Basang-basa sa ulan

sumasabay yung kampanya namin kay milenyo.

update: random notes on the storm

sumasabay nga yung kampanya namin kay milenyo, tinangay naman niya yung mga elements ng kampanya namin. he/she/it, the strongest direct hit to manila in over a decade, ripped our beautiful east avenue billboard into shreds, and prompted our vp to order the rest of the billboards slashed before they could cause damage to passersby.

milenyo also flung away most of the 35 individual character banners installed on the perimeter walls of our building, much to the glee of the tricycle drivers who now have resplendent, mucha-inspired new seat covers. ika nga ng boss ko, "oh well. at least roving collaterals na sila."

finally, milenyo also hurled the luzon into darkness -- the lights have yet to come on in most of metro manila -- effectively rendering our kick-ass tv promo spots useless. "bakit pa natin 'to ginagawa?" grumbled charlie as we put together a series of daily countdown spots. "wala namang makakapanood e!"

random thought: who thought of the name milenyo anyway? talk about names predestining outcomes -- ang lakas kasi ng dating eh. maybe if it had had a meek name -- like, i don't know, malou or miming -- the storm would have come and gone without a whimper.

utterly clueless

i woke late thursday morning, fully intending to take my sweet time primping (an excellent stress reliever, i've found) and show up at work around lunchtime. although i heard wind and rain outside, i didn't realize the full extent of the storm as i languidly blowdried, yes, blowdried my hair and stepped into my favorite black heels. mali. maling-mali!

getting to the office was an adventure, to say the least. great gusts of wind blew rain into the jeep i was riding, which stopped a few meters short of its terminus when two bolts of lightning blew up two condo transformers. the mrt shut down, and i took a bus for the first time since college. on the way to work, i lost count of all the fallen trees littering edsa. some of them were twined with downed power lines, others entangled with twisted lampposts or broken signs. apocalypse na kaya ito? i thought idly as the bus oozed down edsa, the konduktor opening its doors to shout things like "gago, liliparin ka na!" to random, determined pedestrians.

i briefly wondered why i was even attempting to make it to work, but i realized i could not resist the siren call of uninterrupted electricity (tv! cable! internet! aircon! hot shower!) when a blackout was sure to follow.

sanctuary! sanctuary!

ayon. pagdating ko sa office, kulot na ako. not to mention i was nearly slipping out of my heels, my legs were so wet. my formidable global sources payong was bent entirely on one side, and the wind practically hurled me into the gates of gma. "ah eh -- ok ka lang?" said a startled janice de belen, who happened to be the first person i saw.

i spent the night at the office, with a host of other "refugees". it was actually fun. i spent a lot of time online and slept on the giant cushions in our floor's receiving area. plus, my hair had dried into a surprisingly pleasing configuration -- tousled bedhead curls ("dapat lagi kang binabagyo!" enthused a gay officemate). i didn't know what to be more grateful for: my wonderful office (we're literally a beacon of light in the area -- it's totally unreal to look out the windows at night and see absolutely nothing), that my family and i were safe and sound, or that i was actually having a good hair day.

Ain't she a beauty?

the google video thingy is acting up, so i put the compressed version up on youtube.

this is the product of that exhausting shoot, and the now-immortal line, "tell me your story!"

yes yes i have significantly more time to blog today.

Too bad we're not going to Italy

Your Inner European is Italian!

Passionate and colorful. You show the world what culture really is.

Who's Your Inner European?

Postscript to palpitations

the wonders of technology: you can now choose to give yourself a heart attack at any time or place you so desire.

last night, a bunch of us from the acs were having a late-night meeting at mcdonald's katipunan. we got to chatting about our upcoming competition (three weeks until we fly! aieeee!), and were idly wondering about our competitors and their programmes. then we discovered that alex happened to have his laptop on hand, conveniently wired with pldt weroam. how could we resist not checking online?

silence -- then, shrieks. "nandyan naaaaa!"

and so eight hyperventilating choristers huddled over the laptop, poring intently over lists of choirs, competition schedules and jurists. each of us scrambled to dig up every possible scrap of information and experience stored in our memories, ranging from the reassuring and relevant to the jitter-inducing and absurd.

"si volker hempfling, head ng jury sa marktoberdorf, mahal tayo niyan! siya yung nagsabing, 'we are not machines'... ayan may babae sa jury, mata-touch yan sa buwa-buwa [a lullaby]. harap na lang tayo sa kanya pag buwa-buwa na! hahahaha! ngeh may taga-ukraine? sino 'yan? peter broadbent! artistic committee din yata siya ng polyfollia. o ayan si bo johanssen taga-sweden, may swedish piece tayo, pasok na yan... bakit nga ba hindi tayo sinali sa small group category? jusko wesna! sila yung nanalo sa arezzo tapos nag-grand prix the following year... omigod nandiyan nga yung batavia [indonesian choir that is eerily similar to acs in sound and setup]! shet sa sabado pa sila, mas matagal silang makakapahinga... mag-espia tayo, pwede tayong manood ng rehearsals nila... what if hindi pala batavia yung makakatalo sa 'tin, what if university of hickville eck-eck... wag naman sana... kakanta tayo ng 4pm tapos 10pm yung sunod na category? 10pm?!? pwede bang magbaon ng masahista galing polyfollia? aaay certain cutie yang basque judge na yan ha, may pagka-sergio ni marimar... okay, let's analyze... ano ba, let's not read too much into the schedule... uy ankapella ulit, diba nakasama natin sila sa marktoberdorf? ... magaling ba sila? umm okay lang..."

panic and excitement kept us chained to the screen for what seemed like ages. hindi na butterflies in the stomach ito. cavorting elephants is more like it.

like i said before --

oh. my. f*cking. gawd. this is really happening.

Postscript to the accident

aside from the damage to the side mirror, it turned out that there was a loooong scrape from one end of the car to the other -- that for some really weird reason i thought was just paint. ooopsy. my sister was not thrilled to point it out to me when she arrived from dumaguete sunday night, and less thrilled to have to go file a police report for insurance purposes.

thankfully, the police proceedings were a total snooze -- no kickbacking cops or any of that. except that we did have to walk past a couple of overstuffed jail cells to get to the traffic desk, which was rather creepy. totoo pala yung napapanood mo sa sine -- yung naghihiyawan yung mga preso pag may dumaan na babae. *shudder*

and thankfully too, i'm going to get a reimbursement for the side mirror. and that ate didn't blow her top. (thanks ate for being such a cool ate!)

this morning, i also had to go and apologize to one of the neighbors for a scrape i inflicted upon him while backing out of our impossible garage -- only a couple of hours after one of the other neighbors hit his car!

suddenly i'm happy to be rejoining the ranks of the cabbing urbanites. :-P

My first car accident

Ate: u using the car this weekend?
me: yep
me: where are you nga ulit?
Ate: dumaguete
me: ah k
me: by the way
me: i have something to tell you
Ate: YOU'RE ENGAGED????

hmmm why is this suddenly the question of the century?

me: no.........
me: wala kaya si marlon
me: its about
me: the car
me: ehem
Ate: ARGGGGGGG
Ate: nabangga?????
me: actually its not that bad
me: (disclaimer hahah)
Ate: sana sa bumper lang
Ate: para sabay na sa paayos ng iba
me: two trucks made me gitgit on shaw
me: and i was trying to make iwas on my left
me: the truck on my right sped up
Ate: AND????
me: ayun tumupi yung right side mirror
me: and the mirror itself broke
me: but other than that wala na
Ate: *cries*
me: BUT
me: i called all the nissan casas to look for a replacement

me, while waiting for the nissan parts people to come back to the phone and tell me if they had the mirror in stock: please God let there be a mirror. please please please. if you let them have it in stock, i'll do anything God. i'll... i'll... i'll even tell ate the truth!

me: and i replaced it!
me: :-D
me: go me!
Ate: GASP!!
Ate: u almost gave me a heart attack
Ate: thank u!!
Ate: mahal ba?
Ate: tsaka maganda naman yung pagka-replace?
me: mahal sa nagtitipid haha
me: it was 1,325

so much for getting my hair color retouched before i go to europe. haay. the price of stupidity.

Ate: F*CK!!
me: ya ok yung pagka-replace
Ate: wawa ka naman
me: muntik na akong tumawag sa yo right after no
me: feeling ko talaga iiyak ako
me: haha
me: tapos i left the car in the office and took a cab to my errands
me: trauma hahaha
Ate: anobayan pinalungkot mo naman ako
Ate: thank u for the immediate replacement
me: i took it to a car shop on timog to see if they had a mirror
me: tapos naloka ako when they told me i had to drive to banawe to get one
me: hello? in my fragile emotional state????
me: and where the fuck is banawe????
Ate: grabeh!!!
Ate: so san mo finally ni-replace?
me: nissan libis
Ate: ahh gudy
me: so now i know how to drive to libis haha
Ate: mas safe yun
Ate: makakuha ka ng mirror sa banawe mawalan ka naman ng mags
me: ngork
Ate: kelan ba nangyari, yday?
me: this afternoon
Ate: ahhh
Ate: fresh trauma
me: YES
me: and then after i had it replaced i forced myself to drive around before going home
me: para hindi ako matakot mag-drive forever
Ate: well i hope you're over the trauma
me: yeah driving around after helped
me: at mejo praning na ako sa right side
Ate: o sya sho-shower na ako
me: oki
me: see you tomorrow!
Ate: see u tom
me: sorry about the mirror again!
Ate: its ok things happen
me: yeah grr
me: anyway baboo

Being with friends

on thursday night, i went to acs rehearsals feeling like a heap of dung. it was an awful rehearsal. everything seemed too loud, my ears were ringing, the lights were too bright at pakiramdam ko parang binugbog ako. o kaya parang masusuka ako sa pagod. during downtime at rehearsals, i wondered why i was feeling that way. i recalled my last few posts on this blog -- work, work and more work. a lot of angst.

it was then that i realized i was not so much physically as emotionally drained; and that the latter can take a much bigger toll than i imagined it could. i've spent longer hours at the office for other projects. it's just that i've invested more of myself in this project than any others -- it's been more of a struggle.

and so when we traipsed to dada's house later that evening for her post-rehearsals birthday dinner, i sat at the dinner table like a lump, barely able to finish the famous de pano spaghetti. i just sat there and let their laughter wash over me, their company strengthen me, until i found myself laughing along with them over hilarious tour stories -- some that we were hearing for the first time in five, six years; others that have been retold at dozens of late-night dinners, never failing to elicit gales of laughter from the same group of people.

a couple of minutes before we left dada's house, i saw peter with a beer and decided it would be a perfect way to cap a long day. i sought out the cooler in dada's garage and fished out a frosty bottle of san mig light, sighing with relief as i popped off the cap and took a long swig. this is exactly what i needed, i thought to myself as i curled up on the couch with my bottle, the laughter of my friends resounding all around me. but after a few deep swigs, i knew that it wasn't just the beer that i so badly needed, and got, that night.

it was laughter. it was the joy of creating, and sharing, and reliving.

it was the unconditional, honest appreciation of friends.

it was the security and constancy of these people who i felt i've known forever and can't imagine life without -- an intangible embrace, that is as warm and real and palpable as a physical hug.

it was being with people who know precisely who deserves all the glory, all the time.

it was remembering that i have a place and purpose outside of, more valuable than, and i daresay more meaningful than what i do at work.

haay, senti. friends are wonderful, aren't they?

What a journey it has been

so why do i suddenly feel like i can't wait for it to be over?

yes, this is one of the things i've done for that other thing that i've been yakking about for the past couple of months. this is what i try to achieve in a typical workday. i write a piece of hype, run around trying to get various persons to execute it, then i run around begging to get it approved, and then i smile placidly while another set of various persons poke holes into it/claim it as their own/pretend not to notice.

at least the powers that be liked this one. i did too.

Good riddance...

...3kg! i hope to never see you again!

after nearly four months of boxing (not too religiously, i'm afraid) and wondering why the hell nothing was happening, i stopped eating rice last week. and then 3kg fell off, just like that.

let's hope it stays off until i get to europe. that black wool coat i bought in mango last year is going to look great in my pictures when i can finally close it all the way haha. skinny europe pictures! hurray!

(and no, i'm still not engaged.)

Palpitations

oh. my. f*cking. gawd. this is really happening.

*Rolls up sleeves*

bring my script to life! moooahahaha!

actually doing work can do wonders for the way one feels about... well, work. after an indignant email from my boss and a bit of going back and forth from project manager to boss to client, i'm back on the job i signed up for. i'm a writer again!

i can almost feel little kinks in my brain ("writing muscles"?) flexing, stretching and popping bit by bit. it's slow going at the moment, but it feels great. and pretty soon, i know i will be immersed (or is it obsessed?) with a show again.

the setup on the left is for a series of plugs charlie and i thought up. the interesting thing about it is that the storyboard and the shoot came before the actual lines, which i'm just about to write.

we shot the series last friday in this cavernous warehouse where dust and grease attack you the moment you set foot upon the premises. i went home at 230am with awful eyeluggage, dirty toenails and at least three new zits. but to see this all elaborate rigging, artistas literally bending over backwards to bring an idea -- our idea! -- to life was definitely worth it.

from a vague idea to impromptu instructions shouted by our director, vince ("you're lonely!" "you're suffering!" and my personal favorite, which came out of nowhere, "tell me your story!"), to the extremely goodlooking cast of six whose faces are seared into my little tapes, and now to me. i get to give them their stories; i get to savor the thrill of deciphering their expressions frame by frame, and of choosing words for each of them, and of imagining.

it's times like this when i really, really love my job.

more photos from the shoot, plus our cast pictorial two weeks ago, here. my favorite shots are the ones of i took of philippine cinema's iconic celia rodriguez. i love her!

How to get a cab in Makati

since i haven't worked in the makati cbd for over a year, i totally forgot how it frenetic can get during over there. especially when you're competing with a legion of irate, impatient, makati-fied yuppies for that impossibly elusive prize -- a taxi during rush hour.

absolutely vicious! (and don't even get me started on the taxi drivers themselves.)

the rare weekday trek to makati was on account of a rehearsal for mozart's requiem at union church, which is on rada street in legaspi village. i took the mrt to ayala, then battled it out with the yuppies at the glorietta 4 driveway. timog and environs, with its surfeit of cabs, has spoiled me. hindi ko kinaya ang agawan!

consider this:

a cab drives up to the entrance and is instantly besieged by any number of would-be passengers. a near-scuffle ensues for the passenger-side door handle, with the objective of pulling the door open to blurt out one's destination for the driver's consideration -- all this as the poor passenger inside the cab fumbles for change. the driver either gives a lazy nod or (this i hate) simply pulls away in response, upon which the remaining participants of the scuffle must then chase after the taxi to blurt out their destinations -- fingers crossed for that all-important nod.

vicious! absolutely vicious!

after what seemed like ages and ages of this urban violence, i finally cornered a cab with three other hopefuls. one of my competitors had already wedged the front door open as the passenger in the back seat, an utterly bewildered japanese businessman, fled in terror.

competitor #1: guadalupe!"
cabbie: *waves away competitor #1*
competitor #2: "bf homes!"
me, to myself: asa ka pa!
cabbie: *makes gesture as if preparing to drive off*
me: legaspi village, sa may likod lang ng greenbelt!
cabbie: *hesitates, then nods*

i felt rather pleased with myself as we whizzed off down ayala avenue.

cabbie: pa-south na kasi ako...
me: ah, sa rada street lang naman ako eh.
cabbie: oo nga eh, kaya nga pinili kita kasi malapit. pero --
me: pero kuya, malapit lang naman eh. (attempting winsome tone)
cabbie: oo nga, pero ikaw ang pinili ko kasi bukod sa malapit ka, maganda
ka pa.

kaya mo?

me: ano ka ba, kuya, nambola ka pa!
cabbie: walang bola 'yun ah! may kamukha ka ngang artista, eh.
me: *braces self for inevitable comparison to yasmien kurdi*
cabbie: si natalie portman!

sosyal!

makati... iba ka talaga!

More happy thoughts

being a underutilized copywriter clerk has its benefits. i've been filling in the vacuum in my heart (haha drama) work hours with a whole lot of youtube. more specifically, rekindling my adolescent preoccupation with rumiko takahashi -- which, incidentally, was first kindled by an equally adolescent preoccupation with the guy who introduced me to rumiko takahashi.

and so i've finished a couple of episodes of mermaid forest, all five parts of the mermaid scar oav, and random episodes of my all-time favorite, ranma 1/2. it's been fun reliving the creepiness of mermaids and lost souls, giggling over the wit of ranma and company. i almost forgot how cute and gravelly ranma's (english-dubbed) voice was (kaka-in love!), or how perfect mr. saotome's comic timing was (but only when in panda form).

i used to be obsessed with ranma in high school, drawing the characters all the time, even buying the graphic novel in english for php600 (which was a hefty amount of money to a high schooler in the early 90s!). come to think of it, that wasn't the only thing i did for ranma. i even made pa-cute to this cousin of a classmate of mine who liked me (and who i totally did not like) just so i could borrow his vhs tapes (vhs tapes?!?!?!) of ranma episodes.

after four years of me pimping myself to him for anime, he ended up asking me to his grad ball through his cousin. i went, but the moment he escorted me out of my house, i knew that i was in for the most boring evening of my young life. so i ditched him an hour after we got to the ballroom by pretending to have a really bad headache and asking him to take me home.

yes, i was an evil little girl.

or maybe this ranma provider and the poor ditchee are two different guys and i'm mixing them up. at any rate, i don't have to do evil things like that now that there's youtube! youtube will keep me from sinning!

one episode down, 38 volumes to go! that's a lot of happy thoughts. thank god.

(my favorite ranma character is shampoo, by the way. now that i've read her wikipedia writeup, though, i'm kind of worried as to what that says about me.)

Think happy thoughts!

to combat the effects of the work hazard/s i have just written about, i shall now attempt to distract myself with random happy thoughts.

happy thought #1: marlon has successfully booked us a room in paris! the source of my elation comes just as much from the fact that marlon surfed the web and did the booking also by himself (with some help from my sister's 2004 edition of let's go europe), as it is from the rave reviews of our choice, the hotel montpensier. for a hotel that's practically next door to the louvre, the rates are well within our budget and the rooms aren't too shabby (love the big windows and high ceilings!).

happy thought #2: acs is getting into competition mode! last night's rehearsal had perfect attendance, a herculean feat for a choir composed entirely of working professionals. we dropped scores for the competition pieces (although it took quite a few barbs and nasty glances for the male sections to drop them for real), and began my favorite part of the process -- shaping the music. augh, a month and a half to go until we leave!

happy thought #3: watched the devil wears prada with leo, mimi and eunice on saturday. loved meryl streep, the outfits, the humor -- everything! what i'm totally not loving, though, is how manila's alta de sociedad have been tossing out "lifestyle column" after "lifestyle column" filled with copious delusions that they are the manila version of the new york fashion world so glamorously depicted in the devil wears prada. puh-leeze. can any local fashion/lifestyle columnist/editor really say/believe they "make or break" any careers other than their own?

uh-oh, happy thought leading back to angst.

that's all.

Told you so

i knew i'd say it sooner or later. now i find the time has finally come for me to say it: be careful what you wish for -- it might come true.

turns out i never really "got" that project that i really wanted. somebody, somewhere is still keeping it tightly wrapped in the enormous tentacles of his/her/their leviathan ego. while i sit in my little cubicle meekly waiting for instructions to encode and print out like a good little drone, and generally try to fight off creative atrophy, a sinking morale and work-related depression.

i could probably sum up the whole thing in two words, but i'm having a hard time deciding what the killer combo will be when there are so many contenders. control freak? giant ego? trust issues? glory hog?

i know i should be thankful for a lot of things -- a great cast, fabulous concept, early material, a strong creative direction (understatement of the year). hell, some people would even be thankful for not having to do any brain work at all at this point in the campaign. but that's just not me.

then again, i have a pretty tough job ahead of me -- reminding myself that i'm a copywriter and not a clerk. that, i will need to do full time on this project. at least until the humdrum daily requirements start coming in, which of course will be left to me 'cause they're just too damn low-profile, or since the creative directions have already been set and my miniscule brain can probably be trusted to obediently follow in the brilliant wake of the powers that be.

yes, angst. and this flu ain't helping either.

i'm probably overreacting. this is just one of the hazards of my job (which is still a lovely job), and what's happening to me now has already happened to most everyone on the floor. as pia likes to say, God is fair.