What's missing, part 2

I miss music. I miss singing, and singers. I miss Europe. I miss being a singer, being around singers, in Europe.

Yes, I realize I could be more articulate but I'm writing on the fly. It's been a packed few days. Late Sunday night and most of Monday was mental and emotional bedlam; afterwards, thankfully, I slipped into relief and reminiscence.

Whereupon I found that it is far better to be in the grip of intense nostalgia than of utter panic.

On buying art

Tonight Marlon and I went to our first art exhibit opening as potential buyers (emphasis on potential than actual buying). Since discovering the wonderful art of Yasmin Sison via Jessica Zafra's blog, I've embarked on a sort of internet scavenger hunt, unraveling a trail of paintings, artists and galleries -- clues that lead from one thing to the next until I find just what it is I'm looking for, something which I don't really know just yet.

Some clickthroughs lead to dead ends -- artists that I find too leftist or emo or simply not my type. Some have led to amazing events with surprising finds, such as a Juvenal Sanso sketch at what seems like (to my uneducated sensibilities) a bargain price. It's been a happy and fascinating path, and one that I've been traveling with Marlon by my side. I'm lucky to have a husband who loves art just as much as I do. We may not always like the same things, but he says he appreciates the difference because my taste leads him to take a second look at artists and paintings he wouldn't normally look at.

I never understood or agreed with the idea of buying art mainly as an investment. For me, you buy art to love, not to sell. And if you buy something you truly love, God forbid you have to sell it. My mom collected paintings primarily because she loved them; it broke her heart to have to sell them when business began to go bad.

A painting on your wall should bring a smile to your lips and a lightness and spaciousness to your heart, not the anxiety of "Why isn't this appreciating? When can I sell it? How much can I make off it?" For me, the only reason to buy a piece of art is because you love it, you're blown away by it, and it speaks to you; if it should ever appreciate in value over time, then it's a thrilling but unexpected bonus.

I can understand though why people take such trouble to make well-studied purchases of art; art can cost so much money, and there's so much of it around, that you want to be assured you're choosing something that is worth your hard-earned money. In that aspect, it's simply like reading movie reviews or doing research before you buy a digital camera -- an informed buy is a better buy.

Marlon and I have yet to decide on what our first purchase will be, but there are a few options. For now, I'm simply enjoying the process of discovery as it unfolds, meeting really lovely people and talented artists, and being welcomed into this beckoning new world that seems to have a soft spot for "young collectors" -- a phrase which I would like to apply to myself, but only when I'm absolutely ready.

Pamosong tsansa

While reading Cristy Fermin's not-so-blind item about Manny Pacquiao and Atenean homewrecker Krista Ranillo, I ran into one of my ultimate pet peeves.

I can't claim to be a grammar nazi when it comes to the Filipino language the way I am when it comes to English, but I hate, hate, hate it when native writers or speakers use Filipinized English words for which proper Filipino words actually exist.

Prime example: using pamoso for famous. Showbiz talk show hosts and columnists who broadcast and write entirely in the native language always pull this ugly rabbit out of the proverbial buri hat. Does pamoso actually exist in the Filipino grammar? If it does, aren't there less awkward-sounding words to convey fame? How about kilala? Tanyag? Sikat?

Another one which crops up a lot on daytime TV is tsansa (chansa), or chance. Cue the PCSO announcements and low-budget giveaway TVCs: "May tsansa kang manalo ng limpak-limpak na salapi!" I even recall this specific phrase from a TVC (but forget the brand): "Mas maraming tiket, mas maraming tsansa!" Meron ba talagang salitang tsansa? Wouldn't it be better to say pagkakataon, or even the Hispanic oportunidad?

Can you think of any others? Does this bother you too or ako lang ba ang affected masyado?

What's missing

Lately I've been really stressed out about production. My boss, who used to play the role of senior production manager, resigned over a month ago with no replacement in sight. That and an unusually large number of production projects (as opposed to purely graphics-based) have left me picking up the slack and doing most of the production work myself.

Although I realized I've learned a fair bit about production since I started this job over a year ago, there's a lot that completely escapes me, like costing and scheduling. Juggling all the nitty gritty grunt work of production with my creative responsibilities has left me stressed and anxious. I'm antsy for someone to come over and take the lead; while I've professed my eagerness to learn the ropes, I don't want to be (and I don't think I am equipped to handle) being the sole responsibility for production.

There have been many, many times these past months that I wished I could drop the "/producer" half of my job title and go back to being "just" a writer. Especially during times when an important creative proposal deserves attention and I am bound to spend half the day ringing up all the car rental services in Singapore until I find a red convertible Mini Cooper for a shoot at the end of the week.

Mostly I have been feeling that I haven't been writing as much as I'd like, or giving my writing (when I am called upon to write) the time and effort that it requires.

So yesterday I finally gave in to the urge to write. I picked up an old book that used to belong to my mom, called The Right to Write by Julia Cameron, where I remembered seeing writing exercises and prompts. The first exercise was simply called, Begin. And the result of that exercise was what I posted last night.

For the past few months I've been feeling that writing was missing from my work. And just last night, I realized that I don't have to rely on work to supply what's missing from work.

That's what life is for. :)

At home

I am at home with my husband, on an uncharacteristically chilly night. It was sunny all day, the only spot of sunshine in two straight weeks of rain, chill and gloom. I was half-expecting the anvil to drop, in the form of a thunderclap or a sudden burst of clouds. And at half-past six, it did.

That sudden, thunderous downpour of rain rang in my head like the dismissal bell on a school day. I quit my work and immediately dropped my good intention of going to muay thai. I rang up my husband and five minutes later, I was in a cab picking him up from the covered walkway at the Somerset station. We cuddled all the way home. Rain pouring down the windows and a certain nip in the air can do that to you.

And now I’m sitting at the dining table in a pair of velour pajamas, with a hot thick mug of Swiss Miss Dark Chocolate beside me. In front of me are the dining room windows, where I can see a reflection of the paper lamp in the living room. Behind the soft yellow glow of the lamp, the shadowy curve of Marlon’s head as he reads a comic book on the day bed. One of the things I love about us is how we can just share space, each doing his or her own thing, not talking to each other or not even in the same room, yet still be completely together.

I prepared a cup of tea for him, a blend of green tea and mint tea in a rather precious hand-sewn, loosely-woven cotton tea bag that I filched from the hotel room at the Fullerton Hotel, where we celebrated my birthday weekend three weeks ago. I added a dollop of honey at his request, and put the mug in his hands with a kiss. Such are the little pleasures of being a wife.

The cat is padding around in the shadows of a room whose door has been left ajar. She does so in silence, which I’ve come to equate with contentment. Now and then the tiny silver bell on her collar tinkles as she moves her head in little bursts of curiosity or restlessness, but on the whole she is quiet and satisfied to have us home, be well fed and to have had her early evening dose of affection.

There is nothing to think about tonight but how to while away the time until eleven or son, when we finally turn in for the night. The choice is a lazily decadent one – do I write or draw or watch television or read one of my many books that are waiting to be read? The luxury of free time is one that I enjoy so much more because of the number of interests I have, although it does get raucous in my head when all of my interests simultaneously yammer and complain that they are starved for attention.

Tonight I choose to write. Write purely for myself, with no deadlines except the very end of this blank page. Write purely for fun, not to convince or sell or illustrate or anything like that. If I am writing to convince anyone, it is myself – to prove to myself that I can still fill an entire page purely for the pleasure of it, that I still have “it”, whatever “it” is.

And it is a good choice. Even better, I think, than deciding to leave work the very moment the rain first began to fall.

Ignorance is bliss

after the casting and creative chaos of last week, i started this week with an uncharacteristically quiet monday. no client emails, no boss emails, nobody chasing me for everything. i even had time to plan my next production (a repeat of a sleazy, skanky project i did early this year) and think about what to do better, having learned from the last time.

and the reason for this blessed quietness? the central email server in london was down. and london being six hours behind us, their IT guy couldn't even get started on the problem until our local workday ended.

ah, peace and quiet. sometimes you gotta love technology.

The clock is ticking

marlon's colleague paula is this spunky, hilarious colombian woman who was married for ten years before she and her husband decided to have kids. she was swimming along happily, childless and carefree, until one day she turned thirty and "boom!" as she puts it, "it was like an time bomb went off and i suddenly HAD to have a baby. i just HAD to."

last i checked, nothing in me has gone ka-BLAM quite yet, but i do feel the clock ticking. marlon and i have been talking about having a baby for a while now. as i write this i feel like i've just slipped into a crack in the twilight zone. me? a mother? kids? am i really saying this? aren't i really just sixteen years old? where did the time go and what happened to me?

(oh, in case this post seems totally out of the blue, i was actually thinking of blogging about work but i realized work is the last thing that i need to be dwelling on at the end of a long day.)

but seriously, i find that almost in spite of myself, yes i do want to have a baby soon. suddenly i find that the two-year post-wedding moratorium marlon and i agreed upon is up, and along with buying property back home and moving somewhere other than singapore, that's the next big thing that i'm really, really looking forward to. in fact, one of the reasons that inspired me to begin losing weight is to make it to an ideal bmi for pregnancy, which is, oh, about 30 lbs away.

how soon is soon? maybe late next year or early 2011. the only things that are really pushing back the date are the lure of travel and the fat little bundle of cash (well, not so little) that we will need to give little marlon/little deepa an easy entry into the world -- and hopefully a nice head start in life.

my ultimate baby fantasy is to have fraternal twins like atasha and andres muhlach, or, sige na nga vivienne and knox jolie-pitt para mas sosyal, para isahang labas lang, one of each na. marlon always jokes about the six boys (!!!!!!!) we will have, but i sure hope it's just a joke and not his ultimate baby fantasy.

tick-tock, tick-tock...

At eto pa pala...

isa pang dahilan kung bakit hindi pa ako umaalis sa trabaho.

hindi pa namin nakikita, may iilan kaming pinagpipilian at hindi pa kami sigurado, pero balak na namin sa taong ito.

Muni-muni sa trabaho

naloloka ako sa opisina lately. maraming pagbabago, maraming pangako at marami ring trabaho. minsan naiisip ko maghanap ng bagong pagtatrabahuhan na mas masaya, mas madali para sa akin at puro pagsusulat lang, tulad ng ginagawa ko dati. unang-una, mas madali sa akin ang pagsusulat. pangalawa, mahal ko talaga ang pagsusulat at gusto ko pang bumuti at gumaling dito.

pero nandito pa rin ako, kinakaya ko hanggang saan ko kaya. ayokong sumuko para lang mapatunayan sa sarili ko na kaya ko, na hindi ako yung tipong taong madaling bumigay. gusto kong patunayan na hindi ako "manunulat lang", kahit minsan gusto kong sumigaw ng "manunulat lang ako!" tinitingnan ko ang idolo ko sa trabaho -- ang aking bosing na nagmula sa bansa nina vanness wu at jerry yan, LOL -- at namamangha ako dahil ang kinakaya niya, di hamak na mas mabigat, mas marami at mas komplikado sa kinakaya ko.

binubulong ko sa sarili ko na kung kaya niya, kaya ko rin. pero minsan pinagdududahan ko kung totoo nga ang mga aking bulong-bulong sa sarili. siguro kailangan ko nang lakasan, baka bingi na ang loob ko sa mga bulong at sigaw na ang kailangan nitong marinig.

at nandito pa rin ako dahil alam ko na hindi ako dapat magpadala sa bugso ng damdamin. ang damdamin, lulu-lili diba? lulubog, lilitaw, ika nga ng philippine choral community. at hindi sapat na basehan para sa pagpasya. kung ang buhay ay parang gulong kung saan minsan nasa baba ka, minsan nasa itaas, araw-araw na yata ang pag-ikot ng gulong pagdating sa trabaho. at hindi makabubuti sa aking gumalaw at magpasya sa mga sandaling nasa ilalim ako.

pero minsan naiisip ko... kasalanan ba maghangad ng trabaho na kung saan masaya ako, suportado ng maraming katrabaho at huhumusay sa bagay na mahal na mahal kong gawin?

28

i turned 28 last monday! and here are 28 things i loved about my birthday!

1. checking into the fullerton hotel with marlon on saturday. finally, all the clues revealed! (mad props to cris for figuring out the photo!)

2. the super duper high bed in our courtyard room. i want one now!

3. the high ceilings in the room!

4. the view of the river from town, the fullerton's main restaurant. with the pretty white trellises twined with bougainvillea, it just felt so colonial and fresh and precious! hahaha. it was nice to finally be on the other side of the river and seeing the view.

5. just lazing around with a copy of eldest, the second book in the inheritance trilogy. i had been hankering for a long stretch of time to just burn through the book and i finally got it!

6. getting to wear my hot pink maison martin margiela sandal boots! i got them at the barney's warehouse sale in new york and have only worn them once. these shoes make me feel like a million bucks!

7. the beautiful fullerton all lit up in the evening!

8. just having the esplanade across the road :)

9. a surprising sight from home... an ifugao dance at the esplanade lobby! it turned out to be a dance troupe from a university in tarlac, flown in for the singapore dance festival.

10. fantastic orchestra seats to dunas, a performance by flamenca maria pages and contemporary dance artist sidi larbi cherkaoui, to music by composer szymon brzoska. again, care of my hubby!

11. MARIA PAGES. OMG. the goddess of flamenco. powerful, regal, passionate and completely committed. there were really no words to describe her dancing. i must have cried at least 3 or 4 times during the performance. i really had no idea i could be moved to such an extent by a dancer.

11. SIDI LARBI CHERKAOUI. beautiful, inventive, honest and just so totally free. this artist can do amazing things with staging and production, surpassed only by the things he can do with his body. one of the most jaw-dropping parts of the dance was when he literally became like flowing sand dunes, rippling and tumbling and shifting all over the desert. yung tipong sinabihan siya ng "okay. you are sand. blow around the desert. go." then he just goes "okay!" and completely transforms.

12. the music of dunas, by szymon brzoska and ruben labaniegos. a combination of western music, moroccan and arabic motifs, and flamenco... even with some early music thrown in for good measure. the perfect complement to a stunning performance. please if you ever find yourself in a city where dunas is showing, watch it.

13. the post-show dialogue with the artists, describing their journey and their creation. i loved seeing maria's personality in particular, since she can just seem so godlike and imposing when she dances. she was completely endeared to me when she described how one part of the dance was conceptualized. she clapped her hands together gleefully and cried, "i want to be a tree! can i be a tree?"

14. two words. chocolate. buffet.

15. after all that sweetness, we suddenly craved for salt. so although we agreed to forego dinner, we ordered up a big plate of fries from room service and spent the last few hours of saturday reading in bed and satisfying the munchies. mmm.

16. waking up to my wonderful hubby. :)

17. spending pretty much all of sunday at the poolside like a pair of old white rich folks, baking in the sun in lounge chairs, reading and snacking on bar food.

18. speaking of ang moh tourists, there was an old white-haired french couple i loved sneaking peeks at. when she thought no one was looking, the old lady would pinch her husband's butt. hahaha. sana maging ganun kami ni marlon.

19. speaking of marlon. his company all weekend was the cherry on my sundae, the icing on my birthday cake. :) more than once, he remarked, "i feel like it's my birthday!"

20. buffet dinner at town. did we really need another buffet? not really. it was yummy though.

21. birthday breakfast at town on monday morning, my actual birthday! where marlon presented me with my birthday presents...

22. my new braun hair iron! bad hair days begone!

23. my new set of bobbi brown makeup brushes! this will stanch my craving for makeup classes for at least a few months. good thing there's youtube!

24. mostly skiving work on my birthday. hehe.

25. the sumptuous dark chocolate opera cake the office got me for my birthday. there are so few people in the office now that everyone got to have a nice big slice and i still got to bring a full third of the cake home!

26. a tiny slice of birthday cake every day! not good for my waistline but it has certainly made me feel like the whole week was my birthday!

27. opening facebook to a flood of greetings on my wall!

28. feeling loved and happy all week! i couldn't have asked for a better way to turn another year older!

Temporary insanity

ok, i'm over you na.

i guess we can live without the eco-friendly roof garden, the 4.5m-high ceilings in the master's bedroom, the front-and-rear glass facades, the loft bedroom, the accessibility to bonifacio global city.

the madness has passed. the plague is gone. i am free! i already feel millions of pesos richer less poor!

(and somewhere out there, a real estate agent sheds a tear.)

Mystery solved!

well, partially, at least!

brilliant detective cris, a regular visitor to this blog, cracked the puzzle: the dude in the previous post is sir robert fullerton, first governor of penang! how she actually managed to find this out is almost as big a mystery to me as the clue itself!

which means that i'll be spending my birthday weekend at this gorgeous building downtown...

... a happy fact that marlon confirmed today! he decided to tell me early so i could plan what outfits to pack for the weekend. the man knows me, i tell you.

this makes it easy for us to just walk across to the esplanade on saturday evening, where he booked us tickets to a performance by world-famous flamenca maria pages! after which we can attack the fullerton chocolate buffet. ahh, bliss!

ten million pogi points to the hubby!

Paper pretties

as an adult, when was the last time you indulged in a childhood pastime?

there are things that we loved to do as kids. a few of my personal favorites, like making papak milo powder and licking ketchup off spoons, are easy to return to every now and then. many others, like playing in the rain, watering the garden while barefoot, or crawling into mom's bed for a dead-of-night cuddle (my patented bunso cure for insomnia or bad dreams), are things that have been permanently buried in the past.

which is why i was over the moon with my latest find at kinokuniya: the paper dolls that i used to have as a kid!

well, i didn't have these ones exactly. what i had was a book of forties fashions by the same paper doll artist. i very clearly remember buying them in goodwill bookstore in the old north mall (now glorietta). i LOVED those to death, and i always wished i could have kept them.

there's a whole line of them: italian designers, spanish designers, fashions by decade from the turn of the century all the way up to the present. and kinokuniya has them all! who needs $300 anti-ageing creams when just i can buy back my little-girlhood for just $11 a pop?

so saturday afternoon was spent cutting out all these precious little chanel outfits. there are over two dozen outfits in each book. i couldn't believe i had the patience to snip, snip, snip all those out when i was a kid. (then again, i also had an extra pair of hands, care of my trusty yaya.)

i actually timed myself -- it takes roughly 5-10 minutes per outfit, which doesn't sound like a lot but feels like a lifetime. now that i'm grown up, i appreciate all the details that went into the artwork, so i was really careful with how i cut them out.

after all the painstaking cutting, i had to have a photo shoot!

lola coco herself in a suit that she wore to a fitting in 1963. i loved that the suit includes a pair of shears hanging around her neck.

the basic, "naked" dolls. the blue striped outfits are a design for a ballet or a play, i forget which.

very early chanel. ang taray ng paper doll diba, may aso. the green dress on the right is the first chanel outfit ever to appear in harper's bazaar, circa 1916.

chanel designs through the roaring twenties:

including a costume design for cocteau's adaptation of antigone (which also featured scenery by picasso). i put the goddess in the plantbox, hehehe.

lola coco got more glamorous in the thirties -- some of my favorites in the book are from this decade.

the skin tones don't match perfectly with some of the outfits, thus creating the dreaded "espasol face" phenomenon, but who cares? these five-inch fashionistas sure made my saturday!

Wanted

do you know this man?

neither do i. but apparently marlon does, because this old bloke is supposed to be the latest clue to my birthday mystery. the running joke now is that my birthday gift is a time deposit, because that's the only intangible thing i can think of that i can open but not unwrap, and definitely not enjoy on my birthday. so when i got this particular clue, i jokingly wondered aloud if this dude's face is on money (it's not, at least not on any currencies that i know of).

aside from the dude, marlon scribbled these numbers in one corner. i'm thinking they are some kind of jumbled-up latitude-longitude combination, as i recently showed him how to get coordinates from a google map (right-click on the spot you want and choose "what's here?").

and there was a gleefully cryptic, delightfully cheesy message on the back.

then this evening, when i mentioned that our monday morning team meetings would be moved to tuesday mornings instead, he crowed with delight and told me that this new development suited his gift perfectly (my birthday this year is on a monday).

with this in mind, i guessed that "old-world charm" might be referring to a night at the colonial-type raffles hotel, and this dude might in fact be sir stamford raffles. but alas, googling images of the venerable old colonial master proved my guess wrong.

dum de dum dum. who could the lucky merman be?

Back to the drawing board

the last time i picked up a sketch pad was two years ago, right before i moved to singapore. even back then, i wasn't too happy about the way i was drawing.

i used to be capable of copious amounts of concentration when i was a kid, something that changed as i grew older. if it wasn't finished in ten or fifteen minutes, i would drop it. the thought of spending hours working at a drawing or painting appealed to me less and less. ironically, even though i was spending much less time actually drawing, i started believing that the reason i didn't do it as often was that i just didn't have as much free time as i used to.

i started toying with the idea of drawing again after seeing fashionation's post on outfit drawings vs outfit photos. although i love clothes and dressing up, i never got into the whole posting-what-you-wear daily phenomenon sweeping the blogosphere. but the idea of drawing myself in my outfits seemed fantastic! mainly because it could be a way of drawing regularly again, like i did one semester when i had to keep a visual journal for an art elective. and... i can make myself thinner!

my first attempt at style journaling was an affair that can be summed up in four words: cute outfit, terrible drawing. and so while browsing one friday night at kinokuniya, i decided to get serious about overhauling my drawing skills and bought this.

i finally got to crack this book open on saturday (after stuffing my face with salpicao). i must have spent an hour to two hours just sketching.

my first attempt at figures. you can see that the very first one, on the right, has the same figure flaws as i do: short legs, saddlebags and knock knees :P using the eight-head rule of proportion, i quickly got the hang of it after a few repetitions, although my figures still tend to have overbroad shoulders and too-long thighs.

after a few tries, i was confident enough to draw a figure without the guide lines. i think it turned out pretty well!

moving on to profiles, however, presented a bigger challenge. i don't think i've ever drawn a profile in my life. thus the many, many disastrous attempts. such as the presence of the joker.

this is one of the better (and quicker) profiles i produced, thanks to the neat trick marlon taught me about drawing guide lines for profiles. he draws much more realistically than i do, by the way.

EFFORT! and that's just the face! after i nail these profiles, it's on to the back view (which honestly seems SO much easier) and three-quarters... and poses upon poses.

only then can i start having fun with the clothes. baby steps, baby steps...

Salpicao Saturday!

i can't let this weekend go by without blogging about the most blissful saturday i've had in ages! i haven't thoroughly enjoyed a saturday since... since... gp's birthday picnic in central park! ay mali sunday pala yon. ngek. suffice it to say it's been a long time since i've enjoyed a saturday with absolutely NOTHING on the agenda. no travel, no work, no rakets, no muay thai, no movie... NOTHING!

a sumptuous sign of good things to come was the juicy, beautifully marbled cut of australian tenderloin we found at the new, fancy-shmancy grocery on the fourth floor of ion orchard. when i say fancy, i mean fancy -- they had shelves dedicated to imports from dean & deluca, fauchon and hediard!

now marlon is the carnivore in this family (meat just grosses me out), but i had a months-long craving for salpicao that was tearing at me to be fulfilled. and with the nearest dulcinea a plane ride away, i was actually desperate enough to learn how to cook the damned dish myself. so armed with a shockingly easy recipe from market manila, i did!

i tell you, the smell of frying garlic and knorr (KNORR!!!) brought tears to my eyes. (the house still smells like salpicao a day later, and to me that can only be a good thing.) marlon was nearly beside himself with joy watching the tiny, tender bites of beef seared to perfection. i was elated to see the sauce caramelizing just the way a good salpicao sauce should.

sitting down to our salpicao lunch, marlon kept thanking me for craving for salpicao so obsessively (beef rarely makes an appearance in our weekly grocery list). i was astounded at how something i cooked turned out so perfectly! my kapraningan usually drives me to keep to recipes with military discipline, but not so with this salpicao. it was my first time to cook completely by feel... no teaspoons, measuring cups, nothing! my kitchen confidence skyrocketed with every bite.

i would definitely cook this again... but the beef is so damn expensive i would probably keep it for very, very special guests. maybe when my mom and sister come over!

salt-and-garlic cravings satisfied and carnivorous husband happily stuffed, i finally sat down to do the ultra-babaw, mindlessly kikay things i had been itching to do for weeks.

but those deserve separate posts altogether ;)

Clues blues

the birthday guessing game continues.

1) i can now enjoy 1/4 of my gift on my birthday (previously, i couldn't enjoy it on my birthday at all).

2) marlon and i have talked about the gift recently. (thanks ha! now i have to mentally replay all our conversations for at least the past three months)

3) marlon will present me with a handmade clue this weekend.

still stumped! gaah.

Moving on

it is hard to move on, isn't it?

i feel like i should be blogging about the events of last week. not just the storm and all the discontent it stirred up in me and many of our countrymen, but also unbelievably sad and infuriating events that happened to my nearest and dearest.

but i just realized that being able to leave these events in the past is actually a huge blessing! and so is the safety and closeness of my family. we are fortunate in so many ways.

i also realized i had been feeling guilty for being to continue with "normal" life here in singapore despite the widespread tragedy back home. but the life i have here is a blessing too -- although if you had looked at me all twisted up with worry last week, you'd never have guessed.

so i begin to embrace normal life again, and remind myself that i'm not a bad person, or heartless or useless, for being where i am, having what i have, and being comfortable.

(yes, i know. i can be hard on myself for absolutely no reason.)

so it's back to regular programming for me. and that's a blessing. it is in my prayers tonight, and for the nights to come, that all those who most need this blessing receive it too.

Oh, Ondoy

i woke late on saturday and spent most of the early afternoon on facebook and twitter. almost all the status updates on my home page were about the torrential rains in manila, and mild things like hassle of being stuck in traffic or the joy of bed weather. i didn't give it much thought -- i was going to the f1 rocks beyonce and black eyed peas concert in fort canning that evening, and i was preoccupied with figuring out what to wear in case it rained. (it didn't.)

before i left for f1 rocks at 4 pm, i wondered briefly whether i should call mom and find out if she was ok. mandaluyong is notorious for flooding, particularly near city hall. we used to live a street away from city hall, the lowest point in town, and moved out right after suffering through a single rainy season with waist-deep floods. i brushed off the thought, thinking that the area we live in now has never flooded, ever.

at 2am, after the (incidentally, phenomenal) BEP and beyonce shows, i was cooling down with a late dinner and cold drinks with marlon at chijmes when i received a text from my sister. our house was flooded up to sink (thigh) level, the entire sala was afloat, and the ref was submerged.

TOTAL SHOCK. that meant three women (my mom, tita raquel and our maid rosiele) and FIVE dogs were all upstairs. thoughts whirled in my head (was the roof dripping as well? did they have food and water? would all the sockets downstairs get wrecked? did they manage to bring up any of the electronics?) as i realized there was nothing i could do but call the next morning. the only consolation i could think of was that my sister had sold the car after we moved abroad, otherwise it would have been heartbreaking to see it wrecked in the flood

the morning after

i called mom on sunday morning. i knew she would be okay, maybe stressed out and tired at most, but i had to talk to her just to be sure. i caught her just as the flood waters had subsided and she was surveying the extent of the damage. she told me how difficult it was to try and save as much as they could, just her and the maid. other houses in the compound have men in the house and more people in the household, so they got more things done. "hindi na ako nagpatulong," she said. "pag ganyan, talagang kanya-kanya na."

still, i could hear the relief in her voice when she told me that our house was still one of the cleanest and least damaged in the compound. some of the neighbors had to abandon their houses. floods were higher in the lower-situated houses. their cars were damaged. the marketplace nearby had chest-deep floods.

because she's moving out of the house in october, mom had books, clothes and other things packed in boxes and stored on the first floor. all the boxes melted away, leaving our things in a soggy and dirty mess. my heart sank thinking about how much effort mom put into packing; now she has to do everything all over again.

still, i'm just thankful she's ok.

heartbreaking, heartening

watching the videos and seeing the pictures posted on facebook, youtube and twitter has left me with a mixed bag of emotions.

i am proud to see the strength of fortunate filipinos who are pulling together to organize rescue and relief operations. i saw so many people who felt it was unacceptable to just watch the typhoon take its toll. people literally could not rest until they found a way to help.

i am incensed at the ineptitude of the government. the strength, responsiveness, compassion and capability of the private sector only highlights their selfishness and irresponsibility. if public funds were properly channeled and used, would our city crumble so easily? would we have been better equipped to rescue people?

i am hoping against hope. will something good come out of this? will we -- both the people and the government -- learn something this time around? will we take action to make sure this never happens again? i can only think of the numerous dikes and clearly marked escape routes i saw in phuket post-tsunami, and hope someone, anyone, comes up with a plan for the future.

i am heartbroken by so many images. the gleaming white walls of a friend's newly finished dream home, turned to mud. her shiny new grand piano sinking into brown waters. a dog found drowned in a cage. smashed cars piled up on top of each other in ways i didn't even think possible. i don't even want to think about the dead bodies captured by cameramen roving cainta and marikina.

i am amazed by the humor and resilience of filipinos, who can smile, laugh and joke while neck-deep in water.

i am suddenly uncertain about my future, our future in manila. we had planned to finally put down the first payment for a lot in a friend's subdivision this december. we were even thinking of paying for the lot in full after getting our christmas bonuses. but after seeing photos of all the houses in the area submerged up to the first floor, now we are not so sure.

i am thankful my family is alright, and that we have extra cash to send mom for repairs and things that need to be replaced. we even have a little left over to send to the red cross -- just because my family isn't the only one that's been affected.

i am afraid for the storm that is supposed to hit manila this wednesday and thursday. i want my mom to check into a hotel, but she doesn't want to leave the dogs.

i am praying. still.

Clueless

it's officially a month to go until my 28th birthday!

marlon loves to torment me with very cryptic hints about what my birthday gift will be. he finds an almost evil glee in making his clues so obscure that they end up confusing rather than enlightening me.

i figured i should keep track of these clues to see how they actually match up to reality later on. after all, past experience has proven that he's not beyond making up fictitious clues just to completely throw me off.

these are the birthday clues so far:

1) i can't enjoy it on my birthday, this year or any year.

2) it's light cream.

3) it's a thing that can be turned into an event.

4) it comes in three parts or phases.

any guesses? i'm stumped.