Beaching with Murakami

Eto, eto ang gusto kong gawin this summer. Gawd, I miss Bora. Last year, ako na sumusuko sa pag punta, ngayon drought since September 2006--the time I took this photo. I don't even remember kung maganda ang Kafka on the Shore. Carry na! Imagine Murakami reading a review for his book. Carry na!

At eto pa...

Click na click!

I’m no professional but toting a camera to a place that is at the same time vibrant and decadent like Ongpin in Binondo can give you a real high. All of a sudden you notice everything, you are sensitive to everything. Better yet, you are constantly in search of a good shot—and in that sense your dormant senses come alive. And that’s a good thing. Anyway, here was the outcome of my first date with the lens.

Maxi in Ongpin

I played the Sartorialist during the Chinese New Year Celebration in Ongpin and this was my best shot.





GUMPTION!

Chill lang

You wonder if it’s got something to do with the dangerously erratic climate change the past few years but it was too damn cold for me to give the sudden weather change in our province some thought. The cold—19 degrees (in a normally 30-degree weather)—was something I haven’t experienced in years. It was literally freezing in good ol’ Bayombong last February 1 and 2. I haven’t experience this in such a looong time. When we were young, fog literally came out of our mouths—and that was the closest we came to a taste of the US then. Hahaha. Now the chill is back and I had to enjoy it while it lasted. My daughter and I went to the park and the cold was just creeping from everywhere—open hems, nose, ears – and that was 3 pm, when the sun was supposed to be at its hottest. Snow na lang talaga! In the picture above, my daughter’s cheeks were starting to get rosy like those bundled-up Chinese babies you see on magazines (teka, halata ba?). It felt like being in a different place,–and it felt great (and nostalgic na rin cause we used to have the same weather for an entire month as kids!) At night we wore leggings beneath our PJs, socks and super thick blankets. Best part is snuggling under the covers with my baby just to get warmth from each other. In the morning we have to deal with the same thing all over—literally afraid to take a pee because the toilet seat will freeze our butts off. The experience seemed surreal.

Now, where the hell are those Uggs? Chathows!

Oprah, you're da (wo)man!

SINABI MO, EH!




Jerome, do you remember writing the piece below? You sound exactly like Oprah here ... without the money. Anyways, I thought we could all use what you had to say here now that the year's ending. I totally agree with you when you said "it's always best to be your authentic self." That is soooo true but it isn’t easy. But if you apply it in your life --everyday as much as possible, the livin' would be easy, ika nga.

To a truly good, fruitful, fulfilled year ahead for the tres marias! To Jerome and Maricris-- the only two people in this world who reads my blog. Hahaha!

And to your *footnote after the piece, you’re not too young for this stuff, you’re simply trying to be a better person. Wazzzak!


April 18, 2005
Oprah Weekend

It was quite a blessing that I wasn’t able to borrow thelma’s new british vogue, I ended up bringing an officemate's new oprah home instead. Its her 5th anniversary issue and there is a special "what I know for sure" pullout, all of her favorite personal essays in the past five years. It’s quite a lot to take in for a weekend. What I remember most:

1) one page said: "this month, we're changing one thing." change one thing, it’s the only thing you need to do to break the spiral.
2) Live in the moment, because this moment is the only thing you’re sure of.
3) Your beliefs will carry you towards your dreams, your destiny. She talks about how even as a child she knew she was meant for bigger things, so she didnt listen to the people who thought she was gonna stay a small-town girl and grow up fat like all the other winfrey women before her.
4) Your happiness doesn’t depend on other people, happiness is proportional to the love you give, the generosity of your spirit.

Before leaving the office last Saturday, Francine and I even had a moment when we were sort of serious, sort of having fun, asking each other, what we know for sure. She said that at the end of the day, you are your own best companion. What i know for sure is that it's always best to be your authentic self. it's easier, and you might doubt using it in the beginning but you will find in the long run that you are right. It amazes me how into this I have become, not as a pastime but truly something that I have come to believe makes sense. I'd like to say, as careful as i am to be branded as a brainwashed girl again, I must say that it began totally from a personal perspective, personal realizations in the new year, walking about UP last New year's eve day, about becoming more present in the moment, about not becoming invisible, to always be conscious, to keep asking myself is this what I need, what I want, not what other people want. And then I started reading the hours again, writing to a journal, and then I started watching oprah again almost every morning when I wake up.

I was describing the need for exercise to my sister last Friday, and what it is, if you do it correctly, as I was told to do in yoga, is that it connects you to your center, you breathe in and breathe out, without losing grip of your idea of the source of your breath inside you. For thirty minutes in the treadmill, and for a number of hours perhaps after, you are standing better, moving better, into yourself, sure of almost everything that you want. You keep doing it everyday and it will result to a much more connected you. Did i telll you about this glow that they kept saying i had in the beginning of the year? I think it came from there. I was always tan, of course, and exercising. But there was a spirit I thought, inside. It was different. Living in this world, especially in the world that I live in, the many details takes you away from what you really set out doing. The work, the fact that you share this work with someone you’d rather not share it with, the diet, all the little things, the PR. But if you breathe I think, and I find sometimes this is unconscious, you come back to your center. And reading Oprah this weekend has only reaffirmed all these. At least I know I wasn’t brainwashed. All these things that I’ve read, I already know. I just hope I get to really use it in my life.

* I feel like I'm too young for this talk. This is middle-age talk. What do you know for sure?

Go na sa Sango!

MATER CHEESE BURGER
Kung sawa ka na sa American at Pinoy Burgers subukan niyo naman ang Japanese burger. Go to Sango! where the patties are the real deal--they taste and feel like 100 percent beef. Parang homemade. Their best seller is the Master Cheese burger--kinda sloppy because of the genrously spread sauce that will inevitably spill on the paper wrap but the trick according to the owner is to dip ur fries on the overflowing sauce.

GOBOH RICE BURGER

Their fish burger I like, too--the sauce has that mustard mix blends well with the fish. Kung gutom ka, go for their rice burgers. Yun yung value meal, in the real sense of the word. Prices range between 60 to 150. Carry na!

FISH BURGER

Sango!is located at the Ground Floor Creekside Mall in Amorsolo. Interiors are a a tad too bright for me but I guess that's how the Japanese like it.

PMS

TRUE KA DIYAN!

Monkey to Dahl: "Mare, ika nga nung kanta...Life is not at all that bad my, friend"


TODAY is a painfully boring day. While there are still a few things I need to do—at least for today—I can’t bring myself to do it. This is what happens when high-voltage laziness hits a naturally lazy person. Nada. I can waste the entire day downloading games on the Internet and uninstall them when I get bored. Na browse ko na rin yung oprah.com, na-check kung may bagong entry sa blog ang mga ka-berks ko, na view ko na rin yung mga people who’s viewed me sa friendster (9 in the last month, hmmm)—isa lang ang binata dun di ko pa trip ugali. I’d like to believe that whatever I’m feeling right now is a combination of the past two weeks’ marathon writing (all not related to my job here at the office. He he) and the earliest signs of an impending PMS (emo girl na naman for more than a week). Eh, what can I do, I expectedly gets these symptoms month after month after month and, naturally, at some point surrender to it. Tipong, bahala ka na nga kung anong gusto mong gawin sa emotions ko, sige, gaguhin mo, bad trippin mo, make this a painfully boring day, kahit ano, dehins ako lalaban—unang una wala akong lakas na lumaban.

It happens to Maricris and a billion other women out there (except, probably, to Christian Amanpour…”Meanwhile in Gaza, three women were found dead when a bomb exploded….naah, I don’t feel like it, am listening to some Erykah Badu back in my hotel). And it’s a monthly battle talaga. If it catches up with you and you are in a happy mood—ay maganda, nasta-stablize ang moods mo. But more often than not, it hits you when you’re just starting to relish (and celebrate) the past few weeks because it has been stable, relatively upbeat and well, the perfect term would be, normal, you know, just the way everyday should be so you can, ika nga, conquer your little demons: ang taba mo, ang dry ng hair mo, ba’t di mo binigyan yung pulubi ng pera--nanghihinayang ka ba sa limang piso? kuntento ka na ba sa trabaho mo—talaga? talagang talaga?, you don’t have enough shirts, skirts, blouses, accessories sa kamay, sa leeg, sa tenga, you don’t have shoes for every kind of porma, make-up, tali sa buhok, tali sa buhok na blue na brown na yellow (ba’t puro black lang itoh?) hairpin, ba’t di ka makabili ng MP3 nang di ka maburat sa bus, yung rubber shoes ng anak mo isang taon na. waaah!!! Ang dami talaga, pero pakiramdam ko bigay lang ito ng Maynila. Bigay lang ito ng inggit sa mga bagay na kung tutuusin do ko naman kailangan. Yan ang monthly period. And the period before it.

Pag nandito na kaya yung anak ko, may oras pa ba ako para sa mga ganito?

Thank you for smoking

I don’t remember the last time I read a book that got me laughing out loud this much. Thank You For Smoking by Christopher Buckley really had me in stitches.

The book is all about Nick Naylor, a tobacco lobbyist--hated by the media and, of course, anti-smoking orgs--working in a company disguised under the name Academy of Tobacco Studies (Wazak). This is a guy who can lie through his teeth and say that there’s no connection between smoking and lung cancer even if the guy he’s arguing with is breathing through a tube attached to his throat. Together with his buddies from the pro-gun and pro-alcohol industries, he has the most despised job on earth. In fact they call themselves the MOD squad, short for Merchants of Death. In a way, I could relate to the story because I used to work with the PR department of this big soft drink company that defended itself (well, not to death like Nick Naylor) despite numerous studies that say soda is one of the causes of obesity. The convenient line they have adopted is: There is no such thing as junk food, only junk diets(San ka pa!). The funny thing is, the people I used to work with so truly and passionately believe this line.

Nick Naylor also reminded me of my boss back at that company and the reason why (among many others) I wasn’t able to stay. Theirs is a world that required a lot of sophistication, guts or kapal ng mukha and the ability to convince the public out there that what they’re saying is true. It’s the dirty work (and somebody’s gotta do it), and this simpleng probinsyana (ika nga ni Jerome) is simply not cut out for it ("Cola company donates elementary school building for impoverished community". The irony is they've banned soft drinks in some elementary schools. Get the psychology?). In a way, the book reconciled me with the fact why I left the company. At some point, I blamed myself a lot because I had it going for me with a relatively nice salary, benefits etc. but I blew it--more specifically, I blew away dylan’s future! But the book made me realize, that the job is not who I am (Well, who am I nga ba?) and if I forced myself to have my bosses’ mindset I know I will end up a lot richer but definitely unhappier. To be rich or to be happy (siyempre to be rich, gaga!)? Grabe, life is complicated, talaga. But reading the book made me realize how cunning the people behind advertising and PR should be. They promote products in very, very subtle ways—everything is subliminal! If you’re not smart, you’ll fall prey to it. Ang galing, actually.

Anyways, this book you must read for the humor--no dull moment in every page. And don’t take it the wrong way, I like Nick Naylor (who became anti-smoking eventually in the book)... and my former boss, too:)

What can I say, here’s to happiness!