Thursday, April 29, 2004
Adonic Ala
I was thrilled to find that my favoite poet has a poem named after me. Yay.Adonic Angela
today I stretched out next to a pure young woman
as if at the shore of a white ocean,
as if at the center of a burning star
of slow space.
from her lengthily green gaze
the light fell like dry water,
in transparant and deep circles
of fresh force.
her bosom like a two flamed fire
burned raised in two regions,
and in a double river reached
her large, clear feet.
a climate of gold scarcely ripened
the diurnal length of her body
filling it with extended fruit
sand hidden fire.
-Pablo Neruda
And yes, I do have "large, clear feet".
baby book
All three of us Paredes siblings found our baby books and we spent the whole afternoon poring over them. There was one page in my mine that I found particularly amusing. It was headed "Here's What Was Going On When I Was Born".
News Headlines: Fear of Nuclear War, Aids, Coalinga earthquake (CA).
Political Figures: President Reagan, still President Marcos.
Popular Entertainers: My papa and friends, Michael Jackson.
Popular Songs: "When I Met You"- APO, "Billie Jean" - Michael Jackson
Latest dance: Strut
Best Movies: "Gandhi", "Oro, Plata, Mata", "Return of the Jedi", "E.T."
Popular TV Shows: Thorn Birds
Fashion and Fads: Valspeak, Minis, Pastel Colors, Home computers
I was born at the height of the Michael Jackson craze. My, my, the world has changed (except for the fear of nuclear war). Minis are in again. "Home computers"? hahahaha!
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Tuesday, April 27, 2004
My sister got a ton of stuff for her baby shower, including 4 baby bathtubs (we now have 5), a Ralph Lauren swimsuit, and a Kate Spade diaper bag. Sossy :-p.
Before the shower, she couldn't resist buying a Baby Dior swimsuit because it was on sale. The daddy bought the baby little Nike sneakers which I think cost pretty much the same as an adult pair. I said, 'Kids don't even need shoes for crying out loud'! Their feet don't even touch the ground!
I guess when it's your first kid, you get so excited that you can't help buying it all this expensive stuff that aren't really all that practical. Then again, my sis has always been the fashionable one in the family. She is the beauty and fashion editor of Pink Magazine after all.
My 7 year old boy cousin even made her a baby shower card out of bond paper and marker. The front has a drawing of a dog, "because it's ate Erica's favorite animal". The inside has a drawing of a stork, carrying a baby girl not in a blanket, but in an orange Jelly Kelly bag (he drew it with the trademark clasps and all so it's unmistakeable). The stork is flying over buildings and sky scrapers that each bear the name of different brands. One building says Nike. Another, Kate Spade. The others Gap, U2, Esprit, etc. etc.
What a card! :-) The kid sure knows his fashion brands (as well as his fashion trends).
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Monday, April 26, 2004
seeking Zen in my closet...sorta
I spent my day cleaning out my closet and enjoying the benefits of internet radio. I love iTunes. They have something like 20 different jazz stations to choose from as well as all that 80s sh*t I crave every now and then.
Cleaning out my closet is a monumental task that must be accomplished every now and then. My closet just doesn't stay neat for very long. Clothes flow in and out by the truckload. I get insane amounts of free clothes, more than I need, more than what is a fair allotment for one person. It totally goes against my resolutions of following a more Zen way of life, avoiding excess. Unfortunately, excess can't avoid me.
I always see myself living a simple life, taking only what I need. As a little girl, I was always the one who didn't ask for toys very often, even when I was let loose in a toy store. According to anecdotes, while the other kids would go crazy grabbing stuff, I'd always choose one thing, and that would be it. I would refuse to take anymore.
Unfortunately, life is out to foil my plans for simple, uncomplicated living.
When I started coming out on TV, I would get 25 free tops and 5 free bottoms from Lee Jeans every month to wear on the show. That arrangement lasted about a year, and you can imagine how much I was left with after that ended.
Now I'm with Penshoppe and I still get gigantic amounts. I even cleared out one whole closet just for Penshoppe stuff. I have enough clothes to never be seen wearing the same thing for a year. And yet, Only about an eight of my wardrobe is really put to regular use. Maybe even less.
Now that college is over, I need a lot less clothing than I did over the past four years. I've tried various ways of disposing of the excess items in my wardrobe, from throwing ukay-ukays in my drive-way, to straight out giving them away to my girlfriends which makes them very happy.
I don't know what to do with all this stuff. I figure that the universe channels all this stuff towards me for a reason. Or maybe it's a result of alot of good kharma. But for what?
tamara de lempicka
I'm an art buff. I love wandering through musems. I love their whiteness, and the silence, and being alone with a million paintings. Since there aren't alot of museums here, I go for art books instead. And I'd like to share one of my favorite female painters today.
So what is so great about this woman anyway? She was a painter doing the art deco period, and like her contemporaries dabbled in the cubism and "futurism" (did I invent that?) everyone was obsessed with at that time. However, I think she was slightly more ahead of her time than the others. I love the strength in her paintings. She was a portraitist, and painted more women than men. And boy, could she paint women.
Her women aren't winsome, simpering, delicate little creatures. Beautiful they are, helpless they are not. Her women are powerful, fierce, and assertive, and you can tell they were painted by a woman of the same nature. Her style is so fearless, so hard, so...metallic. Stark shading and hard, clean lines. And yet, the women still manage to look soft. Sometimes her paintings look like CGI.
I tried to see which single painting of hers would show off her style the best, but I think you'll be better of surfing the net. One painting won't do her justice (So I picked two).
I just love this one. Look at how intimidating this woman is.
This is her take on Adam and Eve, in an urban setting. Notice the apple in Eve's hand, and the way the woman's belly is painted. I swear she changed the way I see women's bodies.
Try to search for her self-portrait, titled "Auto Portrait". I love the double meaning. You'll see what I mean if you ever see it.
Friday, April 23, 2004
here we are looking like victims of a maritime accident at Carlos's pool in his Antipolo resort. I love my new Marine Case that goes with my digicam.
And some more... I discovered color correction too late.
Vain, vain, vain.
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Monday, April 19, 2004
I was a teenager when I left for Boracay last Monday, and came back yesterday a legal adult: 21 years of age. Coincidentially, I walked into my room upon arrival at home to find that my wall clock, the one I made with a picture of my blog heading on it's face, had stopped running. It only means one thing. My time just ran out. I'm out of college, and I'm 21. I'm old.
Now I can really party hard. Cool.
The Boracay crowd has three main classifications. One classification is the long-haired, shirtless, bohemian, artist-types who paint, make music/jewelry, and walk around with suspiciously red eyes. Another is the "family type" who are, well, families; parents with young children in tow. And last but not the least are the Makati-clubber types. The men sport bonnets and large henna tatoos, usually spiky tribal designs. They hang out at Cocomangas and sometimes they'll even start a good brawl.
I love Boracay. It's so utterly commercial, but I do. Tricycle drivers charge attrocious rates for their reckless driving, transporting you around the island at the speed of death, on unlit winding streets. One particular driver's headlights went off when he was speeding on an unlit, winding street, leaving us in pitch blackness for two seconds... two seconds to collide into something and die. Bathrooms were horrible and leaky. *** On the side, I notice that most Filipino establishments just neglect bathrooms altogether. Bathrooms here are very basic, for the sole purpose of answering nature's call, and not for comfort which is odd because most Filipino's love to call bathrooms the "C.R." (comfort room). Also, the entire island had been invaded by capitalists like Globe, Smart, and Nestea, capitalists who played very loud, bad, headache-inducing techno music all day long. But I'd fly back to Boracay right away if I had the chance to.
Here are myBoracay highlights
1) Jona's milkshakes. Goes down like a dream.
2) "Babe Tossing", a new activity we invented wherein the men stand in a cluster in the water and try to toss the girls as high as they can into the air. I went up so high that I was almost walking on the water. Results of the impact are wedgies and misplaced bikini tops.
3) Lunch at the Talipapa, a smorgasbord of seafood and fried chicken, all deep-fried to high-cholesterol perfection. We ordered a meal for 12 worth 1,200 bucks. It was one of the greatest meals of my life.
4) The sunsets. One word: breathtaking.
5) Nightlife. I'm not a real nightlife person, but in Boracay, how can you possibly resist? Okay, I went to Cocomangas ONCE! It was ridiculously congested, played all the hiphop and house music I hate, and reminded me of the clubs in Makati that I try to avoid when I'm HERE! I never went back. I spent most of my nights in Bom Bom.
6) Massages on the beach, by old ladies in Globe vests. Afterwards, you feel relaxed and look wonderfully oily, like Brittney Spears in her "I'm a Slave For You" video. It give's you a wonderfully wild look.
7) Not having to wear real clothes all day. Nuff said.
8) The people I was with. Who wouldn't have fun with Dave, Fort, Dewi, Burg, Jenn, Therese, Sara, Warren, Nino, and Podge. We all stayed in Dave's uncle's hilltop house in Din Iwid for something like 50 bucks a night (for water and electricity). Aaaah, lovely.
now as i mentioned, i turned 21
I honestly don't feel adult-ish. I think my development stopped at 19. When people ask how old I am, I still almost say "19" like some kind of weird reflex.
Anyways, April 17 started out really crappy. I was sitting outside Bom Bom, sipping a margarita, listening to a really corny group covering Bob Marley, and seething from a big argument we all had before heading off to White Beach. I looked down at my watch, saw that it was midnight, felt old, went off somewhere to be alone and depressed without telling anyone, found the empty lifeguard chair, and got a cut on my finger in the process of climbing it.
I stayed there for about twenty minutes before I went back to join my friends who gave me a candle to blow out, and a birthday chorizzo burger. But we were all still pretty bummed though.
Went home, had a bad sleep, woke up at 8AM to an empty house, had a fight, cried all morning, wished it wasn't my f*cking birthday all afternoon.
Towards sunset, I cooled off and decided to get dolled up. Wore the gorgeous skirt I got at the Bangkok Night Market, and painted my eye-lids blue and gold. Headed off to El Toro prepared to treat everyone to dinner only to find that Nino had beaten me to making party plans. There was a table set out for the both of us under a little Addict Mobile tent, complete with candlelight, wine in an ice tub, and more than one one fork and spoon (yep, fancy schmancy). I felt so utterly lady like. I've never been taken out to a candle lit dinner before. And by the beach, too. He didn't neglect my friends of course. They had their own table beside ours.
That was surprise number one.
Surprise number two came when my friends insisted we go to Cocomangas for free drinks. I objected saying I wanted to go in the direction opposite Cocomangas but they kept insisting (which baffled me) and won out in the end saying Nino had to meet someone there. On our way there, we passed some little kids making huge sculptures in the sand, 5 foot tall castles and mandalas. I got a big surprise when I saw this.
My friends bribed the kids to make it while I was napping in the afternoon. Man, I love them.
After some jamming we headed off the Bom Bom where Hemp Republic was playing on stage, and where we drank and danced all night amidst smooching foreigners, a gay couple, and long-haired, shirtless men holding big, fat joints. I danced till 2 AM, almost totally uninhibted, and it was a blast considering I never dance. Nino is lucky because no boyfriend of mine has ever seen me dance (and he probably never will again).
Mad props to JennBurg for dancing on the ledge. Yahoo! She is the queen.
We said bye-bye to Boracay the next day. I could totally stay there for months. There is nothing for me now but to marry a Boracay-based expat, own a restaurant or resort, and have beautiful, sunkissed, half-breed children (who all study in Brent, Boracay of course).
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Monday, April 12, 2004
pictures of said Palawan trip from previous entry
warning: major camera whoring ahead
I like these pictures my dad took of me on the boat. I always look better when I don't know my picture is being taken because I'm pretty awful at posing. That's why alot of photographers wait for my mind to wander somewhere else before taking my picture for magazines and stuff.
I call this rock the "Peter Pan Rock". You can see why.
Tarzan and Jane... note the matching bedraggled hair. Mukha talaga kaming children of the wilderness.
Cute cousin Jamie.
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Sunday, April 11, 2004
beachin'
Well, I'm back from my Holy Week of being one with the sea in gorgeous Palawan. I adore Palawan no matter how many times I've been there. You don't go there to drink and party. You go there to nature trip and wake up at 4:30 AM to catch the sunrise in a prehistoric lagoon. It's beautiful. I think my heaven will have a little bit of Palawan in it.
Now I'm packing my bags to head off to our long-awaited college grad Boracay trip with the bench. When I say The Bench, I'm referring to the group of 20 plus people I spent every day of college life with on the strip of plastic benches on the right hand side of SEC walkway (coming from the caf), right in between SEC-B and SEC-C (you Ateneans-to-be take note of that). They are my college friends, a group composed predominantly of stunning, artsy, intelligent, bold, fun-loving, women, and a handful of guys who are lucky to be seen everyday surrounded by and showered with the attentions of such unique women (too bad they were never interested in any of us other than on the platonic level); my confidants and partners in crime, and some of the dearest friends ever. College is such a time of metamorphosis and we witnessed each other transform from larvae, to pupae, and finally to beautiful moths or whatever it is we are now.
I bought three smashing new bikinis for the trip. When I get back in a week's time, I will be 21. And a college graduate, too. Yeek. What next? Diamond engagement rings? A grand Filipiniana wedding? Babies? Midlife crisis? Wrinkles? Plastic surgery? Menopause with hormone therapy?
Nay.
Ala wants to fly away first.
fish can talk
After my fishing trip in Palawan, I'm never going fishing for any other reason except for food ever again. I was all excited at first to catch fish. I always manage to catch one or two. Anyway, I cast out my hook and it went down. The line stopped unravelling at about 30 feet into the ocean. Maybe even more. It was pretty deep.
I got the first catch of the day. It was a fish locally called "suki" I think. Anyway, it was too small so I decided to throw it back in so it could live. I learned, however, that if you throw a fish back in, it'll still most likely die a painful death anyway. Instead of seeing it swim back down to the bottom, it floated on it's side away from the boat with cold, gaping eyes.
That made me feel really bad. I had just caused a fish it's slow and painful death for no good reason other than my own amusement. I felt like the most cruel person on earth right then and there. Fishing didn't seem to be that much fun anymore.
It got worse. I learned that if you catch fish from deep water and reel them in real fast, they can't handle the rapid change in water pressure. Their lungs are ruptured by the time you pull them out of the water. All sorts of gruesome things happen to them because of the change in pressure, which explains why my aunt caught a fish with what looked like a pink ball hanging out of it's mouth. We later found out that the fish threw up it's own bladder. I really felt like throwing up then.
The worst was when I caught this huge fish and the hook was in so deeply that it took 3 minutes just to unhook the fish from it. By the time they were done, there was blood all over the boat floor. Carnage.
Here comes the weird part. All the fish we had caught were lying in a pile on the boat, and while they were dying, they were making sounds. It sounded like humming sometimes, other times it sounded like soft purring. And these were regular, dining table fish. How freaky is that? Fish can talk! I didn't even know they had vocal chords.
So all of them lay in a pile there, sometimes flopping around, and humming and purring. It gave me the creeps.
Of course, the death, and the blood, and the guts, and the sounds were all working together to make me feel even more sick and I ended up stowing away my line and jumping in. I didn't want to fish anymore. I will never fish for fun again. It's cruel. I will only fish if I am hungry.
We had sashimi that night using the fish we caught. I had two pieces and couldn't eat any more of it.
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Tuesday, April 06, 2004
pyrotechnic love
Last Friday, I caught the third night of the International Pyrotechnic Olympics at the promenade area, Bay City. It was gorgeous. Spectacular.
If you had been there, you would've seen an awesome fireworks display, and a dazzling, rainbow ocean mirroring the fireworks. You would've people shouting "Wow" at every second with unhindered glee, and of course firecracker sounds, not just booms, but crackles, and fizzles, and wails.
Their were starbursts, and comets, and fountains, and saturns, and rain, every single type of firework you ever can imagine, and ones that you never would've imagined existed. They were all synchronized.
There's nothing that unites people like a great fireworks show. Everyone just drops what they're doing. Nobody even answers texts while it's happening. Everyone becomes a child again, giving themselves over completely to that sense of wonder that becomes so hard to muster when we're older.
If I could, I would've gone and caught all the competitions, would've watched all ten competing countries but I left for Bangkok Saturday morning. I only caught Brazil, Mexico, Canada, and Australia.
I hear China was pretty awesome.
Bangkok
I would want to live in Bangkok for two reasons: the shopping and the food. I love Thai food.
All I bought were cute shoes with bows on them and pretty dresses. That's been my thing lately: shoes and dresses. I don't know what triggered it, being the grunge chick I was all through out college (I think it was right about in 2nd year college when I stopped wearing shoes and began a life in tsinelas).
copyright
Mister porcupinedevil.blogspot.com emailed me a sincere apology and took down his site. I hope that'll be the last of it. I put a semi-copyright at the end of each entry, at the suggestion of one of my readers, even though it mars the page like an ugly scab. Hopefully that'll be the end of plagiarizers.
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Saturday, April 03, 2004
someone is copying my blog
I just found out that someone has copied not just a several, but a whole bunch of my entries, word per word, and posted it on his blog, passing it off as his entries. Not only is this stealing intellectual property rights, but the entries he chose to plagiarize happened to be some of my most personal ones. Also, it doesn't help that every, single one of his entries are copied! Even when you check his archives, they're all my past entries, jumbled up, and sometimes cut up. Yes, they are all mine. He even copied my idea of placing a little icon after every post and much of my lay-out. He even copied my links.
He even had the nerve to tweak one of my entries about my Tagalog Philosophy entries and change it to "English oral" exams. Aside from that change, the entry is still copied word per word.
He even copied my travel guide.
And he's been doing this for a long time apparenlt if you check his archives.
And to think he was even asking me for help with his template.
I shall not name him, or his blogspot address but ate sienna has been kind enough to post it on the comment box of a previous entry. Anyway, all you have to do is copy and paste my previous entry into Google search and his blog will definitely come up. He is rude, and dishonest, and unethical.
Every single one of his entries are my entries. Some have just been tweaked a little.
Needless to say, I am royally p-i-s-s-e-d. Does this guy totally lack any ideas of his own?
I gues plaguiarism is a pitfall of posting your writing on the internet. But at least other people have asked me for permission. Or at least make a reference. Even then, nobody has permission to copy my entries.
Kung ganon, I don't want to blog anymore.
Thanks alot, mister porcupinedevil.
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Thursday, April 01, 2004
children's stories that aren't for kids
Watching "Alice in Wonderland" when you're 20 years old is a whole different experience from watching it when you're six. I know it's really not a whole new idea that Louis Carrol was making references to alot of psychedelic drugs when he wrote the book. It's just different when you actually watch it again for the first time after you learn all that stuff. Wild!
There were some especially striking, drug-related parts (besides obvious ones like the catterpillar puffing from a bong... one of my favorite scenes) likewhen Alice eats the biscuits in the white rabbit's house which makes her grow too big to get out. The Dodo bird offers to lend a hand in how to extract Alice from the house and begins to sing about "smoking her out of the house" (oooh). Alice in turn begins to get awfully hungry afterwards (foodtrip?).
Even the dialogue is so... drug-ish ("I don't know who I am. You see, I'm not myself today").
Speaking of children's stories, "Peter Pan" is set to be shown in theaters soon and I have no intention of watching it. "Peter Pan", by J.M. Barrie, is one of my most favorite books and I'd hate to see how Hollywood has reduced such a beautiful story (and such a complex character) into some dry, lifeless, commercialized fossil. My friend who owns a pirated copy says it's very glossy, and pretty a la "Harry Potter" but that the acting and the plot (which they modified for the silver screen) is utterly predicatble. Just as I thought.
You see, "Peter Pan" isn't really a children's book. It's about an abandoned boy who refuses to grow up and who kills pirates and Indians for fun, a murderous pixie, and a vengeful pirate. It's all pretty violent for a kid's story really. It actually has a dark undertone to it.
You don't know what Peter Pan is really all about until you read the book and learn about J.M. Barrie's life. The novel has alot of Freudian undertones. J.M. Barrie was afflicted with what is known as "psychogenic dwarfism". We all know that dwarfism is a disease that stunts physical growth, something to do perhaps with the pituitary gland. Psychogenic dwarfism on the other hand is caused by childhood stress, and extreme emotional deprivation.
What may haved caused Barrie's condition was the death of his 13 year old brother David who was his mother's favorite son. His mother never recovered from the loss and neglected Barrie throughout his childhood. She only spoke to Barrie to say that his brother "died a perfect boy". His father too was cold and distant. Hence, J.M. Barrie never grew to beyond 4'10", and in this sense, "never grew up".
It comes to no surprise that he later on wrote about an abandoned boy who never grew up, and who has mother issues (in the novel, Peter harbors animosity towards his real mother and takes Wendy to Neverland to be his mother). These mother issues seem to manifest in the character Tinkerbell, who tries to murder Wendy numerous times in the novel.
In the Disney version of "Peter Pan", the main character is presented as a cocky, fun-loving, free-spirited boy. One little detail they decided to leave out however is that Peter Pan regularly cries in his sleep and suffers from terrible nightmares. Only Wendy can calm him down by rocking him in his sleep, and he remembers nothing about it when he wakes up in the morning. Some other very important moments in the novel that define his character have also been cut out. It's a shame.
Captain James Hook, Peter Pan's arch-enemy, represents the father figure, another person in the author's life whom he shared unresolved issues with. J.M. Barrie even insisted that the roles of Mr. Darling (Wendy, John, and Michael's father) and Captain Hook be played by the same actor the first time "Peter Pan" was staged in London.
And finally, Disney also decided to leave out the part where Peter Pan visits Wendy in the nursery after many years. He still expects her to be the same little girl he knew long ago and is horrified to find a grown woman instead. His reaction to seeing a grown Wendy is to collapse on the ground and cry bitterly over Wendy's "betrayal". She had grown up. She had broken the promise.
The point of this entry is, read the novel. It's great.
Some last minute trivia: The name "Wendy" was invented by J.M. Barrie for the book "Peter Pan". John, and Michael were some kids who lived next door to him.
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post graduate life.... I have too much time on my hands. I sleep too long at night, and I sleep late. I have read four books in one week.
I even have time to watch DVDs (I watched "The Goonies" the other night. Astig!).
Although I swore to myself I'd spend the first day of grad doing things that make me happy (and don't necessarily make money), I am almost tempted to get a job because I want to be busy.
And now my mom is pressuring me to learn how to drive. Boo. Who wants to learn how to drive in the Philippines?
May boyfriend naman ako eh :-p
I'm such a brat.
Oh no, it's April Fools...16 days away from turning 21. Ugh.
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