makes you squirm

nausea.

was the feeling i woke up to this morning. no, it has nothing to do with the excess caffeine in my system. or the baby. i'm probably just a bit stressed.

i have been going through the papers of graham allison, digging into the cuban missile crisis in the 60's.

and i watched the late night news before going to sleep.

you know what they showed? yet another video of a filipina domestic helper being raped by her employer in the middle east.

i know we have been hearing horror stories of this kind often. i mean, hello, this country's main export are not bananas or abaca-- it's labor.

but it's so disturbing when you see how a fellow pinoy, a pinay at that, who in search of green pastures that the philippines cannot offer, get violated, raped.

her hands were tied and she was screaming "aray" as the hairy, most likely very smelly arab entered her. again. and again. and again.

it is sad that the government seems to not be doing its damn best to create permanent jobs for the people. yes, we have growth, yes, the peso is strong. but why is it that an average of 2500 pinoys still leave their families and choose to face the dangers of working in a foreign country every freaking day than stay here.

of course, i also get pissed at people who look down on OFWs. i mean, come on, these people who fly on economy class so they can save some more money to give to their families, keep this island republic afloat with their billion dollar remittances. while some divas probably evade tax.

i do not speak for all the OFWs, but i pretty much think that if they had a choice, the domestic helper won't risk becoming a sex slave or a human punching bag for a measly P10,000. the driver won't go around delivering supply materials to war ravaged iraq for P12,000. the engineer won't forego the chance of seeing his kids grow before his eyes. the nurse would rather treat pinoy patients than those non-english speaking nationals. the teacher would rather teach her own kids how to read than some other school children who may go amok anytime.

i rage against the illegal recruiters who make money out of the struggling pinoys' unemployment woes and make conditions for OFWs more difficult.

to the cruel and abusive employers, what can i say? you may be shelling out petro dollars, uncle sam dollars, mickey mouse money, queen's pound-- but it's just for the labor of your pinoy employees. no amount of money, of salary will ever enough for you to deprive them of their human rights and dignity.

p.I. ninyong mga arabo--lalo na yung pinakitang gumahasa sa pinay. maubusan sana kayo ng langis. tignan ko lang.

translation: i am all for world peace.

***

moving on, the WORLD Bank has dismissed the claim for compensation over the Naia Terminal 3 project of Germany's Frankfurt Airport Services Worldwide (Fraport), clearing the way for the eventual operation of the mothballed facility, officials said Friday.

if you haven't seen our international airports, the ones we have now, then congratulations, you have been spared of the emotional scars that come from being welcomed by an ugly airport at your arrival.

seriously. o sige, let's do pictionary muna:

terminal one: the old NAIA

terminal 2: lucion tans's airport--este centennial airport

terminal 3: porjos-posanto-ang-tagal-magbukas- terminal

.

terminal 3 was suppose to open the same time that suvarnabhumi did. but all the belly aching by fraport and all the stakeholders in this controversy delayed the opening.

to this day, it is still closed, not operational.

congratulations to the office of the solicitor general and the phil govt for winning this round against fraport.

but who knows what that foreign consortium still have on its sleeves. last i heard, they still have loads of bullets to fire. err--what i mean is, marami pang ibubuga, kayo naman.

i will throw a party once terminal 3 is open and operational. that doesn't mean though that i'll take off right then and there.

what the ---??!!

there are so many things that i don't understand.

like, the rise of the visitor stats to my blogsite ever since i mentioned that wannabe/tramp thea aquino. gaad, just the mere mention of her name got people stampeding to my uber blah domain. what if i post her other photos that i found on google kaya? umm... NO WAY.

unless you give me a BMW-X5. o sige, kahit audi na lang.

the very cars that were smashed by the bureau of customs at subic yesterday.

i really don't get it. i mean, they smashed the smuggled cars to show that they're serious in curbing smuggling in this archipelago. i don't know what analysis model they are using. their variables just don't add up. someone has to teach this people communication strategy. labeling, packaging of ideas. (oh gad, this statement just pushes my appointment to the cabinet a little bit closer to the edge of oblivion.)

another thing that i don't quite get is why this country, my country (other than thailand) is once again in the midst of an election controversy, this time, involving Uncle Sam's polls.

turned out that some of the defective touch screens used in american polls were traced to have been made in a sweatshop somewhere in this far flung republic.

this discovery has a coupla implications. off the top of my head, the scheming politicians and poll operators must be doing cartwheels right now because such incident can be used as a point against the full automation of polls in the country.

it may also solidify the country's rep as asia's cheating capital to which i vehemently disagree. yes, we may have a couple of garci's, but hell no, we are not a nation of cheats. (there, my appointment is back on the table.)

another thing that i don't get is how fast time flies. it's already the 17th of august. my neck is 23 days away from being sliced with a butter knife in the event that i don't deliver my outputs (which i have yet to start) to my contractors.

yikes. i have to think of an excuse. fast.

yeah, i'll tell them that i chewed on mattel toys when i was growing up.

sobra agua

i was supposed to see the third installment of the jason bourne drama with M yesterday.

actually, the decision to watch bourne ultimatum is still subject to a toss coin. heads, we watch bourne ultimatum, tails then it's surf's up. if we end up contesting the results of the toss coin, then it's a love story for us.

10Am, M called to say that i should stay home because it's raining like hell in the metro. i told him it's sunny where i am.

of course, we are 88 kilometers away from each other.

***

the evening news said that the streets of metro manila looked like this yesterday:

surf is definitely up.

but what's new? metro manila, much as i love the place, is a decaying metropolis-- over populated, has an uber pathetic urban and transportation plan and almost non-existent proper waste disposal system.

the flood was not surprising.

what amused me about yesterday's flood was quentin tarantino's story.

tarantino with tikoy aguiluz took a pedicab to get to malacanang after their limo was stuck in the flood for hours.

when the limo gets stuck,
the tough go on padyak

i was in malacanang a week ago (what i did there, i won't tell you yet). i took the LRT? MRT? i'm not sure what they call that mass transpo along aurora blvd. anyway, when i got off the legarda station, there were all these bikes. actually, these pedicabs are everywhere in that area and i hear a ride costs 30bucks.

let me digress a bit, i have been a manila dweller for 10 years now and in those years, i lived in UP diliman area and makati. in those places where i lived, we have sidewalks, walk ways, pedestrian lanes, traffic lights.

imagine how disoriented i was, being the arte ass that i am, when i got off the legarda station and walked my way towards gate seven of malacanang.

there were thousands of jeepneys, a million pedicabs and a gazillion students (and snatchers, muggers, urban dirt) along the university belt and they don't have a gad freaking sidewalk!!!!!!!

que horror!! i had to fight for walking space.

when i become president, my first order of the day would be to transfer malacanang at the top floor of the RCBC plaza, or to one of the golf courses in wack-wack, or beside bonifacio high street.

manila--- lito atienza's and now alfredo lim's manila-- is just too ugly and too dirty.

yet, quentin tarantino was there yesterday via pedicab.

there he is receiving his lifetime achievement award
from tita gloria
(who also got stuck in the flood hahahaha)

tarantino in manila fashion statement:
barong and jogging pants

and he didn't complain about it. awww... i love him more.

happy bubble

it's 1:16 AM and i am wringing my brain cells dry as i try to finish another spin due eight hours from now.

all the stats and the lies that i have to disspell is starting to annoy the hell out of me. (there's just so many lies out there nowadays, it's hard to point out what's true.)

my therapist said that whenever i'm at the brink of everything, i should think happy thoughts.

randomly, here are the things that are currently making me happy:

the resignation of white house "boy genius" karl rove.

cnn.com

dubya's top strategists

the guy seated at the middle in white shirt, that's karl rove. and oh, there's also tita condee on the photo.

so why am i happy that "boy genius" is gone from penn ave? because that means, there is a vacant post at the white house. perhaps, the republicans should employ "girl moron" (guess who) for a change?

***

what else, oh yeah, that bill board of jessica simpson's ex-boy toy for GAP on LA.

car stopper




***

and... of course, the three words that make me happy now: bonifacio high street. (all photos from walter villa.com)

my new playground at day time

the high street on night mode

***

am i happy now?

not yet. but i have work to do.

missed

whereas rain had started pouring last week, and has in fact flooded several towns in central luzon, the dry spell continue to linger on my blogsite.


the words, the stories, the creativity have all been wrung dry by the petty albeit very valid concerns of my daily boring existence such as gracefully handling that memo from my bosses at the openU reminding me to take charge of my class, developing that reading list and course syllabus that i have yet to start and getting my act together to finish those two outputs for my consultancy projects. yeah, yeah the things i get myself into.


since i don't have much to say, well actually i do have a gazillion things in my head but they're not coherent at the mo. so i'll just do a pictionary of the things that I MISSED the past week.

***

josh hartnett was here and i didn't have the time to see him. grrr....

HOTNESS

my all caps, exclamation punctuated GRRRR!!!!! however, goes to that wannabe/ bi-atch named thea aquino, who was so yabang in saying that among all pinays (that includes me), she was the one chosen to "work" (that is dance naked in front of) with josh-- for that film "i come with the rain." (i still turn green when i think about it. [green with envy okay.])


i don't mind if she's stardust, it's just that, her face powder was all wrong for her color (i am being nice, it should've been her face is all wrong) and she had horrible dentures (or cap/jaket or chiklet inside her mouth).

image from bryanboy.com

you think i would give that wannabe/bi-atch the honor of being in my blogsite? NO WAY. (she got to work with josh na nga, she'll be on my blogger pa. pwede ba?)

moving on, the love of my life was also in manila last week and i missed him. AARRGH!!!!!!!!

QUENTIN TARANTINO
film maker. genius. love of my life.

he was given an award at the cinemanila 2007.
told you he's a film genius.

speaking of films. i had been looking forward to seeing the simpsons. but, let' s say this all together: I MISSED them.

i heard the family has yet to be back at their native spring field and are actually in paris.

i called uncle karl (lagerfeld) to ask if it is true, and he answered: "oui. ze simh-sohns are here in pah-ree-- soaking uhp ohn -- cuhlture. they're probably zick of being fugly ahmeree-kahns and decided to geht glam-d." i know, that sounded like yilmaz bektas, but i'm sure that was uncle karl because the following day, i got photos from him showing how the simpsons are taking over the city of pah-ree.

image from chuvaness

exhibit no.1. marc jacobs and uncle karl
showing pics of the simpsons at their fashion shows



image from chuvaness

exhibit no.2 harper bazaar's center spread


image from chuvaness

exhibit no. 3. marge with her hair down. fierce.

and finally, looks like some producers are due to squeeze out some more uncle sam dollars from movie goers by coming up with something like the movie the transformers. sources from tmz.com reported that new regency is working with the mark gordon co. to turn voltron into a live action film.

just in case you've forgotten how voltron looked like:

voltron: defender of the universe

whatevs. just make the film and let's see. (is it starting to be obvious that i am team optimus prime?)

black forest

i should've posted this a week ago.

but as always... i have my usual, all too familiar excuses.

***

so last saturday, i together with sarah, braved the afternoon manila heat and the weekend traffic at SLEX to pay our last respect to an orgmate in college who succumbed to lupus. or complications of lupus. i'm not sure. i didn't get to google that sickness.

well actually, an hour before going to sucat, i was having a crisis inside the fitting room of mango because none of their bermuda shorts fit me. i was telling the sales lady who assisted me that yes, i know, my waist and hips are totally unproportioned--but they have got to have something for me.

but there was bloody none. they have a term for this-- shopping tragedy. at that time, it was enough reason for me to not go to the final rites. i mean, there i was with a new shopping tragedy and i have yet to recover from my crash moment.

i felt i had too much. i was already drowning in my petty crisis and the last thing that i needed is to deal with another dose of the universe's reality.

oh gad i'm so shallow, i know.

so i walked around my playground to get fresh (mall) air and clear my immature, selfish thoughts.

after a good 10 minutes of looking at the display windows of boutiques, bumping into a hottie named atom araullo and getting some glass-panel-filtered-sunlight, i became okay.

***

we got to sucat at 330PM. len was scheduled to be cremated by 4PM. however, there were many people who wanted to give eulogies, you know, anecdotes, stories, memories with len that the cremation was moved to 5PM.

about half an hour of being seated there, i started feeling restless. i asked for a glass of water. and while drinking, i tried to analyze what was going on inside me. could i be allergic to the flowers or the candles? is all the crying getting to me? will people cry when i die? will they be saying so many good things about me that my cremation will be delayed for an hour or two?

len was a few days short of turning 28 when God called her to a face to face interview.

will God smile at me when i stand (or most likely, be at my knees) before Him and give an account how i lived my life?

i am turning 28 next year.

i was juggling those thoughts when mikki handed me a plate of chocolate mousse. yes, a plate of chocolate mousse which he intended for me, sarah, ryan and louis to eat. however, i was desperate for a diversion so i didn't bother sharing with my other friends and gobbled that sinful stuff all by myself. the sugar kicked in and i just completely dissociated myself from all the sniffing and the crying that went on around me.

***

i spent that night with just my thoughts that were previously dislodged by the endorphins from the chocolate.

i realized that at 27, aside from being pathetic when it comes to sports, public finance and cooking, i am just plain horrible at handling the bad things in life that have been giving me frequent visits lately.

failure. pain. loss. break ups. death.

hmmm... i don't know, at this point, even waiting is painful.

but as everyone had told me, the waiting will have a point.

i am not so sure though if my upcoming stint is the long delayed gratification from all the waiting that i did in the past month.

it could still be part of the waiting. i don't know.

***

what am i up to on monday, august 6?

here's a multiple choice:

1. on august 6, i would be seven weeks pregnant. (yey! baby bump ahead)

2. on august 6, i will start my stint as aerobics instructor at gold's gym

3. august 6 will be my first day at the culinary school in nueva york

4. i will be on mission at an enemy territory on august 6

and the correct is: you'll know soon. let's just say i am on reconciliatory mode and that i am growing up.

***

now that i come to think of it, i am struggling with homonyms. wait and weight.

yes, i do have weight issues.

and yesterday, some psycho, gave my sister this huge black forest cake. my equally psycho sister brought it to my mom's house.

the psycho of all psychos (guess who) was begging to be put in a strait jacket when she saw the humongous cake. but there was no strait jacket at mom's kitchen. only forks.

so here's my shameful gallery of gluttony:

tempt me.

oh. lard.. it is good.

i can't get enough. get me to a rehab!

milk and coffee

in the past six days, i have had only 24 hours of sleep.

my new pillows have lost their magic and i've become immune to lavender aromatherapy.

on the average, i finally fall sleep at 5AM. crazy i know.

hmmm... perhaps it's time i change my sheets. i mean, buy new sheets. my favorite pinoy designer, rajo laurel has come up with his own linen line at Our Home. M says the sheets have a thread count of 300-400. i told him he should've asked rajo for complimentary samples of the bed sheets.

so there, i am once again severely deficient in melatonin and my circadian rhythm is completely messed up.

one word. coffee.

i've been drinking coffee again. three more cups and i'll be an addict all over again.

M says i should be drinking warm milk on nights out instead of coffee.

speaking of milk, someone texted me this morning saying that august 1-7 is breastfeeding week.

lovely, really lovely.

i was asked to think of something new, an angle to promote boob juice in an entirely mind blowing, sweep-those-who-prefer-infant-formula-for-their-babies-off-their-feet way.

gaad. my brain is not working. well it is working but it has other concerns.

one, with my current disposition, i wonder if my mom actually breast fed me. they say breastfed babies have higher emotional quotients and are a lot secure and stong.

two, would i be able to breast feed my baby? given that i have not even a drop of milk in my system. i imagine my boob juice as a mix of coffee, tea and coke light. aargghh... whatevs.

i can't think of anything clever to promote breastfeeding. but this picture's nice.

breastmilk is still best for babies