goodbyes and a tear

said goodbye to a lot of stuff this week:

my month-old glasses after a sober drinking session
my phone's lights and its screen's middle part
my 10-hour-sleep nights
my dvds, some of them
my clean fingernails 'cause i can't find my nailcutters
my secret visits to the neighborhood goldilock's or mcdonald's
my wifi router that i won't need or
my own bedroom and comfort room i've grown so accustomed to
my telling the village guard i need a cab
my tito and tita and their two kids

whose departure actually made me cry,
which is interesting 'cause the last time i cried
was when my grandpa died 2 years ago.

i will miss them but they're just 2 hours away.
bangkok will be nicer with them around.

and with that goodbye i say hello to katipunan
where i will be staying
for the rest of my ateneo life
which will hopefully, though sadly too, end in march

i am not fully ready to move out just yet though by saturday i should be, otherwise i'll have to wear unwashed clothes or sleep in the streets. but my mom is around and she's helping me out.

some teeny-weeny part of my academics need help too.
especially the cutting-even-if-it's-but-two-weeks-to-the-sem part.

what a school year.

lisnin to ateneans typing in the computer lab at the library
sortof readin JAPANESE stuff for JAPANESE class that i'm not attending for no good JAPANESE reason.
feelin kinda hopeful.

rants in my pants

actually pulled it off better than expected.
still missed a class but managed to visit two banks in two different places in between a couple of individual consultations, meetings regarding systems and parties and blitzes and awkward moments with people in command.

but my oh my it still catches you sometimes.
that bug that makes you scream for being such a loser when it comes to figuring out whether you're being patient or being sheer complacent.

that bug that blurs the line between worrying too much or depending too much.

that bug that strips you off of self-esteem, energy and um, color.

i seriously need to start moving about.
protein shakes and workouts included.

lisnin to some Fergie song
sortof readin my sociological autobiography i will share here
feelin kinda weak and vulnerable to self.

the Heart that is Heavy

it sometimes pays to just say it's all so huge and complicated and burdensome rather than evade the question every now and then.

you still won't have an answer or it may not even lighten up whatever you're carrying but it suddenly feels so reassuring. you suddenly are pulled back to the reality that for some strange reason you are feeling this and carrying that and going through it all. for some strange reason.

that you don't know the reason makes it even stranger and that it is so strange eases the sadness of the fact that you don't know the reason. they say the heart operates with no reason.

i certainly don't think so.
the heart operates with reason.
we just don't know it yet.
sometimes, we don't even get to ever know.

lisnin to The Bitch of Living. how appropriate.
sortof readin The Sociological Imagination
feelin kinda restless.

whew. it felt good letting go of that. thank you.
and i think i shared this already but that part when they all go
bla bla bla bla bla bla bla bla bla bla bla bla bla
is really really a relief.

all too real

one of the reasons why i thought high school musical was not so bad an idea was the fact that it made bursting into song in the middle of a conversation so okay again.

seeing timon & pumbaa explain hakuna matata or the genie pull off a grand parade complete with music, choreography and layered lyrics seemed to be so yesterday, so my-time, something my 3-year-old cousin does not have the luxury of seeing inside theaters again.

dropped by andrei's rony's blog and this post of a trailer:

and for one moment there i thought disney's at it again.
what a commentary.

lisnin to Broadway Beat.
sortof readin the esquire
feelin kinda grateful.

here's a male version of an interesting song

blueREPping is a verb

damn, it's friday all of a sudden.

even if we ended up at 2am earlier already, i now have this body clock that wakes me up at 6am regardless. and i love it.

joining blueREP was a split second decision in what was then colayco hall. it too was in large part thanks to vica, who back when i was a freshman seemed really eager a recruiter and a much-liked familiar face. all of us fresh recruits that year did not have the time of our lives as a blueREP experience but some of us stayed, perhaps for one shallow reason or another. i honestly don't know why i stayed. and i don't even know if my status now as a member still is "staying" relative to mako's stepping up.

the people you drink with, the people performing, the people manning the booths, the people whose backs people stab, the people who do the stabbing, the people paying the bill, they've changed, we've changed. considerably in the last three years.

but the kind of humor that made me laugh during workshops at gonzaga exhibit hall back in freshmen year remains the kind of humor that makes me laugh during post-rehearsals stuff that i've chosen to be a spectator of. but you see the beauty of theater in the tiny teeny fact that each spectator is part of the performance and only then is the performance true, good and beautiful.

all the more in musical theater.
where even rehearsals seem ends to themselves not mere means.


















join us.

lisnin to The Coast of Utopia clips in YouTube
sortof readin old Pilosopo Tasyo articles
feelin kinda choosy

remove

you reach a point in your life when motives, underlying or otherwise, suddenly don't matter. meaning is rediscovered, only to be rediscovered again.

and this is why i'm happy being President,
why i'm happy you're around,
why re- is a powerful prefix.

you pray it stays so good and beautiful all through out.
but it doesn't.
but it won't.
so we keepReminding.

it's a mall world after all

my 6pm class today ended early so after making sure i've all the readings and books i need, i decided to drop by metrowalk and by me some dvds and possibly a bag. i did and dropped by shangri-la plaza right after only to be greeted, rather subtly, at powerbooks by


















affluenza.
managed to read 'til the introduction and t'was amazing how something so trite as consumerism can be retold as something so intertwined with every single cause of alarm or a headache or both.

my euromarketing teacher who dismissed us a few minutes past seven mentioned how the japanese are planning to put up an asiamall in pampanga or how mr. montinola and the sy's manage sm. that virus de graaf calls as affluenza is here, in the country, in trinoma, in farmer's, in metrowalk.

i always find interesting the argument that all this is a mere phase we need to go through, a bitter pill before we reach a certain maturity as a nation. but don't prescription pills not work for everyone?

what i'm saying is if america is slowly realizing that going simple, being less materialistic, measuring genuine progress indicators instead of gross domestic product is the way better way to go, can we learn from their mistake of having to go through that crap and just skip that part instead and you know, realize what the authors want us to realize: that the best things in life aren't things.

but then again, who could resist those dvds, or that bag with my name practically written all over them already?

lisnin to Being Alive from the Company

sortof readin The Other Path again. my LS126 teacher asks each of us in class to share what was the most recent book we've read and here i go saying it's this hernando de soto book that i've last read and here he goes saying i should give a report to class about the damn book next week 'cause hernando de soto "should be on our fingertips." he remembers me as hernando de soto and not as karl.

feelin kinda relieved. mama is in town. woohoo

An Ode to Enough

you can be real annoying
and such a pain in the ass.
'cause your being there
tells me i'm crass.
it's not your fault
no, no, it ain't.
in fact, you're good
i'd say a saint.
but see, saints sometimes
they don't seem neat.
they're like bedmates who
pee on the sheet.

your point, it lingers
your point is just.
but it's hard to listen
to words like must.
i'm better off
doing wrong sometimes,
to deviate
and say screw the rhymes.
it proves i'm free,
that i've a choice
that i could pinpoint
music from noise.

i end up though
bowing down to you.
not as a slave
but still with boo-hoos.
you're point's the point
i should've watched out for.
you're point's the point,
the indicator.
without you it's so
real hard to know
what's too much or
what is too low.

and with you, in fact
you never did
restrict my life
or place a lid.
you are a saint
not that cool but still
i'm glad you're there,
i know i will.

doing nothing again

you knew it all along.

you realize how much you value all the free time you currently have with the all-too-plausible reason that you may not have free time later, during the rest of the semester. and suddenly it hits you:

you may not have free time at any point in time.
ever again.
Madame Later may not arrive.
it is seriously possible that it'd be impossible to simply be possible.

you knew it all along. but you just had to try
of course, try

having to buy a shirt, a toothbrush, a bar of soap and the whole package in school simply 'cause you failed to go home simply 'cause you fell asleep with good friends at 4 in the morning simply 'cause you've had enough to drink simply 'cause you're more sleepy and more weak than usual simply 'cause your free time is suddenly

numbered.
which should only be the case if we all agree that zero is a number.
because the idea that there is no room to procrastinate suddenly is so true,
even for sanggunumans,
for solitary trips to spanish bistros,
for random walks through random cities
for good not-a-box books.

and thus, the things we deem obstacles to productivity and growth now are necessary.
delaying to tomorrow can be supported by more reasons.
slacking off is redefined.

we knew it all along. but we now know better 'cause we tried.
Yoda, there is a try. and it is a lot similar with do.

lisnin to that "God will make a way/When there seems to be no way" song playing in my head 'cause it sure is so interestingly true.
sortof readin syllabi
feelin kinda sane.

happy in depth day

what independence?

finally understood Hernando de Soto's The Other Path and how he thinks extralegal systems have enough incentives for informality to thrive serving as the root cause for Peruvian society's trouble. it may very well be as true for the Filipino.

lisnin to The Holiday's opening sequence's score
sortof readin Empire of Memory
feelin kinda sad of my 2 cousins' leaving off to bangkok real soon. i won't recognize miggy and charlie the next time i see them

reading readiness

it feels good to say you're ready,
to pull your sleeves up and scream: bring it on!
but it sure is hard to tell,
to not feel uneasy or concerned.

but those sure are easy to conceal,
to look smug and tough and calm.
after all who is to say
and why the hell worry.

maybe 'cause ready
once read
feeds getting-ready
feeds its self.

and though the reading may
sound elchh blech or duh
you're better off reading
you're better off ready
you're better off

and on and off
and on again

and on.

turning out fine

well not absolutely fine just yet.
a good number of really awful scenarios still have a good chance of happening.
but this is exactly why i end up being crap all the time.


interesting
how i hate realizing things always turn out fine
how i hate fearing things may not turn out fine

and how i used to find hate too harsh a word
and how it's a whole lot better than just nothing
and how nothing was how i actually felt for a lot of things i am passionate for the past 14 hours prior to sanggunuman with aaron's well-wishing party

huge thanks to one movie i chanced upon after mardi's usual cut plus free massage routine.

i would have wanted to elaborate on Le Couperet or The Ax, one of them movies in this French Film Festival at Shangri-la Plaza, but i would rather you watch it yourself:

June 10 830 PM tomorrow
June 11 600 PM
June 13 100 PM
June 14 330 PM
June 16 100 PM

and it's all free admission.




and just when you miserably conclude of the pointlessness of it all, God throws you a movie that may very well argue how pointlessness can be a beautiful point. you end up very glad you're not praying for your life.

lisnin to that all-i-wanna-do-is-find-a-way-back-to-your-love song and a couple arguing whether it was really drew barrymore and hugh grant in the film
sortof readin Not A Box!
feelin kinda sleeeeeeeeepy. only 9 hours of sleep of the 72 hours past

The Strange Case of Dr. Lost and Mr. Found

when you suddenly consider branding as commonplace the absurd, the paradoxical, the oh-cool-it-not-only-sounds-nice-'cause-it's-a-smart-play-of-words-but-it-too-is-whoa, you either have had too much alcohol as best proven by a belly you wish to say byebye to or you have had too much absurd, paradoxical, oh-cool-it-not-only-sounds-nice-'cause-it's-a-smart-play-of-words-but-it-too-is-whoa moments as best proven by questions and answers popping out from the most unexpected places that by themselves reenact delight as soon as you find them only to be lost again in that ocean of stuff that gets rowdier not just with alcohol or an interesting meal but also by conversations with yourself that start as soon as you realize you are with you and only to be losing further its shine and glee thanks to the sheer absence of rosetta stones.

because the strangest thing about two opposing entities is that they end up indistinguishable initiating a recipe for utter self-destruction at the level inexplicably increasing and undeniably irrevocable allowing for conclusions such as

that it's painful is good 'cause i finally now have the urge to act
or
just shut up, stupid.

possible transcript of conversations that start as soon as i realize i am with me and me alone.
scary, scared and wondering what if i was just all yellow, four-fingered and regarded for being dysfunctional. belly intact.

i'm touched

and quite literally so.
and it would probably register as the nosiest massage i've ever had.
and only to realize it's dinner that i really needed to ease the migraine.

but it was a long day.
and so that was well-deserved.
plus catching spit, silly people's improv theater, after
with ate mhir, bea and a good number of bluereppers.

and by long day i mean hot, humid and academic rights.
with bits and pieces of suspense and intrigue.
e.g. actual text message from a freshman only to find out he's lost his jacket.
e.g. actually being on tv or on stage or both real soon.
e.g. actual seeking for my registration form since i apparently haven't even enlisted yet.

and it's good to note that one's got issues.
still.
despite the many words we've already said.

lisnin to Fergie's Big Girls Don't Cry
Yes you can hold my hand if u want to
Cause I want to hold yours too
We'll be playmates and lovers and share our secret worlds
But its time for me to go home
It's getting late, dark outside
I need to be with myself instead of calamity
Peace, Serenity

and didn't i just say "despite the many words we've already said."
sortof readin minutes
feelin kinda rubbed. elbows, shoulders and whatnot.

steve shares a site, that of Himantayon: A True Story
















it's getting late, dark outside. almost 3am.

children ride free on the kaoshiung bus

they say experience is the best teacher.

i say it sure is the best student too.

noel shared funnyordie.com, check out will ferrell and the landlord

aaron shared the perry bible fellowship

lisnin to Can't Get It Right Today - Joe Purdey
sortof readin namfrel 2007 terminal report
feelin kinda stuck in cebu. and loving it.

miss Universal

it may well be my last drinking session with lani around at least for the next give or take 2 years and my last seeing chandy play in the sand with the so mature batchmates that we are.
also for the next give or take 2 years

and i didn't see trixie or rj there for the 30 or so minutes that i dropped by.
i would have proposed a toast.
of pinkish lambanog, watermelon vodka or some egg whites.
kudos to gia yza fretzhie for stepping up and pulling it off.

nikki looked like she had fun. that alone merits distinction.
she was our indie critic too, while watching little miss sunshine.

that reminder of a movie and how the word fuck can be put to good use.
and i share here
what Tony Blair learned:

[Interdependence] means we have a clear self-interest as a nation in what happens the world over.
nothing at all to do with the movie or my reminiscing of drinking sessions but i share it 'cause i read it and noticed how even the older of us could still grow and mature and paraphrase some of the less interesting but more insightful notions development literature has to offer.

he speaks of foreign policy, of terrorism, of China and India with so much self-awareness, his experience i envy.
he speaks of values universal.

i remember using 300 as an example of what i think is a good movie and how people reacted as it being anti-asian. i was dumbfounded. it's nice to have a heightened sense of awareness towards the subliminal. but sometimess we miss the universal, the beautiful, the good. until we're caught offguard from the very things we guarded ourselves against.

i pray saturday lessons of arabic in some public school in quezon city will push through, sir aleem jabbar.

lisnin to Linkin Park, whose new album is a lot less noisy. Valentine's Day is, i think, well-written. no wonder kit loves them
sortof readin summit documentation
feelin kinda mellow.