Philippines

I’ve been in the homeland for a week now. I’ve worked out a nice nest here. Uncomfortable mattress supplemented by three soft pillows and a sheet. Bought two 15 meter cat-5 ethernet cables for 120 pesos each (USD:PHP::01:45), and ran them through windows and hung up across wooden rafters. This way I can get internet from my aunt’s adjacent house into this one. It’s a newly constructed home attached to my grandmother’s house; it’s narrow, but it has two bathrooms, two rooms, a kitchen, and an office. I’m in the office right now; it’s newly painted, the air conditioning unit has yet to be air sealed around the edges but the unit works. The windows are open a crack to allow for the ethernet cables but it stays cool in here. It rained a lot yesterday and a bit today, so the temperature is alright here.

As of yesterday Opera Unite launched, a new technology mixing up the client-server model of the internet. With an alpha build of the Opera 10 web browser, click on the bottom left icon on its window to sign up for an Opera Acount, and easily share your music, photos, files, host a chatroom and post board, and even host your own web page locally. My username on my.opera is biyabo; just ask me for the password to access any of my stuff. Thus far, others can only access your Unite shares if you are online, although I believe that will change soon. Anybody who has been watching my Twitter knows I’ve been raving about Opera Unite nonstop since it’s reveal.

Also, by the way, I have signed up for Disqus and installed a comment system onto my Tumblr blog. I haven’t gotten any comments save one, although it’s probably because nobody reads my blog. Anyway, I’ve changed the link to say “comment” below posts, so that you can see it (before it was a tilde). Also, you can click on the title of posts in order to get a comment box below this text.

Anyway, while here, I haven’t been able to come up with any good designs or writings. It’s really bumming me out. I’ve passed the time playing video games or editing pictures instead. My sister has taken a bunch of photos and videos already, and I am processing them and compressing them to upload if she wishes. They’ll be ready by tonight perhaps.

I want to get to Manila already! It’s a miracle that I have internet here, as years before I would be offline for my entire stay. However, a 42kb/s down and 7kb/s up is killing me. Downloading anything is out of the question, as is YouTube, and browsing regularly is difficult as it is. I cannot wait to visit my cousins up in Manila and a certain old friend for her birthday. I haven’t seen her in years, and it will be great to see her smile again.

Surprisingly, the lack of PC video games isn’t driving me as crazy as I thought it would. I’ve been occupying myself pretty well this last week. Opera Unite lauching sure helped distract me for a long while. However I don’t have a car today, so no Robinson’s. Speaking of which, it’s almost lunchtime, and I’m starving. I’ll walk down to the local joint to eat some filipino pizza.

The rice tasted like plastic

So after leaving my house at 7 pm, boarding a plane at 1am, for a 12 hour flight, and then stopping over at Korea for 4 hours for another 4 hour flight, and then sitting with 7 other people in a 5-seater for an hour drive, and after relieving my tension by eating real rice (and processed chicken), I am in the Philippines.

Thank god I bought that PSP.

My PSP, iPod Touch, and laptop all died, and my DS is all that survived the trip, battery-wise. I would not survive here myself if I didn’t have a transformer. I’m desperately trying to access the internet on a flaky 10 kilobyte per second prepaid connection. I am still grateful to my aunt for buying me the minutes though, better than nothing. The good news is that a food is no better than when cooked at its origin. Nothing like a yaya frying bacon.

I’m not used to sleeping on a spring matress, I usually pass out on a futon with a foam on top, although the multitude of pillows is comforting. The air conditioning is nice although right now it isn’t too hot - yesterday was unbearable. Oh well, I’m so glad my grandmother built a pool in the backyard, with a shade covering the whole back porch no less.

I’m probably going to the mall in the afternoon once the cousins and relatives get here from Manila (I’m in Batangas). We’re going to eat probably at a nice restauraunt called Flavors of China. I also can’t wait to go shopping for clothes. I always enjoy trips to the Surplus Shop to purchase rejected clothes, like my favorite pair of pants, with rear pockets on all sides.

I can’t get my mind off her.

The electronic screens, the earbuds - I still hear her voice and see her face. It’s in flashes, in various emotional expressions. I’ll hear the ringing of an ice cream man’s bell, and see a smile on her face. I’ll turn to the window and hear her laugh. I miss her. I hope she misses me too. I really screwed up our relationship and I don’t know if I can fix it.

Amazing how you can work for seventeen months only to break it in a couple of days. Or was I already alienating her from the start? Had I blinded myself from the beginning? Perhaps I was doing it all wrong all along. She says she feels powerless. She feels jailed. I tried to empower her, set her free. But as I try to defend my behavior she feels victimized. I won’t have her go back. It would be better that she keep smiling even if she no longer kisses me to drop a mint in my mouth, or surprise knocks on my door. Better that she lives without a thought of me than she suffers in my arms.

But I don’t want to lose her. I want to change. I want to fix it. I want to run back home and tell her I’m sorry, but apologies don’t fix disasters. I need either a bailout, a miracle, or a time machine. I’m so motivated to move and yet I’m a thousand miles away. It seems I’m inescapably reminded of a previous life. Except that emotional dilemna followed me on a cruise ship and not in my vacation home.

Maybe all I’ll have left are these pictures in my wallet. Or maybe I’ll be able to sit on that cloud in the end.

Happy Birthday

to me. I was born on 12:06 am. I think.

Life feels terrible

The only majors I can declare that my mom will accept must be in the fields of medicine or engineering. After struggling with math, engineering seems less of a dream and more of a nightmare. I have never had much desire to pursue medicine either. But of course, the collectivist parents care less for the effort or will of the son and more for the result and the image. I’ve wanted to pursue English for a while, and perhaps teach, maybe even abroad. Of course, such dreams are preposterous to my parents. Maybe I’ll have to fail med school or engineering school before they realize that I’m not only incapable but unwilling.

Then she turns around and says I must pick a major whose career would be a profession I’d enjoy. Oxymoron. “You should pick one you like… but you can’t pick this or that.” Not sure what to do anymore.

The struggles and failures of everyone around us are always made aware to me repeatedly at the dinner table, in the car, sometimes even yelled at me while I’m in the bathroom showering. “You have to have a goal.” But not that one. “You just made a mistake, now keep moving.” Look, he failed, now his life is ruined. “I am only trying to help you in your interests.” By helping my interests.

Doctor? Engineer? I’m going to a community college. God help me? It’s disheartening to be replied with silence.

Almost 19

     One month from tomorrow, I’ll be 19 years old. The last teen year! I feel too old for my comfort. I’ve been so caught up with school that I don’t do the things I did as a kid. I feel like the time I realized that I was too old to walk around the house with a blankie - only, the feeling is magnified. I don’t watch weekend television; I can’t eat the same foods over and over before getting sick of it; I grow tired of learning new things at school because I feel I’m over my head already; life’s pleasant surprises grow less and life’s due dates grow more frequent.

     Two weeks left until the semester ends. I’m not sure what I want to do for my birthday. I’m thinking renting a good movie to watch at home with my friends, and then eat pizza. Something laid back, inexpensive, and comfortable. No more elaborate plans for balloons everywhere, cooking food for days and getting a huge setup together. I just want to hang out with my friends. Life is tiring and that would be nice. I can’t believe I’m almost 19. I still think about high school often. I have to say though, my emulation of high school schedules, with a morning to afternoon every weekday class setup, is really tiring. I actually prefer my first semester’s night classes.

     I’m pretty preoccupied with classwork. Projects, essays, studying for finals. I have a lot of creative projects yet on the backburner. I’ve got three animated typography music videos planned with the lyrics choreography laid out in my head. More blueprints for The Challenge photoshops on deviantART to come this summer. I’ll probably hammer those out on the laptop while in the Philippines when I have time. I want to get back into writing as well. I haven’t written anything good for my book in almost a year now. Just rantings and incoherent plot points with which I cannot jigsaw together for the life of me.

     I have a substantial amount of material spread across this universe I’ve thought up but it still feels flat, hollow. Without the life it had when the first character formed in my mind in fifth grade. I plan to write more fanfiction as a writing exercise to explore the characters of others and see what I can formulate based on the material I’ve also created. Maybe some oneshots or a short series will help. I really enjoyed writing the unfinished series I started years ago. I read back and see the horrible flaws in them, and shudder to think I rewrote those many times over until I could see no blemish. And now at this point in time I see so many more. Maybe it’s good, but I fear that if I finally finish the book now (as it is possible to do within a week), that if I publish it, it will look terrible to readers. I need to work at it more.

     I’ve decided now to change my major from Engineering to perhaps a double major in English and Psychology. I’m not sure. I want to pursue a double major, and perhaps work full time after that point while taking classes on the side for a doctorate. Depends on if I can get out of the burnout phase I’ll no doubt run into like a brick wall a couple years down the road. I feel like a time bomb, just feeding batteries into the clock to make sure it keeps ticking. Yet the longer it ticks the more anxiety I feel.

     The girlfriend has been a great help to my patience and sanity. Focusing on her needs or wants helps take my mind off my fears and self-expectations. At the same time, a relationship is work. I feel drained sometimes helping her out. It’s rewarding to see the tears stop flowing; at the same time, I have not vegged out in front of the computer for a full day in over a year. She’ll of course say I have, but she doesn’t know how big of a nerd I used to be compared to today.

     Two weeks left until semester’s end. Then, break and birthday, then a couple days after that, plane trip. When I get back, I have a summer class. I also need to apply for a job…