inner machine

Places more interesting than the moon.

2012-02-10T08:23:00.000+08:00

I like this bit from Poppy Z. Brite's blog

I caught the end of an interview with Neil Armstrong. He said, "No, it doesn't bother me that people will always think of me as 'the first man who walked on the moon,' but you know, I'm doing other stuff now. A person wants to be known for his whole ledger." I can't say I identified with this, exactly, since I've never done anything as huge or important as walking on the moon, but I kinda knew what he meant, and I loved his use of the word "ledger." A person keeps that ledger his whole life. It kind of sucks if you're on page 400 and people still think you're the person back on page 23 -- or, worse, if they say, "23 was the best page ever! You should write it again!" [...] Even so, the ledger does exist and you like to think that people will stay up to date with it. Your feet might not have touched the moon in 35 years, but then again, there might be places a lot more interesting than the moon.

[emphasis mine]

Its kind of frustrating when the image people have of you isn't right. False impressions from years ago, something you did that they remember but you've forgotten. What I don't like are those that act like they know you better than you know yourself, even if they have good intentions. People change, that's all.

Another eerie opening song

2012-02-07T06:45:00.000+08:00

This is the opening song for a TV series written by Stephen King, Kingdom Hospital, though it wasn't as successful as his bestsellers. As one commenter said about this vid, "This is possibly the best thing about Kingdom Hospital. Its atmospheric, slightly scary, and gives you a good impression of a very dull show."

"Meeting again..."

2012-01-31T14:32:00.000+08:00

This is an AMV for an anime I haven't watched but planning to. I like how the clips and subtitles make up a coherent and funny storyline (its a pairing two guys anyway) which is supposed to be set after the anime. If not for that... worth watching for the good song in it, "What's this life for" by Creed.

[ 40. ]

2012-01-21T20:30:00.001+08:00

EBA: Kaya asiwa ako sa mga "book lovers". Feeling laging matalino. Pauulanan ka ng mga pamagat ng libro at pangalan ng author na sila lang ang nakakakilala para ipamukha sayong ang galing-galing nila. Pakiramdam mo tuloy sobrang bobo mo na.

DIEGO: Hindi naman siguro lahat. Ako, ang mga hinahangaan kon tao na mahilig sa libro e yung may matututunan ka pag kausap mo, yung makikita mong naging marunong at mabuti syang tao dahil sa pagbabasa nya ng mga libro.

-from "Lumayo ka nga sa akin" by Bob Ong

I've never met a 'book lover' described on the first paragraph.
Thoughts/Questions: Citing obscure or little-known books=trying to look smart?'loving books'=feeling matalino? Being pseudo-intellectual?

That means reading is somewhat seen as an 'intellectual' hobby. I tried reading literary criticism, and most of them are bloodless and dry and sucking out the joy of reading. There's a lot of psychology and kinds of reading I admit I don't understand at all. It seems that the more interpretations, the farther away from the actual story. Sometimes its pointless to look for meaning, actually. You waste time looking for meaning, you don't see what's happening in front of you. You stop seeing things as they are, which is more important.

Unrelated: I think, if one really enjoys something, there's no point in impressing others with it...

I was wrong saying I don't like Bob Ong because he's popular, now that I know better I retract that. Lumayo ka nga sa Akin's message is good... its showing cliches in TV, movies, popular culture, and how it affects our society. One character has a person without a job because he's waiting to win money in a noon-time show. One's an actress complaining our preference for foreign things, when she's endorsing whitening products herself.

META: There's always something in 'wanting to be different'-- I remember a high school classmate disliking some anime he likes because someone else knows about it. Disliking something because someone else likes it too is idiotic. That thing wasn't made for YOU alone, snowflake. It was made to make money for whoever made it. (I admit I was like that, too-- but its better to be grateful that someone else shares the same interest)

Radio Silence (on music)

2012-01-20T19:13:00.001+08:00

My brother is a pop music geek. He's in an online forum on pop, where they discuss and analyze songs, hit charts, albums, and such. If not for him, I wouldn't know about the latest K-pop groups, UK acts, and music videos. I don't keep up with music much, and there's no genre I prefer. When I like a song, I'd look for the artist and download whole albums I could listen to for a long time.

I've been listening to Gorillaz, The Birthday Massacre, A Perfect Circle, and Sugababes for years. I like lyrics more than sound. A band I like lately is She Wants Revenge, and these are their kind of lines that made me like their songs:
I know we all have regrets, but that's the price of one more lesson learned ("I don't wanna fall in love")
Her words were in italics as it would fall from her lips ("Sister")
We got nowhere to go we got nothing to prove, instead of dancing alone I should be dancing with you ("Out of control")

Maybe I'm musically illiterate. I don't play any instrument and I never understood music concepts like time signatures, beats, or notes, as taught in MAPEH from elementary. Math, I comprehended more.
- - -
My friends back in high school used to list songs we like and pay an internet cafe to burn a CD for us. We didn't know enough about computers or downloading then to do it ourselves. I now feel that internet cafe was scamming us, as it costs 50 pesos. Now I could do that for less than 10 with a cheap blank CD.

My friends' older sisters got mix CDs from guys courting them, complete with custom printed covers and lyric sheets, love letters through songs and music.

Before music could be downloaded via clicks, I made mix tapes with a blank casette tape. In a tape with music on it already, there are two tiny plastic squares at the bottom that prevents it from being recorded on. Snip them off with a screwdriver, and now you can.

For the songs, it has to be chosen to a theme. I had to let that song play from a CD, tape, or wait for it to play on FM radio, then record. Trying to catch the song by the last way needs patience. I had to always tune to another station, only to feel regret when that song was ending, then to hear that it already started on the previous station and its too late. I had to rewind and wait again, and make sure I don't record over a song already on tape. It takes at least a week to complete one.

It wasn't to be given to anybody. I had to draw my own covers in crayon and write the list of songs on Side A and B, as printers and Photoshop were unheard of then. I made my own titles to the tape.

I can't recall any of those songs I recorded from Grade 2 to 5, but I guess they were pop, rock, and OPM songs of that time. The tapes were all flooded away along with other things last 2008. Those songs seemed different and more felt when I first listened to a whole tape without pressing any button (stop|pause|rewind|forward|backward|record).

I miss that, but I prefer the easier way now.

Some Zen koans

2012-01-14T18:42:00.000+08:00

A koan is a kind of parable, anecdote,riddle or puzzle that doesn't need to be solved. It must be ponderedon and applied to your life.

(These are from Zen Buddhism, 1959)

Two monks, Tanzan and Ekido, werewalking down a muddy street in the city. They came on a lovely younggirl dressed in fine silks, who was afraid to cross because of allthe mud.

“Come on, girl,” said Tanzan. Andhe picked her up in his arms and carried her across.

The two monks did not speak again tillnightfall. Then, when they had returned to the monastery, Ekidocouldn't keep quiet any longer.

“Monks shouldn't go near girls,”he said – “certainly not beautiful ones like that one!”

“My dear fellow,” said Tanzan, “Iput that girl down, way back in the city. It is you who are stillcarrying her!”

- - -

A student came before the master Bankeiand asked to be helped in getting rid of his bad temper.

“Show me this temper,” said Bankei.“It sounds very fascinating.”

“I haven't got it right now, so Ican't show it to you,” said the student.

“Well then,” said Bankei, “bringit to me when you have it.”

“But I can't bring it just when Ihappen to have it,” protested the student. “I'd surely lose itagain before it got to you.”

“In such a case,” said Bankei, “itseems to me that this temper is not part of your true nature. If itis not part of you, it must comes from the outside. I suggest thatwhenever it gets into you, you beat yourself with a stick until thetemper can't stand it and runs away.”

- - -

Bodhidharma left his robe and bowlto his chosen successor; and each patriarch thereafter handed it downto the monk that, in his wisdom, he had chosen as the next successor.Gunin was the first such Zen patriarch. One day he announced that hissuccessor would be the who wrotethe best verse expressing the truth of their sect. The learned chiefmonk Gunin's monastery thereupon took brush and ink, and wrote inelegant characters:

The body is aBodhi-tree*

The soul ashining mirror:

Polish it withstudy

Or dust will dullthe image.

No other monkdared to compete with the chief monk. But at twilight Yeno, a lowlydisciple who had been working in the kitchen, passed through the haddwhere the poem was hanging. Having read it, he picked up a brush thatwas lying nearby, and below the other poem he wrote in his crudehand:

Bodhi is not atree;

There is noshining mirror.

Since all beginswith Nothing

Where can dustcollect?

Later that nightGunin, the fifth patriarch, called Yeno to his room. “I have readyour poem,” said he, “and have chosen you as my successor. Here:take my robe and my bowl. But our chief monk and the others will bejealous of you and may do you harm. Therefore I want you to leave themonastery tonight, while the others sleep.”

In the morningthe chief monk learned the news, and immediately rushed out,following the path Yeno had taken. At midday he overtook him, andwithout a word tried to pull the robe and bowl out of Yeno's hands.

Yenoput down the robe and the bowl on a rock by the path. “These areonly things which are symbols. If you want the thingssomuch, please take them.”

The monk eagerly reached down and seized the objects. But he couldnot budge them. They had become heavy as a mountain.

“Forgive me,” he said at last, “I really want the teaching,not the things. Will you teach me?”

Yenoreplied, “Stop thinking thisis mine andstop thinking thisis not mine.Then tell me, where are you?Tell me also: what did your face look like, before you were born?”

(*Bodhi means enlightenment. Though forme, both poems are true.)

How 2011 was

2012-01-03T15:33:00.002+08:00

2010 was bad, as I was still trying to adjust back to school and was always thinking, "People are so strange!" when all along, I was the strange one. This is how things get when you have your own world like me.

In 2011, I got to know more people and had good friends. I'm still not used to it-- but when did I? It will take centuries before I feel fully at home here on Earth.

Ayokong mag-post ng "Before and After" picture pero infernez, pumayat ako nung 2011.
I kinds of dislike the phrase "books that changed my life" as I learn a bit of something new in all books I read even the bad ones, but if there is such list Zen Mind: Beginner's Mind by Shunryu Suzuki would top it. If I haven't read it, I'd still be the same egotistic blowhard I was in high school to 2010. I tried to fulfill empty goals like "If only I get higher grades...". The book taught me that the best way to do something is to just do it without any selfish gaining ideas and how important it is to have a beginner's mind.
Sadness is the same as happiness and the goal of meditation is not to feel both, but not in a bad way. An empty mind is ready for anything. Ignore both insult and praise. Learn to believe in Nothing. My favorite line is: "If a god comes, you will welcome him. If the devil comes, you will welcome him."
Okay. I'm a shiny happy person now.

from ndoherty again

addendum to On "Pretty"

2011-12-27T18:21:00.000+08:00

Likewise, if someone calls you fat and you get offended by it, I suspect that you’re not truly comfortable with your weight. Instead of resenting that person, you should use their words as a launch pad for exploring your relationship with your body, and making it a healthier one.-Becoming Unoffendable

More on Stoic philosophy (how to be calm at all circumstances. The world would be better if everyone practiced it.)

Studying tips from Reader's Digest

2011-12-23T12:36:00.000+08:00

Posted here as a reminder to myself. Anyway, here is a better article on learning and studying: 5 Ways to Give Yourself an Education That Kicks the Crap Out of the One You Got in School.

1. Set priorities. Study time is for study only.
2. Study anywhere and everywhere. It could be reading a list while walking or toothbrushing.
3. Get organized. Don't waste time looking for things if all are in their proper places.
4. Learn how to read. Learn active reading. Ask questions as you go along.
5. Schedule time. Break up a big task like a report to small ones. Outline and research first, and always finish early so you have time to read, polish, and review.
6. Take good notes. Read and note important points of textbooks and what the teacher emphasizes. Don't get ready to rush out before class ends- write the principal points of today's lecture and scan the next lessons.
7. Always turn in neat and clean outputs.
8. Speak up. Ask questions. "He who asks is a fool for five minutes, but he who does not ask remains a fool forever. (Chinese proverb)"
9. Test yourself.
10. Do more than asked. Also read other sources, not only what your teacher requires.

On "Pretty"

2011-12-21T15:57:00.000+08:00

"You got a bit fat. You must thin out soon, or you'll not get any suitors."

My father's female officemate said that to me once. I didn't expect a comment like that to hurt. It did at that time.

These are things about me: I'm 18 and a girl. Yes, until now no one has expressed any interest in me, nor am I interested. I look at my friends that have had relationships and decided its all a waste of time. I'd rather study than waste emotions to petty arguments and shit. Yeah, I know some may say that I'm emotionally repressed, that the 'right person' will come, but no thanks.

Its the comment. That time I didn't answer, but like all good answers, it only came to my mind later. I should've said: "So, you mean I need something called a suitor? So I need to loose some pounds before I get one?" So she was implying, that I have to be prettier by being thinner. So a boyfriend is proof that you're pretty enough. I heard it more than once from a telenovela, you're beautiful, so why don't you have a boyfriend?

Still, the pressure to be pretty. Good-looking. and (how I dislike the word) Hot.

In elementary, a friend played a game of classifying our female classmates to "Beautiful", "Cute", "Charming", and "Sexy". I don't know whatever definition she made up for it, but she said that I'm only in the 'cute' category because my face is not right.

The idea for another game was from a movie that has a serial killer that cuts off the more desirable body parts of her victims and stitches them all up to create a 'perfect person'. We would choose who has the best body part among our classmates and imagine the result. Yes, its creepy to me now, how we were metaphorically cutting off limbs from our classmates in imagination. She said my hands and feet are perfect, but as I remember it now I only feel a phantom rotating blade of a chainsaw and my hands and feet cut off, with blood and broken bones, and what a scary game to be played by twelve-year-olds. (And the arms would be from... R's legs are gorgeous... H's hair!)

It was only the start of metaphorical amputating. Imagine my horror when the same friend told us girls what the boys in class thought of our bodies (may I remind you, we were 12 year olds), with phrases like "her breasts and butt are too small or too big" with gestures of hands in the air drawing curves of body shapes. To them, it was funny. I started being uncomfortable about my body. I guess, that stage starts at puberty, and some of it continues until now.

It was degrading, being judged by inadequate body parts. Maybe its worse now.

The girl who made up those games isn't here now, isn't my friend anymore. She was the popular one, got five boyfriends at a time even in high school. The downside were her failing grades. About a year ago, her Facebook was filled with arguments with her current boyfriend about her cheating, and asking for advice from someone... I wish I didn't bother. That's what I dislike whe I'm on that site, because I keep on reading about things I'm better not knowing. We're veering off-topic again.

Read on "The Golden Ratio"

In another magazine article about beauty saying that an attractive face is one that is in proportion and symmetrical, it shows a woman's face with mapped white lines. One phrase that bothered me was, being attractive was being 'ahead of the game'. What game? Getting the most attention, compliments, and suitors?

I have another friend, who I think is beautiful. Still, she says that if she sees someone very pretty she starts having insecure feelings and wishing she was her. I thought I was bad with the insecurity, but I won't get to the point of wishing I was another person. This friend seems to have the opinion that good-looking ones are ahead of the food chain. Or the game, whatever that is. "Daw si sin-o guid sya, law-ay man!" ("She acts like she's so above us, she's ugly!"), kag ang sabat ko naman ya, "Bale ang mga gwapa lang pwede ka-pa-daw-si-sin-o?" (and my answer would be, "So its the beautiful ones who have the right to act nasty?").

But this trend and attitude is seen as normal, and this rant... may sound like I'm bitter or jealous. I used to be. I just remembered a simple comment that got me thinking about 'pretty'. Its been told to us many times that inner is better than outer beauty, I'm not so far gone to suggest to imagine a world where everyone is blind.

Must watch for librarians, and students too

2011-12-16T16:57:00.002+08:00

Passion for Librarianship from R. David Lankes on Vimeo.

Intermission...

2011-12-11T14:12:00.001+08:00

I think people's petty hates and insecurities come from this (especially the second paragraph), from C.S. Lewis' Screwtape Proposes a Toast:

No man who says I’m as good as you believes it. He would not say it if he did. The St. Bernard never says it to the toy dog, nor the scholar to the dunce, nor the employable to the bum, nor the pretty woman to the plain. The claim to equality, outside the strictly political field, is made only by those who feel themselves to be in some way inferior. What it expresses is precisely the itching, smarting, writhing awareness of an inferiority which the patient refuses to accept.

And therefore resents. Yes, and therefore resents every kind of superiority in others; denigrates it; wishes its annihilation. Presently he suspects every mere difference of being a claim to superiority. No one must be different from himself in voice, clothes, manners, recreations, choice of food: “Here is someone who speaks English rather more clearly and euphoniously than I — it must be a vile, upstage, la-di-da affectation. Here’s a fellow who says he doesn’t like hot dogs — thinks himself too good for them, no doubt. Here’s a man who hasn’t turned on the jukebox — he’s one of those goddamn highbrows and is doing it to show off. If they were honest-to-God all-right Joes they’d be like me. They’ve no business to be different. It’s undemocratic.”

(AND I haven't blogged for a while, means my life has been good/busier lately. Proper blog entry coming up.)

I like reading stories about recluses.

2011-10-19T11:24:00.000+08:00

These paragraphs I've memorized from Mona Lisa Overdrive by William Gibson:

Gentry didn't like people. He spent days on end with his decks and FX-organs and holo projectors and came out only when he got hungry. Slick didn't understand what it was that Gentry was trying to do, but he envied Gentry the narrowness of his obsession. Nothing got to Gentry. Kid Afrika wouldn't have gottten to Gentry, because Gentry wouldn't have gotten over to Atlantic City and gotten into deep shit and Kid Afrika's debt.

- - -

People made Gentry uncomfortable, but it worked both ways. Strangers could feel the Shape burning behind Gentry's eyes, his fixation came across everything he did. Slick had no idea how he got along on his trips to the Sprawl; maybe he just dealt with people as intense as he was, loners on the jagged fringes of the software and drug markets. He didn't seem to care about sex at all, to the extent that Slick had no idea what it was he'd have wanted if he'd decided to care.

Changes

2011-09-12T16:08:00.001+08:00

Since my life was nothing for a year (didn't go out at all), I took 26 units this sem to see if I can take it. Its okay, but not a good idea and something I'll never do again. All I'm doing is either studying, reading, or completing requirements. I now find studying more entertaining than TV.

Gone are the days when I showed up in school for only three hours a day and stay home for the rest. Another countdown until the end of the semester, 20 school days left... but it seems as if I've lost sense of time after that one lone year (The Burnout of 2009). Its only now that I've begun to appreciate the advantages of being a shut-in. I don't have problems with relationships and people, I'm content with the few I know, and sometimes its better to keep away than get in trouble.
- - -
Before college, I thought studying to be a librarian was ridiculous. Now I'm taking the course Library and Information Science and its the most fun I've had. There's only six of us girls in our batch, with somewhat similar personalities (bookish loners), and our teachers are cool.

If someone asks about my course, he'll most likely be surprised that LIS exists. "Te may OPAC naman," someone told me. Well, the OPAC doesn't operate by itself. Cataloging and creating those entries is a complex process and that's what we're studying. Most don't know that there's a licensure board exam for librarians, and we can work as teachers. As long as there are schools and libraries, librarians are needed.
- - -
This song will always remind me that somehow things will work for the better.

Taking everything for granted but we still respect the time
We move along with some new passion knowing everything is fine
And I would wait and watch the hours fall in a hundred separate lines
But I regain repose and wonder how I ended up inside
...
But leaving now would be a good idea
So catch me up im getting out of here...

been a while

2011-08-27T18:11:00.000+08:00

Another good one from Reader's Digest:

According to Kurt Vonnegut, "Most writers are not quick-witted when they talk. Novelists, in particular, drag themselves around in society like gut-shot bears."

To prove his point, he tells of a meeting between two novelists, Nelson Algren and Jose Donoso. Vonnegut introduced them as they were descending a staircase, telling Algren that Donoso was from Chile. Algren shook his hand but could find nothing to say to the Chilean novelist.

Finally, at the bottom of the stairs, Algren turned and said, "It must be nice to come from a country that's long and narrow."

-Palm Sunday

...

2011-07-25T09:16:00.000+08:00

from Zen and the Art of Motocycle Maintenance again. Proper blog entry coming.

It made the kids at camp much more enthusiastic and cooperative when they had ego goals to fulfill, I’m sure, but ultimately that kind of motivation is destructive. Any effort that has self-glorification as its final endpoint is bound to end in disaster. Now we’re paying the price. When you try to climb a mountain to prove how big you are, you almost never make it. And even if you do it’s a hollow victory. In order to sustain the victory you have to prove yourself again and again in some other way, and again and again and again, driven forever to fill a false image, haunted by the fear that the image is not true and someone will find out. That’s never the way.

Silence is golden

2011-06-25T19:25:00.000+08:00

My theme song for silence.

Dream District Creeps

2011-05-31T03:18:00.001+08:00

I'm with a friend, though I haven't seen this person in real life. She's wearing a white lab coat and glasses, her long black hair in a ponytail. We're in an office in a funeral parlor to show me her work. There's a metal table with cut body parts from female corpses. She uses a device that fuses cells so she assembles a body, legs first, and the head looks like me. We transfer it to a room which serves as a freezer. She says, "She'll wake up tomorrow. Give her a name. Let's go."
- - -
This dream had a sort of ritual/game like "Bloody Mary" about a ghost tricycle that only appears at 1AM in front of a mall. I'm with my brother in the backseat. What we're supposed to do is ask the driver to take us to a bridge, but I don't know where it will go (to the Land of the Dead or Hell or somewhere...).
Driver: "Saan kayo?"
Brother: "Sa tulay lang."
Driver: "Anong tulay ang sinasabi mo?!"
Suddenly everything turned black, and I'm floating in the expanse. I thought, something's gone wrong. Then realized this is like a dream in a dream, then I woke up.

I notice that if I stay inside and don't go out for many days, the dreams get scary.

What's wrong with the picture?

2011-05-26T09:52:00.000+08:00

Most people I asked can't guess at first. Clue: the building.

When there's nothing else to do

2011-05-22T09:12:00.001+08:00

Ever felt this? I was laughing alone, then forgot what I was laughing about, then I was laughing because of that, and then laughing only because I looked silly. People are looking, then I suddenly felt like crying, the loneliness of laughing alone hurt.

This is the boredom I feel during school breaks. In that internet cafe, I pretended to read a magazine and went out half an hour later.

Maybe I need a new hobby. School starts again in two weeks.

A belated happy birthday

2011-05-18T18:03:00.003+08:00

The same guys on the header, Yamazaki and Misaki from Welcome to the NHK
If I had it my way, birthdays will be treated just like any other day. I turned 18 last March 31st and it wasn't much, there was lots of food but it seemed like its my family who celebrated and not me. Some asked, "You don't have friends who'll come?" and I marvel at how much I don't have a life. Then I got a surprise visit from a high school/college(in UP) schoolmate. Which isn't really a surprise, since I met Roy earlier at a mall and he remembered my birthday, and I prefer that than a hundred internet greetings from Facebook.
- - -
In a small city like ours, hang out in a mall long enough and you'll surely meet someone you know. One day I was only walking around when I met high school classmates, and later I'm already in the funeral wake of the father of an ex-classmate, engrossed for hours in a card game.

We talked about recent debut parties they attended, with dances and eighteen roses, everyone dressed up and alcoholic drinks passed around, and I see how lame my own birthday was but its alright.
- - -
In the former university I attended, far away from home, its like large-scale social interaction with drinking was the norm. Yes, it is the norm. I'm the one who doesn't go out until now. I realized one of the reasons I left was I can't get used to living in a room with others, and I believe at some point of my stay there I was going insane.

New eyes

2011-05-05T11:34:00.006+08:00

I read and like Nestor U. Torre's articles in the Inquirer on Philippine TV. His article on the "Cult of Celebrity" is spot-on, which you'll agree with if you dislike Sunday showbiz talk shows, too much of what we don't need to know about people we shouldn't care about.
- - -
I got contacts. I can read signs and see clearly without the frame of glasses. It feels free-er.
- - -
Summer classes are too long and boring I'm glad it'll be over next week, but this semester has been nice. I knew many cool people, and been friends with some of them. I think, since starting college, I never really had friends in school until now.
- - -
While arranging my room, I found the first journal I filled. It was written from October 2008 to February 2009, when I was fifteen. I never reread it until now, two years later. I found it... surprising, in a way of 'I wrote this?' 'I thought this?' Even then, I found a part predicting the future, right on the first page:

I picture myself years from now, found a worn-out notebook and reading again, an altered, other version of a past.

...and that's how I felt, reading the whole thing. Things, dreams, and thoughts I have forgotten. Anyway, I know it won't make sense to anyone but me. It wasn't even good, it was embarrassing, I sounded like a whiny teenager whose problems are self-inflicted and imaginary. The good parts were the ones about the books I was reading... back then, it was escape. I never read as much now as I did back then. A quote I found on that notebook, from Scout in To Kill a Mockingbird: "I never loved reading. One doesn't love breathing."

and from Edgardo Reyes: "Hindi ako makakain sa sarap magbasa. Hindi ko na-re-realize na niloloko lang pala ako ng mga librong yun. Pero nung mga panahong yun, ang ganda."

from Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintence

2011-04-19T17:53:00.001+08:00

...which is a good book, though its not all about zen and motorcycles. Now I don't read reviews or even the book's summary on the back cover. The experience is better when you don't know anything about it.

Along the streets that lead away from the apartment he can never see anything through the concrete and brick and neon but he knows that buried within it are grotesque, twisted souls forever trying the manners that convince themselves they possess Quality, learning strange poses of style and glamor vended by dream magazines and other mass media, and paid for by the vendors of substance. He thinks of them alone at night with their advertised glamorous shoes and stockings and underclothes off, staring through the sooty windows and grotesque shells revealed beyond them, when the poses weaken and the truth creeps in, the only truth that exists here, crying to Heaven, God, there is nothing here but dead neon and cement and brick.
-Robert Pirsig

What I learned from going back to school

2011-03-18T16:16:00.003+08:00

1. Don't try so hard to sound smart. You'll only look dumb.

There are students who are always absent, don't do homework, badmouth teachers, and announce their low scores to class. If they used that time doing the work, they wouldn't be complaining.

I was that kind of student before, but I shut up about it. What keeps me going now is there's three years left...

"The most important thing we ever learn at school is the fact that the most important things can't be learned at school," said Haruki Murakami. My head is crammed with quotes.

I read about others' problems and I feel less alone. My problems aren't new, someone else has gone through the same and got over it.
~*~
On Plagiarism: I don't see the satisfaction one can get from all the praise and likes when what you wrote isn't yours.

We're taught how to paraphrase, but I notice more students copy-paste and cram their papers with unnecessary words so it could be longer.
KISS (Keep it simple, stupid.)

Points to ponder

2011-03-16T10:57:00.006+08:00

I'm tired of hate, cynicism, and irony. Its still better to try for kindness. I'm tired of that 'I'm awesome, you are not' attitude so prevalent in internet jokes, where you don't know what's serious or not. I'm guilty of this lame attempts at crass humor I don't find funny anymore.

The recent disasters make me think... We know that the world's population is almost 7 billion, but what about the number of all who has ever lived and died here, who has ever felt life?

(These times I wish I had another mind but my own. I read my own words and find nothing of what I'm looking for, I don't even know what it is. I try to know myself, but I find nothing and no one.)
- - - - -
I read 90's Reader's Digests during school breaks. This is from Points to Ponder:

Many of us leave home convinced we are going to conquer the world. We are anxious to shuck off the restraints of family and traditions, to cut our own swath and make our own rules. We know that we could do it better, make it faster and see it all.

Somewhere along the way we learn we didn't know quite as much as we thought. Our ideas weren't as new as we took them to be. Suddenly the "quaint" homespun wisdom that once was rejected takes on a new life. The first trip home after such an awakening is a return to reality.
-Gary Barnes, Our Journey Home

To be human is to dream. Pipe dreams, daydreams of perfect love or a brilliant career-- we pay rent on castles in the air. But sometimes there's a dream that doesn't fade, an impossible dream that just might come true with the right breaks and a lot of hard work. Those are the dreams we'd be fools to give up on.
-Jo Coudert, Woman's Day

Unrelated things soon to be forgotten

2011-03-13T22:04:00.004+08:00

Years ago, I saw a headline on the Entertainment pages of the Inquirer: “Lindsay Lohan's Ex performs in Manila”. She's a DJ and the article was about the songs played, how good the party was, but I find it odd that her name was only mentioned once. She was mostly called “Lindsay Lohan's ex”. She must be dating someone else or doing something else now, but she'll always be remembered as the ex of a famous star.

I experience the same. I used to have a friend, a popular girl. When I see people from elementary, I'm not my name but Diba siya na ang upod pirmi sang-una ni X? I'm only remembered as Someone's Friend. There's always the shadow of another person. At least I want to be known as myself, but I guess this can't be helped.

~*~

I dread the cliché “I'm only human.” Why, who said you were something else?

Every time something is dramatic, they'll always say “...like a telenovela.” Turn on the TV, its the same: lost babies, all the screaming, slapping, hair-pulling... I don't want my life like that.

I saw a quote reblogged on Tumblr from Norwegian Wood by Haruki Murakami:
“If you read what everybody else reads, you'll think what everybody else thinks.”
My first thought was, hey, everyone (not all, but many) reads Murakami. I disagree, not all will think the same about a book.

~*~

Hearing the opening theme of Ghost Fighter on GMA, I feel nostalgic for those days when I was 7 or 8-- going home after school to watch 6PM anime. Slam Dunk, Flame of Recca, Hunter X Hunter, all else.

Those anime mostly start with ordinary guy/girl living a normal life, then there's an adventure waiting on another world. Maybe watching those made me imagine the same thing will happen to me, where I find some sort of portal by accident. Its childish, I know. But I have my own story here and now.

~*~

My dreams all happen in a place I call Dream District. Its a mirror image of this city-- even has its own malls like the ones here.

Last night in Dream District, I was watching news on TV in an electronics shop. I meet myself from years back. She's wearing uniform and black sling bag. I said Hi, she didn't recognize me. I wanted to talk but she looked lost in her own thoughts.

Feel my absence.

2011-03-07T20:26:00.010+08:00

In high school, I heard introvert used as an insult to describe weirdos who seemed to have their own worlds. Now in Psych class in college, I learned that introvert is just an aspect of personality, and not at all what those off-hand remarks meant (but even then I heard one classmate smugly say that its a word for losers).

~*~

I'm a person with no people. I don't have a lot of friends. I can count the people I can really talk to on one hand. My phone's inbox is empty, I can live without it. I can stay for a long time without talking or seeing anyone. I'm used to being alone. Why I left Facebook*, its my only contact with all the people I used to know, who don't know me anymore, there's no chance I'll see again. I want to forget them, as I want them to forget the me they knew. I want to forget the me I was.

~*~

When I transferred to a new school, I saw someone who was my classmate for 10 years since Grade 1 to high school. He gave me this 'Here's another 4 years in the same school and your ugly face' look. Its weird seeing someone just there for so long, but whom I don't know and never even had a straight conversation with, but in a way we grew up together. Later, he's already saying things from years ago, things I have forgotten, things I never knew about myself. Even about papers checked from Grade 4, embarrassing things. Curse old classmates with long memories.

~*~

This made me remember those people in the past I had falling-out with. You're so close with this person, then there's this sudden strain where people arrive, you can't stop change, then you're strangers. You can't talk to them again, there's something awkward hanging on the air when you pass by each other.

Its been a long time since I last saw them. Now I find myself missing them. Maybe it was my fault, too. Still, people get new friends, and until now I feel that I was left behind.

*5/6/11 I ate my words.

Next: quit the Internet

2011-02-25T16:35:00.016+08:00

I heard my classmates talk: "Gin like mo to?" "Oo gin-like ko." "Lain to ya gin-like mo mong!"
-They sounded as if their friendship depends on 'likes'.
- - - - -
sa Survivor ni Chuck Palahniuk, about sa religion sang character, pero pwede man ma-apply sa tanan nga gina-pa-memorize nga guro malipatan man:

We were kept busy learning. We had a million facts to remember. We memorized half the Old Testament.

We thought all this teaching was to make us smart. What it did was make us stupid.

With all the little facts we learned, we never had the time to think. We were so excited about passing tests, we never looked beyond the night of the baptism.

We were all so worried about our worst fears, we never considered how boring life would be even if we succeeded and got a good job.

- - - - -
from No Reason for Murder:

If we suppose there are people who are enthusiastic about becoming great, there are also people who find peace in becoming small. It's the common notion that becoming great is always a worthwhile goal, the only good thing there is. But the opposite of that idea can give pleasure as well.

I don't even like me

2011-02-23T11:04:00.001+08:00

Most of the time, I disagree with myself. I don't know if that makes sense. I hold mental debates with me on what I thought or said before, what's wrong with them.
I've said "There's always someone better out there", so am I comparing myself to others in whatever standard that rates people better or worse? Maybe comparing myself to others isn't a good idea.
I should lessen the use of "me" "I" "myself".
Dear self, stop talking about yourself. Me.

PROM NIGHT: Strange Tales of that once-in-a-lifetime Night [review]

2011-02-18T14:19:00.009+08:00

The invitation, the clothes, the theme, the night you'll always remember- or wish you could forget! opens Prom Night, a collection of short stories ranging from funny, strange, magical, and bittersweet, on that most-awaited event in high school. Almost anything you can imagine is here: zombies, vampires, elves, fairies, Greek mythology, unrequited love, UFOs, aliens, sex, and time travel. There's sure to be at least one story you'll enjoy.

In fairy stories the spell runs out at 12, but our characters always forget that. In 'Happily Ever After' a fairy godmother helps an awkward boy to the prom, but shows that love and happy endings don't need magic. 'Märchen to a Different Beat', has Hansel and Gretel, now older. A fairy godfather slash drag queen helps a gay Hansel get a date. It ends with a dance- Hansel and Jack from the Beanstalk.

'Omar's One True Love', his dreamgirl kills herself, but he must have her as a date. The solution- bring her back to life, but she wants to stay dead. Omar's condition: she can die again after the prom. It gets funny on the night he brings a zombie. In 'Bitterfly' a boy gets accused of killing his boyfriend due to drug-induced hallucinations, with a winged girl who may not be real.

'The Ancient Order of Charming Princes' tells what happens to Princes Charming after happily ever after. They're for hire as prom dates. As they reminisce about their pasts slaying monsters and saving princesses...

“Who would have thought we are now reduced to an escort service? Like a bunch of hookers in shining armor.”

“Gyrating and thrusting, that's what kids call dancing nowadays. Last time I saw anyone move like that was when you got ants in your codpiece.”

“My butt hasn't been this firm since the Renaissance.”

'Borrowed Lives' is a sad tale on memories from an old picture bought on a thrift store. In 'Music to her Ears', an old woman has a music box that brings her back to 1916. The best story may be 'Memory and Reason', a future where a boy and an alien girl choose to be together despite the odds.

If I were to design the cover, it'll be a rose corsage on a severed hand.

Things you don't need to know

2011-02-10T16:19:00.017+08:00

My previous major was Political Science. I'm still interested in the subject, but don't ask me about it, I only know enough of the basics. I don't want to engage in debate as I don't know shit. I see the titles they're reading now and I think I'm not smart enough to understand them.

I've been thinking about stereotypes about courses. For example, a Pol Sci student is outspoken and a good speaker. Another is Pol Sci is necessarily a pre-Law course. It could be, but not really.

Don't always listen to other people's advice- sometimes they don't know about what they're talking about and they're just as clueless as you. In high school, people told me that I'm fit for Pol Sci because of the reasons in the stereotypes. I listened. Those who told me didn't know shit. I also didn't know shit, and believed them.

Honesty

2011-02-02T19:59:00.019+08:00

“When you're in high school your life is focused on trying to be cool and impress people. College must remove those feelings, and anyone who still has that attitude past college will only get too full of himself.”

I can't remember where I read that or if those are the exact words. When I was younger, I'd go lengths to impress others. Now I want to smack my previous self to a wall. I wanted to be accepted, so people will think I am something. My role in life was that, but soon I realized that I wasn't thinking of myself first. I now saw what the others meant, what I've never seen because I was busy trying to impress: oh, that girl vying for our attention? Wala ginasapak sa balay?

That's it. No matter how much I convince myself that it was a long time ago and I'm different now, I still feel it gnawing. Forgive yourself, you were only 11 or 12 years old. Move on. I can't. My brother dubbed me with the mocking nickname of 'Miss Reminisce' because of my talent: flashback and replay embarrassing experiences and feel so bad about them again. Something from years ago, but damn, sometimes they feel crippling that I wish I wasn't born.

I think, what if people from back then still see me as the girl back then. But if I still care or think about whatever they may think of me, isn't that still me living for their expectations and not for myself?

The other realization is people don't care. They don't care if I care or not what they think. I shouldn't let something petty bother me.

Come college, I've seen that there are more pressing concerns in the bigger world than my own little world. I'm only one among 6,928,198,253 in the world. Its easy to say I don't matter. These thoughts that come to me when I'm in a crowd, and I don't feel like anything special. There's always someone better out there.

Its JUST a blog.

2011-02-02T16:22:00.002+08:00

Not everything one thinks of is worth posting for all the world to see, nor my posts will always be worth reading for someone else.

Breathe through your nose

2011-01-31T16:23:00.011+08:00

One thing about me no one needs to hear about is my time as a shut-in. I didn't know what to answer if someone online asked, How are you? How I am, I can't answer "I was going insane."
- - -
After my last trip to Cebu, the worst fever in my life struck. I stayed in bed for almost 72 hours, not eating or sleeping, just awake. I went to a doctor, the skull x-ray showed my sinuses were so clotted with dry snot and blood, and I wasn't getting enough air and it wasn't going where its supposed to. Turns out, my brain wasn't getting enough oxygen for years.

Which explains a lot of things. Your brain won't function properly. It causes insomnia which causes more things like shitty feelings. That high-school-angst-feeling, (no one understands me! I have no friends!) — I just didn't get enough sleep.

I was given antibiotics and nose sprays and it healed. Good thing it didn't get worse that it needed an operation. That's it kids, take care of your nose and get enough sleep.

and the best time to clean your ears and cut your nails is after a shower,
A

Lines and scenes

2011-01-27T15:47:00.004+08:00

There are times I feel something, but can't put it to words. Then I read something that makes me think, that's what I felt for a long time. That's why its easier to quote them, as they say it better than I can. I keep a text file of those things and scenes that affect me, so excuse another quotes post.

from Paul Theroux's The Consul's File:

The person who appears to have no secret seems to be hiding something; yet there is a simpler explanation for this apparent deception— there probably isn't any secret. We tend to see mystery in emptiness, but I knew from Africa that emptiness is more than just that: behind it is a greater emptiness.
- - -
It made me suspicious of everyone I met, and realized the sort of double life people led— and had proof of it— I felt rather inadequate myself. What was my life? My job, my nationals, my files: hardly enough. I wasn't a character; it was other people who matter, not me. I've always been amused by novelists who write autobiographically: the credulous self-promotion, the limited vision, the display of style. Other people's lives are so much more interesting than one's own. I am an unrepentant eavesdropper and I find anonymity a consolation.
- - -
Fiction is so often fatal— it hallows some places and makes them look like dreamland: New York, London, Paris- like the label of an expensive suit.

Some of my favorite scenes from a manga and a book, Deadman Wonderland and Chuck Palahniuk's Rant.

BANG! Genkaku shoots someone in the face. Someone afar shouts, "What is that sound?" and Genkaku replies, "Nothing, just the sound of a red flower blooming."

Tina: Your girlfriend you like so much, she fucks for money. Your little girlfriend is a gaddamn whore.
Rant: Is that true?
Echo: Is what true?
Rant: What she said. Are you really my girlfriend?

And that's for today.

—30—

2011-01-25T15:44:00.005+08:00

A bit of time away from society may be good, just don't spend it pitying yourself- it worked for me. But after almost a year of seclusion, its quite difficult adjusting back to FHBs* (fellow human beings) and 'normal' life. I'm not sure I missed it, hearing all the backbiting... again, the three things people DO, THINK, and SAY are never the same.

I deleted my Facebook. Yes, there are ways. Its a great site, but I have no use for it. I used to waste time every time I log in, reading about others, thinking of clever status updates... all gone.
- - - - -
finished Cormac McCarthy's The Road.
"I don't want to say my name. I couldn't trust you with it. To do something with it. I don't want anybody talking about me. To say where I was or what I said when I was there. I mean, you could talk about me maybe. But nobody could say it was me. I could be anybody. I think in times like these the less said the better."

Rambling

2010-12-04T09:57:00.007+08:00

I can't blog. There are no "thoughts I can't just keep to myself any longer" as of the moment, I have nothing to say and my life isn't that interesting. Reality ate me and I'm staying away from the internet as much as possible because of school stuff. I find myself always deleting/editing entries because of words that I don't like anymore. I'd rather comment on other blogs than post on my own. I prefer anonymous forums than use something with my real name on it.

I've transferred schools and I feel much better here. My new friends are also transferees, they're cool. I've met a former classmate in a store and he told me nga na-miss ya man ko kuno kay wala na sila "quirky" nga classmate. Huh? Ako? Quirky? I hate that word. Wala ta ka ya na-miss. I don't have ill feelings or something like that for my previous school. The important thing I've learned in my stay there is: The more you know, the more you don't.

Figure it out. And that sometimes you have to know where you don't want to be before knowing what you want to do.

TWATM pt. 2

2010-11-15T15:34:00.006+08:00

Exaggeration
Ako? Exaj? What?

Faceless
Wala akong pictures kasi wala akong mukha.

Graceless
"Aso, kabayo, at orchids lang ang may BREEDING! AKO, WALA!" -Earvin Delikado

Heartless
"How can you be so cold, so heartless?" he asked me. Then I showed him, my heart, in a jar of formaldehyde.

Logging in Facebook and seeing everyone woe and whine about heartbreak makes me glad I don't know anything about relationshits.

History
I failed everything in high school except History. I wrote down EVERYTHING the teacher said, including smartass remarks. My notebook was complete with narratives, dialogues. It was so great she didn't return it. Well, if she's using it now to teach ignorant high school kids (who won't listen anyway), then all's good.

Time Travel
Post sang friend sa FB: If only I could...
tanan nag-sabat: turn back time...
Ako ya, kay exaj: ...turn back time, if only I had said what I still hide, if only I could turn back time, I would stay for the night. Turn back time by AQUA? (Ang nag-kanta man BARBIE GIRL, rilly) wtf ga-post na ko ya lyrics man

Zombies
I decided that zombies are over-represented. These days its all about zombies and ninjas (zombie ninjas, anyone?). We need more on fairies, mermaids, leprechauns, tentacled monsters etc. But my cousin who is a zombie junkie insists: zombie fairies and zombie mermaids. I mean, he's got it all ready in case of zombie outbreak. Guns, supplies, you name it.

Some dreams

2010-10-31T21:12:00.001+08:00

Remember what they say,
There's no shortcut to a dream.
It's all blood and sweat,
And life is what you manage in between.
- "October", Broken Bells

As said in the movie Inception, practice makes perfect when it comes to remembering dreams. Writing what I can recall helps and I can remember them fairly well. For some reason, I'm wearing my high school uniform in dreams. Its like my "totem"- in the movie it's the thing you use to determine if you're dreaming or not, which means if I get stranded in some unknown place and I'm wearing uniform, that's when I know.
- - - - -
These are the short and simple ones. The longer dreams next time.

*A dream entitled "The Various Stages of Starvation". I am watching a video on a blog. A cartoon of a woman says something about famine and starving. It starts showing mother and child about to sleep. Their appearance changes, thinner until nothing remains but skin and bones. The cartoon woman says "So let's take a look at YOUR FACE" and a mirror appears on screen and I don't want to look but a hand goes out of the computer screen to grab my face and make me look in the mirror... I wake up.

*On my grandfather's house that has two floors... but I find stairs leading up to a [nonexistent] third floor, there's a hallway lined with doors and at the end of it is another staircase. Up there is a big white door, and inside is an empty white room and there's another door. I keep going in similar rooms and doors until I end up seeing a wall with a huge black hole then I wake up.
*I'm in a hotel. I'm looking for my room, I always open the wrong rooms and inside are people I know. I get to the right room and find the same hallway of doors in the dream above. -wake-

ALWAYS doors and rooms. A dream interpretation site said, "Corridors, hallways and passages with doors and rooms characterize free choices with options arranged ..."

*Elementary, high school, and college overlapping: HS graduation in a Grade 6 classroom, one HS class held in the the CAS lobby.
*This is cute. On a school bench, a big unicorn is teaching baby unicorns how to fly. (Someone asked if I dreamed this when I was a kid. It's not only kids who can dream of unicorns...)

Somewhere, there is a dream dreaming you.
A

Forgotten pictures

2010-10-04T19:37:00.002+08:00

I'm no photographer. I don't own a camera. I hate having my picture taken. Some pictures from two years ago:

Right after the flood of June 2008, outside the chapel.