Could it be?

Speaking in a foreign language is bearable but writing it on paper is another story. Foreign words will eventually  stick inside your head especially when you have someone to converse with; unlike writing compositions – that could trigger aneurysm and paralysis if taken seriously. I have been attending classes in Japanese over the past 7 months and quite frankly it is not another walk in the park. In the midst of everything political and ideological, in the heart of this university our fortress stands anchored by Japanese beams. Like the way of the ninja, we are secluded eight hours a day: learning everything from IT subjects to the great wonders of friendship and love. Aside from the usual "book -broke-backing" exercises and oral declamations we have 8 pages of survey forms that could easily  pass for a chapter exam. I am grateful we have such superb Instructors and Japanese staff, which never hesitate to lend a helping hand.

Everything as smooth as egg on tefal, until the day oyabun came up with an idea. Aside from climbing the insurmountable Mt. PhilNITS my “oyabun” requires me and flor to submit a monthly report in a specific fashion I have no knowledge of. This report, “mang berson,” as I fondly refer to it, has put lead in my pencil: something that has been missing for quite some time now. A sweet feeling tainted with scorn. Its like taking Bisolvon, it tastes awful but you have to take it to tone down the bass. Ahem! I consider the number seven as one of my lucky numbers until the day they required us to submit it every seventh of the month. I know that oyabun only intends to improve our language skills, and no pun intended . But the burning question is:

“Could it be any harder?”

Fade Away….

(Borrowed Post)

Just borrowed this write up from my old man. My head is practically dried-up of all it's essences due to the compulsory Japanese report my "buchou" requires me to submit every month. Can't write no more. This is all your fault oyabun! Or maybe my "ningas-kugon" attitude is kicking in? I hope not. I'll remove this post as soon as I come up with something. 

The world is down. 

The headline is a steal. From Thomas Friedman’s award-winning book The World is Flat, winner of the Financial Times and Goldman Sachs Business Book of the Year in 2006. The book says that the technology has “flattened the world” and the playing field in carrying out the most important services to humankind is now even, from Bangalore to San Jose in California’s Silicon Valley.

Friedman’s thesis has critics, but the overwhelmingly positive reaction to the book had drowned much of the criticism. Even Paul Krugman, who, like Friedman writes for the op-ed of The New York Times, cannot seem to puncture the solid arguments laid down by Friedman in his book. Krugman does not see the world from the sunny perspective of Friedman and this is very apparent in his writings. While Friedman jets around the world in search of nuggets and boulders of innovation and unorthodoxy, which he turns into inspiring columns, Krugman sees corporate stick-ups, the wretched side of trade liberalization and the deep problems of emerging democracies. Up to now, Krugman cannot seem to muster the courage—or come out with more powerful arguments—to contradict Friedman’s assertion on the flattening of the world.

It was neither a powerful argument nor a superior idea that tore a hole into Friedman’s thesis late December while millions of Internet users in Asia were surfing for Yuletide bargains or exchanging joyous e-mails. What did this was a strong earthquake that rocked Taiwan, the country nearest to us (Formosa is just 180 miles off Batanes province). As the fault lines down deep moved perhaps by a few inches or so, the optic-fiber cables underneath were similarly upset. The result was a technological nightmare of Biblical proportion: disrupted Internet services, patchy phone services, an IT infrastructure turned upside down.

E-tickets cannot be booked. Banking returned to pre-industrial age slowness. Millions of Internet dependent young men and women in the Asian region dying of boredom. The economic loss from the disarrayed cables was immense and so was the assault on the now complacent psyche of the young Asians. For a very rare moment, the most articulate public faces of Google and Microsoft were unable to say something of the disruptive force—primal and unpredictable—that shook the fiber-optic cables in the Asian seabed.

The Taiwan quake has shaken the confidence previously vested on the most impressive technologies in the world. Breakthrough technologies from IT really changed the way the world interacted and with this came the attendant awe and respect that it genuinely deserved. But the Taiwan quake shattered that confidence and sense of awe. It also reaffirmed an old truth. This the unquestioned primacy of nature’s fury in the world are all puny in the hands an inch-long movement in the fault lines of the seabed. Nature has reasserted its superior might anew. The world is no longer flat.

The world is down. Or, it simply crashed.

Of course, the sense of panic was least felt in the Philippines. Of all the Asian countries affected by the disarray in the optic cables, only the Philippines suffered the most bearable of inconveniences. The usually agitated punditry even failed to raise a holler and ask the elementary questions. The blogs and the chat rooms discussed it in detail but there was none of the explosive disappointment publicly conveyed by public and private sectors throughout Southeast Asia. The self-proclaimed wise men of radio did not even realize that something in the IT universe went askew.

But is this least of unease something to be proud of?

The absence of panic in the Philippines over the cables that tripped should alarm, not please, private- and public-sector leaders. It reveals many things. First, we are not really part of the cyber mainstream. Second, we are still a bumpy hump in a world already flattened by technological innovations. Third, our leaders do not really care about full integration and immersion into the E-world. As for the third reason, it does not take a genius to figure out why. A fully automated world cannot produce the likes of Garci and the sham computing that is being done every election season from time immemorial. 

Lost

On a scale of one to ten, my sense of direction is probably nil. I always forget the way back to places I have gone before. If I get a thousand bucks every time I get lost, I would have enough money to pay the government's budget deficit. My first experience was probably the most unforgettable. Quite obvious because I am about to narrate it eh? It happened way back in my kindergarten days but I still remember it clearly. I was on the morning schedule and it was my second day in school. Apparently, It was my first time to be alone in a huge crowd because I was accompanied by my mom on the first day, as she even skipped work that day. Mom gave me a drill about the directions until I memorized the whole thing: just walk across the quadrangle passing the towering basketball goals, then turn right passing the school supplies store and finally walk across the humongous prehistoric black gate. "If you see an old geezer wearing glasses inside the cockpit of a red jeepney, that would be your man," she even retorted. I got every detail in my head but something went wrong. The overwhelming number of unfamiliar faces left me petrified as I walk out of the classroom. Lucky for my other classmates, they had their moms or house maids fetch them. Lucky bastards! I guess being independent has it's ups and downs: you can develop your self-reliance but you have to undergo hardships.

I barely managed to drag my half frozen body near the gate but seeing the two security guards standing in the middle  was too much to handle. Imagine two crooked guys glaring at you. One had a funny fro like Rez Cortez and the other looks like Barney the dinosaur. I completely lost it. I was embraced by fear and began to walk back inside the campus. Back then, I was still oblivious about keeping track of time and I wasn't aware the school service yields to no one, and it will leave no matter what. I found another way out of the campus but it was too late: the red jeepney holding my salvation and my ride back home has already left.

Just like Tom Hanks in Forest Gump, I started running. I ran all I could until the great big cross atop the old Sto. Rosario Church (beside my school) was out of sight. It was becoming an adventure as it was my first time to be walking the great Nepo Stalls (equivalent of SM malls today) alone. I even bought cotton candy from a peddler pushing one of those carts that magically whips up cotton candy. I even thought that sewing machines and cotton candy machines were invented by the same person, that Mr. Singer guy. Looking back, I realized how simple the mechanism is and Mr. Singer was not the inventor of the cotton candy machine. Please hit me back in my message board if you know it. Also, I could have injured my finger with the spinning wheel every time I swipe the newly formed cotton candy when the peddler is not looking. Going back to the story, the second trip driver in charge of the p.m. kids came to rescue me. I guess it was also a matter of pure luck when he saw me wandering half kilometer away from school. I told him my story and he got angry. He lectured me until I doze off. Oh well, adults… What do you expect? ('',)

Fast forward >> at present, I still lose my way, especially when attending interviews in Makati. Though not out of fear but with a poor sense of direction. I have pushed my neurons to the limits and tried proven ways like sketching landmarks on paper, but I always get the same results: I end up at the mercy of bystanders and hope for clear directions. It is quite comforting to know that you can find your way by just asking for directions. My mom always say that you can always rely on “magtanong” if you get lost . And sure as the light will reflect on you bald teacher's head, she was damn right.

axl rose

"makuha ka sa tingin," yun marahil ang una mong iniisip kapag mayroong nangahas sumingit sa napakahaba at tipong magpakailanmang  pila. "mabunggo ka sana," yun marahil ang panalangin mo sa taong singit ng singit sa traffic habang ikaw ay tahimik na tumatahak sa isang linya ng kalsada. "eto racumin", yun marahil ang gusto mong ipakain sa mga taong nambalasubas sayo. nais mong pasabugin ang sss dahil sa tagal ng pag proseso sa pensyon mo. ang sarap sigurong i-choke slam ang taong nang aaway sayo. ang gandang pagmasadang nakabitin ng patiwarik ang mga mmda sa flyover ng edsa. ang sarap sigurong ilibing ng buhay ang mga hiphop. tama lang na gripuhan sa tagiliran ang boss mong panay ang pahirap sayo. malapit mo nang batukan ang taong nangungulit sayo… at syempre lahat ng ito ay pawang kuro-kuro lamang na dala ng matinding imahinasyon. 

hindi mauubos ang listahan ng mga bagay na nakakabadtrip lalo na kapag sa iyong pananaw, ikaw ay naglalaro ng tapat at malinis.  kailangan lang ng pasensya upang makaiwas sa kapahamakan. sabi nga ni axl rose "all we need is a little patience." o diba! ginawan pa ng kanta ng guns and roses. uy bestfrend sana mabasa mo ito. alam kong nanlilisik na yung mga mata mo sa galit dahil sa kakulitan ko. pero salamat sa pagtitimpi. libre nalang kita mister kebab sa sabado. tapos libre mo ako ng movie (joke lang). nay, kahit hindi ka marunung mag internet at siento por siento hindi mo mabasa ito, nagpapasalamat ako sa araw araw na ginawa ng poong maykapal hindi ka nauubusan ng pasensya sa akin. tang and ating, takot ako sa inyo kaya di ko kayo masyado kinukulit. ('',)

It is a good day to die

i lie half-dead with Sol's gentle ray filling the gaps
beneath the sheaths, it slowly slits my soul's straps
like a clean slate with no trace of hate
to god i succumb, i entrust my fate

whether it be eternal damnation 
in hell with no chance of pardon
a highway to the road of perdition,
or the less traveled path of human reason

inside the golden gates that admits only love divine
no possessions, nothing is yours nothing is mine
unaffected by the hands of time
it is a good day to die, so it seems

much better a funeral!
with a clear day and a gentle breeze
i know it doesn't get any better than this
but wait, what is this smell?

fried rice sautéed to perfection,
it's scent tempting and taunting me to it's direction
it is not a good day to die, so it seems
not when mom is cooking breakfast on a Sunday morning

-mang jose