07.09.09 (the road to el hemp-o part 3)

***last installment... hehe!***

woke up early to go to church because it's my lola's birthday. then vitaly and i had breakfast at bana's cafe and met with our guide robert and headed out to sumaging caves. it's also known as the big cave and one of the main tourist attractions in sagada.


the descent wasn't as scary as what other say, although i was told that i'd be reeking of bat piss and shit. but then again, what do we expect of caves right? as we went farther and deeper into the cave, we saw the magnificent display of stalactites and stalagmites.


getting out was harder. again, my choice of footwear was not good and i kept on slipping on the sides of everything i step on to. i enjoyed the short ride halfway back to the town. i rode on top of the jeep, which was pretty daredevilish of me...


next, we headed out to bokong falls. it was a 30-minute trek across rice fields. i wasn't supposed to take a dip but i'm such a gullible person and was talked into it after 2 minutes of convincing.


i thought i tire easily of things but i found out that buttered chicken is good the 4th... er, 5th time around. we had a late lunch at bana's and had lemon pie i bought from the lemon pie house. it was pretty good (memo to self: must take picture of everything to be an effective blogger or something). the rest of the afternoon was practically for slacking off and the night for beers.

the next day was spent in transit. the bus was fine although it was a bit cramped up for vitaly. it took 6 hours for us to get to baguio and the road wasn't as good.

now if there's a place i'd relocate, it's going to be in baguio... i always had a thing for it. i hate cold places but somehow, i enjoy it a lot. so anyway, the reason why i had to stop over baguio was to get milkshakes at 50's diner... so before going our separate ways, vitaly and i had late lunch and to cap my seriously kick ass vacation, i had two orders of chocolate milk shakes!

07.08.09 (the road to el hemp-o part 2)

***finally, after eons of slacking off...***

i woke up with a bad hangover... so i went to sleep again. then i woke up after a couple of hours and realized i was hungry. and so like what my schedule said, i had breakfast at the yogurt house. next stop was to make a reservation for the buffet dinner at the log cabin. vitaly said they serve mean dinners for the price of 350php. i went there to find out that he already made reservations. nice... but i paid...

after breakfast, i decided to go back to the church. unfortunately, it was closed. so i went to the market to look for the bookstore indicated on my map... i wasn't able to find it. but then again, i found shamrock cafe, the restaurant i was looking for the other night which was reportedly closed already. i had coffee and met vitaly to go to echo valley.


this time, i knew where to turn. after 15 minutes of hiking, we got to the view point. took pictures and spied on the hanging coffins.


it is said by our tour guide that they have been doing this tradition for more than 2,000 years. they arrange the bodies in fetal position to fit the small coffin so that they are brought back to mother earth the way they came here. the cave is the earth's womb and should should face east where the sun rises.


after echo valley, we headed out to bokong falls. unfortunately, it rained and we figured it's kind of retarded to go swimming when it's raining so we decided to head back and stay inside and read our respective books.

by nighttime, we were ready for the buffet. we purposefully did not eat anything after sharing one order of buttered chicken for lunch. the french chef who owns log cabin totally reinvented filipino food... the meal was very gooood! every peso was worth it.


the rest of the night was practically spent getting drunk and watching terminator. i would tell more about the movie but somewhere along the way, i got really really sleepy. so i slept...

***yeah yeah yeah... tomorrow... i promise...***

05.26.09 (fucking wasted)

yes, that's about it... i'm totally wasted. i'm pulling a double shift for two consecutive days, plus an additional 8 hours after doing 16 hours on wednesday... i'm seriously hoping i will still be alive and able to go on a roadtrip by thursday morning. i'm going to the boondocks as a treat for myself!

go to baguio and eat at the 50's diner...
go to sagada...
see the banaue rice terraces...
see the hanging coffins...
and probably muster all courage i have to take a dip inside the cave lagoons...

i'm keeping my fingers crossed.

***pictures ripped from this site and this site***

05.15.08 (repost)

making love shouldn't just be confined here...

you: we should create a place of make believe, a place of inner peace and refuge, a place that only we can share

me: like a haven... the island will be lined with trees... and you would make me a hammock. ive always wanted to lie in one

you: as long as we can lie in it together curled up in each others arms and basking in the beauty of life in this enchanted place

me: and we drown in the thought of how this world is so huge and immense and how little we are in the universe

you: but sometimes it is the littlest of things that make the biggest difference in life

me: but the idea of "you and me" can parallel the depth and the width of the universe and we find out that we are not so little after all... and we will make move the tiniest of flowers, the minutest of dust and we change the position of the stars in the universe

you: in this enchanted place of heaven on earth will we be vegatarians and live off the fruits of our harvest in an earthship house

me: and we would learn to nourish back the earth as it nourishes us

you: yes, and multiply the life on our island with the work of our hands

me: and with our palms we knead earth and fire and water and out of nothing we create life

you: do you think that in this place where you only have me you will grow tired of me and lonely for another?

me: no, my heart knows no reprieve

you: we can create life with each minute and hour, bringing existence to the uninhabited portions of the land. it is my hearts deepest desires to sew my seeds in this place to cultivate dreams, to inspire generations

me: to make his story and her story echo to the future...

you: and ring throughout the years

me: that the power of two can outlive civilizations of the old. we too, have survived the cynic times... you move like your fingers turning the pages of an old old book, gentle and quiet. me, looking at you as you absentmindly place your fingers to your lips, wetting it to ease the passing of time

you: enchanted is the path to destiny enlightening the way with each new step along your soft skin like the wind brushing past in a smooth even stroke leaving no part untouched, wetting my lips from the salivation of my tongue as I glare at you with desire

me: and i will love every square-inch of your body, like the water when it encloses me when i decide to drown with you

you: drowning in the sea of passion as the tides of our hormones overflow our senses and bring us to the point of total fantasy

me: and we let the tide overcome us, move us to the abyss... and we are one with the air... we become hollow and we have lost gravity

you: floating together arm and arm seperated from each other only by the confining restrictions of our skin as we explore the depths of our inner existences

me: we find a same soul that binds our bodies to one. and you fill me and i fill you and we are hollow no more. "us" is enough to make up for the emptiness in this world


i wish to make such kind of poetry with you...

05.05.09 (missing...)

i was checking my diaries from before... i miss writing for someone so i decided to just post/repost. oh! and no, this is not for you... trust me...

"sun on rock... that's the kiss that never betrays... because it doesn't promise nothing."
"patrick white" by may-brit akerholt

night... freefalling in circle

bitter coffee, honey sugar,
water dense milk,
all gracefully burnt
under a warm fire.

rolled to a sweet kiss,
melted to a lonely tongue
to the grains of your
sandy hair.

i miss you love
and i will kiss you
faithfully.
like the sun on the rock,
from dusk till
dawn.

i miss you love
and the way your
dew drops travel
the dunes of the desert
to touch my lips.

04.30.09 (trapped inside the bell jar)

I saw the days of the year stretching ahead like a series of bright, white boxes, and separating one box from another was sleep, like a black shade. Only for me, the long perspective of shades that set off one box from the next day had suddenly snapped up, and I could see day after day after day glaring ahead of me like a white, broad, infinitely desolate avenue.

~Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar

04.29.09 (what would love do?)

love rewards the brave...
~danielle la porte

04.23.09 (baby steps i shouldv'e taken eons ago)

... but i would experience relapse once in a while, then i'd spend months of loathing myself. it's a vicious cycle i hope to escape soon...



the heart cannot grieve for what the eyes have not seen nor the skin has not touched...

04.22.09 (PMSing)

i thought i was unlike other girls. i don't feel exceptionally bitchy before every woman's dreaded week. hell, i'm always my usual self... that was the case until someone suggested that the reason why i'm being depressed is because of PMS...

oh-khay, so that's why beck's "loser" plays in my head everytime i'm around people and i feel particularly obliging when the line goes "i'm a loser baby, so why don't you kill me" and i start world war III inside my demented head...

Loser - Beck

04.21.09 (aimless)

my state as of the moment: aimless, pointless... and yeah, senseless...

must watch more dexter...

04.20.09 (stuck in a moment)

secret of the day...

it may be the beer last night or i've been over analyzing my state for the longest time. i feel stuck... no drive, no passion for anything. it feels like i'm just going through the motions of everyday life like a tormented rodent running endlessly in a hamster wheel. i'm sick of it, and perhaps scared. i'm at this age when i'm supposed to be in control of my life, but i'm not. i feel like i need to escape something, i don't know what it is. and i need to find something, i don't know what that is either... i used to know a sign when i see one, i think i may have lost that sensitivity.

soulsearching... i need to get hold of my old self...

in the meantime, i'll watch dexter kill bad bad people. it might help me feel better...

04.16.09 (stealing secrets)

there's this website that my best friend recommended me. it is where people would share their secrets anonymously. i go there everyday and read secrets that could have been mine. somehow, i am relieved that a total stranger would say out loud the things i try hard to bury. though not totally free from the bones i hide in my closet, a part of me has already been liberated whenever i visit PostSecret. maybe one day i'd be able to face my demons. my heart would know courage.

going there today is quite exceptional. something reminded me of googlemaps and you and paint and you.


there is...
...a posted secret that is our secret,
...a posted secret that used to be our secret,
...a posted secret that is still somehow my secret,
...a posted secret that was not your secret anymore,
...a posted secret i fervently wish is no longer my secret...

we're going to find a solution

...there is a posted secret that is not so much of a secret anymore, now that we don't intend to keep it.

i hope the person who wrote this realizes that the impossibility of meeting is nothing compared to the strength of their hearts. we've got planes, for chrissakes!

***finally bought a card reader. yey! i can start taking pictures. ugh! the thirty-day project is still on!***

04.15.09 (everyone needs to fall apart)

An Ancient Gesture by Edna St. Vincent Millay

I thought, as I wiped my eyes on the corner of my apron:
Penelope did this too.
And more than once: you can't keep weaving all day
And undoing it all through the night;
Your arms get tired, and the back of your neck gets tight;
And along towards morning, when you think it will never be light,
And your husband has been gone, and you don't know where, for years.
Suddenly you burst into tears;
There is simply nothing else to do.

And I thought, as I wiped my eyes on the corner of my apron:
This is an ancient gesture, authentic, antique,
In the very best tradition, classic, Greek;
Ulysses did this too.
But only as a gesture,—a gesture which implied
To the assembled throng that he was much too moved to speak.
He learned it from Penelope…
Penelope, who really cried.


***this is the point when i would tell you to come back home to me so that we can finally fall in love again. but you are long gone... yesterday, after six months and four days of pretending i am ok, i fell apart. and my god it felt so good...***

so its valentine's day...

i promise to take out the backlog... but before that, let me just acknowledge this... happy valentines day people! i'm not one to celebrate but i am happy for those who are able to.

the office was kind enough to send chocolate hearts to all the ladies of the company and i immediately gorged mine as soon as i stepped inside my room... then the song which i have been singing for more than three weeks started playing in my head and i just had to take a picture of my misery... here you go janis fans! eat your freaking hearts out!

Piece Of My Heart - Janis Joplin

(Come on…)
Didn't I make you feel like you were the only man, well yeah,
An' didn't I give you nearly everything that a woman possibly can ?
Honey, you know I did!
And each time I tell myself that I, well I think I've had enough,
But I'm gonna show you, baby, that a woman can be tough.

I want you to come on, come on, come on, come on and take it,
Take another little piece of my heart now, baby, (break a..)
Break another little bit of my heart now, darling, yeah. (have a..)
Hey! Have another little piece of my heart now, baby, yeah.
You know you got it if it makes you feel good,
Oh yes indeed.

You're out on the streets looking good, and baby,
Deep down in your heart I guess you know that it ain't right,
Never never never never never never never hear me when I cry at night.
Baby, I cry all the time!
And each time I tell myself that I, well I can't stand the pain,
But when you hold me in your arms, I'll sing it once again.

I'll say come on, come on, come on, come on, yeah take it!
Take another little piece of my heart now, baby. (break a..)
Break another little bit of my heart now, darling, yeah, (come on…)
Have another little piece of my heart now, baby, yeah.
Well, You know you got it, child, if it makes you feel good

Guitar

I need you to come on, come on, come on, come on and take it,
Take another little piece of my heart now, baby. (break a…)
Break another little bit of my heart, darling, yeah. (have a)
Have another little piece of my heart now, baby,
You know you got it (waaaaahhh)
Take a…Take another little piece of my heart now, baby. (break a…)
Break another little bit of my heart, and darling, yeah yeah (have a)
Have another little piece of my heart now, baby,
You know you got it, child, if it makes you feel good


***hoping to wake up one day to find stargazers beside my pillow... until then, let me just travel the world. oh! and take care of my niece... haha!***

relapse...

***saw my college friends yesterday and for some reason we were reading each other children's books. ardee read us this... it made me cringe... now i feel like crap...***

Guess How Much I Love You by Sam McBratney

Little Nutbrown Hare, who was going to bed, held on tight to Big Nutbrown Hare's very long ears. He wanted to be sure that Big Nutbrown Hare was listening.

"Guess how much I love you," he said.

"Oh, I don't think I could guess that," said Big Nutbrown Hare.

"This much," said Little Nutbrown Hare, stretching out his arms as wide as they could go.

Big Nutbrown Hare had even longer arms. "But I love YOU this much," he said.

Hmm, that is a lot, thought Little Nutbrown Hare.

"I love you as high as I can reach." said Little Nutbrown Hare.

"I love you as high as I can reach," said Big Nutbrown Hare.

That is quite high, thought Little Nutbrown Hare. I wish I had arms like that.

Then Little Nutbrown Hare had a good idea. He tumbled upside down and reached up the tree trunk with his feet.

"I love you all the way up to my toes!" he said.

"And I love you all the way up to your toes," said Big Nutbrown Hare, swinging him up over his head.

"I love you as high as I can HOP!" laughed Little Nutbrown Hare, bouncing up and down.

"But I love you as high as I can hop," smiled Big Nutbrown Hare - and he hopped so high that his ears touched the branches above.

That's good hopping, thought Little Nutbrown Hare. I wish I could hop like that.

"I love you all the way down the lane as far as the river," cried Little Nutbrown Hare.

"I love you across the river and over the hills," said Big Nutbrown Hare.

That's very far, thought Little Nutbrown Hare. He was almost too sleepy to think any more. Then he looked beyond the thorn bushes, out into the big dark night. Nothing could be further than the sky.

"I love you right up to the MOON," he said, and closed his eyes.

"Oh, that's far," said Big Nutbrown Hare. "That is very, very far."

Big Nutbrown Hare settled Little Nutbrown Hare into his bed of leaves. He leaned over and kissed him good night.

Then he lay down close by and whispered with a smile, "I love you right up to the moon - AND BACK."

a little love poem

Someone who hates scrabble.

Someone who sleeps on her back near an open window in winter, her breath rolling like a river into night.

Someone who wants me to wake her in the morning by reading ee cummings' love poems, giving a small candle-flicker of a smile just before opening her eyes.

Someone who appreciates the architecture of churches, but refuses to step inside.

Someone who has hands fit to hold hurt sparrows and robins.

Someone who threw out an her Alice Cooper records when she found out he loves to golf.

Someone who would swerve a new car into the ditch to avoid a frog crossing the road.

Someone who would tattoo my name on her arm in writing the same colour as her skin, so it would appear slowly from nowhere when she suntanned, people thinking her blood was telling secrets to the world of its own accord.

Someone who learned Spanish to read Marquez, or Lorca, or Neruda.

Someone whose hips whisper their own stories of the serpent and the garden of Eden.

Someone who bites the back of my neck like a leopardess carrying her kitten to safety.

Someone who'll make me wait for her to come out of the shower.

Someone whose smallest movements amaze me: her hair falling over her eyes, the soft swell of her hips when she ties down, a deep sigh when she sleeps.

Someone who maps every ticklish part of my body and then uses her knowledge strictly for evil.

Someone who paints our bodies black and makes love with me under the stars.

Someone who burns through my chest like that first shot of scotch.

Someone whose tongue, if we're kept apart too long, would nervously trace my face into the roof of her mouth.

Someone who practises her signature with her wrong hand, in case of accidents or a sudden arrest.

Someone whose fingrnails smell faintly of her hair.

Someone who reminds me of the soft tickle of fog.

Someone who would rush outside in the middle of the night, setting a spider onto the lawn, never admitting it's because she hates rain.

Someone who understands the unforgivable importance of ravens.

Someone wholl flicker into my lips with the ferocity of a dragonfly.

Someone who will open, thick, pungent and vital, like a Mapplethorpe flower.

Someone who has searched for me like a near-sighted woman groping for her glasses, stubbing her toes and swearing in Yiddish.

Someone who would understand why Steve and Dave and Paul and I sat in a bar staring at the mirror behind us for twenty minutes because somebody had asked what would happen if you looked at yourself in a mirror using a pair of binoculars until we had to admit the question was too big for us, and we turned back to the safe optics of the beer bottle.

Someone who would just happen to cut my wrist shortly after reading Ondaatje's "The Time Around Scars. "

Someone who'll stare softly but straight at me, smiling reassuringly when I tell her how my 73 year old Medieval lit prof looked up from Chaucer, stared blankly over the class's heads and said that even the happiest marriage will end in death.

Someone who understands the efficiency inherent in suicide.

Someone who knows that love can be the thickest slice of hell we’ll ever taste.

Someone who would dance with me by the sides of highways.

~andy weaver

hoping to find love like this soon...

my legend...

if only all people would think like paulo coelho, then this world would be a better place...

"what is a personal calling? it is God's blessing, it is the path that God chose for you here on earth. whenever we do something that fills us with enthusiasm, we are following our legend. however, we don't all have the courage to confront our own dream.

"why?

"there are four obstacles. first: we are told from childhood onward that everything we want to do is impossible. we grow up with this idea, and as years accumulate, so too do the layers of prejudice, fear and guilt. there comes a time when our personal calling is so deeply buried in our soul as to be invisible. but it is still there.

"if we have the courage to disinter dream, we are then faced by the second obstacle: love. we know what we want to do, but are afraid of hurting those around us by abandoning everything in order to pursue the dream. we do not realize that love is just a further impetus, not something that will prevent us from going forward. we do not realize that those who genuinely wish us well want us to be happy and are prepared to accompany us on our journey.

"once we have accepted that love is a stimulus, we come up against the third obstacle: fear of the defeats we will meet on the path. we who fight for our dream suffer far more when it doesn't work out, because we cannot fall back on the old excuse" "oh well, i didn't really want it anyway." we do want it and know that we have staked everything on it and that the path of the personal calling is no easier than any other path, except that our whole heart is in their journey. then, we warriors of light must be prepared to have patience in difficult times and to know that the universe in conspiring in our favor, even though we may not understand how.

"i ask myself: are defeats necessary?

"well, necessary or not, they happen. when we first begin fighting for our dream, we have no experience and make many mistakes. the secret of life, though, is to fall seven times and to get up eight times.

"so, why is it so important to live our personal calling if we are only going to suffer more than other people?

"because, once we have overcome the defeats - and we always do - we are filled by a greater sense of euphoria and confidence. in the silence of our hearts, we know we are proving ourselves worthy of the miracle of life. each day, each hour, is part of the good fight. we start to live with enthusiasm and pleasure. intense, unexpected suffering passes more quickly than suffering that is apparently bearable; the latter goes on for years and, without our noticing, eats away at our soul, until one day, we are no longer able to free ourselves from the bitterness and it stays with us for the rest of our lives.

"having disinterred our dream, having used the power of love to nurture it and spent many years living with the scars, we suddenly notice that what we always wanted is there, waiting for us, perhaps the very next day. then comes the fourth obstacle: the fear of realizing the dream for which we fought all our lives.

"oscar wilde said: "each man kills the thing he loves." and it's true. the mere possibility of getting what we want fills the soul of the ordinary person with guilt. we look around at all those who have failed to get what they want and feel that we do not deserve to get what we want either. we forget about all the obstacles we overcame, all the suffering we endured, all the things we had to give up in order to get this far. i have known people who, when their personal calling was within their grasp, went on to commit a series of stupid mistakes and never reached their goal - when it was only a step away.

"this is the most dangerous of the obstacles because it has a kind of saintly aura about it: renouncing joy and conquest. but if you believe yourself worthy of the thing you fought so hard to get, then you become an instrument of God, you help the soul of the world, and you understand why you are here."

~paulo coelho
rio de janeiro
nov2002
translated by margaret jull costa
quoted from "the alchemist"

memo to myself

this is my head talking to my heart...

you really have to stop looking. eventually you'll read something that would tear you apart and you won't have anybody to blame but yourself just because you couldn't help it. make it stop.

serves me right for waiting... again

break my heart again for old times sake?




C'mon, c'mon
C'mon, c'mon c'mon
You lay down with angels
To feel yourself again
You've got everything you need
Under your thick skin
I know where you're going
I know where you've been
When it comes to playin' games
You will always win o

[CHORUS:]
C'mon, c'mon c'mon
Break my heart again
For old times sake
C'mon, c'mon c'mon
Break my heart again
For old times sake

You can't see your shadow
Reaching for the sky
Lay your head down on my bed
Please don't ask me why
Why am I leaving
Why don't I know
Something deep inside me
Is forcing me to go
You say you need me
But you can't tell me no
When I ask you to stop me baby
You just let me go

C'mon, c'mon c'mon
Break my heart again
For old times sake
C'mon, c'mon c'mon
Break my heart again
For old times sake

You took the best of me
And threw it away
Too bad the rest of me
Still wants you to stay
Want you to stay
You say you need me
But you can't tell me no
When I ask you to stop me baby
You just let me go
You just let me go

C'mon, c'mon c'mon
Break my heart again
For old times sake
C'mon, c'mon c'mon
Break my heart again
For old times sake


***
the agony of waiting is all i have to know you are still here