10. Colored lights lit up even in the smallest of shanties along the busy streets of Metro Manila.  Parols and lighted decors  just make you feel all warm inside.

9. Cold weather felt.  So, you look for that old jacket or sweater you have kept all year.

8. Gifts wrapped in fancy papers. Sometimes the wrapper is much more expensive than the item being wrapped

7. Christmas parties left and right, despite of any crisis or typhoon or flood or long list of credit card bills.

6. You always forget the name of your inaanak (god children). (Every year, that is)

5. You  tend to run out of gift ideas.

4. You never, ever pass up a tiangge (sale stalls)

3. You set up your Christmas tree.  Without adding any new decor to it.  Haha!

2. You try to remember your present body weight.  So that you can compare it after the holidays.

1. Your Christmas wish list just gets longer and longer every year….

HAPPY HOLIDAYS EVERY ONE!!!

It was Monday and the  first work day after the terrible onslaught of Ondoy.   I indulged myself reading 3 different local newspapers to update me of the latest. After a very depressing week of tragedy, sleep deprivation,  and no electricity, I decided to treat myself with a Starbucks coffee and breakfast.  “I deserve it”, I mused, as I drowned myself  in the papers with a steaming cup of macchiato.

Our street after Ondoy dumped his fury.

After digesting every headline and editorial of those newspapers, I just found myself in tears. God! I really did cry!  My heart ached for my countrymen  who lost more than a refrigerator, a car, and wooden fixtures.  Many had lost irreplaceable lives of their family and loved ones.   As I skim through the photos in print, grief, tragedy, and pain are but understatements  sketched on the faces of Ondoy victims.

When I realized that tears swelled up my eyes,  I noticed that my coffee was not as comforting.  I am but one of the fortunate ones to have survived  unscathed. And there I was reading the papers, in an expensive coffee shop, as if like a mere spectator to this mega drama of Ondoy.

I think that was the most tasteless cup of coffee of my life.  My mind started to rewind to the days prior this cathartic breakfast…

After Ondoy dumped rain of gargantuan proportions in Manila, the first floor of our house in Pasig was waist-deep in flood water.  We found our refrigerator, car, and wooden fixtures floating in the mud-colored waters.  Electricity was already out.

The next morning, me and my husband decided to bring our family to Laguna – at my in-laws place.  We believe our evacuation is the safest decision for my baby of 7 months old.  My parents remained in our home in Pasig, to oversee our belongings.

Makeshift rafts made by residents of our barangay. My baby and me rode one of these life-savers when we evacuated Pasig.

Ondoy came, but the flood waters remained for around a month.  It was only a week ago that water inside our house had subsided.  The flood waters were gone in our barangay.  But some areas in Pasig, Cainta, Marikina, and Luzon still remained virtual water worlds. While my parents  are still fixing our Pasig home, my family and my baby shall be staying here in Laguna.

Many Filipinos had already expressed their postmortems of Ondoy, of  Pepeng, and Rosing, and Milenyo, and all of those natural calamities that proved nature’s fury.

I wonder if we will ever get the moral of the story.

“Man lives freely only by his readiness to die.”

- Mahatma Gandhi

I had a class last Jul 28 (Tue) that lasted  until 7:00 pm.  It was a laboratory class where my students need to cook and prepare some food products they needed to sell.

He was there as usual – working.  Not like other students who would just hide in a corner and play with a PSP or cell phone during lab hours.  I knew him for 4 years and his reputation as a hard-working student, jolly, funny, and nice is unquestionable.

” JM, dagdagan mo nga ng sauce etong luto ‘nyo.” (“JM, could you add more sauce to this dish).  With a smile, he immediately took my plate and did add more sauce.  “Ma’am mas mahal na ‘yan. May dagdag sauce e.” (“Ma’am, that’s more expensive, now that I added more sauce to it.), he chuckled.

The next morning, Jul 29 (Wed), the class president texted me and informed me that JM was in the hospital and in coma.  There had a been a blood clot in his brain stem.

So the sauce request was my last conversation with this fine gentleman of 19 years old.  He is in his senior year,  a graduating student.

I was able to visit him in the hospital when he was still in coma.  I told myself not to be carried away and cry.  But when I touched his hand, already with edema, tears were impossible to hold back.  I told him to wake up so that he can climb up the stage with his classmates, that his family and friends  is so eagerly waiting for him.

He passed away the night of  Aug 1 (Sat). The same date as with a great lady’s death – Pres. Cory Aquino.  Our Father called his son to finally come home.

Yet again, Death, like a thief in the night, had taken one of my students,  my student so young and life so promising.  I could hardly fathom the depth of the pain for the bereaved family.

After his death, life will go on for the rest of us.  For our lives are filled with papers to finish, piles of laundry to clean and endless schedules to meet.

JM, wherever you are, thank you for reminding us how fleeting life really is.  That papers and laundry and schedules are but mirages of what is truly relevant in life.  Thank you for reminding us that when stripped of everything else, it is the amount of love we had given by which we will be judged and remembered by people.  Thank you, JM, for letting us realize that we are but temporary and everything else in the world is. That what matters is to love the people who made us who we are and share that love to those who greatly need it.

Rest in peace, dear friend.

Remember the time when the man in the mirror was bad?

Gone too soon indeed is the thriller that was Ben.

Rest easy,  Moonwalker.

Amen.

A simple tribute to Michael Joseph Jacskon (August 29, 1958 – June 25, 2009)

W - Waking up early.  Folding my husband’s sleeve every morning because he hates uneven folding.  Finishing my cup of coffee before baby starts to smile at me and makes me guilty to leave her all day.

O - Oh, you mean that paper! Well, I think I had thrown it somewhere.  Coming from a year-long leave creates memory gaps as deep as the Grand Canyon, you know.

R – Ready students??? Your professor is back!  Conducting lectures in front of you, class, is sheer bliss. (That is if I was able to prepare a lesson the day prior)

K - Kiss an empty calendar goodbye!  The schedule is darn hectic.  I even squeezed these few minutes to blog.  And I am loving it.

WS#2

Libre naman ang mangarap diba? Hehe…

So I will make most of this opportunity and indulge myself with this list.

What will I do if I had won the lottery? Say, I bagged 180 million pesos (drool… drool)….

1.  Build our own house and put the right stuff in it. A 3-storey house with like, ahum… a gazillion rooms hehe… so that living space will never be an issue anymore.  A house with a complete theater system, with swimming pool and jacuzzi, a big room for a library, a complete set of kitchen, and a comfy master bed room with a breath taking  view (A beach front or the city landscape will do just fine).   You know, the type of houses you see in MTV Cribs, where they feature celebrity homes…. you get the picture…

2.  I will buy a family car. So that I can take my baby wherever and whenever! A Toyota Land Cruiser will do wahaha!!!

3.  I will have a new complete set of wardrobe! With accessories, bags, and shoes  to go with it, mind you.  From Donna Karan  to Esprit clothes.  Prada and Naturalizer shoes.  Braun Buffel leather bags.  Gahd! I feel tingly all over… wehehe.

4.  Tour the world!!! I dream of setting foot on the land of the pyramids,   have a pilgrimage in the Holy Land, hear mass at St. Peter’s Square, burn my skin in Bora Bora, dive the Great Barrier Reef, and  have a  helicopter ride over the Grand Canyon!  Can we go packing now?!

Ok…. So let me jolt myself back to reality now.

Perhaps some people already have or had done all these things.  But I always believed that the best things in life are still free.

Money can buy the husk, but never the kernel.

My Mahal and I are already married for more than a year.   Sad to say that most of that time was spent apart.  He has to work  in Hong Kong while I need to stay in the Philippines to teach.

I think the longest time we lived under one roof was 2 months.  That was summer of  2008.  We settled in a little flat in Hong Kong.  That house for me was special.  I considered it our first home.

When summer of 2008 was over,  I needed to return to Manila.  Little did we know that I was not alone when I left Hong Kong — baby was already with me

Two bleeding episodes, 9 months of growing a bump, and a ceasearan section later, I returned to Hong Kong  just this May.  I was so thrilled of spending my 2-week vacation in our old flat.  I was so glad that my husband had meticulously maintained it in terms of cleanliness.  He is so much better in house cleaning than me.

And that was my last return to our old,  little,  sweet flat.

With my husband’s new job in Laguna, and baby who is already starting to coo and smile, my hubby and I decided to finally settle in the Philippines.

We were just newly weds when we first opened the door of our  flat.  Now we had closed  its door as parents to a cooing baby girl who had waited for us to come home together.

We just got home last 21st of May.  Together.  At long last.

A full circle.

Hooray for my first wifespeak post! Oh goodie, goodie!  WS Post#1

I can say I am vain when it comes to clothing.  I simply scrutinize the color, the fabric, the cut,  and of course, the brand whenever I buy clothes.  And I need to try it on before I attempt to purchase it.

Quite the opposite with my husband.  He is so simple. All he wanted is that his clothes are wrinkle-free and fresh-smelling. Period. That is fashion for him.  He sleeps over the couch of the clothing store whenever I go shopping for clothes.  Haha!  That’s why I love him.

Although my husband and I may differ in terms of fashion sense, I believe when we walk together holding hands is as good as walking the ramp wearing Prada.

For my 2 couples who are candies for the eye…

I choose Richard Gomez and Lucy Torres.  Look at them.  They even complement colors when they go out in public!  They simply have fashion chemistry.  Flawless and chic Lucy + Tall, dark, and handsome Richard = Perfect fashion model couple.  They are simply mesmerizing together.

Fab and chic

My second choice is Charlene Gonzalez and Aga Muhlach.  The wife is a beauty queen,  need I say more?! And the husband is a matinee idol since birth.  Put them together and you create a perfect symphony of fashion sense.  Add their perfect twins for that matter! God, even their twins  have fashion statements!  I think the hall of their house is a fashion ramp.

The dimpled guy and the beauty queen

These couples are blessed in terms of fashion.  I simply adore them!

May 10, 2009.  6:10pm.

Overlooking Hong Kong Island at Victoria Harbor,

my husband beside me,

and my parents whom I brought with me as my gift for them this Mother’s Day,

I held a steaming cup of Caramel Macchiato.

I can say it was the most perfect cup of coffee I ever had in my entire life.

It has been a year since I discovered blogging as a medium for my cluttered thoughts on life, love, megamouth sharks, and everything in between.

I realized how therapeutic and fun blogging was.  When I started, I thought that it would just be a boring routine. Meeting call center guy, call center gal, maver, josiet , cash cow, and the others had proven it otherwise.

My wish for my blog’s 1st anniversary is to meet more nice people like them. Mabuhay kayo!

For my year ender, I gave my site a makeover. Do you like it?

Also, let’s try to review the year that was.  My top 3 most visited posts were:

3 – The Unweatherly Report. 112 views.

It just started with a simple ranting over the strong rain.  The next thing I knew, I was linked by Manuel L. Quezon III. Wow! I feel quite flattered.

2 – Simply Being Pinoy. 393 views.

I was in Hong Kong when I wrote this post.  I was kinda nostalgic of home.  I missed  my isaw days in Peyups and mom’s home cooked meals.

1 – And my top post is (Drum roll please…..)

A Pregnant’s Top 10 List with 2,300 views.

I never thought that there were so many pregnant women or people interested about pregnancy that they bothered checking out my site.  I wrote this post  last December when I was 7 months pregnant. I was so desperate of being online that time because I was deprived of my laptop for almost a month.  I felt like bursting out all my contained rants and raves.

Thank you so much for the people who believed in me and my posts.  (Sounds like an acceptance speech. Eeeuw!)

Sneak peak of what is to come on The Dusk Chronicles…

My participation in wifespeaks (Thanks, maver!) .

Updates on my Digital Coffee Cup…

A series on food trivias. FOOD SCIENCE 101.

and etc…

No more spoilers, ok.

As I always say, each dusk is a beginning.