Valedictory Address for MES

Thank you.

I intended to stop at these two words, not only because I know that I might only bore you if I go on with a painfully long speech, but also because I know in my heart that these are the most important words if not the only words, that need to be said. Thank you.

Mr. _____________________, distinguished teachers, beloved parents, fellow graduates, good afternoon. We have learned many important lessons here in MES that we could carry on for the rest of our lives. Lessons of humility, sportsmanship, courtesy and friendship, it is not at all ironic that I am not enumerating mathematics, science, history amongst the things I learned, because all of us know, these are given.

At this certain age, primary school won’t teach us physics or chemistry nor will it prepare us for a career at all… However, the one thing it prepares us with is to take a step. To take a step towards life, by inspiring us, motivating us, and making us brave and strong.

Today's achievements may fade or even be forgotten. The applause may become a distant memory and our certificates and medals may gather dust on a shelf or in a drawer. But, we will always be remembered for caring enough, for helping someone, for making someone feel special and appreciated and for being the kind of person that others enjoy spending time with.

 It’s hard to imagine that the next time that we will be in a classroom; we are already in highschool, where they say a more serious learning is going to take place. But who says learning is restricted within the bounds of a classroom environment? We now live in a world, where almost everything is possible. Gone were the days of snail mails, and telephones are becoming obsolete. Gone were the days when kids our age play patintero, taguan, and other street games.

We are now in a world of endless possibilities and insurmountable opportunities, and we are to be thrown right at the middle of all of this. But every experiences were only just lessons ready to be learned, lessons that would only make us stronger and prepare us for the person we want to be.

I got scared while I was reading this year’s theme: “Your gift of learning, our tool for nation building”, it’s as if I am to carry the weight of the world on my shoulder, something that I don’t think I can ever do, by the way.  We might have been very bad people in our past life to be cursed with such great responsibility. Fear, that’s what I felt, not until this fear calm down that I felt honored and privileged to be entrusted with such vision. We could have been on the contrary, angels in our past lives, to be bestowed with such opportunity and power to do something greater than ourselves.  I believe that our school nurture as and teach us to be the person we are and help us build our character because we are an indispensable tool to the nation’s future progress.

We are indeed, the hope of our motherland, as our great hero Dr. Jose Rizal quoted. He knew that we are all liberal minds, who have great thirst for learning and immense concern for our nation. He might have foreseen, that this day would come, a day when great distractions will lead us away from this responsibility. This day came, when we have been comforted with computers and play stations that made us forget our books and street games, this day when all we can see are the possibilities and opportunities presented to us by the glittering monitors of TVs and computers rather than the opportunities of visiting a friend, going to the beach or reading a book. Is this the day that learning is limited by the things presented to us by the computer generated environment we’re living in? I say this is the day, that we will stay strong, and stay focus to our future ahead.

From now on we will be taking our talents and beliefs with us wherever we go, if we have learned anything it is that we have to be adaptable, ready to take chances and go different routes. These days we have to be ready to update our knowledge, add to our skills and be ready to cope with change, this is the challenge before us and it is one that we will all meet in our different ways. Some of us will want to stay at home; others might go to other places. Whatever we do or wherever we go we won’t forget today. Hopefully in years to come we will meet up with our friends again at our re-union.

Finally, I would like to wish my fellow graduates, fellow graduates now that has a nice ring to it doesn’t it? I would like to wish them health and happiness in the future and the satisfaction of knowing that whatever they do they will do it well. 

Congratulations to us….we did it!

UCph ain't worth it..

So what if it's a top 100 universities in the world?

I am at my 2nd sem at the University of Copenhagen (Denmark) already this semester, and a week ago the Spring Sem 2012 already started and yet my grades from the Fall semester wasn't out yet? 

It pisses me off, terribly. Aside from paying a ridiculously high tuition fee of 9000 euro a year (around 54k dollars I guess) with my master's degree, that wasn't at all worth it, in my opinion. As there's only around 2 and a half lecture time every week which isn't even at all that interactive and sometimes even cut short or some other week with no class. I don't know what's happening because of the poor student guidance with too much bureaucratic divides..pretty much I'm like in a limbo...

I am not even sure why I'm writing about this. I just want to have an outlet of my outrage..

Maybe it's just my Faculty, or maybe it's just me. I don't know, but having been enrolled to a semester and start it already without being able to know the last sem's grade is pretty much outrageous.

I knew my previous University wasn't at all perfect, but atleast my professors are so inspiring that they have this ability to make you want to read and look forward to every session. And it won't take long to know your grades nor to hear any new information or for your inquiries to be answered.

So what does UCph have to offer in the Humanities anyway? It's still for me to find out..in atleast a year and a half more (hopefully)

Reflection v.1.2

If I knew back then how fun it was to have had my kind of childhood experiences... I would have took the time everyday to have made every second counts.

I have been immersed into the western world for almost five years now..and just today while I was talking with a co-worker we talked about the kind of life they have in Europe and the kind of life I had back home. 

How lucky they are for having free education up until University and they can choose any courses they want. It seems they've got everything that most people in my country dreamed for. Then she asked me how life is in my country...oh well, I said, college education is not for everyone, it is a luxurious privilege that only some can afford, and if ever there are scholarships we need to outsmart hundreds of thousands of others who wanted just the same, that's why maybe in our country, we regard education as a gift, a very precious one. 

And she goes, like...'oh, that's very interesting, cause here, we tend to disregard it'. Socialist Europe tend to disregard it, cause everything is taken cared of by their government, health care, welfare...and yes, their countries are the happiest place to live. But as I continue on talking with my colleagues, boring them (or so i thought) with my life back home...I'm beginning to think...life in Europe is not at all as happy as we know..

I began my story...

Back home, when I was a kid, I learned to swim not because my parents enrolled me in swimming classes but because I live close to the beach and swimming came naturally. I learned to grow a garden not for the fun of it, but for the benefit of having to eat something for food, I learned to give food to fowls (chicken) not just to see them gather around but to have to care for them for livelihood. I read books, cause we don't have TVs back then, I learned to cook on the fire I made out of sticks and stones. I learned to iron my clothes with a pan. 

I know how to make popcorn through the wasted palay (the one that the farmers had separated from those that they will refine for selling), to curl hair from the twigs of plants, to sell balot or ice cream on the streets, to cook and care for the younger siblings, to clean the house, to go fishing with a fishing net, to climb mountains, to ride the buffalo and just being with the nature. 

Back home, we learned to play sports, tennis, volleyball, basketball, not because we are part of the clubs or parents enrolled us but because it's part of the privilege of being in the school, that's why you'll know that when you are part of a sport team, you're probably something special cause the team is composed of the chosen few. 

We learned to play games as kids, even without legos, or barbie dolls or PSPs and Xbox...we played on the streets or on the shore just about anything, against each other or a team. 

It's not exactly as fun that time as it is now, thinking about it, because before all I can think about is playing. I was a kid. I need to make food cause it's my turn to make food, but then it's so hard hearing all those other kids, having fun, playing hide and seek. And up to now, I can't understand the rationale on while we need to sleep in middle of the day.

Childhood. Back then was fun. I don't know now. But I definitely enjoyed mine.

While I looked dreamy, talking about these things, my co-worker, was left awestruck. She was like 'you probably did more on your childhood, than I could ever do in a lifetime' 

Yes. I did. Maybe. But then there's the regression. But whatever, I am always grateful, that I have made so many memories of the past, worth remembering and i think it really made a big impact on my life. 

While I was writing this...it made me think..where have those street games gone? 

I was hoping to make another blog on that next time, i think this is sort of long now.

Reflection:v.1.1

It just happened. 


I don't know why but at this particular moment everything seems so shaky and it feels like I'm falling deep into the ditch of nothingness. 


I felt so terribly hopeless and pathetic. Not knowing where to go and what to do. I'm depressed. 


Felt like I was being tossed and turned into the waves, leaving me not only dizzy but disoriented. It's been so long since I let it curl me around drifting in the abyss.


I lost every sense of me. 


I felt shallow. 


I felt so ordinary.


Where had my dreams gone, where had my hopes gone. Who am I kidding when I'm saying that things will be alright? 


Live one day at a time...yes, easier said than done.


I felt so pathetic.


Now I'm wondering, is it too late? Is it too late to move on? 


As I'm trying to make a "to-do-list", I was reminded, how short a day can be, and if I don't make every minute count? I will surely just be adrift into oblivion. 


There's an entire life to be ordinary, and it isn't big a deal. But being ordinary is something someone is if they play safe, if they are contented of just conforming, living with the conventional reality, trying to pass every moment without anything to do.


Being ordinary means you have forgotten the excitement of dreaming and making them come true.


Being ordinary is the person that I have tried hard not to be yet now I'm the epitome of one.


I used to get ahead of myself in everything I do, I have always tried to challenge everything, to question until I arrive at one point, interesting.


Where have I been? 


It won't help blaming the people around me. No, blaming the circumstances don't make it any clearer either. Nor does becoming apathetic and submitting to the situation at hand. It's like being in a quicksand trying to pull myself up but slowly sucking me down. 


I know that no one can help me cause this is just a state of mind. This is the time to be stubborn to fate and the circumstance, this is the time to be a brat and fight for a place into a meaningful world of purpose and dreams.


No one, not even your friends nor family, will notice that you are floating freely cause you're given up, they will think they know you enough and assume that that's just who you are and what you want. Believe me, I knew the feeling.


So if there's someone, who could make things happen, it's myself...and no one else. I can make believe of anything just so there's something that I would believe again.


I am trying to convince myself, every second of the day, that things will be better, and that somehow, something or someone out there will intervene. 


There's nothing wrong to be ordinary, but why be ordinary if we can be someone special? 

UNMASK: prelude

Things could have been better. A lot of things could have been a little better. As I lie in bed every night, some nights alone, some nights beside this dozing man that I love for almost 4 years now, I get to think of the life I had lived and reflect as to why I was once that dreamy, vibrant and full of aspiration girl to a dull, lazy, inactive woman that I am now. I keep on convincing myself that this is how things happen. This is how I suppose to be. But at the back of my mind, something, someone out there is pushing me hard. Trying to encourage me to be someone else, to assess the choices I’ve made and evaluate my role in this world. I am trying at the moment, to put everything in perspective, trying to think how and why I am here in the first place.

It’s been a routine, for almost four years now. I might say I live in a routine life. Same thing everyday, like someone is playing me up, keep on replaying my life. I’m beginning to think, where is that spontaneity that I so badly convince people to do? Where had been my life?

Much to my dismay, I really can’t answer even the simplest question of “who am i?” and “what I want?” With this that I conclude, I am lost.

No one would really understand my rants unless of course someone who cared, or some people who had believed in me all those times.

Now, I am beginning to reassess everything, and focus on what really matters, I may not end up with a happily ever after but I want to make sure that I have live up trying to believe that it’s where I’m headed. I hope in trying to write the memories I have since childhood, should I track down the once vibrant, full of hope little girl that I once was and hopefully revive my dull adult life into her.

I hope that someone out there, read this story that I will chronicle in this blog, and together we journey back in time to try to find inspiration and refuge in the carefree and inspiring life of childhood.

Void

There are moments in our lives when we stare blankly ahead and just lost in the state of nothingness. it's either boredom or the complete nonsensical phase that we are in. That moment when we swear we are ready to lose everything because we are sure as hell there's nothing to lose. 


There are moments when we felt so crushed, so defeated, so betrayed that we can't even fathom how our heart could handle too much pain. There are those times when bad things happen one after the other and then you can't even grasp the courage to hope for something better but just the ability to keep on understanding the ridiculously piled up misfortunes that keep on coming. 


There are moments when even crying out loud or even making your life miserable couldn't spell out misery at all. Those moments when you felt alone, that no one ever seem to understand and you wish that everything would just end right there and then. 


There are those moments, that you absolutely feel so vulnerable, that instead of fighting you felt the need to give up. The moments when you begin to question your purpose or if there's any at all, the moment when you think you're lost in the middle of a crossroad unable to decide what to do, or not even wanting to do anything at all.


These are the moments when nothing good ever come out of your mind, but the thought of just blaming everything and everyone.


I see these moments of my life. This particular moment, the chance to start anew. A chance to see the most ridiculous chance to the most gibberish thoughts, as some sign to pursue a new road..a hope that it would lead me to a brighter path. And even though it's heartbreaking to lose the baggage behind, starting anew means leaving completely those that made me miserable behind. The seemingly true friends who betrayed me, the childhood dreams that haunted me, and maybe the career that can never be.


This is the result of an outburst. Hoping that i could settle this heavy feeling in my heart... 

Detour's Mishap

I have an OC tendency (Obsessive-Compulsive), I have been very careful about things, I won’t do anything if it wasn’t written in my organizer, and if something I have written on my to-do list wasn't satisfied, even if it was at the middle of the night, I have to do it, because if not, I wouldn't have a peace of mind and everything else will be disordered. My OC-ness is the one responsible for my boring-life; it wasn’t that good to be following your self-made itinerary, so I have tried to go against it. I never thought that I would be more in trouble to be leaving my old behavior, I became impulsive on things. I make moves without prior thinking and I have had a lot of mistakes. Well, I thought at first that it would help me move on, because they say that from your mistakes you will learn your lessons…. I guess that maybe I have learned my lessons; I am just stubborn enough to apply it. Actually, my story is not really much of interest, I would not even consider it as a story, maybe it was just but any ordinary sentiments that come and go, but so long as I can feel the pain, I wanted to share this moment.

It’s not how many times that I mistook affection with love, not many times that I entered a relationship and failed, it’s because I am so impulsive in doing things that I was blinded with my impulse, I have had reasons but I set it aside. I keep on missing it: The lesson that I have to learn. I was taught to love long time ago, but he left me unguarded, so my once simple and systematic life became berserk and I tried to get even. I never became fair, I got even to people who were so innocent of my misfortune, but I had my karmas and I have suffered with them. I never forgot how I was terribly hurt by the first man I love. So there’s the detour. I go out my way to do something crazy. I made my own rules in this game and invited players to join in with the intention of beating them hard like I was beaten by their teammate (that man)… majority of the match, I emerged the winner, but I never find the fulfillment, so I’ve searched for a more challenging opponent. Then out of nowhere, I found him. I have known him long ago and I have been looking up to him, but that was the time that I am still at my controlled-self, so I never dared to challenge him, I fed myself with admirations of him back then, but I never made drastic moves like I have done now.

We met after long years of no-news, and I became excited. Having that player-spirit on me, I urged him for a match, never knowing that he himself has his own rules. I have foreseen a no-match situation, but this time the weak competitor is me, I have had the time to back out, but I was blinded with the feeling of curiosity and/or maybe I was too proud to accept that I can’t fight with him… for I can never fight where my soft-spot was hit… my heart.

When I see him, his smile, his frown, those eyes, just everything about him, I end up liking him just as much as I did, before I stopped. I guess once you love someone, there's no turning back. It's a line that will forever stay embedded deep within your heart. Because once you have loved that person, it doesn't go away, and you're forced to care, no matter how hard you try to forget about them.

I used to treat those who did me wrong with disdain and unacceptance. I was afraid that if I were to treat them nicely it would mean that I was giving them the 'go-ahead', 'thumbs-up', to hurt me again. Little did I know that I was only reaffirming that their choice to hurt me to begin with was the right choice. At that moment I don't think much of it, you know, I just can’t recognize the most significant moment of my life. Back then I thought, "There'll be other days..." I didn't realize that was the only day I have with him.

I thought I was in love with him, but  I realize it was just stupidity that struck me, I have been into this illusion for years of my life, maybe even before I realize my heart could fall in love. I was caught unguarded, I disregarded my reasons, for the excuse that, when you love, you don’t need to be rational, you just feel. But that had been my downfall. I lost. I should have stopped and tuned back when I have seen the sign, but I was overwhelmed with the attention he’s giving me. I was very happy with him, not realizing that, that very moment is still a part of my fantasy. How could I be so blind? Why did I pretend not to hear my mind talk? Now it all comes back to me, I have fallen into a pothole without anyone knowing I am there, for nobody had tried to walk within the same way, if there had been, we are all there stuck up into the very deep and dark hole. KARMA.

Why would I wallow up? Within that dark-deep-down moment of my life, I realized one thing, I wasn’t that bad…and he wasn’t that great either. From there I could start to move, to climb, and to get over that hole. Nobody could help me but myself.

I Have to move on…. Why not? Dwelling too much on the past will only make me feel miserable and I don’t want to feel miserable. The world won’t stop just because I felt such and he won’t stop for me either. I have long built myself without him and I would not be destructed just for that lost. I never lost him, he lose me…No one should ever cry for things that had been gone inevitably it happen, you could regret the lost but don’t dwell on it for long. A million words would not bring him back, I know because I have tried. Neither would a million tears, I know, because I've cried    ***(this is about the most honest quote I came across lately~!)

Memories of him were bittersweet, but rest assured I was awakened, to help me become more cautious and rational on things and to be always reminded that above all is our head. I know that the hardest part of moving forward is never looking back so you could say it’s unavoidable to be remembering the wounding moment with him. I am trying hard not to wonder about what might have been, because that was then and I have taken different roads. I can’t go back again, there’s no use giving in. And there’s no way to know, what might have been, because things were over and accept that.

I’m not about self pity. My love for him did me wrong, so I’m moving on. It hurts to see him walk away. For admit it or not, he had been an important part of my life and the time we shared will forever be a part of me. So even though I realize that it was never meant to be, still, it hurts. I just hate the feeling that someone’s holding my heart and he is crushing it so hard. Ask me how many times my heart has been broken and I will tell you to look in the sky and count the stars. For I always have the wrong turns, and right now, I was at that point in my life that I have not only made a 360 degrees turn but twice, and I am all so shaky that it did not only leave me headache but a heartache as well. I never knew how bad it hurt to lose something I never really had. I could never have everything I want.

I shouldn’t care or wonder where and how he is. But I can’t hide this hurt inside my broken heart. I’m fighting back emotions that I’ve never fought before, because I’m not supposed to love him anymore. No, I can no longer erase that foolishness I have done, but knowing I have done it with someone unworthy is much regretful. Even if my heart should call out his name in the rain. Even if these arms should want to embrace him again. And even if I’m all cried out and no longer in pain... I’ll never fall in love that way again.

Some people are just not meant to be in this life no matter how much I want him to be. Sometimes the worst thing he could do is tell me that I can find someone better than him...when at that moment all I want is him. I thought then it was so sweet, but looking back now, that was so selfish. When we met I thought my life was coming together, I realized it was just starting to fall apart. For a while I thought I would never love or hate anyone, but I have come to realize I have loved and hated the same person. Honestly.. I'm crazy about him.. but that doesn't make me stupid.. yeah, I've been hurt enough times to learn my lesson.. and I know he's not the only guy who looks at me.. I mean why would I waste my time on someone who doesn't appreciate me.. when everyone tells me I could do so much better? He knows where to find me if he ever wants me.. but my world isn't going to stop and wait for him.. if he does happen to come back.. whose to say I'll even be here when he does?

Before, choices were always so easy, I never had to choose between things that I liked and things that I liked more, but now its like that’s what my life is all about. I swear that no matter which one I pick, it seems to be the wrong one.... and I always end up losing something that I really wanted. I thought I already did the most stupid thing when I broke up with my first boyfriend, but loving him is more stupid and it is the most stupid thing I have ever done. I’d like to believe that I’ll wake up one morning and not miss him anymore. I’ll finally understand that when he broke my heart it was for a reason, one I just don’t understand yet. But when I do. I’ll know that he messed up and not me.

We hope and wish to find that special person, that one person who completes us... and it hurts so much when they love someone else. When we finally do get the person of our dreams, they leave sooner or later...gone from our life like a feather floating away never to be seen again. We cry endlessly for many nights, remembering their smile, their kind words, their warm embrace. You can't help but feel joy when you think of their sweet kisses or that special feeling you got whenever you saw them. You dream of them and wake up smiling, until you realize it was only a dream and the closest thing you have to that person are the memories and times you shared, that made it all worthwhile. I guess that's why we torture ourselves with love.

I guess what I've learned is that no one will ever be completely happy. Someone will always want to be somewhere else, be with someone they aren't, and have something they don't. And that's okay; I just can't let it take me over. To be upset over what I don’t have is to waste what I have and I don’t want to be more fool. Sometimes bad things just happen--no reason, no purpose. They just occur and we're left to pick up the pieces the best we can. It’s just that we will never stop loving someone. It's more of just learning to deal with the pain of not having them anymore.

I wonder who will I love and who will I see, but most of all I wonder who will I be? It seems like yesterday I had it all and nothing was wrong, but the times are changing and I am moving on... and I know I will be fine, it's not like the other times I've broken up with boyfriends, when I've been so heartbroken I've cried solidly for about three weeks and not wanted to go anywhere or do anything. Okay, I had that one night from hell, but since then I've been really okay, and at least I know there's no point living on false hope. At least I know it really is over so I can move on. But I have to say that this time I feel a bit numb, still in a state of shock, really, although I don't feel that my world has ended, not completely. I suppose that the light at the end of the tunnel, though not very bright, is at least still there. They say that it never hurts as much after the first time, and I suppose there's an element of truth in that, but they also say that every time you get hurt the barriers go up a little big higher and you end up being hard and cynical, and not giving anything to anyone.

Letting go is something I look forward to. The day that I let go of him, that day will be wonderful. It means that I can finally look past the fact that he want her and not me, and I will be able to accept it and not cry anymore.

The brightest future will always be based on a forgotten past, I can't go on well in life until I learned to let go of my past failures and heartaches. I'm twisted because one side of me is telling me that I need to move on. On the other side I want to break down and cry. I will always have the strength to move on, and when I do move on, I wouldn’t forget what a blessing it was to have that person became a part of my life. I know that he have impacted who I am today in some way and because of him, I will be forever changed.