All The Letters You Wish To Send

The problem with you, darling, is that you are easy. You’ve always been. You can tell others that you are manipulative but after everything is done, they would realize how petty you really were. It gets tiring to play the same game with you. Why do you say you have dimension? What dimension are you talking about? You only have one: vanity. I do not play well with vanity. Vanity does not give and I do not want you to be the one to do all the taking. Think whatever you like. Stop pleading. I am not playing this game anymore.

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 While you are away I will be stronger
in my loneliness, and when you return
I will rebuild a house of happiness.

-Eric Gamalinda, Sutra. (an excerpt)

It has become a joke in my previous office how I cried non-stop for a week after you left. We could laugh about it now: how I would enter the office with swollen eyes and no sleep. It was a week of seeing me despair over the distance. It was so difficult back then to tide this loneliness. I did not think I could do it.

Now, it is a part of me that I cling to–knowing that this loneliness has a cure.

Happy 365s (times three), B. I will see you soon.

(This entry is late by three days.)

This is a copy and paste version of DC’s post: The Hundreds Project. I am just sharing it because I am a fan of the flash fiction and stuff like these make me generally happy.

From Diane’s Blog:

It takes 43 muscles to frown. 17 muscles to smile. 14, 17, or 35 muscles to kiss. It takes much more muscles to make love. It takes a wink to be noticed. A note to make the moment memorable. Or, a drink and a bed to make the night less lonesome. It takes six words to a story. 14 lines and a meter to a sonnet, but you know that’s hard to find. It takes 3 words to express what you feel. 3 words and a slap to know you expected too much. It takes 100 words to express why we all need love and should bother reading this book.

100: The Hundreds Project is a collection of 100 works of 100 words about love and presented by the University of the Philippines Writers Club.

Pick-up available at the College of Arts and Letters, UP Diliman. P 220 only. For more details, contact: Rupert Bustamante IV (0917 844 5134; rupertivabustamante@yahoo.com) or Michelle Esquivias (0926 642 9158; ellie.esquivias@gmail.com)

Diane has a story in this collection.

It excites me that a lot of people are excited about this more than I expected. Buccino’s mom, Kath, some friends, and then some more friends seem to be more excited than we are. Not that I am complaining, it gets me giddy, actually that they are so supportive of our plan to get married.

We pretty much have an idea how things are going to be but nothing is set in stone yet because we’re waiting for the results of Buccino’s New Zealand stuff come June. Friends (hello Xaris and Lara!) have been really helpful with giving ideas about what we can do. So far, I can share that this is our mood board for it.

What comes to your mind when you see that our mood board is like this?

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Buccino left for New Zealand with a part of their house still under construction for this new restaurant.  Buccino’s mom invited Kathrina and me for dinner one time so we got to see it before Buccino.

Sollar, which is Rallos spelled backwards, serves Filipino food. No fusion, no nonsense. It’s Filipino food the way your family used to make it. We had Kare-kare, Lengua, Laing and Baked Fish Fillet. I didn’t like fish fillet too much before but Sollar’s baked fish fillet was really good, it made me a convert! Bar none one of the best I have had. Not just because Buccino will read this post or that Buccino’s cousin also said that the baked fish fillet in Sollar is awesome.

The restaurant has an extensive Coca Cola collection. It’s a paradise for Coke fans. It’s a surprise that Coke hasn’t discovered them yet for the Coke 100 years celebration. It’s so impressive; with one of the bottles costing around $5,200 (that’s a whopping PHP220,000 in current inflation prices!!!) or something. I didn’t take a lot of pictures because there’s a media group who frequents the place on Thursday nights, so we had to shuffle away fast in order not to bother them.

Sollar Garden Cafe is located at 37 Sct. Rallos st. around the Scout area, Tomas Morato in Quezon City. (Sollar is Rallos spelled backwards.)

One of the folders I have for one of my classrooms. I wrote notes on it when I realized that the class required a different approach to learning. Notice my smiley in the note.

I believe that the success of any endeavor is first determined by the planning and preparation we invest in it. In coaching, it is similar to the training modules created specifically for the athlete. With teaching, on the other hand, it involves several aspects: (1) knowledge and mastery of the material (content), (2) knowledge of the similarities and differences of the students, (3) knowledge of the resources available, and (4) knowledge of the other aspects of the curriculum.

Ideally, planning and preparation is the aspect that is easiest to accomplish because resources are available for us i.e.  curriculum is prescribed by the Department of Education, the school provided a management tool like Genyo, discipline mapping and horizontal articulation are emphasized weekly, etc.

However, for me, planning and preparation was a big struggle at first. Read more »

I look like a little girl in this picture. I’m almost 30 (or I am exaggerating.)
Photo Credit: Dewey Sergio. (He’s a genius!)

Last Sunday, several of members of our photography group and another photography group sacrificed sleep in order to shoot for Hyundai for the Hyundai Run For A Cause. As part of a collaboration of the Federation of Philippine Photographers Foundation with Hyundai, our photography group Alpha Camera Club were commissioned to shoot for the said event.

I was– in Filipino street-games lingo– a ketket or a participant who is not part of “the big guys” roster. I don’t know how to explain it. I joined the event just to practice and learn some few things from shooting a fast-paced event like this. I did learn so many things about photography and then some more things. Here’s a short list of what I observed:

1. Shoots like this require a wide-angle lens. That’s foremost. It embarrasses me that I didn’t know this before the event. I brought a zoom (70-200mm), which (at least for me) didn’t quite cut it.
2. Eye Level is not the preferred vantage point for shooting.
3. I can survive more than 30+ hours of being awake running around because of pure adrenaline. (That’s an achievement, I love sleep!)
4. Some people run marathons for the wrong reasons. Please refrain from bringing babies (who can’t walk) from events like this. Even if you’re just running the 5k, it’s not a good idea to tire your children over some unnecessary exercise. (See proof below)
5. Organization is the key to a successful event. This is a cliche but it echoes well with this event because it was one of the most organized events I have been to. Considering that this Hyundai event had about 26,000 runners. It was clearly organized really really well. Bonus points because it’s a free run.

There are some more lessons but I don’t want to share it to everyone. That’s giving away too much. Hek.

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April has proven to be one of the most “important” months, in terms of my emotional growth. So much has happened last month that I am still catching my breath for it. I am posting a couple more updates from April as it is very important for my own remembrances.

Meanwhile, while this post “happened” in May already, this was intended as a celebration of one of the more important events of April 2012.

One of the people I consider as my biggest mentors, Ms. Chuchi wanted to meet with a few of us for a small celebration for passing the Licensure Examination for Teachers in recent years. Some of them passed it several years ago but it’s only now that they are celebrating for it.  This was originally meant to be a bigger party but some of the others weren’t able to attend.

This small get-together turned out to be one of the most “englightening” ones because we got to know much of our insecurities post-graduation.

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Dear Future Son/ Future Daughter,

I am a bit disappointed at myself recently for the way things have turned out. I sort of expected better returns for this one thing that I did.  I admit that upon learning the results of that thing, I was immediately in the verge of tears to the point of panic, kicking myself in the butt for not doing better, disappointments disapointments, etc ad infinitum. But see, if I go back to that situation again, I would realize that the efforts I put on that matter was not proportionate to the expectations I have of it.

Don’t Expect Good Returns For Something You Did Not Work Hard For.

It’s as simple as that.

Read more »