beer and the meaning of existence

published 04/21/07 in the blog plug section of sunstar cebu's weekend magazine

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my soul may just have died, i think, and it's all because of beer.

it happened like this. after months of unbroken sobriety, i finally had my first drink of beer last weekend. an officemate, marlon, was holding his despidida because he found another job in singapore, joining an already numerous group of former officemates working in the city state.

i actually had reservations on going. i knew alcohol would be involved (it always is on all of my officemates' despididas), and i just had a surgery 2 months ago. but my doctor did say that i could now go back to my old lifestyle, and my old lifestyle did include a measure of beer every now and then, especially on special occasions. so if he says it's ok, then nothing should go wrong with me (i hope). so off i went.

i didn't really drink that much in the party. the beer wasn't enough to make me puke on the street and turn my brain to mush, just enough to loosen us all up and make the party a jolly occasion. but i used to have a low regard for people who drink alcohol. the resulting euphoria was not real in the sense that it wasn't derived from thought and experience, but chemically induced. and following that, i saw no difference between beer drinkers and drug addicts. but discovering the joys of drinking later on, let's just say i've changed my position on that matter.

so the night wore on, and eventually the discussion reached the topic of the weird effects of alcohol.

alcohol has different, sometimes weird, sometimes funny effects on people. some become so jolly that when sufficiently soused they will laugh for no reason at all (that's me). some suddenly become all quiet. some start speaking gibberish like it was a foreign language. some get violent (w/c in bisaya is called 'mauy'). we have this office mate who is a quiet and mild mannered guy. but when he gets drunk, he's like bruce banner suddenly transforming to the incredible hulk, a green imposing mass of pure rage. some can even take a piss anywhere they feel the urge to do so (i remember another officemate...). it's like in that song by the eraserheads that goes: 'CR mo ang buong mundo'. thinking about all that, that's when it hit me.

it's a strange thing no, when your mood, and by extension, your outlook in life and your way of thinking, can so easily be altered by some substance or drug. it somehow runs against the proposition of man being a spiritual creature. how can there be a spirit, or a soul, or whatever you call it, that is supposed to be separate from the one's physical nature when it can be influenced by one chemical or other?

there are actually some religious groups, like the rastafarians, who commune with their deity by smoking marijuana. the oracles of ancient greece were known to be exposed to mind altering fumes, and the resulting gibberish from their mouths the priests interpreted to be messages from the gods, like in the movie 300.

we already have pills like uppers (to make us happy) and downers (to make us sad, or at least less happy), both easily prescribed by our friendly neighborhood psychiatrist. but imagine having a pill for, say, passion, or excitement, or romance, or contentment, or even peace of mind. do you feel depressed? take a pill! you've lost passion for your job? take a pill! you no longer love your wife of 40 years? take a pill! you feel that your life is a hassle and you want to end it all by jumping off a bridge? take a pill!

scientists are now beginning to understand the workings of the brain, albeit slowly. they've already mapped which parts of the brain function for emotion, and behavior, and sensation, and basic motion. and using an MRI to scan the brain, they can even read (sort of) what thoughts are going on in your head by measuring the blood flow in your brain. once science has fully understood the brain, the possibilities of what we can do scares me.

and when that time comes, the essence of humanity, of what it means to exist, is reduced to that of being a machine. we will be nothing more than living, breathing, thinking machines, no better than robots. it somehow robs us of a reason, of meaning, in our existence. we just happen to be here because we are here, period.

even sentience has a price, and it isn't cheap. my thoughts are beginning to scare me.

that must be why i get so envious of my cat miming every time i see her get her siesta. all she does is eat, sleep, and hunt for mice and roaches. and she doesn't have the facility to torture herself with thought. i'm starting to think we humans actually got the raw end of the deal.

but what do we do about it? do we despair over it and ruin our day?

i say, let's just swallow the possibility, believe whatever you want to believe, and get back to the business of living. we happen to be here, we might as well enjoy the ride.

some of you philosopher types may now be punching wholes in my line of thinking. but either way the debate ends up, soul or no soul, doesn't make our time here less precious. and the prospect of having no soul actually makes it even more so. if we have no soul, and it follows, no afterlife, then our time here is the only one we've got.

now, if they only had a pill for hangovers, then that would be really great...

stupid spartans: my review of the movie '300'

almost everyone has been giving their own 2 cents on the matter, so i'm jumping on the bandwagon and giving my own :)

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when you say 'spartan', the first thing that comes to my mind isn't the small brave band of greek warriors and their king valiantly defending a small mountain pass from an overwhelmingly huge persian army trying to invade greece. the first thing that i actually think about is 'tsinelas'. but of course, the movie 300 has nothing to do with footwear.

i went to cinema 1 of ayala center cebu expecting at least some amusement. but i didn't expect to get some before the movie started. while waiting for the movie to start, i had the funny misfortune of having budoy of pinoy big brother and junior kilat fame suddenly appearing and then sitting right *in front* of me. the towering structure on top of his head (which i presume to be his hair, if not a radio antenna or a bunch of snakes) partially blocked my view of the movie screen. i had to reposition myself a couple of times so i had an unobstructed view of the movie.

in a nutshell, the movie is basically a stylized storytelling of the battle of thermopylae (a.k.a. the "hot gates") based on the graphic novel by frank miller, where according to greek history, the spartan king leonidas led a small force of 300 men against an invading persian army numbering in the hundreds of thousands. like the previous movie based on miller's comic book sin city, the visuals of 300 adopted the look and feel of the comic book.

the movie actually reminded me of the lord of the rings. the persian emperor xerxes was leading an army of orcs, ogres, grenade throwing wizards, and even mumakil from the return of the king. the whole movie was essentially an extended lord of the rings battle scene. when the mumakil... i mean, elephants, came to attack the spartan positions, i half expected legolas to come out and slay the beasts. the movie was also accused of being racist (the bad guys were either black or arab looking, if not orcish). wait... wasn't lord of the rings accused of being racist also? hmmm...

i think most guys have the same favorite scene in the movie. c'mon people... don't be afraid to admit it... yes, *OUR* favorite scene was the dancing oracle---in semi nude. if only we had fortune tellers like *those* instead of strange old ladies like madam auring, then maybe we'd listen to them more.

xerxes the emperor (empress?) of persia was hilarious. i expected him (or her) to be more like sauron from lord of the rings, wearing thick iron armor, a big helmet showing eyes flaming red, and with a huge battle club in hand. but xerxes as a club fag? hahahaha... who would've thought of that?

and what's with the hunchback dude ephialtes? all it took for him to betray leonidas was neither gold nor glory, but a visit to the nearby strip club and a uniform (he tells xerxes, "i want a uniform!" ... huh?!). as my friend chick succinctly put it: "nadala ra sa pautog".

and poor queen gorgo. she had to sacrifice her ass (literally) to the evil politician dude theron ("this will not be over quickly. you will not enjoy this," he tells her) so she could get the chance to speak before the spartan council and convince them to send reinforcements and save her husband. yet it was all too late. but at least she had her revenge. he... uhh... "stabbed" her first, so she stabs him back, but this time with a *REAL* sword. now that's what i call justice.

unfortunately for leonidas, the movie portrays him and his 300 warriors as brave... and brainless. they were so brave (and brainless) they went into battle bare chested with no armor whatsoever (the unrestrained display of chiseled chests and six-pack abs served as an extremely effective form of advertising for fitness gyms the world over). they were so brave (and brainless) they went into battle with the odds of 300 to 100,000 X N where N > 1 (if you *really* want to know, you can research the value of N). and they were so brave (and brainless) they were actually *convinced* they could win (again the question... huh?!). apparently, spartan culture valued bravery over wisdom.

if stupidity is in the genes, it's a good thing leonidas and his 300 brainlessly brave warriors all died in thermopylae. we wouldn't any more of their DNA spreading in the human gene pool, or else the species homo sapiens would have been extinct by now...

..but judging by the way some of our own congressmen and cabinet members are doing, i guess they *DID* spread their DNA. we're doomed.

assholes

the assholes who call themselves congressmen are at it again:

Congress pork doubles in ’07 budget
Pork used to buy overpriced fertilizer

mathematical error

from the philippine daily inquirer:

According to Legarda, the fact that the survey was done by a US firm with 1,500 respondents nationwide -- 200 more than SWS’s usual 1,200 -- “added authority” to the results.

the frustrated fan

my heart breaks. and no, not because the girl of my dreams turned me down. my heart breaks because the san miguel beermen just lost the 2007 pba philippine cup championship to baranggay ginebra in 6 games.

and with that, coach chot reyes gains the ignominy of being the only coach in pba history to have gained a 2-0 advantage in a best of seven championship series and have his team lose the next 4 games and the championship. and worse, he will be the only coach in pba history to have that happen to him twice.

i know, coaches tend to be the easiest scapegoats when a team loses. not to take anything away from coach chot, he's done a fine job. this is his first conference with san miguel. and with all the new guys around (which, along with the new coach, essentially makes smb a new team), it's impressive how he was able to make them work together and reach as far as the finals. all that while handling duties as coach of the national team.

but they shouldn't have lost game 4 the way they did. wasn't the 131-101 beating they got in game 3 enough to convince them to make adjustments? well apparently not. their record setting 146-111 game 4 loss was even worse, probably the worst finals loss in pba history.

but really, in that series, baranggay ginebra was simply the better team. coach jong uichico did a great job at the helm. "the fast and the furious" tandem of jayjay helterbrand and mark caguioa ran circles around the san miguel defense. the return of eric menk from injury was an inspiration to the team. there's rudy hatfield running the break and snatching all those improbable rebounds... what planet did this guy come from? ronald tubid proved to be a major nuisance for danny seigle, successfully getting to danny's head every now and then. and we saw flashes of the old johnny a. they deserved the title.

and let's not forget baranggay ginebra's 6th man. the ginebra fans were simply being ginebra fans: loud, exuberant, and numerous. they cheered every shot, every rebound, every steal. they stayed on even when ginebra was down 2-0 in the series and all seemed lost. that is what gives ginebra a distinct advantage over other teams in the pba: wherever they play, they always seem to have what the nba calls "homecourt advantage". it's like whatever court ginebra plays in IS their homecourt.

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it's a strange thing this, being a fan. you consider as yours the fate of a bunch of people who you don't even know personally and haven't even met. you rejoice at their victories. you despair over their defeats. every high and every low the team goes through is yours.

i became a san miguel fan around the mid 90s, which was quite unfortunate. i had read about the glory of the old san miguel team of the late 80s and early 90s, the one with hall of famers like ramon fernandez, samboy lim, hector calma, and then later, allan caidic and ato agustin. but san miguel at that time was an aging shell of its old self. the new teams were dominating, like the vergel meneses led sunkist, and then the grand slam winning alaska, and occasional intrusions by alvin patrimonio's purefoods and the ever popular baranggay ginebra.

but i hung on. somehow, through those times when they almost won (like the 1995 governor's cup or the 1998 all filipino cup, both against alaska and both going to a game 7) or when they simply sucked (like the horrible 1996 commissioner's cup, when they didn't even get through the eliminations), in the back of my head, i believed they were going to start winning again. i kept the faith, even if reality was mocking it.

it's like religion, being a fan. you place your hopes (and your bets) on something which isn't a sure thing. sometimes, your team loses one game after another, and your faith waivers. sometimes you want to switch to what looks like a better religion, i mean team, because their promise of salvation, i mean victory, seems surer.

but then the new guys came. olsen racela, then danny ildefonso, then danny seigle, then nic belasco. and they actually started winning. first, the 1999 commissioner's, then the 1999 governor's. then in 2000 they successfully defended both titles. then in 2001, the most prestigious of the pba crowns, the all filipino, which they won against ginebra also in 6 games (i guess we can call ginebra's recent victory as mark caguioa's revenge). sports commentators were calling it a dynasty. finally, after all those years waiting, there before my very eyes, my team was kicking ass!

it was weird. after all those years waiting, after having invested so much passion and emotion, to actually see it right there on my tv screen... it was just weird. it was like finishing a 13k marathon in first place, but i didn't even do the running. i simply believed, and thus i basked in the reflected glory of their victory. if i may take the religion analogy a bit further at risk of sounding sacrilegious, it was like dying and seeing heaven. my faith had been proven right.

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a friend suggested that if the beermen lost in the finals, coach chot should exclude all ginebra players from the national team. seemed like a farfetched idea at first glance, but now i think about it, if my passion for smb trumped my concern for the country's pride in international basketball, then that would have made some sense.

pushing that further, if i were a really passionate smb fan, i'd have waited outside the gates of araneta coliseum and when, say, mark caguioa or jay-jay helterbrand came out, i (or, if you're not the hands on kind of guy, hired goons) would have them kidnapped for a while, only releasing them once the series was over. wait... didn't i see this in a movie?

this reminds me of a recent piece of world news: the football game riots in italy that led to the death of 1 policeman and the indefinite cancellation of all football matches in all of italy. we can't deny it: they were passionate fans. they lived and breathed their football clubs. they were so passionate, it even drove them to the point of violence against fans of the rival team.

let me be clear about this: i do not advocate the use of violence. my point is, if we can invest so much energy and passion in just watching our sports heroes play (which in itself is of little use to society), imagine what we can do if we divert that energy elsewhere.

with that kind of passion, we can defeat poverty and hunger. we can stop corruption. we can bring true progress to our country. we can slow down and maybe even halt the destruction of our planet. we can change the world!

now, if we could only see living as a sport, then we could make ourselves fans of the world. and like true fans, we'd consider as ours the fate of the world, and then maybe we can make things better for everybody. empathy is the essence of compassion. i can almost hear michael jackson in the background singing "heal the world"...

pardon me, i'm preachifying.

but the next time san miguel and ginebra face off, i will pray to all the basketball gods and basketball saints i can call on (is there a patron saint of basketball? like maybe a saint michael jordan?) so smb can have its revenge. watch out ginebra, your time will come.

translate this

here's something from an officemate that i've been puzzling over for hours. translate from tagalog to english:

ika-ilang presidente ng pilipinas si gloria macapagal arroyo?

and this is the closest thing i have for an answer:

if gloria macapagal arroyo is the Nth president of the philippines, what is the value of N?

The Bright Side of Surgery

published 4/12/2007 in the youngblood section of the philippine daily inquirer

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For the second time in my short life, I have to undergo surgery. Thinking about it depresses me greatly. So in the spirit of optimism, I'm trying to figure out if there is a bright side to surgery.

My doctor calls the procedure a "radical neck dissection". They'll be making a cut starting from below my left ear curving down to the base of my neck then back up to the other ear. Then they'll lift the skin off my neck and then remove bad lymph nodes they come across.

It occurs to me that the procedure makes me sound like a biology class experiment. I would be like that poor unsuspecting frog we plucked out from his happy corner of the marsh back in high school, for the education of future doctors and surgeons. That experiment had been an eye opening experience for me. It convinced me once and for all that I would never be a surgeon. Me wonders now how my surgeon did with his frog. I pray to God he did well.

To cheer me up, I try convincing myself that the procedure would be simple and straight forward. But when I first talked to my surgeon, he said the procedure would actually take twice as long (about 4 hours) and be more extensive than my first surgery. The word that caught my attention was "extensive". I never realized how an ordinary word can sound so scary. And 4 hours is long! The chances of things happening... I am totally screwed...

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After coming back to my surgeon for final scheduling, I received a nice shock about the risks involved. I had heard that as a side effect, the skin around my neck will lose sensation, maybe even for the rest of my life. When I asked if this was true, he said that was "part and parcel" of the procedure because some nerves were going to be severed when they lift the skin off my neck.

That was already bad enough by itself, really, but when I asked if there were other risks involved, he said that there was also the possibility during the operation (though uncommon) that the nerve allowing me to move my shoulders would also be severed. That hit me. What am i getting myself into? If the numbness was bad, this is a lot worse.

Am I scared? No, I'm not scared. Terrified? No, not terrified. Terrified can only describe half of how it feels (uhh... terrified x 2?). But f*ck it, I have no other choice. My only 2 options right now are a.) go through with the surgery and accept the risks or b.) not go through the surgery and face the possibility of me getting worse.

My mother has been telling me to take "herbal" supplements in the hope that it would act as cure. But let's face it, we really can't put our faith on those, especially when they start claiming that they can cure all deadly diseases known to man. That is clearly bullshit, money making schemes cleverly designed to hold our faith, give us hope, and take us for a ride, even if that ride is taking us straight to hell. Trusting solely on them is gambling with your health. I am not a gambler by nature. So it'll be the surgery then.

Then I asked if there were any more possible complications. My surgeon gave me a curious smile, and said no. I have this stinking feeling that he's hiding something. Maybe he just didn't think it wise to tell me lest I get too worried and call it off. Or maybe i'm just being paranoid.

As I sat there listening to my surgeon explain things, I wasn't even sure if I was hearing everything correctly. Part of me wanted to shout, to curse the world and to trash my surgeon's clinic. But another was slowly tugging me to a more passive yet highly curious state. I wondered what it would be like to shave with the numbness on my neck (No more sting when putting on aftershave! Yehey!). Or how to wear my backpack if I no longer have full control of my shoulders. Would that affect my game in basketball or pingpong? It's a defense mechanism, I think, a mental anaesthetic to numb our feelings lest the pain cause us to lose our sanity.

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Times like these make me evaluate the status of my faith, or can I really call it faith? I'm not even sure if I actually believe in what I say, so much more the Object of my faith. And now that my circumstances prevail upon me to call out and reignite my faith, I'm not even sure if it is right to do so.

You see, my motivations are suspect. Is it right to believe for the sake of my own sanity instead of believing purely for the sake of believing? Is it right to believe because it feels good to believe instead of believing because you are convinced of its truth? Is it right to believe simply because you fear the possible consequences of not believing, a.k.a. hell?

But that's what makes faith such a tricky thing. By its own Bible definition, faith, being "the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen", has an element of irrationality to it. You can believe (or say you believe) in something and either be considered a saint (if they agree with you) or a lunatic (if they disagree with you). Hmmm... saints & lunatics... same thing really.

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I've successfully kept the surgery a secret for some time now. And so far, only very few people know of it. After hearing of my 2 week leave of absence from work, officemates have been wondering where I would be going all that time. Speculations range from the benign ("You're going on vacation? Bring us pasalubong ha!") to the imprudent ("You're resigning? When's the despedida?") to the ridiculous yet highly imaginative ("You're getting married? Where will you be spending your honeymoon?"). Truly, man's imagination knows no bounds.

Upon hearing the truth, the default and inevitable follow up question is "Why?". But I hate answering all the questions, which usually leads to even more questions, so on and so forth, like I was some specimen under a microscope for analysis.

And there's always the chance that people will be looking at me differently, like I'm some side show freak; that the scar on my neck will become part of their definition of who I am.

But now that I think about it, what's the use keeping it secret? Assuming I do come out of it alive, people will eventually notice the scar anyway. I can't hide it forever. And I can't hide from it forever.

That's why, amidst the depression, fear, paranoia, doubt, and confusion, I need to find out if there really is a bright side to surgery, the proverbial silver lining in every cloud. Or if there is even a higher purpose to all this, real or imagined. I need to find a way to get through it with myself still intact. So far, I'm still figuring it out.

my first post for the year

not until 2 weeks after the fact did it really sink in: "holy crap, it's already 2007". and then the anxiety.

a sudden urge for iced green tea had sent me scampering to the neighborhood convenience store. after paying for a bottle, i took the first available seat in sight, opened the bottle and started sipping. one by one, cars stop by to refuel at the gasoline station outside as i ruminated over my drink. then the kids came.

there were 3 of them, 2 boys and a girl. they came into the store running and laughing, like everything was alright in the world. they played catch in between the shelves, got scolded for playing catch between the shelves, then picked some popsicles from the freezer and paid for them at the counter. then they went out of the store, still running and laughing like everything was alright in the world.

i watched their antics not without a bit of envy. i used to be like that, i thought. whatever happened to me? oh, right. i had to "grow up". oh, how far i have fallen. then it occurs to me: "holy crap, it's already 2007. yet i'm still wishing it were 1997".

friends seem to share the same anxiety. from our calculations, in a little over 5 years we'd be 30. and when you hit 30, a lot of things change. and even worse, when you're 30, you no longer have any excuse to even pretend to being a kid.

i finished my drink, got up, and went back home thinking: why would i wish to go back to being a kid again? is life really that bad? is at all really downhill from here?

i'm not going to advertise my troubles here again. we already have enough our own. and i don't think you'd need to know a litany of my own troubles just to confirm how shitty the world really is. you should already know that, unless you're a clam who's never gotten out of your shell.

and apart from our own troubles come society's demands. for every passing year, people tend to put more expectations on you; that you should be making this much money, that you should own the latest stuff, that you should be married already, or at least have a stable relationship, blablablablabla.

it sucks.

but as i remembered my friends' similar anxieties over the unassailable march of time, i felt a little better. just knowing they feel the same way at least confirms that i'm not alone in this.

just like that song from the musical avenue q that goes, "on avenue q, it sucks to be me, on avenue q, it sucks to be you, on avenue q, it sucks to be us, but not when we're together". i couldn't have put it better myself.

cheers to a better year.

st. nikolay

prologue: an old man in a red coat stands by his window looking at the arctic landscape. "the arctic winters have gotten warmer", thought the old man. he was convinced that he could go out without his coat and not even get frostbite. "signs of the times", says the old man to himself, "signs of the times". a beep reaches his ears. "finally, the message i've been waiting for." the old man goes to his computer. click.

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to: secret agent nikolay code name santa claus, operation christmas headquarters, north pole

from: kgb high command, kgb central headquarters, the kremlin, moscow

TOP SECRET. FOR YOUR EYES ONLY.

we are now in the final stages of our plan for world domination. high command commends you, comrade nikolay, on the progress of your mission. the mind control devices you have planted in your toys are now being monitored by central headquarters. based on our satellite scans, your delivery method using reindeer powered sleigh has thus far proven effective, as the devices have already spread in all corners of the world. it has also successfully penetrated the specified strategic points, like the white house, UN headquarters, and the homes of other important world leaders. come christmas eve, we will activate these devices and turn the children of the world into zombies who will carry out our commands. this new zombie army will turn against their parents, who will be forced to submit to their children's wishes, and we will rule the world! bwahahahaha!

in line with our master plan, high command wishes to give you your new orders:

** on dec 24 at exactly 2255 hours GMT +12:00, we will commence with the final phase of operation christmas. you will form your reindeer delivery squad, and at exactly 2300 hours GMT +12:00 you will launch from your hidden base in the north pole and begin delivery of the toys planted with the trigerring module for the mind control devices already in place. you will begin delivering to the first timezone that will hit dec 25 (GMT +12:00) and after completion of delivery in that timezone you will continue on to succeeding timezones. as the planet turns in its axis, our satellites will position themselves on the timezone that will be hitting dec 25 and send a signal to the trigerring module, which in turn will activate the mind control device, and voila, instant world domination. while the world parties, it shall fall into our hands timezone by timezone. bwahahahaha!

** kgb spies in the cia have reported the presence of a double agent in your ranks, as american intelligence agents at langley seem to have recently caught on to our scheme. high command orders you to identify this spy and eliminate him immediately! initial investigation have so far placed our suspicions on the commander of your delivery squad, major rudolph, as his nose may possibly be used as a beacon for cia satellites to monitor your progress. our investigation also indicated that he may also have accomplices among the elves in your research and development team. you must root them out and teach them what it means to be on your "naughty" list.

** based on initial tests of our mind control devices, our philippine operations is facing some setbacks. filipino children are currently being brain washed by a tune used in the popular noontime show "wowowee". the tune's sequence goes: boom-ta-rat-ta-rat! boom-ta-rat-ta-rat! ta-ra-rat! ta-ra-rat! boom! boom! boom! this may sound quite benign when you first hear it, but our scientists have discovered that the said tune is interfering with the frequency we are using to control the children's brain waves. intelligence reports have pointed to an alias "willie revillame", who is known to be the mastermind behind "wowowee". the said noontime show has already begun systematic enslavement of whole sections of the philippine populace. even seemingly respectable old women are selling their dignity for a thousand pesos and a chance to be shown on national TV. you must understand, comrade nikolay, that alias "willie revillame" CANNOT be underestimated. our whole operation will fail if the cia discovers this flaw in our grand plan. alias "willie revillame" must be stopped!

** once we take over the world, we are going to need puppet administrators that will assist us in directing world affairs. recent news has pointed out a suitable source of candidates: philippine congressmen. it was discovered that their brains waves can easily be manipulated by simple illusions of money and power. thus, with this in mind, our scientists have designed a new mind control device especially for them. we will be sending you a list of candidates for delivery of the device, and you will implement delivery of this new device together with the trigerring module.

high command cannot over emphasize the fact: FAILURE IS NOT AN OPTION. the motherland has long awaited to take over the world and finally exact its revenge on america. if our plan succeeds, the americans will finally learn what it means to be enslaved. america will finally learn what it means to do the bidding of the world's new, and only, superpower! america will learn what it feels to have airplanes bomb their cities and tanks crash through their streets! america will learn what it feels to have foreign soldiers raping their own women! vengeance is sweet! bwahahahahaha!

and most importantly, remember this comrade nikolay: the motherland owes you deeply and will never forget you in your endeavors. if all goes well, as a reward we will change the meaning of christmas day. every year for the next thousand years, christmas day will no longer be about the child who was born in a manger, it will be to celebrate the exploits of st. nikolay a.k.a. santa claus! children of the next thousand generations will be singing praises to your name! images of you driving your reindeer powered sleigh or you climbing in chimneys to deliver your "gifts" will be placed in every room in every house in every nation in the whole wide world! in their eyes, you will be a god!

but of course, we communists don't believe in god. bwahahahaha!

long live the revolution!

KGB HIGH COMMAND

P.S. delete message after reading or your computer will explode in 5 seconds.

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epilogue: fortunately for the world (or unfortunately, which ever side of the fence you stand), st. nikolay had been negligent and never read the last sentence of the message from kgb high command. 5 seconds later, cia satellites detect a huge and powerful explosion in the north pole. operation christmas's secret base was destroyed. the explosion also killed major rudolph and his reindeer squad and all the elves. but st. nikolay's body was never found. kgb high command's plan was never carried out. the world is safe... for now. but is it really?

sabado nights

this was about 3 saturdays ago

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a generic saturday evening in my neighborhood would involve the following: a few houses away to the left, a murder... no, a massacre is being committed against supposedly popular songs, facilitated in no small part by that evil evil invention: the portable videoke machine. meanwhile, a few meters away in the opposite direction, another house is blasting the night with loud and irritating 80's disco music (with the purpose of driving away evil spirits like we do every new year's eve, i suppose?). and right in front of our house, members of the beer belly club gather for their weekly booze sessions, drinking themselves silly like they had a strong death wish (their motto being: eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die), and as a result causing a racket not unlike what you would hear from a pack of squabbling dogs.

imagine the pain of having to hear "brother louie" playing over and over again in an infinite loop, combined with a rendition of "my way" so horrible that it would make frank sinatra rise from the grave to seek justice by strangling the singer. enduring these torments every weekend may be enough to qualify me for sainthood. that would make me saint kenneth, patron saint of those who suffer from uncivilized neighbors.

but this was not your usual saturday evening. no songs were being massacred. no 80's disco music to wreak havoc upon the night. and the beer belly club was mercifully absent (i hope their wives, or their livers, are telling them to slow things down). it was that rare and pleasant saturday evening, the general peace and quiet allowing me to catch up on my backlog of books. but as to how unusual it would actually be, i had not realized yet.

sir francis drake was about to finish up his attack against a contingent of the spanish armada that was anchored in cadiz when i hear gasps of alarm from the next door neighbor's house. curiosity had gotten the better of me, so sir francis drake took a break for a while. i put my book down and listened. then the word i had always dreaded reached my ears: sunog (fire).

the combination of iced coffee and panic gave me palpitations. i jumped out of my seat, ran out of the room, and looked through the windows on each side of the house. a terrible light brightened the sky north of us. the fire was huge and looked dangerously near. i alerted everyone in the house.

there's nothing like a common threat to galvanize a whole community to action, even though you annoy each other's guts. my mom and my aunt ran outside to gather any news they could get about the fire. calls were made to the local fire department. updates as to the location and status of the fire was broadcast around the neighborhood. and just in case, everybody started filling up all available buckets and containers with water. in that moment of great danger, everyone had suddenly become comrades. how pinoy.

meanwhile, we switched the radio to the AM band and searched for any station reporting the incident. sure enough, an evening news program caught wind of the fire and a reporter was already on site giving a blow by blow account. according to the report, the fire was at a factory just 3 or 4 blocks away. the city's firetrucks were having a hard time getting to it because the street leading to the factory was too tight. right. so what else is new?

the reporter began doing interviews with the factory's security guard and onlookers in the area. by the sound of the it, the security guard, the onlookers and even the reporter himself seemed to be enjoying the spectacle. why... those crabs! just wait till it's YOUR house...

in the face of oncoming catastrophe, i started evaluating my dependence on my possessions. i looked at my books, my pc, my collection of music cds, dvds, toys and gadgets... would i be able to live without all these? i had begun to resign myself to a future without them. i think it was dostoevski who wrote that man is a being who can get used to anything. guess i'll have to get used to losing my stuff.

then the irony of it struck me. how strange it is for us to spend a huge chunk of what little time we have allotted on this earth to accumulate all our possessions, and yet the moment we lose them by circumstances cruel yet indifferent, then will those possessions ultimately bring us nothing but pain. we slave away at our tiny office cubicles to accumulate all this but in the face of our common destiny, it wouldn't matter. we won't be able to bring them with us anyway.

don't be mistaken. i do not advocate a return to the stone age. i just find it oddly poetic that it has to take something catastrophic like a fire or a flood or the specter of imminent death to jar our senses and get our priorities straight. things that we consider bad sometimes do serve a purpose. it's up to us to figure out how to turn it to our advantage.

yet what makes things tragic is when the going gets back to being good, we take advantage of the luxury by turning priorities back to our diverse frivolities. just when we see the light, just when we learn something profound and supposedly life changing, then we forget. we never seem to learn. funny thing this, human nature.

our radio reporter finally comes back on air with an update. a firewall was now blocking the spread of the fire. we were spared! waves of relief wash over me. looks like we won't have to go back to the stone age after all. things begin quieting down in the neighborhood. everybody seems to have lost interest in the fire after hearing the good news. we were all back to minding our own business. so continues the story of sir francis drake and the spanish armada...

and that is how i spent my saturday evening.

but wait... what's that i hear? oh crap, they're singing again. like nero playing the lute while the rest of rome burned to the ground.

capuccino for free!

back on the subject of unique and unusual names. at work, i have an officemate named freedom (her parents must be activists of some sort) and someone in another department named life. disclaimer: i have no intention of poking fun at both of you guys, nor do i consider you lower beings simply on the account of your given names, for given names maketh not a man. but think about the implications: what if they ordered coffee at starbucks or pizza at yellow cab? in ms. freedom's case, people call her "free", so when the the counter at starbucks announces the arrival of her order they'd be shouting: "capuccino for free!". in mr. life's case, if he makes an order at yellow cab, they'd be announcing: "pizza for life!". imagine how that sounds: free coffee and a life time supply of pizza! a stampede would ensue upon announcement, for sure. everybody would be rushing to the counter...

...but on second thought, at least their parents hadn't named them death and slavery...

is doing good always good?

an edited version of the ff. piece was published last saturday 11/25/06 in the crossline section of sunstar cebu's weekend magazine

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is doing good always good?

this question entered my mind when a curious thing happened to me on the way home from work one night. i was walking to the jeepney stop where i usually get my ride when i met one of the security guards from my office on the way. he flashed a wide grin when he saw me, almost like a sigh of relief.

"bossing!", we greeted each other. this was followed by some chitchat on what floor of the office building i was actually in and under what department i belonged to. after about a minute or so, my already grumbling stomach reminded me to get home, so i was about to end the conversation when he asked me if he could borrow twenty pesos so he could get a ride home.

this surprised me a bit. we weren't close. i didn't know his name, and he probably didn't know mine. we just called each other "bossing". i didn't even like the guy so much, as he was the guard who always seemed to be so strict on me, inspecting me everytime i enter the office to see if i was wearing the proper attire, while everybody else escapes his scrutiny. but i thought, "uhhh ok... sure, why not? this is my chance to do something nice to someone who's practically a stranger..." i quickly took out from my wallet a crisp twenty peso bill and gave it to him.

he apologetically took the money and thanked me, saying that his salary had been delayed by the security agency. i assured him that it was no problem. after a final word of thanks from him, we parted and i went back on my way. then something unexpectedly bothered me.

i felt guilty.

yes, you read that right. i felt guilty. of all things to feel guilty about, it was for doing a good thing. weird. why? this i pondered on the ride home.

was it really a "good" thing in the first place? it couldn't have been inherently bad. the guy needed help, and i gave it to him. i did it without any ulterior motive behind me, no plan of using it to gain something for myself, and expecting nothing in return. common sense dictates that it couldn't have been a bad thing in itself.

could it have been just my exasperation over the general unfairness of the world? maybe. here i was, with some extra money i didn't need that badly, and there he was, the opposite of me, needing just a little money to get home but not having it. he might even have a family waiting for him to bring something home for the dinner table.

but the world IS generally unfair to everyone, me included. it can't be my fault that the world is unfair. it just is. we are all the walking wounded, as they say. the world piles upon us all layer upon layer of crap and we are all just fellow sufferers in this shared predicament. so it can't be that. so why the guilt?

then it hit me. there is something so deliciously superior about doing a good thing to someone in need. i actually felt a bit smug about doing the "good" deed, as if i felt good that he was in situation where he needed my help. as if i was happy that i had an advantage over him so i could "help" him.

it's the same way you can consider acts of charity as basically acts of vanity too. giving those "bundles of joy" every christmas not just calms your own conscience. it also confirms your superiority over the benificiaries of your benevolence, not just in terms of material wealth, but also in goodness, as if goodness can be bought with wealth.

so is that what the good feeling you get after doing something good really is, a confirmation of your superiority? a mere ego boost?

they say good should not be a means to an end, it should be an end in itself. but human nature always seems to find a way to twist the good. does this stop us then from doing the good?

as humans, we can never be perfect. but it is also human to aspire to be perfect. we live our lives in an endless struggle to attain our ideals.

the myth of sisyphus comes to mind. for his crimes against the gods, sisyphus was condemned to roll a boulder up the side of a hill and topple it down the other side. but just when he is about to reach the top and succeed, his strength fails him and the boulder rolls back down the mountain. he goes back for the boulder, begins again, and the cycle continues.

like sisyphus, we labor on to reach our ideal of good. but just when we seem to be getting there, we commit mistakes, things that we know are wrong, things that bother our consience. we are doomed to fail in our attempt to reach perfection.

but that does not mean we stop. even if we may never reach perfection in our daily lives, our effort to reach it adds meaning to our life. it is in the struggle that we find meaning.

thus we must labor on and run the good race, even if at times we fall down, even if we fail, because our failures are bridges to Him in Whom we will find perfection.

poor loser(s)

ralf souquet just happened to suck at his game at a very bad time. and ronnie alcano's peaking performance made things even worse for souquet, making alcano the 3rd filipino to win the world pool championship.

i'm not taking anything away from alcano, of course. except for that moment when the score stood at 15-9 where he missed the 9-ball (of all balls on the table...), he played great pool against souquet. his break was efficient: soft yet accurate, which is just the opposite of the djanggo bustamante break with the accompanying flying kick from his right leg. his combination shots with the 9-ball were gutsy game winners which the crowd loved. and his safety game was just beautiful it boggled the mind, much to souquet's discomfort. to reach the final he even beat other big name players in the tournament like efren "bata" reyes and the defending champion wu chia ching of taiwan.

but nevertheless, ralf souquet simply sucked... and he knew it. he struggled with a lot of errors and which alcano took advantage of to dominate the match. even his break didn't help him, not giving him a clear shot to the next object ball. in fact, he sucked so much that during the post game interview, he couldn't help but shed tears in front of God, espn, and everybody. poor loser. seeing a grown man like him cry was so unsettling for anthony suntay (who did the post game interview) that, in a weak attempt to make souquet feel better, suntay encouraged the crowd to applaud souquet, telling him to "feel the love" of the filipino fans. hahahahahaha. schadenfreude, more like.

naturally, the newspaper headlines the following day were all about alcano's win. and president arroyo, the political animal that she is, does the same thing she did with manny pacquiao and takes advantage of the situation, awarding alcano the "champion for life" award (corny name for an award, no?) and a cool 1 million pesos (kaaachiiing). i wouldn't be surprised if members of the house of representatives and the senate, plus his home town's mayor, vice mayor, ... [fill in the blanks] ... up to the baranggay tanod, will all be lining up to give him heaps and heaps and heaps of awards. anything to bask in the reflected glory of alcano's victory, i guess.

but wait a minute... don't you notice something here? try mentioning a list of sports filipinos have excelled at internationally. and when i say internationally, i mean the philippines vs. the world kind of international. so in that definition, our win at the last sea games won't count (we had homecourt advantage there anyway). let's see, we have billiards, boxing, bowling... see it now? aside from the obvious and strange fact that they all start with the letter B, the other thing common with them is that they are all individual sports.

tell me, have filipinos ever excelled in a team sport internationally? let's see... basketball? nope... we can't even win gold at the asian games. football? even worse, i think myanmar just gave the philippine team a good thumping at a southeast asian event recently... uhhh, rugby? does the philippines even have a rugby team? rugby boys, maybe... how about baseball? yeah, we did win once in an international little league competition some years ago, but we did it by sending overage players. holy crap. we can't even seem to win in team sports without cheating!

what the hell does that mean? that pinoys can only excel when they are working for their own glory? that pinoys cannot grasp the concept of a TEAM, much more the concept of a NATION? another result of the notorious crab mentality that we all complain about but never seem to conquer?

doesn't speak so well for us as a people, no?

remembrance of turtles past

as a personal gift to myself for my 24th birthday, i bought an action figure of the teenage mutant ninja turtle leonardo. aside from his "Trusty katanas", leonardo also came with "New Sabers!", "New Straight Swords!", and "Ninja Throwing Stars!". and apart from the "New Warrior Weapons!", what made this leonardo cooler was it had "New Ninja Moves! Weapon Spinning Action!", meaning, if you squeeze his legs together, leonardo will start spinning his weapons to make them "Slice and Dice!". "These new moves rock!", leonardo says.

cooool. it's great to escape from the horrors of being "grown up" and go back to being a kid again, once in a while.

i used to have an action figure of that same leonardo eons ago, when i was a kid. of all the action figures i had, he was my favorite. for weapons, leonardo sr. had two katana swords, two ninja throwing stars, a club that looked like an armadillo, a pizza like thingy with blades jutting out of the edges, and a turtle shell that opens at the back where he can store his weapons. i no longer have him with me, owing to my carelessness as a kid.

my love affair with the turtles started when i was in 4th grade. typhoon ruping had just struck cebu, and we spent the next month or so living in the stone age, with neither electricity, light, or television. then when the electricity came back, like the bringers of light, so appeared the teenage mutant ninja turtles.

i remember being glued to the tv on friday nights waiting for each new episode of the turtles. i watched them in their struggle against shredder and the foot, and laughed at their weird and silly enemies like bebop (a mutant warthog) and rocksteady (a mutant rhino) and krang (a brainlike alien with a robot body). then after the turtles, an episode of the x-men came next on tv. i also loved the x-men (i still do), but for childish silliness, nothing beats the turtles.

at the end of the school year during 4th grade, our teachers allowed us kids to bring our toys along with us to school. i salivated at what my classmates brought with them. the ninja turtles! there was leonardo! and rafael and donatello and michaelangelo! i HAD to get one. i begged... no... i pestered my mother to buy me a toy. when that didn't work, i bribed her with my report card (my grades still looked great those days), so she gave in.

after a run of about two years or so on tv, the turtles disappeared. then i lost leonardo sr. and then came high school. the "REAL WORLD" was now upon me. i had to grow up. it was all downhill from there.

so now i struggle with the evils of work, paying the bills, and worrying about "THE FUTURE". work is fine, i can bear it. paying the bills is fine, i can swallow that. but the "THE FUTURE" scares me shitless.

there you are patiently slugging it out with the devils of "THE FUTURE". you seem to be winning. things seem to look good. and then WHAM! "THE FUTURE" gives you a powerful uppercut on the chin, and you are down on your butt on the canvass with the referee giving you the count. you are dazed. you are confused. but you have to get up. you just can't give up. you can't wimp out. it all seems so pointless, but you have no choice.

so you get up off your ass and slug it out again. and it goes on, and on. it's a cruel cycle.

can you blame me then, or anyone else for that matter, if i spend a few moments of my time dreaming that i was a kid again? if only life were as clean and simple as an episode of the turtles, where you KNOW the good guys always win against the bad guys at the end of this week's episode.

but life is not that way. and to grow up is to realize that life is not that way. you just have to swallow it if you are to survive. at times i despair over that fact. makes me want my innocence back.

in his poem "ode on a distant prospect of eton college", thomas grey lamented:

"yet ah! why should they know their fate?
since sorrow never comes too late
and happiness too swiftly flies
thought would destroy their paradise
no more; where ignorance is bliss
'tis folly to be wise."

ahh... the dillema, between sorrowful wisdom and ignorant bliss. but we cannot remain ignorant and innocent forever. either we open our eyes, or our eyes are forced open. but every once in a while, i close my eyes for a moment and pretend that i was kid again, that everything would be alright after this week's episode. then i open my eyes again, and, re-energized, i continue my struggle with "THE FUTURE".

bring it on...

overheard at the mall

girl holding her celfone, to one of her girl companions, in that whiney kris aquino tone:

"jen, do you know how to pangita the signal?"

HOOOLY CRAP. what is happening to the world? and what kind of mutant language was THAT? how should we call it? bislish? or engsaya? call me whatever it is you want to call me, but the day everybody in cebu speaks like kris aquino is the day i pack my bags and leave for the mountains.

madness, i tell you...

life thus far

24. the number of hours in a day. the number of seats in the philippine senate. the title of one of my favorite tv shows. michael jordan's number + 1. kobe bryant's new number (though i am certainly NO FAN of kobe bryant. he has the ego of a michael jordan, but none of the leadership skills to show for it. AND he has to thank shaq for his championship rings). and today, the 4th of october, also happens to be the day i'll turn 24.

with birthdays come the expected rituals of celebration. friends have been holding a countdown the last few days, anticipating a night out over the next weekend with everything on me, maybe with a couple of drinks (birthdays being a good excuse to get drunk). officemates will probably expect a little something too (actually no... not a little...). then the usual dinner out with family.

but birthdays for me have always been marked by anxiety. i usually await their coming with dread. aside from the demands on the pocket (which is painful enough by itself, really), there is also all the unwanted attention. i consider myself a shy person. i am uncomfortable being in groups of people numbering 2 and above, the feeling not unlike what a dressed chicken would feel inside an oven. and when everybody's attention is on ME, it's like turning the oven's temperature on high heat. the result: toasted kenneth. not very appetizing, no?

with all the discomfort i'm getting, me wonders if it's all worth celebrating. so time to look back to the year that's passed and ask the question: how has life been so far?

[pause a few moments for thinking]

it's been fine, i guess. not what i would consider fabulous, just plain fine.

i've got a job that actually pays ok, for my age. although it COULD be bigger, if i had the balls to actually look for work somewhere else and then demand a higher salary. this tried and tested technique has already been employed by several colleagues of mine, with great results. but the fact that i DO have a job is something i should be thankful for, if i think about the Philippine's unemployment rate.

the weird thing about my job is that it cycles through 2 phases, either of extreme boredom (enough to make me think of resigning) or of extreme frustration (also enough to make me think of resigning). i'm currently in the boring phase. i can sleep through the whole day and not miss anything. but when it starts shifting to the extreme frustration phase, the resulting headaches are enough to make me want to jump off from the top floor of our building. fortunately, none of those episodes have actually made me jump off the building (not yet at least), which leaves me here alive to inflict my ramblings upon you my loyal readers. and ironically, both phases have not yet made me resign.

that said, i've lost my passion for the job. i just see it as something to occupy my time and scratch a living from. i used to love it before. i loved the sense of being part of a team setting out on some great project. i loved the challenge of it. i loved the sense of pride and accomplishment upon seeing my efforts bear fruit, and then saying to myself, it is good. but for every passing second i spend in my cubicle, all that passion is slowly trickling down the dustbin. i am burning myself out.

and i seem to have reached this point where i no longer have the opportunity to screw up. it's like everything i'm doing right now is make or break. and the thing is, i have not even figured out yet what to do with my life (or what's left of it). I AM STUMPED. next thing i know, i'm already 30 and i STILL don't know what to do... assuming that i reach that age.

evident in the last paragraph, i also have this feeling that i'm not going to live very long. no, i'm not dying. and no karen, i do NOT have a deathwish. but basing on the number trips i've had to the hospital recently, i'm not what you would call healthy either. from what i've been through, all i can say is there are things that just lay beyond our control. yeah, we'd all like to tell ourselves that our destiny is in our hands, but let's face it. we can't control everything. i am not God. and neither are you. it reminds me of the late cebu city councilor and dermatologist, dr. fe mantua-ruiz, who died a couple of months ago, i think. according to the papers, she lived a healthy lifestyle. she exercised everyday. she didn't smoke. but what did she die of? lung cancer. the universe has a really weird sense of humor.

on other matters, i do not yet have as of now a "love life". which is not necessarily a bad thing, considering the hell i've seen some people go through. better not bother myself with that yet.

much to my annoyance, my mom's friends have all been telling me that i should be getting married already, and then have lots of children. me? married? hmmm... i see their sons and daughters (who are also around my age), getting married pretty early, carrying their little babies with them when i see them in church, and slaving away at their jobs to buy milk and diapers. i sure don't find them particularly happy. no... i think i'll stay single for a while longer. i'm still enjoying life as a 24 year old kid.

the conclusion? life's really not that bad. but it's not exactly good either. it could be worse, thought that's not something i can be happy about.

happy birthday to me.

the adventures of screw up boy - day 2

saturday started peacefully. i should have known it was a bad omen, like the proverbial calm before the storm. the morning was spent chilling out, doing the usual morning rituals, packing up our luggage, and then gambling our change away with a card game they called "in between". seemed like everyone else in the group were experienced gamblers, and i stood out innocently like a sore thumb.

manong boy, our driver, arrived to pick us up at around noon. after taking some souvenir pictures at the hotel, we hit the road. cruising on the highway, we had a nice view of mt. makiling, and i remembered boss joseph saying something about how nice it would be if we also did some trekking there, ignorant of the coming hell. that should have been omen number 2.

i asked the guys what would be our next activity on the list. they said we'd do some trekking on taal. hmmm... trekking. suddenly my spider sense went on high alert. aside from a fear of flying, i also have a fear of heights AND deep water. plus, i don't know how to swim. uh-oh, i thought, doesn't that involve climbing AND riding a boat across taal lake?

i took a good look at everybody. ok... guys' hair all gelled up and spiky, girls wearing those stylish blouses and sandals, the air thick with their cologne. we looked like we were going to THE MALL. ok... maybe... it's just a short leisurely walk then, i thought, maybe on a paved path to the peak of taal where we can admire a magnificent view of the crater and reflect upon the grandeur of nature. i was starting to delude myself. self delusion is one of my psychological defense mechanisms.

after a pitstop for lunch along the highway, we continued the journey. the road was getting noticeably inclined now, as my ears started popping to adjust to the air pressure. then the big road sign: tagaytay.

so this is tagaytay, i thought. i was expecting it to look like baguio. but from what i saw, it looked more like bukidnon. there were so many pineapples and pineapple plantations... well i think they were pineapples. and then there it was, that familiar image found in postcards and wow philippines ads, taal volcano.

we hired the services of a boatman standing at the side of the road waiting for passengers. after some bargaining, manong boy got us a lower price for the boatman's services, and we followed him down to the lake for the boat.

what we saw when we arrived at the shore of taal lake did not calm my nerves. the water was rough, thanks to the strong wind. my spider sense was saying: "turn around and lock yourself up in the van. NOW." but my pride was saying: "boy, are you a wimp, or ARE YOU A WIMP?" so with those thoughts, i considered my predicament. everybody was going. the girls didn't seem to be scared. i'm doomed.

so with some trepidation, i got into the boat, and we experienced a ride that beat all the attractions at enchanted kingdom. maybe i should've tried their water rides after all, so i can get some practice before going on this one. with huge waves and strong winds blasting our little boat, i held on to anything secure for dear life, worried of the headline that might come out on the papers the next day if i didn't: "SUICIDAL TOURIST FROM CEBU DROWNS IN TAAL LAKE". the shame...

after about 40 minutes of having our intestines pureed, we finally got back on terra firma. the taal island welcoming comittee was composed of a whole barangay of hustlers, demanding from us gullible tourists various fees here and there. there was the entrance fee (per head) and a ridiculous parking fee for the boat. they also tried scaring us into renting their horses, telling us how far and difficult the path would be to the top. that would have cost us an also ridiculous P500 per horse. we did not take them up on that offer. and of course, there was the fee for our guide, which at P500 made the whole thing look like extortion. are they kidding? P500 just for a walk up and down the mountain? anything to squeeze the money from our pockets. i hope you hustlers are reading this blog and feel ashamed of yourselves.

aside from the hustlers, we were also welcomed by a strong smell of shit. horse shit to be exact, with all the horses on the island. the place was littered everywhere with it, that they can also call taal horse shit island. and with these two things will i always fondly remember taal with.

after paying all the fees and getting a guide, we trudge up to the crater of the volcano. on the way we were met by tourists on horseback on the way down. they all had this constipated look plastered on their faces, which made me doubt if the trek was worth all the trouble.



turns out we didn't really need the guide. as long as we followed the trail of horse shit, we were fine. the final stretch going up was tough though, as the incline was pretty steep and the path's loose sandy soil did not give very good traction to our shoes. after about 45 minutes of trekking torture, we finally reach the crater.





let's see... how do i describe taal volcano. it was nice, i guess. something you don't see everyday. you can still see smoke rising from the sides of the crater, a sign that the volcano is still active.







i did not enjoy the view very much though, as the thought that kept going through my mind was: "oh f*ck, how do i get out of here alive?!". it did not help me remembering the fact that the british mountaineer george leigh mallory died on his expedition to mt. everest GOING DOWN.

we looked at the time. it was 3:30. the last thing we wanted to do was to wobble our way down the path in total darkness, so after a final session of picture taking, we decided to go down. ok, i thought, now i'm screwed.

and then, i see it, my only means of escape. a big horse was lazily flicking flies away with his tail. a ray of light hit the blessed creature, as if heaven was saying, "here is your path to salvation." hallelujah! i'm saved! i was about to jump for joy at the sight when suddenly, it urinated. the horse shot its pee to the ground like a fire hose, that given a few more hours, it may have been possible for the horse to engulf the whole island in its own pee. i didn't know which was worse, to have myself impaled down the side of the mountain or to drown in the horse's pee.

i asked the guide how much for the horse. he said P200. P200!? why you bloody cutthroats! stuck between paying for a ridiculously priced horse ride and getting back to the boat in one piece, i grudgingly chose the latter. so i hauled my butt on the saddle and went ahead of the group.

what can i say about riding a horse... well... it was a literal pain in the ass. no wonder those horse riding tourists we encountered on the way up all had that constipated look, their butts were in pain. constipation and horse back riding... same thing really. you'd actually need metal balls and cast iron butts to be able to ride these horses. these locals must be mutants.

struggling with my balance, i tried doing a little interview with the guy guiding my horse. but he wasn't so interested in a little chitchat, so i contented myself to chatting with the horse and the occasional bird gliding above me. hello horse, how's life treating you? you be careful now, we wouldn't want to fall down the side of the cliff would we? if you take me down safely, i could give your master a tip so he could buy you some more hay. wouldn't that be nice? hello bird, how are you today? and how are you and mrs. bird, still going strong? and the kids? so on and so forth...

my butt in pain, i finally return to the little village at the foot of the volcano, where i was regaled by an old woman with her story on how she escaped the 1968 explosion of taal. as to why they still choose to live here with the possibility of another explosion, i have no idea. maybe the locals just like living on the edge. or they must have some sort of death wish. how... existential.

the rest of the group finally arrive, and we get back to our boat. good thing the return trip was no longer as hellish, the winds having calmed a bit.

our shoes also acquired a nice new shade of brown. in case crayola decides adding it to its collection of colors, boss joseph suggests calling it "volcanic brown". i suggest "horse shit brown".

so we got back to our van on the mainland, went up to tagaytay for dinner, got stuck on saturday night traffic on the highway, and then, to our hotel in makati.

the moral of the story? NEVER EVER ignore your spider sense again.

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some of the pictures courtesy of roy

the adventures of screw up boy - day 1

i dreamt that an earthquake was shaking my bed. but i wake up and discover that it was just my mother shaking me out of dreamland. "i thought you were supposed to wake up earlier?" i look at the time. 4 am. my flight's departure time was 6:40 am, but i hadn't finished packing the previous night, so i had to set my cellphone alarm to 2 am. hmmm... 4 am. then it dawns on me... 4 am?! oh sh*t! oh sh*t! oh sh*t! i slept through the alarm! sirens soon start shrieking in my head, and the horrible thought of being left behind jolts me awake. so i get out of bed, finish packing, take a bath, eat breakfast, and dress up, all in warp speed. when i get to the airport, i find that i'm the first one of our group to arrive. ok... that's what i get for being too panicky...

i have this slight fear of flying, so the night before i made some small preparations in the extreme event (God forbid) that our plane would crash. after check in, our group proceeded to the boarding area, and the first thing i planned to do upon getting there was to take a look at the plane we were boarding too see how big it was, since i have this (possibly erroneous) opinion of smaller planes being more prone to crashes. after a few minutes waiting, the plane arrives and comes into view. what i saw did not reassure me. it was a small plane. i started confessing my sins before God, just in case.



my travel mates, from left to right, roy a.k.a. "the siomai man", boss joseph a.k.a. "the high roller", jess, guia, eisel, kay, stephen, and kristine, who happens to suffer from an unusual case of ornithophobia (fear of birds), unless the bird is deep fried and crispy. that's me at the back of the camera.

to my relief, take off was relatively smooth. i kept looking out the window, marveling at the view of cebu city hundreds of feet up in the sky and taking pictures of the sky, which may have bothered kay a bit, who was my seatmate on the window seat since i was in the middle seat between her and boss joseph. but hey, i thought, i only get to ride an airplane very very rarely, so i was going to enjoy the experience as much as i can while i was there. sorry ms. kay...

looking at the skies, i wondered at how ironic it was for man, a creature not having the wings of birds, the speed of horses, and the strength of elephants, to have conquered the skies. but it also occurs to me that no matter how high up the sky our metal wings may take us (and our egos), in the end gravity always wins. i am sobered up by the thought.

we were already over manila when the pilot goes on speakers apologizing that our landing would be delayed. before that we noticed that the plane had to do a couple of turns in the sky. it must have been a busy day at the airport.

the sound of the plane's landing gear making contact with the runway soon reach my ears, and a wave of relief comes over me, like a death row inmate given a last minute commutation of his sentence. finally, back on terra firma! and still alive!

as the plane taxies its way to the terminal, we pass by one of the great monuments to the corruption and ineptitude of philippine government, the naia terminal 3. the terminal was so huge, that by my estimate it could have doubled naia's current capacity. it's a shame that the bidding process for the terminal was downright dirty and crooked. nothing much i can do but shake my head.

after a couple of minutes waiting, we finally get off the plane and walk to the terminal. the naia terminal handling cebu pacific's domestic flights was the most technologically advanced airport terminal in the world... 50 years ago. it looked pretty crummy and old, especially if you compare it to the newer, bigger terminal for philippine airline's domestic flights. i was half expecting to meet a dinosaur when we entered the terminal. only shows how much influence lucio tan, or more precisely, lucio tan's money, has over government.

we spend the next few hours going around metro manila, to confirm the reservations we made for our hotel and also to deliver some of my travel mates' obligatory pasalubong, which being from cebu, is traditionally composed of dried danggit, dried pusit, and dried mangoes. cebuanos seem to have knack for drying things. i wonder why.

eventually we reach the steel, glass, and concrete forests of makati. as our van fought its way through this part of the urban jungle, i stared like any probinsyano would at the modern buildings, the skyscrapers, and the general rush and bustle of the business district, all of which led me to wonder if we had not gotten on the wrong flight. "are we still in the philippines?", i thought. all those visible signs of great wealth in this tiny piece of the philippines only seem to prove the statement that "10% of the population owns 90% of the wealth". how true.

and everywhere you turn your head, you always seem to find chicks in makati. hmmm... makati is where the money is, and there are many chicks in makati. there must be a certain correlation between chicks and money. either money attracts the chicks, or chicks attract the money, or both attract each other. but why makati? why not cebu? lucky makati... chicks and money... that's a NICE combination.

we soon switch vans and head out to the first place in our itinerary, enchanted kingdom. as our van cruised along the south express way, i marvel at the impressive network of roads, bridges, overpasses, railways, and highways leading in and out of manila. no wonder the provinces feel left out and grumble about "imperial manila". all the development is right there.

after more than an hour on the road, we finally reach enchanted kingdom. the first thing i notice was the line of buses in the parking lot, which to me did not seem like a good thing. after the customary pictures at the gate, we buy our tickets (at a very painful P400 each) and enter, expecting to have good time.

turns out i was right about the buses, the place was crawling with school children. we couldn't ride the bumper cars as much as we would have wanted to with all those kids in line. but of course, enchanted kingdom isn't limited to bumper cars. there's the usual carousel, which is one of the customary places for a photo op at enchanted kingdom, and the ferris wheel, which they called "the wheel of fate". how... philosophical. maybe it was supposed to remind us of our ultimate "fate" while our gondola reached the peak of the ferris wheel. memento mori? maybe...

then there's the "roller skater", a.k.a. the caterpillar when sm city cebu still had an amusement park. it's basically a smaller and milder version of the roller coaster. it was fun, if you enjoy being flung around in the air, and yet not enough to be scary. but if you do feel scared, here's a tip: Shout. it actually helps drive away the jitters.

if you want to know how it feels like to be a pendulum inside a grandfather's clock, there's "anchors away". it's basically a pendulum shaped like ship. to achieve maximum effect the rider should be seated at the either end of the ride. you will get this sensation as if you're floating in the air while the ride swings you upwards, and as a side effect (for guys) you will also feel your balls retreat toward your intestines as your scrotum disappears. here's another tip: so as to not embarass yourself in front of the ladies, especially when they're seated right across you in this ride, try shouting as if you're actually ENJOYING the ride. luckily for boss joseph, there were no ladies at our first go on this one, or he would have embarassed himself.

if you want to get an idea of an astronaut's training regimen, i suggest the "space shuttle", which is THE ride in enchanted kingdom. it's a roller coaster where you'll go round 360 degrees twice going forward, then you go through the same circuit again backward. the going forward part was fine, but going backward resulted in THE worst amusement park experience of my life. i literally had my breath sucked out of me, that i could barely walk when i got out. another friendly piece of advice: if you don't want to risk having yourself taken to the first aid station and humiliated in front of your friends while trying to get your senses back in order, i suggest you skip this one. TRUST ME. i've been there.

for a movie experience that goes beyond sight and sound, there's the "4d discovery theater". the movie (which was basically a ghost story) is shown in 3d, and as it progresses you can actually feel the blood spatter as a head gets chopped off, a gust of wind on your face as a murder of crows fly toward you, and the impact of a falling body as it hits the ground. the seats even have a massage chair function, which i think makes the extra P40 admission worth it.

another attraction was the rialto. it's basically a movie theater with moving seats to simulate the motion shown by the movie. i suggest you try this out first before going to the "4d discovery theater" so you won't get out of it as disappointed as we were. if not for the moving chair, i would have slept through the whole thing. but as it turns out, the REAL attraction in the rialto was not the movie, it was the rialto girls. oh yeah...





as a sidenote, the music video for the barbie's cradle song money for food was taken in this section of enchanted kingdom. what made that music video stand out was that it was taken in one long continuous shot from beginning to end. you can almost see the members of the band run toward the back of the camera to change costumes as the camera shifts from one scene to the next. plus, i also liked the song. and the band. and barbie. too bad they already disbanded.

i did not try any of the water rides, as getting myself soaking wet was not part of my definition of having a good time.

we got out of enchanted kingdom pretty happy with the experience. the P400 entrance may have been painful, but it sure was worth it, thanks to the rialto girls.

ticket to enchanted kingdom... P400
admission to 4d discovery theater... P40
a hamburger and a large tumbler of pepsi... P90
a picture with the rialto girls... priceless

boss joseph said something interesting as we got out. he said he was happy with the experience because, according to him, he entered the park not expecting much. hmmm... boss joseph may have found the secret path to happiness that men through the ages have been searching for: lowered expectations.

on the way to our hotel in laguna, our van got stuck in some heavy friday night traffic at the south super highway. waiting for it to clear up, i looked back at the experience and wondered why we find having ourselves flung around in the air so much fun. when you try to think about it, it doesn't really make sense, no? after giving it some more thought, i posited that it must have something to do with the way our brain gets shaken as we get thrown about here and there. all that motion may result in the loosening of some screws holding the brain together. sounds logical...

our hotel in laguna was a little hot spring resort located at the foot of mt. makiling. we get there after about 2 hours on the road, tired, hungry, and stinking. so after checking in we had dinner, i took a shower, and went back to dreamland.

next stop, taal.

the glory of defeat

what on earth were WE thinking? what on earth was I thinking? we were humiliated, annihilated, crushed, beaten, awed, humbled, blown away, ______, ______, ______, ...you can fill in the blanks. the table tennis tournament that me and some of my officemates joined can be succinctly described by one word: DISASTER. our team of 4 players did not win a single match, not even a single set. the field was simply too good for us. ironically, two of my teammates went out drinking the night before. drunk guy number one went home around 12 midnight, while drunk guy number two (who was supposed to be a top 10 table tennis player from japan) went home around 4 am. he even came in late on the morning of the tournament, still smelling of alcohol and wearing slacks and shoes that were so scruffy i wondered if he had to crawl his way home last night. player number 3 didn't even join the practice session last night because he went out on a date. so there we were, 4 guys who barely had any practice (actually... none...), 2 of us still nursing a hangover, ranged against the elite, the best of the best, of cebu's table tennis scene. no wonder. and what the hell went in to our heads that we joined the tournament thinking that we could actually win? overconfident or just plain delusional? maybe both. i'll just charge it to experience then. drunk guy number one actually had some words of wisdom distilled from the experience. he said that you can look at it 2 ways, either you become so discouraged that you stop playing table tennis altogether, or you use it as a reason to actually improve yourself in the game so in the next tournament you can at least give a decent showing, or maybe even win. so even though my ego was bruised, at least i came home with a lesson... and a free t-shirt.

an ignoramus talks about art

after paying the electric bill in SM, i went straight to the neighboring art exhibit. it showcased some "abstract" paintings that i just did not get at all. you know, those types of pauntings that you look at while wondering to yourself what on earth the painter was trying to say. if the painter IS trying to say something, well... sorry mate, it just ain't going through. ironically, the group of artists doing the exhibit posted their mission statement together with their paintings, stating that visual art should not necesarily resemble the visible world, but it should be used as a record for one's thought's and feelings and transmit those thoughts and feelings to others via their "work of art". if that is their definition of art, then why do they have to make it so hard for ordinary folks like me to understand what they're saying? if i may speculate on their creative process, it's as if they just take an empty canvass, splash some paint here and there, then choose a deep word from the dictionary, say... solitude, call the painting that, and present it for exhibition. then we ordinary folks look at the painting, read its title, and then scratch our heads asking, what's the connection?

or is it just me?