Expectations

Stephen Malkmus V. Santos had his life planned out for him the moment he was conceived. As soon as he could sit, he would be carried to his high baby chair in front of an upright paino to learn the scales. He would learn to sing even before he could talk. The first sentence he would ever utter would be the opening line of the first epic novel he would ever write.

In his pre-school years, he would not be babysat by electronic gadgets. He could use electronic gadgets all right, but only if they were of the ProTools variety, and would allow him to engineer his own unique electronic musical sound.

He would be well-versed in at least five international languages before he was out of his diapers, and that would be aside from the native dialects of his parents: Tagalog and Kapampangan.

Before entering grade school, he would brush up on some Political Theory and a smattering of Pre-Law during his playtime. He would sharpen his pronunciation skills by participating in debates against University students during the weekends. During semestral breaks when there were no Univerisity students to debate against, he would pass his time by painting his future masterpiece.

Such indecisions as to whether he would take flying commercial planes for a major airlines company, or play as the star centre forward of a top international federation football team as his main pastime would not be a problem, since he would have good time management skills enabling him to do both.

If these all seem too much to expect for a yet unborn child to accomplish, these are actually but a few of the more commonplace entries one is likely to find if one were to browse the Expectations Booklet his father is preparing for him. With the first of the drafts started in secret as early as his father's bachelor years, the Expectations Booklet contains a list of milestones he is sure his future child will, at some precise predetermined future time, achieve.

In its present form, the Expectations Booklet is a six-inch-thick legal-sized office binder, called such because on its binder spine is hand-written in black marker a simple description of its general contents: "EXPECTATIONS". Within are a couple of hundred pages of legal sized bond paper, filled with almost no margins with the very small handwriting his father is known for.

There are two columns for every page; one for the "life goal"—as his father likes to call them—and the other the target date the goal is to be achieved. Once each expectation is met, his father will simply strikeout the entire entry and will be ready to move to the next milestone.

For now, of course, none of the entries are struck-out. In fact, his father is in a late stage final revision, trying to add a couple more pages of goals that aren't included in earlier drafts. This late stage revision, similar to how the booklet has been started, is also being done in secret—that is, unknown even to the future child's mother.

They say babies can hear and comprehend even in the womb. If so, Stephen's father is using every opportunity when his wife is asleep to read to the yet unborn child writings from his Expectations list. In the middle of the night, he sneaks the thick office binder into the room, and whispering through each of the items in the booklet, he calls Sthephen by name and assures him that he will indeed achieve.

It was automatic. Though deep in residual early morning slumber, he came awake at the sound of paper being ripped. The ticket, of course! It came in a gray, recycled, low grade paper, cheque-like rectangularity. He accepted it as soon as the conductor handed it over. Whereas before he was asked of his destination beforehand, this time, due to the regularity with which he availed of this mode of transportation, the conductor already instinctively knew his destination. Magal Lanes--he could tell from the patterns of the perforations. He noted how the holes just exactly appear right where a particular number would have been, and it left no doubt in his mind that the conductors of this particular bus liner were not only experts at traversing the interior of a bus while in motion, but they were also pretty darn good at punching ticket holes with extreme accuracy. Like the punch cards of early computers, this seemingly insignificant bus ticket contained a wealth of information. From the date and time of travel, kilometers from the source to the destination, amount to be paid, it also displayed the the serial number. This last was to him the most crucial piece of information held in this oft-ignored bus ticket. As he took it he gave it a not so insignificant time in contemplative perusal, noting in its uniqueness how it had never ocassioned--and quite expectedly!--that he has been handed a bus ticket of this serial number before. He nodded in approval at the authenticity of the whole deal, paid the conductor the amount expected of him, and leaned back in his seat to resume his sleep.

Khöeeshelle Annn (Part II)

The ultimate goal of any type of work in a capitalist soceity is to make sure to rake in as much money as possible straight to the capitalist's pockets. That the ones who do the raking in of said financial gains—the workers—can sometimes maybe earn something for him- or herself is entirely accidental.
    Khöeeshelle Annn grasped this simple concept very early on in her corporate career. For this, she was very much spared from the disappointments that she would have otherwise endured. With her expectations properly managed, she was actually able to enjoy her work, finding fulfillment in the small triumphs that came out of her day-to-day efforts. More importantly, she met new friends.
    They were not necessarily co-employees—not that they needed to be in order to develop closeness with each other—but working for more or less equally profit-eager employers, they all shared similar experiences and professional frustrations.
    There was Revvekhah, whose affinity for food was only matched by her high fashion sense; Mimi, who never had a boyfriend her entire life and had a strange but amusing sense of humor; Felibelle who everybody knew would be disgustingly rich one day; and Juleiy who had 2 pairs of every shoes, clothes, and accessories she'd ever owned, and was acknowledged as the most intelligent of the bunch.
    Despite these superficial differences though, the girls had much in common with each other. One of these is that they had their own distinct way of getting back at the greedy system for overworking them at only the slightest amount above the legal minimum wage.
    Every last Friday of the month, they would put in five minutes less of their required work hours and cap their week in their favorite spot in Ayungin. True, it allowed them to reclaim only a small fraction of their work week, but so what? What was more important here was the idea of cheating their employers, for a change, instead of the other way around—which was alarmingly all too common for lowly workers like them.
    It was in a small place called the "Ninth Dash Eatery". It was owned by a distant aunt of Mimi's, and was popular among these chain of islands by the welcome sign hanging by its door that said:

The owner prided herself with some knowledge of recent history, and would not hesitate to indulge anyone who would care to ask how her establishment had got its name. It was a very funny story actually, concerning imaginary dashes and foreign leaders who magically lost the ability to measure.
    Too bad, Khöeeshelle Annn and friends had very little interest in recent history. They were instead much more partial to the good food being served in this establishment, good company, and of course the latest workplace gossip.
    One such last Friday happened to be Khöeeshelle Annn's payday. She was seated on her usual chair, in her gang's usual corner, and her pretty forehead was knit in concentration—in the way it always was when working with numbers.
    "Thrice have I gone over my pay slip," she finally said aloud, "and thrice have I found that something seems not to compute! Why would I earn one thousand less of what I am supposed to receive?"
    Revvekhah, who was next to her, couldn't help commenting. "You're not supposed to be paid for work rendered 6PM onwards, remember? So don't expect payment for those nights you stayed up till 1AM looking for sales."
    Khöeeshelle Annn's brows knit even closer. "I know. And I know that although I put in fourteen hours of work a day, my computation is based only on as if I worked only for eight. Everything else is OTY."
    The girls laughed with minimal amusement, like someone familiar with the concept of OTY would. OTY is a rough transliteration for rendering work with not much as at most a "Thank you" by way of compensation. Like most workers in these labor-justice-challenged times, everyone had experienced working under such terms at one point or another.
    Mimi squinted at Khöeeshelle Annn's pay slip. "Didn't you tell us just the other day that you've received a memo about your company introducing an 'improved' allowance policy? What was that again?"
    Khöeeshelle Annn thought for a moment. "You mean the one about rewarding employees a full day's allowance if they brought in a solid hundred thousand to the company within a week?"
    "Yeah, that one."
    "Except that we are already receiving a full day's allowance! There's nothing improved about that policy at all—except an improvement to their money saving schemes perhaps! They are effectively reducing our daily allowance by half. Honestly, who brings in a solid hundred thousand in a week to any company?"
    The rest of the girls agreed. Their situations were not so different. Mimi in fact had stopped receiving her monthly living pay starting two months ago, when her employer deemed that only agents who could bring in five consecutive twenty thousand contracts in a week were worthy of it. A centavo less, and it was: "Sorry, girls, but you didn't make us as rich as you were supposed to, and so no monthly living pay for you for this period."
    Khöeeshelle Annn continued. "As soon as reading that announcement, I knew that it is nothing but an excuse to reduce the already small daily allowance they're giving us. I'm in the most extreme of luck to be closing a two hundred piece contract at any given day, what more a hundred thousand!"
    Mimi understood where Khöeeshelle Annn was coming from, but eventually, she decided they had to get back to the question of the salary calculation. "So your computation already considers this no full day allowance?"
    "Uh-huh. I would not be one to begrudge my company all that money they can save by not paying me. I am already resigned to the fate of receiving only half of the allowance I was promised when I've signed up."
    "Where then could the one thousand be?"
    Until this point, Juleiy had not offered her mathematical expertise to this problem. "Let me take a look at that," she said at last, indicating Khöeeshelle Annn's pay advice.
    A very unhealthy yet noneheless delectable dish called "Oil Rig Surprise!" lay in front of Juleiy. In order not to have to move this food away, she simply held up Khöeeshelle Annn's one-page pay advice in front of her face, and processed the figures inside her head.
    Although the most basic pay details were on the document, a lot were still not printed there—possibly to save the company on printing costs. Nevertheless, Juleiy had heard enough details from the earlier exchanges in order to deduce the number of days worked, taxes due, overtime pays if any (there was none), and added benefits (also none).
    It didn't take her long before Juleiy handed back the paper to Khöeeshelle Annn, and said with finality, "You are right to believe that you should be receiving one thousand more than what is printed here. Your one thousand should definitely be there, but for some reason isn't. I think it's a perfect time for you to call up your HR and ask for an explanation."

Rural Dreams

It's in a small rural town, and it seems, perpetually, to have just turned four in the afternoon. It's already late enough that the sun is not that hot anymore, yet not that late yet so the children can still have an hour our two of play in the dusty unpaved roads.
    And play the children do—and as could be expected of children at play in these street games, they would be dirty in their light, thin garments and semi-worn rubber sandals. At any given moment they will be running around after each other, or at times jumping across lines drawn arbitrarily across the brown earth—all in keeping with imagined rules they've come up with themselves. Of course they will be all sweaty—even snotty—but one thing one is not likely to miss will be the smiles on their faces, the delight of being with friends and of being young and having the most minimal of worldly worries beyond the confines of the rules of their games.
    Not far from this play area are the houses—humble, airy shelters made from local materials. Due to long history of flooding during the rainy season, most of these houses are raised from the ground by stilts. When they are, most of these elevated houses find use of the lower level by serving as an enclosure for domesticated livestock. The others at ground level, accessible from the street without the need to climb a ladder, have the bare earth as their very floor.
    The small town can have a name, perhaps from some Catholic Saint—better that than the surname of a recently powerful political clan. But then again it may not. Afterall, this is a town whose identity is derived more from the almost sleepy late afternoon quality of its atmosphere, than from any actual common name.

* * *

As it happens, though, this Rural Town does have a name, and it is named after a recently powerful political clan. In fact, it is the youngest son of this very same political family's patriarch that comes driving up the dusty unpaved rural road this particular afternoon. Except also that he is actually not the one who's driving; this politician-sired individual is being chauffeured by a professional driver in his father's employ.

    Driver and master's son are both in an oversized luxury vehicle with wheels so massive the tread prints of a single tire effectively obliterates the lines on the dirt road where the children play in. Its iridescent body paint with matching chromework, plus spinning rims, give it a stark contrast to the humble surroundings it now finds itself in. That the vehicle is actually more popularly known as the "Humble Vee" should by no means lead one into thinking that it is as the adjective describes. The "Humble Vee", although admittedly is but a provincial imitation of the more expensive, foreign-made original, is no less flashy—and never in any way something within the financial capacity of a villagefolk to own.
    Whether it is a credit to the skill of the driver, or a true sign of the reckless disregard for the lowly lives of people not born into influential political clans, this recently arrived "Humble Vee" screeches to a dusty halt precisely a half inch from a slight-framed girl of four in the process of shooting a marble in the ground.
    If the girl's father has it is his mind to protest the near murder of her eldest child—which he has, by the way, witnessed—his curses in the Provincial Dialect directed towards the politician's son are immediately drowned out by the loud thudding of party music that suddenly emanates from within the big vehicle. As the customized rear passenger scissor door rises open, the common citizens of Akren behold for the first time the youngest son of their constitutionally mandated leader, J. J. Akren.

Khlöeeshelle Annn (Part I)

What differentiates an inspired business decision from pure corporate greed aimed solely at extracting the maximum financial profit no matter what? Apparently in the case of JC Marketing, Inc., nothing much.

As a member of the recently congratulated batch of '17 graduates, Khlöeeshelle Annn applied for employment in the above mentioned company. Within the reasonable wait time for fresh grads to receive an employment application return call, Khlöeeshelle Annn got called for an interview. The job vacancy was for a Sales Agent, and the HR personnel she spoke to informed her that she was perfect for the job. Thus began Khlöeeshelle Annn's road towards becoming an income tax-paying citizen of this nation. And eventually towards a fruitful and successful corporate career.

Except that this last wasn't really the case... at least with this first job. For one, the employment term was on the basis of a five month temporary contract that was only in effect practically for as long as Khlöeeshelle Annn could haul in a steady stream of money for her employer. For another, the compensation was a meager 8 pesos above the minimum wage, no Health Benefits until "regularization", no paid leaves until the same, and had an automatic 33% contribution to an Absentee Insurance.

The Absentee Insurance. If patenting such innovation didn't cost so much, JC Marketing definitely would have had it registered already. It was brought about by past history of absenteeism among JC Marketing employees--often to secretly explore career opportunities elsewhere. This prompted the brilliant account officers of JC Marketing to identify a possible risk of potentially losing prospected income when their agents didn't report for duty. The Absentee Insurance virtually liberated the employees from any form of limitation when it came to absences, while at the same time ensured earnings for the owners.

One cannot truly blame Khlöeeshelle Annn, therefore, when on the day of her contract signing, there was a momentary hesitation upon coming across this particular bit of salary deduction.

"I know 33% percent is a considerable chunk of solid hard earned money," the HR said, noticing this hesitation. "but you see, the deduction is merely a way of discouraging absenteeism. If you give the company no reason to use the Absentee Insurance, the money just pools into a Retirement Fund. And this Retirement Fund will be given to you if you complete 20 consecutive years of profitable service."

33% of an income, with almost guaranteed increases in the span of 20 years, and multiplied by a factor of the same number of years of service, seemed too much for a quick mental math for our young aspiring professional. One thing was certain about it, though, and that was it amounted to a considerable future sum. She fought the hesitation, and upon signing the allotted spaces on the contract, Khlöeeshelle Annn could almost feel herself being physically transported from the ranks of the Unemployed into becoming a First Time Sales Agent.

* * *

It didn't take long for Khlöeeshelle Annn to start suspecting that there might possibly be a minor mistake in her decision to accept the JC Marketing offer. Day 1 of her deployment she received an urgent text from HR asking her where she was, the New Hires' Orientation was to begin in 5 minutes.

"But I'm here in Ayungin, bright and early for my first day of duty," she replied with enthusiasm and only the slightest of mounting worry.

"Why? We emailed you that there is going to be an orientation today at 8 AM. Didn't you check your mail?"

It was true that Khlöeeshelle Annn had been advised to maintain an internet account, and regularly check her email for any memos or additional instructions from the Head Office.

"I checked yesterday," replied Khlöeeshelle Annn, "and I didn't find any such instruction from the company. My sincerest apologies. I might have missed it."

"Well of course you would miss it! Why check from yesterday's mail? I sent the announcement an hour ago."

The gravity of the injustice--specially highlighted by the impossible italics in the HR officer's SMS--struck at the very pit of Khlöeeshelle Annn's existence, that she felt suspended in spacetime for fifteen full seconds. When she regained her orientation and self awareness, she typed--unitalized--through the SMS function of her mobile phone a powerless whimper:

* * *

Sure, Ayungin is well within the 200 Nautical Miles Exclusive Economic Zone of the Philippines (and to anyone with a  minimum set of eyes and a properly functioning brain, it sure as hell belongs to it), but still it is a good 7 hour travel from there to the JC Marketing, Inc. offices. Khlöeeshelle Annn started as soon as she could. To save time, she even started writing her Letter of Apology, Incident Report, and Authorization to Deduct Salary as soon as getting on the boat. All three were of course required of her by the HR, intended to minimze--if possible--whatever impact such neglectful conduct had on her probationary status.

Khlöeeshelle Annn arrived at the JC Marketing headquarters with only one hour left in her orientation. Good thing she had taken a taxi all the way from the ferry port to the office, she had made it right on time for the last topic on the orientation deck. The ride itself cost her 15,000 plus PhP, but she believed this could be reimbursed from her employer. (Poor girl, how wrong could she be!--but of this... later.)

As it happened, the last topic being discussed was on Disciplinary Actions. On that last hour, she learned that yes, this latest mishap on her very first day of work warranted a Disciplinary Action, and no, mere Incident Report, Letter of Apology, and Salary Deduction were not punishment enough. In fact the offense would be stamped indelibly in her Employment Record, which would be promptly distributed among major and minor corporations nationwide.

Most importantly, given that she was now under disciplinary action, any costs she incurred--be it travels, meals, and the like--they would no longer be reimburseable from her employer. If she was still holding on to her 15,995 PhP taxi receipt, now would be the right time to throw it to the nearest waste bin.


(to be continued...)

Lake Rashiv

or
(A Short Story Written Entirely on the Virtual Touch Screen Keyboard by Thumbs)

Since two months ago, Saturday mornings would find Rashiv strolling along the banks of the man made Lake Rashiv. That the lake was named after him was no slight coincidence; as a child he fell on two separate ocassions on the open pit when the lake was just being dug, and when the lake was complete he along with five companions drowned there, with him being the lone survivor. For some reason that previously hadn't ocurred to him—and which even now was not yet fully clear to him—he found the environment calming. But what tranquil body of water, natural or man-made, doesn't inspire peace and calmness to a troubled young soul? And yet somehow, Rashiv was almost entirely sure he wouldn't be as impartial towards any other body of water than the one that had been named after him.

It was then but expected that during his weekend strolls along the place, he would have with him a backpack filled with Lake-appreciating necessities: a "double"-sized picnic mat, two fly swatters, a 2-gallon water jug, half a loaf of "pre-buttered" sandwiches, a collapsible foot stool, various modern electronic gadgets including a GPS phone with a pre-loaded sattelite image of the vicinity of the lake and an audio tape casette emulator smartphone application software. Last of all, sticking out of his right back pocket—as though brought to the trip as an afterthought simply because no one is truly sure when inspiration would come—a plastic alto recorder flute.

The flute had no cover and was rarely cleaned, not that it required much cleaning for a plastic instrument. In fact its surface was heavily scratched and it finger holes and mouthpiece worn to the point of risking to lose perfect tune—but only just. Because for whatever reason, be it skill of the player or plainly the sturdy build of the instrument, not one of these physical imperfections impede good music from coming out of the instrument once Rashiv takes it in himself to pull it out of his pocket and play it.

In fact that was the very thing Rashiv was starting to do one Saturday morning on his favorite spot on the lake's northern bank. And who can fault him? Inspiration was truly everywhere: a mild, golden April morning sunshine, a light breeze, children playing, people running about in their branded running gear and patent sweat-absorbing dri-fit shirts, fish merrily swimming about in the water with the ocassional jump out the surface, if for no reason than to flaunt their shinny silver scales.

Rashiv had barely pulled out the remainder of the recorder from his pocket when the lake for an unexplained reason started bubbling wildly and noisily. Had it started quietly at first and only gradually increased its clamor, it wouldn't have startled Rashiv that much. As it was, it came so sudden and so loud that whatever inspiration to play good music that was within Rashiv that morning was ripped away from him, and he dropped his flute and broke it.

Yes, it actually shattered upon contact to his picnic mat. Not the mat's light cushioning could protect Rashiv's beloved instrument from shattering to pieces when it landed, and shattered more when it bounced once, twice, thrice, and then a fourth time.

Needless to say, the instrument was but unrecognizable shards of plastic debris half a second after Rashiv had let it go of his grip.

Had there been time to ponder over this seemingly physically anomalous event, Rashiv would have been completely curious as to how the instrument could have suddenly gone that fragile. He sensed some kind of injustice about how Nature's rules could so suddenly and specifically be bent just to part him from his beloved flute.

But this particular Saturday morning, there was no time for such curiosity and feelings of injustice... especially when the waters of the lake started behaving erratically. Talk about rules of nature being bent: huge bubbles were now coming out of the middle of the lake, each one sending tsunami-like waves rushing to its banks. Whereas earlier there had been people laughing and playing, there was now only amazement and moderately terrified onlooking.

Rashiv himself could not help being drawn to the commotion coming from the lake. The lake's water of course was not clear to begin with, but all the bubbling and churning gave it now a brown and muddy appearance. Churning it indeed appeared to be, for if there was an invisile gigantic hand churning the lake, the very same effect was being achieved that moment.

It was coming from near the center of the lake, its deepest part, and if there was anything anyone could fault in Rashiv, it would not be his affinity to every corner of the lake. He knew it by heart. Yes he had a GPS mobile phone application to navigate its banks, but it is something completely unnecessary, for Rashiv knew Lake Rashiv like the keyholes in his now decimated flute. It was afterall the lake he had survived drowning in.

Rashiv knew how far it stretched from the northern banks until it curved slightly to the northwest, the widest portion being somewhere around the middle. He knew its depths, and knew that the deepest part was actually deeper than the lake floor, because unknown to those who had dug it, there was a fault line beneath it, and when it gave during an earthquake a couple of years back, the fault opened up and nearly swallowed all the water in the entire lake. Ever since then, there had been a deep trench in that part of the lake.

That was why when Rashiv's friends perished from the drowning, the authorities weren't able to recover the bodies—not even after they had dried the lake. Many believed the bodies were swallowed up in the deep lake trench and they had given up searching due to inaccesibility issues.

And now the lake was behaving abnormally, and off all places right where the deep trench was, where Rashiv's friends' bodies were believed to have gone.

Rashiv grew increasingly unsettled. What can be happening? he asked himself, and how can it be related to the fact that the bodies of my four friends who drowned with me some two months ago were never found and were believed to have been lost on that part of the lake?

His questions didn't take long to go unanswered. As suddenly as the lake began churning, what appeared to be human forms suddenly emerged out of the water. Shortly, it became clearer that they were in fact four actual human bodies, and they were walking as though they were alive—although clearly they were dead.

Rashiv's fears were realized. The four human bodies were his friends, and they all had now been turned into... ZOMBIES!!!

Test post saved to SD

This is a test blog entry saved to SD. Dated 08 March 2013. I will post this online on a later date to see it if will be tagged as "posted" on that date, or on March 08.

Is it posible to blog privately?

The fact that one posts online practically exposes one's entry to the scrutiny of the most casual of web browsers. Yet the sheer volume of material there is on the web makes me doubt if people will even be interested or even have the time to look at your posts. I find that slightly reassuring. The web has gotten so noisy and full of clutter these past ten years or so, that maybe I need not be overly worried about posting too much personal info. With so much information to filter through, will a potential stalker even bother with me?

I'm writing tonight (early morning actually) for the first time on a mobile blogger app. It's supposed to automatically post this entry once I tap a button. Toi bad it doesn't have a save feature. Or maybe there is but I haven't found out about it yet. Maybe I can even save offline to post fpr when there is internet connection. I'm yet to find that out. In any case, let me make a general snap shot of my life so far thru this short but nonetheless rambling entry. I'm quite fine and doing actually not so bad.

24 Aug 2010
04:28

Woke up and couldn't sleep anymore. Mostly I'm still in shock after having watched just last night the spectacle of a man ending the lives of fellow human beings over live tv. With the conclusion of course of that man getting killed himself.

And so just this morning in bed while trying to recover sleep I am reminded of why it is forbidden in most every religion to take another man's life. Somewhat similar to what the narrator's father in "The Kite Runner" says--and yet still different. Killing another human being is, yes, basically stealing his right to life. And yet it still is different than regular stealing, in that if you steal a material possession from someone, you always know the value of what it is you steal. You more or less know by what amount you deprive that person. With killing it's different; you never know how many tomorrows you deprive that person you kill, how many sunrises he'll never see again, how many raindrops he'll never feel on his skin, how many smiles and acts of affection he'll never again be able to give his lovedones, just because you ended his life. It IS still stealing, but it is far worse than any other type of stealing a person can commit against another.

And so while I was browsing thru facebook immediately after the tragedy, curious about people's reactions to the event, I came across that single line that I'd been certain for a long time I'd never find in the midst of all the ego and vanity and excessive self centeredness/tracking that we channel thru there. On Dave's brother, Joe's, status was a quote from the Dalai Lama: "be kind to others whenever possible... it's always possible." And I've proven myself wrong. Kindness, afterall, is still being given thought even in a place like facebook.

We are insignificant. With all our imagined sorrows, greatness, our fleeting beauty, our supposed intelligence, we are very close to nothing. Zoom out to a tiny fraction of a light year from our planet and we are nothing but that pale blue dot Carl Sagan points out--that is, if we even do see that tiny dot at all. In the scale of the expanse of the entire universe what are we? In the scale of all the eons the universe has been around and will still be, human history itself is far, far less than that insignificant blink of an eye. And still how dare we presume we have the power to decide over the life and death of another fellow human being--no matter how deserving we believe that someone is of death? I guess I'll have to keep this in mind whenever I fly into a homicidal rage against someone for whatever reason. One person has no right to deprive another of an unknown number of tomorrows.

Storage

Still "proof-reading" electronic journal entries from 10 years ago. I'm amazed at how relatively more prolific I was back then. Then again isn't that but one of the expected reactions people would have at reading what they've written from a considerable time in the past? Past writing could either evoke admiration at how apparently so much better one has written in the past, or embarrassment because it is the opposite.

For me it's more of admiration at finding that I was, at least around 2000, not a lazy aspiring writer.

And so again, I have this internal debate on whether it's much better to keep journal entries in electronic vs physical medium.

Electronic copies of course have the advantage of being conveniently stored in physically small storage devices. Much better is that they can be edited and read much more cleanly—no strikeout marks, no illegible texts, etc.

On the other hand, there's this fear that the day may come when all technology fails. A doomsday scenario in which we can't run our computers anymore. Gigabytes upon gigabytes of our data, though safely stored in our disks are suddenly unreadable.

This is not an unlikely fear. I was much convinced of this after reading an article a few years ago (in BBC I think) on how we are at risk of losing data because our electronic storage media themselves are vulnerable to the elements. CD's can be rendered unreadable by a scratch, a hard disk by a speck of dust. I have first hand experience of this after my hard disk crashed on me a few years ago. (Fortunately, I have a backup copy of my more important files.)

Such can't be said of things written on a physical notebook. Here you don't need complex electronics to be able to read—just the minimum pair of eyes, and optionally, an understanding mind. Here if you can overcome decyphering the twisting, sometimes almost illegible writing—something all analog writing is in one way or another liable—you have the information you want.

Which is not to say that writing on paper is better in terms of avoiding data loss. If anything, given that they take up much more physical space to keep and maintain, makes them more prone to the very things that can destroy them. Primarily fires and flood. And secondarily, disorganization—imagine pages of manuscripts dissarranged, shelves of notebooks you can't make sense of because they are misplaced and aren't properly indexed. And imagine making backups of physical files. As bulky and space-consuming as it is to keep the originals, think about keeping at least twice that amount of redundant data in hard copy.

At least this problem is significantly minimized with electronic storage. Sure your disks are vulnerable to scratches and specks of dust, but if you have backups, what is the likelihood of your backup meeting the same fate as your original on the same day?

Text searchability and ease of organization are other advantages I can see with electronic file storage. No matter how well-indexed one's library is, searching for an entry takes time to leaf through. With electronic data searches, given the proper search criteria, relevant results can be obtained at far less time.

And so, at the end of this entry, with some 548 words written so far—I know thanks to the computer's word count function—I still haven't really decided which is better. Although I'll admit that in recent years I've made it a point to write exclusively on physical notebooks.

So if one day you find yourself in my room, you'll see this modest pile of notebooks that throughout the years I have filled with my semi-legible handwriting—and quite some few I'm yet to.

Cocoa Tree With Fruit

If I hadn't turned out to be doing what I am now doing for a living, I would have probably been involved in something that has to do with agriculture. Seriously. If I remember correctly, I even listed Forestry as a second or third choice for a course to take back when I was applying for college.

We raised quite a handful of animals in our yard back in my childhood—well, chickens and pigeons, aside from the cats that we've always had since I can remember.

What we had a lot of were trees. We had two guava trees, two mango trees, a coconut tree, sampaloc (tamarind), guyabano (soursop), papaya, cainito, chesa (canistel), alatires (I don't know what it's called in your language), and quite some others. Then there are the small vegetable and flower gardens we kept on some of the small plots of earth that we can spare.

This was years ago, when there were still open expanses of unpaved earth in our backyard. Way before the general area where we live was known to be the urban, commercial center that people now call it.

Anyway, what this is about is that, for all the plants and trees that used to grow in our yard, now, after these many years, there remains only one tree standing. It is this cocoa tree I personally planted in 1991. Its seed itself was given to me from the province—Cebu, unless I'm much mistaken—by one of our tennants.



As years passed, financial needs—among other reasons—drove us to have the trees cut down and plants cleared off to make way for various structures. Around 2006 there stood only three, and when typhoon Milenyo (international name: Xangsane) struck, and the remaining mango tree was nearly uprooted, with a branch falling on our roof, my mother decided to have the whole tree cut down.

Well, that was the agreement. I was opposed to any tree-killing around here in the first place, but with the typhoon damage, we had no choice. I had a feeling then that Mom wanted to do away with all the trees altogether—because then there would be no fallen leaves to have to sweep off the ground, no fallen leaves to clog the roof gutters.

But I said no. In particular I didn't want her to touch my cocoa tree. I had an attachment to it, having planted it myself, unlike all the trees that we used to have which were already growing when we got here. I might have even issued a threat or another at that time, but I don't remember now.

Anyway, as it turned out, after we children conceded to have the mango tree chopped down, Mom had the star apple tree cut down as well—which was sneaky of her, as we'd only agreed on the mango tree.

I was furious for a time, but there was really nothing more I could do about it. And anyway, she didn't touch my cocoa tree, and so it is even now the only tree in our yard—just because it's my tree.



And it's now bearing fruit... the second time, actually.

I count it as a good thing, because according to who gave it to me, it would mature and bear fruit at two years old. In this case, it didn't (probably because I didn't plant it on good soil; it's mostly gravelly where it is).

It took 10 some years before a single fruit developed, and even on that first time the fruit disappeared right before it ripened. We don't know what happened to it. Could have been stolen, or eaten/taken by birds perhaps.

This time, though, there are two fruits. I was able to take a picture of the more easily to spot of them, and post it here.

A Very Small Die-Cast Car Collection

This began on the latter half of last year. This isn't much. And I have no intentions of making a real big die cast car collection like what we see of other people around. I only add to the collection every once in awhile, and dependent on the car's availability on the nearby local malls at that.

So again, with few further text, here they are...










(well, this one's actually a plastic radio control toy car. but i post pictures of it here anyway.)

Rich Kids

There's no such thing. Everyone is born equally broke. Nothing in their pockets or bank accounts. Without even pockets or bank accounts to speak of. We're all equally born with nothing.

What there are are rich-parented kids. And the only difference between them, really, and their non-rich-parented counterparts is that they have less of an excuse to end up not doing well in life. (Not that kids with poor parents are excused to screw up their lives either.) And the only real advantage they have, these rich-parented kids, is that they've got moneyed people to supposedly provide for them, and take care of their education, their upbringing, etc.

I don't even know why I'm telling you these things.

Return Trip Home

At twenty-six, there was left only a handful of things in this world that could really surprise Thina, but if there was one thing that could it was the realization that she had wasted the last five years of her life in the Public Safety Sector. In fact, it would be a realization so profound to the still-single, Cabanatuan-born, Mathematics degree holder, it would nearly cause her to choke on the piece of ube-hopia she was at that moment consuming—her second for the day and—if truth be told—her actual lunch.

It was, however, not as if she was to any degree unaware of this basic truth; it was just that the entire time she had worked and had wanted to leave her consultancy under the semi-government-owned Polonoling Public Safety Board, she had always thought next year would be the year, but she had not gotten around to really doing it. And so, one year moved to the next and so on, and for a time Thina seemed to have surrendered to the permanency of her stay on the Board. It was not until the fourth month since her boyfriend had dumped her to get married—fourth month to the day, in fact—that she finally built up the courage to open up her workstation's OpenOffice.org and draft what, after evelen revisions, would be her formal resignation letter.

The letter itself was not at all long by any compositional standards. It told just about everything that needed to be told about five years of a person's life, and the consultancy service which was as a matter of course attached to them. More than that it told of a person's resolve that a certain amount of time had already passed one's life doing something, and would it not be a good idea, by any chance, to stop doing it anymore, and do something else instead?

In any case, the letter was completed, saved, printed in duplicate—only one page each, Thina didn't want to needlessly consume company resources on what she considered a relatively personal resignation—and sent, one to the HR, and the other to her superior, Jebb "Jeberson" Soamos.

As it happened, this superior of hers, this Jebb "Jeberson" Soamos, was the very boyfriend who had left her, and who four months prior had definitively, irrevocably, terminated any chance of their getting back again. This, of course, was done by getting his current girlfriend of four months—the very HR officer, by the way, to whom Thina had submitted the other copy of her resignation letter—pregnant. Well, strictly speaking, it was not so much as the act of getting the girlfriend pregnant as it was his immediate decision, this Jebb "Jeberson" Soamos having nothing but the most noble, gentlemanly view of himself, to marry the impregnated mother.

"Is this decision of yours final?" Jebb "Jeberson" Soamos had asked—but not in person, and instead thru the Board prescribed gyachi instant messanger.

Thina had waited exactly 55 seconds before she typed in her reply: "Yes."

"OK," Jebb "Jeberson" Soamos almost instantaneously had replied back.

Thus, with the resignation approved, Thina was granted to use up her remaining leaves—provided she facilitate a decent handover of her past duties to the new guy.

Thina had used her last month wisely. In that time, she had not only ensured a seamless turnover of her duties to the "new guy"—which turned out to be a girl, young and fresh from the University and going by the name Dipeeka (or Deepika)—she had also settled all her business that had to do with her being a resident of Polonoling for the past five years.

Her landlady, in particular, was in tears when Thina told her she would be going back to her native Cabanatuan. She herself having a daughter of almost the same age as Thina go to a foreign land to study, had almost found a daughter in Thina—these past three or four years at least. "First KC left for Harvard," her landlady said, "and now this... you're leaving your Nanay Mamerta for good! What now will become of me?"

There were tears also in Thina's eyes. It was true that she had been like a daughter to Nanay Mamerta, truer even than most known biological relationships out there, but what was she to do? "You know I can't stay here anymore, Nay," she said.

"In fact, I don't know," Nanay Mamerta said. "How can you say I know when I don't know?"

"Of course you do. We talked about it last night, and if you love me as a daughter you wouldn't let me go through all the pain again telling you my reasons."

"Jebb? Are you doing all this just because of Jebb?"

"Oh, Nay. Please don't speak his name. If you truly love me..."

"Thina, you know I do. But if this Jebb..." here she had considered
rephrasing. "If this boy is all the reason you have for—"

"He was my everything. Maybe still is. All the reason I would ever
need."

Here Nanay Mamerta was about to say something along the lines of "that Jebb being the sole reason is pretty lame," but she didn't. At that moment Thina wrapped her arms around her in a tight embrace, the tears now streaming freely down her face—except that it was more of like clinging to her for her life, holding her firmly to the very spot they were on as if that would prevent time from moving and things from changing. She in particular.

Nanay Mamerta was all too familiar with this vareity of extremely violent heartbreak, having also, of course, been young once, and in love quite more than. She was now old, had seen a lot and had experienced a lot. In a rough International Language rendering of the well-worn expression that always went with the elders' admonition to the young, Nanay Mamerta was already on the return trip for the journey Thina was just at that point in her life getting prepared for.

Maybe it was precisely because of this that after allowing precisely three minutes for Thina's grief to pour on her motherly shoulder, Nanay Mamerta gently, affectionately held Thina back and said, "You'll be late for your Ro-Ro.¹"

Then again, maybe not. Maybe it was less than that than the knowledge that since Thina was resigning, she wouldn't be receiving the current month's pay until three months later along with her backpay, because Nanay Mamerta quickly followed: "By the way, you take some ube-hopia with you to munch on the trip."

Thina, being the sensible girl that she was, found sense in this. She didn't say anymore, just nodded, wiped the tears off her face, and accepted the offered ube-hopia.

__________________
¹ Ro-Ro - Roll-on-roll-off ferries. A common inter-island
transport in the Philippines.

Fuerza de San Pedro

As part of my unofficial Antonio de Morga 2009 tour, I toured Cebu late May/early June this year. Here are some of the the pictures I brought back.
Below are those taken of Fort San Pedro. If you want to know more about this, here's the wikipedia link.
Enjoy!

Henceforth, this shall be known as "Jay's Blog of Good Intent".

But first a few things about myself. At the time of writing, I am a thirty-year-old, public-school-educated, single Filipino male. I still live with my parents.

At one or a few points in my life, I decided it was nice to write, not so much as to be read by friends and/or complete strangers, but to have something to read that is of my own, in some future time when I'm older and presumably wiser than I was when I was still writing them.

Thus, I wrote, starting sometime when I was 17 or so. That was in college. Quite a late-bloomer, admittedly, and in that I even decided to want to write at all, credit should be given to my friend, Dave, who, before I even set my pen to write something other than the usual school-required writeups and sutff, introduced me first to the joys of reading.*

Before blogs were all the rave in this internet, and back when storage space was not as cheap as today, I used to have a 15-MB free web hosting account on geocities. Well, actually, at the time of writing I still do. It was (is) called "Jay's Literature Page", which, as serious as it may sound, is nothing really but a place where I "publish" a few of my more readable writing exercises online. In fact, that's basically what it is... not so much as an actual Literature page as it is a Writing Exercices Page. If one would want to get technical, that is... I think...

For one reason or another, after some 10 years of providing free web page hosting for HTML-ers like me, geocities will be closing down October this year—and with that also will go Jay's Literature Page. Not for a short time after hearing this news, I was mildly resentful, and blamed that blogs and (mostly) HTML-illiterate "bloggers" have killed Jay's Literature Page.

Of course, I understand that that is not really the case. You take something that gives free service to anyone, and make it last 10 years, what with all this new technology and all this blog sites for example who offer services as free as they do, and there are people having preference for the new technology and everything... I understand that at a certain point, you'll have to close down eventually.

Not really something drastic or dramatic. It's the same reason you discontinue using old computers in favour of faster ones. Or replacing cellphones.

Since I started this blog—then temporarily called "Jay's Test Blog"—I haven't really come to discussing why for all my mild resentment (snobbery?) towards blogs and bloggers in general, here I come starting my own blogsite. What it is, really, is that I'm giving in. When I heard about the plans to close down geocities, I was thinking I would either: a.) disappear from the online world completely; or b.) yield to this new medium that mostly everyone is using anyway.

Obviously I didn't choose to disappear completely—well, not yet anyway. And as for deciding to have a go at this thing, I can only hope that I get at least as much readership as I did back when I was in geocities, which is about 3 readers/month (including me). Then again if no one reads this, I can always be happy to have something to read, I don't know, in 2015 when I'm bored or something.

If they haven't closed down blogger.com by that time, that is.

_____________________
* In this just-started "Jay's Blog of Good Intent", you should, of course, expect me to intend talking about (reviewing?) books. And that includes books that I enjoy =).

Test on posting pre-current date

So you can't trick this using the system time to believe you're actually posting at an earlier date. Looks like it's more or less real time.

[root@fed10 ~]# date --set="Tue Sep 1 00:00:01 2001"
Sat Sep 1 00:00:01 PHT 2001
[root@fed10 ~]# date
Sat Sep 1 00:00:08 PHT 2001

So much for migrating here the stuff I have over at the geocities site.

Sample entry with an image on it.

Images make any (web/blog)site interesting. Why not here? And if I'm going to post pictures in my blog, why not pictures that have me and/or people that I know on it?

In this case, this is one that was taken on the Sept '08 trip to Subic with my work friends. From left to right are: Me, Dex, Mat, and José. We were about to go-cart!

Note, by the way, that I'm posting their picture here with neither their knowledge nor consent. Rest assured, though, that I will let them know of it once I see them again. Should I get at least one objection from any of them for getting this photo public, I should remove the picture (and this post) right away. In the meantime I will hope that the copyright watermark(?) I've embossed on it will deter any ill-meaning person from doing anything inappropriate with the now publicly posted image.

I intend to put such marking on all the pictures I will be posting here, just as I do on all the other pictures I make available on the Web.

hi everyone!

My first entry. Not really sure about this blog thing. With geocities closing down before the year ends, I figure I need to have somewhere to move to. I don't know. As tempting as it sounds, I still don't feel like entirely disappearing from the Web. Not yet.

So here I am, testing the water, so to speak.

Expect a few entries in the coming days, maybe. I intend to post here, really. Basically, I'm posting this one tonight just to see how the blog page looks with an entry on it; it's been blank since I've setup the account a couple of weeks back.

That said, I thus quietly and with the least possible noticeable splash allow myself in to the world's blogging community.

An Exemplary Leader Of Ak'ren

By any average-sized, semi-agricultural rural Philippine town standards, Ak'ren was more prosperous than most. For one, it was gifted with an extraordinarily fertile humus soil, conducive to the growth of sorghum and many a variety of vegetables. For another, its proximity to the provincial capital of ***** exposed it to modern industry to just about the right amount to provide a steady in-flow of much welcomed revenue.
    However, neither the most perfect geography, nor the most modern industry could scarcely guarantee the prosperity of any community. For most of the townsfolk, what good fortune they had been enjoying being blessed with couldn't have been remotely possible had not for the responsible ruddership of their fifth-term re-elected, once-Ondista-turned-mayor mayor, Mayor Jimm Boyy Landicho.
    It was understandable, then, that on the Tuesday morning that it was announced on local radio news that their beloved mayor, at the young age of fifty-two, had not reported to office due to a just-diagnosed rare terminal heart condition, most of the entire town took a break from the bustle of their daily activities and thronged in front of the Landicho residence to wish their town leader well.
    It was difficult at first to believe that Jimm Boyy Landicho could possibly be suffering from such a fatal illness. Jimm Boyy was a very healthy man. In fact, he had only been absent due to sickness three times since being a public servant, starting some thirty years ago. He was not athletic—most musically inclined people aren't—although he regularly worked out on the public gym his administration had made available for the health and/or figure conscious of Ak'ren. He didn't smoke—he was one of the most passionate campaigners of the anti-smoking ordinance when it came out—never did drugs, and only drank the most minimum of sips of alcoholic beverages on social occasions.
    If there was anything to be blamed for the mayor's recently discovered illness, it could perhaps be his genes. A quick inquiry to his family's medical history revealed that a significant number of ancestors, some spaced at least a generation apart, suffered from the same rare heart problem.
    In spite of this, Jimm Boyy pleaded for his doctor's permission to be wheeled to the front porch of his modest single floor, two bedroom house—"a house an honest government servant should have" as he had called it on a broadsheet interview a couple of years ago—to face the people of Ak'ren.
    "I am alive, though not too well," he spoke in a croaky, though not un-statesman-like delivery in the native Ak'ren tongue. "Worry not over me. As you do so, the fields are left untended, and the wheels of industry are halted. If this persists, what will be of our beloved town, Ak'ren?"
    "The fields can bear half a day without our care," the people replied, "and most of the modern machinery processes are run on cron anyway. We have heard the most dreadful news concerning your health issues, our honorable mayor, and we are distressed. We come here to show our support. Indeed, what will be of our beloved Ak'ren should... should... the Unthinkable happen?"
    "Comrades, my comrades. My friends, what is the death of one man, if the ideals of good leadership remain in the very hearts of everyone of you?" At the mention of the ominous word, an audible gasp issued forth from the crowd. The town leader ignored this. He continued: "I have served our community since as young an age as twenty-one. Indeed, as young as when I discovered that the life of a high-paid, overpriced capitalist-coffee-drinking ***** yuppie was not for me. You all know of this, and many of you have watched as I climbed the ranks of Public Service, weeding out the bureaucracy off corrupt practices along the way, and encouraging our leaders—though not without much frustration and heartbreak—to do the same. I trust you have learned much from my example?"
    "Why do you speak of such things, Jimm Boyy? Are you not to complete your fifth term, and eventually run for a national position, showing the country for the first time, and Ak'ren for not quite the first, How To Beat An Actor Wannabe Politician to a position?"
    Jimm Boyy laughed one of his snorting and at the same time high pitched laughs that got him so charismatic and endearing to the public. For a span of about two seconds, the people of Ak'ren could almost believe their leader was nothing but in the pink of the highest health. But then, all that proved to be make believe, as Jimm Boyy's laughter was suddenly silenced by what visibly was pain around his chest area, which he grasped tightly in his hands. This was accompanied by a tight shutting of the eyes and a deep contortion of the face.
    His doctor was upon him immediately, his instruments ready, and so was Mrs. Landicho, ready to wheel the town mayor back indoors for more rest and less excitement.
    But as soon as Jimm Boyy's laughter had lasted, so did the pain. He raised a restraining hand before his beloved wife turned him out of the people's sight.
    He was allowed time for one last brief one-liner to Ak'ren.
    "As much fun as that is," Jimm Boyy said in a faltering voice and almost in tears, "I'm afraid my poor heart can't take all that excitement anymore."