Green

Right now, I'm inhaling through only one nostril. The other one is in a state of mild malfunction. Apparently, a couple of elves thought it funny to roll bowling balls down one of my airways last night. If only I can get a knife and slice the nostril open... and then, maybe I'd find some sort of semi-solidified goo or a flower vase from Rivendell with Elrond's signature on it.

In the world of prima donnas, however, competition is the name of the game. You see that triangular stretch of gum between the back of your two median incisors? Mine's swollen like mad. With a hand mirror, I can see the great bulging spot. It feels numb, and so does the surrounding hard palette. Not to mention the fact that the area hurts at the slightest pressurized touch of my tongue. 

On a more serious note, I'd just like to say that our Embroyology teacher has a most admirable fashion sense. Last Thursday, it was a long-sleeved pleated blouse of varying hues of green paired with a white skirt awash in tiny green dots, plus green-and-gold sandals. Oh, and I probably shouldn't forget about her bracelet and necklace, both composed of rocks in various shades of guess what. But her favorite color is violet actually. Also, I've only seen her in pants once, and it was a silver-blue paired with long sleeves, which she wore during our first laboratory exam. By the way, she drives. Yes, that's how cool she is with all her strands of gray hair.

It Will Rain

… Ever since man learned how to count, or rather, how to use words that would make expressing quantities less taxing, he has been fascinated with the way these quantitative expressions turn out at the end of the day. We have always been a species awed by numerical combinations, and calendar dates are not an exception. When New Year came, the triple one was all the rage. Today, it’s the quintet of ones. In the spirit of such a rarity, our Physics teacher even decided to dismiss us at 11:11 AM – four more ones to add to our bragging rights at having lived such a day.

… The exam results came out one by one in a span of six days. Bio certainly was deadly, no doubt about that. It even came to a point when we were already anticipating, instead of dreading, how low our scores could possibly get. Biochem, on the other hand, was the disaster that it had promised to be. I’d like to think of my rather unpleasing score as a consequence of poor testmanship. Next time, keep this in mind: Answer as you go. Don’t just write your final two choices on the margins of the questionnaire, intending to choose between them later, lest later never comes.

… I have a thing for Southeast Asian fare. Curry on the throne of the pantheon. And now I’m working towards becoming a pescetarian (like that will happen in a decades’ time). Fish is healthy, at least considerably healthier than terrestrial meat. But yes, seafood in general is agreeable to my palate. Have you ever eaten slices of spam that, when squeezed with the hand, leave the palm shiny and sticky with oil? I think of that, and I see with my mind's eye people dying of clogged arteries.

… Human existence is all about conformity. Yet, when one simply lives to conform, a part of the soul slowly dies. It’s that part that yearns to be different, to be expressive, to just let go. Funny how many people write about the supposed evils of conformity in their papers and essay exams, when all they ever do is stick to the dictates of society.

… Last year, my pen suffered a dry spell. This year, it will rain, and when it rains, it certainly pours. Time to toil away, my love.

"Those you’ve known and lost still walk behind you."

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.