Nap Time Rocks!

i’m supposed to publish my entry about this annoying little group of people, but that’ll wait. for now, i am seething over the fact that some big media corporation has deliberately forgotten about media ethics.

do you really know everything about media broadcasting? i’m afraid that my roots in the media business is terribly in danger of being typecasted entirely as negative. i am very afraid the time will come that nobody will believe in it anymore. all because of complaints like this. i know that you have a business to run, but hell, we do too! (more…)

ang dahilan kung bakit maraming barumbado sa kalye ng pinas? sobrang dali kumuha ng lisensya.

kaka-renew ko lang the other day at akala ko kailangan ko pang dumaan sa normal na process ng pag-renew. but nooo. unang window palang sa ‘evaluator’ tinanggihan na ako ng hanep na lalaking empleyadong yun. di na daw sila tumatanggap ng renewals (2:30pm pa lang noon) dahil quota na daw sila for the day. kumpletuhin ko daw muna ang requirements saka ako bumalik bukas ng umaga para tapusin ang renewal process.

shempre di ako makapaniwala at gusto ko na sanang mag-amok dun sa lobby ng LTO kapitolyo pasig para sabihin sa kanilang lahat doon na hindi dapat ganon ang government service. they’re supposed to work for me, hell my taxes should be working for me! pero shempre napangiti nalang ako at nag-decide nalang akong makisama sa mga bureaucratic sons of b**ches na yon at sinubukan ko kung makakalusot ang excuse ko. may hinahabol kasi ako sa office kaya dapat makuha ko yung license that same day.

triny ko din magpa-cute, pero nooo, sanay na sanay ang lolo mo (kuya #1) sa mga ganon. pinaalis na niya ako para magpa-”requirements”. at apparently may ka-tag team siyang nag-aabang pala sa tabi ko. inescort naman ako ni kuya #2 sa gilid ng building para magpa-drug test, sabay hirit sakin, “Alam mo ma’am, kung ako yun papayag yun. Makukuha mo din lisensya mo.” Hanep no? May hidden agenda pala.

At dahil desperado nakong mapa-renew ang license ko, tinanong ko na kung magkano. Sus naman, magpapaka-demure pa ba ako sa kaniya eh yun lang naman talaga ang trabaho ng mga fixers? Teka lang daw at tatanungin niya si kuya #1.

Php500 lang naman daw, all in na. Pero excluded yung drug test and medical exam fees. Php300 din yun. So in short, nalakad yung lisensya ko, with additional Php50 dahil professional pala license ko (me and my big mouth; dapat di ko na nabanggit), at nakuha ko within 1 hour and 10 minutes.

madami din akong natutunan habang nagiintay doon sa lobby ng LTO kapitolyo pasig. pag tiningnan mo lang yung mga window counters, walang pila at hindi mashado nilalapitan ng maraming tao, pero ang daming nakaupo sa mga benches sa harap. lahat ng lumalapit sa window, fixers nalang. per fixer siguro 3 o 4 ang inaayos. wala na yatang dumadaan sa normal na process except sa umaga sigruo dahil walang excuse si kuya #1 na naka-quota na sila.

pag hapon mas madaming naghahabol, kaya mas desperado ang mga tao, hence mas kailangan ng fixer para mapadali ang proseso. yung iba nga dun, siguro mga jeepney or taxi drivers, nagpapa-fix pa. eh sobrang dali naman magpa-drug or medical test. pinipirmahan lang yun tapos na. i doubt kung may mga analysis pang nalalaman yung mga “drug test centers” sa tabi-tabi lang doon. yung sakin nga, nag-”please” lang ako kay ate #1 dahil hindi ko na kaya mag-wiwi ng madami, hinayaan na niya.

so in short, sa sobrang dali kumuha ng lisensya, kahit sino pwede na kumuha. ano ngayon kung hindi ka marunong magbasa ng road signs or traffic regulations? bayaran mo lang yung mga tao doon, ok ka na. ano ngayon kung walang road ettiquette sa bokabularyo mo? ok lang yun, para sa maliit na halaga, nandyan si kuya #2 para ilakad ka.

lesson learned? renewed pro license: P600. speedy processing: P200. LTO experience: priceless.

Fresh from a perfect vacation at one of the sparkling beaches of Thailand and a cultural soak at one of Asia’s best, you take the first step into reality. You’re back in Manila and, well, you miss fresh air already. The moment the monotonous voice over the PA announces that you have landed, you have switched on your cellphone and have found a hundred messages streaming in to your dismay.

Is it not possible that your boss won’t miss you for a couple of days? You silently complain to your carry-on luggage, your only companion on the trip. You were suddenly pulled back and you realized that the name tag on your carry-on was caught in a snag and had fallen off. You didn’t pick it up anymore since you had no need for it anyway.

As you continue your check out from the airport and into a hectic life and survey the surroundings, you smell a different kind of smell. It was of cement just recently laid on the walls and floor, of fresh paint, and of something malevolent in the air. You thought you were hallucinating, when for a split second you think you also smelled something decaying nearby.

You quickly dismiss the thought that something so big and shiny and new could be unkept by the airport administration. It was impossible because they had just reopened Terminal 3, the infamous port named after Ninoy Aquino. It had been a decade before it was finally ruled to be opened by judicial courts; before that a number of legal disputes had erupted contesting its legality. And you were one of the lucky commuters who have just used it.

Nobody was waiting for you outside the arrival gate because you hadn’t bothered letting anyone know when you were flying back. It had been a surreal event, a month ago, when you had abruptly told your boss you were going on a one-month leave and your parents that you simply needed to go away.

It’s just stress, ma. I’ll be more relaxed if I just get on that plane and spend some time alone. You had told your mother who was perpetually worried about your health and the long nights in the office.

As you neared the exit sign, at one side, the smell of burning candles and a slight aroma of flowers made you turn to your right where it was seemingly coming from. There was a makeshift memorial for some people who died. As to who, you didn’t know, and you did not bother to find out. You are just anxious to go home and get a good afternoon’s rest.

———–

The television flashed the grotesque images of three gunned down bodies, the two near their home seemingly, and one in front of his. One was a known magistrate who ruled in a case against some corporation. Foul play and blackmail, the police were saying. It would not be the last news bit for the networks were replaying unsolved massacres of old involving the infamous Terminal 3.

The tv in the living room continued to flicker while the inhabitants of the house regarded it with faded interest. The floral cream-colored wallpaper changed its colors as the hues of the television changed in each flash. Meanwhile, a cold draft seeps in through the slight gap between the door and its frame. It was the middle of summer but the inhabitants of the house shuddered.

———–

After a well-rested sleep, you take a cold shower to wash off the residues of vacation from your mind. You were thinking that it might probably help prepare you for work the next morning. In the shower you smile at the fading memories of your trip, and you suddenly feel someone had entered the bathroom.

Hey. You say to nobody in particular. Maybe you’re still dreaming. You go back to scrubbing your back but there’s still that nagging feeling that someone was indeed looking at you through the shower curtain. You pull the curtain back with a jolt; nobody was there. Silly, paranoid, you thought. Must have been the cement in the airport that was still wafting in the air when you arrived.

You finish your shower quickly and decided to open your computer to check your mail. Your inbox must be bouncing off emails already. The computer boots up and takes a million years before the blue prompt screen shows up. You check the CPU. The LED light that’s supposed to say the computer is still reading has stopped. You wait for a few minutes and nothing happens. A bit irritated, you turn off and on the AVR to restart.

Even the computer missed me, you muttered to yourself. Staring at the black flat LCD screen, you notice a slight movement in the reflection. You turn around and see that everything was in order: nothing moving back there, you say. You sighed. You realized you must be really tired for imagining these things.

You settled then on leaving the computer alone for a while and scanning the three day-old newspaper left on the living room coffee table. You see nothing of great importance. After all, it will take a report on natural calamity to get your interest piqued at any breaking news. You just weren’t the politically-conscious type. Who needed to hear about squabbles of selfish men masquerading in barongs and briefcases?

But one particular headline caught your attention: “NAIA Terminal 3: Cursed Airport?” Curiously, you clicked on the link to read the whole story. The opinion column was criticizing the slow movement of investigation of unsolved cases, particularly those of two distinguished government officials related to the NAIA Terminal 3 controversy. And now, the ceiling that caved in for the second time since its construction.

You continued to read on because you had just come from that airport and you remembered if the memorial outside the arrival gate were connected to that. You find out that a major beam that supported one area of the terminal’s ceilings had collapsed, taking down with it several passengers. The reconstruction had still been weak and probably faulty (since it had caved in earlier in its construction phase), despite the government mandate that the defect be fixed before being expropriated to Philippine management. However, a legal hodgepodge of technicalities had bogged down whatever improvements were needed on the structure, until the issue was pushed into the hindmost of court hearings. There were about 141 passengers and personnel who died that day, many of which were destined for Thailand.

And so because of this, the column writer had concluded, Terminal 3 (very aptly named) had taken its latest victims, as if punishment to the ones responsible for it.

———–

Ewan ko ba, Jun. Para bang kinilabutan ako nung pumasok ako sa kwarto ng anak mo. Narinig kong nakabukas yung shower, pero hindi naman. Tapos yung computer parang nakabukas din, your mother says glancing towards your bedroom. She had just gone in to get her your framed graduation picture to display by the coffin.

Your death had not been easy on your mother, or any of your family, but she had to fulfill her duties. Your father gives her a tight hug and clutches your frayed name tag on one hand.

———– Since its commissioning in 1997, the abandoned airport terminal had accumulated several wrongdoings to its name. Some have died, trying to question the legality of its contracts. True enough, the Philippine justice system have found that its country was done wrong by its main contractor for the project, Philippine International Air Terminals Co., Inc. (PIATCO). The contract was declared null and void, and a year later Judge Henrick Gingoyon, who presided over the government’s expatriation decision of the terminal, was found dead. A year after that, Solicitor General Nestor Ballacillo and his son were also gunned down. The older Ballacillo was also one of those handling a case against PIATCO.To date, Terminal 3 is still abandoned. No conclusion as to who and why the two were murdered can be found in any news archive as of yet.

This story is fictional. However, the deaths of the 2 government officials are a fact, as well as the series of legal events that the Terminal itself went through. The second caving of an area of Terminal 3’s celing is fictional.

–
© 2007. Read my other shorts here. Please credit the author and site if you want to share this post.

 wasn’t much of a boxing fan, but i think ever since pacquiao glamourized the sport at least here in the philippines, i’ve been able to watch his matches (thanks to my dad and 2 brothers; even my mom watches avidly). so, it’s not at all hard to be very proud of the one man who brings down the cime rate in a single day, and who makes both rich and poor equals in front of the television. ironic no? that this man’s the only one who does it.

anyway. congratulations to us for hoisting the flag up once more in a foreign land. naawa naman ako kay barrera. if you go, you really should go out with a bang. it was supposed to be his pre-retirement victory. but one thing that really set pacquiao apart from him is humility. we all saw how the guy landed a rather frustrated punch at manny after the referee calls it. if he knew that he was going to lose to manny in his final game, after promising that he will beat him, he should’ve just kept to a good clean fight. i actually lost some respect for the eight-time boxing champ.

but then again he hasn’t got filipino respect, so let’s just give it to him. hail manny pacquiao.

—-

in other news, gusto ko lang sabihin na ang kulit-kulit ni mia. she’s so likot, when she sees me on my laptop she just can’t help but join in. but i don’t mind

and yup, we sleep on the floor now, just to make sure she doesn’t have any more night-time accidents. mia likes being done up. hehe. when i put on her sunglasses, a headband, or a bonnet, she doesn’t even mind.

cute no?

I know everyone’s been aware of Cris Mendez’ story — his being a rather painful one. I can only imagine the horrible things that his family has to go through knowing that he’s already gone.

 I really don’t want to dwell on his death any more than a lot of people already has. It’s just too unnerving for me because I’m a mom myself. A mother’s pain is always the most agonizing one. To Mrs Mendez, I pray for your healing.

Instead, I want to lash out at the fraternities, “brotherhood” they call themselves, whose principles must be upheld by violence. To those who do not, then shut up; I am not after you. Why manhood must be proven by taking licks from your ‘brothers’ is just pointless.

You will soon understand when you boys grow up and enter the real world that can hurt you even more than your wooden paddles. It is not the physical strength that matters most; it’s actually your principles and character that hold you together. I have proven this when one of my closest friends told me,

kaya nga ako nabibilib sayo kasi you seem so strong…yung kahit nahihirapan ka na sobra, you still go on. and parang yun nga, your courage comes from elsewhere, yung fear hindi ganun kalaki kasi you know Someone is going to take care of you.

Is that the kind of strength you get from being initiated into a fraternity? My friends have stuck with me no matter the kind of crap I’ve been through, and no thanks to any kind of hazing that bound us together. My dear fratmen responsible for Cris Mendez’ life, show me one of you who can admit to the world the violence that you did and I will applaud you even for showing responsibility for your actions. Isn’t that what brotherhoods are all about, or are you just another typical clique?

Hindi na nadala ang UP. When I was a freshman, the University AS Walk was still fresh from Niño Calinao’s murder. Several frat-related violence in Diliman became some of the highlights throughout my stay there. And I’ve admired some fraternities who could make a positive difference in the campus. What now, that another name has been added to the roster of the murdered? Will these groups change? Will they realize that hazing isn’t so important in instilling whatever principles they uphold?

My fellow UP scholars, let’s keep Cris Anthony Mendez’ fire alive until due justice is given him, or at least his family.

it’s election time again. time to whip out the wads of kaching to lure in those votes.

to all you campaigners and aspiring “heroes of the masses” who have no decorum nor respect for filipinos, you disgust me.

you have no decorum because you’d rather have your pretty (ugly) faces plastered all over the city and thus trash the mmda-reclaimed walls (yes i’m a big fan of BF. there.) you have no decorum because you’d rather let loud music blast from makeshift stages with women dancing in skimpy clothes just to attract attention.

“Candidates may put up their posters on the gates, walls, and fences of village halls, public markets, and other government offices. They may also put them in public plazas, public schools, health centers, tricycle terminals as well as covered courts and open spaces and vacant lots.”-inq7.net

which brings me to my next point: you have no respect for filipinos. i’d like to think that my fellow citizens are not just passive recipients of mass messages and that the spiral of silence theory is just a bunch of crap. you present your agendas like you spell A-B-C’s to a 7 year-old child. i think filipinos have gone through a lot for us to be treated like innocents. we know there are hidden agendas, and pork-barrel aspirants. where the hell do my taxes go!? (that would be another story) and what’s with the tv ads and commercial jingles?

you have commercialized yourselves too much. you’ve sold your souls to the gods of advertising. leadership is not a commodity we filipinos can just take at face value. unfortunately, a lot of you do have the faces that can launch a million friggin votes. leadership is something we measure in deeds and actions. but those not skewed during the last year of term before reelection. leadership isn’t something to be taken for granted.

sometimes i wish there would just be complete political genocide. sometimes i wish those people who would run for office would only either be from the middle or upper class with just enough money or if they had to be poor, only those who have an honest ambition to serve.

to serve. public office is a service. why do i always have a feeling that it’s the other way around? i don’t think a lot of our government dudes know that. again, where in hell do my taxes go?

so forgive my disillusion. 3 EDSA “revolutions” can do that to someone who grew up in a society where corruption is the norm rather than the exception. so to all you political wannabes, you had better be worth the scrutiny.

scenes around the city, everyday:

a foot puts out a cigarette butt on the asphalt sidewalk after it lights up another one. The young professional puts his lighted vice between his lips and takes out a menthol candy from his pocket. The wrapper is thrown also on the street, not far from the wasted butt.

A crumpled ball of tissue finds its way down the sewer after being thrown away from a car by a motorist. The tissues were actually used to wipe away a spill from a soda accident.

A mother takes out her daily trash on the street because today is garbage collection day. she dumps it on the sidewalk in front of their house, reeking plastic of fish innards and all. In a little while, a dog picks up the fetid scent and begins to rummage through the garbage, leaving a trail of disaster in the gutter.

The traffic along a major thoroughfare bores the hell out of a young teenager and decides to munch on a bag of chips. She finishes the snack, while the jeepney she is riding on manages to advance a few feet. She casually lets the empty bag slip out of her hand out the window and resumes wondering when the traffic is going to move again.

Later in the day, a month, a year, or a decade after.

the skies were an angry hue; the steady downpour of rain has escalated to a raging storm. Flood waters can now be seen rising to their full potential: to drown and destroy. Everywhere on the streets, people were stranded on whatever higher ground they can reach, while some vehicles braved the mini-rivers that have become the roads.

Iñago was nervous. His beat up 4-wheel drive pick-up was in no condition to become a half-submarine. The rain continued pounding on the windshield, which his wiper was trying hard to push away.

Please, Lord let me through this one. I’m almost home.

Up ahead was a valley of water that few dared to cross. A deserted bus was already on one side, obviously not having enough power to restart. Iñago pumps the accelerator and inches forward.

There’s no turning back now, there’s no turning back. don’t let me down now. Come on, baby.

The flood waters gurgle and rush beneath the truck, seeming to find a way in. the tense driver steps on the pedal a little harder, coaxing the old machine to keep going. In a few feet he was beginning to be satisfied with his progress until the van in front sputters to a stop.

Heck no. move it!

Iñago has no choice but to gun his accelerator and maneuver around the stalled van. Luckily, the street was wide enough to be passed on both sides. Iñago’s hands sweat a little. The pick-up heaves and gains speed in spite of going against the heavy flow of water. in a few seconds, he was finally rising out of the pool.

—

do you know how it feels like to be stranded in the middle of a rainstorm, floods all around you, vehicles stalled, and there’s nowhere else to go? And that feeling of uncertainty rises to fear because you might actually spend the night either inside a vehicle or in the waiting shed.

Im sure the majority of us (except those few lucky bastards who own a helicopter or a submarine) have flood stories to share. The rainy seasons are not always a welcome break from the stretch of summer heat because for some, it means having to leave their homes to the mercy of foul smelling flood waters. It also means, for a lot of commuters, risking treading pools of dirty water on the way home. We curse and dish out hate speech because we hate being found so uncomfortable in the rain, when it’s meant to be enjoyed curled up in bed or with a cup of hot coffee.

The chilling truth is, for every exerted force there is an equal reaction. We cannot expect that the trash we nonchalantly toss out the window onto the street just vanishes as it also disappears from our sight. Where do they go? Go figure.

Try watching the nature documentary specials on the National Geographic or Discovery channels and you’ll soon come to a remarkable revelation. The earth has healing powers. Our sewer system can only hold so much junk, and as our high school biology teacher tells us, ours is a finite earth.

As for me, I will not complain when I get stranded in the rains because of the floods. At some point some of my irresponsibility have caused this problem. it’s just sad that a lot of people don’t realize theirs and do something about it.

—

©2007. Read my other shorts here. Please credit the author and site if you want to share this post.

driving to work this morning, I was confronted by an inescapable fact that Christmas is just around the corner. I wasn’t reminded by the alternating parols hanging quietly on the lamp posts, nor by the festive invitation of several bazaars and malls to come to their last-minute Christmas sale. I wasn’t prompted by the Christmas songs played every now and then on the radio; in fact I was just a little annoyed that they didn’t play “just regular music”. It wasn’t the glitter and Christmas trees nor the many variations of Santa and his reindeers imprinted on every household décor.

I’m not playing the old scrooge role though. Every year I get older it seems that i would lose a thread of my “Christmas spirit”. I used to get excited 2 weeks before the big event, and would anticipate every trip to the mall for the annual Christmas present shopping. Now, I would dread having to squeeze my way through the militia of bargain-hunting people, even throwing one or two threatening looks to those who would dare invade my personal space (which, by the way, has been limited to a very tiny area).

I was reminded by the people who would annoy me one way or another; those jeepney drivers, in particular, who would cut you and stop in the middle of the road to let passengers get on and off. drivers who might have also lost their sense of giving, and pedestrians who have no concept of stop and go. Even the men in blue — those MMDA guys who seem to have found every corner of the street a comfortable watch post. I watched myself go from happy-go-lucky to road-raging driver. I was close to saying ‘bah, humbug to you too.’

I was reminded because they reflected how I dealt with them. if there’s anything more methodical than Santa Clause this time of the year, then it would be that Christmas is synonymous with love or charity. It’s plastered on all hallmark cards, printed on billboards, and advertised so much on tv. I was not anywhere near obeying that credo when it came to these people. It was so much easier to be nicer to people of value to you, why bother?

But then it isn’t easy for them either. Having nothing for Christmas eve is no comfortable idea, nor faking to celebrate prosperity when we all know that food and gasoline prices are increasing making it so much harder to go by these days. (I would sarcastically wear my seatbelt lately dahil malapit na ang Pasko, kailangan ng pambili ng pang-Noche Buena).

By now you’d expect me to retract and say that ‘tis the season for forgiveness anyway, so what the heck. I’m not changing the way I think about the undisciplined drivers of metro manila, but im resolving to alter my fixed response to negative stimuli. Haha. Which means I will try to avoid hurling profanities and ruin my day by going nuts over people I have mentioned earlier. I would be doing them and myself a favor wouldn’t i?

‘Tis the season for realizing the bad things I’ve done for the past year. ‘Tis the season to change how I live my life, start and end my day. ‘Tis the season to do something nice to other people for a change. ‘Tis the season to eliminate stress in my life and the things that make it stressful. (I wish there were no more jeepneys around. Just kidding.)

a couple of months ago, I realized I had too much loose change left in my pocket (and my bags too) at the end of the day, that even when I rummaged through my bag for my pen or a lip gloss I could feel (rather annoyingly) them lying at the bottom. so I found an empty plastic container that used to be a perfume case and put all those useless change in it. after a week or two, I noticed that the coins were already half the container high.

I thought, this could be the start of a beautiful partnership between my coins and i. once I ran out of money to pay my mom some (unwillingly accumulated) debts and since the wallet and the atm were particularly useless at that time, my makeshift alkansya saved the day. it wasn’t much, but still.

tonight I went out with friends and just had to have that occasional unnecessary pricey coffee at this place, and realized I had no money on me left for tomorrow. thinking the nostroum (that’s the name of the alkansya, named after the perfume it once housed) can somehow augment my momentary state of poverty, I went home and counted my treasure.

aha, well im getting just enough for lunch tomorrow. or so I thought. something just tugged at my sleeve and made me realize that some people need this money more than I do. i’ve almost forgotten how it feels like to be an answer to somebody else’s prayer. while I’m busy drinking from my overpriced plastic cup, some people have been trying to save up enough for transport fares.

I’m not saying this to brag, but I’m so damn lucky to have just enough for myself and my family. a friend of mine told me how he has to help his grandmother and some relatives through financially. I mean, how much have I even done to help other people besides my mom, dad, or brothers? I vowed that this next one will go to somebody who needs it.

for now I put the lid back on the nostroum. I can wait until payday. these coins need to go somewhere else other than another unnecessary expense.

everything about life i learned from jogging…

life is one big loop; it always goes full circle (well sometimes it’s square or oval, sometimes it’s just shapeless).

no matter how long you’ve been going down the same path everyday, there’s always one undiscovered route you’ve never taken and it’s exciting to take it.

don’t try to overtake those who’ve been at it for a really long time lest you tire yourself out just outdoing them and forget why you’re doing this in the first place.

it’s nice to have company along, but it’s also good to be alone once in a while.

nooninooninoo…

i just realized, men really are melodramatic too. eddie guerrero just pointed that out to me this morning, spitting into the microphone that Dominick was his real son. as if life couldn’t be any crueler to Rey Mysterio. he rises from his agony and finally manages to defeat the ruthless guerrero for the custody of his kid. hahahaha. WWE is one big soap opera — for men.

the male species is particularly deterred abhorred repulsed shunned away by the word “marriage”. my guy friends told me how, even being with the current loves of their lives for not less than 3 years, they are driven to explore the “world out there”. there are just too many fish in the sea, they say. there’s always one that’s better than the current one. there is, isn’t there? and there always will be.

my ideals have been shattered by these same polygamous creatures i call friends. i’m still thankful for them, i really am. because despite their confusing behavior, my ideals have found a different basis on which to grow on. it’s true men take longer to grow up. to my fellow intelligent kind, wait for your men to mature, then serve on a platter with your choice of garnish.