishes. Ha-ha.

on the way of my work

2005-06-08T22:04:00.000+08:00

I think I have Tuberculosis. My cough hasn't stopped until now and it really gets in the way of my work. I have to mute my headset everytime I need to 'cough' 'cough' when I'm in the middle of a conversation with my clients. I'm not really sure, but though Nix had declared on the first day of training that his TB is not contagious since he is complying with his strict medications, I still feel that I do have TB and I got it from him.

By the way, I don't really consider my work fulfilling. I'm actually wondering how we have so many Filipinos working for call centers when all we get everyday are nasty and rude clients. I'm starting to believe that many of us are really used to being shouted and yelled at everytime. As for me, it really feels degrading. Though I know for a fact that they have no idea that I am a Filipino, I still feel it like a big slap on my Pinoy face to be cursed over the phone by my American customers just the same. (In all fairness to them, some were also really nice, but I am here to rant, ok)

My first ever call have been an answering machine and the second was an irate customer who called me different names before she hang up on me. What a good way to start huh. That's when I knew that this job is not something I would really like to do for the rest of my life. I don't even think I could last a month, 'but then again' (Nix's favorite line) I still hope that the pay day would change my thoughts.

I didn't go to work tonight. I texted Maggie to tell our immediate boss, J.Lo (that's how he wants to be called, I don't know why). I tried to take the quiz on my Design class on the earlier section which would end at 7:30 but I left my book at home so I still had to wait for the first class to finish and find someone to lend me one.

Now, I'm waiting for Mench here at 630, at the back of the SM Manila but she's still nowhere. I have a feeling she's avoiding me, I called her yesterday but the girl I spoke with said she wasn't at work and I'm pretty sure that girl was already her.

P.S. Joanne (pronounced as Jone, God knows why) is in speaking terms with me again. She must've forgotten about the boo-boo.

on grammmatical boo-boos and theft

2005-06-02T19:03:00.000+08:00

Working for ICT has been the biggest commitment I have ever made in my entire life and doing it while I'm still in school is my biggest challenge. While in the training, there were many times that I almost decided to quit. It just didn't affect my school, it also affected my health so badly. For four days now, I have a terrible flu and occasional fever attacks. It must also be the weather, every morning during my training, I go to school to stalk my professors, giving away excuse letters (which they, thank heavens!, approved) or to drop my Eco class formally, enduring the scorching heat outside then head to RCBC building afterwards where the temperature is in constant low.

It is a good thing that my officemates, er, colleagues, as Air (our accent trainor who has a personal tagline that goes 'The air that we breathe.") had corrected, were too kind and concerned to give me medicines especially Ate Jo, who is for me, the nicest in the group.

Unfortunately, I am technically the only guy, Nix being the other one is a homo, so there were times that I feel like I don't fit in. But they were all nice to me just the same. There's also Maggie who is now my official love team partner (the others call us Margaret and Andrew from the teleserye, Hiram) is too kind to always remind me to log in/out, that's how we get paid, you see.

There's also this one girl in the group who was actually my first 'pick'. For me, she's really sexy, and for a very brief time I got to know her a little better. She told me some of her life's stories during one of our breaks and after that she asked me to promise not to tell. I mumbled, "Sure, Your safe are secrets with me." where I meant the other way around. I'm so dumb! After that, she never spoke to me again. Ang Boo-boo ko..

I got nabbed Monday evening, because I have chosen to walk again (as if there was no public transpo in my midst) on my way to Rj's apartment from Manila City Hall. I was actually walking with a classmate but I have decided to take a different route after we reached the end of the underpass. I trailed down the under-construction alley beside the City Hall building when someone from behind grabbed me and pointed a knife at my belly. In the end, I went home phone and wallet-less. Now that's the great walker's nightmare.

ict group, inc.

2005-05-26T00:09:00.001+08:00

I got the call center job. After I looked for Carlo (the guy who promised to call me, but didn't) in the Unionbank building in Ortigas, I was given a final interview schedule for 5:30 in the afternoon so I rushed to school just in time for our reporting for my ACDC class. I don't go to my Eco class anymore, which was supposedly for 12 noon, because I've already decided to drop it.

Pre-empting my Thermo and Machine Design class, I went back to Ortigas and met with the Recruitment Manager, who conducted the interview. It went fine and swift, contrary to what I've been expecting. What only puzzled me was her answer to my question (I was trying to really impress her, you know):

Manager: Are there any other questions?
Trap: Oh, yes! How does the company feel about the professional development of the new part-time hires?
Manager: What do you mean 'professional development'?
Trap: I mean, how does the company feel about the progress of the new part-time hires?

Manager: Oh, their progress? Well the part-time workers can eventually be coaches or TL's, given that they perform their job efficiently ..."
Trap: Oh, uh-ok...

Now stop wondering how I got the job. Hehe... I feel so mean, she was very kind anyway. She was just maybe out of sorts at the time of the interview.

After that, I know I should be happy now. But after the things that happened later gave me more reasons to worry than to be exhilirated.

Right after I took the interview, I messaged Mama's number about the 'good news'. I kidded that we could finally finish the construction of the 2nd floor of the house. I was actually expecting for a 'Congratulations' for my first job but the reply was asking me my salary. So sad. I don't really know who typed it, and I would like to keep it that way because it will only hurt me more if I learn that it was really Mama.

An hour later, on the Orientation, I've found out that I'd be having a training schedule, 12nn-9pm for 5 days (excluding the weekend) at the RCBC building in Makati, so it took me a long while before I signed the contract because I was thinking about my school, consequently after the girl who conducted the Orientation, 'threathened' (I see it that way) to give my slot to other applicants who were waiting outside.

I felt so stucked, I'm really scared of legal matters and now that I've signed it, I guess I'm stucked. It doesn't have any cash bond, thankfully, but nobody resigns in the training period, right? And I still want to go to school. Damn.

I walked again, from Ortigas to Guadalupe but this time not because I went broke again but because I wanted to think and I want to know if it would feel different, now that I got the job, only to realize later that it didn't. The things that happened today was too much for me that I think my brain's gonna explode.

The reply I got. The sudden and abrupt embarkment to the corporate world. My school. Oh my gulay...

the missing call

2005-05-23T21:50:00.000+08:00

The bastard hasn't called yet. That guy who has given me the Skills examination for my application in ICT promised to call me today and give me my Final interview schedule but he didn't. Im feeling nervous already, I think he's not going to call anymore. I'm going there anyway on Wednesday, (I'm still giving him tomorrow to remember me) and ask him personally what on earth had happened.

For the meantime, I'd have to finish the video about Motor rewinding due on Wednesday afternoon, with Rj and the rest of my group. I just want it over and done and hopefully we will be able to finish it tomorrow coz really, it's not a very clean job.

pinoy perception of beauty

2005-05-21T14:52:00.000+08:00

Isn't it odd how the pinoy perception of beauty is defined by what's new and what's hot? Just like in the celphone industry, do you remember the time when nothing could be more techie-savvy and more fashionable than large-sized analog phones? Then as the digital phones cropped up, no one ever paid attention to analog phones again. You are not considered 'in' if your phone is not equiped with a camera.

In fashion, wasn't it considered sexy for a time when you wear large colorful belts and paddings right on your elbows? Try doing that today and for sure all eyes will be on you as if you have killed someone's mother. Then do you remember those ridiculous elephant pants? I swear to god, you're gonna laugh your heads off when you see yourself wearing a pair of that in a picture five years from now.

It's also funny how the Philippine Cinema and Television dictates what looks great and what doesn't, what's hot and what's not or what's in and out. Back in the early decades of the Philippine development, when the colonial mentality is truly rampant, nothing more than a mestizo or mestiza can be allowed to be called a beauty. Us filipinos, being commonly dark-skinned, doesn't really belong to that category and it's really strange that we ourselves back then don't consider our own self a beauty. We have inherited the notion that we are indios and just because of that we had always considered a sunburnt skin in constant inferiority to the whites.

Take the case of my bestfriend, Jules. In the mid-90's, when Mexican telenovelas dominated the Philippine Television airtime and Thalia was the most beautiful woman alive, he hitted for girls with hispanic beauties which eventually lead him to Vanessa, his first real love, who really has the look of a Spanish soap opera queen. Their dramatic love story ended in tragedy just as the flair for Mexican telenovelas did, and just in time for the birth of another epoch, the Asian drama series.

The new 'mania' really didn't offer any difference except that the Asian invasion (Philippines not included) also dominated the worldwide cinemas with the consecutive showings of different Asian films almost always having the same genre: horror, that some of the movies produced were even remade in Hollywood, indicative of the fact that Asian movies, indeed gained a lot of notice. Though some have also succesfully produced romantic Asian flicks, such as the phenomenal My Sassy Girl among others, the drama type was given more attention on television.

And subconsciously, as if on cue, Jules began looking for girls with rosy pearl skins and eyes that disappear when they smile, almost in perfect resemblance to the 'hot item', Sandara Park. And currently, he's going out with Shiela Marie, a girl he knew from way back in grade school and who exudes the beauty of a Korean chic, purely Asian- a trait considered beautiful just recently.

Then I began to wonder when the true Filipina beauty will get the spotlight on her or if that will ever happen, knowing that Filipinos are combination of mixed races. And now that our own local dramas have been replaced with Asian 'canned' telenovelas, I don't feel certain anymore if the Filipina stands a good chance to get noticed. I don't even know who among our local celebrities gives out the true Filipina beauty.

And if you will look at it geographically, you will see that the Pinoy perception of beauty has been getting nearer and nearer. From Latin America (Mexican Telenovelas), we went to Taiwan (Meteor Garden) then swerved a little bit to Korea (Lovers in Paris, Full House). I just hope it would go a little bit back to the Philippines and give the Filipina her time of day before it heads further to the Bollywood of India. Oh, God forbid.

shame comes after fame

2005-05-20T13:10:00.000+08:00

You can never really be too happy in this life. One moment your on top and on the next, things get out of hand. Jules and I together with Rj went to the ICT group office in the Unionbank building in Ortigas to apply for a part time job in the call center.

Then after the nerve-wracking initial interview and after Jules' declared in the Interview room, in front of a group of other applicants including me, that he doesn't want being pressured and god knows what happened to Rj on the other room, I was the only one who passed.

I was then asked to go back at 2:30 in the afternoon for the second level and since it was only 11:00 am, we went to Makati and dropped off our resumes at the Sykes Inc.

In the afternoon, I went back alone to the Ortigas and luckily passed the Call Simulation, where I was interviewed over the phone. And later, I underwent Skills examination which I surely failed. On the first set of the exam, a message box appeared on the screen of my computer telling me that I've exceeded the minimum allowable wrong answers. DAMN.. I went on with the other two, not being able to finish the last after I have exceeded the time limit. Aaah!!

They have given me my Final interview schedule for Monday but I have requested to make it Tuesday, since I can't afford to absent myself from school again since I wasn't able to go to school yesterday.

I proceeded to Jules' house and agreed to meet Mench there because I don't have money anymore. Then about an hour after she arrived, we left for home. She lend me 50 bucks and on my way to Edsa, it became two 20-peso bills because I had to pay 10 bucks for the tricycle.

On the bus on my way to Guadalupe, I've realized that the remaining 20-peso bill have ripped off right in the middle. So for the first time in my life, and very shamefully, I begged a stranger for 5 bucks with a promise that I will pay him if I ever I see him again. Dyahe!!!!

canine caretaker

2005-05-18T22:43:00.000+08:00

Mama seemed really upset about Cody's death. After adopting three askals, er, Philippine dogs I mean, they went home from Batangas with another dog again. Then with the arrival of Dagul's son (by another Dachscund), the dogs in the house have now outnumbered the humans even with Hansel, now also living with us.

I don't know, but little by little, I can see the whole household is being transformed into a canine orphanage. Now, I heard she's gonna get another one. (sighs..)

starstruck

2005-05-17T19:34:00.000+08:00

Conversation over lunch before my Parents and my sister left for the Pastoral (Church workers) Outing.

Mama: Pag-graduate ni Nono, mapapatapos ko na 'tong bahay.

Papa: Pag-graduate ni Nono, makakabili na ako ng bagong sasakyan.

Nono: (smirks...)

Mama: Pagtapos na si No, mapapagawa ko na 'yung mga kwarto sa taas.

Papa: Pagtapos ni No, pwede na tayong makapagbakasyon.

Nono: (smirks.. then changes the ridiculous topic)

Dream. Believe. Survive.

Punyeta.

Mangangarap ka na lang ba? o magiging katotohanan pa..... (music on the background)

pinoy big brother

2005-05-17T02:40:00.000+08:00

Jules and I were planning to apply for a part-time call center work so when he messaged me to call a number he had given and simply told me that I will earn money just by doing so, I assumed it was connected to the call center agency that has called him a few nights ago.

As soon as Mench arrived, I curiously (and stupidly) called over the payphone the number that Jules had given. And to my horror, it was the ABS-CBN's number and since our channel 2 isn't working, I hadn't the slightest idea what it was all about. The next thing I know, I was being inteviewed and I am now a certified contender to be one of the 12 contestants for the Filipino version of the famed Big Brother reality show! What the...?!!.

I just might be in the Filipino version scheduled to air on June 2005.

xXx 2:State of the Union

2005-05-14T21:55:00.001+08:00

If you're in for a wild-smashing action flick, filled with some good laughs and one-liners this summer, the xXx 2: State of the Union is the perfect movie for you.

Ice Cube plays the role of the new xXx after Vin Diesel's character died (as we're told in the movie). He was a wrongly imprisoned soldier who was then forced to escape with the help of his former platoon boss, played by Samuel L. Jackson, to assume where Vin Diesel's character left off. Then the action begins.

The president of the USA's life is in danger after the US Defense Secretary plotted his assassination which was of course impeded by Ice Cube and led them to the highlight of the movie which was in the US president's bullet train.

Almost every scene is filled with shocking sequences, and I mean shocking. My sister could attest to that. She got so affected and so seated-over-the-edge all throughout the movie that there was a scene where she got so surprised that she inadvertently spilled half of her soda over the guy in front of her.

pretty lady in red

2005-05-13T21:57:00.000+08:00

After falling sick for the past days, it was really a comfort to be paid a visit by one of the people I truly miss. Ranna dropped by the school today, constantly ranting about her broken computer.

She was looking really well and I'm feeling more comfortable now with her than I felt a few months back. I just wished I had more time to spend with her but unfortunately, only after a few minutes in the computer shop (I peeked at her computer and who I saw was no surprise-Angelina Jologs), I had to leave for a quiz in my Thermodynamics class.

I tried to check if she was still there after an hour and a half, but the pretty lady in red wasn't there anymore.

i feel hot..

2005-05-12T23:48:00.000+08:00

My toothache/headache cum migraine plus fever has gotten to its ultimate strength. I woke up today feeling all these and you could just imagine how hard it had been. I know, basing on my state, I should have stayed home but basing on my professors' standards, that is never an option.

Nonetheless, I still ended up in the clinic this afternoon, failing to attend, for the second consecutive time my ACDC class.

I was really feeling bad but I still tried and went to my other classes before I finally went home, happy that my Mama was there to attend to me.

The single thought that makes me happy right now is that I might get my old figure back. I can't eat anything harder than noodles and bananas because of this immensely gruesome toothache, I really need to get my molar extracted.

my own scandal

2005-05-11T23:10:00.000+08:00

I won't be surprised to see myself in scandalous pictures or even videos one of these days. In the afternoon, with a near-splitting headache and a near-unbearable toothache, I went for a quick stroll at the SM Manila. I went down to the Food Music Zone to take a pee.

After doing so, I washed my face at the lavatory (where else?) and as I was wiping it with my towel I heard a sound of a camera clicked. When I checked, I saw this weird guy pointing his camera phone right at my crotch! That's when I realized that we were the only ones inside the rest room, I wondered how long could he have already been there with me and what else could he have captured in Kodak moments. Gosh! As I was just about to confront him what on earth he was doing, he gave me that most disgusting smile I've ever seen in my entire life! He scared me to death so I walked out.

The bastard followed me to the drinking fountain so I hurried to leave and when I looked back to check if he was still following, I saw him with a group of giggling women and his phone still focused on me! DIE PEOPLE!! DIE!!

20 minutes later, they followed me to the 3rd floor, again with that darn phone pointed on my direction. AAARGH!!

I got a raging fever when I got home.

we are not alone

2005-05-10T13:57:00.000+08:00

These are secrets told by other people through postcards. It's funny that we can relate ourselves to some of them. To check other postsecrets or if you want to send your own, go to www.postsecret.blogspot.com

eye opener

2005-05-09T21:58:00.000+08:00

I was meaning to whine on this entry and complain that the things that are happening in school are getting too much for me. One terror professor after the other and one horrible paper work right after the other. It was like a chain of unfortunate events, I failed to attend Madame Noche's class (I'm beginning to hate her actually, she's good but she has no word of honor, last term she announced her resignation because of the Malayan thing, whatever happened to that, but now what? I'm afraid I could get heart attack one day from her stern stares) because I slept really late last night, I tried to finish my Machine Design plate. I then went directly to the library to complete my Lap winding set-up for the next class only to realize that we did it the wrong way so needless to say, I didn't attend the ACDC class as well.

I continued with making the 10-problem assignment for my Thermodynamics class, but only completed 4. Later it turned out that Engr. Balberona only needed 5. Now that was a relief. I really wanted to escape from all these things and I was already beginning to ask myself if I was right in filling my subject load for this term coz it was really getting to me now. All the time, I was sitting on the same chair inside the library, provided with O.T.'s (old testament) by my newfound friends and never having the nerve to ask if they were correct. I pondered upon thinking if I did the right decision 5 years back. Was M.E. really for me? Or am I just trying to convince myself that it is? RJ once told me this line: "Pasasaan ba't mapapasa natin ang lahat ng ito." but was he right? Why can't I find the optimism he has and apply it on myself? Why doesn't he worry in as much as I do, though I was already ahead of him even if he is a batch older than I am?

Mr. Balberona reprimanded us in his class and his words made me change my mind about whining and ranting about my life on this entry. It was ironical since only last term, I hated and cursed him so much for being so intelligent and wise but right now, I'm realizing why he have such high standards and I'm now beginning to see what he wanted us all to see: our future. I never thought that he have such great concern for us. He wanted us to see him as an example and a model, not an adversary like many thought of him. He almost pleaded us to study and I know that is what I need to do most.

Even Mr. Ventura on my last class (Machine Design) lectured us on the things that we should be paying more attention to, that is our studies. I know what they said are already known thoughts but maybe I only needed to hear it from the people that could take me where I wanted to be.

hitch

2005-05-07T23:18:00.000+08:00

Mench had gone nuts. She messaged my sister (as if they were close) and proudly told her that we’ve been going steady for 2 years now (even she know I’ve taken her seriously only recently) She even supplemented that with stories that are going about our ‘relationship’. Why she did that, I don’t know, but what I know is that I smell trouble.

I’ve already told her many times before that I don’t want my family to know the thing about us. She doesn’t know what she’s getting herself into. I know Papa very well and I’m pretty sure he would never approve of Mench as my girlfriend even (or more so) that she’s from Bicol. He has the sickening habit of investigating about the family backgrounds of the girls I go out with and in Mench’s case that would be a piece of cake.

Maybe she’s trying to see how I would fight for her but what she doesn’t know is that I am trying to protect her. I have never introduced any of my past girlfriends to my family, especially to my father, but one. And that one didn’t really turn out right coz I have been in constant disagreement with him and the arguments we had usually ended up with my girl.

I don’t really know what’s going on Mench’s mind but her recent actions are scaring me. Just last week, she texted an ex of mine to no end and she would check my phone every time it rings as if she’d find something out. Things could have been great and fine between us, without her doing that.

ad aspera per astra

2005-05-06T02:33:00.000+08:00

From the stars to the mud. Mench moved out from the exquisite 36th floor condominium unit to a diminutive dorm-type room located in what she labelled as a squatter’s area in Quezon City. She’s been having a hard time dealing with her cousin, Shiela, since Joy and I went to the condo the last time and she have finally decided to leave after Shiela accused her of taking birth control pills which the latter found somewhere inside the house.

Mench have been telling me these past few days that she and Shiela have been in constant dispute with each other since that night Joy and I went there. And after that god-forsaken night, I heard Shiela said that I was ‘baduy’, the first time in my life that someone has actually said that to me, and that I walk like a traitor (really now, I can’t understand the way she thinks) and that’s where it all started.

I can’t help feeling guilty and responsible about what happened to them though I can’t see any point why Shiela had to say those things, but Mench assured me that she’s already been planning to move out long before what happened. She even said that she couldn’t have lived in that place in the first place if not for Ed’s (Shiela’s sister) plea, who is in Singapore right now.

For the time being, Mench will be staying with her friend with a 5-year old kid, who were also from Bicol, in that rented room until we find a better place.

As for me, I don’t think I can ever have the nerve again to wear that red Superman shirt I wore the night that bitch called me ‘baduy’. She is so mean.

eddie gil: son of marcos?

2005-05-05T19:17:00.000+08:00

Muriel is back on track. After signing a promissory note, the hospital finally released her. Today was the first time she went out after her recovery and she hoped to see the barkada but they were nowhere to be found so she went to her high school friends' place instead.

On our way to Manila, in the LRT, she told me that when she was still in the hospital, a visitor of the other patient claimed to be working for Eddie Gil, the controversial presidential candidate. She asked the guy if Eddie was really rich and he answered yes and even said that Eddie is a son from another woman of the late president, Ferdinand Marcos. Crap. You be the judge.

father and son?

the ark

2005-05-03T19:20:00.000+08:00

I've been keeping this list on my outbox messages for some reason I don't know. I've seen it posted on my mother's nurse's station back in the time when I felt so low. It talks about things that we should do about our lives to make it a little less harder using the Noah's ark as its medium. It sound so inspiring and I feel I should share these things with someone out there.

Don't miss the boat.
Plan ahead, it wasn't raining when Noah built the ark.
Stay fit, someone might ask you to do something really big when you're already 60.
Don't listen to critics, just get on with the job to be done.
Build your future on high ground.
For safety's sake, travel in pairs.
Speed isn't always an advantage. The snails were on board with the cheetahs.
When you are stressed, float awhile.
Remember that the ark was built by amateurs, the Titanic by professionals.
No matter the storm, when you are with God, there's always a rainbow waiting.

title search

2005-05-03T18:45:00.000+08:00

I asked Jules if he reads my blog entries from start to end. He confessed that he doesn't. He said it partially depends on the length of my post and mostly on the titles. From that moment, I promised myself to give my entries catchy titles.

And after my brief meeting with Jules, I had my first quiz for my Fluid Mechanics class under Engr. Dela Cruz (one of the scaringly-reputed B.A.D. professors, BAD stands for Balberona, Anastacio and finally, Dela Cruz). As expected, nabano na naman ako.

I saw an ad, posted on the wall as I made my way out of the school, searching for NCAA courtside reporters. Of course, no one would be surprised if Andrew Trapani would dare to join, because putting himself in a shameful state is not new to anyone anymore, but I felt really stupid smiling as I walked out of the school gate, fancying myself as a courtside reporter, that a girl on my way even thought I was smiling at her.

I had a long weekend this previous week and the classes were cancelled yesterday due to the declared holiday. But that didn't stop me from going out of the house. Last Saturday, I was in Recto searching for the Machine Design book. I found it, actually loads of it, but I underestimated the price so I left empty handed. I killed the remaining time I have by going to the old and stinking Isetann mall, the nearest mall from the Mapua High School, and once again, a stranger have mistakened me to be a sex worker.

Sunday, I went with Mench in Bicutan. It was a birthday celebration of her cousin, Bhal. At first, I was a stranger to everyone and everything was almost fine until the people learned that I am Arnold's son. The Sorsogon contingent of the National Sunog-baga's began talking to me as if we've been friends since high school and explained to me how my father is so famous in San Juan, Sorsogon. Oh tell me about it.

Yesterday was the only chance I had to actually stay in the house. And my father didn't pass up that chance to let me staff the store again from afternoon til closing time and when I got home, I was already too tired to study my lessons. (Nampucha! parang totoo.)

reasons

2005-04-30T03:07:00.000+08:00

There are just some things you can never forget. No matter what you do or how you try, there's always someone or some things that would make you remember. Sometimes even in the most unexpected places at very unexpected moments. It gets really weird and sometimes eerie that you ask yourself why these things do happen but only find your questions impossible to be answered.

I lit a cigarette as I await for a tricycle hours ago in front of the hospital where Muriel is (she still can't go out because of unpaid hospital bills), then out of nowhere, a cab zoomed in front of me. It was overloaded and one of the two people at the passenger seat were smiling smugly on my direction. It was Rommel.

After a few seconds, my tryke arrived. It was equipped with an audio system, tuned in at RX93.1. The DJ on the radio went on ".... this one's going out to Shiela, who's saying hi to her ex-boyfriends out there blah blah blah..."

"When things go our way, it's easy to believe that things happen for a reason, it's easy to have faith. But when things go wrong, we stop holding on to that faith and begin to wonder whose reasons are these things happening for." - Dakota Fanning, from the TV series, Taken

killing time

2005-04-29T11:50:00.000+08:00

I bumped into a high school classmate today. The two of us were the only ones left (as far as I know) in the Mechanical Engineering among those who pursued Mapua College. Others were either denied readmission after getting kicked out or have voluntarily given up ME and shifted to other easier programs. He told me he'd already graduated and was only in school to complete a subject, which makes me the only real one left. Damn.

Last night, before Mench and I left the computer shop where I waited for her, I tried keying in her name at the Yahoo search. Guess what I found: a website for Filipina maids for hire. OMG!

whew!

2005-04-28T23:15:00.000+08:00

I have gone through hell and back. First week of school and it already feels like we’re already in the middle of the term. Loads of assignments and paper works have been my life for the past week, then add a new set of the most hideous professors in the land and surely there’s an awful lot to expect.

My social life have almost been zero if not for the almost frequent visits to the hospital after class where Muriel eventually ended up ('Almost' frequent in the sense that I have been the only Silversoul, which Yeye definitely expects to worry the most next to her family, who took time to drop by until last night) and Jules’ birthday celebration last Saturday.

I have even involuntarily ignored a text from Ranna (what!?!) and a late-night visit from Roy and Shane in the house while I was at the hospital because I had so much in mind.

And I don’t also see much of my girlfriend (sometimes I even forget that I do have one), Mench. The last time, was an after class, unplanned meeting where she and my cousin Joy came to see me at the same time also last week when my workload is not that heavy yet. We chatted the whole time before we realized it was already late. Joy, though an orphan and doesn'r really have to bother about it, was anxious to go home to her house because she doesn’t want her first and new boarders to think wrongly of her, she thinks a woman like her shouldn’t stay out late.

Mench invited her to their place but Joy changed her mind after seeing Mench’s cousin, Shiela who began bombarding annoying personal questions at the sight of her. Maybe that’s the way things really are for people who have lived together in the province. They feel like they have an unspoken agreement of some sort that they can ask each other very personal questions of whatever nature at any given time, especially when you need something from them. And that is what I hate with those people most, my father’s constituents exactly, they waste over 90% percent of their lives everyday gossiping about other people and it really gets nasty sometimes.

Eventually, Joy ended up in the visitor’s chair of the patient flanking Muriel’s hospital bed. She had nowhere else to go, it was already 3 in the morning so she had no choice even though she have an undone rift with Donna and Muriel. Muriel already have two companions on her side so she had to stay at the other bed because the nurses won’t allow three companions per patient and because of the situation, though Joy felt like an uninvited guest, they were rather compelled to talk to each other.

Then last night, finally Anette and Jules visited Muriel at the same time with Roen, Jules’ ex and a fellow Paulinian, who have heard the news about her condition from a neighbour who works at the hospital. I have also remembered to text Ranna and thankfully she didn’t mind. I haven’t texted Roy back yet, I know his emotional tendecies and I know it would be tougher for me to explain in his case.

This is actually the first real free time since this whole term began. Believe it or not, I've been trying awfully hard to be a good student right now. My family's economic satus is dropping 10 percent each day. And I'm not sure until when I could stand those stupid questions like when I will graduate. Now I'm gonna stop this shit. Mench is on my back and I don't know anything to say. I'm tired of people nosing on my business.

first day walkathon

2005-04-20T23:41:00.000+08:00

It’s the first day of the 4th term and nothing great happened. Quite the contrary actually, because I went broke and tired and hungry.

Just as I’ve been dreaming of attending ALL my classes with no absences or late whatsoever, I found out that there had been classes yesterday (there was a nationwide transport strike, so my family assumed there was not) meaning I wasn’t exactly in the first day of class.

And if that’s not enough for a first day treat, I also had my first walkathon for the new term, I walked from the school to Pedro Gil on my way home because my money won’t fit again on the first day of school.

A habit I used to do with Anette that have grown to a matter of necessity, I have already mastered the different outskirts of Manila in search for possible shortcuts from school to Pedro Gil. This is what I do when I get short with my money, I’d rather walk than do what I loved to do when I was in 2nd year high school, the 1-2-3 thing, yeah. For me, it was a young boy’s fantasy to get away without being caught but now, it would surely be a nightmare if I do that and get caught.

It was probably the hundredth time I have done it that I didn’t even bother anymore.

fiesta

2005-04-18T18:46:00.000+08:00

Jules, Anette and Marvin dropped by. It’s not surprising anymore that every year, less Silversoul do come for the fiesta because I’m already expecting it.

It was also an opportunity for them to see Muriel who has been abnormally bleeding for a couple of days now. She is already using diapers in place of the sanitary napkins but still, no doctor can tell what’s going on with her. Yeye said she’s been to two doctors already but none of them can tell exactly what the problem is. We were actually ready to take her to hospital but she said her family’s already planning to do that for the next day.

She said she’s still okay and as a matter of fact, she even played billiards with us before Marvin and Anette left. Julius followed suit after having dinner in the house with me just as the Mr. & Ms. Southside 2005 began. I continued watching the pageant with Yeye and I can’t help being thankful for joining it a year earlier. This time has a lot of skin exposing, off and on stage- that is something I’m just not yet prepared for. The swimwear on video was fine but almost nude on stage is a no-no for me.

Halfway through the show, I accompanied Yeye, who was already feeling and looking really weak, on the tryke terminal before I went back to join Mama and my long lost cousin Joy in watching the show.

Eventually, my frat mate, Arian (as expected) emerged as the victor with Jeffrey landing the second spot.

The next day, Mench also came over but most of the time she was with me, we were only in Yeye's house. She passed out and we were there to see her. The doctors at the Rizal Hospital in Pasig refused to attend to her because they said they have to prioritize those who were giving birth and in Yeye's case, they probably need to see her faint before they would even take notice. Yeye's family's thinking of taking her to the PGH instead.

cody's finale

2005-04-13T23:21:00.000+08:00

It has been a gloomy Wednesday for my whole family. We have just lost Cody. The doctor pronounced him dead at exactly 5:30 pm. He said Cody didn’t respond well to the treatment and medications given to him. He died of massive internal bleeding secondary to parvoviral infection.

It felt so sad when I received the message. I have always been a dog lover and I know this is not the first time a dog died in my care but this time’s a little too different. I have never given the same amount affection and attention to any dog in my life before him. Cody was the only one who had made me not bother sleeping really really late just to give him milk every four hours and he was the only dog I have bottle-fed in my entire life.

My mother (who have decided to short-live her Galera escapade after learning waht happened to my Aunt and to Cody) and my sister were preparing to go to the clinic when I told them about the bad news. They were both stunned. A moment of silence passed as I watch their jaws drop that I actually felt they would cry. We went on together to the clinic, paid the bill and collected what was left of Cody.

The garden in front of our house served as Cody’s resting ground. I dug the hole myself, with Lael’s help of course, and placed him neatly at the bottom. It was so sad I wanted to cry. I even placed flowers on top of the mound the interment had created. I had to inhale hard to stop my snot from dripping out of my nose. Never in my life had I imagined that I will have to bury someone someday with my bare hands.

Later, I learned that Mom had just bought three food trays for the dogs with their names on each one and three additional big milk cans, Cody will never be able to use. It’s really hard for us, we have just lost a family.

vet alert

2005-04-12T19:29:00.000+08:00

In line with the forthcoming fiesta, a Barangay Day was held at the Multi-purpose hall in our place. There were horrible dance contests and cheap freebies for the kids, complimentary pre-need privileges for the adults(you just have to stand in line under the sun) and free vaccines for the house pets (i.e dogs).

I took Dagul, Shin and Cody with my sister to have the first two shot with the anti-rabies for the second time. Of course, Cody’s too young for that but I took him along because I was hoping to see a vet there who might be able to check him up, his condition was not getting any better. Unfortunately, only one vet was around and she looked so busy so I had no chance to talk to her.

A family friend, who happens to be a dental doctor, was waiting in line with me together with her 3-month old Lab. She recommended a veterinary clinic only two tricycles away. She even said Cody’s getting a little too dehydrated and strongly suggested that we take him immediately.

My sister got so unnerved so we rushed Cody to the clinic, right then. Arriving there, I got reprimanded by the vet for not taking Cody earlier. He told us Cody was infected by parvovirus and that he was already in an alarming state. He gave Cody two separate shots of antibiotics and vitamins before he put him in a cage with dextrose connected to his leg.

As we went home, I felt really heavy that I can’t help but blame Mama for not being here even more and for not de-worming Cody earlier as Bon had instructed though the vet said it couldn’t have been the main reason for Cody’s illness.

And though a little scared, I feel confident that he’s going to make it and I have to be optimistic. Now this is the first night ever since Cody arrived that I’m going to sleep without him in the house. Sob.

while mama's gone

2005-04-09T17:32:00.000+08:00

I went home after scrupulously fixing my schedule and paying my school fees. Auntie Manay, Papa’s elder sister and Elaine’s Granny, and Cody fell ill almost simultaneously. She was rushed to the hospital because she just had a mild stroke while the dog refused to take anything edible the whole day. I think he just misses Mama who is in Puerto Galera tonight for their yearly outing.

Another problem came concerning the admittance of Auntie Manay to the Ospital ng Makati so Papa was compelled to go there. I heard they don’t want to admit her in the hospital and they don’t want her to move to PGH either. Are they out of their minds? I know if Mama was here, she’d surely know what to do.

Now I’m here waiting for them to come back while watching the re-run of the Pope’s funeral. I couldn’t sleep, I’ve been trying to feed Cody but he keeps on throwing up everything I force him to take. I also needed to hear some news about Manay’s condition.

tomorrow is another day

2005-04-09T10:21:00.000+08:00

I've been out of the house since Wednesday. The money I was waiting for came earlier than expected, so I wasn't really that late for the enrolment. Surprisingly I failed ACDC again, which was ironically the last subject I was expecting to fail but on the lighter side, I'm still IN and the tragedy didn't struck me for the first time in four years. The only bad thing left is that it took me so long to complete my schedule arrangement. All the other sections were already filled up so I had to wait for new sections to be opened.

I went back and forth with Bon to the Encoding room at the SW building since Wednesday, in the hope that we could be in the same section in any of our classes because we were planning to attend the gym together this term. I also stayed in their house that night, to get to school early, as he said. It was a chance for me to get reunited with Cody's family, only one of his siblings was left and Bon and I were one in saying that Cody's become the most beautiful of the rest of the puppies so far. Ooooh, what a compliment. I've been bottle-feeding that Lab-Pitbull crossbreed since he arrived. Thanks to the milk supplies of my Mama's dietician friend.

Anyways, we were still the last person to go out of the Encoding room the next day (without new sections in our schedules) because we still had to go to the PGH in the morning because he had to run an errand for his mom which took terribly long even with Mama's help.

And today, without Bon, I've succesfully completed the maximum 15 units and had my enrolment done. Whew!

Jules and I have been planning to see each other since Wednesday but had never really been able to. I think I'll only be able to see him again and the rest of the guys in our fiesta, which we always look forward to, next weekend.

I'm hearing the latin prayes from the TV for the Pope's burial while I'm doing this. Let us all pray for his soul, he had been very good to all kinds of people and has already made a niche for himself in the history of mankind. I am proud that I have been one of the lucky people who have been able to see him when he arrived here in 1995 for the World Youth Day.

I've been trying to recall (just now) that Latin Responsorial psalm which was sang during the mass Pope John Paul II celebrated at the Quirino Grandstand. Help Fellow Paulinians! Eda, I need your memory now!

You won't believe this, few seconds before publishing this, I remembered! Now, Eda I still need you to tell me if it's correcty spelled and whatever it means, please.. Here it is:

"Ube Caritas et amore, Ube Caritas deus cibi est."

enrolment begins

2005-04-05T12:50:00.000+08:00

This is the first day of Enrolment for the fourth term, but not yet for me. We still don’t have money to pay for my dues which means I will have to wait and which also means I will be a late enrolee.

These are the kind of times, which makes me feel so bad about myself. My parents are working so hard to send me to school and give me a decent life but I can’t live up to be worthy of all their efforts.

And another thing which makes me not at ease is the fact that I haven’t seen my grades yet. I will never have the heart to show that to my mother if the tragedy comes again.

I always had chances, but I always end up screwing it all up. I hope it won’t be like that this time.