I said yes because I'm a self-indulgent little shit, and I'm taking that yes back because I'm a self-indulgent little shit.

Calatagan

Went to Batangas with the team after cancelling Galera because of the malabo weather.


The whole day was pretty crazy since we were only staying for a night. We got there just in time for lunch and I did fast-break baking right here:

medyo successful naman harhar

had to do some errands though so we went back to town to buy booze and the nakakalokang gwyneth's lechon manok. sarap ng suka. ininom ko lang naman :p


anyhoo, driving back to the resort, nag mukha kaming nasa 30 days of night, hurrying back to catch the sunset. you know, for ehehe picture-picture.


i took shots from the car

we were racing to the lighthouse kasi feel namin na maganda ang sunset from there but the lighthouse was gated and it was closed so boo! bye sunset pics :(

but guess what i saw to my right:


yay! how pretty!!!!

there's a clearing by the lighthouse so we hopped into the car to take better pictures. presenting, the sunset in a secret cove in calatagan:

how lucky were we?


now this was totally serendipitous. the guys left at the resort said there was no sunset. instead they saw this:

a tornado. ayus. but you know what, i'm thinking that's my sundo. on may 9, the mayor of blue springs declared the day to be david cook day and kansas joined as well.


obviously, toto and i never made it to kansas :p


i clicked my heels together three times too soon. plus, i wasn't wearing my ruby red slippers. *raises clenched fists to heaven* curses! white flipflops boo!


anyway, back to the pretty sunset ... so beautiful no? and without photoshop help too. i'm not recommending that you try to go to the lighthouse and the clearing leading to the cliff where we caught mother nature's gift. we put a whole new meaning to braving the elements. the effing clearing was blairwitch scary ... but that's another blog entry.

tagged by kookie

rules: post 10 things that recently made you happy then tag 10 people and force them to post this on their blogs.

1. *see previous post*
2. home cooked dinner - love in my tummy
3. bronzers and bronzing lotions
4. peanut butter ice cream
5. coffee
6. deep dish pizza
7. usb cables
8. pictures
9. caramel scented body wash, shampoo and conditioner
10. sharing a bar of dark chocolate with mommy and daddy and laughing at nothing. crazy.

no tag.

can't grieve, will write.

i still have three deaths in me that i haven't grieved for properly, i haven't mourned for my grandparents yet the way they deserve to be mourned for.

and now, within weeks of each other, we lost two uncles and the family i heartbroken.

a few days after my uncle joel's death is talked with my dad and asked him if he was okay. we're both firstborn so is understand the panaganay syndrome.

"time for tears later?"
"yes."

what do you know? i am my father's daughter.

i try to be the shoulder my cousins can lean on, the hand they can hold.

i'm just scared that postponing my own mourning to give way to theirs -- and to the everyday -- will saturate my being with unshed tears.

i'll be a very very salty person.

saline. saline dion.

I wanted an eagle

instead I got a hornbill hahaha



they're supposed to be carnivorous but we only feed it (diced) apples, green peas and sometimes, dog food hahahaha!
lovett!

Sabel and Greggy, 3-on-3

GREGGY, the Oktomat
SABEL, the Holga

PERSEPOLIS

Of graphic novels adapted to screen, this is more to my liking.
It's smart, clean, in-your-face, serious but made me laugh a lot, unexpectedly.
It's grim and absurd but funny.



to-date, one of my best serendipitous dvd finds.

reason #37 why i heart the sunken garden at dusk

center of my universe

you used to be the best part of everyday.
i was defined by your existence in my life.

i am slowly easing into my new role: me without you.
i am not sad, bitter, or numb.
i'm just tired.

and a little empty.
you were a big part of my life.

i used to know everything about you. when people ask, i always had an answer. now i dont know where you are, because you are not with me.

it feels alien, you not here.

i will miss you. i promise.

MonoLomo

*cross-posted from lomogroupie
i think i'm growing to like black and white.

for the not-so-random stranger who needs to read this

This used to be my story. The water washed it to your bank. Let it cleanse you, and know that it will not rest it your bank forever.
The current will take it out to sea.


By the river Piedra I sat down and wept. There is a legend that everything that falls into the waters of this river—leaves, insects, the feathers of birds—is transformed into the rocks that make the riverbed. If only I could tear out my heart and hurl it into the current, then my pain and longing would be over, and I could finally forget.

By the river Piedra I sat down and wept. The winter air chills the tears on my cheeks, and my tears fall into the cold waters that course past me. Somewhere, this river joins another,then another, until far from my heart and sight all of them merge with the sea.

May my tears run just as far, that my love might never know that one day I cried for him.
May my tears run just as far, that I might forget the River Piedra, the monastery, the church in the Pyrenees, the mists, and the paths we walked together.

I shall forget the roads, the mountains, and the fields of my dreams, the dreams that will never come true.

I remember my "magic moment"that instant when a "yes" or a "no" can change one's life
forever. It seems so long ago now. It is hard to believe that it was only last week that I had found my love once again, and then lost him.

I am writing this story on the bank of the River Piedra. My hands are freezing, my legs are numb, and every minute I want to stop.

"Seek to live. Remembrance is for the old," he said.

Perhaps love makes us old before our time or young, if youth has passed. But how can I not recall those moments? That is why I write to try to turn sadness into longing, solitude into remembrance. So that when I finish telling myself the story, I can toss it into the Piedra. That's what the woman who has given me shelter told me to do. Only then in the words of one of the saints will the water extinguish what the flames have written.

All love stories are the same.

just because there are 14,000,000 people in manila

doesn't mean i will not hear the skeetons rattling in your closet.
i'm very audient :p

besides, i can't help who i know, and who they know
so there is a big chance i will know of you.
especially if you talk shit about me even if we don't know each other.

Double-Duty

Visita Iglesia+Lomocrawl

Finished a roll and a half of 120s and a few shots on the oktomat. The lomos are yet to be processed. Hit a roadblock with the oktomat when the advance crank got stuck. Had to rewind the film so good luck ... hope double exposures work with the oktomat also.
In the meantime, some phone cam pics :p

Santuario de San Antonio Parish


Church of the Gesù


Monasterio de Santa Clara

gifts worthy of second level reading

a survival kit for everyday snags and tears
a dreamcatcher that i have to put together

i've been equipped :p-slash-:)

-

pia and alfred, my favourite couple in the universe (haha i'm biased, sorry)

i always have so much fun with these two, kahit na i have to wear stilts when i'm with them kasi they're two full heads taller than me. it's like barbie, ken and skipper hahaha.

i can't wait for the sleepover. high school! and now pa lang i'm excited sa b/w 120 slides hahaha (alfred, sabi mo ha?)

but shempre, pinaka-pinaka excited ako for siquijor and dumaguete!
i'm so there! i hope there's a motor na small enough for me. or a vespa.
vespa to valencia!!!

acccckkk.
*blocks cosmic powers of udlot*

soon finally came

03.04.08
xocolat


i held court.
took my crown out of the chest, and put it on.

my high counsel
i wanted them to tell me that i made the wrong choice, that i should fight to the death.
to claim and own what i believe to be mine
to hold on and to stand fast

but they didn't

because they saw that it was futile
that it was not worth it
that it was false

they made me realize that armed with brutal honesty, i was capable of making sound judgement
i needed no validation
i knew
i knew all along.

aww,man. again?!

fork in the road

so where do i go and what do i do when i get there?
i'd like to be all quixotic and choose the road not taken but the road not taken was not taken for a reason, and at this point in my life, kamot-ulo moments might as well be laslas-pulso ones.

*uy run-on sentence haha*

I think i'll go buy na that hammock and guitar and live.

refresin

random post of an insomniac

i shy away from covers lalo na if i heart the original artist but sometimes, i change my mind.

i like cellar 55's version of u2's with or without you.
smashing pumpkin's rendition was kadiri but ari hest did a wonderful job on fleetwood mac's landlside. seven million hearts. i want to marry him :p
cassandra wilson owned neil young's harvest moon.
and dilana (of rockstar supernova) who is nakakatakot, was nakakakilabot in a good way when she did the tapang cover of johnny cash's ring of fire.

my pinaka hate? pizzicato 5's version of girl from ipanema.
buwiset.

Cleansed

He asked if I was okay and I didn't realize that I badly needed to be asked.
Words and tears flowed.
He didn't say he understood, or that he could relate, or that he knew where I was coming from.
He just listened and he listened well.

I tasted the sea on my face and it was cleansing.

I can stop writing now.

at a loss

but for the record, not unhappy.
there's just too much going on inside now that it's competing with what's going on outside that i'm disoriented.

in an attempt to regain my balance i've been writing a lot -- here, in my journal, sticky notes tacked to my wall, back of receipts ...
i just need to siphon everything out so i can step back and rearrange the pieces to my emtional puzzle and make a big beautiful -- not necessarily pretty -- picture that may or may not make sense.

i still go about The Everyday but it spills over. i spent hours on end talking with jojo the past week because she sees what i don't and i want to see whatshe's seeing.

i'm hoping this will all dissipate soon but The Meantime is a bitch.

i've had prescriptive glasses half of my life.
and half the time i don't wear them :p

for one thing, i'm pango so i only have my ears to make sure they don't fall off.
it also got a lot in the way of my everyday life :p

i got contacts after college and i only got to wear them once.
it was an ordeal trying to put them on without anyone's help so needless to say i gave up trying hahaha.
i just resorted to my cute plastic specs and tried hard not to get annoyed at the old school lisa loeb reference.

i've been toying around with the idea of getting contacts again but given my legendary blink reflex,i was hesitant. i was afraid of blowing cash again on something i was not going to use.

but guess what, yesterday, i got a pair of lenses. putting them on took quite a while. it didn't take the whole day but if it was a task in the amazing race, we'd be eliminated. anyway i was able to put them on unassisted, so yay me!



so it's not the prescriptive ones that i need but it's a start.
vanity won over practicality eh. sue me.

back to basics

osho reduced it to two things:
people stay if they are happy
people leave if they are unhappy

so why not make people happy instead of expecting them to make you happy?
let it come from you.
besides, if you make someone happy, won't that make you happy?

it's that simple really.

when did it become so difficult?
that anyone would actually want to be defined by misery is beyond me.

i don't know why there are some who actually prefer being miserable.
forsan miseros meliora sequentur -- for those in misery, perhaps beter things will follow.
better ate, hindi bitter.

it's a good thing j gets it.

and i hope one day, you do too.

love from sabel

more pictures in hanivanivers/boracay bliss

feeling better + quest for the elusive cheap thai food

but i'm still keeping my appointment with sister luisa :)

more on yesterday because i got sleepy.

iza texted in the morning asking if i wanted to meet up because she was craving for sr thai.
i asked her if she was craving for thai food or sr thai specifically.
"cheap thai food mare. i have budget constraints but my friend needs me."
** is that not the sweetest?

anyway, cheap thai food. eh di soms ... but more on that later.

so we made plans to go out after mass. planned to get my hair cut (didn't happen) so i went to phase 3. heard mass sa phase 2 and ito na, the soms adventure.

iza said that there's soms na sa QC. i didn't know that.
she was positive that there was, around the ABS-CBN area. so we were driving around for an hour na when we finally gave up. i told na we'll just have dinner sa thai kitchen so we parked there but it was so second rate so outside the place, we called people! siguro naman at least one of the 40 billion people we called would know where it was. i even called an ex's friend who lived in the scout area. we were that desperate hahahaha we were hungry na eh. our EQ was room temp na no.
of all the people we called only iza's brother chico and marco picked up. marco didn't know where it was, chico even asked chikoy and and he didnt know where it was.
it felt like the twilight zone. francis, who texted an hour later i think, reckons people were avoiding us :p
so far,our response rate was
pick up - marco, chico
sms - francis after an hour, ge-ann and kerol, the following morning.

the rest? wala hahaha. maybe francis is right or MAYBE god is trimming the fat and leaving me with my handful nyahahaha
so yeah, we decided to just go for sr thai so from timog, we drove back to katupunan (and this is after seriously contemplating driving to espana fo the sr thai behind UST ha? pag gutom talaga, irrational!)
we had like really sabaw hirits in the car:
"ayun o thai! thai massage. pamasahe na lang tayo."
"asian food! ayun! filipino!"
"pa-tattoo na lang kaya ako?"
"thai-wanese food ayaw mo?"
"hap chan na lang kaya? chowking?"
and the dialogue of the night:
"alam ko may maliit na thai karinderia sa katipunan. di ko alam pangalan pero may drawing ng elephant tapos yellow and purple."
"of course! pag may purple na elephant, sure na thai yun."
hahahaha! love her to bits.

anyway off to sr thai:
when we got to where it was, guess what. the place was closed. as in closed, closed! not just for the day but forever :p
so we made our way around again, deciding on cantina but ending up where?
here:



churyaki voy. hahaha.

to replace our catfish mango salad, bagoong rice, pad thai and tom yum craving we got






and



plus i finally got what i didn't get sa jonah's:



avocado shake yay!

after being bondat, we went to seattle's best. we had tea and sympathy, coffee and tears, talked about our kabakyaan with boys nung college para naman we'll laugh ... being tanga, and blind and scared and bokya hahaha

it's always like that with iza.
i heart her.

a curve ball from god

"jinggay! i haven't seen you cry since 2004!"

because since 2004 i had no reason to. boo!
that last night sa bocaray is what kamote fries are made of.

thank you kerol for being there.

summer is starting early

it's still a week but i'm so psyched for boracay!
rest!

hello hedonism, i missed you :p

why i need a break so bad

a couple of weeks ago i was ready to hunt someone some eighty five hundred miles away down, poke her eyes out and scalp her :p

buti na lang i forgot about it because i got distracted by my excitement. i was "boracay, yay!" for awhile.

and now although i'm still looking forward to it, i'm not as giddy so the green-eyed monster had a chance to rear its ugly head and say "hi."

and i said hi back.

now we want to kill her.

death to her and to her haliparot ways.

i just wish that ADD kicks in soon para i'll think about something else na lang, like work.

in the interim, i'm sending evil thoughts across the pacific. i hope she spontaneously combusts.

pandora's box

last night i found out stuff that would have mattered had i learned of them when i needed to... like 10 years ago! :p
village friends+alcohol(lots and lots of it)=revelations galore.

ex.
"why'd you break up?"
"coz i didn't sense that he loved me. couldn't see/ feel/hear that he did."
"he did. you were everthing. everyday he'd tell me."
"but not me. i had no idea."


i can't even bring myself to regret.
i kind of feel sorry for the relationship but i'm at a point in my life where i'm absurdly steady that it armoured me from the potential pain and confusion i would have felt had i found out about these things in a different time.


life's like that. i hope he's well.

back to work

it says 7:02pm sa clock ng laptop and i can't wait for it to be 8:00pm so i can start getting ready for work.
i've been sick for almost a week, and was just well enough yesterday to go traipsing about the metro. for the pat few days, my little engine that could, well, couldn't.

sucky yes, lalo na if you're energizer bunny me who can last ng almost 48 hours without sleep and in heels ha?

but yep, i'm raring to go to work. it's monday so it's reports day harhar.

but i'm pretty sure we'll be spending the first few hours catching up.
i missed team starbucks :p

---

let's answer the UP centennial meme first:

1. Student number?
95-25336 hahaha

2. College?
CSSP

3. Course?
Philosophy

4. Did you shift or get kicked out?
nope.

5. Where'd you take the UPCAT?
Bio Pav hahaha iskeri.

6. Favorite GE subject?
PI 100, where you can get a 1.0 if you can outdrink your teacher hahahaha shh. I wont tell who.

7. Favorite PE?
Ice Skating -- nuninu

8. Where'd you do guy/girl watching?
AS Lobby

9. Favorite professor(s)
SV Epistola (+) who introduced me to Buddhism
Paolo Manalo who made our class write about our Oblation run experience which Darra and I planned to fake (because we had no intention of watching fat naked strangers parade their weiners) but the Unverse had other plans
Wendell Capili because he forgave us (Darra and I) for being late on the first day, among other things :p


10. Most hated GE courses?
STS! Pointless!

11. Did you take Wednesday or Saturday courses?
Had to -- Majors.

12. Did you go on field trips?
Everyday kahit hindi required :p


13. Did you ever become College Scholar or University Scholar?
ALmost but I dropped a subject so underload blah blah.

14. What were your organisations/fraternities/sororities?
AIESEC only. I'm baduy eh.

15. Where do you hang out?
AS Lobby --- far away from the AEISEC tambayan sa attic ng BA

16. Dorm, boarding house, or staying at home?
I live two kendengs and a kandirit away from UP so, dorm. hahaha. Joke. Home

17. If there was no UPCAT and you were free to choose your course, what would it be (given your mental state during high school)?
Philosophy pa rin. I dreamt of beoming a Pink Sister :p

18. Who was the first student you met in UP?
Na non- Paulinian?
Si Donny Dingcong. He was the nicest, and we became fast friends.
and then there's this guy whose name I vaguely remember, Buji? Basta I call him 4-J kasi that was his section sa Ateneo. I think it was Chiquit who introduced us and I zoned out when I saw his lashes. They were incredibly long! Everytime I'd see him I'd go "4-J!!!!" and that went on all-throughout college :p

19. First play that you saw in UP?
I don't remember ever watching a play. there was enough drama between our bench and the soccer bench eh. Drama!

20. What were the 5 most coño orgs.
Babaylan :p

21. What were the coolest organisations/fraternities/sororities?
I don't knw... but I was always envious of the people sa fine arts. they could doodle everywhere.

22. Was there a fraternity/sorority that recruited you?
they tried :p

23. Where'd you have lunch usually?
Darra's, Marco's, my place, Mang Jimmy's, SR Thai, sa Ateneo,Manang's and sa Caf (yes, nang i-invade ako ng school).

24. Were you happy in UP?
Yes, kahit ma drama :p

25. Were you ever part of a rally?
No. Rumble, oo hahaaha

26. How many times did you vote during the student council elections?
Once, when my friend Jeboy ran for well, something.

27. Name at least 5 leftist groups in UP.
I have no idea.

28. Did you ever wish for laude status when you were a freshman?
No.

29. Who did you have the hots for?

Jusko! Mike Templo and Joma Marquez hahaha.

30. If you failed the UPCAT what was Plan B?
I wasn't planning on passing. UP was Plan B :p


okay, 7:41pm na. wrap it up vera.

see you whenever :)

double date

me and sabel
ice and dee-dee, ice's diana +

woot!!

girl on girl action, yeah?
harhar.

we initially planned to go to UP but i swear the minute we parked the car, it started to rain.
nge. we were both excited pa naman.

ice: so san tayo?
vera: doesn't matter really. ako okay lang dito kaya lang ikaw, mauulanan ka.
(ang weird ng hirit ko no? as if hindi ako mauulanan and ako pa yung galing sakit.)

anyhoo, since parehas kami di mapakali, we set forth and ended up here:



ang lapit no? :p

i didn't finish my roll though. nge diba?

maybe i'm not as histrionic as i think i am.

it still makes me senti everytime someone sincerely tells me i've touched his/her life, that i've moved them in some way, or opened their eyes to new things.


i guess it was always enough na lang kasi for me to know that they have a place in my life, and that i would not -- and could not be the me i am now had it not been for them.
knowing that i have a place in their universe -- and not just them in mine -- makes me all emotera and iyakin and hiya and thankful and lucky and humbled and happy
basta seven million emotions cramped in my fist-sized heart (and you know how small my hands are.)

thank you, i love you and even if you stop, it will be a long time before i do, if at all.

good start

no, GREAT start.
okay
now, sustain :)

---

I usually do this pre-Christas but (insert excuse here) so I'm doing it now :p

1. What did you do in 2007 that you'd never done before?
Have dinner with myself in PUBLIC.


2. Did you keep your new years' resolutions, and will you make more for next year?
See previous post.

3. Did anyone close to you give birth?
Ging, Cla, Audrey :)


4. Did anyone close to you die?
Pato.


5. What countries did you visit?
Divisoria :p parang India din sya.


6. What would you like to have in 2008 that you lacked in 2007?
sleep!


7. What date from 2007 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
Apr 15 - hello, dolphins! ang dami nyo!
June 10 - my bebidog died


8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
weeding


9. What was your biggest failure?
weeding


10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
carpal tunnel of love! hahaha kidding!
nothing major. flu mga 4 times this year, fever, food poisoning hahaha


11. What was the best thing you bought?
Sabel!


12. Whose behavior merited celebration?
mine. i can see now in black and white.


13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?
ay nako. wag na. stalker yun eh. fan ko :p


14. Where did most of your money go?
i don't know.


15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?
the dolphins. really. it was raining when we headed out to the sandbar and there was no sun so i was kind of resigned na but i'm favoured (hahahaha) so yun. yay!
and i'm forever thankful.


16. What song will always remind you of 2007?
a lot of old songs
Last Good Day of the Year - Cousteau


17. Compared to this time last year, are you:
i. happier or sadder? always happier
ii. thinner or fatter? same i guess. i maintained my fatness hahahaha
iii. richer or poorer? poorer but eh ano :p


18. What do you wish you'd done more of?
rest and eat healthy


19. What do you wish you'd done less of?
smoke.


20. How will you be spending Christmas?
i ate, saw friends and then slept because i had work in the evening.


22. Did you fall in love in 2007?
yes, with dumaguete :)


23. How many one-night stands?
nuninu
n/a HAHAHAHAHA


24. What was your favorite TV program?
kitchen confidential, gossip girl, jake in progress


25. Do you hate anyone now that you didn't hate this time last year?
nope


26. What was the best book you read?
6 keys to buddhist living


27. What was your greatest musical discovery?
ATB, 4 strings


28. What did you want and got?
vacation and promotion


30. What was your favorite film of this year?
shrek 3 hahaha


31. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
i was late for a surprise birthday dinner hahaha i turned 30.


32. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
um, 4 weeks in sardinia :p


33. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2007?
swordfish, ie misdirection.
for people not to look at your bilbil, show cleavage HAHAHAHA!


34. What kept you sane?
replaying happy dumaguete days in my head. and music.


35. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
wala naman.


36. What political issue stirred you the most?
spiritual boycott in burma -- monks refusing to accept alms from junta cronies. winner! no nirvana for you, general.


37. Who did you miss?
you. everyday.


38. Who was the best new person you met?
Patrick! I heart him all the more because he saw sakal, sakali, saklolo hahahaha!


39. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2007:
it is true what ammu said.


40. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year:
There's a place I dream about
Where the sun never goes out.
And the sky is deep and blue.
Won't you take me there with you.

Ohhh, we can begin again.
Shed our skin, let the sun shine in.
At the edge of the ocean
We can start over again.
-Edge of the Ocean, Ivy