this week has been really busy, i managed to get my passport photos done last weekend but i missed the medical exam, tsk, blame it on me getting up late. i hope to finally wrap it up this saturday. right now i have tons of codes to create and integrate, this will be one l-o-n-g week.

i just found out that people back at my former office are now keeping blogs =) hmmm, more interesting reads coming up for me. i should list them down here and visit them often for more updates on whats new with the life i left behind hehe =)

• beetle


• mai


• aneshka


• gi


• arjay


• watermark


• emms

now that everyone seems to be in the blog bandwagon, old timers like me feel well, really old hehe, the mania or the urge to blog about things has become too tiresome for me, sometimes i feel better lying down on my bed and chasing words that gather with the artificial stars pasted on my ceiling, words that will never be written down or marked immortal into blog pages such as this =) some things are better left unsaid. there is more beauty in things that cant escape the narrow confines of our imagination, it just sits there waiting to be unleashed by a powerful event that will forever change our lives.

it was raining again this afternoon when i went out, i cant really stay sad when everything else around me, even the weather, is gloomy. im not really sad though, im lost. and this loss confuses me, until i no longer know what to feel and how to feel.

this place is covered with black and sharp and stinging things, i cant stay here and wait till they come to life and choke me. i want to run far until they all fall out of my head into a place where things are pure and honest and real.

these days, writing has become too difficult, its hard to wade through words and pick one out from the herd and paste it down on paper without cutting a piece of my skin. everything hurts, and i dont know where the hurt comes from. does it hurt to be lost? i really dont know. when you're lost, you're afraid, afraid you won't find your way back, when your afraid, you are angry, angry of the unknown, angry for not knowing. but where does the hurt come in? why this aching feeling that grips through my heart like a claw?

tonight i will step out of this building, not knowing where to go, even as my feet involuntarily lead me back to that place i call my home. this city moves too fast, and though i can run with it until all things around me become a blur of unfeeling, there is really no point. because one day i will have to park, and when i do, im afraid there will be noone there to sit quietly beside me and share my stories.

"I'm finding my way back to sanity again
Though I don't really know what i'm gonna do
when i get there
I take a breath and hold on tight Spin around one more time
And gracefully fall back to the arms of grace"
- breathing, lifehouse

after almost a decade of walking behind your shadows, i feel lost now that i have chosen a path away from you. you used to define me. you are in every line of my face, your memory burns through my veins like embers from a nearly extinguished fire.  i was nothing without you. "every step i took ever since i learned to walk was a step towards finding you", what do i do now? now that you are gone, my north star, my guiding light.. how do i start again? i didnt foresee that the outcome of letting go would be this - a vast chasm that eats away everything. a void that cant seem to be filled with light, a black hole that extinguishes all hope.

to any kindred soul out there, to the gods that must be, help me find my way back again...

"I'm looking past the shadows in my mind into the truth
And i'm trying to identify the voices in my head
God I wish won't you
Let me feel one more time what if feels like to feel
And break these caluses off of me one more time"
- breathing, lifehouse

so this is how it feels to be free. free of comfort zones, free of people who break my walls only to create taller ones of their own. my heart is so light, there is no need to look back to the past and be sad, nor look forward into the future and worry, this is the ultimate feeling of letting go, its like being set free from prison after decades of captivity. at first i was so uncertain on which path to choose, or if i really wanted to be free at all, some part of me sighed and felt it needed to be in chains in order to have meaning, but the other more tired self just wanted to move on and let things be.

no time is the wrong time to be thinking about you. especially on late nights like this when the only company that keeps me awake is the sound of horns from vehicles plowing along ayala avenue.

i should be going home really, i have no business staying here, im too preoccupied with a zillion other miniscule distractions that prevent me from accomplishing my work. im just here so i can be with the presence of other people who are themselves distracted with some other trivial matter. i choose to stay here because being alone in my room with the noise that comes from inside my head is more troubling than sitting here and listening to the conversations of people in a foreign tongue.

its futile to escape the voices that wrap around my memory when i close me eyes at night. if only i could lock them all in a jar or throw them inside my closet where they could never escape, then maybe i will have better chances of hearing my own thoughts amidst all the confusion. its difficult to choose which me i should listen to everytime. i hope one of these days, a clear voice would finally speak up show me what i need to understand.

the clouds are pouring its rage on the towers of this spired city. im tempted to stay inside and let the storm pass but i have promises to keep.. after everything ive went through, a little drop of rain cant hurt me now.

promises, you said you hated making promises, because you always break them. but why make a promise you can never keep in the first place? to ease present doubts and worries? for immediate gain? ahh, i forgot, i can never know how your mind works, there are no reasons unreasonable enough for you

back to the present, i need to get out of this comfort zone and face heaven's rage if i want to move forward and prove myself, the path towards enlightenment is laden with challenges like this. i must not give up so easily.

"Most of us would like to believe we can have both security and freedom. But in Rich Dadｮ terms, these are two opposing values. My rich dad said, "Freedom and security are not the same ideals. In fact, in many ways, freedom and security are exact opposites. The people who have the most security are people in prison. Prisoners have the least freedom and the highest security. People in prison do not need to provide housing, food, recreation, health care, or education for themselves. They have a lot of security but at the price of their freedom."
- robert kiyosaki

my cousin kat lent me this book last weekend, and i just cant put it donw. studying, getting high grades, and getting a good job is really not enough in our changing times. at the end of the day, despite all our hardwork, we will still find ourselves making ends meet, or worst, in debt.. i should break the cycle.

rich dad, poor dad by robert kiyosaki is basically what my father always reminded me when i was in college, i just didnt have the courage to follow his advice back then. i was guided by fear. now i should know better..


title: rich dad poor dad
author: robert kiyosaki

few books actually make me feel like i've been hit by a brick wall of realization. "the road less travelled" by m scott peck is one of them.

i've had this book since november 2003, but i've only started reading it last month. there's just too much books on my bedside table right now and i just pick up anything from the pile before i go to sleep. im almost 50% done, and yeah im a slow reader.

i especially liked peck's discussion about the difference between love and being in love. i hope one day i can finally find both..

"Once we know that life is difficult - once we truly understand and accept it - then life is no longer difficult. Because once it is accepted, the fact that life is difficult no longer matters."
- m. scott peck. "the road less travelled"



title: the road less travelled
author: m. scott peck

i sent an email to my college professor yesterday, telling her how ive been since i left cebu. she was here two days ago for a quick visit and she had lunch with her brother arjay, my current boardmate. too bad i wasnt able to see her then.

anyway, her reply to my email sort of triggered some distant memories in my brain, its like uncovering some boxes from under my bed. i am almost remembering college all over again.. i think she's right, im just making myself too pressured with things that shouldnt really be my responsibility, i shouldnt think too much. i recall what mary jane watson said to peter parker in spiderman 2 "dont you think its time you let somebody save you?"

here's an old letter i sent to miss when she left our college and pursued her dreams elsewhere:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Sent: Tuesday, April 15, 2003 10:11 AM
Subject: my letter for the card

dear miss,

thank you for being my friend,
thank you for teaching me things beyond finite state automata and polynomial space complete problems.
thank you for being an angel in my life
for watching me grow, while i pursue my dreams and pick up my broken pieces

i remember that one morning when i came in early for the 730 data struc class.
you were there on your table at the first floor computer lab, and i was scribbling something on my notebook. you asked me why i was in cebu, and we had some general conversation about things so mundane, that i dont quite recall them now.

i remember me weeping at your office back in 98 when i wanted to transfer in diliman but i couldn't.. i remember being sad because i would be the only one left behind in a strange city that speaks a strange language that i will never get used to.

i remember many things, bits and pieces, the tour to your new house on paper = the stories about your own personal journey into this madness that is life, i remember the invisible thread of hope that you've given me through the years, and the things you've sacrificed to stay in an institution which you believed in.

thank you for all those things you've done for me, and for the many others like me who are very fortunate to have met you on this road. you have a way of affecting people that one cannot help but go home and sleep at night with a happy thought that a kindred soul has been part of their lives. in this lifetime, there may be others who will fail to acknowledge your worth and fail to recognize and appreciate you, and i am sad for them because they will never know how good you are and how lacking their lives have become by closing their doors on you. i feel sad for UP that it will lose such an important person like you. you are the institution in UP.. you are part of the greatness of every student who have once been just another nameless faceless gray mass in the infinity of living each day.

you are part of how we do things, why we choose an elegant solution over an easy one, why we disdain vectors and praise data structures, and all the other little things that define the idealistic spirit in each of us.

but like us, you cannot confine yourself in a constricted space that will always hide and refuse to reward your talent. you are a teacher, a friend, but most of all, you are a human being too, and you have dreams, and you have goals, and as you watched us grow and live our dreams, the time has come for us to watch you grow too, and follow your dreams.. UP may have been that goal and that dream once, but time like the tide has shifted and has changed a lot of things, and i understand that you too must adapt to that change..

thank you miss.. for everything, i hope you get whatever your heart desires, and i too, hope that i could somehow give justice to what i have learned from you, so that i may one day do something great too.. and affect people in a positive way, the way you've done to me.

take care as you embark on yet another journey =) as you close another chapter in your life, and begin a new one, please don't forget that we are always here cheering for you.. =)

always,

"And, when you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it."
- The Alchemist, Paulo Coelho.