What if's

What if I never knew him? Will I still suffer from insomnia for almost every night?
What If he never knew I am head-over-heels for him? Does he I am? Oh God, how I wish he does not.
What If I never knew everybody around my circle of friends in college? Will I be still the same Evora with the Evora they are chatting and eating with?
What if NDMU is just a meter away from our residence? Will I not be staying up late at night to study with my friend’s house?
What if I lost my family in a war? Maybe it would be the end of my beautiful life.
What if Shoga feels the same with my feeling toward him? Will the situation between us become better or worse? How I wish the former will happen.
What if there is truth with my instincts with Shoga and _________, that there is something more than friendship between the two of them? I guess it will be the start of my journey toward being alone for the rest of my life.
What if that dream of mine about my future groom will come true? Is there still a chance for me and Shoga to be together?
What If I chose to be an AB Pol-Sci student? Will I get as many pimples as I have now?
What if the earth is flat? Will Newton’s law be formulated?
What If I am a boy? I thing I’m more handsome and appealing than my classmates.
What if I was born in Poland? Would I still have the same face with this face I am presenting everyone with?
What if Beata did not get pregnant? Will my family be happier?
What if I die now? I want to know if the feeling of being dead is a feeling like that of sleeping.
What if that thought of mine about my childhood is true? What will I do?
What if I went to college at NDTC? Would I still meet Shoga?

Colors of Poverty

Red lights on the floor:
Yellow flower on the door:
Blue plight of a poor




Spark of Life

Alone and astray:
Found a spark within me;
The Holy Spirit

Self-Reliance
For us human, it is always a God-given right to trust ones self , to love ones self and to rely ones self. We may not be satisfied with the ideas that our mind can formulate but remember that a thousand-mile journey starts with a single step. Great leaps and strides are impossible without learning and executing small and swaggering steps. Do not be afraid of the possible outcome of utilizing your own ideas, they may bring us disappointments and frustrations because they turn out to be several failures but always remember that mistakes are the lifeblood of learning. Like a metal blade ourselves must be sharpened day-to-day by the experiences that environment could offer us. The experiences that I am referring in here are the challenges one must face bravely, sincerely and willingly, engrossing in mind that one needs these set of challenges to grow and elevate ones self.
We may be afraid to go one step higher from where we are standing because of the dismantling remarks we received and we will receive from the people around us but think of the opportunities that line in front of your journey toward self-satisfaction in your golden years. Due to depreciated strength and cognitive skills, once we are there we can do nothing but reminisce with the memoirs of success and inevitably memoirs of failures. This one big reason for trusting the power that lies beyond your own ability and ideas, to trust oneself and to pursue escalated disposition in life once still young and able.
One might not see this as a striking predicament but if one grows old but I see this as horrifying and threatening. I do not want to spend the rest of my golden years in life remembering my past that is filled with miseries and failures.
There is more of a loser to a person who lost in the game and that is the person who had not given himself the chance to join the game because of deep aversion toward losing. I abhor\or person who say “ I can not do that” followed by the traditional excuses like “because I am not him”, “ because I did not undergo this and that”, “ because I am not capable of doing it” and “ because I do not want to be embarrassed”. Do not these people deprive themselves against success and transition? Of course they can not do it now but sooner or later they already can. Deep determination and self-esteem coupled with humor should be either acquired or learned by these people. After learning or acquiring it they should characterize it. With these comes self-reliance.

“La Vita El Bella” or “ Life Is Beautiful”, a story of a Jewish man together with his family who trapped under the Hitler demagogy; depicting elements of war, romance and humor.
Guido, taking the lead role, characterized as a happy-go-lucky young Jewish bachelor who went to Italy to live with his uncle met Dora, a beautiful and sophisticated Italian teacher who was already engaged, out of her will, with a prominent person in the community. The two met in an accident and serendipity destines the both of them to successively bump into each other. Eventually the two, fell with each other's charm. Both decided to settle down without Dora's parents consent. Dora gave birth to an intelligent and brilliant boy named Josua.
The big problem came when the war between the Germany and America began. Jews were caught and sent off to a place where they were made as slaves. Unfortunately, Dora is a pure-blooded Italian and was not included to these people who are to be brought in the place, Dora being determined to see her better-half and son, decided to get inside of the train where the Jews are placed. Guido made a fanciful story out of the horrifying situation Joshua and him are into for the former to stay calm. Amidst the gunfires and shots, a gunfire shot from a Nazi soldier got Gyido killed.
The story happened in the romantic place of Italy with their classic houses built out of bricks. repetitive circle patterns are apparent in the story, promoting the romantic undertone of the story. Romantic scenes are highlighted and intesified by classical Italian music.
Life is indeed beautiful if one sees it so and makes something beautiful out of it.

Happiness and sadness

When the wind whispers to my ears, when the mist kisses my cheeks, when the gleaming waves of the shore splash through my skin I can feel happiness!

I can feel happiness even in some little ways; like a new born baby, newly sprouted leaves flashed to delight me, my thought reminds me of looking forward to life because there is always hope that awaits .Like the sun retiring from the day's work, greenish-brown tilting blades of leaves reminds me of looking back in the past to venture some moments of giggling.

Happiness is when I am alone! Spending most of the day reading (Oh how I delight myself by reading books). This kind of happiness comes once in a while and i prefer to have this kind of happiness comes only once and a while and I prefer this kind of happiness after a long and exhausting day.

Happiness to me comes in a package of smiling people, laughing friends and caring family. This happens when one is at the verge of their success, victory and triumph over whatever challenge. Smiling is man's way of showing happiness, whenever I see people smile, I feel happiness, whenever I see people laugh, I see a glowing light coming out of me; caring is man's way of sharing happiness.

What is happiness without loneliness! After all, one cannot know goodness without recognizing evil.

When the clouds cluster and darkens my day, when the raindrops fall down from my lids, when the splashing waves of the deep blue sea ruin my sand castle on the shore, I can feel sadness!
I can feel happiness most with great big thing; like a brown falling leaf departing from a caring origin reminds me of the life after death; like the waters in the river which know nothing about their destination reminds me that everyone and everything goes somewhere.

T'nalak Festival

A prism of streaking lights hit the gloomy and starless sky fronted me and my friends as we agree to step out from the monotony of the school and take part in the celebration. Bombarding sounds beat along with grooving youth. Ornate cottages stand in array, lacquered with proud ethnicity and humble cheer. Four-colored intertwining abaca fibers abound the merrying crowd, lighting the purpose of the celebration.
The smoke spreads and mixes with the air, enticing people to take a bite with the grilled chunky white meat and swirling yellow tasty food and to take plunge into the bitter-sweet beverage along the sidewalks.
As we walk along the Alunan avenue with smears of everybody’s sweat around our bodies, variegated color of sparks exploded in the sky like splashes of hues in a painting, one after the other, surprising the crowd. Suddenly, we found ourselves putting our hand together in awe with loud booms and bangs especially with the expanding glows of colorful lights in the heavens.
People pushing, people dancing, people singing, people eating, people laughing, people drinking, people hopping, people joyriding, people smiling; if you see these kind of people at day or night, walaaah! Welcome to T’nalak festival.

“UNLEARNING WHAT I HAVE LEARNED”

“UNLEARNING WHAT I HAVE LEARNED”

A Reflection Paper In Renato Constantino's Article

Recalling the Past: An Introspection

When I was in elementary, in meeting the greatest heroes through a poster, i wonder why we should study their lives, I wonder why we should give them an hour of discussion or lecture, why should we print their faces on posters and stick these posters in every corner of every classroom, why should we give them our time to read and time to reflect in their so-called “great deeds”.

I cannot, with all honesty, blame myself to be subjective in times when I need to be objective because human beings are considered to be both rational and emotional beings. it is fine when the rational attribute coincides with thew emotional one, otherwise, problem will arise ( Ugh, as much as I wanted to express more of myself I can't because I need to be true(that would mean I would have to be objective) in what I write, unless this is creative writing that anybody could be in the story, that anyplace could be the setting, that any situation could be the story.

I wish I wish

I wished to have taken my Rizal subject this semester so that I can greatly relate with the particular situations or settings that Constantino is talking about in his text; I wished to have read this article during my elementary and secondary days so that I can ask my teachers about their point of view regarding the apple of discord; I wished to go back in the past during Rizal's existence and ask him what he mean about the difference between independence and liberty and why he wanted the Philippines to be a province of Spain and why not an independent state!Like Constantino I cannot go back in the future, limited are the things that we could do with it, we can rewrite it the way we could but it should be written the way it should have been! I cannot go back in the time when Rizal was born, when he wrote Noli Me Tangere, when he joined the propaganda movement and when he was shot. the manner of his death is comparable with Jesus's death. Jesus's death was the reason for discovering his journey and role as the begotten son of God and the messiah (this is what the Bible says); Rizal was shot dead in one afternoon and his manner of death made way to his martyrdom and made him the best choice of the Americans to be the National hero of the Philippines.

A Da Vinci Code experience

I was not yet in the middle of reading the whole text, a memory of a scene in Da Vinci Code flashed came across the streams of my thought. Smiling on my own, I stood up and stretched my arms then made my mind to get into reading the text again and realized why the thought of such made possible.

All the while I thoght that the author wanted to put rizal a sour National hero and made me conclude that this text is like the movie written by Brown, the D Vinci Code. If your faith with Christ or knowledge about Christ is not that profound you willreally think for days or weeks or even months(just like what happened to a friend of mine) about the numerous twisted concepts about him in the story. Because I conditioned myself to stick to what my family told me about Christ, stick to what my religion taught me, I never went wrong. I also did the same with the given selection but this time I think I missed to see the forest among the trees!

I think All He Want Is To...

Towards the end of the text i realized that Constantino just wanted students as well as teachers of history to reevaluate Rizal's life work and writings, to weigh his positive as well as negative attributes equally equating to the idea that we should correct the way we learn history that we need to learn from Rizal's mistakes and weaknesses the way we learn from his success and glories.

Eureka!

I realized that I should be open with the things that somebody would try to convey in his or her own point of view for a particular matter or topic. To be a good and effective teacher , one must promote a welcoming atmosphere for students' suggestion and I found out that I need to learn more of this as a hoping soon-to-be-teacher.

I wished to have many careers before but finally I realized that I want to touch lives and shape minds-this possible in TEACHING!