peaceful reverie

lousylousylousy

2007-09-25T04:24:00.000-07:00

Why:
- After 3+ hours of reading 50+ pages of the ethicsofbeliefwhatsits for philo class and drinking all that coffee just to stay awake, ipopostpone lang pala niya yung "quiz". Boo. I mean, I could've done more productive things, like sleep, eat, use the computer, and er, sleep more.

- It's been 3 days after the math 17 dep ex and I still don't know my grade. It's haunting me. I swear, my stomach churns every time I get within a 6-feet radius of the math classrooms and whenever I hear the words cosine squared alpha.

- After megacramming for socsci, wala rin palang quiz. Boo more. Naka-pusoy dos pa sana kami kanina.

- Ugh, it's that time of the month.

- Ayaw tanggapin yung lrt 2 stored value ko kanina kasi mali yung pasok ko. Sa lrt 1 ko nagamit yun, kaya ayaw na gumana...dapat magbabayad ako ng kinse para magamit ko ulit yung card, pero dahil hindi ako sigurado kung 15 ba o 50 ang kinse at nahiya ako magtanong at dahil wala na rin akong gaanong pera, pumila pa ako dun sa vending machines para makabili ng ticket.

- Rode the wrong jeep on the way home and almost ended up in Cubao.

- I'm semi-giving up on my crush on this certain person. Let's call him Exhibit A. I hardly talk to EA anymore, and I think he likes this other girl. I only talk to him, like, mga once a week na lang.

- I still have 50+ pages to read for the History quiz this Thursday.

Sigh. You have no idea how looooong this day was.

P.S. I really want to see No Reservations. :)

boo.

2007-09-09T07:32:00.000-07:00

High School Musical 2's out. Brace yourselves; this means about two months' worth of week-after-week sing-a-longs, dance-a-longs and every other a-longs they can think of. Yipee, it would be sooo exciting to hear the songs playing again and again, I'm practically bouncing on my seat and breathless from excitement. Not.

So, HSM 2---erk.

Two hours of watching His Imperial Gayness Zac Efron exude, well, gayness. I swear, HSM has deteriorated. The first one at least had rather good songs, semi-LSS-worthy songs. Most of the songs in the second are rather poor. Also, the Lava Springs set in the start of the movie looked like a set you'd find in a high school play, not exactly what you'd expect from a million-dollar production. The cast wasn't so bad. Ashley Tisdale was kind of overdoing her acting but the others were okay.

In short, it's a rather poor sequel to the first one.

guuuh

2007-08-25T02:02:00.000-07:00

Had the interclass tourn for badminton and I'm so freakin' exhausted from all the running around. Hungry too. All I had for lunch was a pack of Skyflakes and a bottle of C2.

We didn't win, but it's fine. I still had fun with my doubles partners, May and Vina. Best partners ever. :)

The thing I hate during competitions like this is that I get all competitive. I keep reminding myself that winning is nice, and that it isn't everything, but I can't seem to stick to it. I hate myself sometimes for that. Anyway, I loved that my teammates and I didn't give up without a fight. That was great.

UNB's closing. Today was the last day, I think. It was so sad. We've had so much fun there. I'll miss badminton a lot.

Anyway, hafta go. Must wash all the stink off.

nabubulok

2007-08-18T22:33:00.000-07:00

Because I'm badly rotting at home, here's another survey.

This is called 50 FIRST REACTIONS
Type what comes to your mind first whenever you hear these 50 words.

1. Beer: malamig na bottle ng San Mig Light

2. Food: filet mignon

3. Relationships: holding hands

4. Your CRUSH: si ano…:)

5. Power Rangers: toys

6. Life: magulo

7. Death: Grim Reaper

8. School: chalk on green blackboards and apples

9. The President: GMA

10. Yummy: ice cream

11. Cars: Beatles (sp?), the tiny cars

12. Movie: popcorn

13. Halloween: jack-o-lanterns

14. Sex: kissing

15. Religion: Catholic

16. Myspace: nawawala na yung account ko

17. Fear: heights, standing on top of a tall cliff

18. Marriage: husband, kids

19. Blondes: haha Pamela Anderson and Dolly Parton

20. SLIPPERS: Banana Peel

21. SHOES: Jimmy Choos

22. Asians: Chinese

23: Past time: internet

24. One night stands: eew

25: Cell Phone: Nokia

26: Smoke: cigarettes

27. Fantasy: fairies haha

30: COLLEGE: UPM!

29: High school Life: i kinda miss it

30. Pajamas: sleep

31. Stars: star-gazing

32. Fitness Center: Fitness First

33. Alcohol: Green Cross..di lang pampamilya, pang isports pa

34. The word love: err..

35. Friends: i miss the ones i haven’t seen in ages

36. Money: dollars

37. Heartache: squeezed heart

38. Time: tick-tocking clocks

39. Divorce: poor kids (if any)

40. Dogs: chow-chows

41. Undies: what would life be like without them?

42. Parents: safety and happiness

43. Babies: nappies

44. Stripper: dirty-dancing

45. Blogs: Blogger

46. News: TV Patrol

47. One: strawberry tea

48. Panda: cute

49. Weddings: a couple kissing by the beach at sunset

50. Kleenex: sniffles and colds

viganviganvigan

2007-08-18T13:04:00.000-07:00

13 more days till Vigan! The long wait is killing me. Can't wait! God I hope it doesn't rain.

Siigh. :)

walang magawa

2007-08-14T03:34:00.000-07:00

Gaya-gaya, pero ito, walang magawa. Pa-steal, Koko, kung nababasa mo. :)

List 20 things you want to say to certain people but know you never will. Don't say who they are.

1. I love you very much.

2. I probably have little or no chance with you, but I can’t help but like you because you’re such a great person.

3. Eeeww. You think you’re all that, but YOU’RE NOT.

4. You look so pathetic. Stop trying so hard.

5. Thank you so, so much.

6. I appreciate you a lot.

7. You’re a gargantuan pain in the ass. LUMAYO KA NA PLEASE.

8. Stop being such a sexist. We’re all starting to hate you for it.

9. E ano namang pakialam mo? Inggit ka lang.

10. Ang bastos mo at wala ka man lang karefa-refinement.

11. You’re a great friend, the best ever.

12. Maybe if we spent more time and talked more, we would’ve been better friends.

13. You’re weirding me out.

14. I like you. A lot.

15. I don’t know what I’d do if anything happened to you and we didn’t part in good terms.

16. I’m sorry.

17. Ang yabang mo, nakakainis.

18. I wish we could talk more. I’d like that.

19. Panira ka ng araw.

20. Sana magbago ka na.

yay, nay

2007-08-08T19:19:00.000-07:00

No classes tomorrow!

Thank God; I'm not exactly keen on sloshing through the streets and puddle-trekking just to get to class.

On the downside though, I still have to go to school on Saturday to finish that infoboard for my org. Yipee.

Gtg, still have to study the categorical syllogism whatsit for Philo class.

raindrops keep falling on my head

2007-08-07T14:00:00.000-07:00

Rainy days are <3.

Nothing else can make you want to curl up with a hot cuppa chocolate with oodles and oodles of marshmallows and a nice book and sleep for hours and hours.

I just don't enjoy the getting-wet part and the stepping-on-a-million-puddles part.

2007-08-04T06:27:00.000-07:00

Okay, so wala lang, I'm updating for the sake of updating.

I'm still loving UP, although I wish manalo man lang kami ng isang game, nakakahiya naman.

Math 17 is a crime, and should be outlawed. The dep ex has been postponed twice, and I noed at the last minute to the reunion because of the dep ex, only to learn at the last minute that it was postponed yet again. Shoot.

I loved Deathly Hallows. Loved it, loved it to pieces. The ending couldn't have been written any better and Snape's story was so nice. It was so sweet, so romantic. The epilogue was also nice; I liked the way everyone turned out. Medyo bitin, the way the reader doesn't know what happened between the time Harry defeated Voldemort and the epilogue. Got this from the Net, really helped in clearing up some things. It's a transcript of JKR's webchat w/readers:

http://hpbeyond.net/hpb/jk-rowling/transcript-of-jk-rowling-web-chat/#more-318

We're going to Ilocos! For a lakbay-aral trip for History class. It's going to be fuuun, from what my roommate tells me. Siiigh, aaand we're staying in a resort by the beach! Wicked. :)

Must. Buy. New. Swimsuit.

yay post

2007-07-10T05:53:00.000-07:00

Yay! The Math 17 dep exam is finally freakin' over and we can breathe normally again until the next one comes along. Okay, so after nung test, di na lang nosebleed e. Internal hemorrhage na raw. Erk. Lorena and I ate dinner at Robinson's and after that I went to PowerBooks to buy The Devil Wears Prada. So far, it's nice, but the beginning isn't as good as Bergdorf Blondes'. Lauren Weisberger still isn't rivaling Plum Sykes as my favorite chic lit author.

Really pleased with the outcome of my first Comm I assignment. Hope the next ones are as okay, or even better.

HP na bukas!! I squee. Can't wait to see it with LLE on the 21st. :)

holymolycripetycripes (revised)

2007-06-22T04:27:00.000-07:00

First official week is over and I'm barely alive after Venn diagrams and Sophie's World.

Lessons are fun, but some are just plain sleep-inducing. Parang sleeping pills talaga, instantaneous ang effect. Five minutes pa lang makakatulog ka na. Kung hindi naman sleeping pills ang subject, nosebleed naman. If you happen to like nosebleeds and migraines, then Philo is the subject for you. There, we dissect everything to within an inch of their lives. Example: What does it mean to be mean? Can we be mean without intending to be mean? What is a question? What is the essence of essence?
Holy craaaap.

Blockmates are fun too. We're not too bonded yet, but still, it's fun. Sometimes we go out for block or half-block lunches.

Right now, I'm back here at home. Still not liking the dorm. Dorm-ing, while it is liberating, is too quiet and lonely for me.

First quiz next week! Yikes. Study time, gtg.

pre-college jitters and first day buzz

2007-06-13T22:28:00.000-07:00

Pre-college

I moved to the dorm (say those two words with as much bitterness as you possibly can. That's how I refer to it.) yesternight. It didn't turn out to be so bad, I mean, I didn't cry as much as I thought I would. Around a gazillion buckets of tears lang naman. I didn't exactly enjoy the whole experience.

The morning following my official move-in to the dorm (bitterness!) was so pathetic. I ate a cold breakfast and had to wait for two of the other dorm people to take their baths before I could take mine.

****

My first day went well. I met up with a friend I made during the registration, Lorena. It's nice because she lives near my dorm so we can go to classes together and everything. The whole morning was pretty much devoted to long, long talks and speeches by the important UP people. There was also a mass by a Jesuit priest whose homily was Harry Potter-related, him being an HP fan like the rest of us (the faculty don't count, as he pointed out that he noticed that none of them were able to relate to what he was saying).

During lunch, I met up with some of my blockmates and got to know them. It was nice, albeit awkward. All those PROSEC tips on how to stroke people weren't put to too much use (some look like they don’t want to be stroked). Hmm. Couldn't even remember exactly what HELP stood for anymore.

I like my blockmates. They're really nice. Friendly too.
(random fact: presidents are called blockheads. their vp's are called whiteheads. this is probably why we still don't have a whitehead.)

The afternoon was pretty much the same. Another orientation. We didn't hear much of it, though, owing to the fact that we were late, so we just sat there and talked about anything-under-the-sun stuff (HELP topics).

UP culture is so diverse. I never really realized it until now. In one day alone, I've made 3 Chinese friends. I guess it's in places like this where you really get to see the "real" world.

So now, I'm back in Quezon City, having gladly given up the dorm for one night. You have no idea how happy I was to be back. Everything in Manila was so foreign. Sigh. I expect I'll get used to it, seeing as how I'll most probably be spending the next 4 years of my life there.

Gtg. I have yet another orientation tomorrow and I must get some shut-eye.

collegecollegecollegecollege

2007-06-01T06:46:00.000-07:00

Oh God. It's June and college is a mere 12 days away. *shudders* So near yet so far, so far yet so near. I've become kinda apprehensive because of the whole dorm thing. I've accepted and even warmed to the fact that I would be taking the MRT and the LRT to school. I even memorized all the stations between GMA and UN Avenue so that I wouldn't get lost, but then my parents found that...that dorm and so now, I have to spend a year living there. I don't like the way it looks, aaand my food situation there seems rather bleak. I'm not allowed to cook or probably even heat any food I might bring from home because the owner charges about 500 for every electronic thing you bring in there. Christ. How can a food person like me not live on the food I eat at home. Oh, and have I mentioned that the bathroom-people ratio is 1:6? Sigh.

It even made me think whether or not I really wanted to go to UP. A little too late for that, I know. It even crossed my mind to go to CCA instead. I'm a little messed up at the moment because of all the what if's. The people I met and eventually befriended were so different from the people I know now, but I'm probably just expecting too much. The main scary thing though, is having a rerun of my summer college review. The whole how-do-they-know-that-and-how-come-i-don't kind of thing and feeling that slight twinge of inferiority complex. Oh, what troubled thoughts plague the mind.

Totally random thought: I apparently have a knack of leaving the change behind whenever I buy anything. Tsk.

get my name right, will you??!!

2007-04-05T05:01:00.000-07:00

One of the burdens of having a name like mine is that people often get confused with my sex. Seriously, even if they see ALEXANDRA printed in bold capital letters, they still think I'm a guy. My name in the Grade 6 yearbook is ALEXANDER for crying out loud. What, was there any facial feature that was even indicative of my being a male? Holy craaaap. Even my aunt calls me Alexander!

alex: hello?
pizza guy: hello sir alex lee?
alex: huh. excuse me?
p.g.: (is probably slapping his forehead at hearing my feminine voice) uh, yes, ma'am alex, we had a problem here yadayadayada...hindi po namin nakuha yung address niyo yadayadayada...
alex: uh-huh. hindi ba yun binigay nung call center?
p.g.: ang gulo po talaga nung system e *chuckles nervously*...kung pwede lang po makuha yung address niyo...(he still goes on explaining about the mix-up for about 3 minutes) tinawagan ko na nga po yung call center at lahat e. *chuckles nervously again* o sige po, 'bye! *hangs up phone*

That P.G. was weird. He didn't even get our address. Besides, if he already called the call center, why was he bothering to call me? Plus, I clearly remember the lady at the call center called me Alexandra. The P.G. should have seen that.

Annoying pipsqueak.

2007-04-03T21:49:00.000-07:00

Today, I was finally able to get out of the house. Freedom at last. Had a fun fun lunch with Nicki and Jescia. We went to Wok Dis Way to relive "fond" summer review memories. It looked just the way it did one summer ago. We even saw 3 of our teachers. Don't think they recognized us. Ah, well. The food was as "questionable" as ever, but we, the self-proclaimed planning committee of our group, still had fun planning future summer getaways.

Towards the end of the meal:
Jescia: Dessert tayo. May dessert kaya sila dito?
Alex: Wala ata. Walang nakalagay sa menu e.
Jescia: Sabi na we should have gone to Cravings. Dun definitely may dessert.
Nicki and Alex: *exasperated sigh* Sabi nga e, we're reliving our summer review memories.

After our dessert-less lunch, we went to NBS to pass the time. Para magliwaliw. Saw some rather interesting books. We browsed through them for a while laughing at all the weird stuff we read, then when Nicki left, Jescia and I went to Starbucks for a quick drink.

'Twas a great day. :)

graduation

2007-03-25T07:10:00.000-07:00

The world is too ironical for me to comprehend. Why is it that the special events speed by but the ones we don't like take so long? It ended too quickly. One minute I was changing into my gala, the next I was receiving the long-awaited diploma, the next I was hugging my friends and crying. I was pretty much a wreck last night. I managed to put on a strongface, as Nicki would say, throughout the whole singing of the grad songs, but I started to break down while were singing the Alma Mater song. It sucked by the way, the song I mean, because we were all practically singing the alto part, but that was the part when I started crying because it finally sank in that it was the last time I was ever going to sing that song. I took one last look at the gym and got all emotional.

I was even more emotional in the podium. We took pictures and cried and hugged more. Apa and I started the waterworks again when we saw each other.

On the way home, we talked about how I'd have different friends in college, how they won't be the same as the ones I have now. That made me even sadder than I already was. I cheered up a lot, though when I saw my parents' grad gift when we got home. It made me happy to have it. Then, we went to Tomas Morato and ate in Tempura, where I saw other graduates with their families.

I sigh again.

raging hormones and sappy good-byes

2007-03-23T07:30:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was so sad. I can't remember ever having cried that much at school before. Everyone was hugging everyone else. It was all so incredibly sappy but we didn't care, because it would be the last time we'd all be together in our classroom, and the last time our adviser would be imparting any advice to us. It's sad; I can't even remember much what she said.

I'm going to miss our class so much--praying together in the morning, taking classes, laughing together. The year was lost to us before we even had time to stop and really look at it. Most of us were hoping that there'd be classes today, as our day of lasts in the school, but classes were called off. It hasn't really registered yet that yesterday was the last day I'd ever wear that brown uniform, the one I've been wearing 5 days a week since I was in the first grade, that yesterday was the last day I'd ever say those long-winded morning prayers, the last time I'd ever enter our classroom, the last time I'd eat with my friends at our Jesus Table, and the last time I'll ever take the bus to school with The Busmates.

It's hard to really let go of people and things you've been with for so long. Even if I've been raging at the school for that thing that they denied me, and even if I kept saying I wouldn't ever go back because of that, I still probably would. I'll miss the school, most of my teachers, and my friends. Apa and I cried and hugged for a long time because it just sank in yesterday how far we'd be from each other next year. She'd be here in Quezon City, I'd be in Manila. It's funny; we've talked about it for so long and haven't been bothered by it until yesterday.

****

Had a fantastic lunch with Jescia, Koko, Nicki and Keishia at CPK today. It ended too quickly though. I didn't want it to end. I wanted us to just eat and laugh at all the nonsensical things in the world like we've always done for the past 4 years or so of our being tablemates and friends and never leave. I got all sad again when I realized that I wouldn't eat with them during recess or lunch in college anymore. I keep wondering whether I'll still find friends like them in college.

I sigh.

scared sh*tless

2007-03-19T06:03:00.000-07:00

Gah. I just confirmed my slot for college today. I'm still scared, though. I keep thinking if I made the right decision. I've been wanting to go to that college since I was a kid. I mean, to me there was no other college. I like my course there, and I can get great a job after I finish. (Great meaning one that pays a lot.) I'm just apprehensive of the long travel there, although I kind of anticipate taking the MRT and LRT to school. I saw the campus when we there last Saturday. It wasn't a pretty sight. It looked outdated and extremely old. Think 100 years old.

So yeah, hindi mapanatag ang kaluluwa ko.

2007-01-30T05:48:00.000-08:00

Peace SHoutS came and went. This fair was probably the best I've been to in all the years I've stayed in the school, and the one where I've contributed to the most.

There wasn't much to do in the first day, so it was great that I decided to volunteer for the sanctum booth with Koko, Nicki and Jescia.
The rides were rather fun, but the ferris wheel ride nearly made my poor heart give out in terror. Motion sickness coupled with my fear of heights. Oh, glory. Just my cup of tea. I realized I enjoyed it, though, after the screaming stopped, and we decided to come back the next day for another ride.
Baila was nice, although we were miffed by the lack of seats and the standing we-don't-care-who's-behind-us-as-long-as-we-get-to-watch people.

The second day was practically the same. I started the day alone, since my friends all had their own thing to do and Mia and Jojo weren't coming until 10.
Mia and I rode the ferris wheel again, and then went for a ride in the caterpillar.
Later, I had fun with the others doing the powerpuff girls' paper clay thing, our beloved piece de resistance. We had the funniest conversations, where Ces laughed at my feeble attempts to get a right color for Blossom's hair, saying it looked like iput ng ibon to her and we all pretended we were Ilonggo ("Kay hirap naman nito, uy!").
Band-Aid was a put-off. I didn't have as much fun as I expected; the heat was unbearable and the lovely aroma of boys and little kids were none too pleasing. The epileptic rock artists and the weird music weren't exactly the icing on top of a good evening, either. I had fun with my friends, though, so it wasn't too disappointing.

Eeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2007-01-22T01:07:00.000-08:00

Oh cripes, I'm so happy right now, I could just jump to the rooftops and yell my heart out! *scream* Thank God!

Must-see.

2007-01-20T03:46:00.000-08:00

I seriously want to watch Perfume: The Story of a Murderer. It's a horror/thriller about this man born with an amazing sense of smell, but who doesn't have a natural scent of his own. He strives to find the perfect scent and eventually finds that the scent of a beautiful young girl is the most wondrous of all. (site: http://perfumemovie.com)

I also want to watch Marie Antoinette, the one directed by Sophia Coppola, but apparently, it's not going to be shown here. Crappe. I have to wait for it to be shown in HBO.

****

Exams ended today, thank goodness. Couldn't take anymore of the late nights (aka sleeping at 2 or 3 in the morning) and the pressure of having to do well. I think I did reasonably well in some, and rather bad in some (aka the English exam). At least I don't have to see how badly I've done until Monday.

Gtg.

Happy New Year :)

2006-12-29T20:41:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year everyone. :)

While this holiday season has been anything but a holiday (thanks to the beastly heap of hws and projects the teachers left us with), the "break" was still rather good, although for some reason this Christmas was slightly sadder than last year's. My "income" from the aginaldos was, however, better, and I'm now a thousand something pesos richer. Great haul this year.

I love the holidays though. I love all the lights and the way they make everything seem brighter and more than ordinary. I love the presents (and the money, of course) and the fantabulous food, but not the calories so much, though.

In a matter of some hours, we'll be ushering in the new year. Yipee! because this year's finally over and because of the media noche we'll be having tomorrow, and Yipee..because January = Back to School = subjection to more stress. I'll be glad when we finally graduate and step into college, although I'll be missing the closeness and security in high school.

Oh, the bores and the snores.

2006-11-16T02:54:00.000-08:00

Had CRT today with the third years. I didn't really want to, since I'd be missing a whole day of lessons, but I absolutely had to do it. It's for some requirement in homeroom or something, I dunno.

Anyway, it was as people said it was, albeit the awkwardness and uncomfortableness that came from being with the third years. They didn't pay much attention to us and we didn't either, so it was pretty okay. I hated the icebreaker part, where Ella and I were left without a 'baboy', so we had to face an embarrassing consequence, which involved us having to spell our names out using our behinds. That was when all dignity was lost and I was humiliated within an inch of my life.

Anyway, the nicest part in the CRT was when Ms Cruz came and shared her own views on critical thinking. The other parts, were, well, there's not much to be said about them. I wish they made things more interesting, the facilitators, since CRT's not really an intriguing subject. It can't really manage to sustain an audience's interest. I mean, who wants to listen to people talk about nothing but critically and reflectively thinking all day? Ah well, I had a rather grand time on my own in that little corner of the conference room, doodling and daydreaming a bit when things got a wee bit dull.

Camping tomorrow and I'm all hyped up. Can't wait to dine a la primitive-caveman and go on that treasure hunt. Oh, I squee. Gtg, still have to pack the things.

Most Interesting and Funniest Learning: It's better to cheat than to repeat. (from a survey conducted by the school)

Oh, the torture.

2006-11-11T02:45:00.000-08:00

Had to go to school today, Saturday. It's just sad and pathetique, but we have, have to do it because of the school's obsession to finish those 200 something days that students have to go to school. I don't see how the teachers are going to manage to squeeze in some knowledge in our poor, sleep-deprived brains with only about twenty minutes each subject.Two days na nga lang pahinga, may Saturday classes pa. So much for a nice weekend.

Jolens told me today that The Lost Colony already went out in Fully Booked. Her ate was able to buy one, and she said it cost about a thousand pesos. Can't wait to buy one and finally read it after a year or so of waiting! Must. Save. Money. Now.

The Prestige

2006-10-28T05:18:00.000-07:00

There are three parts in a magician's trick. The first is the pledge, where the magician takes an ordinary object. The second is the turn, where the magician turns the ordinary into something extraordinary. The audience won't clap until the magician brings back what he vanished. The final and most crucial act is the prestige, the time when the magician amazes and awes his audience with the reappearance of the vanished object.

The Prestige is this movie about two magicians, once friends but turned enemies, enslaved by their desire to beat each other at their own game. What once began as friendly competition evolved into a bitter rivalry at each tried to prove himself the best magician in all of London. The plot was fantastic; it was elaborate and unique. Watch it! :)

Are you watching closely?

*****

Went to eastwood today. Twasn't too fun...there wasn't much to do after we watched The Prestige (!!!). We planned to not go back anymore...the people were too pa-sosyal, pretentious and just plain annoying.

When Apa and I were playing in this dance revo-like game sa arcade, these really annoying girls came up behind us and watched us play. E dahil sa hindi naman kami bihasa ni Apa, nagkakamali kami, and humirit yung isa sa kaibigan niya, "Diba expert ka dyan?". She even repeated it, like two more times or something. Umm, ok, so kelangan mo pa ba igiit na di kami magaling? Tapos nung umalis na kami, sabi nung isa na yun snootily, "FINALLY, we can play". *rolls eyes* Arte. I longed to give them a piece of my mind, but being the one of the actually "mature" people there (Apa being the other), I just kept silent.

Another time na pumasok kami nina Apa and Jescia sa store para bumili ng smoothies, tumigil talaga yung mga tao sa loob and binigyan pa ata kami ng ulo-hanggang-paa na stare. Eeek...parang they were telling us na you have no right to be here...mga sosyal lang na tao ang pwede. Eeew. People like those make me gag. Hmph. Kung wala lang yung Fazoli's dun hindi na talaga ako babalik.

Gateway rules. Dun na lang tayo. Wala pang mga superficial na maarteng tao.

Snoozefest

2006-09-27T04:22:00.000-07:00

We had the club "interaction" today. Two words: 1. Exciting! 2. NOT. Eeek. It was the absolute worst of all interactions. There wasn't even any interacting going on. People kept grouping with their friends, so it makes you think what the whole point of the gathering was.

Some of the guys were so KJ. Stoic. Deadma. NR. Walang paki. The whole time na pinapaisip kami ng team name, they didn't even contribute anything. Just sat there and complained, "Wala na akong maisip...piga na utak ko...blahdiblah..." Kahit nung charades, when the emcees asked for one guy and one girl, wala sa group namin yung nag-volunteer. Gaaah. One word, and it starts with L. Our group presentation also sucked by the way. The seniors were planning a graceful [and secret] exit from the stage to avoid any more humiliation when some of the others on stage got all giddy for some unknown reason and started streaming to the wings, screaming their little lungs out. Ugh. Weird much?

Overall, the whole thing was so incredibly dull with a capital D, so I won't bore you with the details. The only fun part was when the guys did a sort of rendition of Kalye Onse. They were pretty good and funny. My most favorite part of the whole interaction was probably when it ended and we went out to meet the glorious, glorious rain and celebrate the calling-off of classes for tomorrow.

Where are you going to make sakay?

2006-09-18T03:59:00.000-07:00

Had ACET yesterday mornin. Boy, traffic was absolute, absolute murder on the way so my mom and I just walked when the car neared the HS building. There were so many people and equally many lines that I didn't know where to go. Thank God I found Ces and we queued up with the rest of the people who belonged to rooms 1-14.

The test itself wasn't that bad. Easier than expected. English was fun, although I think my essay was pretty lame. Lamer than the usual, I mean. Abstract Reasoning and Numerical Ability weren't, though. The time was too short so about five minutes before each subtest would end, I would shade all answers I didn't know 'A'. A for Ateneo raw, sabi ni Sir Rai sa Experts. So yeah, the rest were fine. Math was fine, Gen Info was fine, the rest were pretty okay. God, I hope I pass.

Ang daming pa-sosyal na tao. Everywhere, I heard people speaking either English or conyo, although the majority spoke conyo. I overheard a girl asking her companion, "Where are you going to make sakay?". God, I hope I don't ever learn to speak like that, even if I'm in the Ateneo (hopefully) already. Although it can be fun at times to speak that way, we don't really do it seriously. Apa and Nicki and Koko and the rest in our barkada do it just for fun. And yung ibang mga Atenista, ang papansin. High-fiving each other and shouting as if there was no tomorrow. Papansin. Tsk, tsk. Pathetic.

*sigh* No use thinking about it anymore. We still have 4 loooong months before we have to think about it again.

The Magic of the Long-Forgotten Shoes

2006-08-26T00:46:00.000-07:00

She was four years old again.

The little girl laughed delightedly, her rosy cheeks flushed with excitement and her chocolate brown eyes sparkled and danced. As she twirled and pirouetted around the room, she marveled at the ease and grace the magic shoes lent her. She stopped to gaze at the beauty that lay in the simplicity of the shoes and her smile widened. The pink shoes perfectly matched the pink tulle in her skirt and the satin ribbons that wound themselves around her legs. Then, she leaped as far as her short little legs would allow, knowing that the magic of the shoes would let her go even further.

The dream ended as abruptly as it had come. She found herself on her knees once more, clutching the satin ribbons of the old shoes. Moments ago, she had found them tucked away in a dusty corner of her closet, forgotten and neglected. Still, the shoes seemed to retain vestiges of its magic. She touched the scuffed toes, hardly daring to believe that these were the shoes in her dream. As she touched them, she could hear the first few strains of the violins, its soft sweet velvety melody enveloping her.

Then, impulsively, she slipped her feet into the old shoes, and wound the ribbons around her legs as she had done several times in the past. She remembered the forgotten stories, the secrets the shoes had witnessed, and felt it rushing back through the wrinkles of time, sharp and clear. The shoes lent her its magic again, and soon she was lost in a dream once more.

She felt like the little girl in the dream, relishing the discovery of a new prospect and savoring the irrepressible exhilaration of dancing as the sweet notes of the piano weaved themselves through the air. She found herself dancing again to the tune of a sonata, and felt herself soaring to great heights she could never reach before, until the shoes lent her its magic.

Crap Week

2006-08-25T06:42:00.000-07:00

I'm just grateful this incredibly hellish week's over, since there wasn't a single day that went well. Each day had to be marred by the dreaded quarterly test results. Most were so infuriating that it made me think whether or not I really studied for the tests. Some were okay, like my Computer test. I'm rather proud of that one, since I'm not exactly techie material.

Eco-Song results only made me feel worse that I already did. The few hours I spent rehearsing for the audition the night before were sadly wasted, since I didn't make it through the auditions. Failed dismally even, probably. Oh well. There's still a window of opportunity open: the Eco-essay thing. I'll definitely go for that.

Today was especially crappy. Some people started to not talk to us. I don't know what we supposedly did, but it would've been rather nice if they just told us what was bothering them instead of mutinously whispering about us behind our backs.

Some things went rather well during the week. Our magazine for the Linggo ng Wika turned out great! :) All our hard work paid off. I just hope we win. Endurance test results were also given, and it made me feel a whole lot better.

Ateneo permits were also given. I'll be taking the test on Sept 17, morning, High School Building, Room No. 4. Please tell me if you are too. :)

2006-08-21T06:26:00.000-07:00

I've just watched Mom at Sixteen for the second time in two days. It's a pretty good film. It's this story about a girl who became a mom at sixteen [hence the title], but still tries to live a normal life as a teenager. She faces unforseen challenges as people at her new school find out that the baby who she's been calling as her brother actually turns out to be her son.

The film leaves an important message. It shows how dire the consequences could be if teenagers continue to have premarital sex. Kids can't take care of kids. Heck, the only people most teens know how to take care of are themselves. What more little kids who need to be waited on hand and foot? [here enters teenstar's erik erikson's psychosomethingsomething: trust vs mistrust] Most of us will probably get married and have kids someday, but that can wait. Studies should come first. So many futures and dreams have been flushed down the drain because of impatience.

2006-08-19T05:15:00.000-07:00

My mom saw this article on the newspaper about being around negative people. Included was this funny story:

The Negative Hairdresser

A woman was at her hairdresser's getting her hair styled for a trip to Rome with her boyfriend. She mentioned the trip to the hairdresser, who responded, "Rome? Why would anyone want to go there? It's crowded and dirty and full of Italians. You're crazy to go to Rome. So, how are you getting there?"

"We're taking the Continental," was the reply. "We got a great rate!"

"The Continental?" exclaimed the hairdresser. "That's a terrible airline. Their planes are old, their flight attendants are ugly, and they're always late. So, where are you staying in Rome?"

"We'll be at this exclusive little place over on Rome's Tiber River called Teste."

"Don't go any further. I know that place. Everybody thinks its gonna be something special and exclusive, but it's really a dump, the worst hotel in the city! The rooms are small, the service is surly and they're overpriced. So, whatcha doing when you get there?"

"We're going to go to see the Vatican and we hope to see the Pope."

"That's rich," laughed the hairdresser. "You and a million other people trying to see him. He'll look the size of an ant. Boy, good luck on this lousy trip of yours. You're going to need it."

A month later, the woman again came in for a hairdo. The hairdresser asked her about her trip to Rome.

"It was wonderful," explained the woman, "not only were we on time in one of Continental's brand new planes, but it was overbooked and they bumped us up to first class. The food and wine were wonderful, and I had a handsome 28-year-old steward who waited on me hand and foot. And the hotel was great! They'd just finished a $5 million remodeling job and now it's a jewel, the finest hotel in the city.They, too, were overbooked, so they apologized and gave us their owner's suite at no extra charge!"

"Well," muttered the hairdresser, "That's all well and good, but I know you didn't get to see the Pope."

"Actually, we were quite lucky, because as we toured the Vatican, a Swiss Guard tapped me on the shoulder and explained that the Pope likes to meet some of the visitors and if I'd be so kind as to step into his private room and wait, the Pope would personally greet me. Sure enough, five minutes later, the Pope came into the room. I knelt down and he spoke a few words, laid his hand on my head and blessed me."

"Oh, really! What'd he say?"

He said, "Bless you, my child. But, where'd you get the awful hairdo?"

*****

I hate being around people I don't really like, although there are some cases that I really have no choice. Like being around this guy I've christened "Mr. Conceited". He's incredibly amazing at this thing he does, but the guy just can't stop rubbing it in hard enough. *rolls eyes* And, he makes it a point that everybody knows about his Promil-kid-worthy genius on playing. *throws up* I rarely permit myself to remain even one minute in his presence.

I guess even if you don't like being around someone, you still have to be nice, even if it's the plastic kind of nice. Play along. Even if it's not really a good thing, sometimes you really have to fake it till you make it. I mean, what if it's with your boss? Even if you absolutely detest him, you can't just say "I hate your stinking guts" in his face, unless you want to find yourself unemployed.

Censored

2006-08-01T03:20:00.000-07:00

Sayonara, free ranting and raving.

Discretion is now a must. Keep thy lips zipped.

my mind is an empty sponge

2006-07-26T04:04:00.000-07:00

Endurance test. The name says it all, really. Oh, and btw, add mind-numbing, nakakasabaw-sa-utak and sleep-inducing to the long list of adjectives that could describe it. Science was incredibly long and absolute murder. Throughout the remainder of the day, I really did feel like an empty sponge, my mind sucked dry, rendering me incapable of paying any attention to the afternoon subjects.

UPCAT looms steadily and scarily than ever. I've taken to studying Mathematics for the past four days of our glorious, glorious albeit wet and freezing vacation. I'm terrified about this whole UP thing, since it's supposed to have a big impact on my future, yadayadayada. God, I really hope I pass. *crosses fingers*

ACET form still not filled out yet, and still no idea on the essay. *crickets chirping* As I've already said, my mind is a dry, empty sponge. Enlighten me please.

Thank you.

Back to Business

2006-07-13T03:50:00.000-07:00

Hey. Just got back from the pleasantly freezing weather of Batangas to the sultry and humid one of the metro. It was great, being away from all the pollution and hopeslessly congested streets and retreating to a rustic "countryside" for two and a half days.

The truth is, the retreat was quite boring. Oh sure, the place was nice, the food was even satisfactory and the people were so accommodating and all, but some of the sessions were repititive and just plain sleep-inducing. I swear, if there wasn't such a thing as ethics , I would've sunk into a boredom-induced stupor in no time. There's this brother who was nice and all, but he was just so boring. He kept saying "O, baka hindi na kayo makatulog mamayang gabi kasi hindi niyo nasabi yung nararamdaman niyo." over and over again when no one else would care to share their realizations/reactions/learnings. It's not like sharing one's feelings is as incredibly vital as deciding what to do for the rest of your life. They're personal, and not everybody has to know about them.

To be honest, I don't like retreats. I just like the experience of staying in a new place and taking a rest from all the stress. And yeah, I like the short time that I get to talk properly with God, since I rush through my morning prayers in the chapel more often than not, but the truth is, after the retreat, I just got more confused about God and the Catholic religion in general. There are just so many things that confuse me.

Classes were suspended today because of the typhoon. Yay. Tomorrow though, we have to be back in school. Darn. My glorious week-long [counting the college orientation] has come to an end. Oh well. You have to go back again some time. I was just hoping tomorrow wouldn't be the day.

2006-07-07T03:37:00.000-07:00

Haven't updated since last Sunday, since, well, nothing much has really happened this week. Same old, same old.

We had the college orientation for two days, which was a big bonus for us fourth years, since it meant two days off from regular classes. It was boring though and I kept nodding off during today's afternoon session from lack of sleep. Haha. Ang saya katabi nina Frankie, Lori, Apa at Karay, even though I was quite lethargic most of the time. They were playing the game with the folded paper thing. Apa: Ilang mm ang circumference ng adam's apple ni tots? [tama ba lori? haha] Lori: Hmmm. Mga tatlong libo lang naman. Wohoo.

I spent most of the orientation reading my book for the HRR, Wuthering Heights, by Emily Bronte. It's a good book, and I think it's better than Jane Eyre, a book written by her sister Charlotte. For one, it's a good deal less thick and for two, the story's plot is more colorful than Jane Eyre, since there's more juice on the first few chapters of Wuthering Heights. An added bonus: Wuthering Heights does not contain one single, solitary word of French, thus, I won't need the services of the ever-so-reliable online translator anymore.

UPCAT's a few weeks away and I haven't even started reviewing yet, since I'm one of the world's foremost procrastinators. Haha. Maybe I'll start reviewing tomorrow or Sunday [or Monday]. Haha. Kidding. It's our retreat on Monday, so no can do. Reco letters please! Don't care if it's late, as long as you give me one. Only if you want to, of course. Thanks. I'm actually looking forward to going to Batangas, minus the actual trip there. I detest long drives, since I have this little problem called motion sickness that usually ruin fun trips. Make me spend four hours or so in a moving vehicle, and things could get pretty messy. And I mean literally.

I hope the food at Capuchin doesn't bear a likeness to the incredibly insipid rubbish they serve at our canteen. I don't want to relive the horror of having to actually eat some of those God-awful things they call food. Well, okay, not all are bad, I can name some that are quite good even, but ketchup and corned beef in spaghetti and "pizza" that doesn't even looked like it's cooked? How incredibly low-class, cheap and cheesy. To think we go to a private school pa. Tsk, tsk. We poor students have no choice in the matter.

I had so much fun with the girls during lunch. We played concentration for a while using our surnames. Jescia's was hard to say since it was so long so we made it lizan para mas madali. After that we invented a routine for a six-person bahay kubo game and proudly called ourselves "pioneers". It still has a few rough edges, but we'll smoothen them out after a few "rehearsals". :)

***Justine Henin-Hardenne beat Kim Clijsters in the semifinals yesterday. 'Twas too bad, since Henin-Hardenne, who will be advancing to the finals against Amelie [I love her name!] Mauresmo, already has a Grand Slam title [French Open] and Clijsters doesn't have one yet.

Chololo vs Pacman || Refresher

2006-07-02T05:39:00.000-07:00

The nation came to a standstill as everyone tuned in to Pacquiao's match with Larios. Worldwide, Filipinos watched with bated breath as their hero fought bravely with the Mexican. The judges' decision came as no surprise: Pacquiao won.

Okay, wala lang. I just wanted to practice my news reporting skills if I'm ever to become a news editor. Haha. I probably need to brush them up, though.

****

Had the refresher course in Expert Guides yesterday. God, it was so great seeing them all again, especially Donna. It was just too bad that Lyka wasn't able to make it. Tete was there! Haha. Had fun with her too. They had this makeshift bulletin board in the back and we made fun of the cliched and weird statements posted on them. Like there was this boy who said "hello, hehehe...wala lang. mabait ako". Others said, "It's better to talk than to listen", "It hurts, you know...it hurts" [ang sarap ilagay, what hurts?] "Please always stay in your assigned seat". Ay grabe. Tawa kami ng tawa.

My mock UPCAT score went up, thank goodness. :)

The fun day had a sad ending, though, when I had to say good-bye to the friends I made. I think yesterday was the last day I'd ever see them. I mean, they live so far away from QC. Oh well. Baka isang araw, ipaglapit muli kami ng tadhana. Oh God. How incredibly sappy and schmaltzy is that?

Henry's Grille

2006-06-30T05:31:00.000-07:00

Jescia, Tintin, Camille, Dani, Michelle and I went to Henry's Grille [sp?] today. It's this tiny little restaurant about a block away from our house, which, according to Dani, served really great chicken, so we decided to try it. The restaurant was quite small, but it had a good and bistro-like atmosphere in it.

We ordered two servings of Chicken a la Henry and two orders of Grilled Stuffed Shrimp for our main courses. It was good. Pwede na. The stuffing for the shrimp was cheese and tomatoes, quite unique, but tasted pretty good just the same. The chicken reminded me of the Italian chicken in Fazoli's, minus the yummy basil and oregano sauce. Instead, it had this slightly smoky flavor.

Most of the time we goofed around and took pictures with Camille's camera. There was this candid picture of me caught in mid-dance with a funny expression on my face. Needless to say, they laughed themselves silly when they saw it.

Dinner soon came to an end and we had to total up the expenses, my least favorite part when it comes to gimmicks [I speak from experience], and we were still debating whether or not to order dessert. In the end, we just decided to go home and have dessert at home. Haha. I came home with my hair smelling like barbecue.

It was so fun. It almost felt like a college reunion wherein we hadn't seen each other for decades. Too bad Koko and Lois and the others weren't able to make it. It would've been funner. Oh well. Maybe next time.

sing back that old tune

2006-06-29T03:33:00.000-07:00

Ces has been talking a lot about music lessons the past few days, and hearing it makes me miss my music lessons a lot.

When it came to piano teachers, I teacher-hopped. Wala akong permanent na teacher. My first one was a woman who lived here in our village and I'd just go to their house and have my lessons. She was pretty decent. At least I got past John Thompson's Book 2 for Beginners or whatever it was and she was the one who taught me note reading and how to play the scales.

The next was a teacher from the Miriam Music Center. She wasn't too bad, but she scared the heck out of me. Every single note had to fall on the exact time and if couldn't do it, she'd make me stop and go over the start of the line, or if she was in a bad mood, the start of the whole piece. I lasted a summer with her.

The next one was a teacher from CMM and lives just a few doors down from us. I didn't like him. During our last lesson, I couldn't get the correct timing for the pedals and by the end, he was practically yelling at me. Needless to say, that ticked me off, I mean, no one gets anything right the first time, and I didn't want to continue lessons with him anymore. So now, I'm teacher-less. Anyone know any decent piano teachers out there? Haha. Let me know.

For my violin lessons, I stayed with one teacher, and she was terrific. Her name was Miss Olga and she was from the Music Center too. She was part of an orchestra, so she was really good. During the times I'd scrape and squeak away in my violin while she would play waltzes and sonatas on hers, I wanted the earth to swallow me whole. Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star na nga lang e, mali-mali pa. Haha. I stayed with her for two years until school work interefered and I had to stop. I kinda miss her now.

It's just sad that I have to stop music lessons because I'm too busy. I wish I had more time, so I could immerse myself in all that again, even if it's just for a really short while. I could play my violin again, and finally get the timing for the pedals right.

High School Musical || Dancing the Conga

2006-06-26T03:00:00.000-07:00

Watched High School Musical last night. I think this was something na tinutukan ng mga tao sa school, since for the past week, I've been hearing nothing but High School Musical this, and High School Musical that. I've heard people singing the songs. So, to see what the fuss was all about, I watched it last night with my sister.

It was quite nice, but it wasn't that cracked up to be. Hindi siya yung tipong paulit-ulit mong papanoorin hanggang magasgas na yung cd. Not like Amelie. Haha. The songs were typical Disney and the plot was well, typical Disney too. The only difference was that people kept breaking out in song and dancing. I liked the way they attempted to not stereotype the students, like yung sa smart kids, they can dress quite well, and hindi sila yung recluse and loners. Kasi mostly in movies, they're portrayed that way, all nerdy and geeky. There's also this kid who's a basketball star, and he bakes really great food. It shows kids na just because basketbolista ka, you should stick to your status quo. It just doesn't work that way.

The Zac Efron dude is kinda cute, but not drool-worthy. Haha.

****

I'm supposed to get my hair cut today, but sadly, a relative in Quezon passed away, so my mom had to leave for Lucena. Grabe talaga, you never really know when you're going to be taken. It's just so unfortunate. *sigh*

On a happier note, I, or rather we, just got some very good news today. Very good indeed. Call it mean or whatever you like, but what can I do? My joy knows no bounds! Haha. Some were even putting up a front of "crying" and "pleading", but I know they were dancing the conga inside.

*sigh* Why is it that everything I write is nothing but bloody, bloody drivel?

2006-06-24T07:06:00.000-07:00

Haha. Tried a new layout today. It's quite simple, and the hearts are a tad bit too much, but I liked the swirlies. I can't ged rid of the headshot-yourdead.blogspot.com thing under the swirls, though. Does anyone out there know how to get rid of it? If you do, please tell me how. Haha. Thanks.

T.G.I.F.

2006-06-23T04:09:00.000-07:00

Thank God Friday na. I'd spontaneously combust if I have to go through one more day of school. I think I've lost any interest I might have previously had for learning. Everything's just so boring, insipid, vapid, jejune, and any other adjective that would mean the same as those. Some of the teachers are quite dull. Sometimes I don't even listen anymore, and I find myself staring blankly into space and praying that I won't succumb to the endless drone of their voices and fall asleep. I mean, it's the rainy season and masarap matulog.

We were up all night yesterday, conference-ing and im-ing each other, trying to think of an investigatory project that we could pass. Yeah, I know that we had one week to work on it and all that, but kami ang dakilang crammers at procrastinators. So there.

Aside from school being boring and all, I actually get to have some fun time with Apa, Lori, Karay, Jolina and Anna, a.k.a. my lovely lovely investi groupmates, when I'm not with the other girls. Haha. Mga alagad ng Diyos....[with matching actions]

broken record day

2006-06-14T04:19:00.000-07:00

Have you ever repeated the same phrase over and over again for, say, thirty plus times? Nah, probably not, unless you were one of those who did the club promotion earlier. Unfortunately for me, I was one of those people, sounding horribly perky and bubbly and repeating "Hi! Welcome to the Culinary Arts Club! If you love to eat and cook, then this is the club for you." countless and countless of times. It became nauseating after the first twenty greetings. *sigh* So yeah, 'twas a broken record day for me. I dearly, dearly wanted to record my voice on a recorder and just press the play button every time people came and it was my turn to speak. After some time, though, I ditched the perkiness and bubbliness, since it was so not me. Haha. Nah, I just got tired of being that way, since standing in front of about ten people and saying the same thing over and over again can be very tiring.

And to drive the point further home, I sounded like a pirated cd when Tintin and I were talking with Ms. Platon. She asked me how Amelie was and I said great. After that she asked me how fourth year was. I said great again and added, "The aircon's really great." Haha. I'm really showing off my vocab there. Testimony to how repeating the same phrase over and over again can effectively reduce conversation skills to monotonous blabbering.

Haha. So instead of doing my homework now and studying like a good little girl, I choose to write here, since blogging offers great [see? still have the hangover of saying great] pleasure after a veeeeeery monotonous day of school. I can't believe I managed to make it, since we had three periods of nothing but sheer, unadulterated DULLNESS. It takes a lot of effort to not let your eyes glaze over and fall promptly asleep. Check our class schedule and you'll know why. It's just our luck that we have to take some, ehem, not-so-useful classes. If only we had that sweet, sweet prerogative of choosing them.

Schmuckiness.

amelie

2006-06-10T23:27:00.000-07:00

Le Fabuleaux Destin d' Amelie Poulain was fantastic. Many, many thanks to the ever-so-great Miss Platon for lending Nicki and me her Amelie dvd.

[spoilers]

Amelie is basically about this shy waitress who began her quest of making other people happy by returning an old and rusty box of 50's paraphernalia she found in her bathroom. After seeing the effect she had on its owner, she decides then to do little things to make others happy, all without revealing her identity. She befriends an old man in her apartment building, plays the matchmaker and brings together two people very unlikely to end up with each other, steals her father's garden gnome and sends it to different parts of the world after he expresses a desire to see the world, and returns an old album to its owner.

Even though she managed to make others happy, happiness, as well as love, seemed to elude her. She remained an unpainted face, an unwritten page, an unfinished song. However, as is with all fairytales, the film ends happily. Love came knocking at her door soon and she ends up with the album owner, Nino. They, together with all the people Amelie touched with her good deeds, all lived happily ever after. All it took was a nudge in the right direction.

Amelie's story was beautifully illustrated in a tapestry of colors as rich and vivid as her imagination. It's also a story of enjoying life's pleasures, no matter how simple it is, like skipping stones on a canal, cracking creme brulees with a teaspoon, or letting your imagination run away with you.

It's a wonderfully heartwarming film, something you'd not tire of watching. :)

new beginnings

2006-06-05T02:28:00.000-07:00

Classes opened today. Haha. Old news, I know.

Most of the complaints of "Ayoko pang pumasok!", "Ano ba naman yan, ang aga aga!" and "Kasi naman, nananaginip pa ako nung dumating yung bus." quickly dissolved into squeals of delight upon seeing their friends. The empty hallways of the school buzzed and echoed once more with the gay chatter and laughter of its students. Stories that accumulated over the summer were quickly exchanged and greetings and hugs were given.

Typical first-day stuff. Nothing new.

A lot of changes happened though. Aside from the gargatuan-texted and weird-looking signs I know all of you have spotted, heaps and heaps of new rules will be enforced this year. The whole day was basically an orientation on that.

Mrs. Ben's really fun. Thank God I was given a great adviser on my last year in Holy.

My classmates aren't too bad, I admit. I was feeling a bit apprehensive at first. actually, but now, I don't think I have any more reason to be.

The class was divided into committees and I joined the Scholarship Committee. Haha. I couldn't find anywhere else to go, since I can't draw to save my life and I'm not too partial towards Spiritual or Socio-Cultural stuff, even if it does have a nice ring to it.

Fourth year is probably the most desired year since we have one thing the entire school covets: air conditioning. For some unknown whatsit reason, they weren't turned on today, since there was no go-signal or whatever from whomever was in charge. We had to suffer the humidity and fan ourselves with our hands when we could've had a nice, cool breeze provided by the air conditioners. Ha. Dapat bukas air con na the whole day, since hindi naman binuksan yung air con ngayon.

It's good to know that we'll still be having some of our old teachers from third year. It's great that Miss Aniago will still be Pinoy, since we had so much fun with her last year. Thataway, it won't seem to intimidating for us.

My sister started first year today. Yehes, long sleeves na. Haha. It's good that she wasn't traumatized by her first day, although I think napagod siya, since she's slumbering peacefully in the bedroom as I write. I felt kind of sorry for the first years. They went together in tight packs, looking disoriented and fearfully staring at the older levels as if they were going to scold them for simply breathing. They looked awfully small too, in their too-big, kimono-like uniforms. At least they weren't strutting about the school as if they owned the place. Not like some I saw earlier...

I can't help but look back on my first day of high school. People then were unperturbed by the impending horrors related to us so many times, innocently exchanging gossip on Meteor Garden, since it was all the rage back then in first year. Maybe it was because it wasn't so strict then. There're so many new rules now that I can't keep track of them. Haha. I feel sorry for the little kiddies. I hope they get to have fun too, since they're entering what's supposed to be one of the most memorable moments of their lives.

New school year. New beginnings.

the last outing

2006-06-02T17:18:00.001-07:00

*pardon the title. wala na akong maisip.

Went to gateway today with the girls. Haha. It was fun, even though we had but a few hours to spend with each other.

Since it was Koko's birthday last May 20, she treated all seven of us to a movie. Guess what we watched? Haha. Another cheesy pinoy flick, Manay Po. We couldn't watch anything else, since Koko already watched X-Men, and Nicki already watched the Da Vinci Code. Anyhow, the movie wasn't too bad. It made us laugh a fair number of times.

After the movie, we went to i-pose and had our pictures taken. Haha. We took such a long time to decide our poses that I think the dude who was taking our pictures was getting a wee bit annoyed at us.

Went to Timezone after. Played the usual, air hockey, then car-racing. After that, went back upstairs to the other Timezone. Jescia and I went straight to House of the Dead and just blasted and blasted dead people to our hearts' content [well, maybe not to our poor, sore arms]. Played some more games, then we went to the karaoke room.

So yeah, that was basically the whole outing. When I got home, I changed, the plopped to my waiting bed and promptly fell asleep. Yep.

****

On Monday, they're going to have to drag an unwilling body to the school premises. Mine. I don't really want to go back. Not yet. As Koko said, Hindi ko pa feel e. Haha.

au revoir, review

2006-06-01T04:13:00.000-07:00

Okay, so my Expert Guides review ended today with the mock ACET and UPCAT. I guess I didn't do so badly, except in Math [what's new?], wherein I got a 44% in problem solving. I know. Pathetic, isn't it? That's exactly why I need to start practicing more.

Nagulat nga ako. The mock exams were harder than the actual mock ACET and UPCAT. Take chem for example. I was expecting the gas laws problems with the big big figures that takes around three whole minutes to solve, instead, ang lumabas lang yung mga empirical formula, finding the molecular weight, first-quarter-chem stuff like that.

Ang sweet din ng Expert Guides. They gave all of us the 30-peso sized Cappucino McFlurrys [how do you pluralize McFlurry anyway?]. Parang lahat kami napa-"awwwww...". So yeah, 'twas another day of sappiness and good-byes. I'll miss Donna, Lyka, Anna, Leona, Kevin [well, maybe not his meanness and poking] and the rest of the class. The review actually turned out quite well enough, despite the waking-up-at-the-wee-hours-of-the-morning part. Anyway, we'll see each other again on July 1 for the refresher course.

Sayonara, review, and hello to the last four days of summer vacation, if you can still call it a vacation, that is, left. Then, back again to school, homework, and stress again. Pffft.

my uber crazy, jersey-lovin' classmates

still crazy :)

a review of the review

2006-05-23T03:29:00.000-07:00

It's been four straight days of math and science now in my review. Nice, isn't it? I'm having a great time, don't worry.

The teachers are quite good. We had this chem teacher though who kept steamrolling us with heaps and heaps of information that we couldn't [and never will, i think] understand. His antics, which we found utterly amusing, positively exuded gayness, reminiscent of a certain someone who i think you all know, especially you, Tete. During breaks, when he'd leave the room, a girl in class would crack joke after joke about him and people would laugh their heads off.

My classmates aren't too bad, I guess. There's just this one guy who annoys the bejeezus out of me. Nakakainis. He's too KKSP. He'd yell "Yes, Ma'am!" at the top of his lungs and those silly girls who sit with him in the back would trill appreciatively. He's always late too. There hasn't been a review day that passed that he wasn't late. Then again, no one's punctual these days. Set a time and people would arrive thirty minutes later. Well, anyway, yeah, I hate him. His "papasin" strategies distract people from learning properly. Oh well. Guys being guys.

I managed to make some nice friends in the review. Haha. We'd eat together, talk about school, friends, and criticize the teachers. We ate in Wok Dis Way for lunch earlier. Eeeeek. The place smelled like a meatshop. *barf* The food wasn't too bad, but it wasn't too good either. Well, at least it wasn't calorie-exuding fastfood. I'm incredibly sick of McDonald's, and I miss my mom's yummy cooking.

Eight more days left.

*P.S. Ugh. Currently hating that stupid host in Studio 23, Asia Agcaoli. Why can't she act and talk [Anyhoohow? What the heck is that?] like a normal person? She tries too hard, but to absolutely no avail.

the sore throat from hell

2006-05-21T02:40:00.000-07:00

shmuck. my friggin' throat hurts like hell. it's been at it for three days now. argh. every time i swallow, it sends shoots of pain up and down my throat. it's not like any ordinary sore throat i've ever had. the ones i had would go away after i gargle a warm saline solution before i go to sleep. waaah. my mom's taking me to the doctor tomorrow. i hope it's nothing serious, like strep throat or tonsilitis. ack. if it is, i chose an inopportune time to fall ill.

cripes. now i have to postpone my meeting with jescia on wednesday, since i can't enjoy a mocha frapp with a sore throat.

perfect. just perfect.

2006-05-18T05:36:00.000-07:00

a review ends, and another one begins. haha. what an incredibly fun way to spend my summer. studying. yipee. it just makes me want to jump for sheer joy...not.

so yeah, the review ended with the usual sappy good-byes, with us bidding each other farewell as if there's no tomorrow. well, nah, it wasn't that sad. it's not like we really bonded as a class. those who belonged to the same schools pretty much formed their own little groups and shunned the rest out. there were a select few who disengaged themselves from their groups and managed to befriend some of us.

errr. tomorrow i start reviewing at expert guides. that means around eight hours of sitting on your ass doing nothing but listening to a teacher, taking down notes and pretending to look interested when you're really thinking about lunch. ger-reat. the highlight of my summer. oh, and i have to eat fastfood every lunch. eeeek. it exudes tons of calories and fats. i don't need that.

to add to that, elliott got voted out. argh. i was banking on him on winning american idol. i'm happy katharine got to stay, though. i thought she was the next to get voted out, and that it would be between elliott and taylor. argh. i kept wishing that it would be between elliott and katharine na lang, so it won't matter to me if either wins, since i like them both anyway. america's officially mad.

great. just great.

espionage escapades

2006-05-16T00:49:00.001-07:00

summer usually means one thing for me: taking out my nancy drew books and rereading them. somehow, i don't get tired of reading about the tight spots nancy manages to get herself and bess and george in, and her ingenious ways of getting them out. i started out with the nancy drew notebooks and moved up to the hardbound ones then to the paperback ones again [the ones with the flower prints on them]. my dad saw how much i liked them and bought me a collection of the hardbound ones [that was when books were still cheap]. haha. call me a sucker for mysteries. i read agatha christie and jessica fletcher too, and even watched the movies that featured her, but i don't read it as much as nancy drew.

tete, maki [somosot] and i were huge fans of nancy drew when we were still in the third or fourth grade. we took such a fancy for her escapades that we even tried imitating her and went on "stakeouts". we would look at people passing by and whisper about whether they looked suspicious or not. i remember maki saying once, "don't look now, but there's a really mysterious man in black standing over there." tete and i turned immediately and said, "where?" of course, by that time, the man was gone.

when we weren't doing that, tete and i would try to solve our own little mystery: finding out who nappi was. nappi was actually a signature we noticed on the drawings on the front covers of the books. we would brainstorm and try to come up with answers. who was nappi anyway? was there a mystery behind the signature? was he/she actually a captive trying to convey a message? we later found out that there was no mystery at all; it was just the artist's signature. haha, pardon our childhood innocence.

when we went camping in the fourth grade, we even made this checklist that included items we'd need for investigations. we were all hyped up and excited to go sneaking around in the dark, armed with our trusty flashlights to knock out any unsuspecting prowler that came our way, but sadly, the rain poured steadily that night and we were unable to do so.

haha, it was so fun pretending to be nancy drew, even if we didn't come close to apprehending any villains.

****

errr. great. i just saw on the news that mtrcb has finally rated the da vinci code. just when i was feeling relieved that they were allowing it to be shown here, they announced that it was rated R. isn't that just dandy? absolutely perfect. i've been waiting for that movie to be shown ever since i saw the posters in the cinemas, and now they're not allowing the underaged to watch.

what a total rip-off. oh well. i guess there's always pirated dvds. [see, because of their rating, tataas ang rate ng bibili ng pirated. tapos sila pa nagsasabi na avoid piracy? how can we not? should we wait until it shows in hbo? tsss]

i think they're making a mountain out of a molehill about this whole da vinci code thing. it's just fiction [meaning: not real, made-up]. a woman on the news said, "two hours of watching a movie cannot change your faith." i mean, okay, it does make some "blasphemous" allegations, but what's so wrong about exploring your faith a little further? it might make some things clear. honestly, there really are some teachings that i can't understand.

ay. religion's too messy.

the nineties blair witch project

2006-05-14T02:28:00.000-07:00

haha. i was looking through these old photos and i came across some of mine when i was around six or five. eeeeeeeeek. i looked really bad. i won't post the pictures here of course. i'd die of shame before i do that.

the nineties were fashion disaster days [as tete said]. unfortunately, we innocent children were guinea pigs to our mothers' attempts to create a so-called "fashionable" look. aahh. those were the days of bangs, stockings, knee-high socks, really short hair, and the dresses that exuded lace, floral designs and pinkness. innocent as we were then, we wore the dresses our mothers made us wear [take note: made us wear]. they would either be itchy, chiffon-y, poofy, or a twin of our sibling's outfit. my sister and i have this pair of dresses [they were gifts, i think] that looked exactly alike. our individualities cried out to be recognized.

sa school, pataasan pa nga ng socks. the higher the better. bangs too. the longer the better. haha. i remember this really crazy thing i did when i was in grade school. one day, for some unknown reason, i took a pair of scissors and cut off some of my hair. the result was the hair that was left behind stuck up in all directions and i looked like a porcupine. *blush* noon pala, may peer pressure na rin. haha.

well, thank God fashion has evolved and polished the rough edges of the nineties and forsaken the too-frilly look. *shudder*

here's a conversation tete and i had about it.

me: haha, you know kanina, i was looking through these old photos.
me: of me when i was around six or five.
me: eeeeeeeeeeeeek. dork much?
tete: hahaha
tete: i cant see!!!
me: can't see what?
tete: the pictures
tete: haha
tete: aaah
tete: hahaha
me: eeeeeeeeeek
me: over my dead body
tete: haha ganun din ako
tete: yikes!
me: eeek. ang pangit talaga nung outifts ko non. *insert retching noise here*
tete: hahahahahahaha!
tete: ako din
tete: GRABE
tete: major fashion disaster
tete: aaaaay
me: oh yeah.
me: our outfits then exuded lace, floral designs and pinkness. not to mention bad hair days.
tete: AAACK
tete: the baaaangs
tete: THE HORRIBLE BAAANGS!
me: yeah!
me: and the knee-high socks!
tete: aaaaaai
tete: hahaha
me: they were supposedly protection from the mosquitoes
tete: hahahahaha!
tete: hmm
tete: let me make a blog entry about that
me: ako rin!
tete: hahaha
me: i was going to say that too.
me: okay. let's get to it.

so the conversation pretty much ended there. after i said that, we each dashed off to our respective blogs to write about it. haha. view tete's blog. she might be able to give a more animated description.

try looking through old photos, preferrably around grade one or two. maybe you can dig up some photos of our field demo, when we did the beatles.

haha. dorky much?

math is LOVE. not.

2006-05-13T00:59:00.000-07:00

do you know just how much i adore math? how extremely easy i find it that i got oh, i don't know, 20 possible answers right out of 60 easy-as-pie questions? yep. the dry-run exam today was a testimony as to how much i love math, and how much math loves me. solving math problems is just as simple and uncomplicated as reciting the alphabet. it's that easy.

ha. i'm not hoping anymore that i could even get into the top 100 of the batch, since i screwed math BIG TIME. there were practically no word problems and permutations, two topics which i found really hard during the review and topics which i concentrated on while studying. just as my luck would have it, there was only around five world problems and maybe one permutation/combination problem.

science was fine. the only questions i wasn't able to answer were the physics questions, since the formulas i studied didn't really show up in any of the problems, and yeah, the pointers in the back of the modules were practically useless.

i think i did quite well in the language and reading comprehension part, the only two parts which i finished ahead of time and were able to review. now this is a testimony as to how much i love english. hmmm. does that mean i'm destined for an english-related course? haha.

i still haven't settled on a course yet, although biochem and molecular bio are big possibilities. i'm still not sure if i'm going to push through with medicine. my dad says na naghihirap na raw ang mga doktor sa pilipinas [contrary to my belief] so i don't think he wants me to take medicine. i think. if i don't pass the quota for the above mentioned courses, i'll probably choose creative writing or journalism as a second choice. if i don't pass either diliman or manila, haha, i might choose baguio as a second choice.

oh yes. decision-making is soooooooo easy.

*pardon my sarcasm. i can't help it. i mean, don't you just adore math?

the sweet rains of may

2006-05-11T20:52:00.000-07:00

it's raining, it's pouring, and the sweltering heat has taken a respite. yeees. finally. sayonara, hateful heat.

during the rainy days, there's nothing better than turning the airconditioner way up and curling up in bed with a blanket, your favorite book and a steaming mug of hot cocoa with marshmallows.

aah. sheer bliss.

current state of mind: in DENIAL

2006-05-10T02:23:00.000-07:00

the title speaks it all. errrr. my brain is in denial and is not working at all. i owe it to the fact that i stupidly forgot everything i'm supposed to remember. eesh.

i'm hating math right now. really hating it. specially word problems. i can't understand why math can be so useful; it has an answer to practically everything related to numbers, yet it is so friggin' hard. life's too ironic to make any sense of it.

it is three days away from the UPCAT dry-run exam and i still haven't studied science, english and filipino. i think it would be a miracle if i even get a 2-point something in the exam. i'm keeping my fingers crossed for a cash prize, but then again, dreams get you nowhere.

studying has ruined my summer, even if it's really necessary for, you know, my future and all. i hate having to study during a period of rest and relaxation, if you can even get some from this heat. summer's a time to get your minds nice and empty, as dumbledore said in harry potter.

i wish i study in a chinese school, so that solving math problems would just be like writing my name. they study math twice a day, in chinese and english.

agh. wishful thinking.

i have to go back and torment myself with functions-relations-whatsits. *groan* wish me luck.

childhood memories

2006-05-07T23:06:00.000-07:00

how often do you revisit your childhood? can't say i do too much, but just recently, i decided to. i took this storybook [bunnies, bunnies, bunnies. a treasury of stories, songs and poems] from the bookshelf and immersed myself with stories about, you guessed it, BUNNIES. haha. they were given to me by my neighbor, christine, during one of my birthdays.

one of my favorite tales there is the tale of peter rabbit by beatrix potter. ang cute. heee. it's about this naughty little bunny, peter, who decided to get into some mischief and broke into Mr. McGregor's garden to eat some lettuce and French beans. unfortunately, he came across Mr. McGregor and was "most dreadfully frightened". he ended up losing his shoes, his new blue jacket with shiny brass buttons, landed with a splash into a watering can, and needless to say, he was scared to death. he eventually got out of the garden, but he got sick, so during dinner, the naughty little rabbit only got camomile tea while flopsy, mopsy and cotton-tail had bread, milk and blackberries.

haha. it's like one of those stories our mothers used to tell us so we would learn our lessons. my mom used to do it, like when i was "training" for a spelling bee, she asked me to spell spaghetti [hey, i was really young then. haha] and she told me that if i couldn't spell it, she would never ever buy me jolly spaghetti again. little kids are easy to manipulate aren't they? haha. give them something to do and they'll do it, often struggling like it's a herculean task, even if it's just distributing art materials to their classmates. i've noticed that with kids, lalo na kung teacher yung nagbigay nung instruction. brown-nosers. haha. we all did that. when apples were short of hand, stickers would be the best substitute. prep teachers must be unendingly patient.

haha. another silly entry.

driving 101

2006-05-06T05:06:00.000-07:00

the farthest i've probably gone to driving a car was in that car-racing thing in the arcade. since i'm still underage, and i still lack the sufficient knowledge, i'm limited to sitting in the back or at the front, or to backseat driving while the car's moving. until today, that is.

today i learned how to drive a car with my uncle's help. first he taught me the basics, like how to differentiate the clutch, brake and gas pedals, their functions, how to start the car, and how to get the car moving. it was a lot to swallow, and at first it was difficult to follow. it all seemed simple, but nooo. first you start the car, then press down on the clutch, shift to first gear, release the handbreak, and start stepping lightly on the gas while slowly releasing the clutch. the first time i did it, the car lurched forward and it scared my little cousin so much that she left the car [my mom told me later that pia told auntie nancy "mama, i thought i was going to die."]. *sheepish*. am i bad or am i bad? i had pressed the gas down too much and released the clutch so the battery died and i had to start all over again. i got better and better eventually, and gradually started enjoying myself. oh sure, i was an accident waiting to happen, what with me panicking and pressing down on the gas hard, which made us jackrabbit like crazy, the heat was incredibly unbearable [the aircon broke down and it was around two in the afternoon], but driving's awfully fun. :) i drove around mapayapa and soon i was learning how to make turns, all in first gear only, of course. ha. ang aksaya rin sa gas.

there were times that i nearly backed into the tubero signs, according to isa and trina, and i made the car go into the sidewalks, but thank God there were no accidents. isa even said "ang saya kung si atch yung nag-dradrive. we get to have an adventure." at that i had to raise an eyebrow. adventure? all the two of them pretty much did was sit in the back, sing mission impossible to hype up the tension that was already rising and annoy the heck out of me.

at the end of my first driving lesson, i was exhausted, but i think my uncle was even more tired than me. my mom and aunt were waiting back in the house and ask how i did. they said i did okay, and isa even rated me A-, even though i probably deserved something lower.

i still have tons to learn, but that in itself will be an adventure. i can't wait till the next driving lesson. heeee. :)

dull as dishwater AGAIN, but not as happy as a clam now

2006-05-04T04:53:00.000-07:00

ugh. had that extremely booooooooooooring algebra teacher again in the review. you know, i think the chair in front learned more than we did, since that's what he talked to the entire time of his boring lecture. *snore* he wouldn't even face us! garrr...tapos the way he conducted his lecture, i think akala niya we already knew what he was talking about. he droned on and on about critical points whatsits, while we just stared blankly into space. he was too fast too. *sigh* i wish we could've had our previous teacher, teacher claudine. she was okay. at least naintindihan namin yung tinuturo niya. kasi naman, why do they have to keep switching the techers and shuffling the rooms.

to add to that, while i was trying valiantly to keep my eyes open and look interested in things that i'm really not, nicki, keishia, koko, apa, and the others were in gateway, having a good time, probably watching a movie and car-racing and killing zombies in house of the dead at the arcade. *sob*

i am definitely not feeling as happy as a clam right now.

change. we need change.

2006-05-03T03:26:00.000-07:00

we went to school today to enrol. the lines were absolute murder [it took around fifteen minutes, give or take, just to get an order for the pe uniforms] and don't even get me started on how hot it was. pretty soon tempers [especially mine] were running high and my sister and i started nagging and bickering.

the school seriously needs to get rid of that lady guard. i think you know who i'm referring to. extremely poor public relations, loathsome attitude and disposition, tomboy-ish manners, uh, need i go on? ugh, make me barf. anyway, my mom got really really infuriated with her when she wouldn't let my mom back in. she had to go down from the accounting to tell my dad that he should just go on ahead because the lines were really long and he still had an appointment somewhere. she left me to wait in line until she got back. so i was upstairs waiting when i heard the guard calling my name. i approached him, and he told me that i needed to go downstairs. when i got there, my mom was arguing with the guard, demanding that she be let back in because she needed to pay the tuition. that effing guard said that the accounting office was closed so they weren't letting anyone else in. WHAT A GARGANTUAN LOAD OF TOSH. my mom fired back that she just asked the accounting office if they were already closing but they said that they were just going to accommodate the entire line. [ha! take that] pambihira, pagkatapos pa rin niya sabihin yun, ayaw pa rin niya papasukin yung nanay ko. jeez. i was really close to swearing out loud. really close. finally, she reluctantly relented.

could you imagine the nerve of that woman? she really needs to be let go. a lot of parents and students alike have complained about her attitude. *fumes* she makes me so mad. garrrr...i hope that she's gone by the end of the school year. i don't want her to ruin my last year and i don't want her picture in my year book. i might just puke when i see her there. *insert retching noise right here*

aside from the lady guard, the school might also want to let go of the current concessionaire, since i don't think i'm alone in saying that the food they serve is really really bad. to add to that, not many are happy with the extremely exorbitant amounts they make us pay. masyadong malaki ang patong nila sa produkto nila. 50% na ata ng original price ang mark-up nila. [boycott!] i liked the previous concessionaires better. the food was good then. i miss the days of good pansit, chicken pops, corndogs, and dunkin' donuts munchkins.

enough of the rants. gtg. i have a splitting headache. *moan*

don't EVER talk to strangers

2006-04-27T03:09:00.000-07:00

i had my review again today. it wasn't so bad. i sucked big time at mathematical series, progressions, sequences and stat. i'm sorry to say i've forgotten almost everything mrs dino taught me in second year, except the definitions of mean, median, mode. why is it that i seem to forget [or purposely forget] all the good things i'm supposed to know?

oh yes, i am such a good example to my younger sisters in the lower levels [remember? grade six, ms carandang]. yipee...

bio was okay. didn't know much of the terms, so i got a low score. [ha, why do i even bother fabricating such a pathetic excuse and not just come clean and say i forgot?]

dismissal time. i was waiting for my dad in the stone bench outside the entrance when a girl suddenly sat beside me and started talking to me. at first i was kinda taken aback [more like flabbergasted], i mean, since the cliche "don't talk to strangers" is highly applicable these days. i talked back, since she seemed quite nice. she asked about me, my school, what section i was in inside, you know, bio-data questions. she kept addressing me "po". jeez, do i look that old and wrinkly? she also called me a rich kid upon hearing that i went to shs, which i am not, just to set the record straight. i hate being called a rich kid. makes me sound spoiled rotten by my parents.

anyhow, i soon found out the reason for her apparent friendliness. after the hi-i'm-alex-who-are-you part, she asked me if i believed in the apparition of the virgin mary in fatima, portugal. i said, yes, of course. next thing i knew, she handed me two sheets of photocopied paper. i skimmed it, and i saw it was about the prophecy of fatima. she told me that the reason why she was giving it to me was because she encountered some "bad luck" when she first ignored the message. apparently, her grades "slided" when she didn't pass on the chain letter. chain letter. CHAIN LETTER. would you believe that? you know how i feel about those effing chain letters. i wish they'd burn in the fiery pits of hell, that's how i damn well feel.

*following dialogue is a rerun of our conversation.

me: ohh. prophecy of fatima. alam ko na 'to. matagal na 'to, actually.
mary vynne [the girl's name]: ahh...
me: so, ibig sabihin ba nito, pinapasa mo yung malas sa 'kin?
mary: depende sa 'yo kung gusto mo paniwalaan yan o hindi. [a narration of her "experience" follows]. basta kelangan mo ipasa sa 24 na tao.
me: ahh..so bale nakuha mo yan sa email tapos si-nerox mo 24 times?
mary: oo. kelanga kasi. [again, chain letters are not effing real, okay?]
me: no thanks. [giving back the photocopied letters]

i'm neutral about this whole prophecy of fatima. i know it exists, since people broke down in tears and got all hysterical last year when they read it. i've seen proof of it in dan brown's books. i don't know if i should believe it or not. i believe in God, that's all, plain and simple.

i don't know why i didn't ignore her and just find another place to wait. maybe good manners just dictated me to keep talking to her, since it was a potentially safe area, and people were around. cripes. the whole time we were having that weird conversation, i kept thinking so that's your game? just sidling up to people, then befriending them just so you could pass it on? man, that gives a whole new meaning to making friends.

paranoia struck again kanina. i wondered if she really was a student there, or if she was a holy person, maybe an angel or even mama mary [really paranoid] testing people if they actually believed in the prophecy of fatima. *shudders* needless to say, she scared the bejeezus out of me. she seemed nice enough, but still...*shudders*

*sigh* why can't i ever follow good advice?

insanely weird trips in the land of dreams

2006-04-21T21:08:00.000-07:00

on a scale of one to ten, how would you rate your dreams? in terms of weirdness, i mean. ha, if you'd ask me that question, i'd say eleven, or twelve, on the days my subconscious is really on wack. honestly, i don't know where all of it comes from.

want to hear one of my weirdest dreams yet? brace yourself; it's insanely weird. long too, so you might want to grab a pillow just in case you pass out in the middle of my narration.

Act 1 [haha...may pa act 1 act 1 pa ako no? nagfifeeling shakespeare]

Scene 1: my dream starts out in this medieval castle. there were a lot of people, pages and noble people, and princesses, who looked quite harassed and distraught. turns out the reason why was because all of the princesses, except one, were being sent away.

Scene 2: the dream shifts to one of the rooms in the castle. characters: the king, the princess who was left behind, and one of the lady's maids. there wasn't much dialogue. the king was just looking out the window and sighing and the princess and her maid were talking. oddly enough, the maid called the princess donya consolacion. after that, some scenes followed, but they just flashed by like a blur. next thing i know, the princess morphed to a prince, and she, i meant he, was romancing the maid. [aha...the plot thickens...:)]

Scene 3: the dream shifted again, but this time, it was a different setting. i was in the powerstation arcade in eastwood, but it looked really old and the games looked a bit outdated [i mean, there wasn't even that race car thing i adore so much or house of the dead 2/3]. instead of the power card, we were lugging around tokens.

Scene 4: it shifted back to the castle, but it was a cartoon view this time [in scenes 1 and 2, the characters and places were actual people and places]. anyway, the other princesses were back and a party was going on in one of the castle's ballrooms.

Scene 5: back to real-people-and-places view. the princess-turned-prince was carrying the maid in his arms and was taking her to this secluded cottage in the woods. it's not what you think, okay? :) then there was this flash of light and the prince tripped and fell. then he crawled to the cottage's steps and took out his silver knife. in the sand in front of the cottage, he wrote the words do not kill?? in bold red letters that looked like blood [don't know where the blood came from]. another blur of colors flashed by, and next thing i know, the prince was on top of the maid and they were surrounded by pools and pools of blood. grisly, i know.

Scene 6: the prince staggered to the garden and collapsed near one of the fountains. a floating white mist appeared. the prince saw it and sucked in his breath. as he did, a thread of white light from the mist followed the air and soon he was sucking the white light to his mouth. the princesses soon appeared after that on the balcony and they started sucking the white light themselves. a queen from another country and her son the prince appeared and watched the odd event like it was a spectacle of sorts. there was another flash of white light and the prince and princesses disappeared. instead, only one princess lay on the place where the prince used to lie. she was a fusion of the princesses and the prince, dressed in a resplendent dress of blue and silver. her hair was styled like marie antoinette, only her ringlets were orange and silver, alternating ringlets. the queen on the balcony gasped when she saw the princess, declaring that she was fit to marry her son, the prince.

Scene 7: scene shifted to a sort of videogame kind of view, with the distorted and grainy graphics. the prince and princess were in their courtyard and there was a picket fence in the middle of it. in the center of it were four babies [two sets of twins, two girls and two boys]. they were cooing at them and stuff, and decided to name them. they named one of the girls sofia mariella [?????] and one of the boys james [?????]. i think the other two remained unnamed. i really don't know why.

Act 2

Scene 1: at first we were in school, preparing for the band aid. then, it shifted and we were at the mall. hale was there, and people were acting really wild and rambunctious. they were all moving to the beat of bebot by black eyed peas all at the same time and they were drawing speech bubbles in the air all at the same time.

fine.

so, that ends my insanely weird dream. are you still awake, alive and breathing, reader? did my dream bore you to death? or made you laugh hysterically? actually, it's not the first time weird dreams keep popping out, nor do i doubt that it would be the last.

P.S. oh and yeah, ace was eliminated in american idol the night before, but i think you know that already. the last song he sang was that's all by michael buble. *sniffle* made me remember charley and krista and char-char. i miss them terribly.

poor taylor had to decide between the two groups [elliott, kellie and katharine in one, and paris, chris, and ace in another] who he thought was safe that night. thank God katharine's safe. haha..i want her to win, since she's good and really pretty too. :)

ang saya. napakasaya.

2006-04-19T02:32:00.001-07:00

went to get my card today. on the way, traffic was absolute murder, so we rerouted and detoured and took several short cuts. would've taken ten to fifteen minutes from house to school, instead nasayang ang gas at tinagal pa kami. kasi naman, may misa pa yang si erap. hindi ko talaga maintindihan ang takbo ng isip ng ibang tao. ginulo na nga niya tayo at lahat, may nagpamisa pa sa kanya. pambihira, traffic tuloy. eleven na kami nakarating sa school. ang saya. napakasaya.

let out a sigh of relief when i saw my grades. thank you God so so much. yipee...i saw my term paper and learned my score in the english exam. so much to be happy about. :) got the application form for up as well. i don't know how i'm going to get it filled out on time, since i don't even have a course in mind yet. oh well, have to do it, sooner or later. :)

dull as dishwater, but happy as a clam

2006-04-17T06:10:00.000-07:00

it's official. the summer heat has completely gone to my brain, hence the weird titles.

started my review classes today. tracy was my classmate. heee. :) we had math and language proficiency today.

algebra was incredibly boring. boring, boring, boring. oh, i forgot. one more thing. boring, and dull as dishwater. kung wala sigurong aircon, i might have succumbed to the endless drone of his voice and sunk into a boredom-induced stupor. yes, fortunately, it was a male teacher. i sound horribly sexist, don't i? needless to say, almost everything he said did not register in my poor sleep-deprived and fun-needing brain. i was just jotting down whatever he was writing on the board, zombie-like, in my notebook, promising myself i'd take some time to review it again later. i don't really enjoy math, except if miss lagud's teaching. she makes it seem less complicated, dissecting every problem and repeating it until we get it. wahooo...kudos for miss lagud!

language/english was really fun [when was it ever not? :)]. i loved our teacher to bits. she was like a combination of mrs benitez and ms canivel. ang fun and funny niya, and she made the topic really interesting. we were laughing most of the time, and she kept sharing tips on how to get to up. even if we were kidding around, she was still able to explain the topics really well. i had tons of fun. :)

next thursday again, but no more english. *sniffle*

bee season

2006-04-15T05:32:00.000-07:00

i watched bee season [a movie based on myla goldberg's book] last night. it's kind of confusing, so stay with me as i try to explain the movie. at first i thought it was a movie about an attack on people by a swarm of deranged honeybees. weird, i know, but it can happen. turns out i was...not right.

okay..the movie opens showing eliza naumann's surprising ability to spell any word given to her, no matter how complex. as she proceeds to the national spelling bee, her father [richard gere] gets obsessed with helping her win, and is confident that her spelling abilities have become a sort of spiritual channel in communicating with God, a teaching known as Kabbalah.

meanwhile, unbeknownst to them, their family is growing more and more dysfunctional, as each has his own secret to guard. miriam [juliette binoche], haunted by frequent lapses into the past, has grown fond of breaking into people's houses and collecting, magpie-like, trinkets that she is convinced will help her "hold the light of God", a religious concept she picked up from her husband, or tikkun olam, which means collecting shards to reunite and repair the world. aaron, their son, on the other hand, has grown confused of his father's ideas about God and tries to find a way to connect with Him. he meets a mysterious woman in a park, chali [kate bosworth], who introduces him to Hare Krishna, a Hindu religious sect devoted to worshipping the Hindu god Krishna.

so basically, that was the plot of the movie. i know my blog's turning into this one big home reading report that doesn't seem to end, and i apologize for that. haha...with nothing to do, all i can seem to do is watch and critique movies. i just hope i don't run out of good movies to watch.

okay, so back to the movie. i was confused most of the time the movie was playing until the end, when everything from miriam's odd behavior [it was a mental problem] to why saul naumann grew obsessed over helping his daughter was explained. i looked up bee season's reviews on the internet [halatang wala na talagang magawa] and they didn't really receive much praise for it. i think that the movie was divided into too many parts, like eliza and her father's story, then miriam's, then aaron's, that it would become all jumbled up and the viewer would only grow even more confused when in fact, they were already confused by the information overload from the previous scenes.

try seeing it yourself. :)

see the world through a kaleidoscope of colors...

sweet, sweet sixteen

2006-04-13T02:26:00.000-07:00

whee...happy sweet sixteen to me! and to tracy too, my "twin" sister!

i really don't feel like i'm sixteen today. still feels like i'm fifteen...oh well, i guess it does take some time for these kind of things to sink in.

every year, as far back as i can remember, i have always woken up to the smell of sesame oil and misua noodles on my birthday. it's a chinese tradition that my mom insists on keeping, because noodles are supposed to symbolize long life, according to the chinese. truth is i'm not really crazy about it, even if it is quite good.

nice day to celebrate my birthday, huh? maundy thursday...don't know if i should be sad or happy. in fact, on my actual birthday, there was even more reason to be, because i was born on a good friday, exactly one minute after jesus died. i came during a time all catholics were mourning, new life amidst, well, not new life. my uncle once said they were hoping that i was going to be born on april 15, easter sunday, para masaya raw, hindi malungkot.

we didn't really celebrate much today, since all establishments were practically closed due to their observance of the lenten season and most of my family members were out of town. thank God tempura [one of my favorite restaurants] was open, so we had lunch there. i love the food there. my parents let me order anything i liked. yipee...one of the perks of being the birthday celebrant is they give you anything you want, since it is your birthday and it only comes once a year. well, almost everything.

then, to wrap up everything, we went to church to hear mass. after that, had the stations of the cross then went home. pretty simple, i know, but could i really ask for anything more? :)

where's the justice in that, eh?

2006-04-11T22:46:00.000-07:00

the day started out as usual. woke up at 8:30, ate a mcdo longganisa breakfast while watching jack on star movies then proceeded to spend some thirty minutes in front of the computer, doing nothing but checking out people's blogs and looking up the harry potter and the goblet of fire script on the net. after waiting some ten minutes for the home page to upload, my patience wore out and i decided to abandon my attempt and watch some good old television instead.

there was nothing good on either disney channel, cinemax, hallmark, hbo or star movies, three channels which i usually just choose between to watch. so i channel-surfed some more and found a movie that piqued my interest in cinema one. it was ipaglaban ako, the movie 2, starring carmina villaroel and some other minor filipino actors. it was about this nanny [carmina] who was wrongly accused of kidnapping her five something charge, a seemingly autistic child. the truth was the child ran off on her own accord. meanwhile, belen [the nanny] was taken into custody by the police, who, instead of informing her of her rights [makes you think of the shows wherein policemen would handcuff people and say 'you have a right to remain silent..anything you say or do will be used against you in a court of law...you have a right to an attorney...blah..] physically, verbally, emotionally and sexually abused the poor woman to make her 'sing'.

need i say i was aghast the entire time i was watching the film? made me think that there must be a lot of people in jail who really are innocent and had to go through hell just because they were used by some people to save their behinds. justice is indeed blind...it only sees those who can give it money and turns a blind eye upon those who are poor. cripes, if that's so-called justice, then we might as well forsake all ethics and decorum.

this sort of thing could be happening everyday. we just don't know it. people like her go through hell just for the truth to be told and for the wrong to be righted. bravery isn't dead after all..

a not-so-vacation vacation

2006-04-10T00:58:00.000-07:00

*pardon the title. i couldn't think of anything else.

we just got back from our annual pe family outing and i'm dead tired. got carsick on the way back, even if i did sleep most of the time. don't worry, we got home before the scene got ugly.

while the outing was bitin, i at least got to spend time with my family instead of the tv, computer, or my books. so we checked in to taal vista hotel to spend the night.

we didn't really do much, just swimming and checking out the local restos, so no beach or sand, just the chlorinated blue swimming pool in the pool deck. while we were there swimming, something weird and really unexpected happened. so there we were, swimming away and splashing about when this little girl [who by the way kept shrieking daddy! daddy! daddeeee.... cripes, you could've screamed at the monotony of it] went up the pool's stairs without the lower part of her swimsuit [it was a two-piece]. we thought, you know, it just got swept away by the water [like in the movies...home alone 2], but no...she had another agenda in mind. she squatted at the edge of the pool, and well, i'll spare you the details. i'll just tell you that we ditched the kiddie pool asap.

so basically, yeah, that was it. swimming all afternoon then we headed to gourmet's for dinner. food wasn't really good, i had to practically force down my supposedly creamy carbonara because i didn't like it that much.

today was just as uneventful, just breakfast down in the lobby [yummy...pancakes, croissants w/butter and jam, fresh fruits...and lots more] then running around in the grassy slopes outside with my cousins and sister. took pictures of taal lake, then a little vanity moment for ourselves. after that, we went back to our rooms, cleaned up, goof called our uncle just for fun, raided the bathrooms for freebies, then checked out.

na-bitin talaga ako sa outing namin. one day lang, tapos wala pa kami masyadong nagawa. *sigh* we don't really go home to the province and if we do, it's only around once every four years or so. we also don't have the ancestral homes that most of you have [you know, the ones with windows na capiz, i think and the wood's kind of embedded on it], since, well, my ancestors aren't really from around here. i wish we had one though, somewhere near the beach, 'cause that sure beats the chlorinated swimming pool by a long shot. anyhow, i could always visit palawan, boracay or even maldives in my dreams, right?

ha. wishful thinking.

some pictures might follow.

gateway!

2006-04-07T05:55:00.000-07:00

today was a really fun day because finally, i got to do something else for a change instead of bumming out and just watching tv and spending "quality time" with the computer. went to gateway and spent a wonderfully fun-filled day with nicki, keishia, koko, jescia, apa, ces, and jill.

we had a blast at timezone, where the time spent there simply exuded media violence. we took out zombies and dead people come to life in the house of the dead 2 and martial arts people in another martial-arts related game [don't know what it's called] with guns. duh. anyway, even if it went everything ms galicha taught us in media awareness, it was something i tried for once and sickeningly so, i kinda enjoyed seeing all those things taken out and beaten. we also car-raced, something i'm mediocre at but something i thoroughly enjoy. i'm just wondering if you really have to keep turning the steering wheel right and left to stay in one direction. well, just musings of a confused mind. oh and yeah, ms galicha would've positively glowed with pride if she had seen the ride nicki was on. completely non-violent and relatively, i mean, completely safe. how much harm can you possibly get from a yellow-pink-and-blue contraption that gently swayed from side to side in tune to a nursery rhyme?

*warning: next part may contain spoilers [if you ever intend to watch the movie,
that is.]

well, the icing on the cake, the cherry on top of our fun outing was when we watched moments of love. now don't think any of us swooned and were na-kilig when we watched it. in fact, we weren't even supposed to watch it. we were supposed to see either ice age 2 or she's the man, but jill "suggested" that we watch the movie, so we did. we wanted something new for a change, so a pinoy movie it was. truth is, i'm really not much of a fan of pinoy movies [i sound really unpatriotic, i know] and i almost don't watch them. i've watched around three movies in the past three years. truth is, there's only a select few pinoy movies that are, well, worthwile entertainment. there are times that it contains too much drama and crying, kaya nakakaumay panoorin.

moments of love was pinoy cheesiness at its finest. the movie contained really mild [and quite shallow] humor and it was utterly predictable the whole time. we were able to guess most of the situations and turn-outs [is there such a word?] in the story. to me, the plot was unoriginal, seemingly taken from good foreign films, with only slight modifications. the movie was like a remake of somewhere in time [jane seymour and christopher reeve were the actors] and the love letter [campbell scott and jennifer jason leigh], especially the love letter, where the two people [one present, one civil-war time] communicated with each other through an antique desk, not a phone, like in moments of love. despite that, it was fun watching the movie because we got to criticize it. well, more like panning it. we were giggling when no one else was, and positively guffawing at the last part, because we thought it sounded funny when the old lady professed her love to her late fifties sweetheart, who was, i think twenty-four years old.

we went to fully booked after to browse at some books. didn't see anything i liked, and besides, i didn't have enough money left [most went to the arcade] so i didn't buy anything. i had to leave after some time, so i said good-bye to nicki, ces, koko and jescia. we planned to meet again in may and watch a movie marathon.

seeing them today made me miss them more. hope we have more of these outings.

summery summer

2006-04-04T07:17:00.000-07:00

it's the fourth day of summer vacation and while i think it's a bit tame after third year [nakakapanibago e...i mean, wala akong ginawang kahit ano right now], i'm really enjoying the heaps and heaps of R & R i'm getting.

currently spending a lot of time with my sis and my younger cousins. there are just the four of us girls, and two other boy cousins in our mother's side so we're pretty close. we've [the four of us] named ourselves in the wackiest, craziest and weirdest ways, like four knights from the round table [as usual, being the eldest, i get to be king arthur], the four founders of hogwarts in harry potter and the four witches in charmed. don't ask, i know it's weird.

my days have so far fallen on the same routine. wake up. eat. computer. tv. eat again. computer. tv. sleep. wake up. eat. sleep again. haha...i think i'm going to get fat from all of this.

i miss my friends. it's been just four days, i know, but i've grown accustomed to them being there with me everyday, and now, well, they're not. i even miss school, and my teachers. i know i've been grumbling about too much work and late nights, but now, i kinda miss it.

anyway, i won't be bored for too long. i'll be starting my review classes and my mom said i could study piano and violin again, in up this time. can't wait! she also said i could study swimming as well. we might even go on vacations in between. yay. :)

a day of lasts

2006-03-31T18:53:00.000-08:00

*pls be warned. this entry may be a rerun of my 'saying good-bye' entry.

the truth is sinking in [haha..ngayon lang]: tapos na ang third year!!!! i made it! i should give myself a medal of bravery or something. haha.

yeahhhh...and nooooo at the same time. yeah because finally, we can get all the rest we can need. we can sleep the days away and just do nothing but eat, have fun, watch tv, and just be normal kids again. we didn't get much of chance to do that. we can finally stop worrying about the next project to be passed, or the next quiz to be studied.

nooo because i'll be missing a lot of people, especially my classmates who became my close friends as well. this was the year i really enjoyed getting to know apa, ces, jill, tete, paula, charley, anna ig, krista and charisse and become closer with nicki, keishia and mia. i'll really be missing them next year, when we'll get scattered all over the fourth year sections.

i got all sentimental today. when i was writing my name on my trigo paper, i thought, awww...last time and last day ko na 'tong isusulat yung Alexandra P. Lee, III Katarungan, CN 23 sa kahit ano [i was also singing don't cry for me argentina in my head while answering the questions because i watched connie and carla a few days ago. really bad case of LSS, i know]. i also thought that today would be the last time i might go up the stairs that koko, jescia and i use everyday. you know, the ones by the first year sections. today was also the last day i stepped into our classroom, which has been my home for the past nine months. waaahhh...and today was also the last time i yelled, classmates, paki-pass naman na yung comm ex envelopes nyo! last time na 'to! last time i'll collect anything for ms platon. i might be the english secretary again next year, but it would be for another teacher, not ms platon anymore. i'll really miss her next year. i've had the most fun in english classes [hu-muhlet discussions]. she's one of the best english teachers i've ever had. even if sometimes she makes us pass a comm ex the following day, we just can't seem to find a reason to get mad at her.

speaking of teachers, i'll miss most of them next year, since there's like a 99.99% chance that they won't be my teachers again. i'll miss ms canivel, for the best world history discussions i've ever had, and for making me just adore world history. ms malayas for the really, really, deep and thought-provoking cl lessons [morality!] and the ganda points she so generously gives us to boost our recitation points. ms aniago, for her good-natured kapikunan and the songs she sings us with her amazingly beautiful voice [isunog mo ang aming bangkay...ikalat mo ang aming abo...that was for noli, a song koko simply adores and KEEPS ON SINGING].

i'll miss katarungan, too, no matter how many times we were yelled at, or scolded, or sermoned by our teachers. sure, we weren't exactly a model class [i don't think we've ever won a cleanest classroom award yet], but we've had the most fun as a class. i'll miss that the most. i just wish ms sabordo said something at least; a thank you or a good-bye would have sufficed. made me think she wasn't grateful for us, that for those nine months, we didn't do anything she could be thankful or grateful for. oh well..

fourth year na ako!!! good luck na lang sa akin next year. haha..physics at economics..

do ron day ron day

2006-03-31T18:51:00.000-08:00

to celebrate the end of classes, koko, jescia, tintin and i went to eastwood. we had so much fun in the arcade. we car-raced, played air hockey, played the drums and the dance thing, then sang our hearts out for two hours in the karaoke room. napaos na ko sa kakakanta. nakakabaliw talaga. lalo na nung dinare kami ni koko nina jescia at tintin na kumanta nung "new girl in town" na hindi naman namin alam. since we didn't know the song, we just yelled into the mike, a tip we learned from ces. the lyrics were really weird, like do ron day ron day, oooohhhh...what that meant, we didn't care to find out. whew...and much to our surprise, we got a hundred! haha...

to finish the day [and to rest our really tired feet] we went to starbucks. no, i didn't order mocha frapp, since i already had my dose of caffeine for the week. tin and i shared on a vanilla creme instead. it tasted good, although we shouldn't have added the nutmeg and chocolate because it made it taste all funny, pepperish (according to jescia) and kinda cinammony.

man, i'm really tired...must hit the sack to get some rest...finally.

my greatest blessing....not

2006-03-28T20:20:00.000-08:00

this is not the first time i've had a test or a quiz ruined because of this. i happen to be extremely careless when it comes to exams. sometimes, i miss a step in solving a problem or i forget to add a number to the formula, like what happened earlier. formula for the area of a triangle is 1/2 Bh. i forgot the 1/2.

i know i'm stressing too much on things that don't need to be stressed on, but it's just so frustrating na alam mo yung isang bagay pero dahil sa carelessness mo, nakaligtaan mo. crippppppeeeeeeesssssss.

chem results were also out today. looooowwwww. i hated my score. again, result of carelessness. why, oh why, do i never learn my lesson? you'd think that after carelessness has affected several of my exams, i'd learn by now, but nooo...don't know how that's going to affect my grade. i don't know what happened to me in chem this fourth quarter. it's like i just lost "it" in chem. i used to do okay, but now i don't know...nakagulo na ang lahat.

five more tests to go...and then it's sheer, beautiful, deserved freedom.

ang mga pesteng kadenang sulat

2006-03-24T03:45:00.001-08:00

getting chain letters really ticks me off, especially if i'm working [scratch that. i meant CRAMMING] on projects. i mean, it just pops out of nowhere, disturbs you, then threatens you.

which idiot started sending out chain letters anyway? he probably had nothing better to do with his time, so he resorted to scaring poor, innocent people out of their wits instead. the nerve of people. are they that desperate for attention?

i especially hate chain letters that say "send this within thirty seconds or you will have the worst life ever" or "send this in seven days or your mother will get hurt". what, is this some kind of ransom demand? for the love of God, can chain letters get any lamer than that? and speaking of God, it's really cruel that people send out chain letters saying "if you love God you will send this...". that is really toeing the line there. i mean, dragging the name of the Lord and then using it to make you guilty so you'd send the message? how sick can they get?

sending that message does not mean that it will make God love you more. not sending it does not also mean that God will condemn you to burn in the fiery pits of hell. chain letters are not a test of faith. don't believe it, because if you do, you're just allowing yourself to get manipulated.

i think the reason why chain letters keep coming in is because people keep sending them. please, they are not REAL, okay? whatever you've heard about people getting into accidents or dying because they broke the chain of letters, then please know that those incidents are just COINCIDENCES. put a stop to chain letters because they are ANNOYING and extremely STUPID.

saying good-bye

2006-03-24T02:57:00.001-08:00

can't believe this week is finally over. coffee-filled nights in front of the glaring screen of the computer are OVER. yeeessss. thank you God for helping me survive this week.

today was so sad. we had to say good-bye to ms canivel and ms malayas because we wouldn't be seeing them on monday anymore. *sob* ms canivel is probably the best ap teacher i've ever had. her liveliness and enthusiasm makes us really want to study history. when she conducts discussions, it's like those historical events are actually happening inside the classroom.

in fact, it's not just ms canivel and ms malayas i'll be missing. i'll miss most [emphasis on the most] of my third year teachers. it's sad to think that they won't be teaching me anymore. i kinda want to stay in third year, because this year has been really good for me. this is the year that i made friends with a lot of people i didn't really know then, and the year i gained the two best seatmates in the world, anna ig and charley.

truth is i didn't really want to step into third year. i mean, who wouldn't be scared of all those threats of geom, trigo and chem? i also wasn't looking forward to being a member of katarungan. i didn't think i could replace gabay and ms casimiro that quickly. first few days of school, i wanted to transfer to kamalayan because people kept saying what a great adviser ms platon was and i also didn't like my classmates.

i gradually learned to like being in katarungan. oh sure, we weren't really a model class, but the important thing is that we had become sort of like a family over the last months, and it's hard to say good-bye to that family that i had grown in.

so ends another year.

forty winks under the stars

2006-03-19T05:31:00.000-08:00

we had the stargazing last friday and saturday. it was fun, but it really wore me out. well, seeing as i only slept for a few hours the previous night because of too many, ehem, assignments..

it was great. i got to see saturn! i saw its rings and i think, one of its moons. i also got to see the southern cross and the moon through the telescope. we also saw many constellations, like taurus, orion, ursa major, and even Polaris, the north star.

oh, and did you know that geometry followed us to the star gazing? the speaker, who's this oh-so-fabulous astronomer who practically knows every star and every constellation, pointed out three stars that if you measured their distances using your fingers, you would be able to form an equilateral triangle.

after dinner we had a really long lecture, which i'm sorry to say, i kinda slept through. it sucked that the first years who were sitting beside me could not keep their mouth shut. they kept going on and on and on about who knows what, even if koko shushed them for like ten times already. i mean, it's great if they were discussing the things the speaker was talking about, but no. needless to say, that ticked me off.

after we had a look at all the planets that were in the night sky, i went into the tent and planned to "rest my eyes" because they were itching from tiredness. my nap turned out to be a four-hour sleep, wherein i slept like a log and did not have any inkling at all as to what was happening anymore. i slept through the sunrise, wherein we were supposed to have a look at venus, and any shooting stars other fellow campers might have spotted.

i was the last, i think, to awake the following day. it was ms ngo and mrs torralba who woke me up. didn't take long to rouse me from my beauty sleep. so when i was finally awake, koko, jescia and i proceeded to pack up our tent, which by the way, we worked really hard in setting up the previous day, with the help of a few friends. we proclaimed it a miracle that the tent did not collapse and bury us under its sheets. anyway, it was really hard packing up the tent because it had become really dirty with grass and dew. we wondered how the tent could have fit in the teeny tiny box with the heavy metal poles and pegs before, but now couldn't. so we worked out that dilemma partially and proceeded home.

it was a great experience to just lie underneath the stars and appreciate them. there just aren't too many opportunities that allow us to bask in the beauty of the softly glowing stars in the inky black sky.

just like heaven

2006-03-17T22:02:00.000-08:00

watched just like heaven. call me a sucker for romantic movies, but i really liked it. the storyline was creative and good. so kilig-inducing. haha.

the movie was not really the basic love story, which was what made the story quite unique. it's about this workaholic doctor who meets an accident and ends up in a coma. while she's hovering between life and death, she enlists the help of a dejected landscape artist to aid her in rediscovering her life. they end up falling in love with each other along the way, and both discover that their love for each other was what saved them both. the rest, as they say, is history.

i watched it twice, actually. watched it again after i watched it for the first time. it was really good. it practically reduced me to tears at the end of the movie. another embarrassing yet true fact: i get sentimental a LOT. hahaha. the truth is now out.

gtg. have to do research paper.

life's immeasurable injustices

2006-03-14T01:31:00.000-08:00

life just has to have so many of these. each time i feel rage surging through my veins, i have to keep reminding myself that they happen for a reason. to balance all the good in the world, because without good, you can't have bad things, right?

it's just so unfair why people have to give up time or effort for somebody else who clearly enjoys taking advantage of that situation. like cleaning for example. i hate, no make that DETEST, cleaning our classroom. know why? first, you make, i don't know, about twenty trips to the far-off trash can just to throw away dirt that isn't even yours. why, oh why, can my classmates not even be considerate or sensitive, considering that they themselves clean one week once every seven weeks and have loathed doing the task because of the mounds and mounds of trash katarungan manages to produce by the end of every day? second, some people take advantage of other people's kindness or generosity by skipping out of cleaning. ehem. if you don't like cleaning, well, i have some news for you. we don't either.

i don't hate cleaning in general. actually, i would gladly wash plates or sweep the floor or dust furniture as long as i'm not forced to do it. just do NOT give me the task of cleaning a classroom which looks like Hurricane Katrina hit it at the end of every single day. kung anu-ano pa ang nakakalat. sangkaterbang papel ang nakakalat sa sahig, sangkatutak na Stay Fresh wrappers ang mawawalis mo na resulta ng pagbabatuhan ng mga tao ng dulce na iyon tuwing media awareness, at kung anu-ano pa. pambihira oo. wala na talagang respeto.

sabi ko na nung pasko na dapat talaga ang mga binigay ko sa mga kaklase ko e either lapis, ballpen, 1/4 sheet of paper, crosswise, lengthwise, one whole sheet, gunting, STAPLER, ruler o kaya glue stick. matatapos na ang taon, wala pa rin sila nito. hindi makakalipas ang araw na hindi sila hihingi, hihiram o hihingi at hindi na ibabalik ang mga nasabing kagamitan. at ako naman itong uto-uto, masyadong mapagbigay, kaya tuloy e naubusan na ako ng supply ng staple wire dahil sa pag-hingi nila ng pang-stapler ng formal theme, com ex, home reading report, sulating pormal, o kaya ang mga hw namin sa ap. ay nako. pero alam mo, ngayong sinasabi kong wala akong stapler o kaya ruler (kahit meron naman), paunti-unti na ang humihiram. phew.

okay. back to english. sorry, i usually switch to either tagalog or english when i get carried away. i'm just so sick and tired of injustices. even if you try and try to do something about them, usually it's out of your hands. it's just so maddening at times to be treated like that, and without even an "i'm sorry", or "thank you" at the end. cripes.

a cycle endless

2006-03-10T21:45:00.000-08:00

She ambled listlessly from the article she was trying to finish to the book she was attempting valiantly to understand. She glanced at the clock that glowed green in the corner and sighed. The luminous hands of the clock read half past one. It was another sleepless night. She reached for the steaming mug of coffee beside her laptop, her third one that night.

She leaned back in her chair and rubbed her eyes, which were itching from the five-hour exposure it received from the computer screen. She closed her eyes, thought for a moment and leaned forward to type another meaningless sentence to her article. It was the last one she had to do for the paper, but she still had the book to look forward to.

It was another thirty minutes before she was able to print out the article and store it safely in her folder. She turned to the book that lay innocently on the table and picked it up. She turned to the page she marked and continued reading where she left off. It wasn’t long before the book slid from her limp hands and she fell asleep at the table.

The next thing she knew, sunlight was streaming through the blinds and she was being shaken awake. In school, she slept through the discussions and languidly answered questions. Finally, the torturous eight hours were over, but still, she ended up with the same amount of work she had the previous day.

When she arrived, she made herself another cup of coffee and went upstairs to start working again. Dinner summons were ignored and good-nights were never said, as she never did go to sleep. That night, as she drank from her fourth cup, she numbly pressed the keys to type in another sentence to yet another article.

She closed her eyes that night, thinking that it was a cycle endless and impossible to avoid.

brink of insanity

2006-03-08T02:50:00.000-08:00

all third year students are currently on the brink of insanity. we have a ton of work to do and there's only around 12 days left to accomplish all that. phew. how are we going to manage all that?

currently at a loss as to what i can still add to my media log. only 4 entries left then sayonara, media log. i don't ever have to do it again. [yes!]

had another music class earlier. received another sermon for the, what is it now, 16th week in a row? apparently, it's proving to be very difficult for him to teach us, the POSTE people of III Katarungan. what a change from being called the beautiful ladies of III Katarungan by mrs dino.
i mean, come on, enough of all that. yes, the topic itself is fine. we don't mind learning about renaissance and baroque music. the problem is his execution. if he could just present it in a way that we would be encouraged or motivated to learn, there might be a possibility that us POSTE people would have mustered enough strength to listen.

i hate it when teachers berate students for being lazy or disinterested in lessons, kaya raw nagkakaganyan daw ang grades namin. please, cut us some slack. we read 2 chapters of noli per night, memorize formulas for the areas and volumes of spheres and cylinders for geom, values of quadrantal and special angles for trigo, read scenes from Hamlet for english, then memorize historic people and places for ap. minsan ang rason kung bakit kami inaantok sa klase kasi kulang ng tulog.

kahit nga pagpasok nakakatamad na rin. lalo na nung nalaman naming ang ateneo natapos nung march 8. ang unfair din no. kami sagad na sagad talaga hanggang dulo ng marso. maaga pumasok, late matapos. ganyan ang sistema ng paaralan. sabi nga ni koko, mag-enrol na lang nga kami sa ateneo para maaga rin ang pahinga namin. kung pwede nga lang naman no?

2006-03-05T01:13:00.000-08:00

5:23 pm
currently at koko's house.

just finished cooking the churros for tomorrow's practicum. dead tired. imagine standing for three straight hours doing nothing but squeezing batter from a pastry bag (which wasn't even a real pastry bag, more like a plastic bag with a star tip attached to the end) and deep-frying it. koko and i were practically panting because the heat was really unbearable.

koko's two little brothers were really cute. especially nathan, the youngest. ang kulit talaga. nangupit pa ng churros namin. tinakot ni koko, sabi niya bayaran daw niya dapat yun kasi malulugi kami. anti-nepotism pala si koko no.

*sigh* really exhausted. hope our churros and mac and cheese do okay tomorrow.

the things we dream of...

2006-02-26T04:54:00.000-08:00

the question of the century: what am i going to be when i grow up?

i have NO idea. even after the 4 1/2 hours of the career talk i am still not able to decide on a career. nada. nil. zilch. NOTHING. i mean, yeah, i have ideas, but that's just it. they're just IDEAS.

the people who gave the talks said that we should choose a career that would bring out the best in us and in the same time serve people. that we should be passionate about. hmm.

i'm worried about college. i really really (times a thousand) need to get into UP. it offers really good education and it's not that expensive. i love my parents. that's why i don't want them worrying about money for my college tuition.

i'm seriously thinking about medicine, with chemistry or med tech as my pre med course. as far back as i can remember (think kindergarten or prep age), i've always wanted to be a doctor. when i was still small, i remember that my cousin isa, my sister trina and i would always play doctor, with my sister as the nurse, my cousin as the patient and yours truly as the doctor. well, most of the time i think i was my cousin's obstetrician because she played the pregnant patient. i would "deliver" her "baby", which was either a teddy bear, her stuffed dog or Elmo, whichever toy would be on hand.
you know those doctor's records where everything about the patient is recorded? i used to make records like those when i was younger too. i would think up a fictitious person, write down an illness and prescribe medicine. the illnesses i recorded were limited to "fever", "colds" and "cough" and the medicine limited to "tempra forte", "dimetapp", "solmux" or "bed rest". then, i would cut a bond paper into halves and make up a letterhead for myself. then i would sign my name at the bottom, with an M.D. at the end.
if i would EVER become a doctor, i'd like to be a pediatrician because i like kids. i just hope i get over my fear of blood and cadavers in time for college. :)

i considered chemical engineering a lot over these past few months. thing is, i'm not really sure i want to be an engineer. there's trigo and geom i think, plus chem. i'm not sure my brain would still be in one piece when i graduate.

journalism. i've always loved writing, no matter how mediocre my essays or stories are. even if i have never finished writing a story, writing the story itself was always fun. but then again, journalism isn't all writing. there's also broadcasting, which i'm not that keen on taking up.

business. starting my own restaurant. jescia told me, if wala na talaga akong maisip, magbukas na lang daw ako ng restaurant. magaling naman daw ako magluto e. well, i hope tumagal yung restaurant na yun.

a psychologist. might not be a good idea. sometimes, i think i'm the one who needs a psych. my patients might end up being more troubled than they were before they consulted me.

architect slash interior designer. building and designing houses is fun. i love doing it in the Sims. i don't think i would be too bad at it, but i don't think i would be really in it. you have to have really good taste in furniture, paint colors, an overall theme for the house, etc.

flight attendant. glamorous, you get to go places, yet, also not a good idea. they need twenty-twenty vision, which i don't have. *sigh.* that's just too bad.

ayy..so many wasted dreams...

madness. sheer madness.

2006-02-24T20:37:00.000-08:00

have people gone mad? is a celebration of a time in our country's history reason to forsake all sanity? seriously. if that's the case, then there probably shouldn't be any more holidays like this. is rallying for a never-going-to-happen cause even a right way to celebrate? all of this is doing nothing to improve our country's situation. first there was the WOWOWEE stampede, only proving more to the world how incredibly destitute we are that people would resort to that kind of means to acquire money. then, there was the st. bernard, leyte tragedy. heck, kahit ilang beses siguro magkaroon ng landslide o kahit anong trahedya, hindi pa rin makukuha ng mga tao ng ang mga insidenteng iyon ay babala na na masyadong nating pinagsasamantalahan ang mga biyaya ng Diyos.
nakakalungkot na talaga ito. iisa na nga lang ang bansa natin, hindi pa natin alagaan. sayang lang. walang magagawa ang milyong-milyong reklamo sa gobyerno kung ang tao mismo hindi rin gagawa ng paraan. ang bansa kasi hindi puro gobyerno lang ang bumubuo.
hindi naman sa sinasabi kong kasalanan lang lahat ito ng tao, pero hindi ko rin masasabing wala silang kontribusyon sa nangyari. pero paano uusad ang pilipinas kung tayo mismo hindi tumutulong sa sarili natin?

life's simple pleasures

2006-02-24T18:41:00.000-08:00

Name five of life's simple pleasures that you like most, then pick five people to do the same.Try to be original and creative and not use things that someone else has already used.

1. laugh my heart out at some joke, corny or not.
2. spend some quality time with my cousins, who i only get to see during vacations and during the really boring parties my relatives regularly host. even if it's just going to the UP lagoon and running around playing tag.
3. read a good book.
4. go out with some friends to watch a good movie.
5. drink a grande sized Starbucks mocha frapp without worrying that that much caffeine will ultimately damage my nerves

i'm tagging whoever is reading this. :)

ang pagbabasa

2006-02-24T01:49:00.000-08:00

kasalukuyang nagbabasa ng paboritong libro ni hudas kaya inspired akong magsulat sa tagalog.
ang ganda ng librong yun talaga. ang saya basahin. pero sa tingin ko, naweweirdohan na ang mga magulang ko at kapatid sa akin. concerned na siguro sa sanity ko. tuwing nagbabasa kasi ako, tatawa na lang ako ng basta basta sa mga joke at kung anong kababalaghan na ginagawa ni bob ong sa libro. sa tuwing tatawa ako, titingin sila sa akin at magtatanong ng "bakit ka tumatawa?" ayy...

masaya magbasa ng libro kaya gustong-gusto ko. halos kahit anong libro, ayos lang sa akin. wag lang yung ubod ng kapal at liit ng sulat. o kaya mga horror stories. kailangan sa akin, ang libro maganda ang papel, ang font, ang font size, at ang spacing. kung pwede lang, wag newsprint ang papel o Times New Roman size 10 ang font ng libro. nakakaduling kasi yung ganon e. (hal. Lord of the Rings, ilang taon na ang nakalipas nang iregalo ito sa akin ng magulang ko, pero umiipon lang ng alikabok sa bookshelf ko). nakakatamad rin kasi basahin, pwera na lang kung maganda talaga yung storya, kagaya nung Da Vinci Code at Angels and Demons. kahit yung classics ok lang. kahit mahirap intindihin, pinagtiyatiyagaan ko na lang kasi maganda rin naman. kagaya na lang nung jane eyre. sigusigundo kailangan kong tumingin ng definition ng salita sa diksyunaryo. halimbawa na ang mga salitang 'expostulation', 'animadversion', 'sententious' at ang 'physiognomy', na hanggang ngayon ay hindi ko pa rin alam ang ibig sabihin. at isa pa 'to. ang daming French na salita. walangiya. kaya nga yung librong yun na ibinigay sa akin ng aking tita noong Disyembre, hindi pa rin nangangalahati. hay buhay.

ang problema lang talaga sa libro, ang mahal! lalo na kung sa fully booked ka bibili. mga tatatlong daan na ata ang minimum na presyo ng libro ngayon. bawat piso kailangan ipunin mo talaga sa piggy bank, lalo na ngayong mahirap na talaga ang buhay at gipit sa pera. pero kung titingnan mo rin, worth it naman kasi may natututunan ka talaga sa pagbabasa.

o cge...ako ay lilisan na...aalamin ko pa kung nakalabas talaga si bob ong sa gubat ng Camp John Hay..:)

report card

2006-02-17T23:06:00.000-08:00

got my report card today...it was fine...except for one subject: MUSIC. i got a three-point decrease from last quarter. my mom wasn't really mad when i told her who the teacher is, but she still wanted to know why my grade decreased that much. so we went to the faculty and talked to him. i saw that the average of my quizzes was 81. i asked to see my scores, twice, but he didn't want to show it to me. just ignored me. *fumes* i really wonder why it got that low. my mom told him that we should have an index card to monitor our grades. sabi naman niya, next year pa niya gagawin. *slaps hand on forehead* why not now?
i used to like music. in fact, i still do. i just hate the classes, though. when ms pineda was our teacher, i think all of us were still able to get 94s and 95s. now, i think that's just impossible.
i still can't get over the fact that 45 % of our grade is dependent upon an activity which we didn't even get enough time to practice on. geez.

the mango leaf addiction

2006-02-13T02:40:00.000-08:00

the title sounds weird, doesn't it? unbelievable and crazy, yet true.
meet the hottest(?) new craze...

pe class.
we were playing volleyball but the sun was too hot so we stayed under the shade of this ginormous mango tree. we found apa and ces sniffing at some leaves.
me (laughing): anong ginagawa niyo?
ces: umaamoy. ang bango kasi e.
nicki (taking a leaf and sniffing as well): oo nga no..amoy mangga!

after that, we each took a leaf and sniffed our hearts out. was it bliss. okay, so now i sound like a druggie attached to heroin. but seriously, it smelled really good. we each took around two more leaves to satisfy our "addiction" for the week. i still have the two leaves tucked in my pe notebook. it'll probably lose its scent in a day or two. i probably have to sneak there near the gym just to satisfy my "addiction".

it's good to be safely adddicted to something, isn't it? even if it's just something especially ordinary like mango leaves. at least it's not something that could harm you, like adhesive or heroin.

try this: find something, an "addiction" or hobby of any kind that'll make you happy. an example is sniffing mango leaves to your heart's content with a few of your friends behind the school gym. :)

the sacrifice

2006-02-12T00:56:00.000-08:00

I ran quickly, occasionally tripping over a root. I knew they were after me, ever since I renounced the ways of the clan. They were getting nearer; I could hear the snarling of the dogs and the fall of their footsteps. Suddenly, a figure appeared in my path. Under the sliver of moonlight I found that it was my friend Ameena, who was also a member of the clan. She must have escaped from the barbed enclosure as well.
"Hurry, I know a safe place where we can hide!" said Ameena, alarm ringing in her voice. All thoughts of fear were driven away by her surprising yet reassuring appearance for she was my friend; I knew I could count on her.
We stopped in front of an old and abandoned chapel and quietly slipped inside. I peeked through a small hole in the chapel doors and let out a sigh of relief; my pursuers had passed the chapel without bothering to check.
As I turned to thank Ameena, a handkerchief soaked in chloroform was pressed to my face, recognizable by its sweet smell. The series of events that happened next was quite hazy, as I was only subconscious, but when I finally regained consciousness, I found that I was chained to the chapel's old altar. I glanced around me and fear gripped my sides. I was surrounded by people wearing black robes and white masks--the traditional clothes worn by the clan whenever a sacrificial offering to the Gods was to be made. I turned and saw Ameena standing over me with the sacrificial knife, ready to drive it through my heart the minute the Bishop, the head of the cult, gave his consent. I closed my eyes and the searing pain in my heart was the last I remembered.

this is my com ex in english...feel free to comment...thanks...:)

sinta!

2006-02-12T00:45:00.000-08:00

we watched the play sinta! last friday in ateneo. it was performed by the dulaang sibol, their official drama group, i think. the play was good despite the lack of props. the actors were good and really funny. the play was about two young lovers who lived on opposite sides of two haciendas and were separated by a "wall". the "wall" was actually a person, who banged a stick on a crate every time sinta and anding, the two lovers, got too close. of course, being the jumpy person that i am, i kept starting every time the stick was banged.
around the last part of play i think i must have dozed off because they were just singing. for a really long time, i might add. after the play, their director gave a sort of speech, which i almost slept through as well. tagal eh, gutom pa ako. :)

field trip!

2006-02-08T03:55:00.000-08:00

we had our club fieldtrip today. it was really fun. first we went to CCA in Katips. it's quite a small school lang, pero the facilities are state of the art. we were given free food samples. there was one that was quite good, grilled zucchini and cucumber salad w/ pasta, but of course we didn't eat the zucchini and cucumber. the dressing was nice-olive oil, Dijon mustard and balsamic vinegar. yum. we went around a bit more and we were showed this case where all the chefs keep there knives. there was like a million knives there, like knives for cutting pineapples, a special knife for apples, a really long knife for guess what? cutting bread, and this gigantic roast fork. that costs them 20,000 pesos. after that we went around a bit more then left.
after CCA, we proceeded to Eastwood to have our lunch at fazoli's. God, the food there is amazing. and quite cheap, as well. i ordered this plate of italian chicken and pesto pasta. it was really, really good. then after eating, we went to the mall and played games in the arcade. camille and i shared on a power card. i even hit the bingo in the spin thing, which gave us around a hundred tickets! after that we didn't want to do much anymore so went outside and did the dance thing wherein you sort of wave your hands over and under these two motion-sensitive circular objects. i don't know what they're called. it was really fun.
on the way back i mostly slept. i had this really weird dream wherein i was sitting in pinoy class and we were discussing noli. i think in the dream i wasn't really paying much attention because ms aniago suddenly yelled at me, "Alex!". turns out it was camille waking me up because we were already in holy.

weird?

go figure. :)

tag, you're it!

2006-01-23T01:36:00.000-08:00

koko tagged me weeks ago but i just got the time to write so here...
the tagged victim has to come up with 8 different points of their perfect lover. no need to mention the sex of the target. tag 8 victims to join this game and leave a comment on their comments saying they've been tagged. if tagged the second time there's no need to post again.

He would be a person who loves God and his family above all.
He would be a person who can cook as well, someone who can cook up some culinary magic in the kitchen.
He would be a funny sort of person, spontaneous and unpredictable. I'd like to be with someone who can crack a joke out of nothing and make me laugh a lot.
He would be Chinese. I don't really know why, but I've always preferred the Chinese kind of guys, maybe because I'm Chinese and all that. (racial discrimination! nah, i may be, can speak a bit of and look like a Chinese, but i think i'm more of a Filipino at heart.)
He would be smart and share the same interests and hobbies as me. It would be really hard to be with someone who doesn't know what the heck you're talking about, who just nods and nods and pretends to understand what you mean, when all the while things like "What's she going on about now?" are going through his mind .
He would be sweet and thoughtful, but not too corny or mushy. Those things can make me cry. I'm really a cry-y (???) sort of person.
He can keep a conversation going until who knows when. He isn't the type of person na tanong ka ng question, sagot siya, then stop. tanong ka ulit, sagot, then stop nanaman. Ano naman ang mapapala namin pareho sa pag-uusap na yun?
He would be someone who would appreciate and love me for me, someone who would listen to whatever problems I would have, to just be there when I need someone, or when I don't feel like talking to my parents about certain stuff, he would listen, the like.

sana nga me taong ganyan out there. :)

narnia

2006-01-22T03:36:00.000-08:00

finally, i was able to watch the chronicles of narnia today! it was a post-celebration (which has been put off for weeks now) of jescia's birthday last december 31. we went to eastwood. i went off to starbucks and satisfied my craving for a mocha frappucino and a Starbucks ham and cheese croissant. after i drank it though, my head hurt a bit, i think because the coffee was really, really,cold.
i loved narnia! as in. to bits. it was so good. better than harry potter. Andrew Adamson will probably be better than Alfonso Cuaron and Mike Newell put together. really. people even clapped at the end of film. and during the last part, when we thought it was all over and there was a pahabol pa pala, everyone who was going out of the cinema literally went back and looked to see what was happening. it was that good.
when i watch these movies based on books, i have these certain expectations. and narnia met them all. the flow of the story was really good, so those who weren't able to read the books were able to understand the story, wherein in harry potter, ang gulo, when one thing happens, hindi naman connected dun sa last scene. you have to be able to have read the book para lang maintindihan ang nangyari. i read this entry from TIME..

Book vs. Movie
I don't see how Richard Corliss (a movie reviewer, i think) could pick the movie version of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire over the book. While i really like the movie-it was fast and action-packed-none of the film adaptations of J.K. Rowling's books, that one included, have been able to fully capture the essence of Harry. They cannot put us inside Harry's head the way Rowling deftly does.

-Marianne L. Adams

i absolutely agree with her. a good director should be able to do that. the movie was like the book put to life. the effects, the actors, everything was great. lucy was so cute, with the lisping and the way she said, "I don't know!" when mr tumnus asked her why people shook hands. jadis was really cool. the hair(!!!), the clothes, the acting. she came out the way I imagined her as I was reading Magician's Nephew and TLTW&TW.
overall, the movie was really great. i couldn't find anything to criticize. the movie was able to bring Narnia and its creatures to life.

love love love narnia!

the horror of the exams

2006-01-20T22:35:00.000-08:00

tests are over. thank God. i screwed up MA, especially the last part. i was really desperate, so i made some things up. hope she won't notice (yeah right). and chem was fine, i guess. anyway, i do not want to relive the horror of it, so never mind that anymore. and yeah, geom test results were out. thank God i got 85 out of 95. that's not so bad. higher than i expected, actually. i thought i was going to fail because i really screwed up that part with the angle AOB thing, but i just got one mistake, haha. and the last part. wow. that day when we took the test, it took me at least an hour to figure out that the polygon was a quadrilateral. nice, i know. sheesh.
last night, i was reading TIME instead of studying. ha. it's got some interesting stuff in it really. here's a challenge i found. see if you can do it.

say the color the word is printed in, not the word itself. try to say all 10 without a mistake within 15 seconds.

Blue Yellow Red Green Yellow Green Blue Red Yellow Red

it's kind of hard at first but after at least six tries, you don't need to even look at the words anymore, since you've already memorized them from repeating it over and over again.

losing the battle, winning the war

2005-12-08T01:07:00.000-08:00

okay, so had the intrams for the past three days. it was uber fun, really. the games were great to watch. nerve-wracking even. couldn't remember the last time i yelled so much. :) our cheering was so, so great! their practices really paid off. even if they just won second place, it was still one of the best i've seen. and the rhythmic was great too, even if it just received third. the great thing about the entire intrams, walang na-pikon. lahat, tanggap lang. sport lahat. that was the best part of it. the unexpected twist was that we won overall! we thought pysche was a definite shoe-in, what with all the 1st places they won. goes to show not all things are what they seem. ;)

Utopia

2005-11-28T03:08:00.000-08:00

I laughed. I couldn't remember feeling so much joy and excitement. I sank to the ground and felt the lush meadow underneath me. I stood up and looked around the beautiful paradise around me. Soft music with graceful cadences played from somewhere and a brook gurgled near a willow tree. I was so happy to have become just a part of it. As I laughed again and walked over to the brook, I felt myself falling at a great speed. I screamed but I wouldn't stop. For what felt like a long time, I kept on falling and at last I slowed down. I looked around me and saw a vast wasteland shrouded by a thick fog. It was cold, dreary and gloomy. I stumbled through it when at last I came to the edge of a riverbank. A small boat was tied to the shore. I stepped into it and rowed silently. The fog cleared and at last, I found myself back in my paradise, my utopia.

In the renowned book Tuesdays with Morrie, we are portrayed as little waves riding on a vast ocean. We come upon other waves. Soon, we catch sight of the shoreline and we fear of crashing into it. We needn't fear for it, for once we do crash into the shoreline, we become waves once more and we come back into the ocean again.

praise the Lord, hallelujah!

2005-11-26T05:06:00.001-08:00

praise be to God! my grades weren't so bad...there was just the drawback that some of my grades decreased...like in entrep (guess what? 3 pts) trigo (no surprises there...) and health (1 pt)...and most of my grades increased too...some were retained...and my conduct went up too! it felt really good..i was really happy for my sister because she finally got into the top 20...result of less TV and more studying...and i was really proud of her when i saw her card...she went up like 3 to 4 points in the subjects that she had previously low grades...my mom was so happy...that was what made everything i worked for worthwhile...seeing my mom's reaction...we even celebrated last night...:D

harry pottter

2005-11-26T04:55:00.000-08:00

watched hp4 today...i didn't think it was really good...medyo sabog...scattered yung flow nung story...even if i've read the book and know how the story goes, it's still good to see the interpretation of the director and see how he's going to manage to fit the whole 4th book into 2 hours of viewing...it wasn't that good...i still think chris columbus is still hp's best director so far...alfonso cuaron and mike newell just aren't up to scratch...kuhang-kuha nila si voldemort though...and si fleur...the presentations of the school was really nice...and sobrang bitin nung quidditch world cup...i was really looking forward to watching that...also in the 3rd book...i was waiting for the quidditch final but alas, i was disappointed...i had fun with jescia and pig anyway...even if they had to leave early..:)

open your eyes

2005-11-19T03:34:00.000-08:00

The depths of her eyes were unfathomable. It was a deep, ice blue abyss of mystery. They were striking, yet radiated a kind of gentleness and warmth one would not notice right away. Her laughter was infectious, her smile beautiful and sweet. Her actions were slight yet sincere, though it went unnoticed most of the time. Her words were simple and few yet had a great impact on those who heard and listened.
Yet, not everybody noticed how beautiful she was. No, they only saw the cold shadows in her eyes, emotionless laughter and heard only the austerity when she spoke. To them where a heart usually is, a stone resides, not even the slightest action could soften.
To others she was beautiful. To those who saw and not just looked, who heard and listened and listened and understood, she was the perfect embodiment of a person, warm and real. Not many saw how truly real she was, because few still possessed the ability to see, listen and understand. To those who saw only the bad, it is because of the burden of pain and hatred they were carrying. They were the ignorant, the stubborn, who refuse to see, because they are unwilling to let go. She saw how much the world needed to have their eyes opened.

Let us not be like the ignorant and the stubborn in my story. We fail to see the true beauty of things because we keep all our anger inside us. Anger destroys a person. Learn to forgive. As said, the weak do not forgive. Forgiveness is an attribute of the strong.

not so bad

2005-11-19T02:59:00.000-08:00

well, we had the compet today. it wasn't as bad as i thought it was. okay lang. the students from st.stephen, ang galing! nasagot lahat ng questions. chinese school e. magaling talaga sa math. then we toured a part of la salle and saw the buildings and everything. we saw the building where the priests were massacred and reputed to still haunt the halls of the school till today. after the tour, we headed to mcdo for lunch then went home.:)

the eve of doom

2005-11-18T04:04:00.000-08:00

okay, so maybe i'm exaggerating. i'm not really meeting my doom or anything. it's the eve of the compet and i'm terrified. i'm cramming all this knowledge into my brain and it can't take it anymore. my mind has gone on overdrive. ah well..i'm so scared to disappoint the school but i guess it won't be so bad. after all, ms cruz told us that she doesn't pressure us to win, but she is pressuring us to do our best. i hope i do my best tomorrow and give it all i can...anyway..gotta get back to the books...

open-boat day

2005-11-15T03:11:00.000-08:00

the open-boat day was really fun. i learned a lot from that experience. it opened my eyes to how much we can make use of clean energy so that we won't affect the environment. it also made me realize how blessed we are to even have mother nature and now we keep taking her for granted.
we saw exhibits and received fliers and pamphlets. i wanted to become a greenpeace member but they only received donations through credit cards or bank accounts. sorry, not that rich! XD
we also saw agot isidro and her husband, i think, doing a commercial on greenpeace.
the greenpeace boat is called the "Rainbow Warrior". some parts of it were salvaged from the original Rainbow Warrior that sank some years back, like the steering wheel(yes, it really is used to steer the ship) and a bell. we also saw an oak dolphin. i think it also came from the wreck. its (or his or her, they weren't really sure of the gender) name was dave, or divina, since they didn't really know. it's said that dave or divina is hollow and that there's a bottle of rum and a time capsule inside.
we saw several parts of the boat and we also saw a real live (but rusty) anchor. anna even took a picture of that. actually, she took tons and tons of pictures. XD
the whole trip, though short, nevertheless made me grateful for mother earth because it is from her that we get everything, our food, electricity, everything, without mother nature, we'd all be dead. as humans, we need to learn to take of her. we can start with segregating our wastes. in the Rainbow Warrior, they had these color-coded trash bins for aluminum, plastics, steel, etc. when they reached a place, like in Japan, they would turn over the plastics they threw away so that it could be converted to something better than plastic.
greenpeace also helps affect governments' views on the environment. they lobby for change on the country's way of managing our environment. they promote clean energy like solar and wind energy. come to think of it, isn't that better to use rather than coal, since they are renewable and produce 0 pollution?
the environment is too good to waste. why not start taking care of it??

c'est la vie!

2005-11-14T05:20:00.000-08:00

aaahhh...this is the the life..doing nothing, just kicking back for a little r&r..i don't have to do anything and i won't be attending any classes tomorrow! yay! as you can see from my mood, i'm eager to go to the open boat day tomorrow. i wonder what we'll do. anyway, details tomorrow!