Thursday, March 30, 2006

they make me smile

do you have things or know persons that can immediately brighten up your day just because of their existence? i know i do.

first off, there's A. remember the line from spiderman, "with great power comes great responsibility" (or something to that effect)? he embodies this so well. then there's R who i realized was not really as perfect as i thought he was but still, it doesn't change the fact that he's just a nice person. and then E, whose generosity and selflessness still blows me away.

but the two persons who can just make me smile without fail are...

my adorably cute niece, sofia

cute sofia


and my wonderfully cool nephew and godson, franco

cool franco


a couple more weeks and i'd get to see them again. how i wish i could make time go faster until then.

Friday, March 24, 2006

what a way to dampen my day

i just realized that some people can be a pain in the ass without them knowing it.

Tuesday, March 21, 2006

start of spring

i was getting tired of staying at home all weekend so i decided to go to a garden show at the krohn conservatory. i got a bit lost on the way but it was well worth it. here are some pictures from my weekend adventure.

krohn conservatory orchid house
bonsai garden display cactus display
rainforest flowers waterfalls


more pics here.

Monday, March 20, 2006

it's been three years

yes, three years since i started with my current company. it might be trivial for some but it's kind of an accomplishment for me. i spent a year in my first company, staying a whole year outside of the country. by the time our contract ended, i was all too ready to go home. my experience with my second company started out great. i didn't feel lonely at all even during my first day because i had friends from my previous company with me (we transferred companies together). plus, we had other batchmates who immediately became our friends, and eventually our office barkada. as time passed, our barkada grew to what it is now. looking back, i would say i grew a lot because of my experiences in this company. i learned much, enjoyed much and endured much, as well. eventually, the enduring had to end and i happily transferred to my third company. i was happy to leave because i knew i was going into something better and with the knowledge that in leaving, i would not sever ties with my friends.

it was actually a harder transition to my third company. first, because i was the only one coming into the team then. i had no friends on the first day and most of my teammates were on business trips outside the country. for about two weeks, i was alone. as time passed, i gained new friends. my teammates became like a family to me. and my manager was, and up to this day, the best mentor that i ever had. things were great. everything i wanted in a company, i got there. but as fate would have put it, we got outsourced to an IT company. most things remained the same but there were also some inevitable changes.

within that three years, i have had three different roles. and i enjoyed all of them immensely while learning a lot. i have met and befriended people of different nationalities. i was able to travel and embrace different cultures. it has been an amazing ride. i just feel blessed to be here and still enjoying what i do.

Friday, March 17, 2006

bet me

i actually wanted to go to old navy but ended up entering barnes and noble since the parking was so bad because of the rain. i decided to browse around since i was there anyway and they had hardbound books at paperback prices. the first book i chose was mary higgins clark's nighttime is my time. it was an easy choice for me since i already have a lot of books that she wrote already (that i usually buy from book sales) and i enjoy reading suspense novels. the second one was harder to decide on. i wanted a book that had a lighter flavor to it. after looking at the cover flaps of a few books, i decided to get jennifer crusie's bet me

bet me by jennifer crusie


i enjoyed most of the book since i could relate to the main character, min dobbs. she had self-image issues since she was on the heavier side and was struggling even more because her sister's wedding was coming. she had her girlfriends that were there to give her support and affirmation, which i also have. i enjoyed the book since min eventually landed THE GUY. it didn't start out great since their meeting started out as a bet by min's ex-boyfriend but fate had other plans and they eventually ended up happy together. a nice fairy tale for me, too --- which is ironic since min didn't believe in fairy tales. what i didn't like so much was that at the end, it sounded more like the medieval-themed romances that center more on sex. all in all, i think it was a nice read --- it did keep me awake until 2 am for the past few days. :)

Wednesday, March 15, 2006

UP's pride, UP's burden

Jose Dalisay Jr., PhD
Address to the Graduating Class
UP Baguio, 23 April 2005

Former UP President (Francisco) Nemenzo - whom I was privileged to serve -was frankly not too fond of the phrase "iskolar ng bayan" to describe the UP student. We are all, of course, scholars of the people in this university, in the technical sense that our studies are subsidized by the sweat of the poor, whose hopes we bear upon our shoulders.

But the President's point was that scholarship remains a distinction to be earned not merely by scoring well in an entrance examination, but by adopting a lifelong attitude of critical inquiry and rational judgment.This, sadly, is something that many of us lose upon our entry into the University and our immersion in its life - not only its intellectual and academic life, but also its social and professional life. The curiosity ends, the magic fades, the writing dries up, and we retreat to a cocoon - to a dimly lit room marked "Me & Myself" - there to spend the rest of our career sulking over the next fellow's promotion and so-and-so's research grant.

"Get a life" has been one of my lifelong mantras. I have always believed that while a formal education is a wonderful thing, what I call an active life - with all its serendipitous detours and little accidents - is even better. It is a cliché by now to say that there are many things we can never learn in school - but for those of us who are in school, it is even more important to remember this.

Some of the best things happen when we step outside of our own lives and begin to be engaged in those of others. Often, the answers to our own problems lie in others, and in their larger predicaments. While involvement in a great cause can also create its own kind of blindness to everything else, I believe that, at least once in our lives, we should embrace a passion larger than ourselves; even the disillusionment that often follows can be very instructive, and will bring us one step closer to wisdom.

One of the best ideas I ever heard came from a friend whom I used to play billiards with until the wee hours of the morning:"Everyone," he said while cleaning up the balls on the table, "should be entitled to make at least one big mistake."

I would not have been the writer I became if I had chosen the safe path and stayed where I was supposed to be. It took me two years to finish my MFA, and only three to finish my PhD. But before that, it took me 14 years to get my AB.

At 12 - like your chancellor - I entered the Philippine Science High School. As my parents never tired of telling anyone who cared to listen (and even those who didn't), I was the entrance-exam topnotcher of my batch, No. 1 of about 6,000 examinees. However, what my parents didn't say was that after my first year in Science High, I was going to be kicked out - with a 1.0 in English and a 5.0 in Math.

What happened? Well, you might say that I got a life. From the grade-school nerd who read two books a day in our all-boys Catholic school, I suddenly discovered girls, parties, and fun. What did I do? I used my 1.0 in English to save my 5.0 in Math, by writing a letter of appeal that began with "At the outset, let me say that I bear malice toward none." I guess it worked, because they put me on probation for a year, and I survived PSHS by the skin of my teeth.

At 16, I entered UP as an industrial engineering major - and promptly got a 5.0 in Math 17, for too many absences - the bane of the arrogant Science High graduate, even the perennial flunker like me who thought he already knew more Math than he needed to know.

At 17, still a freshman, I quit college - over the tears of my mother, whose fondest hope was for me to graduate from UP just like she did. I wanted to join the revolution, like many of my comrades; at the same time I was impatient to get a job.

At 18, I was working as a newspaper reporter covering hospital fires, US mbassy rallies, suicide cases, factory strikes, and typhoon relief operations.I spent most of my 19th year in martial-law prison.

At 20, I was a husband and father.

At 26, I took my first foreign trip.

At 27, I learned how to drive - and went back to school.

At 30, I got my AB, and decided that what I wanted to do was to write and teach for the rest of my life, so here I am.

I have been shot at, imprisoned, and worst of all, rejected by more crushes than I care to remember. Aside from my abortive career in journalism, I once worked as a cook-waiter-cashier-busboy-janitor,
cutting 40 pounds of pork and chicken every day before turning them into someone's dinner. Much earlier, I worked as a municipal employee, checking the attendance of Metro Aides at seven in the morning, and then I studied printmaking and sold my etchings cheaply by the dozen in Ermita.

Incidentally, it was at that printmaking shop that I met my wife June, who's here with me today, and for
whose patience with my colorful moods I am forever grateful.

Some of these events have found their way to my writing; most of them have not and never will. I believe that creative writing should generate its own excitement, beyond whatever may have happened to the author in his or her own life. But neither can I deny that my outlook has been influenced by what I have seen out there, as bright, as indelible, and as disturbing as fresh blood.

If we are to abide by the Phi Kappa Phi motto to "let the love of learning rule humanity," we should first ourselves be ruled by the love of learning, learning from books, and learning beyond them. On the other side of the equation, let me observe that there is, today, a nascent but disturbing strain of anti-intellectualism in Philippine politics and society. The vulgar expression of this sentiment has taken the form of the suggestion that we can dispense with brains and education when it comes to our national leadership, because they have done us no good, anyway.

It is easy to see how this perception came about, and how its attractiveness derives from its being at least partially true. Many of our people feel betrayed by their best and brightest - the edukado, as we are called in our barangays - because we are too easily bought out by the powers that be. Marcos and Estrada had probably the best Cabinets in our political history, well-stocked with prestigious PhDs from places like Oxford and Stanford; but in the end, even they could do nothing against their President and his excesses.

For us UP graduates, the seductions of power will always be there. Power and wealth are also very interesting games to play, and few play them better than UP grads - the power side more than the wealth, as I suspect that Ateneans and La Sallites are better at making money than we are.

But even these can put you out of touch. I have friends in Malacañang and Makati who seem to have lost all sense of life, thought, and feeling on the street, beyond what their own commissioned surveys tell them. Worse, they seem to have lost touch with their old, honest, self-critical selves. They forgot all about Sophocles and poetry and mystery and music you can't buy
at the record store.

To be a UP student, faculty member, and alumnus is to be burdened but also ennobled by a unique mission - not just the mission of serving the people, which is in itself not unique, and which is also reflected, for example, in the Atenean concept of being a "man for others." Rather, to my mind, our mission is to lead and to be led by reason - by independent, scientific, and secular reason, rather than by politicians, priests, shamans, bankers, or generals.

You are UP because you can think and speak for yourselves, by your own wits and on your own two feet, and you can do so no matter what the rest of the people in the room may be thinking. You are UP because no one can tell you to shut up, if you have something sensible and vital to say. You are UP because you dread not the poverty of material comforts but the poverty of the mind. And you are UP because you care about something as abstract and sometimes as treacherous as the idea of "nation", even if it kills you.

Sometimes, long after UP, we forget these things and become just like everybody else; I certainly have. Even so, I suspect that that forgetfulness is laced with guilt - the guilt of knowing that you were, and could yet become, somebody better. And you cannot even argue that you did not know, because today, I just told you so.


text copied from krista's blog

Tuesday, March 07, 2006

burst bubble

i just learned i might not be able to go to minneapolis after all. with our project schedule so tight and developments not going on as planned, i couldn't take a leave. well, i could... if i dare risk putting my project in jeopardy. but i still have my fingers crossed. until the schedule has been finalized on thursday, i wouldn't exactly give up my plans.

now all i need to do is not to get my hopes up until then.

Sunday, March 05, 2006

it's normal

one good thing that has come up because of this fixation i have with short track star apolo anton ohno is that i am meeting a lot of people.

i have come across ohno zone from apolo ohno's official site. ohno zone has a lot of information, not just of apolo but of speed skating in general. no wonder a lot of speed skating fans converge there a lot. it's not merely a website, it's more of a host for a community. the fans' energy and enthusiasm are highly contagious!

with my plans of going to minneapolis to watch the world short track championships, i joined the yahoogroups they've created. i've exchanged emails with a bunch of people and they all seem nice and genuine and share the same excitement that i have, if not more. a lot of apolo's fans go back from four years before, when he competed in salt lake. but there are also new fans like me who have shown interest when he competed this time in torino.

it's nice to find people who understand. who knows, my current fascination with apolo and short track might lead me to new friends and new things. within this realm, the "abnormality" my friends and acquaintances see me with is normal for them.

Friday, March 03, 2006

apolo on leno

i am watching the tonight show with jay leno as i write. the segment with apolo anton ohno just ended and i need to let out my energy in some way or else i won't be able to sleep.

oh my goodness, the guy is just amazing! he's so down-to-earth, funny and interesting! he brought his medals from both salt lake and torino --- five in total. an amazing feat for any athlete. he talked about his quest for the perfect race --- being able to perform as he wanted, no matter the outcome --- and how he achieved that in torino. he talked about his love for the short track, something he almost always says during his interviews. you can tell that he has this immense passion for the sport. he talked about abstaining from pizza for a year (a sacrifice he had to do as part of his preparation for the olympics) and being able to eating it to celebrate when the olympics was over. he talked about staying in the olympic village and in an offsite location and their team having an "encounter" with a ghost. it was a very fun, light-hearted interview that ended all too soon.

tomorrow

i'm getting my first digital camera!

kodak z740

wooohooo!!! i am sooo excited!!!

Wednesday, March 01, 2006

the questions inside my mind

how do you choose when to go for what you want and when to stick to what is practical? are all wants frivolous or are there occasions wherein you need to pursue them? for a person who has, for most of her life, been level-headed and logical, is it possible to throw caution to the wind and not feel guilty about it? when we are fighting battles within ourselves, is there ever an instance where we are really victorious or do we always eventually lose?