Is Anyone in the Mainstream?

... I could have simply sung "La Vie Boheme" last night and I might have rocked it. Of course I'm being outrageous - you don't do that song solo and without the matching choreography. Perhaps I could have enlisted the help of the half-drunken party people of Smallville? Anyway, tonight is Maureen's performance down at the lot, so this is going to be one cool New Year's Eve.

... I watched "Closer" again for the second time last Wednesday. I'm now totally sure I have this thing for films with heavy dramatic moments. Natalie Portman and Clive Owen did amazing performances there, and everybody rocked the language. The film's now in my top ten list (of what specifically, I cannot answer yet).

... Dearly beloved, we gather here to say our goodbyes. And I still hate cats, even with Eli's slightly successful attempts to make me love them yesterday.

Moments in the Woods

Now there's that relative we all can't escape from, that annoying whining bundle of undesirable matter perpetually stuck in bratty pre-adolescence. Every family has such a relative or two. This is the social structure as we know it.

P.S. The sty was unusually noisy today, and the sounds echoed immaturity.

This might just make it to the cover of our yearbook.

I want to make a thank-you list, since everyone who writes seems capable of conjuring one up at the end of every year. But aspiring writers, fret not: Know that the ability to put gratitude into words and the talent to write are not, in any major sense, related. So you may thank me in the future if you prove me wrong. 

Now 2010 has been another colorful year for me. There were moments of inspiration and moments of covert madness. There were moments spent by the lakeside on a beautiful Sunday, and there were moments spent traversing the dark of the woods. There were moments when the air smelled of mountains and leaves and grass, and there were moments when the air was hardly breathable. So here goes.

Thank you for the gift of theater. Thank you for the gift of film and music. Thank you for the gift of beautiful masses. Thank you for the gift of scholarship. Thank you for the gift of aviation and technology. Thank you for the gift of food. Thank you for the gift of friendship and company. Thank you for the gift of art and culture. Thank you for the gift of fresh air and scenic seas and distant mountains. Thank you for the gift of hope and determination and courage. Thank you for the gift of writing and speaking and acting. Thank you for the gift of thought. Thank you for the gift of love and sincerity. And thank you for the gift of family and life. 

No Room at the Holiday Inn

Christmas lights at the plaza, municipality of Pototan, Iloilo. December 2009

... Today is Christmas Day. We celebrate it as the birth of Jesus Christ, but no one really knows when that actually happened. If you count using the Gregorian calendar, the Immaculate Conception took place on December 8 and Jesus's birth comes almost a year and a month later. Isn't that biologically weird? Enlightenment on the biology aspect of the matter is most welcome.

... When I think of Christmas, I find no better way to describe it than by alluding to Rent. There's nothing like friendship, love, and the mantra of No Day But Today to remind us of the true holiday spirit. P.S. Aren't Christmas lights a bit ironic for a world that's supposedly doing its best to conserve energy and preserve the environment?

... It's fun how, in the middle of a conversation, I'd spit out a line or two from a musical and people would give me furrowed brows and blank faces in return. It's like someone would say, "Damn it, the power's out again," and I'd go, "We need some light. First of all, we need some light."

... I'm sick. Well, I was sick. I'm better now. I think I am.

Sunrise, Sunset

 P.S. I do not own this picture.

... I discovered while watching Sondheim: The Birthday Concert that when Patti LuPone sings, her mouth transforms into a trapezium. It's all part of the way she opens her mouth and enunciates her words. Listening to her sing, you'd think she's grown weary of the task.

... American Beauty is a masterpiece. I think it's one of those films that should be made required viewing for college students - high school, even, if almost inexistent codes of morality would allow it. The whole cast hit all the right spots with their characterizations, and whoever thought of that suggestive dialogue by Spacey in his final garage scene is a genius.

... Seen at Ninoy Aquino International Airport, December 20th, afternoon: Cathay Pacific 777-200, Singapore Airlines 777-200ER, Korean Air 777-300, Asiana A330-300, China Southern A320-200, Japan Airlines 767-300ER, Emirates 777-300, Qatar Airways 777-300, Etihad (unknown), Saudi Arabian Airlines (747-300/400?), FedEx A310-200F, Thai Airways A330-300.

... It's film awards season! Alice in Wonderland for Golden Globe Best Picture Comedy or Musical?! What the eff. I should've watched The Social Network during the semestral break when I had the chance.

... Gibbs Cadiz released his theater roundup in the wee hours of Sunday/Monday, and here are two points that I strongly feel about: Miguel Faustmann should have been nominated for Best Actor in a Play for Equus, while Phoena Baranda's turn in the same production was too annoying to have merited a nomination for Best Featured Actress in a Play.  There are still other matters, of course, but anyway, opinions vary. I'll be releasing my roundups at the end of the school year, which will serve as my 'season divider': one for 2009-2010 and another for 2010-2011.

... Jenn's debut was awesome. The host, the venue, the photo booth, Madi's dance moves, and all the processes that defined that night. 

... An interesting piece of ruckus graced Lea Salonga's space in Twitter the past few days. I must say, those people really have nothing better to do. Why did they even bother following Lea in the first place?! 

... Here in Iloilo, there's clean, cool air. The sunrises and sunsets are just beautiful, and there are coconut trees taller than a three-story house all over the suburbs.

... currently reading Eleven Minutes by Paulo Coelho.

On Inventions

The following is a reaction paper written for Science, Technology, and Society (STS) - a 3-unit, 3-hour, once-a-week subject we're currently required to take. Our teacher made us guess which 100 inventions composed Tom Philbin's list. Who our teacher is, you need not know; what the 100 inventions are, you may buy the book by Tom Philbin, whom you may hunt down in Google.

Anyone who attempts to list down humankind’s greatest inventions and narrow the roster down to a hundred never succeeds in echoing the unified sentiment of the other six billion members of his species. An invention or two – or ninety-nine – will always be left out, much to the dismay and disapproval of the person who ever gets hold of such a list. Therefore, the easiest way to not attract the ire of the many is to include the magic words: ‘personal’, ‘my’, ‘private’, as in “My Private Personal List of the World’s Greatest Inventions.” Of course, this is assuming that everyone understands the virtue of respecting one another’s opinions, which is not the case at all – but this is a totally different story in itself. Here, then, are my top three inventions.

At the top of my list is no other than the airplane. The reason for my naming it the greatest goes way beyond the fact that I correctly named it as one of Tom Philbin’s one hundred during last week’s meeting, or that I’m secretly a huge fan of the Wright Brothers (which I don’t think I am).

It’s foremost because of this peculiar love for the big metal birds of the sky, a fanaticism of some sort that runs deep down the boys of my family. It’s because I grew up to the daily roaring of engines and the sight of these huge flying machines, almost an arm’s reach in my mind’s eye as they soar past our house in the provincial suburbs. It’s because my childhood bookworm spent half his time engrossed in books and pictures of airports and commercial airliners, to the point that his teenage incarnation now has a mental pantheon of all things modern aviation. And with the current state that I’m in, it’s because airplanes have become an indelible part of my life, the carriage that can take me in an hour from home to college and back.

But the reasons go beyond my personal life, too. Because of airplanes, continents have become much closer, people brought to one another more easily, and time spent less and less whiling away on the road to wherever. The internet may be able to let us talk to loved ones ‘face-to-face’ from halfway across the globe, but the airplane can bring them right to our faces, clothes and arms and all. I’m aware, though, that pitchfork-bearing environmentalists may come chasing after me anytime now.

The second on my list is the camera. There is no point asking me as to what specific type – digital, SLR, etc.; to me, they are all the same image-capturing devices whatever the size of the lens. And the reason all of them made it to this list as a technological generic is defined by their primary function: to capture moments in time.

Imagine what it would be like today if all we could ever do to bring back the past is dig into history books that are all words, or talk endlessly about it and let the mind summon the images on its own. Not a single historical account or recollection of what’s done would ever be accurate anymore, and the only thing that we can do to bring past experiences back is to willfully wish in vain. There would only be the ‘now’ that is so fleeting, and the ‘what has been’ which we can never fully grasp again.

Writers and artists have long talked about preserving the past; historians have always insisted on reopening it; present-day techies are always into transforming it. Thanks to the camera, and as the University course Archeology 2 would have it, the past is never a distant land.

Finally, the third in my top three is something that has, for the past five years, served as a sort of lifeline for me: the eyeglasses. One may argue that the more correct term for this would be the lens, but I’m currently not exactly a big fan of contacts, so there. Anyway, let’s say that 96 million of the world’s population is either near- or far-sighted, or have astigmatism. Without eyeglasses, are these 96 million to just spend the rest of their lives bumping on walls or walking with the aid of squinting or another person? Or take President Ninoy Aquino III, for example: How is he to read a top-secret document without the precious eyeglasses? Truly, the eyeglasses transcend personal use; they have become integral to the internal functioning system of humankind.

The rest of my list is as follows:

4. wrist watch

5. shoes

6. the World Wide Web

7. paper

8. flashlight

9. toothbrush

10. calendar

To repeat what I’ve pointed out earlier, lists such as this are all largely or entirely composed of personal preferences. On Philbin’s list, I have only one thing to point out: He included a lot of the specifics and mostly technological stuff, which have undoubtedly made life easier. But how is a microwave oven any better without the plate, or a spoon and fork, or that thing that’s used to get freshly heated stuff out of the microwave itself? In the process of going through his list, it feels as if Philbin somehow forgot to include the basics – clothes, for instance. Maybe shirts and pants are not specific nor technological enough to qualify?

Old Man

Manila City Hall in the absence of heavy traffic.

It usually takes me around fifteen minutes to get home from school. But last Monday, it was four times the duration spent in the jeepney. The traffic at sundown that day actually made the news. Here in Manila, like the decrepit sewage system that forms an underground city in itself, the roads are just as easy to clog with cars. It only takes a little fall of rain before the streets are filled with enough water to reflect the sky or the gloom. With it, all commuter life comes to a halt and the ruckus begins; the honking eventually becomes a collective tidal wave of sound massive enough to last for several hours and reach the heartlands of neighboring provinces. I'm exaggerating, of course, but you get the picture.

My previous record of 45 minutes, caused by a similar incident two months ago, just as easily fell apart, sat upon by an extra quarter of an hour. And as any loyal follower of this blog would now be able to deduce, I'm not here to talk about the traffic. (I think I already have... haven't I?)

In the world of jeepney-riding, 'full' and 'over-capacity' are virtually unheard of. My side of the vehicle was already stuffed by enough people that movement was already restricted. Out of the blue, with droplets of rain gently falling outside amidst a faint sunset, this old man climbed aboard and squeezed himself between me and the guy to my left. Exclamation point. Insert expletives.

One of the mortal sins that I recognize in riding a jeepney is squeezing oneself inside a vehicle that is already full. (Though I am guilty of this once.) I hate it/ abhor it/ detest it/ consider it an abomination to create for onself an imaginary space for seating where there is none! If he weren't only old and I, bound by culture, and if I hadn't been that weakened by the weather and the preexisting spatial arrangement, I might have had the balls to tell him off. But again, this paragraph contains incomplete information as to what really bothered me about the man.

One, he was emaciated. Seriously, gravely, seemingly dangerously emaciated. I could actually trace his jaw. His forearm was thinner than mine (no, his was centimeters thinner), and the muscles that hung onto it looked as if they haven't been fed for decades. The orbit of his skull seemed to me the winner in a competition as to which bone seemed the most obvious to the naked eye and least covered by skin. With what little hair he had, his cap made equally no effort to cover his balding head.    

Beyond the physical, he had a stench clinging onto him. I am describing him, thus, 'undesirable' adjectives cannot be avoided. If you think you would be offended by the end of this post, it's best to leave now. As I was saying, he smelled - and it wasn't the usual musk that a sweaty guy would emit. It was terrible, I tell you, and even the most accustomed noses of the 21st century would have noticed something eerie.

His clothes were also really wet. But that's not the bad part; it was that he did not make any effort at all to keep the wetness from crossing over towards the people beside him. I did not expect him to do so, of course, since I would not have expected anyone else to have done so given the situation. I myself would not have been able to do so. I realize at this point that I have been straying from the point. 

Anyway, he slept throughout his ride, or he seemed to be making an effort to fall asleep, and every time he'd go whoopy away from consciousness, he would fall over me like I'm some wall. That was the worst part of the ride for me. None of us would want a random stranger to fall asleep in the jeepney and make us their air bag. That's plain rudeness.    

He woke up after the third 'fall', and we were already at the Manila City Hall area. Then, he calmly asked the guy to his left where the jeepney was headed to. "Divisoria," the man said. Divisoria, the ever famous retail kingdom in Manila. He calmly stood up and got off - he had boarded the wrong vehicle, after all. He left without paying (because that's somehow what one's supposed to do after having been on the wrong jeepney for nearly half an hour). 

He just left. I got home after an hour, bothered. Was the man dying of some disease, was he plain penniless and starving, or is there a more mystical explanation to this?

Today, we remember the birthday of Andres Bonifacio - the Filipino revolutionary who was, to my kindergarten self, one of those Ninja turtles. I may be right.

Sacrilege

Three idle weeks. I surmised this afternoon I better kill the silence already, else netizens who would chance upon this artistic haven find nothing of interest. But who's to say 'interesting' comes at the price of silence's death? Words have come and go, yet that which captures the reader's attention forever remains elusively unspecific. 

* * * * *

Exactly a week ago, I found myself traversing the capital by means of mass transit a.k.a. the LRT. The plan was supposed to go something like this: Go to Greenbelt ahead of time, get tickets for Harry Potter, wait for the ladies, watch and have dinner together. Problem was, tickets for all of that night's showings were virtually sold out. In the layman's term, I went train-hopping for nothing.

The experience is what matters now, of course. It's something I place in between priceless and unnecessarily necessary. Until then, I'd never been on the EDSA line by myself, though I pride myself in being an expert of the Taft Avenue line.

There is a moment during rush hour that every Filipino must experience at least twice in their lives: once, to get the first taste, and second, to look forward to tasting it again. As the train approaches, a cloud of anticipation shrouds the entire station, the breathlessness audible throughout the hall. The doors open, and it all happens so quickly, one would think Mufasa died an easy death. One need only stand near the doors of the train with the rest of the eager crowd on all sides, and go with the flow. The choice of not entering instantly turns to dust. You are pushed inside like a wave pushes the tiny floating things toward the shore. Then, you find yourself whizzing past the setting sun.

What rush hour looks like.

The sweat, musk, and breaths are to die for. To not brush sticky arm against sticky arm, damp shirt against damp shirt, would be an abomination in the world of LRT travel.

* * * * *

Despite the fact that I watched it on its opening weekend, the seventh installment of the Harry Potter film franchise has yet to lick my opinionated knife. All thanks to three things: that Robinsons Manila's old cinemas are simply terrible; that we entered the cinema late; and that the screen projection made me dizzy. Ergo, a second broomstick ride is in order.

* * * * *

What we are going to do in this year's TRP - Tao Rin Pala, where students of the UP College of Medicine try to prove for one night that they still possess some semblance of normality - is sacrilege. At least, I see the sacrilege. I don't blame them though, whoever them refers to; the theater is not for everyone. You either love the stage or live the rest of your life pretending to love it, and the former are a rarity.

Cats is currently one of my top five musicals (but this deserves an entirely different post), and I'm sad to say that I'm taking part in the desecration of the fearless felines. I am sorry.

This is way out of Imed's league, anyway.

Dripping with the Aftertaste

It's not the last day that hits the hardest. It's the day before that, when the thought of that last day starts to form in the mind, conjuring wispy shadows of the shoulds and musts which would have to take shape in the next expected cycle of light and dark. 

I've been struggling with all this since last night. Past midnight already, and I found myself staring at the ceiling, trying my best (and failing in the process) to empty my mind of all that should remain in the future. Now, here I am, stuck in the same albeit slightly graver predicament, grasping in hand what is hopefully a more concrete version of the things that should come. 

If it's any consolation for pragmatism, I never mean to drag this palette of mixed emotions back to my canvass every single time. It's the colors that come looking for me, or less pretentiously, I who get drawn to the colors, like a sailor who unwittingly follows the deathly call of the siren. Only, in time, the colors wash off, and I'm again this mundane, black-and-white figure as nature intended, neither wrecked nor slain by the mythical temptress. 

Maybe it's that unspoken need to escape the humdrum of earthly banality that's at work. Or, more likely (and therefore, less melodramatically), it's the fact that one never really knows what the final day will be like until it comes. More so with the day of departure. I'm probably waxing melancholic at the moment, but departures always need some preparation, and part of the preparation is anticipating and overcoming the eventual melancholy. 

In many ways, nostalgic may even be a better description of the state I'm currently in. Looking back, the past three weeks have been one fantastic train ride across town, a road trip encompassing multitudes of friendships and endless troves of memories once more unearthed. Faces again converged in front of mine, betraying years of experiences and deep-seated relationships. The ride was as scenic and colorful as I had envisioned it to be almost a month ago. 

I need to sleep. Perhaps this is the only way to finally douse the fires of fresh memories seemingly burning to no end within me. It's high time as well I attempt to reverse my body clock, though this would definitely be a futile one, an aimless effort to return to a lifestyle that now seems so distant. Dreaming may well be the solution, unreal as it is.

P.S. The Rule of Four is indeed a magnificent read. It's the kind of novel that sucks the reader in, drawing him to the lives of its fully developed characters, leading him to somehow doubt in the end the fiction in the very hearts of the people he'd supposedly just brushed arms with. I am, as one has seen, dripping with the aftertaste that the book leaves the reader.

Princeton University's Ivy Club, where the climax of The Rule of Four is set.

Body Clock

So I went nature tripping again this afternoon.

I was scanning pictures from the Beijing trip I had with a couple of high school people way back in first year as a prize for our winning a national "All About China" contest. When we went there, it was already midway through the beginning of the winter season; snow fell only during the first night, but the wind and air were cruel. Being the supposedly naive and clueless thirteen year old that I slightly refuse to believe I was, I was not allowed to bring the then-brand new digital camera. Ergo, I went to see the Great Wall with a traditional manual camera - and in a vicious turn of events, I somehow managed to delete all pictures in the roll of film that I'd brought to the Wall. I've somehow forgotten how it happened (there was a button I believe).

 The author at the Great Wall of China, Jan 6, 2006.

Anyway, the power (unsurprisingly) went out after the 8th photo. And as any rational person who'd been living in Manila for five months would do during a blackout in the provinces, I decided to get in touch with nature. But it's not like this was the first time I'd done it this semestral break. The power basically goes out for two short periods almost everyday here.  

So I first took the garden trail, and Troy was again happily keeping me company. He walked me all the way from the backyard to the front lawn, and stayed with me as I took in all the green Manila will never have to offer. Fluffy the Bitch was doing her weird stuff again - brushing herself against a bush or the leaves of a plant. It's just... eerie... like she's doing some sort of ritualistic love dance with the plant.

After the garden trail, I went to the rooftop. A slight commotion ensued, as Elphaba was blocking the stairs with her humongous, stinking brown body while licking a dead pig's femur. She had to be taken care of, meaning lured to the backyard, through ways our household helpers have mastered time and again. Just like Elphaba the Witch, I was free to head to the rooftop and do my own Defying Gravity (the dog doesn't have a broom, of course).

The first thing I noticed upon entering the rooftop was a peculiar brownish dot on the wall. It was an insect, I realized at first glance, but the body was simply a freak of nature. A closer inspection revealed something as nature had all along intended: a jumping spider clutching a dead thing with bee stripes. It was so beautiful, I nearly cried. The sun, though, prevented that.

The author at the Summer Palace, January 6, 2006.
 

* * * * *

The one thing I'd been so determined to do when break was still in the near-future was to fix my body clock. The first semester of year level 2 is evil, so they say, and it will twist your sleeping patterns in ways you can hardly imagine. Twelve becomes ten and ten becomes... well, still ten.

At this very hour, however, I grievously announce to the world that I have failed. Instead, I have done even worse damage to my body. Ever since I got here, I've been sleeping somewhere between twelve to one. Which is why I need to sleep now.

Halloween

It's actually the first of November already, but what I did was to type a little something for this post and click 'publish', just so this would be my final entry for October. Halloween has been not at all eventful, save for finishing my Glee marathon this afternoon. We were supposed to go to my grandma's place for trick or treat with the cousins, but the circumstances changed. A class reunion had been scheduled for me earlier tonight, and my sister had an awful fight with her stomach (I could hear their desperate attempts to pull out each other's hair, all the while flooding the living room with invectives of all shapes and sizes). The closest I can now get to those Hollywood-spawned spooky sensations is by singing Jonathan Larson's melancholic lyrics: How did we get here? How the hell? It's from the musical Rent, kiddo. You know, the song Halloween? Act II? Never mind.

Original cast of 9works Theatrical's 2010 Manila production of Rent. Photo from Spot.PH.

* * * *

Maybe - though to say this would be to assume that you follow this blog as faithfully as you believe in your God - you remember the vow I made a couple of weeks ago? To post an entry everyday, with a song or two per entry? I think I may bury myself in the ground now, like how the samurais do harakiri when faced with shame or defeat.         

* * * *

So I made the cut. General Weighted Average for the 1st semester is 1.667. A college scholar nonetheless, but that's the lowest I've had in my three semesters plus a summer at the University. I do hope - and I certainly hope that hopes do come true - that that will be as low as I'll be able to make of my academics throughout college. (Just playing the nerdy geeky stereotypical Intarmed student here.) 

And yes, Organic Chemistry was as disgusting, degrading, and demeaning as everybody says it is.

* * * *

Two weeks ago, I attended the opening night of Atlantis Productions' A Little Night Music, directed by Bobby Garcia at the Carlos Romulo Auditorium, RCBC Plaza. The outcome of my watching the musical can be stated in a single sentence as this: I still think Into the Woods is Sondheim's finest job, but Night Music now comes a close second.

What a masterful creation this Atlantis show was.

The stars of Atlantis Productions' A Little Night Music from left to right: Dawn Zulueta (Desiree), Nonie Buencamino (Fredrik), Cris Villonco (Anne), Felix Rivera (Henrik). 
Photo from The Philippine Star.

The biggest stars of the night for me were: Felix Rivera as Henrik (his Later was fantastically rueful and confused); Cris Villongco as the naive trophy bride Anne; Jake Macapagal as the domineering Count Magnus with a lisp; and Dawn Zulueta, who was a revelation as the faded actress Desiree. I will never - ever - look at Send in the Clowns the same way again (I do wish I can lay my hands on a recording of Dawn's bitterness-infused version).

Best musical numbers of the night were: Every Day a Little Death, that duet by Countess Charlotte (played by Jenny Jamora) and Anne that little by little makes the theater seem as fragile as the song; A Weekend in the Country, that perfectly executed Act One ender; and Send in the Clowns (I'd be damned if I didn't include this one). Honorable mention: You Must Meet My Wife, The Sun Won't Set, It Would Have Been Wonderful. 

Interior of the Carlos P. Romulo Auditorium, RCBC Plaza, Makati City.

The year must end with The Wedding Singer, Xanadu (the rerun), and possibly, Little Women. Well, at least the year should hopefully end with them.

* * * *

Two weeks have passed. The semestral break's been one jolly ride - and I hope it continues to be so in its last nine days. Much of the break's been spent in the presence of high school classmates and batchmates - in the constant presence of some them, if I may say so. We've been working on our yearbook, which is taking forever to finish. This, then, must be the time when the world will finally see a forever that has an end, and may that end come faster than expected.

Tonight's reunion was a disaster. There were only nine of us, I was the only guy, and more than half  of those in attendance were yearbook people. We had dinner at Afrique's, dessert at Nothing But Desserts, and ice cream at Fiorgellato, interwoven with repetitive walks down Smallville.

Carbicide at Nothing but Desserts.

One last point: Iloilo City is a really small city. It really is.