My long-overdue PETA and thesis photos

After two years, I finally have the photos from my thesis and PETA OJT days out of my old Nokia 6600 cellphone.

These photos are pretty much my pride and joy from my college days, so I'm posting them here.

I won't be around later on as we'll likely be somewhere else tonight, so I want to take the chance to greet everyone a merry, merry Christmas. I'll post again real soon.

Quarter-life crisis

As I mentioned in another post, Rachel is leaving for America. It was all so sudden, but basically she's leaving because she wants a vacation and she'll do some soul-searching there for half a year. She told me she wanted to find out if there were opportunities for her in the "land of the free, home of the brave."

I could understand why she decided on doing this. The two of us are in the dreaded "quarter-life crisis," where we're starting to question what we're doing with our lives and how it doesn't exactly match what we wanted to be doing. True to form, she's being braver about it than I am, gambling her savings and the last of her current US visa on this trip. She's not without her worries, though, as she wonders if it's going to be worth it.

As far as I'm concerned I think it will be. The trip will have valuable lessons, even if she doesn't land a permanent job. I told her I learned from my new friend Nina that she'd really have to bust her gut to survive on her own over there, independently. That in itself will make the trip worth it.

I wish her the best of luck. Thanks, Rachel. We'll keep in touch.

My blog, an endless wellspring?

I have no expectations of this blog. While my ex may have started me off, I've kept my blog for six years simply because it's my way of unwinding. The personal nature of my blog, limited customization and my own less-than-charming personality mean that my readership figure is low by design. (Don't tell me it's otherwise, I know this as a fact.)

So it's always nice when good word comes in about my little piece of online estate.

My high school friend, blockmate and thesismate Leia chatted me up on YM "by mistake" and mentioned my blog. She said it's as if I never ran out of things to share. It's odd because most of what's printed in these pages is simply my personal nonsense, the petty ravings of a mind that lacks quality sleep.

After graduation she stayed in DLSU for her master's degree and a job at the Cultural Arts Office. It's been a while since we last saw each other, and she missed talking with me. The feeling is mutual; I miss her zest and wacky ideas. We've been together for such a long time.

So many of my college friends are going abroad. Rachel's leaving for America soon, so Leia and I might just bump into each other at her despedida dinner tonight.

My pep talk for you, part deux.

My pep talk for you, part deux.

You know, we are in the same boat.

We both think about love more frequently than is healthy. We both know the pain of unrequited love: how it pulls our legs, takes us for a ride and then unceremoniously dumps us on the cold lonely sidewalk with a heart and head that refuse to work in tandem. Oh, how familiar it all seems to us.

We both thought at one point or another that we were wasting time on people whom we felt deserved our affection. Let me tell you: They were not a waste of time, effort or affection. They were learning experiences we didn't really sign up for but ended up taking anyway. I guess I should know, I just came from one.

We are basically a pair of lonely souls. We should not use this fact as an excuse to mope and curse the fates for our failures in love. Instead, we should stop wasting time this way. We should put on a brave face and live our lives as best as we can, for nobody else but ourselves.

You already know by now how I was and still am enamored by how beautiful your mind is, how it seeks to break out with this amazing level of creativity and independence. My only regret is I never asked you out on a date in the five years we had in common. In hindsight, however, perhaps it was for the best.

I am still a little surprised by how you called my belated confession of affection a "pep talk." That was...cute. Certainly a tidy way of putting it, I reckon.

I once wished a couple of years ago that you could continue making me your "constant listening ear" and "personal punching bag"...these were your own words. Regardless of our newfound distance away from each other, this offer still stands. I'll be right here and you know how to find me.

Take care of yourself, Mao. I will miss you.

Mao bids farewell.

Mao bids farewell.

And so we went to Mao's despedida party at Taberna Otso in Quezon City.

Being the typical early bird I am, I got there an hour before anyone familiar showed up. No matter, I had good food and pasta to keep me company. Mao chatted with me for a few minutes. She was leaving for Los Angeles on Friday in hopes of work, most probably for good. She then left to tend to her many guests, most of them high school friends of hers.

Later that evening my blockmates Rachel, Denise, Kate, Catcat, Isa, Zeri and Tantan all piled into the place at the same time. Apparently they met up somewhere, got lost and managed to find their way to the venue. Bottles of beer and a glorious amount of noise and laughter followed.

I'm going to miss Mao. Fiercely independent, very creative and possessing a style that's uniquely hers, she certainly brought a lot of color into LC24, and I'm honored I got to meet her, even just for a short while.

Into the terminal and out of my sight.

Into the terminal and out of my sight.

Mao surprised us all a couple days ago with an announcement over my college blockmates' e-mail group. She announced a despedida party somewhere close to her house in Quezon City, with the title of her message being, ominously enough, "Leaving on a jet plane."

Apparently she's leaving for the U.S. for work. With that she joins a small but growing list of blockmates who are leaving the country for greener pastures overseas.

So this is how it ends. Will we see each other again? I would love to, but I don't know that for sure. Maybe I'll learn more by driving to the party tomorrow night.

"Imagine"

"Imagine"

The DLSU Pops Orchestra's concert last night was awesome. This time around they indulged in a slew of different medleys, a little music from celebrated video games (the Super Mario Bros. Medley and "Aerith's Theme" from Final Fantasy VII, one of my favorite RPGs), lesser-known songs (Chantal Kreviazuk's "Time"), hyperactive dance music (Jamiroquai's "Canned Heat") and a suprisingly lean ballad lineup.

A number of familiar faces have graduated like me, but they were replaced with an equally capable lineup of instrumentalists and vocalists who are more than capable of kicking ass on the concert stage.

Thank you, Denise

Thank you, Denise

After all that's been said and done on this blog, Denise and I are really very, very good friends. That I can now say with the utmost conviction.

I tried calling her last Sunday on her cellphone, and I asked her if she wanted to have dinner sometime this week. She agreed, so I made plans to get off work early tonight.

Braving the Friday night traffic, I swung by her Makati office and picked her up. It was so great seeing her again after so long. We proceeded to the Old Spaghetti House along Valero St. and in seconds we were talking like the long lost friends we were.

Like me, she's also in IT now, having quit from her old job at a major medical goods manufacturer, and like me she's also enjoying the company of her coworkers. We shared stories about supertyphoon Milenyo, homey houses and personal lives over eggplant parmigiana and spaghetti aglio olio.

It felt so refreshing to be as open as I could be with someone who already knew me very well. There was none of the frustrating repression I felt for the last couple of weeks. Here she was instead, laughing along with me, unafraid of being misunderstood because we knew we wouldn't be. We were mired in traffic when we left for her house, but we kept chatting and singing away to jazz songs.

After so many years, it was tonight that I finally realized had we ended up together in college, we wouldn't have agreed to see each other like this post-graduation. I realized just how valuable our friendship is to her and how she wanted to keep it this way, without undue stress.

I missed Denise a lot, and she missed me as well. I am so glad and grateful we had this chance to reconnect.

We should do this again, Den. If you need me, you know where to find me.

"I don't know why you say goodbye, I say hello"

"I don't know why you say goodbye, I say hello"

Auntie Carole flew in from LA at 1 am this morning, and she stayed at our place to recuperate from the jet lag. Thursdays being Thursdays, I saw her for just half a minute as Bianca and I were getting ready to leave for work at 6:15 a.m. but apparently she took to our dogs well. For now, she'll be staying at my grandma's in Caloocan, but not before leaving me a little present---heavy canvas cargo pants from GAP. While I think I have too many cargos in my closet, one more pair can't hurt. Thanks Auntie!

On a sad note, though, my old FINAMA1 professor Dr. Perfecto "Pert" Perez passed away at 3 a.m. on January 22nd. The balding big jolly guy was a favorite of all the MFI students and FINAMA1/2 takers alike. He was soft spoken but always a happy guy to be with, with his little jokes and jabs. He will be missed.