Mind, Body, and Soul Exercise

It was a weekend well spent, must I say.

I was surprised, actually, that I woke up on my own without the sound of my most-of-the-time-useless alarm; perhaps it's the drive to help. (Doesn't sound like me.. at all.) Thanks to Bourne Legacy's shooting, the road was clear, and tada, I arrived earlier than the call time. Being Filipinos, we left an hour later, but arrived at Rizal just as scheduled. By the time we got there, the kids were already at the Function Hall, all set for the fun day ahead of 'em.. and us. It felt so good to see how the kids' faces lit up when they saw our bus. They gave as flowers us part of the welcoming ceremony, and oh what a delight to be hugged by those tiny, cute hands. Being a child-friendly person, you can't imagine how elated I was.

The first thing we did was Bible Study with Sister Julom, followed by a story telling courtesy of Lowell, and finally, the most interesting part of the day.... Outdoor games!! We played agawan-base, badminton, and I mostly stayed with the boys because there was this cute kid who became my closest buddy and asked me to be his partner. :"> Aww, isn't he sweet?

Right after playing, the kids, together with some parents, had merienda. There was this little boy who kept poking me, asking for water. I felt *how do I put it in a right way* pity over the kid 'cause he really really looked tired, with clothes worn out and wounds all over. So I went inside our bus, took my bottled water, placed it in a plastic cup and had him drink I even gave him my Marie. It wasn't my intention to brag. But this incident made me realize how blessed I am. That moment, I thought to myself, here's a kid who doesn't eat enough, compared to me who wastes food from fancy restaurants. I wish I could do more, probably, given the enough resources I would extend my help. But I'm just a student, also trying to recover with every day's crisis. My hope is with the rest the of the world who has all the resources: HELP.  Even in your own little way. Even just for a day. It makes a BIG difference.

Blogging, again

For years, I’ve been trying to blog as much as I could. I know I wasn’t able to update my “online diary” for quite some time now, but believe me, I never wanted anything else but share what I feel to my readers (if there’s any).

The past months were spent going craycray over Twitter, maintaining a cyber-status of being known – as if it is my own dose of self-esteem booster. To me, the more RTs, tweets, followers I have, the popular I get. In this very controversial social network, I showed the who I really am and had the chance to let everything out without worrying of how others would react to it. From a food tripper to a Secretary ni Kuya (PBB) to spoilers of Hollywood divorces to a movie commentator; even to a bitch who once started an online war – Twitter has showed me how vast the range of my emotions are. 

If there’s one thing tweeting hasn’t made me, it is to be intellectual. In the hours I spent in front of the computer or holding my phone, responding to mentions, updating everyone with what I do, I threw away the chance of having good grades. Most often, I’d take more time in this pleasurable yet somewhat ruinous activity than that of my studies. Plus, compressing my thoughts into 140 characters, trying to make shortcuts for every word possible isn’t of any help in expanding my vocabulary and comprehension.

And so I made a pact. That is to tweet less and blog more. Scratch that. Maybe just to blog more. I’ve no intentions of sounding brainy; rather, I want to be more interesting than what 140 letters can offer. Hence the weeks spent reading books, online articles, even blogs – I wanted to come back with a bang. Anyway, here’s to a year full of learnings and memories – be good or bad – to share.

Glad to be back, Blogspot!

P.S. I’ve nothing against Twitter. It is my haven, it is my punching bag which I can express my rage at, my mini diary of the kilig moments I spent with crushes, the powerhouse of my memories. I still love Twitter; always have, always will… but I just really want to blog again.

Velada Tomasino

I once dreamed how life’s like 400 years ago, living in a country dominated by Spaniards, studying at a University ran by Dominican fathers – kalesa as our mode of transportation, guardiya civil surrounding the campus, Spanish (and not English) as the second language, and veladas as our 21^st century all-white uniforms. On the 25^th of January 2012, I woke up with exactly the same thing on mind, only this time, it was real. Every little thing I imagined is in front of my eyes. “Maybe time machines aren’t just found in movies,” I wondered.

Prior to that day, I was stressed out, thinking to myself “Where do I find a Filipiniana that won’t cause me thousands?” I loathed the anxiety felt when I realized I only have less than 24 hours to produce an attire for the next day’s event. Lucky enough, I scouted a fair and definitely unfancy terno, all for 550 pesos. Yes. 550 pesos wasted for a freakin outfit that I’ll only get to wear once.

Then came the day of the Velada. I arrived in school seeing [not all but mostly] everyone in their old-school get-ups. Was greeted “Buenos Dias” by a guard who’d normally tell me “Good Morning.” I even overheard some male students exchanging “Mi amore” with their boy friends – like they don’t know what it means. Bromance, I supposed. Going back (oh, how I hate distractions), sans the cars, gadgets, modern-style buildings, you’d really feel the 1600s vibe – made better by kalesas roaming around, giant tarpaulins of ancient structures which probably came from our tuition fees, and most importantly, the attitude of everyone who participated. Had free food ala Barrio Fiesta courtesy of the College of Science, attended a talk about stress management, picture taking all over UST, and did what we do best: played Fashion Police slash critic slash red carpet commentators during the La Naval procession. We all had a good laugh over our choice of Worst Dressed, That B*tch Stole My Look, and even of those who just looks funny to us (for this, we are sorry).  Must I say, there’s no one I could have spent this Velada with other than some good old friends – who somehow made the exhausting activity uplifting. A day earlier, when I think of the hassle I had to go through, I feel nothing less than rage. But when I heard the wows and saw the smile on everybody elses faces, I felt grateful. And was dumbfounded how brilliant the minds of Thomasians are. Clever, aren’t we? ;-)