Transcendence

My head aches. It swims around the room. Sugar rush comes to mind after hearing a buzzing sound in my ear. It must have been the coffee. Or something terribly familiar. Something intangible. But it can't be.

I sit here at the waiting room where unnoticed things happen and where time seems to flow, overlapping each moment more tedious than the next."

"Dear One,

The setting sun warms your face with its final glow. You sit on a chair in front of your cluttered desk. You scan the familiar room, hoping to find some lingering parts of my self. There is none. You grab an unfinished book lying around and you flip through the pages, hoping to find one of your favorite words.

But no. You would not find anything there because it does not have my name. And all along, the shoulders droop. The eyes froze in a blank stare, while the nameless thing tries to take you by the week. And it can't see you nor touch you anymore because it's already here, sitting on a brown leather couch, convincing herself that it's the other way around.

The nameless thing will not leave tonight. It will engulf me like it engulfed the infuriated by-standers of a man-made tragedy. "

Just When Real Love Finds You

"We really loved each other, didn't we?" -Allie Hamilton, The Notebook

If you ever bumped into a lover from your distant past, what words would come across your mind - a small string of words that is able not only to reminisce what was but also to usher back in the lost spark?

Just when real love finds you, the very moment you least expect something precious and wonderful and amazing to come your way, you are confronted by circumstances that render you vulnerable. Just when you think love conquers all, and equate it to yourself being able to conquer all because you have that love for a person you feel strongly for, you realize you can do nothing. Because you can never even conquer distance, for one.

But let me reminisce a moment from my past. I never knew a brief meeting could last love a lifetime until it came my way. But the meetings were nothing magical; nothing poetic - just a surge of feelings lovingly strange to anyone who loves. I was loving every moment we were together, and would wish at most times that a day would never end. We were more than fond of each other's presence.

I like to think that love is able to find its way back no matter how big the world is. And in this world that rushes to change, I like to believe that the love I once knew is still there - holding on and waiting for me.

Clueless Still

I really don't know how to start it. I don't have any idea what to write. I even start feeling stupid why I decided tapping the keyboard, wishing that along the way fluttering words would take me away to somewhere that fans my zeal to write.

Unfortunately I'm where the unimaginable cold sips my entire being and freezes my very brain and even the tiniest of my veins. Oh how I'm missing the Philippines and everything that is Filipino! The crows that wake me up at dawn, the friendly neighborhood folks chatting on my way to somewhere early in the morning, the warm sunshine sipping through the glass windows of MRT, the routine of catching up the train and elbowing my way to my destination, include my putting up with the traffic and gray smoke belching out of vehicles... eek! What's that again?

Now I'm having second thoughts. Am I really missing my country? As much as I've been dying to pack my things and fly away to home, I'm not yet ready to view again the pitiful sight of an endless trail of slums from an airplane. As compared to where I am right now, the geographic scene might seem unfriendly and alienating, but one can't help getting fascinated at the meticulously planned infrastructures of villas and skyscrapers lining the arid terrain with such geometric accuracy. While ours is a country of dump site avalanches, traffic jam, pick pockets, unresolved political issues and restless activists. And it hits me, my fellow Filipinos don't deserve such.

My flying away is not my choice. Because if I had I would've stayed and kept my idealism intact. Idealism that by staying there and starting a career I might be able to help my country - a small part of the huge workforce trying to pull our motherland out of poverty. Such a sophomoric idealism. Of course that's not just it. The moment I got here a thought dawned on me, how can a Filipino remain idealistic in helping the country if the government itself is not able and willing to help him? From that moment on the idealism in me started to doze off.

True, our peso is strengthening. I'm not, in any way, protesting to that. What I'm worried is that it is able to take away the dream of greener pastures our overseas workers have been longing for. And I'm not also saying that staying and working in the Philippines is undesirable; it's just that the future of the country lies not only on the peso-dollar issue but also on the good governance, and I mean getting rid of that great reptile heaping the nation's wealth from the start. This peso-dollar issue is able to drive the OFWs home and this great reptile is able to keep making money illegally, and everything stays the same. Who says our economy is doing better? Someone who notices an extra food on his table tell me.

Twinky here, and like most Filipinos back home and abroad, I'm still clueless of what's going to take place in the next few months of our Philippine economic status, along with the many discreditable issues the present administration is facing today. Whatever lies ahead, it shall define the fate of the country and us Filipinos. Keep posted. And keep wide awake with me, along with a dream of a better place to go home to.

Changing Identities

When I was eleven, I was willing to change my name to
Ysabel if given the chance. I even wanted to be called
anything as plain as Jane or as femme as Penelope just so I
can change my name.

When I was in school, I always cringed at the sound of my
name. Lots of jokes have been made out of it. As if the cruelty
of not being normal during fourth grade had not been
enough. Apart from my classmate's daily chantings, I also
suffered from the (un?)intentional mispronounciation of my
teachers. Like Pi in Yann Martel's novel, I tried (and failed) to
come up with a good moniker out of my flimsy first name. I
came up with all kinds. Well, except that proverbial "h" added
to names, making them qualify as monikers.

All these attempts became futile and soon, I gave up. It
dawned on me that I am "marked" for life and this name I
have been given is my own burden.

This strong dislike for my name ended ( quite abruptly) after finding out what my name meant. In most baby names books, it meant specific and outspoken. I liked those meanings, but my favorite one had been "sea jewel" for it had transformed me into something enchanted.

My name is Eulalia.

From Weird Kid's Desk

I know how big the world can be. I know how small Philippines is in the eyes of a map maker. A cartographer. Well, I get the picture now. The world is like a huge jigsaw puzzle strewn across the galaxy. Continents have bruised edges, worn out from constant pulling and pushing towards and away from each other.
I am supposed to work only on Asia, but I chose to make maps of my own dream destinations. Like that of Santorini, New York, Phuket, and Paris. I intend to also draft that of Berlin, where I imagine myself studying a course in new media.