{ ostensibly }

These fucking guys...

2010-04-24T23:33:00.008-07:00

Candidate A: You just really need to stop. You squandered your mandate monstrously, and, frankly, your lack of remorse and any sense of self-awareness is frightening. Every time you contribute to prevailing political discourse, it feels as if something bright and small dies inside all of us. Just stop. Retire with all the spoils you bled out of the country. (Tragically for us,) you have your pointless sons to carry out your legacy of iniquity and misery anyway.

Candidate B: I'm certain you're the president this country needs. But, your chances are slim to none. I'll probably still vote for you though (a recent development).

Candidate C: The only redeeming thing about you is that you have an actual chance of winning this election. And, in the miserable race of serious contenders, you're easily the lesser evil. This country really shouldn't have to settle for that.

Candidate D: I really don't know anything about you.

Candidate E: Just... no.

Candidate F: We know you're a decent guy, and I believe that in a country with sound democratic institutions, you would do reasonably well as president. But, the moral vacuum that comprises Philippine politics will ruin you. (Get out while you still can!) And, you know what, your political motivations? Nebulous at best. Your ostensible loyalties? Disastrous. So, yeah.

Candidate G: You are incredibly shady, and that your political existence rests so closely to the presidency makes me want to weep and gnash my teeth. Out of all the candidates, you have the most to gain. Your tremendous political and economic capital (and the way you ruthlessly amassed both) ensure that you are in the best position to plunder and pillage what's left of this weary and heartsick country. And, that some people acquiesce to that, in exchange for the small scraps you're obligated to throw their way, speaks of a citizenry that's given up on itself.

Candidate H: Nope.

Candidate I: You've made some sound proposals, and you've had your share of successes. But, something about you feels too narrow, too limited.

sold my red horse for a venture home

2010-01-21T06:28:00.005-08:00

A YouTube comment posted re: a live performance of Lump Sum by Bon Iver:

I am not sure if I am happy as a little child or sad and alone when I am listening to this song..I feel like all the people are one big family and there is nobody unhappy, but at the same moment I am so alone deep in myself and anybody can't [sic] understand me..it is so fascinating song [sic] I cannot describe..

Yeah, that about covers it. I kind of want to crawl inside his music and sleep.

Our cook makes the best gravy ever. I am not even kidding. I don't know how Minea does it. It's so incredibly rich and earthy, so savory it makes me want to weep and make a tabernacle out of my plate. I want to make babies with it. Obviously any offspring to stem from this unnatural (but, delicious!) union would be morbidly obese and short-lived (by way of cardiac arrest, probably), but they would have such happy lives. Minea is probably the principal factor contributing to my inability to revert to my pre-Canada weight. But, I love her. There are, obviously, other factors. One of them: alcohol. Another: general sloth. Whatever.

Not gonna lie, Star Trek is probably my favorite 2009 film (of this generation, of this decade). I even made my dad get me the original DVD. And, in a country like the Philippines, where bootleg copies constitute the status quo of film appreciation, that's kind of a big deal. I've seen it several times, and I never get tired of it. Part of it is all the eye candy involved. (John Cho! Chris Pine, ravaged skin and all! Zachary Quinto! Eric Bana! Chris Hemsworth! Zachary Quinto!) Oddly enough, I only find Zachary Quinto appealing with the Spock paraphernalia. Otherwise, he's just a character on that shitty show I never cared for. Another part of it is the nostalgia. I grew up watching Star Trek with my dad. It was mostly Next Generation stuff (Jean-Luc Picard was like a second father to me, no joke), but he threw a few movies in. The best was probably the one where James Kirk, by some tremendous galactic phenomenon, became trapped in the same time warp as Picard, and they had to defeat Glenn Close to set things to rights. I'm getting that wrong, I'm pretty sure. I have no time to fact-check, because I want to get to how DATA WAS SO FUCKING CREEPY. He was like an android pedophile, the type who lives in a basement and used to decapitate domesticated animals as a child. I liked the blind guy with the visor though. I used to play him, but I used a head band to cover my eyes. That was kind of dangerous. Anyway, this was my childhood.

I'm not sure where I'm going with this. I was supposed to write about the time my dad and I took a drive down south (Laguna and Tagaytay -- several months ago). But, I got distracted.

I might actually go watch Star Trek again.

You know what I did catch on cable a few hours ago? The cinematic masterpiece Kokey starring L.A. Lopez and Cherry Pie Picache. These are their real names. O, the humanity. L.A. Lopez, I certainly hope you've managed to live a fulfilling life. Because your childhood? It was kind of embarrassing. Even by the esteemed standards of Philippine showbiz.

Yeah, I really might go watch Star Trek again.

Quite the hiatus

2010-01-17T05:04:00.002-08:00

Honestly? I haven't been writing much because in some ways, my life has been unbearable. And I just didn't know if I could trust myself with that. I want so much for this to just work. Maybe I've spent too much time trying to justify my circumstances, when, really, all I've needed to do was just live them out.

Moving back here was the product of a dubious epiphany, one that I shouldn't have trusted so blithely. (Never go with a hippie to a second location.) I'm not going to say that I've come to regret my decision, because (1) I really don't, and (2) sometimes I do, and I'm never quite sure how to deal with it.

It's this sickly sweet regression that I can't stand. This gradual willingness to conform to behaviors and ideals I once recoiled from. The things I've grown to care about, the things I thought I would champion and see to essential fruition, the things I've lost and let slip through my futile fingers. Some days I forget that I'm no longer 18 years old. I forget that I've spent more than 5 years living a different life, a life undeniably tied to the one I've come back to, the one I'm currently trying to carve out and vindicate. I forget that I no longer need certain things, and that I no longer have to prove certain others. I forget a lot of things.

So maybe my life hasn't been unbearable after all. It's been bearable -- viciously so. And, maybe, finally, I can no longer endure it.

Which kind of sounds like I'm about to slit my wrists. I am not. For all my whining, my heckling, my morose pondering... I kind of love life. My own is no great shakes, but it's... something. And that's all I need to start with.

at long last, have you no decency?

2009-09-13T01:41:00.005-07:00

I feel like the gum beneath your shoe, the turd scraped unevenly across a sidewalk, a bloody shard of broken glass left unseen beneath a bar. I suppose my life could be worse. Maybe if I'd been raped by a horse, or if I had willingly raped one. But, these probable scenarios prove to be cold comfort against this mammoth of sadness and dejection lodged into the major arteries of my shrivelled heart. Like butter. Or bacon fat. Only sad.

Full disclosure: I bailed on friends' birthday festivities to chat with my ex-boyfriend. For five hours. I wouldn't recommend this to anyone. Especially if, within minutes of your playful banter, your ex-boyfriend happily volunteers the information that he is dating someone else. This shouldn't have surprised me, really. That we'd ended things was unequivocal. No gray areas, nothing left unsaid that could feed into some godforsaken delusion that we could pick up where we left off. It helps that our geographical circumstances are just as unambiguous. The gulf between Ottawa and Metro Manila isn't really the stuff of enduring romance. But, whatever.

It kind of all boils down to certain things that I've done my utmost best to avoid since I moved back to the Philippines. This struggle to find things familiar, this deliberate struggle to find place. It isn't working out very well. I've had two options, really. Either (1) find a new place, a clean slate with which to start over; or (2) reinhabit the hole I had left behind and, over time, chip away at the grooves and cavities that no longer fit.

What's slowly becoming clear is this: that if I'd found all this so unbearable five years ago, that I'd decided (haphazardly, superciliously) to leave, then it's only gotten worse.

So little has changed. Sure, people are more upwardly mobile, more attuned to some overarching transnational sense of community (and the socio-cultural and -economic aspirations thereof). Things have also changed cosmetically: more commercial developments, more public infrastructure (if these new bridges and shit actually constitute improvements is another story), more green spaces (highly contested, but at least the effort's there). But, the heart of it is the same. The deep-seated class prejudice, the remorseless sexism (that allows men to justify the physical abuse of women as a logical response to infidelity, and the sexual exploitation of women as a logical manifestation of masculinity), the homophobia (seriously, the homophobia), the stifling religiosity that pervades and continually shapes all acceptable notions of right and wrong. I hate this shit. Add to this that thick, viscous sense of hopelessness that government leaders bring about, and Vancouver is looking incredibly cushy. Incredibly cushy. And, add to this the fact that my mother's moved back here, and I find myself habitually checking the impulse to look for cheap flights out of dodge.

Whenever I'm stuck in traffic, suffering the grievous injury of getting cut off by shit-for-brains motorists and bus drivers (EDSA bus drivers should be castrated), I always find myself stewing in my car and reciting in my head everything I hate about the Philippines. (But, seriously, I don't understand how people think it's acceptable to add an extra lane to a 3-lane road. And, when that road narrows, because there's no fucking way it won't, everyone cuts everyone off, and I'm left cursing at the heavens, like a heart attack on a stick.)

But, I gave the decision to move back home more thought and care than I'd given to the decision to leave it. It was a conscious and deliberate decision, one that I made after a disgusting amount of soul-searching. (Although, I realize now that the prurient romance of wandering about Central & Eastern Europe certainly colored things.) A part of me (that part that isn't heartsick and tired of all this shit) would like to see this through.

But, another part of me (that part that I've come to like) is currently in Amsterdam, biking alongside a canal, dreaming of pannenkoeken and nice fat spliffs, and thinking of grandiose ideas meant to save humanity, but are, in reality, too obscure to do much of anything.

And, maybe, just to counter all this negative mojo, I should take the time to think about all the things I love about the Philippines and about being home. Maybe.

And, now, I should probably go home and apologize to my father, before my mom convinces him to disown me. It's what I deserve to be sure, but I'd rather that he won't all the same.

(Baby steps, Lia. Baby steps. The future will be there regardless.)

snow flurries, london fog

2009-03-08T23:29:00.001-07:00

Weekend: over. Not too shabby, not too shabby. Started off with a friend’s farewell party at my place. The theme was sushi-and-bad-movies. (I wanted a sushi-and-hideous-sweater theme, but I was grievously out-voted.) We didn’t really do the sushi part: the guy in charge of the seaweed didn’t get here until 11, and by then we were more interested in the vodka he brought. Instead we made do with California chirashi bowls (i.e. seafood salad on sushi rice… it was kind of disgusting). And, we didn’t really do the bad-movie part either. In theory, I suppose watching Repo! The Genetic Opera seemed like a good idea. But, the reality of its atrocity was immediately overwhelming. (We watched Forgetting Sarah Marshall on cable instead.) So, Friday night’s lessons were: (1) drunken sushi-making is never a good idea, and (2) true friends always throw out the garbage for you.

Saturday morning (and afternoon, fine) I spent in recovery. Then had dinner with my mom and brother, took them out for some Mexican (mmm, chile relleno). Ended up at the Blarney Stone afterwards—haven’t been there in ages, so it was nice to see that its unique flavour of broken glass, sticky floors, and smelly-feet miasma hasn’t changed much. The music was great though. The band was kind of meh at first (I’m not cool enough to dance Irish jigs ironically), but I have to admit their rendition of U2’s Where the streets have no name was kind of mesmerizing. I did not appreciate the Lady Gaga and the Pussycat Dolls though. Seriously. Crawled to my mom’s place at around 4 (didn’t have enough cab money to get home), and just crashed. Today was a little more chill: barely made it in time to RB, and then had to meet my sister for dinner.

Might be going to Seattle this weekend. Should be interesting.

it dawns upon us

2009-03-02T01:58:00.004-08:00

Whenever my life settles into unbearable routine, my dreams start acting up. Everything becomes awash in bright and bejeweled strokes, memories and yearnings cut open and bled dry, their truncated limbs spliced together to create some phantom creature inclined towards haunting and ponderous thought. An alternative North Korean reality with a savage incumbent monarchy and large airships prone to spontaneous combustion. A moment of listless love stretched out to unbearable lengths and depths (an exhausted narrative that's grown snide and senile). An embrace.

I take nothing from them. But, on nights like this, nights when the orange light falling through the filter of my bedroom blinds seems to float and dance on my quiet, timid breath, I find myself unwilling to fall back into them. On nights like this, nights when the burbling patter of rainfall becomes the frenzied heartbeat of my neighborhood, I don't want my dreams prevailing over my small, petty reality.

some moments en route

2009-02-04T14:45:00.005-08:00

There was a moment: The train trudging (at an impressive speed that belied the judgments I may or may not have cast on its grimy appearance) through a flat, green landscape serenely dusted with snow; trees holding up their empty, gnarled branches as if proclaiming their resignation at the emancipation of their leafy wards; tall, majestic windmills, blithely going about their business of saving humanity from ourselves; the sky a meek and mewling blue, clouds corpulent and unwilling to be moved from their heavy perches.

Another: When half the sky is so overcast that it almost looks sick and swollen, while the other half seen through the opposite window defiantly lets light break through thickening, quickening clouds; the light making the trees glow golden against that swollen, purple sky; and you just want time to stop because you can't be sure if you'll ever see anything like it again. And then it starts to snow. And everything gets blurry and strangely speckled. But, certain things seem to be beyond all that icy, white obfuscation: the colour green, and the dying golden light of the horizon.

so lovely dancer, call a dancer

2009-02-03T21:07:00.002-08:00

So, I have a little less than a week left. I've officially decided to nix my two weeks of further gallivanting. ("Gallivanting" is now officially my parents' favourite word in reference to me.) It's not that I've had enough -- may the universe open up and swallow me whole if that ever happens. It's more... I know what I want to do, and while I can't do anything about the timeline, I can't help but feel that my time (and money) can be better spent elsewhere. So, I bit the bullet and called Air Canada to move my flight -- and, promptly understood why everyone bitches about them. Seriously... I was on hold for 40 fucking minutes. Roaming, long distance toll charges apply and everything. Rogers and Air Canada... what a crap sandwich they make. My heart broke a little, but I'm okay with it for the most part. The parents were kind of mad -- mostly because I never told them I'd be traveling post-internship. (My bad.) But, I think my mom is (not-so-)secretly glad that I'm headed back earlier.

Switching topics: My dad's made peace with my decision, I think. So much so that he's already making plans to get me my own place (our old condo... tenants will have to be displaced) and thinking about what kind of car to buy me (because god forbid I use any of his babies). It's more than a little alarming listening to him, really. I don't want to sink back into all that. It's partly why I left in the first place after all. I realize it's ridiculous to be complaining about this sort of thing, not to mention a little tacky... but, whatever. It worries me, is all.

Just got back from Prague a couple of days ago. But, I don't want to talk about it. (Yet?)

Whatever.

It's kind of gross, but all I've been listening to for the past couple of weeks: Tessellate (Tokyo Police Club); After Hours (We Are Scientists); Keep The Car Running (Arcade Fire); and the albums Places Like This (Architecture in Helsinki) and For Emma, Forever Ago (Bon Iver). That last one has never failed to put me in a wall-staring funk of smoky yearning and silvery, quickening tide pools. Should this worry me, I wonder.

(A Prague-reference: I may never be able to listen to MGMT again.)

And, I'm out.

if you go by night, you'll hit the coast for sure

2009-01-21T12:37:00.003-08:00

Planning my last trips around the continent has proven to be quite bittersweet. But, did I really expect any less? This has been... I don't know. What's a gray area passably ensconced between sublime and excruciating? The thing is, I could go on like this for years. But, like any gong-show night, the prospect of that doom-and-gloom hangover just waiting at the fringes throws an eerie cast over the otherwise golden Bacchanalian proceedings. And, at the same time, I miss home. Vancouver, Manila... I'd take either one. (Or both.) If I've learned anything (and this is very much up to debate) at all, it's that we thrive in the unknown best if we strive to create the familiar in its midst. That, and the best things flourish in doubt and hope.

Also: Apple products are officially my emotionally abusive boyfriend.

on that night when our dreams stutter and bloom

2008-12-10T12:24:00.004-08:00

Originally uploaded by L i a

Got back from Kraków a couple of days ago. There's something about traveling alone... in some ways it intensifies everything. The interactions, the temporary relationships we build, the triumphs, the defeats, the petty annoyances, the small thrills and pleasures. The solace isn't as immersive as one might expect or hope for, probably because it's become instinct to try to keep the loneliness at bay. But, there's always something in that bit of pooled time and circumstance (a stretch of a journey spent alone in a train compartment, night fleeing past the window, landscape rushing past unseen; a purple evening spent walking amidst the roiling masses of people entirely absorbed in the wiles and foibles of daily life) that sings to me.

On the train ride over, I shared a compartment with this Indian girl. I can't precisely remember where she's studying, or even what her name is (although I know I have it written down somewhere). We talked about her marriage, gender equity across cultures, the caprices of globalization, intercultural mobility... our shared ambivalence towards Hungarian food. The 10-hour train ride was kind of brutal, but the randomness of it all can be just a little bit intoxicating.

Upon arrival, I immediately set about finding myself a hostel. (Not a lot of preparation for this trip.) Fortunately, the first hostel I stumbled upon (almost right across from the train station) had a free bed, and turned out to be absolutely fantastic. I stored my stuff, got some supper, and proceeded to get shitfaced with the rest of the hostel patrons. (Somewhere in the midst of all this, I met a guy named Joe from Alaska -- it physically hurt to be polite and not make the obvious Palin pun -- who reopened my festering sushi wounds by rhapsodizing over Vancouver sushi and sashimi and even Richmond bubble tea. Apparently, he makes the trek into Vancouver regularly just for the Asian cuisine. Also, I ran out of mobile load sending texts to Hungary.) We ended up doing a bit of a "hipster" club crawl: mad dogs, cheap beer, rum cokes, chocolate vodka, stone walls, a little pole dancing, great music, Polish drunk anthems, random creepers dispensing hugs and gropes, being obnoxious drunks on the streets (I was hanging out with Americans, what can I say?), and late-night kebabs.

The next day, I made the sojourn into Oświęcim to visit the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum. I elected to join a tour group (something I'm usually loath to do) as I figured it's not the sort of thing I want to do half-heartedly. It's not some generic museum I can weave through, mesmerized by art objects and ostensible masterpieces, telling myself that I can just check Wikipedia for each piece's specific history, because I'm too cheap and impatient to listen to a piddling audio guide. I can't even describe it, to be honest. Throughout the first part of it, I was pretty stolid. I asked the tour guide nit-picking questions, trying to align his spiel with my own shoddy knowledge. It wasn't the macabre piles of decaying hair, it wasn't the middle-aged man reduced to silent tears whom I walked past. It was the valises. All those valises with all those names scrawled on their aged, scarred leather surfaces. All those names, each unique, none of them the same. The graceful, studied curves, the precise and harsh edges of their penmanship. These were people who all learned to read and write, people who each had their own dreams, fears, failures, frailties, eccentricities, memories, loved ones... To be reduced to these piles of inanimate objects... It was staggeringly incomprehensible. It was the valises, but it was everything else. The children's clothes, bits of frayed lace and faded cheery patterns. The shoes, the prosthetic limbs, the eyeglasses, the pots and pans. The hair. It was everything. And, I found myself wondering what the fuck I was doing there.

A part of me wanted to leave, wanted to have nothing to do with this attempt at understanding. Not because I wanted to deny myself knowledge of it. I didn't want to understand it. I felt that, in some small, petty way, understanding this would justify its logic, render it accessible. I wanted it to remain beyond my comprehension, beyond my small realm of experience and knowledge. Those barracks, the bathroom barracks. For fuck's sake.

I was pretty much shattered by the end of it. Frayed, singed, bleak. When I got back to Kraków, I decided to just walk around a bit, not to look for distraction and forget, but to remind myself that we move on. We don't heal completely, but we learn to live with the wounds, the misery, and we move on. The city was all lit up with the imminence of Christmas, and it was soothing. All those throngs of people rushing past, little kids on their fathers' shoulders, mulled wine. There was a children's concert (little boys and girls singing emphatically into a mic with a jolly, rotund man egging the all too willing crowd on), the Christmas market in the main square, and a bunch of random bright and glittering things. (A fight broke out at one point... it all started with a rather decisive man-slap.)

When I got back to the hostel, a bunch of people decided to watch Schindler's List, and we ended up watching it 1.25 times (don't ask). While I was in a better frame of mind (less misanthropic, less morbid), I wasn't in the mood for a jaunt into the "Lizard Lounge." So, I spent the night talking, drinking, and smoking cigarillos with a few others instead. (There was a Québécois guy who was all too willing to share his stash of Polish beer.)

The next day was spent in a slew of typical touristic activities. Spent the morning wandering the city by myself, then in the afternoon, J. and I decided to check out the salt mine in Wieliczka (finding the right bus stop was a bit of an adventure in itself). It was this great sprawling complex of underground tunnels and chambers. The "tourist route" only really covered some 3.5 km of the whole thing, but it was more than enough really. Our tour guide was pretty cute -- but, we only realized this when he got out of his dorky uniform and ran into us at the bus stop. He should really think about using deodorant though. Just saying.

Um, Gossip Girl was kind of alright this week. Some parts were downright ridiculous (as expected, really). But, Chuckles... Chuckles was mesmerizing! With his contemptuously flaring nostrils and his wounded, wounded eyes. ♥

(Yeah, I just wrote about the Holocaust and Gossip Girl in one entry. Seriously.)

Edited to account for my own dickishness

2008-11-28T01:04:00.007-08:00

Ok, so I figured I should maybe say something about, you know, my work here, lest everyone back home (Vancouver & M. Manila) becomes convinced that all I do is flit about and, I don't know, gallivant or something of that sort.

This is a research internship, so obviously that means a great bulk of my time is spent online, trawling the interwebs for "free" articles and sources because this university doesn't seem to have any viable subscriptions to academic journals and databases. I found this tragic (and a little alarming) at first, but I think I've gotten the hang of sifting through the muck of PR rhetoric that seems to be the defining province of such articles. My topic is on the role of financial institutions (focus on banks) in the furtherance of the environmental movement (focus on climate change mitigation) in Central and Eastern Europe. Now, I wasn't exactly very keen to start working on this. They initially let me read up on my own a bit so I could maybe choose my own topic, and I was leaning towards something along the lines of the politicization of the green movement, maybe doing a comparative study of the situations in Canada and Central and Eastern Europe. But, it was all for naught. My supervisor listened to my pitch with impenetrable patience and summarily said: No thanks, what we really want you to do is this. This took 3-4 weeks. Seriously.

In any case, I started working on it, all the while mourning the disuse of my cherished minor in Sociology (and, really, the entire focus of my major in Economics). I mean, I spent my undergraduate years resolutely evading the cloying advances of financial, monetary, whatever economics, and here I am... in Hungary, doing a research project on climate change and the financial services industry. It's kind of demeaning.

So I was off to a slow and ignominious start, staring dejectedly at my laptop's pristine screen (checking Facebook every five minutes and spending more time on MSN and YM than I have in the past 2 years probably), attending weekly lectures (most probably just so the room won't look very empty -- Erasmus students... they really don't do much, here anyway), and having random consultation meetings once in a while. But, as I've immersed myself more in the (skewed, self-gratifying, self-congratulating) literature, I've actually started to enjoy myself. Sure, I sneer at the text once in a while, mostly because I am secretly Marxist, and something inside me dies a little when I read about the different ways the profit motive (and its equally nefarious siblings: commodification and needless market creation) is set on purloining the self-righteous thunder of the environmental movement. (What's next? Puppies and kittens? Dammit.)

But, yeah. I've started to have fun with it... in a perverse, self-defeating kind of way, I suppose. It helps that, while this is a great opportunity to develop skills and experience and references or whatever, I recognize that the job is really only secondary to what I want to achieve here.

But, that's an entirely different story.

they abound, they abound

2008-11-23T09:49:00.009-08:00

Just got back from Wien. It was magical! It was gorgeous! It was snowing! (You can't tell from the pictures, because when the first few snowflakes hit, I dutifully tucked my camera away.)

The Sachertorte: like mainlining chocolate.
Explaining ad nauseam: I work in Hungary, I'm from Canada, and I grew up in the Philippines.
The Texans at the hostel (at least that's what they sounded like) who banged on my door at 3 in the morning. They were ignored.
Being mistaken for an Indian by a Polish girl, and being mistaken for South Korean by an Indian boy. (See, I could maybe say something about cultural expectations and ethnocentric perspectives, but I just can't be bothered right now.)
The Klimt (and the Kunstschau) exhibit! The Oberes Belvedere! I could've spent hours in there... oh, wait, I did. Klimt! Schiele! The Messerschmidt heads! That French guy who kept on following me around and trying to talk to me... not so much.
Fried duck!
Getting caught in icy rain as I searched for the Burgkapelle. (FAIL.)
Glühwein in the cold. Like magic.
Christmas markets!
Spittle!
My personal space getting invaded many, many times.
@Wien!
Trying to (awkwardly) dance to trippy lounge music and eventually giving up.
The PGF curse. Twice makes it official, right?
Frozen toes!
The hobo at the Westbanhof who was exceptionally multilingual... maybe suspiciously so?
Snow! And all the pretty!

And then there was that block of time when I swept through the city like a hobo in the dark in a series of failed attempts to avail myself of Wien's night bus network. I don't want to talk about it (the scars! the scars!), but it involved the following: two American girls (who were really nice! I kind of felt bad that I spent a portion of my night American-bashing, etc.); a McDonald's; three crazies; a kind soul who responded to my chattering "Sprechen Sie Englisch?" with ready aplomb; a Chinese couple (the female half of which was three sheets to the wind and all the worse for it... O, tiny Asians and alcohol...); frigid, frigid cold; and €10 lost... lost forever!

But, I don't want to talk about it.

do not fear we are here, we strike like monkeys in the night

2008-11-16T10:00:00.003-08:00

Random nuggets from the past couple of weeks:

Be nice to hobos -- always, always. (Except maybe the mean, drunk ones.)
Don't listen to Chromeo when traveling alone, especially when standing in the metro. (Awkward quasi-dancing will ensue, and old men will stare and be amused.)
Things in 3's are good. Current TV shows: Gossip Girl, The Office, and SNL. Current vices: bottled water, run-on sentences, and judging people in my head. Current music on rotation: Kings of Leon, Chromeo, and Broken Social Scene (yeah, nothing new here).

"It squeaks when you bang it."

2008-11-02T09:33:00.007-08:00

Originally uploaded by L i a

I can never have that one perfect train day. There's always something wrong with my ticket/pass, and the ticket-controller always speaks just enough English so that the values of our mutual comprehension comprise a null set (that is to say, none). But, anyway, I daresay I'm cute enough to melt the hearts of even the most curmudgeonly of ticket-controllers. (Except for that one time when we had to stay overnight in Budapest-Keleti pu. because we missed the last train out to Gödöllő and the controller was a tired-looking woman who wouldn't accept the ticket I'd bought the night before, but technically I'd bought it only a few hours before. End-of-story: I had to pay 2600 Ft... some $17, Canadian.) Whatever.

Last Friday was another Budapest all-nighter. We went to a Diwali Festival celebration for a bit, but left early because we wanted to go meet up with some of the other Gödöllő members at a pub. (Sucks because apparently, shortly after we left, the dancing started and the @ers started a round of Tunak Tunak Tun or something.) Anyway, it was the German trainee's last night in Hungary, and he wanted to stay out all night because his train was leaving too early in the morning to justify going back to Gödöllő. After the pub (where it was explained to me that instead of Jägermeister, Hungarians like dropping shots of vodka into their Red Bull), we went to a club where we were approached by random people who wanted to practice their English. There were these 2 guys in particular who were kind of pesky. After they asked me about some Canadian F1 driver (clearly, the only Canada-related thing they could talk about), I took it as a sign that this would only go downhill fast. S came back from the bathroom, so we hastily said our goodbyes and went over to him. And then, while we were bemoaning the price of drinks (me more so than A -- funny because the price list was about on par with Vancouver prices, but whatev, this was Budapest) some time later, one of the guys came up to me again and was like: I forgot to give this to you, this is yours, and gave me this little flower. It was more embarrassing than sweet to be honest; especially since the poor guy had to do it in front of my friends.

Saturday was a day of intense mood swings. I think my funk was a combination of homesickness, a weird sort of envy that S was going home, and a bit of woe that the number of Gödöllő trainees was dwindling. (I'm not exactly looking forward to being the only trainee left.) In any case, it was a wise decision to not inflict my dismal self on others, so I spent my time answering e-mails and catching up on The Daily Show and The Colbert Report. (How weird is it that the Comedy Central website is accessible from Hungary and not Canada?)

Today, I had sushi. And paid through the nose for it. (Some $31, Canadian! Reprehensible! But, to be expected... I think I paid about the same for sushi in Athens a few years back, and Greece isn't even land-locked or anything.) It was nice though -- the half-Hungarian-half-Japanese sushi chef and I got to trade life stories, and, you know, I got my sushi fix and everything. Spent the day in the more touristy side of Budapest, and I'm ashamed to say that being around so many English-speakers made my poor, language-bruised heart positively come to life. It was just so nice to be able to communicate with other people without cracking my skull and gushing blood over language barriers. It also made me miss my parents some, because there were so many nice hotels and restaurants, and I found myself mentally sizing them up and figuring out which ones my parents would like best. Strange, I know.

I should probably sign up for that Magyar class, yeah?

It persists, it persists...

2008-10-29T10:38:00.014-07:00

Originally uploaded by L i a

The weather, that is. I mean, for a few morning moments, when the sky is given to soft, grey keening, I turn to my winter coat and think: Is this it? Is this the day I have to put you on? But, it never is!

I've been in Hungary for a little over a week now. And, it's been pretty chill for the most part. (I'm not sure if this is a good thing.) I've just started working -- the last week was a mess of national holidays (ok, only one... but people made the most out of it), so there wasn't much to do, really. Part of my job is helping the department staff with their English skills, so I've been sort of tutoring this professor for about an hour each day. It's a little alarming, realizing how tenuous my grasp of the more technical aspects of the English language is (explaining grammatical principles and such). But, yeah. What's even more alarming is being complimented on my "beautiful" accent. No joke; at least two different people called my accent beautiful, like it's some sort of prized, furry cat.

Also, I suspect that my supervisor (a Ph.D student who looks remarkably like a Hungarian version of Jonny Lee Miller) doesn't really know what to do with me just yet.

(An aside: as I'm typing this, I find that I have to pause every 2 minutes to kill these bloody annoying fruit-fly-things that are flying around my head. It's kind of disgusting.)

In any case! The roommate's gone off to Budapest for the night, so I have the room all to myself. So, I'm sort of steeping myself in this rare luxury of lonesomeness -- something I grossly took for granted back in Vancouver. That seems to be the tragic flaw in my character: I need to be alone, but I'm not strong enough to endure the loneliness for too long.

My ex-boyfriends should be able to attest to that. Ok, only one of them has said it to my face (really: via MSN and e-mail), but I suppose it counts for something.

(Another aside: This trainee-dude from Armenia gave me a Jesus keychain. I didn't have the heart to tell him that I'm really a staunch godless heathen... who is not apologizing for it.)

Vancouver-Toronto-Dusseldorf-Budapest-Gödöllő

2008-10-21T00:06:00.006-07:00

All things considered, it was a looooong trip. Did most of my sleeping in the TO-Dusseldorf leg (where I was seated next to the cutest little old lady from Montenegro who spoke no English whatsoever, but seemed determined to converse with me), and some in the Vancouver-TO one. Dusseldorf was a blur for the most part. All I remember was landing, getting thru passport check, and getting on the bus that took us to what looked like an alarmingly small plane.

I had a pretty great send-off; thanks for the most part to Ai. and N (who surprised me at home), and Ad. and T (who surprised me at the airport). And 3 plane rides, 2 bus rides, 3 train rides, and some 19 hours later (all this with a 30-kilo bag!!!!), I finally arrived in what will be my home for the next months to come:

My first impressions of Hungary are mixed, I think. On the one hand, everyone I've met so far seems very nice. (They also seem to all have aspirations which include leaving Hungary, which I found interesting.) On the other hand, my "otherness" (oh, Sociology) seems so much more intense here. People stop and stare (not in a hostile manner or anything, more like frank curiosity), more so when I ventured out of the university and into the city. Hardly anyone speaks English, and I feel absolutely rude when I have to resort to gestures, broken Hungarian, and beseeching English to communicate with others. For the most part, I've been dependent on my roommate and the LC in terms of getting around.

I haven't been doing much, since the professor I'm supposed to be working for is apparently hard to track down. So it's been pretty chill, I guess. I don't like all this idle time though. I was supposed to be in the same dorm as the other Gödöllő trainees, but since I arrived 10 days late, the university gave my room away. I had plans of going out with them last night, but my planned 2-hr. nap succumbed to the exigencies of jet lag and general exhaustion and turned into a 17-hr. sleep-fest. My bad.

Spent this morning waiting for word about a meeting with aforementioned professor, then my roommate showed me around the city for a bit (pictures forthcoming).

Anyway, I've been in front of my computer long enough (sadly, my only means of Hungarian communication is e-mail), and the surprisingly-halcyon fall afternoon awaits! (The weather's supposed to turn at the end of the month, I've been told.)

all the aforementioned

2008-10-18T13:36:00.002-07:00

So most of this week was spent running around and saying goodbye to people. (Even our banker had well wishes to impart.) I'm trying my best not to have any expectations, really. (Because we all know what expectations lead to: kitten death.) But, they creep on, quietly, insidiously. Small tendrils unfurling, narrow fingers grasping. Stealing away sleep and breath, anointing in their place the small, petty fears that I keep trying to outgrow.

But, there's also the thrill and anticipation of finally leaving, of starting something new again. That pink excitement, that purple high.

Whatever. I'm probably overpacking. I blame Pablo.

The moment

2008-10-10T01:25:00.002-07:00

swayed
Originally uploaded by L i a

{...}

is the same moment when the trees unloose
their soft arms from around you,
the birds take back their language,
the cliffs fissure and collapse,
the air moves back from you like a wave
and you can't breathe.

- Margaret Atwood -

[his eyes] rested on objects with a singular persistence

2008-10-08T12:49:00.007-07:00

Ok, so after schlepping to Apple and paying through the nose for a new battery, I am all shades of broke -- purple, magenta, a sick, barfy yellow. (And, I still have to get the stupid top case replaced.) So, no ridiculously scalped concert tickets for me, no new camera glass, and no new anything for the next 6 months or so. Just food and drink and transit. O, DarthBook. With you, I fear I have always arranged my affections into too fragile and delusional a bouquet. And, you've been an absolute cow.

Anyway, so I watched my last VIFF movie a few days ago. Just for funsies, I've decided to rate them according to how much I enjoyed them. This essay into hierarchy-development is slightly misleading: they were all quality films, I totally lucked out when I glanced through the catalog (my movie selection process was embarrassingly arbitrary). The worst one I watched will always be a better use of my time than, say, watching a Hills marathon. And, I fucking love The Hills. I love it like I'd love an eleventh finger -- it's entirely beyond the normal scope of what I require of my body and appendages, and it's not a little ghastly, but I'd love it just as much as I would my ten others.

To the list! (That's a lot of American movies, I just noticed. Um, click picture for source.)

Welcome to the Sticks [France]. This one was such a gas. We watched it on a rainy Monday afternoon, so a pleasantly empty theatre was to be expected. But, no, as with most other widely released, critically acclaimed French movies, the middle-aged, summer-in-Bordeaux/Provence/Southern France set came out in droves to watch it. (And, even worse, I got seated next to the worst old-person stereotype: the one who thinks they're too old to wear deodorant. I guess that lends itself to the whole authenticity of the experience. You know, if I could just use one more stereotype/misconception: the French don't wear deodorant! Zut alors!) The film was great fun, really. One middle-manager, driven to defeatism by an aggressive, volatile wife, gets transferred to a town in northern France. (After a hilarious attempt to secure a post in the Riviera.) Despite his gross misconceptions of the Ch'ti (who claim Ch'ti-vie Wonder as one of their own), he falls for its charms, its characters, its fried foods, and its alcohol. He continues to lie to his wife about it, who, touched by the profound "sacrifice" of her husband, becomes a paragon of good wifely virtue. Antics, expectedly, ensue. It's a sweet little movie, filled with good, stunningly simple humour, and fluid characterization.

Sita Sings the Blues [U.S.A.]. This one was absolutely mesmerizing. I remember taking up The Rāmāyaṇa in high school -- which means, we read an excerpt after establishing minimal context -- but, the misogyny of it just completely went over my head. (Although that's probably because we only read the part about how Rama rescued Sita from the dude with the many heads. Literary complexity and cultural nuances weren't really big deals in my school, ok.) The animation was stunning and eloquent, and I loved the way the whole story was put in the context of a sort of collective consciousness. Like, the story's sublime thread was wound around the bones of Indians while they were in their mothers' wombs, or something. The musical numbers, which I understand are integral to the theme, got a little tiresome though. But, they still worked. And the way the filmmaker posited her own personal journey as a parallel to the themes of redemption and empowerment of the Rāmāyaṇa was done beautifully. That stuff usually fails miserably.

Throw Down Your Heart [U.S.A.]. This was one was just... sublime. Musician and insane banjo player Béla Fleck goes to Africa (Uganda, Tanzania, Gambia, and Mali) to bring the banjo back to its roots. What follows are some of the best spontaneous jamming sessions ever. The nature of the basic insights of the movie was kind of predictable: music is universal, music is the one language that can transcend cultural differences, Africa is not all that bad, etc. And, at some points, the documentary even trotted out a few disingenuous African stereotypes. The music though... the music was awesome. I could have sat there for hours just listening. Some of the best cuts: Oumou Sangare, Jarju and the Jatta family, Harouna Samake and his wife Ami, and maybe a few others. The insights were predictable, yeah, but that doesn't take away from the charm of the film at all.

Religulous [U.S.A]. Yeah, I have to admit that Maher was pretty much preaching to the choir with me (or, really: one who wants nothing to do with the choir). In retrospect though, Religulous is sort of like those U.S. presidential debates. You go into them knowing who and what you like, and you leave with your preferences and convictions intact (if not reinforced). Maher is a little less absolutist than the major players of the much-touted "new" atheist/secular humanist movement, and I really did appreciate the way he kept going back to the importance of doubt. Honestly though, sometimes his arguments were kind of embarrassing (e.g. the Horus comparison and a few others). But, you know, not on the level of Dawkins' flying spaghetti monster.

Momma's Man [U.S.A.]. A man goes back to his parents' home to visit his sick mother and never leaves. It could have been every North American parent's nightmare (Filipino parents, on the other hand, would love that shit), but it was done so truthfully and earnestly that it becomes an experience quite beyond stereotype and cultural convention. Who wouldn't want to crawl back into their childhood? (Ok, there's a tragic non-joke in there, but, really, I try to limit the mention of pedophilia and child abuse here because they're so depressing.) Going back to that golden space of easy contentment where happiness can be as simple as a prepared meal, your parents' soft and lilting other-room murmurs, and maybe a few novelty toys. It is reprehensible, yes. Just like watching TV all day is reprehensible. But, sometimes, it's necessary, you know?

The Witch of the West is Dead [Japan]. Some parts of this reminded me of a live-action Hayao Miyazaki. Pubescent awkwardness and that needling sense of otherness, the need for sanctuary, the mercurial magic of nature and grandmothers. The ending was a total wash for me though. I wish they hadn't included (was it in the book?) the grandma's disembodied voice echoing ominously in the cottage. They should've just left it with the girl staring out expectantly, with the shifting, whistling wind as the only response to her declaration. That sort of ruined the whole thing for me. And that whole witch-angle I felt should have been more metaphorical and implicit. It just seemed sort of out-of-place with the whole thrust of the film. There were so many touching, poignant scenes in this one that it was almost nauseating. (The one where the grandmother recounts how she discovered the meadow of wild strawberries after her husband's passing? I definitely felt a quiver in my little, black heart.)

The Good, the Bad, the Weird [S. Korea]. This film wasn't at all that bad. It's a western action-adventure film for one thing, and for me at least that translates into no extra points. It was flashy (brilliant shots and sweeps, great sets and costumes, eye-candy cast, etc.), but the plot was kind of lame. Some characters were definitely underused and could've used a lot more development. Ok, most. Ok, all of them. Some parts of it were genuinely exciting and intriguing, but on a whole, unable to prop up the flimsy, feeble plot and premise. And, the ending? You can see it from miles away, and even though you know it's coming and you have time to brace yourself, you still end up feeling embarrassed for everyone involved. Parts > sum.

the implausibility of reform

2008-09-30T10:10:00.005-07:00

Fun little weekend. Got a surprise visit from an old friend. (Ok, the surprise was really for his sister and her birthday.) Anyway, he was the perfect excuse to just stay in all weekend long. Our plan was basically obtaining gross amounts of Chinese take-out and booze and just seeing where that would take us. (I wouldn't recommend it.) Ended up missing Waltz with Bashir (you still owe me $8!!), but I found him a ticket for Religulous so we managed a little downtown trip Sunday last.

Religulous was damn funny. (My favourites were probably the Cannabis minister and that weird little Jewish-but-not-a-Zionist freak.) Bill Maher is still a tool, but his douchebaggery is definitely growing on me. I could totally have sat there for hours watching that shit.

I missed out on a few other things, too. I think. But, the weekend was definitely Pareto efficient, or something. (Time-wise, that is.) It was perfect, too, that my sister's in Manila for the week. So no one was offended when we were doing our very best to make ourselves one with the couch.

Huh. I suppose I could go on about it, but I'd just be embarrassing myself. Or something.

The visa-situation is pretty much the same -- in that, I still don't have it, etc. (In other news, I'm really getting the hang of typing with a cigarette in hand. And, that's another thing, we probably smoked 6 packs between us or something. That's like a new low. GROSS. I'm grossing myself out. And, ash on my keyboard! Ash on my keyboard. Shiz.) I was pretty adamant that it all transpired in my little shoebox study though. The place seriously reeks now.

Ugh, I really need to go out.

these interwar voices are left to speak for themselves

2008-09-21T03:31:00.005-07:00

Hmm.

If I had to make a list of everything I've accomplished in these last few months, the list would be very sorry indeed. (And I don't throw the word "indeed" around lightly. I usually save it for occasions that involve cigars and pipes and quilted-satin smoking jackets and maybe a smart-looking top hat.)

I made a few decisions that completely change my 5-year plan. (Yes, I have one of those. Bite me.) Of course, further decision-making will be contingent on whoever wins the upcoming U.S. presidential election. I'm going to go ahead and say that the prospect of a McCain-Palin administration sincerely makes me want to fill a pillowcase with broken glass and beat myself to death with it. But, the U.S. election isn't the only thing that's giving me pause. Let's just say that everything will be cleared up come June 2009. If things go well, I'll be sure to make everyone sick of me and my news. If things don't go well, expect to see the rotten corpse of my dreams floating in the wasted river of my self-esteem.

Also, I started (and promptly discarded) two would-be novels. Strangely enough (or maybe not so much) I started them at roughly the same time, which I really should've taken as an indication of the extent of my commitment/fidelity. I distinctly remember whining about my affinity with the written word not too long ago. Well, news flash: I kind of suck at it. I'm going to stick to reading for now. I've been reading a bit of W.S. Maugham's work, and I may have spent a few gloomy hours staring up at my ceiling and despairing at my sad lack of talent. Oh, well. One delusion down; what's next?

Anyway, the past few months have been quite grueling. (Ok, not really. Like, the only exercise I've been doing is biking to the beach. It's really less impressive than it sounds as I live 3 blocks away from Jericho. Although, I make it a point to bike all the way to Locarno, ok. Plus, I've been not-so-grievously unemployed this whole while, all attempts at securing a part-time job for the summer having died small, petty deaths after a few weeks of half-hearted cover letters, etc.) They've been grueling on my peace of mind. I've so far considered (and promptly discarded) at least six career choices. (See bit about 5-year plan.) I'd enumerate, but honestly, I've already forgotten most of them.

I've been driving a lot. I blame my lack of a UPass. I don't know, paying upwards of $2.50 for a bus ride just doesn't hold much appeal for me (discount bus tickets notwithstanding). I've gotten a lot more zen about parking woes, so it's not so bad. How I'm going to survive without my trusty prolechariot is a mystery. But, really, that's a whole other can of worms.

I've had some experience with wading through red tape and jumping through visa-related hoops, but I can't quite fully quell the panic attacks. My love for the Philippines definitely, definitely does not extend to the weaksauce visa constraints of Filipino citizenship (plus: endemic corruption, thoughtless environmental degradation, and the vicious pervasiveness of the Catholic church, etc.). Boo, I say, a thousand times boo. I'm still aiming for a mid-October departure, but that's not looking too good.

Also, my darthbook is slowly dying. The battery is shot to shit, and there's even a gaping hole in its casing or whatever. My disappointment is deep and grave and made of the stuff of gangrenous open wounds.

I currently have no happy thoughts because bitching is generally more fun. Chances are, I'll have more to bitch about next week. But, as always, I'll be very passive-aggressive about it. And glib.

I laced the track, you locked the flow

2008-09-11T21:19:00.002-07:00

I must have had at least six conversations on this one topic, like a month ago or something: 90's music.

Smash Hits, CD Warehouse, Bop, YM, Channel [V], MTV Asia (circa Mike Kasem, etc.)... shiz. Stalking visiting pop stars in their hotels. Bringing CD players to school. Cutting out pictures from magazines and putting them in clear books. We were all such impressionable shits back then.

112 - Cupid: This song...
Janet Jackson - Got Till it's Gone
Boyzone - Picture of You
Billie - Girlfriend
B*Witched - Rollercoaster
Mariah Carey - Always be my Baby
Des'ree - You Gotta Be
The Corrs - What Can I Do?
Suede - Saturday Night: one of my first CDs!
Bush - Glycerine: I bought my Sixteen Stone cassette at National Bookstore, ok.
Duncan Sheik - Wishful Thinking: Great Expectations was probably the last time I found Ethan Hawke sexy.
Public Announcement - Lonely
Next - Too Close
Puff Daddy, 112, Faith Evans - I'll Be Missing You
Sugar Ray - Falls Apart: I have to remind myself that there was a time Mark McGrath wasn't a total joke.
Five - Keep on Movin'
All Saints - Never Ever: I actually cried to this song in high school... silly pubescent drama.
Blackstreet - No Diggity: Probably the only hiphop song I still listen to.
Damage - Wonderful Tonight: I never realized just how much it bastardized the Eric Clapton original until years later, but I can't completely denounce this version.
Jars of Clay - Tea and Sympathy: Who knew they were a Christian rock band? Not me.

a hand in my forgetting

2008-08-19T03:28:00.004-07:00

The moon's full(-ish). Waxing or waning, I can't say. There's a car across the street idling. Its engine doesn't sound too good, which reminds me that my car is due for an oil change. My stomach doesn't feel too good. Might be because of the fancy Chinese food I ate, might be because I've been smoking again. I really shouldn't smoke in my apartment. I've so far constrained my habit in my study. I remember walking in one morning, and it smelled like an old lady. The kind of old lady who sets her hair in curlers before going to bed, the kind who likes doilies. And cats. Cats are a foregone conclusion. The kind of old lady who always has lipstick on her teeth.

I've been wanting a tattoo for about six years now. I'm thinking of using one of the panels of a Craig Thompson graphic novel. I'm hoping to get inked before I leave.

But, that circumstance deserves a post on its own.

you think you can defeat me with your rebellious beard?

2008-07-22T03:08:00.008-07:00

Got back from Calgary-Kelowna last week, and I've been sort of twiddling my thumbs since then. Kelowna was great; a lot more arid than I expected, but just what I needed, I think.

The Greyhound bus dropped me off hours before I could check in at the hostel, so I had to roam the streets for a bit. It was all very hobo-lite: napping in the park, pondering by the lake, writing at a Starbucks. Then my iPod died, and I decided to trek back to the hostel to see if they could possibly get me my room earlier (unwashed and disoriented as I was), but no luck. Fortunately, a group of travelers from Quebec took pity on me, and I hung out at their room for about an hour or so. It was kind of awkward (I was smelly and hardly up for human interaction), but they were nice, I was exhausted, and it just made sense. Once I got my room and went through the necessary ablutions, I headed to the beach to take a nap. (Exciting stuff.) Ran into the Québécois folk again at the hostel, and ended up having dinner with the lot of them. They invited me to go clubbing, but the idea of clubbing with virtual strangers held little appeal, so I ended up walking around with this guy who seemed to be of the same hermit mindset.

I've missed rambling conversations. The kind that takes you places, but goes absolutely nowhere. It cleared up a few things for me. More so than the conversation I had with the moon while I was sleepily peering out of the window in that hellish bus ride from Calgary to Kelowna. I guess it did qualify as a "long walk by the beach," sans the romance or potential thereof - oddly enough, the basis of its appeal.

The rest of my stay involved finishing The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay. It was absolutely stunning; Chabon easily earns a spot in my short-list of writers I'd give up my left nut (if I had one, that is) to emulate. (For the curious: Aldous Huxley, Margaret Atwood, Alice Hoffman, Eric Gamalinda, Kelly Link... and these are only the English-language writers, I'm not sure how to categorize writers whose work I can only access through the filter of translators.) Currently working on Yellow Dog (Amis), and The Ice Queen (Hoffman).

In other news: I really do have to wash my dishes. This is ridiculous, I have a dishwasher. But, there's nothing like a pile of disgusting dishes and pots and pans to make me lazy. Also, watched The Dark Knight for the second time on IMAX. I had more bones to pick with the film the second time around, like little things I didn't pick up on the first time because I was too dazzled, etc. Seriously though, the scenes specifically shot for IMAX were incredible.

The Half-Blood Prince trailer (teaser?) is total fail. Just like Mamma Mia!, which was just ridiculous. I don't care if it was intentional. No one needs to see Pierce Brosnan and Colin Firth rip off their clothes and dance like deranged lunatics to ABBA. Although, I think it was mostly appalling because I had to experience that glut of sublime campiness mere minutes after watching The Dark Knight for the first time. It was very disorienting.

Off to the Atlantic coast (Nova Scotia and Newfoundland) in a week or so. I'll be sure to take pictures of a lighthouse or two (or twenty).

the value of this lost time

2008-07-08T01:11:00.004-07:00

Since school's end, anything even remotely academic has suffered a slow and ignominious migration to shelves and drawers unknown. My desk's been razed to its faux wooden finish, cleared of all the debris that comprised my piddling scholastic life. Papers have been filed away (strangely with minimal turmoil and remorse) and readings happily banished.

And it makes my little, black heart sing.

[Click for size++, ignore the misspelling, ok.]

Everything else is gravy, thanks.

sunshine and clouds and everything proud

2008-06-28T20:49:00.002-07:00

Hi.

Sunny weekend is proving to be sublimely benevolent so far. I bought a bike. But, it's a crap bike, the kind ambivalent parents buy from ubiquitous chain-stores for their kids. I'm planning on customizing it some, though. And, by "customizing" I mean buying a new saddle and maybe a nice, perky bell. But, beyond that would be counter-productive as I plan on not being here in a few months or so. (That's picking up, got a few murmurs of interest from Germany and Italy, but the constraints of my schedule might prove to be my undoing.) The saddle is a killer, really. Whenever I ride on it, I think of that joke with the nuns who ride on bikes sans saddles. And, no, it's not a good thing.

Yesterday, I took it out for a spin. Planned on riding all the way to Stanley Park from Yaletown. But, I got waylaid by the beach. Stayed by English Bay for a couple of hours, with nothing but a banana, my cellphone and a book. I realized too late that I was making an unwitting statement of irony as I was wearing my anti-Jesus shirt while brandishing a copy of The Year of Living Biblically. I wouldn't have realized it until someone pointed it out. The humour was not lost on me, but his combination of paisley and stripes was. The book, in any case, is proving to be a disappointment. Too much of that spiritual bullshit. And the way he went from abject agnosticism to unquestioning religiosity just baffles me.

Today was lots more chill. So chill, in fact, that I may have imbibed too much sparkling rosé wine. I hate spelling and grammar when I'm knackered. It always proves to be such an ungodly chore. Fizzy.

Also, I've been watching too many movies. We wanted to watch Wanted last night, but it was sold out, and I wasn't about to cross city lines to watch a crummy movie. Ended up watching The Love Guru, which made me want to shoot myself. It completely baffled me. Why is Mike Myers still making movies? Did Justin Timberlake really think he was doing a credible job of playing a Quebecois hockey player? Because his accent made my ears bleed. I also watched Crystal Skull a couple of weeks ago. Why is George Lucas still making movies? Because the last 3 Star Wars movies made my soul bleed. He should just stop, someone should just stop him. No more new movies, Mr. Lucas. And, no, your new animated Star Wars feature doesn't look any better. It all makes me want to desperately clutch onto the feelings that Episodes 4-6 inspired when I was a kid. I remember the ewoks with much, much fondness.

The beaches here make me miss beaches in the Philippines though. All that white sand and crystalline waters. And cocktails with funny names.

Anyway. Drunken summers are the best.

Peace out.

he touched his heart, but it did not beat

2008-06-23T17:57:00.003-07:00

I'm not really sure how I feel about my picture being up there. But, I suppose I have to have something to show for the hours I bled away tinkering with Photoshop.

I've been having a run of weird dreams lately.

The one I remember most is set in some dystopian, post-apocalyptic world curiously set in what looked to be my high school. My family and I are crawling down a corridor, trying to escape. I catch sight of a zombie, and I tell everyone to turn back, we're going the wrong way. On the way back, still on our knees, we run into one of my friends from Canada. But, he pretends not to see us, and keeps walking. But, as we're running, an alarm suddenly sounds. And, I think to myself, I should've asked my friend for help. But, I also suspect that he may have been the one to sound the alarm. So we're running, and we reach the covered walk. We crouch down, hiding behind a shelf of lunchboxes and thermoses. There's a swarm of zombies in front of us. With guns. My dad tells me to make a run for it, just run like crazy to the waiting room. He starts pushing me, and I stumble and fall on my ass. He shouts, and I scramble up and run. The zombies see us, and behind me I hear gunshots and roaring and other zombie sounds. I make it to the waiting room with my mother and brother. Mang Baguio is there, happy to see we made it out alive. I realize my dad and my two other siblings are not with us. I turn to my mom, demanding to know where they are. She shakes me and tells me to go back for them. I run back inside, ignoring Mang Baguio who's screaming at me to stay put. When I get to the covered walk, I see a crowd of zombies standing over something. I push my way through the throng, and then I see my dad and two siblings dead, riddled with bullets and covered in blood. I become crazed and I start attacking the zombies nearest to me. They quickly overpower me. This is when I wake up.

Anyway. Birthday weekend was fun. Went back to Goldfish for my celebratory slab of red meat (the first I've had in weeks!) and cocktails. Random debauchery ensued afterward: dubiously mixed liquor, Italian-dubbed softcore porn, and a procured lap dance. The family version was more PG: obscenely expensive sashimi and tapas at Tojo's, penises, and cake. (The penises were kosher... sort of.)

I always get a little homesick on my birthday. It was hard to feel glum on a summer solstice birthday weekend though. (Even for me.)

Ho-hum.

actions don't work to constitute character?

2008-06-06T02:38:00.005-07:00

A lot's happened these past few days... most of it happened in my head, but that's where most of my magic happens, peace... And right now, I feel shattered, broken, bruised and stiff with dried blood (not all of it my own). But, hopeful. And a little silly because of it.

And this song, coupled with its video casing, to be honest, it's seen me through a lot. The whole album has, really. My life's most defining moments, I revisit them with Takk and Ágætis byrjun running through my head, weaving through the flimsy, self-deprecating walls of my petty, petty heart. And that's really arrogant of me, I know. It's seen me through a lot, but sometimes it stalls me. Rests a flawless hand on my chest and begs me to stop and stare at something, because this moment will grow old at the bat of an eyelash, moss will invade the room, and tide pools will emerge out of the rocky corpses that comprise my ambitions.

That moment: when the boy starts banging his drum, and they all make a run for it, and he flings his drum away, and that other boy watches it roll down the hill, heartened by the benevolent incline that their little legs pummel against, and they fly. My breath always catches, I suspect because it insists on keeping me here, tangible, sentient, so monstrously vulnerable to error and frailty. That tiny hitch of breath serves to remind me where I am, what the air feels like crawling against my own skin, to remind me of the ponderous circumstance that defines and polices my sense of immediacy and viability.

And that last little boy, he always breaks my heart. Because my interpretation of it always sees him falling to his death, unable or not willing to go by the route of his peers, and reveling in his choice, his lot.

And that scene when they stumble upon the other boy and lay out on the rocks, making beds out of its small and dark embraces, that always gets to me, too. But, that's not what I want to write about tonight. That's not what I want to think about.

we have a map of the piano

2008-05-23T02:16:00.007-07:00

Such a trippy day.

Spent the morning banging my head against Gilgamesh -- oops, I meant writing a paper. Finished in record time, primarily because: (1) I could hardly give a shit, and (2)... no, wait, I really only need that one reason. Afterwards, had lunch at my mom's place since my dad and brother were leaving for Manila (plus, I had neither food nor coin readily available in this black hole of an apartment). I was supposed to spend the whole afternoon there, but things got boring really quickly, so I decided to crash N's place for a while. We made good use of her deck, the sun, her speakers, and my iPod (Kevin Drew, DeVotchKa, Shout Out Louds, and I even managed to sneak in a couple of Múm songs). Those few hours pretty much summed up everything I love about near-summer in Vancouver. She made quick work of her stash of Quebecois beer, while I had to wallow in the wretched sobriety my evening class required of me. Swung by my apartment to pick up a few books, then headed to stupid class. Left early though -- the second our prof called for a break, I was already shoving my things in my bag. So rude.

Red bulls consumed: 2. Gross.

So much junk going on (supplies!). I better schedule some stare-at-my-ceiling time pretty soon before I do something drastic. I don't really know what "drastic" constitutes at this point, but it can't be pretty.

Friday!

Grandma! I love you in a salad way.

2008-04-21T00:18:00.004-07:00

Saw Richard Dawkins speak at the Chan yesterday. It didn't really wow me or anything - probably because I know most of his arguments by heart, and I've read quite a bit of his work. Kudos to him for not mentioning the flying spaghetti monster though. And he should really consider asking Al Gore's team to teach him some lessons on Keynote. His slideshow looked like it could've been made by 4-year-old secular humanists. Or something. It was a good talk all in all - typical charming, erudite, and serenely logical Dawkins. And I'm ecstatic I had the chance to see him in person. That's another thing off my do-before-I-die list, I guess.

Grabbed an early dinner afterwards: cheap and insidiously delicious Chinese food with C. I love C, I can't think of anyone else who can make venereal disease and poverty funny. (Because theyr'e NOT.)

Slowly resurfacing from the black hole that was finals period. It wasn't really a lot of work, to be honest, I'm just absolutely horrible with all that "studying" business. I squandered about a week and a half on odiously unproductive activities, and the rest of the time holed up in the library and at home suffering through the agonizing process that is death by paper/textbook.

And going to school with some 9 books on the European missionary movement in Africa and African Christianity (read: thesis shitfest)? Not fun.

I love the smell of napalm in the morning

2008-03-17T03:18:00.007-07:00

Wild mix of meme-things I found on the internets:

3 things you would never do:
- Be on a reality TV show
- Eat soylent green?
- Sell an organ on the black market

3 figures in history you'd like to have tea with:
- Mohammed
- Edie Sedgwick
- Karl Marx

3 figures in literature you'd like to have tea with:
- Harry Haller
- Sirius Black
- Crisostomo Ibarra

3 things you'd love to do:
- Go to Mongolia
- Write a novel
- Challenge my worldview

3 people you'd love to do:
- Marlon Brando, circa A Streetcar Named Desire
- Stephen Colbert
- John Cusack (Rob Gordon, Martin Blank, Lloyd Dobler, geeky dude in Sixteen Candles)

3 films/shows you're ashamed to admit you like:
- Gossip Girl
- 13 Going on 30
- America's Best Dance Crew (JabbaWockeez!)

3 films/shows that affirm your existence:
- Say Anything
- Anything touched by Hayao Miyazaki
- It's a Wonderful Life

3 things that define your childhood:
- My Poppa
- Sunshine and our old backyard
- Disney's The Little Mermaid & Clueless (omg, I was a kid when this came out!)

3 time periods you wish you could live in:
- Interesting...
- but I like where
- I'm at right now.

3 poems that made you take heart:
- Percy Bysshe Shelley's I arise from dreams of thee
- Charlotte Brontë's Evening Solace
- Most anything by Eric Gamalinda and Margaret Atwood

3 films that you wish were never made:
- Garden State
- Anything involving a washed-up actor/actress, kids and suburban moral values
- Mm, tough to answer, really. Most films always have a few merits to save them from outright exile, and the ones that have gotten horrendous reviews I don't bother watching so who am I to really judge?

3 things/people/etc. that had to grow on you:
- Gone with the Wind
- John Mayer
- UP... and UBC, really

3 musicians/bands that make you appreciate life:
- Yo-yo Ma
- Vusi Mahlasela
- Dave Matthews (Band)... or Hanson

oil... they call it liquid gold, but I prefer my liquid cold

2008-02-29T23:29:00.001-08:00

Well. Except for the BoA meeting this morning, my day was remarkably lacking in AIESECness. Hardly had any sleep -- woke up wired at about 10:00 p.m. the night before (after crashing at around 6:00 p.m.), then stayed up the whole day through. Spent the night mostly organizing my files, cleaning up my computer, and fiddling with my undergrad thesis proposal. I had a heck of a time unearthing all sorts of obscure files on competency development, structured learning processes and issue-based experiences. Most of it is now either tucked neatly into nondescript folders or hurled at the yawning black hole of whatever is beyond my computer trash.

(What I'm looking forward to most though is purging my Gmail account and my Apple mail. Hello.)

Post-meeting, headed to school. Crammed a bit for my meeting with my thesis adviser. Stayed for nearly an hour -- she got me all excited about my topic again. Which is good, seeing as I'll be spending a good part of the weekend doing extra research to establish historical context and expand my bloody data set. It feels a little weird to genuinely like what I'm writing about (especially since it's Economics). I don't think I've ever felt like this about a paper since... my Filipino homosexual identity paper for Sociology of Sexualities. Or that paper I wrote on childhood heterosexist trauma for that Women's Studies course. That was a hoot. Oh, and that paper I wrote on the enforced encroachment of intelligent design on the discursive space of science. That really was more trouble than what it was worth... considering it was a first-year English class on university writing.

After that, the rest of my day was spent in random non-AIESEC meetings, random non-AIESEC bump-ins, and not-so-random non-AIESEC crawls around the north side of campus. Got home, dived into my bed for all of 5 minutes and dragged myself to dinner with non-AIESEC friends and folk.

I don't know. I thought I'd be a little more torn up over "turnover," but I'm curiously serene. The past few years have taught me to be wary of making emotional investments, but it was hard not to bleed a little over AIESEC. What with all those blips of drama, the incredible tedium, the typical snarls of conflicting commitments and butting heads... last year was definitely... an experience? An experience. Now it's over, and I can have just a little bit more of my life back. It just feels weird I guess.

And, what, it's my last term of school (universe willing). I get a little jittery sometimes, a little misanthropic at times, but the future (no matter how it makes me cringe to admit) is bright. I have a general sense of what I want to do, and have access to viable opportunities to get to where I want to be (both figuratively and literally). My family is well (although my brothers are idiots), my friends are dear, the weather's getting better.

Now I'm just waiting for the world to cave in.

my circuit's bigger than yours

2008-02-05T21:03:00.001-08:00

My current happy space? Nonexistent. But I'm keeping the ghouls at bay. Because this too shall pass. And because I'm classier than that. (And, yes, that is saying a lot.)

I have made a ceaseless effort not to ridicule, not to bewail, not to scorn human actions, but to understand them.

- Baruch Spinoza

2008-01-23T17:00:00.000-08:00

D, as he picked me up from school (after a lot of whining on my part) pre-dinner:

You do realize you're going to have to blow me after this?

You're disgusting, D. And only marginally witty.

This is officially assignment-week. But, I'm jonesing for some sushi, so I'm going to put off the Ray for a bit more.

I really liked last night's episode of The Colbert Report. And I usually hate those musical episodes. Even the one with Barry Manilow.

Been listening to a lot of Miracle Fortress lately. I first found out about them when I went to that Stars concert, and they were the opening act. I just recently found their CD, and it's pretty much all I'm listening to. That's going to get old really fast, I know.

My fridge is full of beer, I don't know how it happened. Mmm, witbier. And I think I have at least one more bottle of winter ale in there.

So fragmented, Li.

god says nothing back

2008-01-17T22:57:00.000-08:00

Someone pointed out that I forget to be grateful for things.

Smashing Pumpkins - 1979: a song I'll probably never tire of.
Derek: who reminds me of the lights up in the mountains -- they don't figure in my daily life at all, but when I do see them they always surprise me with how beautiful they are.
Instant messaging: most days I find it barely tolerable, but sometimes it's just necessary.
Phantom of the Opera - Music of the Night: a rainy day, full-volume speakers, the barest hints of silver light weeping through my curtains. And my bed.
AIESEC: a black hole for all of my good intentions, but the best people I've ever met.
Ideas that make you go: Hey, how about that?
Sushi: if I could give the Japanese civilization a hug, I so totally would.
Those small, incremental innovations that make you question how you ever got through life without them.
Those majestic, improbable people who make you question how you ever got through life without them.
My Poppa: because he's alive and well.
Holiday quasi-flings: because, all shallowness aside, they affirm me.
Books and journal articles: because they feed into my delusions.

So there.

the gospel of reconciliation through accountability

2008-01-09T20:25:00.000-08:00

I've been reading Philip Gourevitch's We Wish to Inform You That Tomorrow We Will be Killed With Our Families: Stories from Rwanda on and off for a couple of months now. I go through these intermittent reading periods because after a few chapters or so, I honestly have to stop and put it down because it's so wretchedly disheartening and infuriating. It's so incomprehensible to me. I like his treatment of it -- half relentless facts and half personal musings, because that's something I can appreciate. You can't possibly deal with this kind of stuff without looking within yourself and adjusting your beliefs about humanity and civilization. And I'm going to run the risk of sounding really naive now, so bear with me if you intend to read on.

I saw Gen. Romeo Dallaire a few months ago at the Chan. It had been an impossibly long day for me, so I'm ashamed to say that I was struggling to keep awake for the middle bulk of it. He started off talking about how nuclear weaponry -- the very concept of it and how it's continually being developed and proliferated, its unforgivable history, and the way it's currently being leveraged politically -- speaks of the deplorable state of humanity today. The bulk of his speaking time was devoted to the issue of child soldiers and the collective failures and frailties that are inevitably entrenched in the very idea of it. At the very end, during the question-and-answer session, a woman came up to the mic and told him that one of her sons would soon be deployed into Afghanistan (and that this was a decision on his part that Dallaire's book and experiences greatly contributed to), and asked him how she could possibly stay sane in the midst of all this. But, more importantly, she challenged his assertion that the the possibility and the reality of the "greater good" should justify the "individual sacrifices" of families and nations. Earlier on, Dallaire spoke at great length and with great conviction on how the international community is obligated to intervene in times of great crisis.

I don't know how I feel about that, strictly speaking. I mean, I support it. I support providing services and resources to stituations and circumstances that demand it, I support the idea of global justice and universal human rights. This is why the idea (farce) of neoliberal discourse was so appealing to me, because it could prop up the exigencies of transnationalism so neatly, because I liked the idea of global citizenship and international opportunities. I support the idea of "helping people out," the ideals behind it, if you can look beyond all that mess of religious rhetoric that gets forced down its conceptual throat (and everyone else's). I support that. But at the same time, I find it distinctly impossible. Like communism. National boundaries, even in the face of all this "flat world" rhetoric, are as stringent as ever, I find. National identities are changing, but territorialism is as formidable as ever (see media whorage of U.S. immigration issue). The enforced sanctity of local cultures feeds into this whole idea that the world is naturally and irrevocably segmented and even a little irreconcilable. But the thing is, the criteria are changing, social hierarchies are being restructured and values redefined. It's the boundaries that haven't changed. The world may be a little flatter, but it's a conditional flatness, an inclined plane skewed in favour of the transnationally powerful. I don't know who I want to trout-slap more, Thomas Friedman or Sam Huntington. (Maybe Pat Robertson.)

Dallaire ultimately pinned it on "political will." Holding governments and government actors accountable to their actions, and ensuring that the motivations and mandates of the intervention are valid -- these sort of things would do such "individual sacrifices" justice. Seeing the mission through, to its glorious yet somehow demeaning end, this would ensure that all expended efforts -- human, economic, military -- would not have been spent in vain. That sort of thing; half-measures and half-hearts undermine all incarnations of progress. Dallaire's military background clearly rears its helmet-clad head in that answer.

But so does his experience in Rwanda, only its helmet has a machete sticking through it.

I don't think I'm emotionally/intellectually mature enough to really say anything about these things yet though. And, really, what do I know? What can I possibly say that won't make me look ignorant and constrained by my own warped, little world view?

all in good time

2008-01-05T22:55:00.000-08:00

And, here we go. Final stretch of the winter break, and I'm expending as little fuel as possible. It was a great break, too. Didn't get to go out too much since there were familial exigencies to deal with, but I managed to make initial rounds anyway. Hosted 2 dinner parties, which were great. I mean, I have to use up that store of heterosexist societal expectations that have been shoved down my throat, right? (Pertaining to housekeeping and contrived hostess duties, and the like.) It was all in good fun though, I even enjoyed cleaning up, which is a little disturbing. I've also developed an active distaste for cilantro and, to a lesser degree, wine. It seems my palate has shifted back to that murky area of hard liquor that it favoured back in the day. Managed an appearance at G's party, which was monumental, since it's been ages since I saw those full-time-workforce folk. It was a little shady (all that questionable under-the-table action afoot -- yes, that was a pun, savour it), but it was great in a reassuring kind of way. There were other opportunities for social interaction too, of course. And they were all: awesome. But it seems counter-productive to recount them all. (At least this way my life seems more mysterious than peculiar.)

Dad and other-brother came over, which took up most of my time -- not surprising. It was great though, I'm a sucker for my Poppa, and it's always fun ragging on my younger brother. Christmas loot was surprisingly mostly liquid, which I heartily appreciate. Only, I'm seriously considering blowing the lot of it on a digital SLR or something. This is only because I've lost faith in my historic little cybershot after it died on me in Banff a number of times (all that extreme cold weather, see). There were circumstances that needed documenting, and I was ruthlessly disappointed. Maybe not even a full-out SLR, I'd be happy with a powershot (only marginally less probably). But, what.

There will be no talk of grades.

Banff was great. Even all those icky touristy things my parents made me do. I abhor playing tourist (or, really, conspicuous displays thereof), but sometimes, things need to be sucked up, etc. The hotel food was atrocious for the price they were charging us, but the downtown area was replete with all sorts of chain restaurants and tourist food-traps, so that wasn't really a big deal. It was a busy few days, all that running around and sport (to a certain extent, ok), and all that piss-freezing snow. I liked the snow the best, I may have grown up in the tropics, but I'm a sucker for frost and powder and all those other white and silver things. I wish I had more pictures, but my camera, dammit.

Anyway. It really was a great holiday, I'm probably making it sound retarded.

Mm. Managed to watch a bit of the Democrat leg of the New Hampshire debates. I wish Philippine politics had that sort of substantive space for debate and discourse. Political participation and investment on my part would be easier to stomach, and I wouldn't have to suppress the furious urge to make myself bleed just so I could drown out those pompous and conniving talking heads that comprise a tragically good portion of the current Philippine political landscape.

Aaaah, I can't believe classes are about to start. Poo.

different definitions of "us" and "them"

2007-11-21T23:19:00.000-08:00

People can be so poisonous sometimes. It worries me. And proves me right, but what. My knees are flayed, skin shredded into bleeding ribbons. It's exhausting, all this compromise. Get it over with, universe.

(Disheartening!)

It's so cold.

Also: your grammatical mistakes appall me. How you got through university is a mystery. (But, not entirely.) Tenses are great, you should try using them (properly) some time. Also: subject-verb agreement. Seriously, it's not that hard.

You know who I pray to? Joe Pesci.

2007-11-02T23:13:00.000-07:00

As George Carlin once said:

Don't sweat the petty things, and don't pet the sweaty things.

But, maybe: pet the sweaty things.

Balm.

2007-10-23T23:46:00.000-07:00

Tonight I Have to Leave It (Shout Out Louds)

2007-10-23T20:16:00.000-07:00

My econ prof is so far the only person I know who says things like "gizmo" and "in cahoots." It would be more charming if he'd given me a better grade on my midterm. I find it a little irritating. An offshoot of self-hate mostly.

This post is going to be a little drenched in self-pity. Just because. Just because it's not even 9:00 p.m., and I've already worked my way through 3-quarters of a bottle of wine. (A nice cabernet sauvignon.) It's like a light just went out. I even know when, I know exactly when. Sunday night, in the parking lot. I was just sitting in my car, staring at my rain-splattered windshield, when all of a sudden, something inside me decided to be sad. And I haven't been able to shake it off. This wretched thing.

I've been sleeping ridiculously early, waking up at inconvenient hours (2:00 a.m.) and just zombie-walking my way through the rest of the day. This happens all the time, but usually it's a conscious decision given a particular set of circumstances. Like scenarios involving an ex, some pictures and new people. Or scenarios involving my mother. Those sort of things. I'm so chemically/emotionally unstable. It might be all imaginary, but that's even scarier.

(The last time I saw D, he offered me some bud and I said no. When all I really wanted was to be persuaded to accept a few joints. Why didn't he see that?)

I want to go buy something. Some top or skirt, or shoe. I know that's really immature, and really annoying and ignorant. But I'm just really, really feeling sorry for myself. And I don't even know why. I've been staring at my ceiling for the past 2 nights. Thinking, mulling, sulking. Sometimes it's what I do best, but I'd like to be able to justify it.

In other news... I have no other news. My life is trash, I'm lonely, I'm average, I'm half-pissed (and there's no wine left).

And I'm a hypocrite, because religious people just make me want to shit myself. Stop talking to me if you have to, but don't "cheapen what we had" by testing your missionary/preacher skills on me. It's like you see me as an empty space, just waiting to be (re)filled with the golden grace of Jesus's love or something. It pisses me off. I'm not a lesser person because I don't subscribe to your belief, or even your pattern of belief. If I were Muslim or Jewish, I wouldn't be getting this shit from you.

Ok, now I'm just all mad. But, shit, man.

And isn't this the cutest thing ever? It brings me back to those days back in high school when I'd whimper to myself because no one understood that woolen products deprive sheep of their natural protection against the vagaries of nature. At least they acknowledge their contributions to human commerce and fuzzy warmth.

http://theseflocks.com

two lost souls swimming in a fish bowl

2007-10-03T01:59:00.000-07:00

Jesus.

Haven't been doing much besides school and AIESEC. It's a little disgusting, really.

I don't know. I'm a little worried about school. Mostly Econ. I can barely stand it. Maybe it's just the way the prof teaches, or the models he's chosen. It feels totally useless if you have to impose all these unrealistic assumptions. (E.g. closed economies, three-good/sector economies, three strictly distinct social groups, etc.) I just don't see the value of obscuring the complexities of history and reality. Sociology, on the other hand, I'm quite pleased with, as it veritably thrives on complexity and societal chaos. There's a real purpose to Sociology almost, even a sense of moral understanding in the midst of all that convoluted discourse and narrative.

I'm a little bit done with all of this. School, AIESEC, Vancouver even. I mostly just want to curl up in crisp, cool sheets, and just sleep for several hours. Several hours. I miss sleeping in. Reading things that don't make me want to peel my fingernails off one by one. Driving with no set destination. The silence of blank walls and empty spaces. I guess I just miss having no obligations at all. Having no constraints on my time, no exogenous expectations dumped on me. From all of it, over all, I guess I've just gotten more impatient. With certain people, certain types of people. With certain circumstances and ideologies. It's made me... just a little more unbearable. A little more oblivious, because now I'm less hesitant to burn bridges. And that's what I'm going to do after this, to an extent. I'll choose my bridges well, to be sure. I'm just no longer afraid to admit that some of them are expendable.

Maybe I should go back to Manila. It's been feeling more and more necessary these past few months. Not just to see old friends, to be with my dad and my stinky brother (the other one). But to just actually see it again, to actually experience how it's changed. Those small, sometimes cataclysmic, shifts; those moans and groans of a house that wants nothing more than to cave in and take everything with it. But, at the same time, I think I'd find it excruciating. Seeing whatever I left behind swept away or written over. Not having contributed to the set of circumstances currently steering its course.

(Jeebus, I'm always so maudlin when I'm on this thing.)

ZOMG, I can't wait.

heaving bosoms

2007-09-05T02:36:00.001-07:00

I grew up reading, mostly trashy books of the paperback genre, but I've come across a few gems. And by "gems" I mean soaring pieces of literature that establish extensive landscapes of thought, feeling and possibility in my petty little heart. The kind of stories that you either gulp down in one go because they're so stunning and irresistible, or the kind of stories that take you forever to read because the process is meant to be excruciating and ponderous, monumental and pompous. (I like pompous stories.) I like books that shape the way I think of and see things. The kind of stories that make me want to write and imagine, the kind of stories that make me want to sit down and think, assess and change.

For some reason, my perception of my relationship with my mother is very much coloured by D. Marlatt's Ana Historic. Now, that's not a very flattering lens with which to perceive things -- historical distortions wrought by vicious patriarchy, the re-imagination of language (armed to the teeth) and literature, dualistic definitions held up to an almost violent scrutiny. Throughout the course of the novel, the character that I found most disturbing was Ina, the unfathomable, manic-depressive/subtly deranged mother. I didn't see my own mother in her precisely, but I heartily recognized Annie's emotional processes as a richer (far, far) more eloquent reflection of my own.

I don't even know what I'm talking about. Everything's all a-fuzz. This is my stream of consciousness: fuzz. It's not even a stream, more like puffs of crinkly thought meekly popped out.

Sometimes, I really do wish I was born male.

Yeah, what he said.

2007-08-16T15:50:00.000-07:00

my name is judge

2007-08-03T02:40:00.000-07:00

I'm just not sympathetic enough. And people exhaust me. Social interaction exhausts me; those small, vindictive compromises you're obliged to make (average of 11 svc/hr) to ensure that feathered tutus aren't ruffled and the eggs are intact for the omelette everyone's always dreamed of. The disappointments and offenses you're forced to take on your knees, eye contact never wavering, always resolute but utterly demeaned.

There are so many things on the verge of happening -- like little lemmings quivering with repressed longing to jump down some rocky cliff. Their tight, jagged bodies bursting into singular brightly coloured pixels once they reach ground zero. But all I want to do is lie in bed and hide from the world. Just for a little bit. Or maybe go climb up a mountain. Stand on a cliff and make it majestic with the certainty that I would never jump.

It's not healthy. (But I love it. I don't know why.)

It's the same old theories, sloshing in my head like some futile, chaotic soup. No resolutions in sight, thanks. Always the same: talking heads feeding each other, reaching towards each other, warped and wet and all teeth (hardly any gums). It's those things no one wants to do, neatly dropped on to your lap like a drooling baby from a parent near-dead with exhaustion and resentment.

So obscure, Li. It's not 1998 anymore. Short stories about death in the high school paper this is not. Was I in high school in 1998? I can't remember. I hate reading my old stuff. (Which explains why I routinely delete entries... sometimes whole blogs.) Shit, I was in high school in 1998.

I miss home. Or maybe it's because I've stayed put for too long?

I had to, I just had to.

2007-07-07T04:07:00.000-07:00

A couple of interesting things I picked up in my disgusting, late-night internet sojourns:

And: LOLHoff. Like, seriously, it's like someone out there knows me. They know me.

In other news: lots of things. Wouldn't know where to start.

Birthday: Yes, please. And thanks.

2007-06-24T22:53:00.000-07:00

So, that was my first birthday not celebrated in the Philippines. I thought it would be weirder, but I guess I was too busy to really feel weird about it. Had birthday dinner with family at Cioppino's, fancy Italian place, small servings, multiple courses, but undeniably delicious food (try the salad with the goat cheese, eggplant, something-something and maple syrup! I was *this* close to hugging the Bible!). Then the next day was laser tag with AIESECers (Hoffwoman = 3rd place, yesss), which was a total throwback to those smoggy Laserquest (sp?) days. Then the most random birthday shipwreck/shebang/gong show (jury's still out on what that night actually qualified for) at Mel's place. The lack of cameras (or, really, sober people with cameras) was a total godsend. It wasn't no-pants (thanks, Justine, for the reminder), but it came awfully close. Kind of weird to be the only one still studying though. Damn those credit incompatibilities. And my lazy ass. Ho ho ho.

Was supposed to have Sunday brunch, too, with some of the kids, but fortunately my mom had errands for me to do. I get antsy during my-birthday celebrations. I don't know why.

I'm thinking: 22 isn't exactly a milestone. It's sort of a meh year. So is 23 now that I think about it. I'll probably do the whole rethink-every-facet-of-my-life-and-despair thing when year 25 rolls around. But right now, I'm pretty chill.

Got a lot of CDs for some reason: New Order (Michelle!), HANSON (EB!), Nick Drake (Deke!), some good old Hot Hot Heat (A & M!), Coconut Records (sQ!) and some new music: Hey Mercedes (sQ, still!). Haven't had the chance to give it an honest listen, but I'm a sucker for night skies and firework references, so this might work. Nothing from my parents, because I'm an expensive kid, and I feel bad for all those credit card bills (and trips) I've accumulated in the past few years. Yeah, mostly CDs. Not complaining, I hardly ever buy CDs anymore. Except for Friday: Beach Boys and some more Modest Mouse. It's getting gross, I know. O, and I bought myself some cigs. Birthday pack.

Thanks everyone. Those were lovely times.

I want to read some books! Just finished the latest Lisa Tucker (Once Upon a Day): kind of sickly sweet, but still a good read. A little heartbreaking, a little fortifying, one of those draining stories that make you want to slump over and disappear for a while. Finished re-reading The Time Traveler's Wife, and that's always something to go through. Also, Elementary Particles by M. Houellebecq: tremendous and just a little bit essential, in a grotesque kind of way. Reminded me a little of Ishiguro (Never Let Me Go), which reminded me of equal parts The Giver and, sadly, Prep. Right now, still slogging through some non-fictions: D. Dennett (Breaking the Spell) and V. Nasr (The Shia Revival). It's not quite the 50-books-in-a-year I was planning, but it's something. Recommendations? E-mail! (Or: Facebook.)

painted, palsied, sweating and drooling

2007-06-21T00:27:00.000-07:00

(I honestly can't say.)

Some things I just miss. The stretched flesh of stereotypes, the salt pillars of lofty ambition, maybe the distended air of knowing that each step you take will be met by certain, pompous earth. And some things I just don't miss. The montony, the rigid colours, the distended air of knowing that each step you take will be met by certain, pompous earth.

I miss writing. I know, I know. I'm embarrassed, too. Thinking about this feels tantamount to playing with imaginary penises in public. Never mind thinking about this and blogging about it, too. To boot. But, it's my birthday (no, really, it is), and if that's not reason enough to grant my inhibitions some leniency, I don't know what is. Maybe I should do drugs next. And sex with... no, never mind.

I don't believe I was ever brilliant at writing, although I was never one to negate any compliments thrown my way for sure. It was contingency, mostly. That Lia, she's never been pretty, always been fat, never been exactly, strictly smart. But she can sure spin a yarn (is that the right metaphor?) sometimes. I haven't written in so long now, I wouldn't even know how to start a haiku.

I'd like to write though. And maybe one reason why I never allowed myself to consider it seriously and actually pursue a career in it was because I was afraid I'd find out I absolutely suck at it. It's one thing to write about little boys and God for the college magazine/paper/whatever, quite another to sit down and write a 500-page treatise on human error, frailty, triumph. Because that's the kind of book I'd like to write. Something expansive and dreadful, searing, endearing, ostentatious but in a bearable sort of way, easy. I'd like to write about that quiet gleam in your eye, the blue shadows shimmering on the walls to your every move. I'd like to write about history, and how circumstances so ostensibly detached from your present situation inform the way you talk, the way you tilt your head to the side whenever you feel stupid, the way you flick your wrist while you gesticulate. I'd like to write about absence - empty spaces and the quiet and savage memories that pool in them like black water. I'd like to write about your mother. I'd like to write about ideologies and how sometimes they can get reduced to inconsequential blips on TV, and how sometimes they can be tremendous and absolutely blinding.

Another reason would be (maybe) because I was afraid I wouldn't find out I absolutely suck at it, and end up hating the world for not appreciating me and my deluded sense of self. Yet another would be because I was afraid of having absolutely nothing to write about. What have I done, like seriously done, to merit fleshing out the written word? There's that tawdry little saying, about how one cannot sit down and write when one hasn't stood up and walked around and, I don't know, picked flowers and have conversations with hummingbirds. I'm not ready to tear off a bloody chunk of flesh and thought and put it on bloody display, and I couldn't subject others to anything half-assed. Not with my name on it. I may have no morals, but I'd like to think I have some standards. A few.

Maybe I'm just afraid of rejection. Maybe I'm afraid of being poor.

(No, I am afraid of being poor.)

Whatever. I'm boring myself.

The nature of the average cost function

2007-04-11T13:41:00.000-07:00

Finally watched the C-SPAN (Book TV) Religion and Reason debate between Reza Aslan and Sam Harris (moderated by Jon Kirsch -- not the best choice, I found), after having the video lurking in my desktop for a good long while. What can I say? I find it intimidating sometimes, weighing in on issues like this. I have such a narrow sphere of experience, and no claims whatsoever to any semblance of relevant expertise. All throughout (over 90 minutes of squinting and nodding vigourously at my screen), I found myself just so gratified to be a spectator to this simultaneously exasperating and tantalizing conversation. Now, I've always liked Reza Aslan. I've read a bit of his work (his book and some essays), and I find his claims and arguments compelling. Not unique, surely, but compelling and cogent nonetheless. And he's pretty easy to look at, too. Let's just get that out of the way. Especially when he gesticulates and his voice rises as he gets all excited about making a point.

The thing is, I'm an atheist. It was an active and deliberate decision on my part. I didn't fall out of the Catholic bandwagon out of negligence or laziness. I didn't turn away from religious belief because of some life-changing event that completely shattered my belief in an omnipotent, omniscient god. It was gradual, yes, and sometimes sufficiently excruciating to make the idea of agnosticism (or nihilism, really) more appealing than it should be. My reasons are personal, but they had a lot to do with my perceptions of the abuse and constraints Catholicism (and most other organized religions) imposes on human agency and any form of profound inquiry. Belief in an ostensibly omniscient, omnipotent being presupposes that God is the answer to everything, all inquiry will inevitably lead to "God" (see Intelligent Design), all unexplained phenomena will inevitably be attributed to the will of the divine. Life is conditional, its worth is measured by one's allegiance to a specific set of codes and rules, its purpose reduced to serving the intangible and incomprehensible (or, really, the self-proclaimed prophets of the intangible and the incomprehensible -- but don't get me started on that). And it doesn't exactly help that religion itself is a painfully obvious human construct, one that is imperious and fragile all at once, pieced together by the contingencies of historical circumstances and charismatic and/or vicious figures.

No god but God whetted my rather reluctant interest in religious studies -- the historical and political conditions from which religions arose and gained popular recognition, if not allegiance; how ideas and scientific and metaphysical inquiry alike contributed to the formation, preservation and evolution of what is essentially glorified (sanctified) ideology; the myths and legends of societies, the cultural specificities of language and folk symbology, the primordial ways unexplained phenomena are attributed to an ostensible divinity. I liked the book. I liked it for its careful and reverent narrative of this mammoth, imagined historical circumstance; I liked it for its vigilant and critical account of how that singular, heartbreaking circumstance took root and flourished; I liked it because it made long train rides bearable. But, no, I didn't like it enough.

(I want to write about The End of Faith, but I'm afraid this will turn into a comparison of the two books, and that would be grossly unfair. Though it would seem that the two books sit on opposites sides of the same spectrum, I found that they address quite different points and issues, ones which aren't entirely consilient to each other.)

In the debate, Aslan chose to focus more on the experience and theory of religion (religion as a vehicle and language for transcendental, "spiritual" experience, and scripture as a truth constrained by conditional and rational interpretation). I found this disappointing and, at the same time, rather shrewd. By framing religion as a system of belief that can be interpreted rationally, one that allows people to experience some sense of profound elevation, and validate such experiences, one appropriates the domain of reason. His justification for religion negligibly addresses the lamentably ill-contested space of dogmatic belief that pervades people's subscriptions to religion. Bigotry stems from people, yes, but this does not condone the claim that bigotry is therefore completely removed from the sphere of religion. Religion justifies bigotry, it provides reason and grounds for bigotry and divisiveness. And for that, at the very least, people should step back from religious belief and analyze it critically. How is this reasonable? How is it rational, to meet someone of a different background, of a different sociological location, and implicitly (or explicitly) condemn them for not having the same beliefs as yours? Condemnation here can be as "benign" as condescension, that specific religious belief allows you access to answers and truths that aren't available to others by virtue of their subscription to a different god (or gods). My own father, educated to the teeth as he is and a progressive in most issues, will readily say that anyone who doesn't believe in the Catholic god is on the fast lane to hell. (I love him, but he's a bigot.) He refuses to even go into places of worship of other religions; my mother had to fight him tooth and nail to display Buddhist art (it isn't even a depiction of Buddha, it's a sculpture of a Buddhist monk) in our condo.

What makes missionary work different from the Western colonialist project? Missionary work uses interventionist discourse in constructing non-religious folk as "heathens" needing the moral guidance and theocratic expertise of a specific set of people, just as colonialism justifies itself by constructing other peoples as underdeveloped, subhuman, backward. One might say that they are set out with good intentions (helping the poor, providing medical aid and social services in underdeveloped countries; facilitating social and economic development, introducing technology and infrastructure), but they more often than not result in the distortion of local cultures and experiences, the undermined evolution of folk histories, meanings and language, the destruction of local markets and industries.

Aslan contends that religion is indispensable because it provides humanity with a space and language to describe and live out life. He contends that religious scripture, if read and interpreted in terms of its specific cultural and historical context, is a valid text to live by, a text one can draw upon for inspiration, development, affirmation, and all sorts of other shiny spiritual things. I find that wholly unsatisfying and immensely deleterious. Such a stance obscures the impossible, diametric opposition between belief in a singular, infallible god (or host of gods) and the incalculable diversity of human culture. Such a stance undercuts the need for critical inquiry, and confines such to the realm of scientific study while effectively immunizing religion from its gaze. Such a stance posits religion as fluid and conditional, which works to undermine the very premise of religion (that specific beliefs and laws are absolute, not to be contested by social and historical contingencies).

And, yes, I've just about run out of steam. I have an econometrics final next Monday, what am I doing? :(

All this is not to say that I agree wholeheartedly with Harris. Though I'm not too put off by his style like a lot of people (he's essentially "preaching to those who have left the choir" with me, after all), I find that he generalizes too much, and that his claims (especially his statistics) can stand to be a little more refined. I think people should watch this debate, take what they can -- those bits and pieces that precipitate agreement or hostility -- and just try to figure out why they trigger such reactions.

And just go from there.

A reevaluation of the development enterprise

2007-04-03T22:06:00.000-07:00

It's interesting how people's perfumes can be so cloying, so much so that in one's mind it's given space to come into its own, an odoriferous pink cloud of chemicals and induced nausea. Staining skin, finding smug refuge in clothing. Yuck.

I've been meaning to write here for the longest time. But things just keep rearing their ugly heads -- from neglected deadlines to neglected friends, from the exigencies of sleep and respite to the general inability to piece together fragments of thought into coherent and voluble sentences. I always feel so demotivated these days, I can't help it. I've always had something to look forward to come spring time, but now there's nothing on my summer plate except the prospect of more microeconomic theory and what will probably prove to be a fruitless job hunt.

I just really need to take a step back from things. Try to get my game-face back on, try to refrain from smacking people. And I need to stop judging people, it's gross. I don't know anything about your life, even though I've spent an unfortunate amount of time watching you stuff face and just rot a little, just rot a little more. (I think you're dead inside.) And I miss music. I only ever listen to music in my car now. And then I have to constantly fiddle with the tuner knob, to filter out all the poopy radio stations and their poopy DJs and poopy song choices. (Listening to the same 5 CDs over and over again is not healthy.)

I don't like how my mother talks to my grandmother. I mean, I can understand why my mother's furious with her. But she's an old woman. And you don't castigate your own mother in front of your children. Christ. I couldn't even stand it, I had to leave the room. But the walls are frightfully thin in this place, and I ended up staring at my ceiling while listening to my mother's voice, sharp, coldly accusing, and missing my dad. I miss my dad. I miss so many things about living with him, knowing he's always a door down from me, or a cheap phone call away (probably at the golf course, where he likes it best, or even in his office shuffling his lawyerly papers). I miss how he's always willing to fix things for us, from my stint in ROTC, to my sister's dorky assignments about, I don't know, Jesus or something. I miss having meals with him, hearing his yabang stories about his cars or his lawyerly victories, or his stories about his childhood in Iloilo, which are curiously peppered with dead cats, field mice, and fairies. Right now, he's what I miss most about home. It's weird, I never missed him this much when I was living alone. I just can't stand my mother. And, yes, that's heartbreaking all in its own. It's ironic how, with each passing day, she reminds me more and more of my grandmother. It's like she's shrinking right before my eyes.

I'm fat.

At present...

2007-02-12T01:55:00.000-08:00

Saved this as a draft, dated 07 February, I think.

Wow. Reading that made me panic some. A tiny, devious kernel of panic sliding down my system, wreaking small bursts of havoc in its meandering descent. Small steps, small steps, and all that. I'd hyperventilate if I were the type of person who hyperventilates.

So, right now (at present). I have the gloom-and-doom prospect of midterms hanging over my head. And all I can think about is how I need to buy shoes. I'm not even kidding, I always feel like I'm perpetually behind on everything. It's like a curse. I have really screwed up priorities apparently. Hmm. I've been noticing recently that I only ever use these blog-things whenever I feel like shit, or when I feel like talking about school. That's not cool.

Anyway. Some updates on that:

I did finally buy new shoes. But I don't like them all that much; it was a moment of desperation.
I'm still pretty scared, and I think I am the type of person who hyperventilates. But I usually only do it in the bathroom when I'm alone.
I still haven't seriously studied for midterms. The most that I've done is make squiggly little notes about development discourse, etc. (I don't even know what).
I feel marginally better, less shitty and all that.

Ok, maybe not that last one. I feel kind of funny, I think. I was talking to a friend a couple of weeks ago, and he made a comment about how much I've changed since last year.

I don't hang out with the same people anymore. Never mind the fact that I don't really have much of a social life these days anyway. I just really like my life right now. There are the usual gaping holes, of course. But they just make me appreciate what I do have even more. That sounds really dorky, I know. (I'm sorry.)

The thing is, I probably have changed. And it might have been for the better, but regardless, I had to let go of a lot of things to get where I am today. And going back isn't... viable in some ways. Leaving -- it's almost like dying. Immortalized in the hole I left behind, roughly the same size and shape of the 19-year-old I was when I got on that plane, the shadows of other people's memories and perceptions pooling black in its Stygian trenches. These small, impenetrable changes chipping away at that illusion every time I go back and try to occupy the same space. But this is getting depressing. I missed out, yes. But in some ways I gained so much more, too. And that's something I haven't entirely been comfortable with.

Wow, I haven't been this sappy in a long time. I miss people though, I miss driving down EDSA and C5 at night (the pervasive gold of street lights, that whole mass of strangers suspended in time and immovable traffic), I miss driving around the UP Acad Oval (sunlight buffeted and tamed by the filter of trees, that floating sometimes grotesque timelessness of people streaming by with dreams on their shoulders), I miss being a part of something I grew up in, grew up with. I miss people, or maybe it's the relationships I miss, the dynamics that arise from knowing people for years -- their quirks, their frailties, their failures and successes -- from contributing to those, from being a part of those, from learning from those. I miss my dad. He's such a big part of who I am, who I want to be. His history, his family's history -- I draw so much from them, fuel for my motivations, a leash on my neck... money in my wallet. (I'm kidding.)

Costs and benefits, right?
(I should go to sleep, what am I doing?)

No Kidding

2007-01-11T17:48:00.000-08:00

This is for the cat who thought my distended absence from blogger and its other online variants meant that I'd gone and stuck a gun in my mouth and pulled the trigger. Seriously. I know my last post was depressing, but everyone knows it's all hot (hot, sticky, suicidal) air.

Ok, hahaha.

Current location? Library! Big surprise. I'm already behind on my readings, it's just appalling. My books are crazy-shit expensive this term. I always think that for every term, but this time I'm bleeding real coin.

Ok.

the bitter with the sour

2006-12-14T01:22:00.000-08:00

Finals crunch, and I'm feeling pretty ragged. Had my first one a couple of days ago, and it was shit. I only studied the day before (having clearly not learned my lesson from midterms), and pretty half-heartedly at that. Seriously. I don't have any more free passes, this is it, and all I have to show for all my posturing are dropped balls and decapitated toes. Ok, just bruised toes maybe. Like overripe fruit in a Marrakesh market.

I don't know. I've had quite a lot of alone-time these past few, mostly self-imposed, sometimes random. I think I've learned a lot of things about myself, little nuggets of thought (slow, self-indulgent, torturous) and contemplation (shit), but nothing I want to commit to. Sometimes it feels like I can't do this. The returns are obscure, the path too contrived, too obviously secondhand. That's always been my beef with the world, I think. Not having anything of my own; having the monies, ideals, religion, dreams, poetry of others shoved down my throat, injected into my tinny bloodstream. I've never been invested in life. In general. In general, I could just disappear right now and I wouldn't mind. Maybe it worries me that I don't find that depressing. (Not really.)

But all this begs the question: what am I doing? Maybe if I'd stayed in the Philippines, I'd have been better sucked in, better plugged in. I wouldn't be worrying about these fringe issues (existence, subsistence, obsolescence), I'd be worrying about the trivialities of a job I secretly hate, which of my father's cars I should bring to work, how to lose weight with minimal expended effort. But I'm not in the Philippines anymore. And while part of me is thankful, part of me is still heartsick. I've let go of a lot of things this year. Sometimes I'm able to trick myself into thinking that I've moved on, too. They're not the same, letting go and moving on. They float and flutter past me, nefarious intentions riding blithely on their wings, these things (issues, people) I've let go of. Sometimes I don't even let them go, they just slip through my fingers, and I'm left bewildered, staring at my peeling hands, hoping to divine reason from the meandering lines of my palms. What am I doing? (Drowning in loose ends, lost and demented in the flowchart from hell, writing you a letter I may never send.)

I remember, I dug out an old pair of pants from the rotting carcass that is my closet (haven't been doing my laundry, clearly). It smelled like last year. Like last year's clean laundry. And it made me want to cry. That's been happening a lot. I come across a familiar scene (dusk shimmering through a tree's gnarled branches), an old smell (a friend's car), an old song (Hoppipolla, Everlong, 405), and I just can't function properly. It baffles me; what were my motivations back then, my thoughts, how did I feel those things, what made me feel them? I get slivers of it, just enough to break my heart, before they recede back into inconceivability. Does that make sense? (Does it matter?)

Maybe it's Christmas. I know a lot of people think I'm just gloomy by nature, and while that's somewhat warranted, it's also mostly bullshit (like Santa). I'm just a snob.

I think I'm just going to go watch The Royal Tenenbaums again. That scene wherein Chas tells Royal he's had a rough year, it always gets to me.

the ballad of pictures not taken

2006-12-07T03:38:00.000-08:00

The snow's practically all gone now. That glorious, equalizing blanket of white reduced to haphazard piles of gray. You'd think the ground underneath, suffocated and frozen by the snow's relentless accumulation, would be more triumphant, more vibrant. But it's mush. Meek, mewling mush, sticking out like the most tantalizing sore thumbs; I just want to bend down and suck them into my personal oblivion. I remember walking to the bus loop, my footing still tentative (deathly afraid of suffering the gross ignominy of slipping on a patch of ice and possibly compromising a hipbone), the Mr. Roboto sounds of my printer still ringing in my ears (yet another night sacrificed at the altar of Paper), and the cold chill of the air railing against my face like a pack of rabid bunnies (with claws). The sky was lush with gray, pregnant and heavy with cloud. And my short-term intentions were gleefully dancing to the merry tune of the prospect of sushi with friends. Because snow and sushi are pretty much all I need in life. Well, that and cheap airfare. And, maybe limitless disposable income.

I've been trying to book my flight out of Vancouver, but the airlines just won't cooperate. I'm needing something along the lines of under-$100, but it's just not happening. Mm.. I haven't been out since... ok, last night. But that was with family, so it doesn't really count, does it? Took my brother out downtown last night, did a bit of shopping and had dinner at Guu. Food was fantastic, although the service was a little meh. Called up G a while ago, but was summarily rebuffed in favour of a night of bleeding all over textbooks and other pesky things involving "learning". Pffft, finals period. I should be getting my geek on, too, I guess. And I will soon, for sure. I've been oddly drawn to Varian for the past few days, but it doesn't last for very long.

So I read somewhere that they're planning a film-version of The Time Traveler's Wife. The book was devastating, and the idea of fleshing it out with tangible imagery and music makes me excited (but in a very sedate way). Sort of like when I found out they were doing a film-version of The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants. Seriously. Although Alexis Bledel was a serious miscast, in my opinion. And so was the guy who played Kostos (is that even his name?). I can't even watch that movie anymore without my stomach churning (3 guesses why). And Rachel McAdams as Clare (supposedly)? Not a bad choice, I guess. The Notebook was the most shameful waste of time (referring to the book and the movie), but I really liked her in Hot Chick (go figure). Christian Bale would make a delicious Henry. Adrien Brody would be too conspicuous, almost contrived (too hot, too). Aaaah, Paul Bettany! Ok, what am I even writing about?

Best movie combinations, I maintain, are still ones that involve Wes Anderson, Mark Mothersbaugh, and maybe Owen Wilson.

all the squalor and the squalid whores

2006-11-14T00:55:00.000-08:00

Last week was a little disgusting. I say heartbreak (not mine), gross inefficient use of time (as per my legendary time-management skillz), worst date (ever), and no alcohol whatsoever to offer sweet, sweet life-lubrication.

I made a conscious decision to go on a self-imposed exile of sorts during the long weekend (Saturday notwithstanding, I was entitled, I maintain). But, really. Went on a date-date last week, a date-date. I thought it would be charming, it was so unexpected. But, no. It would've been ok if he were a social retard (like Jonno); but, no. I can handle awkward silences, they comprise the story of my life, I can laugh at awkward silences. But don't be obnoxious, ok? Don't regale me with stories of your cousin's Filipina maid and expect me to laugh at your disgusting punch lines. Don't wax poetic about your new Prada loafers and expect me to bat my eyelashes and coo appreciatively. Don't babble on about your mother, for fuck's sake, and expect me to have anything to say about a woman I've never met who sounds like the worst sort of bigot. And don't try to hold my hand while walking to your car, not after that. (But thanks for dinner, it was delicious.)

It was just one of those nights, I guess. My head was hurting like a mother by the end of the night; too many forced smiles and futile wishing that the night would just end or there'd be a switchblade hidden in my moussaka. There were just too many things wrong with that night. Now I just have to find creative ways to avoid sitting next to him in class. Three more weeks (right?) anyway, it shouldn't be too hard.

Anyway, so my long weekend was cold, lonely, and too delicious for words. The benefits of a thick, immensely readable paperback (Gabaldon -- a lot of sex and cinnamon hair and history, ok) and some lazy cold-rainy-day tunes (Interpol, Josh Rouse, a little Sufjan, a little Oh No! Oh My!) are astounding. Sweet.

And woo, there's a strong possibility that I'll be spending this new year's in Edmonton! I just have to find a decent flight first (to uphold my less-than-$300 promise to my Poppa). My sweet, sweet Poppa. I miss him enormously, really. My older brother'll be coming in less than 2 weeks (right?), and with him he'll be bringing all the glorious possibilities of a balikbayan box. Or whatever it's called outside of the Philippines. I'm having him bring a few of my books (Whoever's still got my Mankiw book is a cunt! Just kidding, but its return would be ecstatically appreciated.), my beat-up Prada hand-me-down, and my Econ 131 notes (which I doubt he'll find, but whatev).

A blast, a blast, I say.

SUBSTANTIARREORGANIZATION

2006-10-30T18:06:00.000-08:00

In the library still, feeling a little peaked.

Got a sociology background paper back, and the A-minusness of it is really bothering me. I'm thinking I'm in way over my head with this Canadian banking industry thing. It's a sociology paper! I should've done something soft and fluffy and delicious, and instead I'm stuck in a quagmire of economic theory and the looming threat of statistical analyses of Canadian statistics I can't seem to find. Ok, so the theory part's pretty straightforward: Gary Becker (1957) posited that with increased competition (and decreased market concentration [Ashenfelter & Hannan, 1986] and increased deregulation [Black & Strahan, 2001]) the tendency of employers to discriminate against women at the point of hire will be mitigated or totally phased out by the exigencies of productivity and profit maximization. But causality issues can’t seem to help but rear their ugly heads and poop all over StatCan and its small reserve army of statistics; and there’s the issue of insignificant statistical variances in terms of gendered labour market segmentation and wage differentials. The latter I’m finding dubious, so it should be a matter of refining my research strategy and method. The former is more problematic, since most of the studies I’ve been looking at tend to focus on the U.S. and the EU. I honestly don’t know where I’m going with this, and come crunch-time, I predict a lot of blood lost and spilled on this marble slab of student ritual torture. Preliminary arguments are due next week, and I still have to set up an interview with my banker sort-of-contact. I should’ve done Filipino nurses or something, dammit.

All this grade-consciousness is not a little distressing. Grad school’s looking more and more necessary, and my GPA isn’t exactly panty-dropping stellar. I’m even thinking about law school (secretly, of course: if my dad even suspects I’m toying with the idea of considering law school, he’ll never let it die its unceremonious and inevitable death), which just goes to show how unprepared I am for graduation.

My life’s so boring. Even the small, contrived dramas that a certain person somehow pulled out of his ass can’t seem to motivate me into responsiveness. I just feel so detached from everything it’s disgusting. I’ve been told to just go carve out a few hours to go burrow and read a trashy book or stare at my ceiling while going tralala-la, but I can’t seem to do that. I no longer find trashy books pretty and shiny (mostly cloying and unintelligible), and staring at my ceiling only compels me to think dark and twisted thoughts about life and sex and school. Which partly explains why I’m still at the library on a Monday night, fretting over a paper and a stubborn pile of readings whose relevance is circumstantial and temporary at best.

But, whatev, blah blah blah. I went shopping yesterday, and that was fun. I watched Marie Antoinette, too; and while the prospect of some 2 hours of watching Kirsten Dunst running naked around Versailles (I’m kidding, this thankfully did not actually happen) was a little nauseating, I found the movie quite enjoyable, mostly because of the music and Jason Schwartzman (yum). We were supposed to watch Little Miss Sunshine, but we totally forgot about DST. :(

Ok. So that was me procrastinating.

the self-defeating lies you've been repeating

2006-10-27T00:43:00.000-07:00

First saw this on OGM; Youtube is awesome.
Why don't I watch Boston Legal more? As per my 3-TV-shows-only rule (loosely enforced, of course), maybe I should stop watching Grey's Anatomy. It's just too McFucking weird now.

In other news, my impending road test is making me nervous. But I want a car so, so, so bad.

Just checked out the Poveda website (tip to Celina), and it's hilarious. Did I come from that? It's ridiculous! And so, so vexing/mortifying. They've devoted an entire section (ok, not really) to "Povedan first-time commuter" experiences. And, yes, I realize that in the Philippine context, I'm at the very end of the spectrum of hardcore-commuterness, and not at the good end at that (would there really be a good end though?). But, come on, entrenchment much? Seriously, it's ridiculous. And Borja's all over the place. I never liked her.

Fantastic sushi earlier! And to think I was getting sick of Vancouver sushi. Mmmm.
(I'm so fat.)

i swear i'm gonna bite you and taste your tinny blood

2006-10-25T22:22:00.000-07:00

Some people might say I give up too easily, I say it's simple cost-benefit analysis. But then, I don't know which is sadder. Being a quitter, or having nothing in my life worth keeping, never mind worth fighting for.

(Hi, Lia needs some alcohol.)

Ok, end of spell.
Blah blah blah.

there are many ways to see the light, but only one way to be blind

2006-10-08T16:43:00.000-07:00

Things have been weird, sort of. I've been keeping busy (not voluntarily though), and I've still got a pile of work to muck through for the next couple of weeks. It just feels like I'm circling around something, though I can't say what. Like I'm floating in this shallow stream of events and circumstances, the current pushing gently, relentlessly, dreamily on. My toes just brushing the river bed, mossy and soft, but never enough for me to get my footing.

But, what.

Watched a bit of the VIFF, just a sliver, really. A shaving. Caught four movies (schedule wouldn't permit more, what a ho): Todo Todo Terros (Philippines), Heaven's Doors (Morocco), A New Day in Old Sana'a (Yemen), and The Blossoming of Maximo Oliveros (Philippines).

I didn't like Todo too much. On some level, I thought it tried too hard to be poetic, tried too hard to be relevant. It seemed so promising, too. The story was too erratic, and while some people might appreciate the aesthetic of a deliberately ambiguous storyline, it got old really fast. Some shots seemed a tad too indulgent, as if they were there just to fulfill some art-film, moony-faced quota. There were like twenty people at the most in the theatre (understandable, really, since it was a weekday matinee—I skipped my last class). And as the film wore on, I could just feel them getting restless, impatient, like shifting in their seats and sighing was an insidiously creeping epidemic (especially during the "terrorist" spy parts). I liked it for what it is though: a film on the bleeding edge of the fringe, its brilliance somewhat mitigated by its diaphanous pretensions and the expectations of others.

Heaven's Doors felt like a substandard derivative of Amores Perros and City of God. Set in a gritty and sweltering Casablanca, the film was principally about three people: a young man weaned on poverty and family dysfunction who starts working for the local mob, a middle-aged American woman—lonely, emotionally battered and starved—who suddenly becomes the guardian of a young boy and his comatose mother, and an ex-con just sprung from prison who’s consumed with revenge and love for his dying mother. In short-form: the young man, Ney, dies, Lisa (the middle-aged woman) gets an emotional awakening and goes back to the U.S. to fix things with her bitchy mother, and Smail the ex-con kills the guy who betrayed him and caused his incarceration, Mansour, the local mobster Ney worked for before meeting his tragic death. It's a beautiful film, beautiful shots (the ones leading to Mansour’s death stand out, as well as the panning shots of the city), and Casablanca is brilliant. But the story is ridiculous. Ok, not really. Ney’s story was probably the most interesting, clichéd as it is. It should’ve been more violent, I felt. And I’m not even particularly fond of violent movies (no, really).

Now, A New Day in Old Sana’a was ridiculous. Like, seriously. It reminded me of this one episode of Beverly Hills 90210 (already, not the best thing one can say about a movie) where a black family moves into the neighbourhood (and racial tensions arise!!!). Their son, Robbie, is supposed to be a talented photographer (and Andrea forces Brandon to woo him into working for the Blaze), and we know this because he goes around campus taking the most random shots of the most mundane things. Like, Dylan will be lying on a patch of grass and Brenda will be flirtatiously leaning over him and the screen goes still and all grayscale, and you hear this ominous click like someone just took a picture. And then Kelly and Donna will be laughing about some unsounded inane thing, all blonde and sparkly and so, so 90’s with their shoulder pads and matte lipstick, and the same deal with the grayscale and the click. And this goes on for a while, like the lamest joke ever. Anyway, Sana’a. There’s a narrator (a narrator!), an Italian stud-photographer named Federico who’s living in Sana’a, mentoring a young scion of a rich family, Tariq. Tariq is about to get married to Bilquis, a girl from a similarly prominent family. She’s a total bitch, but endearingly so. He’s been mooning over this girl who dances in the streets just before dawn, and one morning he sees her whirling about in a white dress he gave to his fiancée. So he naturally assumes it’s been Bilquis all along, and he pronounces himself in love with her (it’s an arranged marriage, see). But, as all formulaic fairy tales go, it’s really Ines, a poor orphan caring for her sort-of mute brother (he hasn’t spoken since their parents’ death), who thinks herself desperately in love with him. Anyway, you have Federico who’s waxing poetic about Sana’a (understandable, it’s absolutely gorgeous) every chance he gets. He even does the whole Robbie-thing, taking mostly uninspired shots with that annoying little telltale click. And you have Tariq, who’s a total douchebag (he stands Ines up when they were supposed to run away together), and Ines who’s a whiny little doormat. The only remotely likeable characters are Bilquis, her sister Mona, and Ravi, the Indian teacher who gets run out of Sana’a by Mona. It just could’ve been so much more. I mean, Sana’a’s this city shrouded in global anonymity, gilded myth and this brilliant, complex culture, and all they manage to secrete from all that is some contrived little tale based on ethnocentric Western stereotypes about Middle-Eastern love and duty.

I found Maximo the most affable out of the four. It’s such an endearing film, colourful, riotous, simple and enormously satisfying. There were a couple of snags though, like Maximo sometimes being all robotic faggot-queen, and Victor sometimes being all robotic alpha-male. But I loved it. That’s Philippine humour for you: when it’s good, it’s really good, and when it’s bad, it either makes you want to cry or move to another country (I’m kidding). There were a lot of Filipinos in the theatre; you could tell that we were the ones laughing the loudest. The friend who I went with was a little nonplussed about it (though she agrees that it was, indeed, funny), and the white guy who sat next to me was totally stoic all throughout. My friend did say that had Maximo been a young girl, the film would have been just slightly offensive (in a Humbert-Humbert kind of way) and utterly banal. And I grudgingly agreed. But, whatev, it was a fun movie. I'd buy the DVD if I could.

(Can I?)

sick-ish

2006-09-23T02:16:00.000-07:00

I like school. I like Sociology. Although, here, there's not a lot of talk about capitalist bastards, the evils of a moneyed progress crudely buttressed by the infrastructure of colonial enmity, and the merits of shunning society and its stifling, exploitative characters and institutions and living out an enlightened life in the mountains (and growing a beard, if you can). No. Here, it's more about gender ideologies, racial discrimination, and theory. A little bit about capitalist bastards, fine, but only because studying theory necessarily entails half-hearted forays into Marx (and Engels). There's always that boob in class who lionizes the firm's natural right to maximize profit (at the expense, of course, of poor Worker Schmidt's species-being). I've always secretly hated that boob.

I'm still waiting for my computer (I'm still waiting for my hair to grow out).

I've been reading a lot of history books lately. Mostly British and American 19th century history. For fun, no less. It's fascinating. Victoria and Albert, the Great Exhibition of 1851, Harriet Wilson, Disraeli, Palmerstone, Pitt, Vanderbilt, Fisk, Gould, Cooke, the Jacksonian Era, the War of 1812, steampower and the cotton ginny. Still waiting for that new Dawkins book to come out (definitely buying if the hardcover's less than $40, which it probably isn't). That Dennett book's out in paperback in 3-4 months, I figured I could wait and save myself (my dad, really) some $20. I hate hardcover books. They're no fun to read, and they're expensive.

Maggie, I totally agree, retail therapy is woefully near-sighted.

Crap, I'm coughing now, ohnoz. I should go swallow some pills or something.

equilibrium in a market for risky assets

2006-09-05T19:13:00.000-07:00

O, Varian, looks like I can't escape you. I've been staring forlornly at my Varian (7th ed. this time), trying to muster up sufficient enthusiasm to peruse its contents, in an effort to reacquaint myself with all things (or, at least, some things) microeconomics. But, no.

I'm trying to look for the funny footnotes, I remember there were funny footnotes. But, so far, all I've seen are stuff on how to pronounce Greek letters ("bait-uh," "mew," "sig-ma," "gam-ma," and "lamb-da" among others) and how, yes, "8" really is Jennifer 8. Lee's middle name. O, and on how the violation of the Weak Axiom of Revealed Preference demonstrates WARPed behaviour (but one cannot say so in polite company?).

Today was very productive, I feel.

I can't believe I'm studying this again (apart from the usual Econs 101 and 102, Econ majors have to complete Econs 301 and 302). But it's probably a good thing, considering I didn't really get much from Kraft (did anyone?). I can't believe I'm still studying. This blows.

abbot of unreason

2006-08-28T00:20:00.000-07:00

Wooo. So I was only moved to sit in front of my sister's computer (my poor little drama queen Guido is still in the trusty hands of Suneet, the noble tech of my neighborhood Apple-ish store. I totally misjudged him by the way. He's not the douche I initially thought he was -- even though he did make me wait for 10 minutes while he smarmily congratulated his friend over the phone for being featured in the Sun, under the guise of consulting him about the painfully obvious state of poor Guido. Fried temperature sensors, that's what it is. What a ho. Guido's a skank. I should've known. My dad says I can go get a new one -- hello Macbook -- but I'm attached to Guido. I think.) because I wanted to write about how much I hate armpits, my own and everyone else's. I just really hate them. There's this one scene in some movie where this guy is licking Patricia Arquette's armpit, and then her character's husband walks in, and it was just disgusting. I hate armpits. Come to think of it, I do believe Sarah Moro probably has the best armpits ever. I don't mind hers, because they're stunning. But that's it. Anyone else's, they're just gross.

Anyway, I was supposed to go on and on with that, but my sister's keyboard is truly pissing me off. It just won't type properly. And I'm unofficially banned from my mom's snazzy laptop because she caught me reading her mail (a gross invasion of privacy to be sure, not to be condoned in any civilized society, but she was writing about me! How could I resist?) twice. In any case, this is a really shitty laptop.

I have a neat pile of books next to my bed. I'm not doing them justice, but I do try my best. Just finished The Know-It-All by A.J. Jacobs, which was a total trip. In a nutshell, it's about this guy who reads the entire 2002 edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, all 65000 entries, all 44 million words. It's all absurdly fascinating bits of trivia combined with random insights about the pursuit of knowledge, working definitions of intelligence, the intricacies of fatherhood, the triumphs and abominable failures of humanity. At one point, he mentions how someone once summed up the Encyclopaedia in one sentence: This too shall pass. I like that. I should get a tattoo of that, slap it on my ass or something. Anyway, neat pile of books. Some Pamela Aidan (glorified fanfiction! The first book of her Fitzwilliam Darcy trilogy), Georgette Heyer (Angela's influence), Curtis Sittenfeld, Ronlyn Domingue, Zadie Smith. I have a separate pile for my trashy books, but that's another story. O, and that Richard Rorty book I picked up on a pseudointellectual lark. Where did that one go?

Finally got around to watching Howl's Moving Castle (bought the D.W. Jones book, too. It was, embarrassingly enough, in the kids 9-12 section, but I've been to worse.) Wow. That Howl, he's a stud. (Speaking of studs, why didn't Stephen Colbert win any Emmys? Barry Manilow?? Seriously. Yeah, I watched the whole thing, I'm a spaz.) I want to live in a Miyazaki movie. I mean, as I was watching, I just had this soaring feeling, like I wanted to just burst, like I wanted to just slit myself open and just fly. Either that or get baked. Same deal with the rest of his movies (haven't watched Kiki's Delivery Service and Porco Rosso though). You should've seen me when TCM had that Miyazaki tribute festival. Totally spastic, rushing home from class and camping out at the couch and everything.

But, yeah. I'm strangely chatty tonight. That's what everyone's been saying. Lia, you're so chatty, it's totally scary, what happened to you over the summer? Well. This too shall pass.

can you do the fandango?

2006-08-15T16:31:00.000-07:00

So SQuinnt finally managed to carve out some time to see me (the ho). Went downtown to try to get my license (didn't happen). Luckily, he was just twiddling his thumbs when I gave him a call. He popped in for a quick beer (or two), he couldn't stay long though because he had to clock in more hours or something (I wasn't really listening). I keep forgetting to email Deke (I keep forgetting to call Mace's dad! Sorry Mace :P).

Afterward, I went to the Apple Store on Broadway. The tech (obnoxious prick, but it could've been the language barrier) solemnly proclaimed Guido a lost cause and advised me to blow my hypothetical $1000 on a new laptop instead of a new logicboard. Preposterous! He did (grudgingly) tell me I could stop by again next week to have it really checked out ($60 right there). I figured I'll panic after next week. My dad seems pretty ok about it though. He's so nice. He injured his ankle, so he's been stuck at home for a few days now. I overheard him complaining about it on the phone with one of his lawyer buddies, and I just wanted to pat him on the head. He'll be back in November, he says; hopefully to buy a car. I'd be happy with a Honda Pilot, but only if he stops dangling the possibility of an X3 in my face.

I'm wanting to get a tattoo again (a condition which usually lasts for about a month or so). I saw this girl on the bus with this really neat one. It was a little too scene for me though, I'd only look like a dork.

I want new shoes.

I don't really want to go out tonight. Big surprise. I guess with my parents and sister here, nights at home aren't quite as threatening. Which isn't entirely a good thing, all things considered (my retarded personality for one).

Meh. Whatev.

more's the pity

2006-08-13T02:03:00.000-07:00

I don't know why, but Vancouver reminds me of my childhood. Just sleeping with sunlight slyly draped over the back of my neck, the circumspect whirring of the electric fan, grass. And grass.

So I promised Quinn that there'd be no more international students this year (or did I say ever?). I'm really glad I gave him a call (even though he was too busy to hang out with me, the ho). Ended up with the girls instead, and being with them is always awsome. We might do the Grind on Monday. Exciting! I dragged them to MacStation to have Guido checked out; but, alas, that didn't work out, so I'm going to have to check out the other Mac Store on Broadway once I get my UPass. Then we scoured (not really) Robson for a tea-and-cake place and ended up in Capstone where we parked our butts and just talked for hours.

Went to Ikea today. I really want to buy an Ikea room. Or maybe an Ikea kitchen. But at least I got my file cabinet (fire-engine red) and my sheets. I'm going to paint my wall, I've told my mom. A nice, bright, electric blue. It's going to clash with everything, for sure, but the white, the whiteness, I can't stand anymore.

Stupid Guido, why are you wigging on me??? I'm pretty sure there's something wrong with his temperature sensors. Stupid narcoleptic Guido.

I'm really excited for school this term. And I just realized how inconsiderate my mom is being, insisting that she study in the same university I'm studying at. (What was she thinking?) Ok, I'm just kidding. (No, I'm not.) Gross. But I'm really excited.

I'm hungry now.

stick to the status quo!

2006-07-03T08:19:00.000-07:00

This isn’t my room anymore. It’s like my sister grew into the space I left, like my mother swept away all of these small, tiny Lia-things to make room for her. It looks different, it smells different. Even my desk, once a bastion of all things Lia, my books, my papers, my pens, the fax machine my dad bought me as part of a bribe-package because I refused to talk to him for months over some exaggerated slight, it feels different. Books have been rearranged, and boxes moved. Papers have been rifled through (and buried as if in shame), and CDs randomly stacked in unexpected places. Little knick-knacks have mysteriously appeared, wallowing awkwardly in all the blank-eyed plaster cheer they can muster.

I don’t like it; I don’t like any of it. But it feels like a sort of penance. Like the prissy, backhanded slap of a faggy karma.

like babies want god's love

2006-06-18T01:31:00.000-07:00

At YVR right now, Cathay lounge.

Hungry, but too lazy to go to the buffet/snack bar. They have dimsum, they always have dimsum. Mediocre dimsum, yes, but I haven't had dimsum in ages. And I live in Vancouver, where there's a Chinese restaurant at every corner (and where, I've heard, the sushi bars outnumber the Starbuckses). O, wait, I was in Europe for 6 weeks. Hmm.

Right now, at this very moment (protracted over several thousand, it feels like), I want to talk to:

Justine Relova
Mia Singson
Jonno Yoshihara
Lyn Manansala (Lyn Manansala!)
Ethel Francisco (do we suck that much at keeping in touch? :P)
Derek Morgan.

I'm tired, and I want to go home. I'm tired and confused. And I'm going to either edit this or delete this after I get some food. So hungry, dammit.

___
In HKIA now, Cathay lounge still. I've got a couple of hours to kill before I troop on over to my gate. The thing about long flights, sometimes, they don't feel long at all. And when you've finally landed, you find the wooziness so startling, that nagging exhaustion, and you feel compelled to figure out why it is exactly you feel so tired. Or maybe that's just me. Nice flight though. I don't know why, but I always manage to fall asleep before take-off (not that I'm complaining).

Watched a Korean movie, some snazzy little thing with a crisp storyline and endearing characters. The title's all sorts of hokey though (When Romance Meets Destiny--I kid you not). Then watched Junebug, which was a surprisingly satisfying movie. And I got to see Alessandro Nivola's ass, and that's always a good thing. Then watched a couple of TV shows (Scrubs, The Office [U.S.], Friends). Then listened to some music, while staring at the cabin ceiling, thinking little, crawly thoughts. Then chatted up the guy next to me (some Taiwanese dude travelling with his brother). They invited me to play cards with them, but the spatial logistics were just impossible.

Yuck, I need to go to the LTO. Or do I? I can't remember if I had to go with Mang Totoy to renew my license. Ah, Mang Totoy. Hopefully, my dad will even let me drive.

Off to Bohol on the 30th. But that's my registration date, so I'll need definite net access. Got into the Econ program at UBC, but I'm not entirely sure I want to pursue it (again). Unlike my dad, who's ridiculously sure that I should. Or that I will. It's like a foregone conclusion with him. I hate his foregone conclusions, they make me want to rip my teeth out (I wonder if I should have my last couple of wisdom teeth pulled out).

Mm, more people coming in. I'm at the Noodle Bar right now, but I'm not eating noodles.

Off! (pretty soon anyway)

2006-05-06T14:22:00.000-07:00

Europe, son.
I want to send postcards, email me your addresses!

&hearts

Housework

2006-05-01T17:42:00.000-07:00

My room, clothes flung out all over the place, an explosion of bras, tops, pants and unsorted laundry. A half-empty suitcase on the floor, from within, Stevedoll staring at me accusingly, blankly, from his bed of haphazardly folded clothes. Accusingly, because I’ve ignored him all year, and allowed my friends shameful liberties with his person, from unimaginative kick-me signs to compromising positions involving a toilet brush and a glass ball. Blankly, like he’s been raped one too many times. (Don’t pout, Stevedoll, we’ll have a fabulous time in Europe, I promise!) Papers… papers everywhere. Some, testaments to my propensity to bullshit academically. Others, not so much. Receipts, dumped, consigned to inexistence, needing to be forgotten. Wires, snaking from pile to pile, like veins waiting to be sliced open. Books, some read, most mocked. Bottles, mostly water, others, not so much. Dust, lint, hair. Small change, glittering like stars, resting on carpet floor like it’s a revolution. My floor, desperately crying to be vacuumed and sprayed, combed and skinned. Pillows and cushions, some kicked off my bed, others thrown down to make friends comfortable. My bed made into an altar of good intentions, of secrets and fears, of loneliness and reluctance.

Open shutters, light streaming in, bright and relentless. Wind wafting through, dancing with music, making things… strange. Piano music from another apartment. Dancing and twirling. Pirouettes and sunshine.

I can’t fold laundry to save my life. There’s always that little bit of sleeve poking out of the fold, taunting me, breathing down my neck. I don’t understand. And pants! The crotch, it’s a bitch.

I see my friend’s old camera. Someone’s shirt, the one I’ve been keeping under my pillow, because I’m disgusting like that. Pictures by my bedside, to remind me. My desk. Impossible.

Nothing perfect, nothing pretty. Christ, I’m going to miss this.

Tomorrow, my living room and kitchen.

everything in its right place

2006-04-17T17:02:00.000-07:00

I'm usually a sucker for strange dreams.

I was with my dad. We were on one of those bamboo rafts with the shaded tables. I have no idea what you call them. We were just floating, both facing the sunset, sitting on opposite sides of the table, so that he had his back to me. I asked him why he used to carry a gun around back when I was a kid. He used to bring it with him everywhere, in a neat leather man-purse. At one point he'd hired bodyguards for himself, and security guards for our house. And sometimes, during weekends, he'd go off with his bodyguards to the mountains and practice shooting (these days, he just plays golf). He didn't say anything, and I told him about how back then I used to sneak into his closet to look at his spare gun. I'd hold it in my hand, a little discomfited at its weight, gingerly switching it from hand to hand because it was slightly oily. Sometimes I'd point it at my mirrored reflection. Sometimes I'd hold it up to my temple, just to see what it would feel like. Always, always careful to not touch the trigger area. He just sat there quietly, not moving. I started to feel scared, and I said, reassuringly, that it wouldn't have mattered anyway since I never really figured out how guns work; how to hold it properly, how to load it, which things to pull and push to get those gratifying clicks. He didn't say anything for a while. Finally, he reached into the back of his pants and pulled out a gun. He turned around and set it on the table between us. And, still without a word, he began to show me how to use it.

That's all I remember. I'm pretty sure other stuff happened before that. Things involving a roof-top jungle and a Lord-of-the-Flies/Battle-Royale mentality.

I woke up a little nauseated, toes cold and oddly exhausted.

American Beauty

2006-04-14T18:48:00.000-07:00

you smelled like coconuts

2006-04-10T22:57:00.000-07:00

I guess I’m just tired. I keep waiting for the punch line to fall from the sky and crack my head open, so I can bleed all this out. Bleed, bleed, bleed.

So far, all I’ve been really doing is cruising on small triumphs, beady-eyed A’s, pretentious conversations about the deleterious vagaries of religion, the evils of right-wing politics and the merits of The Colbert Report over The Daily Show (yeah, that makes no sense). George Bush and Christianity piss us off, but Stephen can have our first-borns (bottom-line though, I want Demetri Martin’s babies... but I'd still give the first one to Stephen, yo). Or something.

I question things too much, to the point of gratuitous tedium. Morals won’t keep me warm at night. Who am I kidding? I have no morals. And it’s not even that cold anymore. O, the metaphors. They’re eating me alive. This is getting embarrassing.

And I wish we could just sit outside my balcony again, careful not to move or make a sound. Cautiously sipping our drinks, an ashtray and my iPod between us. Leaning against cold wall and making a point to not touch each other. Did that really happen though? You’re always trying to prove me wrong, but you never look me in the eye. (You look like Yoko Ono when you brood.)

Go home.

I hate this kind of indeterminacy. It’s crushing, this kind of impotence, this kind of uncertainty. Wait. How maudlin, how unforgivably, unbearably maudlin.

I’m supposed to have breakfast with Derek tomorrow. But I’m not sure if I can wake up on time. And he doesn’t bathe anymore. (Mother, do you like the smell of your man-musk that much? No jokes about your other-man-musk, please.) Haven’t seen him in a while. A total lie, of course, I just choose to believe that last, last Friday never happened. I’m entitled, my delusions are enablers after all.

I need a life coach.

;',./;'.,..

2006-04-10T01:14:00.000-07:00

I'm feeling a little like roadkill. But, you know, optimistic roadkill.

I bought Alessandro Moreschi, The Last Castrato last week, thinking I needed a bit of cheering up (material acquisition always cheers me up, see). And it's really creepy. I blame Anne Rice. That book was really depressing. I don't think I even finished it. Too much sodomy and dismemberment. Mm, fragments and short sentences.

I don't think I want to go back to Manila. There's something about these last few weeks, that makes me dread the idea of going back. Which is ridiculous, because I miss it like hell sometimes, and Vancouver isn't exactly oozing with good vibes right now. I just don't want to go back. I want to stay here and be miserable. I want to see what Vancouver in the summer is like. I want to get a job and earn (not save, because, everyone knows my propensity to save is non-existent) enough money to do a Greece, part 2--assuming, of course, Greece, part 1 (EUROPE) pushes through (WHICH IT WILL, DAMMIT). I want to go white-water rafting with my friends, I want to go camping. I want to go bungee jumping. I want to ride buses. I want to go biking in Stanley Park, hang out with all the obnoxious art-school kids at the Island. I want to ride in a car at 3 in the morning, blithely speeding down highways and city roads and thumbing my nose at unknown circumstance. I want to stay here, where I can pretend I'm an only child, and my parents are either too cool for fucking school or dead. Does that make sense? That sounded mean. There are no strings here. No strings, no leashes. Just my purple-eyed pretensions and my lispy delusions.

Lithhpy.

Manila. Not now, please.

Is it wrong that whenever I go shopping now, I gravitate towards things that make me think: this will look totally hot in Europe, yo? It's appalling, I know.

Man. Can't wait till finals are over. I should really study more. I'm totally shitting all over my acads, it's gross. Emotional baggage, stupid boys, and generic sloth aside, I really owe my parents decent grades. No, I owe them phenomenal grades, but even I'm not that delusional. Dammit.

non-overlapping magisteria

2006-04-02T23:31:00.000-07:00

Seriously. I really shouldn't write poetry.
It's disgusting.

tender

2006-03-10T14:15:00.000-08:00

I want to take you home. I want to bring you to the house I grew up in.

We’ll go into my room, kick off our shoes. I’ll close my yellow curtains, so all we’ll have of the tireless sun is that heavy burnished gold. I’ll turn on my air-conditioner, the old one, with the long horizontal vents and the bulky dial. We’ll sit on the floor between the beds, listening to it hum and drum. I’ll put words in your mouth, and you’ll swallow them, pause, and regurgitate them and lay them at my stocking feet.

We’ll lie down on the parquet floor, and sleep the day away.

fever dream

2006-02-27T14:27:00.000-08:00

I was in a beach, thin enough to wear a bikini (oh, snap), and my lover was waiting for me in a makeshift hut. I had my Sponge-Bob t-shirt on. My lover was the dashing martyr sort—imperial looks worn down by the futility of grandiose ideals. I took off my shirt to play around in the water for a bit. The beach was all cold black sand, and the sky was dark, heavy with vapour and foreshadows. A woman approached me to castigate me for my indecency. That was when I realized that I was in a changed society. Apparently, I had been off in another country/dimension, away from my homeland, and had just recently returned to live with my lover. And there was some kind of revolution, which sucked the life out of society, and everything was very The-Giver-like, everything whitewashed and stonewalled and regimented. So I put my shirt back on and walked over to my lover. And he put his arm around me, and we sort of just leaned against each other. And, I remember that part of the dream being acutely heartbreaking. This overwhelming surge of glutinous heartache, black and purple, just crashing down on us.

And then suddenly, change of scene. We were in some sort of workhouse. Everything was mint-green tiles, and tinged with mildew and the smell of smoke and grease. I was off in this partitioned room, making some sort of monstrous, revolutionary invention, which could potentially bring about the demise of the prevailing regime. I was some sort of welder, with the full-face mask and the leather apron and all; see, and I was making sparks fly with this hardcore-looking torch-gun and random pieces of scrap metal. My lover was in the other room, looking worried and resigned. And there were these other guys, greasy-looking guys, who were making fun of him because of me. And then suddenly, I was my lover, change of perspective. And everything was so bleak, so drenched in tragic resignation. I was just staring at this girl, wrapped in this filthy leather apron, her face obscured by one of those ominous masks, and I just had these unbearable strange thoughts about war, and death and wasted sacrifice. And defeat. Defeat so tremendous, that breathing hurt, and harbouring hope was some excruciating exercise in futility.

And then suddenly, I became “me” again, and I was at Playland. It was night and all of the lights were pink. And it was empty. And it didn’t look like Playland, it looked like Eastwood. Ok. And then I saw one of my high school batch mates, because she supposedly had some sort of gig at Playland-Eastwood. And she told me my friends were waiting for me at the parking lot (which looked like Greenhills). And then, as I walked to the parking lot, my lover came running towards me, naked. He’s very hairy, and his balls were bouncing all over the place. He grabbed my hand, and we walked together to the parking lot. And my friends were there. I asked them why. And one of them stepped forward and said, “to reinforce your morals”.

And then I woke up.

basang sisiw

2006-02-26T03:57:00.000-08:00

Crap. My brother would be so laughing at me right now, if he knew what I'd just downloaded (and what I'm currently listening to).

I behaved badly tonight. I'd like to blame it on the alcohol. But there wasn't any.

There's too much to think about. Like, seriously, earlier, staring at my ceiling (my white, white ceiling) was all I could handle. And listening to drippy music. And eating too much sushi. Please, go home. Please, let it be summer already. Summer, summer, summer. Summer will be like a George Meis photograph; summer will be gothic architecture and foreign languages and long, aimless (probably silly) conversations. Summer will be Manila (assuming that there'll still be one to come home to :P) and old friends and old jokes.

Please, go home. Let me be that fat, socially retarded girl you can bitch to your friends about when you go back. Just that. That girl who you wasted too much time on, that girl who, in the end, wasn't worth figuring out. That's all I want from you right now.

How weird is this? It's not quite as traumatic, just sadder. A little colder, a little sadder.

But that's just one chunk of wormy meat on the decaying carcass that is my life. And, yes, I just laughed out loud after typing that. Don't screw with me, universe. Please?

I wish I could find the right words to wrap around my neck. But the delete button, it's a whore.

dead disco

2006-02-11T23:19:00.000-08:00

Woo, what a lousy Saturday night. It started out so promising, too. I was already in my sweats, all warm and cozy on my couch, trying to figure out how to not study and still respect myself in the morning. Then my friend calls and proposes that we go out. My books were thankfully, thankfully, abandoned, and I hopped on a bus (or two) to meet up with her. Then she tells me she can't stay out late (o, Filipino parents), and I was just whut? But I put on makeup for you. And I'm wearing my new coat (the one I had no right buying), don't you think we should take my coat out for a night of debauchery, and it's a Saturday night, you dweeb (I love you). Then we parted ways after the consumption of sinful amounts of ice cream and nutella, and I trooped off downtown with my cellphone in hand, thinking I could maybe hook up with any number of people. But, what. The only ones who expressed affirmative sentiments were individuals I didn't really feel like hanging out with on a one-on-one setting, see, because I'm retarded like that. And, ya, so I blew off the nice-sounding lecherous Saturday-night plans my friends threw at me a couple of days ago, because I was really supposed to devote tonight to studying. Like crack open my skull on the altar of Sociology and immigration studies and just bleed all over the place. Like crack. And when I called them up, they were all the way in freaking Surrey, and, woo, no thanks. (What happened to Caprice??)

So I got home, and it was barely 11 pm (it was barely 10:30 pm, dammit).

I'm so ditzy. It's like what little brains I had went to my wallet, and all I've been doing is spend, spend, spending.

I was supposed to study all day, too. There was a plan. A plan! All afternoon in Starbucks/Blenz with my books. Our books. But you needed new shirts. And you made me all jealous, flashing your plastic three ways from Sunday (what does that even mean?) while my wallet stayed closed like the legs of an atrophied nun. Dammit.

Woo, can't wait for Tuesday! Four days with ERIKA LEUNG! Hot!!! Ahaha. Hello, debauchery. I'm so excited. And summer! Alessandro, Flavio, Giacomo here we come! ANGELA, you have to get one, too. Then we can tell our grandkids about that crazy night we spent in Giuseppe's tattoo parlor.

Ok, I'm going to go stare at the covers of my books now.

ersatz components

2006-01-30T00:03:00.000-08:00

The thing is, I don't want to study. And I need a haircut.

I miss mornings. Which isn't to say that I'm always unconscious during mornings. It's just that most mornings for me are spent in soulless lecture halls and anemic classrooms (or, just recently, doing silly things like sitting at a booth and trying to lure bleary-eyed students into various nefarious ventures). And others, well, others are spent wallowing in an utter lack of wakeful consciousness.

Taylorism has been a pretty prominent part of my life these days. Well, that, and these tiny, despotic mathematical things that insist on disrupting the timid development of my self-esteem. So, that's Taylorism and math. I know there's something else. I want to say hot sex, but who am I kidding? I pretty much pooped on that. I guess exams. I promised myself hedonistic nihilism during the first half of reading break. But after that, (hopefully my brain won't be too fried) I'm going to go burrow myself a hole in the library and just die, just die a little more.

I have a professor who wants to have David Ricardo's babies. She looks totally affronted when we poke holes at the veritable mammoth that is Ricardian logic (ok, I don't do the actual poking, because most of the time, I'm the dunce struggling with the weight of Ricardian rhetoric). She gets a little pink and shiny in the face, and she goes on and on (rather poetically too, I'm impressed) about the elegance of his writings, the simple brilliance, the brilliant simplicity. Like Ricardo slashed his wrists with Occam's razor, and we should all prostrate ourselves on the ground and lap at his pooled blood like fuzzy kittens. She really is a nice lady though. She reminds me of my aunt. Because she's so proper and dainty and so unbearably scholastic, with her coordinated outfits, her uppity vocabulary and her oddly endearing airs.

Motherfucker. What a useless day. I was supposed to troop over to Burnaby today for a study group. Right. Then I bailed on that for tentative plans of checking out the Chinese New Year's parade with J. But I bailed on that because... well, because I'm not Chinese, and I don't see the point of pretending to care about a culture (or its commercialized, watered down equivalent) that's bloody everywhere anyway (mooncake! noodles!). That being said, omg, I miss tikoy.

I have a new appreciation for Vanessa Carlton. Yes. Sometimes, all I want to do is stay in bed all day and listen to girly music.

I went to an art gallery some weeks ago, and I saw these hopelessly adorable porcelain Chairman Mao statues. I wanted to buy the entire set, but my friend (the heartless wench) talked me out of it--mostly because buying the set would have entailed some $200. So this is how regret feels. Pure, unmitigated regret. They'd have made a better investment than the pairs of shoes I bought last week. And the shoes cost more, dammit.

I can't wait for summer. Even if Europe doesn't push through (GOD FORBID), I can't wait to go back to Manila and just bask in its shitty, battered, Third-World glory. 3 more months, 3 more months. March-April (and probably a large chunk of February), I'm sure, will be academic torture. But May, May will be fucking golden, I can just feel it. In my bones, my bloody bones.

Ok.

And thanks for laughing in my face when I asked you to come with me to the Coldplay concert. Did I laugh in your face when you bought the new Madonna CD? No. I didn't. I waited in line with you, and held your bags while you pawed at the innards of your backpack for your disturbingly red wallet. Fucker.

pockets

2006-01-22T13:51:00.000-08:00

It's being silent, eyes downcast and black, feeling cold and impenetrable and hostile. It's walking through woods, stomping across rushing creek, meekly poking the toe of your shoe into icy lake. It's the skin on your fingers peeling, your cheeks stinging with cold. It's fleece and borrowed warmth, a bonfire and chopping wood. It's having someone to whisper to in the dark. It's lying on the floor, on top of a blanket of dust and mud and grime, drawing stars and circles with bright-coloured markers and feeling small and cherished and young.

It's laughing with strangers. Dancing with strangers. Whooping (whoop-wooping) with strangers.

It's the prospect of going through the same thing again next, next (next?) week. Only there'll be alcohol this time around. Copious amounts, you promised me.

~~It's wondering if he'll call. And knowing that I want him to. Even if~~ I find the sounds coming out of his mouth ridiculous.

I think I miss home.

nurse that tooth.

2006-01-05T00:28:00.000-08:00

And what?

Your wild, slightly damp hair. The smudges of colour under your eyes, makeup that didn't wash away like the oil on his fingers. The pillow on the floor. Puffs of salty breath, hot and cooing. Sour, too. Just slightly sour, the wasted flavours of a day consumed. That venereal confusion of flushed heat expediting the slow but eager death of cold. Cold, with its pursed lips and black eyes. You. Your round face shining, doleful and humble(d) and pink.

That soft ache, that soreness. Smug and hateful, petty, golden. You don't want to touch it. To wash it away, to feel it drain out of you and slither (and glisten) down black, slimy pipes. You want to step away from the mirror, away from her curious eyes, her unspoken questions, her exhilaration. Her small death. (That wasn't you on the floor?)

The pooled blood, rushing and raging, like cats with no eyes and no tongues.
Purple and red. Sickly gray.

Now what?

omg, brain-fart

2005-12-18T00:56:00.000-08:00

This day was exceedingly annoying.

My Women's Studies final was a total joke. Our prof gave our proctor the wrong exam, so we only had to answer 2 instead of 3 questions. But that's actually a good thing, considering how my thinking processes (and penmanship) have deteriorated. Right now, I'm struggling to form coherent sentences. It's almost tragic. I did find out though that most of the class got shitty essay marks, and my marks were one of the highest. It was a momentary ego boost. Because the highest is still pretty shitty.

Afterwards, I met up with a bunch of people, and we ended up in some dimly-lit pub. And while the lot of them giggled and guffawed over their beers, I was grumbling over fish and chips (grease!) and my sociology notes (no, really). And then I had to drive them home. Because they were useless. And we got lost. Which is a forgone conclusion, really, given their diminished (and my non-existent) navigational capabilities (and license). But at least we didn't end up in East Hastings. We did almost cross the bridge to North Van. Luckily, my mom's frequent trips to Wal-Mart clued me in, and I turned just in time. I miss driving.

Wait. Why was this day exceedingly annoying again?

My dad said I could get an Xbox 360. But I feel bad for him. He really shouldn't be left alone with any of us. He just gets sorely abused (his wallet anyway). While my mom was away, my sister raided Vuitton, and my brother raided Nokia. I tried playing around with my dad's phone (he got a new one, too) earlier, but he took it away from me in a huff of indignation because he didn't want me to see his "sex messages" from my mom. (Hello, trauma, how've you been?)

These past few weeks have been a blurr-r. I can't remember what I was doing 2 days ago, but I bet it involved studying and stress. And maybe a little alcohol, since I do remember I was well on my way to being drunk at some point.

People are leaving, going home to their families for the holidays. Canada is turning me into a ditz. I was already a ditz in Manila, but this time it's somehow worse.

My dad is cute.

would you?

2005-12-08T01:05:00.000-08:00

Sometimes, I just like hearing the sound of my voice.

And it helps, dearly, that you find me interesting. Or, at least, pretend to.
Because that's what counts. The facade of things. We both don't want to dig deeper, and are content to stare at brick walls.

But what am I doing?
Stuffing syllables into your mouth (like soggy bread into a turkey).

We both know I'm all hot air and big words.
And you. You're all hair gel and saliva,

shadows under tables,
orange juice,
rum and coke and high balls,
silver skies and cold weather.

Thanks.

flying

2005-12-04T16:01:00.000-08:00

Something has to be said about dark, snowy Sunday afternoons spent principally in one's room. With weepy, Icelandic music sleekly slithering out of audio speakers; blithely seeping out in blue trickles, hovering in the air made heavy and lethargic by the efforts of heaters and humidifiers.

I want to go home for Christmas. Home. Manila will always be home, it seems. I want to feel that rush. That inexplicable rush of giddy happiness when my plane touches NAIA tarmac. That rush that makes me smile like a fool when the plane starts its descent, and the miniature landscape becomes bigger, greyer, more and more marked by the scars and incoherent poetry of Metro Manila. And disembarking from the plane, walking through the decaying hallways of NAIA, waiting in line, hearing that colourful mess of verbalised homecoming. The excitement, the headiness of being home again. Collecting my luggage, impatient to escape the airport's suspended time. Being blasted with the dusty tropical heat, the sticky humidity, the first half-second after I sweep through those glass doors. Exuberant, bereft of a heavy heart, suffused with something so indescribable that it's almost excruciating to endure. And home. Even if it is 31 floors up and not exactly carved out of traditional concepts of home. The lobby, the cheerful guards, who somehow always recognize me even though I never think to greet them with anything beyond a quick smile. The front desk people, their "good afternoon/evening ma'am" sweeping past me as I walk through the lobby and to the elevator doors. The smell of my bed, the feel of my pillows smashed against my face. My bed, my pillows. And friends. Joyous friends. Getting together, trying to soak up lost time and lost experiences, drowning ourselves in conversations and unwitting memories, creating new ones, making old ones golden. Everything steeped in glorious familiarity, everything slightly haunted by the ghosts of my childhood and adolescence, the ghosts of history and hardship and blood-deep similitude.

The only thing that might make this Christmas remotely bearable is tequila. And seeing my dad again. And, ok, my brother and sister, too. Even though they can be such unconscionable gits. And my mom, too, of course. Even though she makes me want to gouge my eyes out and inundate myself with rainbow-coloured hallucinogenics. And maybe an Xbox.

Home for Christmas. Wow.

freud sucks cock

2005-11-27T02:06:00.000-08:00

Why do I resent my mother? Mothers and daughters. Mother-and-daughter. That sordid female chain. That sordid female chain of teeming inheritances. An inheritance of ravaged, mute histories and hysteria, of suspended obscenities, of prohibition and domesticity. An inheritance of subjugation. An inheritance of engorged organs, of emptiness and fertility made golden, of penetration and witch hunts and pap smears. Of pretensions so thick and viscous and red, we have to seep them out monthly just so we can go on with our factotum subsistences, just so history can repeat itself, just so history can be made and shattered and glorified. Seep them out of our vaginas, purple lips and coarse hair, an orifice etymologically built from sheath or cover-of-a-sword. A sword's scabbard. A sword. That phallus of power withheld from us by biology and evolution and fate.

Mothers squeeze out these nescient, thankless scraps of humanity. They squeeze them out, bathe them, cuddle them, get chained to them by some quirk of biological survival involving neurons and engendered emotional bonds. And they spend the rest of their lives trying to compensate for that moment of penetration and pumping and release (rarely theirs), when they pulled these disparate people out of the ether of inexistence and thoughtlessly dumped them here. On this chair. In front of this computer.

I hear the same thing in my mother's voice when she talks to her own mother. That condescension. That spite that just snaps out and bristles with all the pomp and circumstance of imagined progress and repressed history. That coolness, that nonchalance that tears through flesh and sinew, and preens with all the self-righteousness of seized revolutions. I hear it and I feel shame. For here is another sordid chain, another noose around my fat neck. Something else I can pass on to whatever unfortunate penis-less demon evolution will allow me to spawn.

trickle, trickle

2005-11-26T01:02:00.000-08:00

credit

sheesh

2005-11-17T22:02:00.000-08:00

On days like this, all I really want to do is bend over and let the universe sodomize me to its petty heart's content. Either that, or just stay in bed all day. All fucking day.

But, hey, two more hours until Friday.

Weekends rule. Except for this one, I guess. Because next week, my mother comes with all of her mother-baggage. And, really, I'm too exhausted to make this weekend rock. I just want to go die in a hole or something.

So much negativity! I can't find my cigarettes. I had half a pack, at least. All I can do is stare at my lighters and sigh at their pointlessness. Until tomorrow, anyway.

Universe, where is my candy???

Oh. There it is.

we are all steve buscemi

2005-11-13T04:02:00.000-08:00

Late-night cable TV is adventure. I now know more about the resilience and malleability of the male penis than I will ever care to know. Ever.

Life exhausts me. But I guess that's a good thing.

I worry about my mom. She can be such a dork sometimes, it's embarrassing. Ya, like I'm so socially adept. Pfft. We are all pots and kettles.

Earlier, I was on the bus. A bus. Long bus rides home, at night, in the rain, they're beautiful. The beefy roar of engine, the orange lights smothered by darkness, blurred by foggy windows, the barely discernible patter of rainfall. The drunk almost-hobo sitting across from me. The tragic-looking Korean girl sitting sedately with her knuckled hands and dark eyes on her lap. The shared silence of strangers, strangers turned into damp, hapless sardines by circumstance.

Man, I need a car.

Mm, sinigang.

third world love

2005-11-07T00:55:00.000-08:00

the beautiful side of somewhere

2005-11-01T16:18:00.000-08:00

B+'s are vindictive. Those smug, smirky sons of bitches. It's like saying nice try, shit-for-brains. Pfft.

Why am I even home? I should be in the library. The sun is out! The sun! I should be outside, rolling in the mud. I love downloading snooty journal articles from the library network. Access makes me feel special. It's so cold outside, it's almost exhilarating. Almost.

I need to get my shit together. Getting picked up in 3, 4 hours for not-really-dinner and to get my cellphone back. I have $15 in my wallet! It's appalling, but not exactly shocking.

Mud! Squishing! Aaah.

Today is ditzy day. It just is. And half-Asians are hot. Rawr. Or, Purrr.

(whut?)
Ok.

there goes the fear

2005-10-31T18:57:00.000-08:00

I feel so bogged down. By heavy books, by layers of clothes, by the exigencies of rain. By chores, by meetings, by res-pon-si-bi-li-ties. By friends, by friends, by friends and alcohol. By food. By grammar.

And it's only Monday.
(Monday!)

It's so cold.

My mother. My mother'll be moving in with me soon. Like November-soon. Seriously? I shoud be gagged. With something rusty. And blunt. Something rusty and blunt. I love my mother, I do. But she drives me crazy. Her emails annoy me, her contemplative looks make me want to barf. I hate how she stares at people, I hate how she speaks Filipino, I hate how condescending she is toward our helpers. I hate the books she reads, I hate how she's so helpless, I hate how she seems so diminished. I hate her attempts at stilted affection, I hate her second-thought affectations. That's my mother. But that's my mother.

How bad can it be? She's my mother. She's endearing. I'm such a troll. She's endearing, she's my mother. She's not cute like my father though. I miss Papa. I remember how I sat in the backseat of our car, concentrating so hard on my father's profile to keep from crying. I remember how the gray light danced on his cheek, the way shadows fanned across the slivers of his face. Like slender soldiers (in sparkly sarongs) warring on a bone-weary plane. I remember how his barong felt like pressed against my cheek as we hugged goodbye. I remember the smell of his cologne, Dolce & Gabbana, I think, and the warmth of his neck. I remember how that sticky feeling of threatening tears made me choke (slightly) when I realized he was coming along to bring me to the airport. I remember how small I felt when I couldn't find him in his bedroom and thought he wasn't. His hair's turning silver, my Pa. They always seem so sinister to me, his tufts of silver hair.

My mother. My mother'll be moving in with me soon.

Sun Kil Moon - Ocean Breathes Salty

2005-10-22T18:51:00.000-07:00

Well that is that and this is this.
Will you tell me what you saw and I'll tell you what you missed,
when the ocean met the sky.
You missed when time and life shook hands and said goodbye.
When the earth folded in on itself.
And said "Good luck, for your sake I hope heaven and hell
are really there, but I wouldn't hold my breath."
You wasted life, why wouldn't you waste death?
You wasted life, why wouldn't you waste death?

Yesterday was this song. With dreary, grey skies subdued by trees, trees bleeding red and gold. The crunch of fallen leaves validating my every step, validating yours as well. The bite of the cold. So sharp and small. Yesterday was everything in those few breathless moments of cold and wind and leafless tress, those moments when the thin silver light finally succumbed to the blue-black of dusk.

Yesterday was peace. And your cold, clammy hand.

a life less ordinary, please

2005-10-03T19:02:00.000-07:00

I can’t get that feeling out of my head. Having a shoulder to press my face against—to muffle incited laughter, or to wet with shed tears. A strong shoulder, the steady warmth of bone underneath flesh underneath skin. That kind of tangible assurance and comfort, the kind that can only be validated by something so gloriously intangible that most people are reduced to writing putrid poetry about it. It doesn’t have a particular face, this feeling. It’s something quiet and ghostly, some meek and gray mewling thing quivering inside of me. I want to wrench it out. I want to yank it out and smash it until its figurative flesh tears and its abstract body breaks.

It’s so juvenile.

sundays are not love

2005-09-25T23:10:00.000-07:00

But they are serviceable.

All I really wanted to do was sit out on a patio while sipping on something warm and sweet while listening to weepy music. But I didn't get that did I? No. Instead, I get my alone-time invaded and get knuckled into retarded situations. Maybe my life isn't meant to be exquisite. Maybe I should just be happy I'm getting by.

Lia, Lia. Why is it that whenever something goes wrong in your life, you run crying to your blog like it's the end of the world? And your pants are on fire. Sucky days are supposed to make you stronger. And what are you complaining about? Some smutty little revelation that the people you know aren't as cool as you thought? The fact that you feel so cut off from your parents that you can only stare dumbly at the screen as you read their cold and thoughtless emails? The fact that you're too chickenshit to pick up the phone and call them up? The fact that you resent them like hell for being too stubborn to do the same?

I worry about you sometimes, Lia. You're too proud, too in love with sadness.

Put it somewhere else, for christ's sake.
It doesn't matter.

I worry about you, too.

free delivery

2005-09-18T12:46:00.000-07:00

I'm sick. I should've taken it more seriously last Friday when I was feeling wheezy and dizzy and just a little bit nauseous. But I thought a handful of aspirin and a nap would be enough to make it disappear. Now my throat's attacking me, too. So yesterday was fun. I think. Just when I was trying to decide whether to hit downtown by myself for some cheap-CD love, Derek buzzes my apartment. Like a blooming flower! He brought me half a box of doughnuts--doughnuts because I told him I was feeling under the weather, and half a box because, apparently, I didn't deserve a whole box since I bailed on them Friday night. Wha, he's so pa-cute sometimes. :P

We ended up going back to his apartment, and I ended up cooking them stir-fry. Gendered behaviour at its best! :P He made margaritas, and Jonno... tinkered around the apartment aimlessly. Such a strange boy, that one. I think Derek just likes picking up strays, case in point: me. So afterwards, we were pretty much all horizontally-inclined and talking about stupid, vapid things. Jonno was a total goner, weirdly wedged between Derek's ratty couch and the wall. At one point, while Jonno was too busy staring at the ceiling to care about us, Derek leaned over toward me and whispered So what do you think of him? I think you guys would be cute together.

Too weird, and oddly offensive. Then Derek had to go to work, and I got stuck with drunk Jonno for a while. We were supposed to get ice cream, but we ended up getting samosas at some Indian/Persian kiosk.

Yesterday was oddly depressing; fun at specific times, but depressing when taken collectively. And Derek didn't even let me bring home the leftovers, the lazy bastard.

I need to find a job.

I should go read stuff, I guess.

when personality is scar tissue

2005-09-10T19:07:00.000-07:00

Man. It always surprises me. The complete absence of parental boundaries always surprises me. And not in a good way. Not even in a good way, dammit. It’s not like my life is all of a sudden rolling down grassy knolls and playing with yellow butterflies and not worrying about strangers’ candy and cholera and grass stains. My parents didn’t raise me the right way, they raised me the scared way. Which was very clever of them. Now I do what they want without excessive needling on their part. But they still have to nag—case in point: my mother’s principal purpose in life.

So last night we were supposed to hit open SUB night, because we are UBC students and that’s what we do. And we did. For all of fifteen minutes anyway (the $10 entrance fee makes those minutes pretty expensive to my thinking, but I’m poor so what would I know?). Derek hooked up with some cheerfully plastered friends, and we all crowded into his car for purposes of further intoxication. I was so drunk, it makes me want to cry just thinking about it. I don’t remember much, which is a godsend considering what little I do remember is the stuff of beer-soaked boobies. I remember we were still running amok at 3:00 a.m.—I know this because I remember accosting a middle-aged man in the street by shoving my watch in his face, drunkenly bemoaning the fact that I couldn’t tell time anymore. He told me it was a quarter past 3. He seemed very taciturn. I remember telling a drag-queen-looking chick that she looked like she’d smeared “uling” all over her eyelids. I remember getting into a somewhat ugly fight with Derek over Franz Ferdinand and money. I remember someone’s voice in my ear, and someone’s hand on my ass. I remember Quinn laughing at me. I don’t know why he was laughing at me, but I do know that it made me feel incredibly shitty. I remember sticking my head out of the window of Derek’s car and falling in love with Vancouver. I remember waking up in Derek’s apartment without my pants on. But, no, it wasn’t a sexcapade, dammit. It was just me getting frustrated with buttons and zippers after narrowly evading a near toilet catastrophe. I remember the sleeping bag Derek dumped me on smelled like old socks. Not a big fan of morning-afters, this one. I’m so weak. I nearly blubbered in the cab ride home (because public transit is not my friend when I have a hangover crawling up my ass) because I wasn’t sure if I had enough money and if I still had my keys.

So right now, it’s a little past 7 p.m., and I only feel slightly human. I realize that these are my roaring 20’s and I’m supposed to be frothing at the mouth for similar inebriated experiences. But, it’s just not my cup of tea. Please, please, just give me sushi and hot tea and friends. And gelato and pad thai noodles. And smoothies. But not all at the same time. Because that would be gross. :P

I haven’t done much today. I learned how to cook adobo (and now I have adobo to last me for a week and then some). And I tried making new playlists for Don Palomino (because the exigencies of reinstallation needed Raoul out of the way), but that was a bust because finding songs for “Songs to Sing My Loneliness Away” was just too heartbreaking for my state of mind. Later, I plan on doing some laundry and finishing my sewing.

No, seriously. I have sewing.

hello from vancouver!

2005-08-22T09:03:00.000-07:00

Shit, this is going to take forever.

Sometimes, I wonder why I’m friends with certain people. But it feels so high school to think about these things. So maybe I should just stave off these thoughts until, well, they die their inevitable, pointless deaths. Because, really, some people, they’re just sad. And I keep telling myself it really won’t do any good to call them on their simple-minded delusions. Let them wallow, I say. I’m better off pretending I have much more important things to do than poke them in the eyes and wax poetic about their tragic hypocrisy. Yes.

I don’t really know these people, I guess. I try putting myself in their shoes, try to explore their probable perspectives, and it all just makes me want to puke. Because, the truth is, even if I know I don’t deserve it, I really do think too much of myself.

Self-perception is a trigger-happy bitch. One is never sure, however, in which direction her gun’s pointing at. I really do think too much of myself. I’m always thinking I’m too good for these mundane things, that I should be rewarded in the afterlife for putting up with idiots and morons and being forced to slum it with the rest of them. I’m always thinking I deserve more than this, this is shit, and I shouldn’t have to work for shit. But, really, those are probably just my moments of rage. When the shy-humble-fat-girl act feels too much like a noose around my neck, I just really want to flick a finger at the universe and dance deliriously to how much better I am than most people.

Deep breaths, Li, deep breaths. Some people just can’t help being stupid fucktards.

you know what

2005-08-19T11:56:00.000-07:00

I've been weepy pretty much the whole week. It's ridiculous. I'm leaving for the airport in roughly 5-6 hours.

It's going to drive me crazy, this.
I have to finish packing.
I wonder.

Weepy, weepy, weepy.

I'm going to miss the Philippines. I'm going to miss my friends. I'm going to miss the convenience of generalizations. I'm going to miss conversations over hot tea and sushi. I'm going to miss this dainty stream of hapless faith. Faith, faith, faith.

It's just silly. Well. Here's to long airplane rides and returns on investments to human capital.

till it bleeds

2005-07-21T00:16:00.000-07:00

Been listening to a lot of Clap Your Hands Say Yeah lately. They're so happy. They make me want to bounce and bop and grin.

This is all I want to do. I want to bop around to music all day. Give me vodka and life will be so sweet I'll just cry.

But, ho! I should be spending more time outdoors! My going-out quotient pretty much dried up weeks ago. My car just gets more and more inaccessible. Ah, bugger. Now the weather seems as good an excuse as any to hole myself up in my room and just die a little. Just die a little more.

Such grayness. It's making me think too much.

Hmm.

It always shocks me.

impotence

2005-07-12T11:51:00.000-07:00

It's 3 AM. I can't sleep, I can't think. I need to cut my nails.

I went to UP today. Well, yesterday. And it was horrible. I don't know why. I just felt so lonely. And yet I couldn't think of one person who I could stomach to be with.

Hmm. I think I should just lie down. Or something. I want to think myself into oblivion. No alcohol. Gin is gross.

And I've got
Books I bought but don't want to read
Movies I bought but don't want to watch
Friends who tolerate and love me (in their own strange and unique ways, I'm sure) but I'm afraid to talk to them
~~Money to burn~~

Issues. I've got issues. But they're invisible. Or lost. Or misplaced.

I just kind of died for you, you just kind of stared at me.

Don't I know it, bub.

2005-07-04T22:42:00.000-07:00

This is such a weird feeling, I don't know what to do with it.

The rain makes me think of high school and suspended classes.

It's so quiet, it almost hurts.

I feel so small. I feel so small and still.

A while ago, I caught myself having a conversation with the knob of a drawer.
When I got home last night, I spent over an hour sitting on my bathroom floor contemplating the molecular cohesion of the tiles.

My yellow tiles.

When I finally fell asleep, I dreamed of my grandmother's ridiculously hairy ass. Not that her ass is actually hairy (but what do I know? Thankfully, I've never seen it).

I want to do something crazy.