eleksyon na!!!!!!!!!

our public walls and posts are full of posters and our streets are being fixed. streetlights are built, and a lot of "projects" are underway. (even free insurance policies are being given away). it only means one thing: its campaign period. tv airtime is full of ads from candidates, celebrities are suddenly busy endorsing and participating in campaign shows(though i bet half of them dont know the platforms of the people theyre endorsing), and the news is very very entertaining. i would love to share my views about certain candidates, but i dont want to be the next body found floating in the pasig river. i would love to share with you who i will vote, but it would be unfair. they will not get free endorsements from me. :) i would love to comment on showbiz personalities in relation to politics and campaigning, but i dont want to badmouth the people i work with(i dont want to be featured in tabloids and talkshows). i will keep my mouth shut (only my friends will know what i've been ranting about), and invoke my constitutional right to privacy and that self-incrimination right(those are very popular rights invoked by accused government officials and certain personalities).

humans are above all other creatures because of our ability to reason. please lang. gamitin naman natin ito. if theres any time for us to be smart, its now. our future depends on it. :)

im back!

its been soooo long! its been months since ive posted anything here. that doesnt mean ive got nothing to say. on the contrary, a lot has happened. i vanished from the face of manila (for a month only), ive changed a lot about my perspectives, ive revised my priorities. a lot has happened. but its still the same old me. i have lots of stories to tell (which, so far, has been written in my handy dandy lil notebook.) and no time to share it. theres also a lot of hesitance, because the things that i have to tell you are more on the personal side, and im not too sure if writing them would do me any good. there are also quite a lot to be posted, since this is an election year, and, being the "socially relevant" person that i am, im just dying to share my thoughts. sadly, only my friends (via sms) have heard a few of the ranting ive been doing. the rest, are in my handy dandy notebook, waiting to be posted here. i wish i have the time to post them all, but now is not the time. ive got a lot of ideas for this blog, but i could only hope i can actually organize it all, so i can really get to share with you the things that have been going on in my mind. most of them will be senseless, but then it would be so unlike me to post something sensible. one of these days, i'll do something about it. for now, im happy with just posting something here. i missed being online, and i plan to make up for it. i hope i'll get to post some stuff about the upcoming elections, about actors and their political endorsements, about the perks of getting away from it all, about spending time (and actually enjoying) alone, about friendship, books, music, films, vodka, tequila, and the moon. but for now, im gonna go and spend time with the only constant i have, the only thing that kept me sane through the past 5 months you havent heard from me: my friends. so goodnight world wide web, hello friends, lets go get coffee. :)

a little reminder

Everyone's busy these days. The world has developed into this system where time is more than gold, and everything must be delivered-fast. Everything happens so fast, we dont realize that years pass by in a blur. We are all too busy working and making sure we've done all our errands. We are too preoccupied worrying if all the bills are paid, if the whole family's insured, or if youve already saved up enough for retirement or if you have enough money to cover for the engagement ring, the wedding, and the marriage itself (and, in later years, a marriage counselor). We are also busy meeting deadlines in school, or shopping for things that cheer us up. Most of us are too busy wishing the day or week was over so we could get the few hours of sleep we so rightfully deserve. The minutes go by unnoticed. The hours turn into days, then months. The months fly by into years. And someday, we'll see that our years went by unused. Our time went by unappreciated. It is only in the rare moments when all of a sudden, we find ourselves with nothing to do. When its as if you need someone to comfort you, but you feel that no one can realy understand you. Never have you felt so alone, in spite of everything you possess. Its that day when you grab a bottle of beer or wine and look out your window, staring at the city, at the sky, wondering what the hell went wrong. You begin to miss the things that once made you happy. The things you let slip away because you were too busy living. You then realize that you might have been working too hard that you've pushed your husband away, or that youve been tailing your boyfriend too much that youve forgotten about your friends. Maybe youve been spending too much time with your friends and fail to see that your parents miss the weekend trips your family would always take. That maybe your siblings miss the late night pig-out sessions. or maybe youve been working so hard that you have no time to even catch your breath and relax. Now ,you feel tired. You long for those things you miss. If you dwell long on this, you'll end up suffering from depression. But if you understand all this perfectly, you'll know what to do.

Surprise your husband with a romantic night out. Go to karaoke night with your friends. Cook lunch for your folks, throw a pajama party for your siblings and eat all the junk food you can get. Go to the spa and get a massage. Treat yourself to something nice. Take time to read that novel you've had at your bedside table but never really touched. Go to church. It doesnt really matter what you do, its the happiness you derive from it that matters. Its the happiness and contentment you get from the ones you love.

We only get to live each day once. Wouldnt it be nice to look back one day and say that we spent our days well?

We only get to live our lives once. Lets try to make it a good one.

birthday thoughts

i never looked forward to celebrating my birthdays. i would often think that there's nothing much to celebrate. birthdays are celebrations of how many years you've existed; to me, its a countdown of how many years i have left. the few days before my birthday, i felt numb from everything. everyone was excited but me. didnt really see the point in celebrating; theres so much i have to do, so much missing in my life that i didnt think anything was worth celebrating. plus, the night before my birthday, unfortunate things happened. I almost lost someone very close to me. and i had the girl thing. on my birthday. kainis diba! but hey, i was still looking forward to spending the weekend with my family, and my friends. i most certainly didnt want to sulk that day, it wouldve pissed a lot of people off. surprisingly, i had so much fun. i was surrounded by people who have been true friends to me for a long time. people who took time and effort to make me happy, knowing whats been happening to my life lately. these were the people who were there for me every single time i needed them. these were the people who never gave up on me and truly accepted me for the crazy lunatic that i am. (well, not that crazy, not much of a lunatic too) and i felt grateful. just this morning, i took a little alone time, and had a cig while looking at the smog-infested city (i was on the 37th floor, smog exists, even in late mornings), and i realized a few important things:

1. i felt loved. (ooh emo moment!!) and i was happy.
2. as i was looking at the city, i realized that amongst all the people in the whole world, i was lucky to have friends and family who are there for me, people who make me happy. i realized that i was also lucky to be who i am, to have what i have. and instead of complaining about things, i should be grateful for everything.

the most important realization:

as i was looking at the city (makati and manila skyline), i looked at all the buildings, houses, streets, and cars that passed by.. i saw how beautiful it is. i saw how beautiful the sky was, how the sunlight reflecting on the sea made its such a wonderful thing to look at, i realized that this couldnt jsut be coincidence. the ingenuity of humanity to have created such precise machinery, architecture, how we have made everything out of scratch, how we managed to create a sturctured, albeit corrupted society.. it couldnt be just coincidence. it was too perfect (more of imperfectly perfect, or perfectly imperfect) to be just coincidence.. GOD exists. coincidence cannot create something this wonderful. there is a God, and he made this possible. he made me possible. this world exists because of Him. that thought made me smile. It was that moment of, uhm, spiritual contentment that i havent felt for years.. it also ended my "existentialist" phase. i realized that the existense of God or Allah or Shiva or even beezlebub cannot be proved or disproved by debate or anything. its something you feel in your heart. and what the heart feels, cannot be corrupted by logic. its jsut there. you feel it without reason, without cause. thats the best gift ive recieved this year.

looks like a beggining of a new phase in my life. lets see where it takes me.

Wala talaga

Wala. i am doomed. i will die an old maid. i have a deal with my bestfriend though. if we both reach 30 and we are both still single, we'll get married. but duh! that wont happen. and even if it would, i would still like to marry someone i really love, i mean, someone who is a partner, a lover, a friend, and everything in between. but the way things are going, yes, i'll be single for the rest of my life. If this continues, im getting 8 dogs. or cats. or 4 dogs and 4 cats. whatever. my mcdreamy better come out soon and sweep me off my feet.

5 dogs and 3 cats kaya?

173-32

10 am, after 17 hours of debate, mocking, and a few senseless wordwars, its finally over. the impeachment complaint was dismissed. i tried to watch it as much as i could, and when i was out, i would listen to it over the radio. i've said it before and i'll say it again, watching hearings, sessions or meetings presided by government officials can be very entertaining... we heard prayers, a congressman offered 3 Balut eggs to another congressman, which eased tensions in the hall, and, the temporary moment of cooperation between congressmen when they all put out their wallets to pay for food for the people viewing the hearing..tsk tsk.. this event was supposed to be a matter of national interest, but i dont think most people cared about it.. if i didnt want to watch "honorable" men and women and make fun of them, i myself wouldnt monitor that event.

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so pluto's no longer a planet. the International Astronomical Union, after a week of deliberation, declared that pluto is no longer a planet, and we now have a smaller solar system. so basically, my childhood days spent thinking how cute pluto is, about it being the baby of the solar system, was just a lie. and now, finally, they have also agreed to a formal definition of a planet.

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it seems that we have so much need to clarify and fix things nowadays. from the heavenly bodies to the crappy politics of a developing country, much has been said, and yet we still eat our words and change things. hopefully things would be for the better. if something as big as pluto has now found its identity, i hope a country as small as ours can find it.

the Rizal effect

im just 21 years old, a college student, and i recently had my internship in Malacañang. Luckily, i was part of a policy group (i wont mention it to be safe..hehe), and was protected (by our boss) from corruption, the corrupt, and the Dirty Old Men. :)

during my internship, i, with my boss, tackled the lack of participation of the youth in society. To be specific, i was ratning about the lack of concern, and love for the country we have. In fact, I met some dear foreigners who seem to have more concern to the current state of the country than my own classmates, even me.

my boss asked me to produce a policy paper on any topic i wanted to, and i wanted to write something about the youth and their detachment, if that is the right word, from our nation. sadly, as much as i wanted to, that paper was never written. not just because of lack of time (i was under time pressure and my resources were limited), but because i was saddened by what i saw during my research. our government does not have much programs for youth involvement, and even if they had, it was more on aid. I checked the education departments and so far, i have seen little effort in teaching us of nationalism.

i shared my frustrations with my boss, and he happened to have thought of that issue. Sadly, the government doesnt have much funding for programs like that, and relies mostly on NGO's to help on that part. but that is not enough.

I am young still, and i know i have a lot to learn. But i find it disappointing that most people my age dont show concern for our country. it is easy to blame capitalism or whatever. We would rather be seen with our i-pod's than a history book. we would rather be out having our frappuccino's at starbucks than attend our philippines government and constitution or rizal class. it is not cool for us to like history. I remember being laughed at when i said that i was willing to defend the relevance of studying Rizal.

I always remember what my professor, Mr. Ronaldo de Jesus said to us about Rizal and his relevance. he said that until we all learn from our past. until we have realized what should be done and do something to improve our country, Rizal will always be relevant.

but how do we get the youth to learn to love our country? one, of course, would be through our educational system. two, the government must be strong-willed in promoting nationalism. third, our parents must guide us. More importantly, society itself must show us that our country is worth respect and love. our generation has become jaded. most think that people who had the sense of nationalism Rizal had dont exist anymore. most people think that our country offers us little opportunity. most are ignorant because they dont see the point in nationalism and social relevance.

this is just the view of a 21 year old. i believe that the youth, if properly educated, can turn things around, even a bit.

the question is, how?