Shopping for Love

It took me such a long time to find it. Somehow it was difficult to have a list of qualifications completely set in your mind before you even decide on committing to it.

Oh, and it was a bag I was shopping for.

One fine day, after such a long time of searching, I was able to find the perfect bag, which fit all the qualifications that I was looking for. It was spaceous but not too big, it had enough pockets inside, it was red leather and looked fab and glamorous, the style was right, and all that shebang. I simply fell in love with it. Didn't come cheap though, and it was a big leap for me to commit to purchasing that fabulous bag. But I did, and I shelled out enough to buy me lunch and snacks everyday for a whole month. I loved that bag, and every moment I spent with it.

I thought everything would be alright, that I would be spending quite some time with that bag until it's all worn out... But that wasn't the case. Just a short time after I bought it (a little more than a month maybe?), it got into a crazy little accident. A small bottle of alcohol I kept in my bag spilled (and this is a warning -- don't ever put a BAND-AID brand alcohol in your bag, the cover simply ain't good). This destroyed my wonderful red leather bag...

My time with that bag was so short lived. That has been two years ago, but up until now, I haven't found anything that would measure up to it yet. I've went back to the same store over and over but they simply didn't have anything close to it. I've bought another red leather bag after that, but it just isn't the same. Perhaps I am never to find anything like that ever again.


AND, my last love affair just sound so similar...

(crosspost: http://pulanglangit.multiply.com)

Bad Peanuts

If you were a city bus rider, you'd surely know about the peanut peddlers who jump aboard carrying their goods. They deliberately open their tubs to let the aroma of the roasted peanuts linger in the airconditioned bus, while doing their "mani" chant... "mainit, malutong, bagong luto..."

There was this one evening on my way home, I was so hungry that I decided to buy me 10 pesos worth of their roasted peanuts. It wasn't a great experience though. I was able to go through only 1/3 of it, and didn't finish it because it really was just horrible. Rancid.

Well, thinking about it now, it really is questionable how these peddlers claim their peanuts to be. How in the world do they keep it warm the whole day? Those peanuts probably have been cooked days before... They are kept warm by some means, just to deceive the consumer that it's still freshly cooked. And since it has been cooked and re-cooked for quite some time, it really isn't crunchy anymore.

But still, how in the world do they keep it warm the whole day??? Still makes me wonder.

Those people who had nothing else to do

Imagine decades, or even centuries ago... That time when there were no radios, televisions, videos... no video games, computers, internet, mobile phones, no motorized vehicles. There was actually nothing much to do except do house chores, read books, or walk about.

But what about those people in the Northern hemispheres who had to sit through months of freezing weather every day? How else could they keep busy, especially those who had brains that were far to curious to just sit about and stare into nothingness?

Well, sometimes they do sit through nothingness and end up figuring out an explanation to a lot of things that have not been explained before their time. Gravity by Isaac Newton. The mathematical relationship of the sides of a right triangle by Pythagoras. Theory of Special Relativity by Albert Einstein. Just look through your higher mathematics books and your Science books now and you'll see so many names there, and equally, so many things to study and understand.

I remember a funny line from a high school teacher of mine, "blame all those scientists and mathematicians who had nothing else to do but discover theorems, and physical laws that we now have to suffer through to study".

So many centuries after human beings start speaking, communicating, and pondering explanations to every single thing in the world, now there is so many things to re-discover and to understand, as explained earlier by those geniuses who came before us. Yes truly, they are the geniuses of their time, savants even.

Now, there are so many other things to do, so many distractions, sometimes there is not much time to ponder those things anymore. But then again, there are a number of people who are still so passionate about discovering the undiscovered, or rediscovering things in different ways. And now, there are powerful mainframes and supercomputers to help with the quest for solutions and explanations.

Emotional Limbo

Limbo - a state of waiting or uncertainty, in which final judgement concerning the outcome of a decision is postponed, perhaps indefinitely.

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Emotional limbo is that state when you've gotten out of one relationship and have somehow gotten over it, but you've not quite completely moved on to a new one yet. Sometimes there is that emotional gap in-between.

Luckily a lot of people does not have to go through that. The luckiest people just try once, and they immediately find a love for keeps -- no more time needed to move from one to the other. There are others who just can't live without having a "someone" in their lives -- those who sashay from one relationship to the other, leaving virtually no time in-between.

I am not a stranger to emotional limbo. Most probably, I'm in one right now. And I've been there possibly a few times before. Let me describe how it goes.

The time after the dissolution of an actual relationship. It doesn't matter how short or long the relationship lasted, but what matters is how emotionally involved you were during the relationship. The more intense the emotions in the relationship, the harder it is to let go. But after the letting go, what comes next?

Sometimes you end up asking that a million times to yourself, not noticing that months, or even years, have passed. Somehow at the back of your mind, you know the answer. Somehow you know that the real question is "who comes next?"

But you can't answer that just yet, because your last relationship probably taught you that there was something wrong with the choices you made before, and you need to somehow re-think your criteria. You can't answer that yet, because part of you is afraid of the possibility of being emotionally involved and being abandoned in the end. Maybe you're just too emotionally exhausted to move on to a new relationship right away. Or maybe, you actually don't want to answer that yet, because you've found the extraordinarily wonderful satisfaction of being on your own, sans the complications of a commitment.

I, me , mine. There is no other person involved in the equation to complicate any decision that needs to be done. All that is critical is your happiness or your despair. You can spend all the time and money on yourself, pursue the things you've been wanting to do for the longest time.

There will still be times you'd miss the old times, that feeling when someone would call you everyday just to know how your day has been; when there's someone to snuggle up to during weekends that you share doing nothing at all. All that emotional residue will always be there.

Sometimes you look forward and wonder where the real love of your life could be, if you have already met him/her, or how and when you'll meet him/her and how you would know that the time has come. Anticipation for what is to come.

It's not at all bad. It's how you deal with it that can make it worthwhile. A period of waiting could be the best opportunity to do productive things or just absolutely random things. Travel. Learn a new skill. Shift careers. Meet new people. The opportunities are endless.

One nice thing to do is to write "100 things I want to do while I'm in emotional limbo," or something like that. You don't have to write all 100 in just one sitting. You can start with 10 and add to it as time goes by. I did that once before, and it turned out to be really interesting. But I didn't finish doing the 100 things, then a "someone" came along. Maybe I should do a new 100 list now?

But don't mind me, I'm just making all of this up. The emotional limbo is an abstraction I chose to create.

The Common-people's Limo

With the continually rising gas prices and the increase in fare for most public transportation, a lot of people are turning to the common-people's stretch limo, a.k.a. the MRT/LRT.

I myself travel almost the entire stretch of EDSA everyday to get to and from work, and I may say it's still quite a blessing to have MRT as a means of travel besides the regular four-wheeled public transports. I ride from Quezon Avenue station (which is 2nd from the QC end of MRT), all the way to Ayala Station (which is 3rd from the Manila side of MRT) - a total of eight (8) stations in between. I just figure out how to get to and from those MRT stations from my home and from my work. Also, the current fare for MRT is still lower than if you take the bus or the FX -- plus, you get to skip the usual EDSA traffic.

However, riding the MRT is still not a walk in the park, unless of course you are speaking about a ballpark overflowing with football fans just waiting to explode into a riot. Especially lately, it is apparent that there are now a lot more people taking the MRT to their destinations. For example, there was this one evening that I was stunned to see the entire Ayala MRT station full of people just waiting to get into the actual station itself (past the turnstiles, that is). There were far more passengers than I have ever seen Ayala station during rush hour. I heard, there have been an increase of around 500,000 passengers of the MRT station a day, since the gas prices and fares have started going up.

Nonetheless, I still choose to take the MRT. You just have to get used to the mob of people, and find little ways to make the commute a little more bearable. Here are some adaptations I have discovered so far:

- Buy a G-pass. I still believe its better than the stored-value card. It is a proximity pass (prox-card, like in Singapore!), and it is reloadable. The reloading window is separate from the actual MRT ticket counters, and there is hardly any queue for it. Another secret is that in some turnstiles, you can still get through it even if it has the red X mark, as long as it has the prox-card reader.

- The first coach. Thank God for it. I know how it was when there was not a dedicated coach for the women (and children, and elders). Now there's that coach, where you wouldn't really mind being stuck sardine-type inside, because I don't need to be wary about men who could try to take advantage (or be wary of men who stink - cause some of them really do).

- Stand on the side. While waiting to ride the MRT, it's a better idea to stand on the side of the crowd than at the back -- there's a better chance of you getting in from the sides. Also, it gives you the leeway to shift to the other door if it seems easier to get through that.

- Get in the middle. Once you get into the coach, proceed to the middle if at all possible, especially if you're going to ride all the way to the last three stations. This way, you wouldn't need to be bothered much by people getting on and off the train. But if you're only riding the MRT through 2 to 4 stations, it's best to stand near the doors so that you wouldn't have too much trouble getting out.

But, irregardless of whatever precautions or adaptations you make, always bear in mind that MRT is and will always be a battlefield. You always have to be ready for any inconvenience you can encounter. You will always have to wait, one way or another. There may be times you may be implored to be nice to some people (I gave a tissue once to this little girl who was all sticky, eating a piece of watermelon while waiting for the train. There was another time I had to keep myself from getting mad at another passenger who almost fell during the ride but ended up stepping (quite painfully) on my foot). But most times you will need to be as selfish as possible (like during times you need to know the difference between a real queue from that which you can skip, ignoring the dismay of the people around you). At the end of the day, the MRT ride will always be each man for himself (or each woman for herself).

Avenue Q - The Farewell Run

Friday night at RCBC plaza. The auditorium was filled with young professionals and theatre aficionados. It was the night I was watching Avenue Q. I've been listening to the soundtrack for the past few months, and that alone was something I really enjoyed. I wanted to be able to experience it in its entirety. And truely, it did not disappoint.

Avenue Q is a parody of Sesame Street. It is a play featuring human puppets, monster puppets, and humans. The story revolves around Princeton, a young man straight out of college, starting to explore the real world. He moves in to Avenue Q (a fictional street in the outskirts of New York) as he was starting to deal with the challenges of jobs, relationships, and the search for purpose. There are characters who are recognizably parodies of some Sesame Street characters, like the roommates Rod and Nicky who are like Bert and Ernie, and Trekkie Monster who has the similarity to Cookie Monster. The characters are already in their 20s and 30s struggling through their own challenges in life. It also has its own share of profanities, as well as a lot of reference to porn, sex, and homosexuality.

It was really dedicated to the generation who grew up on Sesame Street and Batibot. After all, that generation (myself included) are the ones who are now in their 20s and 30s probably going through the same struggles as these characters. The younger generation would probably not be able to catch the other subtle references of the play to Sesame Street and Batibot. For example, during the start, there was a video intro that looked so similar to the Batibot opening sequence.

My favorite characters were the "bad-idea bear", who always had their way at getting the main characters into trouble, but making it seem like their trying to help them out. They show how cute and adorable temptation always seem to be (haha!).

I also adore Carla Guevara, the one who played Kate Monster and Lucy the Slut for this season. I'm sure it's a real challenge to play the two extremely different characters (in terms of voice and attitude), and she did it really well.

Their next run will be in Singapore. I'm greatly recommending this, it's really a great show!

Peace or Extreme Joy

Look into a still body of water - a lake, a pond, or steady water in a pool. In this, there is a certain kind of calm, a relaxed state of being. It denotes a sense of peace.

Disturb this pool of water, and you will find yourself making waves. The greater the disturbance, the bigger the waves. The waves peak, creating highs in the water which it couldn't have reached if it was left alone. But with these peaks, troughs are also created. The troughs' depth is directly related to the height of the peaks. The higher the peak of the waves, the deeper its troughs. Happiness - Sadness. Extreme Joy - Extreme Sorrow.

Would you rather feel peace, or would you welcome extreme joy even if it meant that extreme sorrow would probably be not far behind?

It's honestly a difficult choice. Last year I encountered the biggest waves in my life... it probably was a tsunami already. I experienced the highest and the lowest points in my life ever. But looking back at it now, I probably won't trade them for anything. I felt more alive because of the rollercoaster ride of my life last year.

But being at peace feels also a different kind of good. For one, it's less likely that there would be great disappointments. The peace itself is its own reward.

I'm loving the peace in my life right now. But somehow I'm missing the intensity of last year.

Budget

I know that I'm not the only person in the world who keeps track of her expenses using an excel file. But please tell me if this sounds quite new to you... because maybe I just belong to the crowd that has this knack for monitoring their financials, and everything else in their lives.

The financial monitoring spreadsheet I'm using right now is a third version already. I started monitoring my personal cash flows since I started working. They say, you become more critical of your spending when you are already earning to spend. At first, I simply listed all the items that I spend on and their corresponding values. This was just to have a feel of how much I spend on which items. After a few months, I decided to start allocating a budget for the different things I spend on - food, transportation, other basic expenses (medicine, toilettries, etc.), and non-basic expenses (books, clothes, etc.). Then I monitored my expenses per category for each day, and then summarized them to see if I have any budget left for the rest of the month.

I don't earn a lot from work. Well, I do earn more than most other people in the country my age, but for my capability I may say I am not earning enough. I recently transferred to a new work not because of the salary, but only because of the experience it entails. I still am earning less than I'm supposed to, and even spending a little more on the basics (food & transportation) compared to where I used to work. Thus, there is really a need for me to budget my earnings for my spending, lest I end up bankrupt.

So far the third version of my financial monitoring spreadsheet is doing well. I have a sheet which records, in summary, my total monthly debit and credit from my two bank accounts. In another sheet, I record my total spending per category per day, which then automatically summarizes it weekly and monthly. The third sheet shows the allocated budget for each category for the month, the total actual spending for each category for the month, and the remaining budget.

I do, however, record my big spendings separately - plane tickets, expensive items (watch, gadgets, jewelries), etc. I don't consider them under the budgeted categories. They are what I spend my supposed savings on. Therefore, I have no savings to speak of at the moment, ever since I started working. Especially now, I am somehow financially desperate since I am just getting out of the transition from one work to another, which entailed more expenses and less income.

But may I say, I think I did pretty well with the budgeting this past month. I have so far stayed within budget. I will probably re-allocate some budget for the next month, and I am able to determine which items I can try spending less on.

I cannot say I am an expert on this. It takes different ways for different people to sort out their finances. But if you would like to know how I exactly do this, I'd be glad to help out. :)

Keep Looking

These are times I'm brought back to the Shaider era... Remember "Time space warp"? That's how I refer to moments when things go missing when they're not supposed to. There are no simple explanations to these things in life, except perhaps the "existence" of black holes.

Case No. 1. The case of the missing file. There's this particular file I was working on, but a day or two after, I couldn't locate it in my files. I kept looking and looking and then decided to just get the copy I sent via email to a colleague. I couldn't figure out where the file went.

Case No. 2. The case of the missing report. Where I used to work, we had several regular monthly/quarterly/annual reports that we prepare for the GMs. There was this time when there was a report that went completely missing. I knew I had it printed already and submitted it to my immediate superior. My superior was sure she endorsed it already. It still had to be signed by the big boss. Weeks after, after we almost completely forgot about it, we realize we haven't released it yet, but couldn't completely figure out where it went. Thus, we had to print it again, and have it endorsed and signed again.

Case No. 3. The case of the missing area. When doing actual computations, its not uncommon to miss by a few measures, depending on the one who's measuring or computing, and depending on the method. The only problem is when you end up missing the mark by a few hundred. We were validating the size of the different areas of the building for our project, but we were completely confused because there was a few hundred square meters missing from the computation. We spent almost an entire day of trying to figure out where the missing area was.

There are still several stories like this I know about, but I can't distinctly remember. So, how did these things end? You're supposed to keep looking until you find it, or at least until you realize there really is nothing to look for.

Case No. 1 Resolution. The file was indeed saved in the computer, just in a different drive/folder.

Case No. 2 Resolution. The report got stuck with the big boss... I don't know how and why. It just reappeared a week or two after we prepared a different set of report for release already. In other words, the initial report was stuck for signature by the big boss for more than a month.

Case No. 3 Resolution. After careful scrutiny, and not finding the few hundred square meters that was missing, we re-discovered the discrepancy between two versions of area measurements that were being used. The area that was missing did not exist, in theory. But it's something we still need to align sometime soon.

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By definition a black hole is a region where matter collapses to infinite density, and where, as a result, the curvature of spacetime is extreme. Moreover, the intense gravitational field of the black hole prevents any light or other electromagnetic radiation from escaping. But where lies the "point of no return" at which any matter or energy is doomed to disappear from the visible universe?

At the center of a black hole lies the singularity, where matter is crushed to infinite density, the pull of gravity is infinitely strong, and spacetime has infinite curvature. Here it's no longer meaningful to speak of space and time, much less spacetime. Jumbled up at the singularity, space and time cease to exist as we know them.

http://archive.ncsa.uiuc.edu/Cyberia/NumRel/BlackHoleAnat.html

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I'm not making any point, am I? Maybe the only point I am making is that perhaps only a blackhole can explain the complete and utter disappearance of anything (matter, space, light, or even time), considering that it did exist at one point. If the thing that is missing did not exist at all, then there is no point in looking

Otherwise, if it did exist, and there are no black holes anywhere nearby, it's probably best to just keep looking.

Seriously

A lesson for all the single women out there, my age, younger, and even otherwise -- never take a man seriously unless he has already taken you seriously. Never give a man your heart until you're ABSOLUTELY SURE that he's completely and absolutely serious about you.

It is our ultimate privilege as women to have the last say if we should give chance to a relationship. And as it should be, we should always seize that privilege. The latter times have given rise to what they say "equal opportunity", women being the agressive party with regards to starting relationships. I'm not saying that that is wrong. I've been there somehow, and I have some idea of what it takes to have been down that road. However, I would like to point out that in taking the initiative, we give up that opportunity to find out and filter out the good and sincere men before we even give them a chance at our hearts.

Men are supposed to prove their sincerity and genuine desire to be with us before we even decide to entertain the thought of completely giving or hearts to them. We should let them take the initiative to get to know us, to discover our best and worst, and then let them decide if they can tolerate us, if they can love us for what we are and for what we are not. Courting shouldn't be superficial where both parties excert much effort simply to impress the other.

Men and women are simply wired differently when it comes to romance, intimacy, and relationships. I can't say exactly how men view these things, but for women these are often fused together in a package that we closely associate with love. We feel a certain affinity and closeness to someone, we engage in an exchange of romantic thoughts and ideas, we ascribe intimacy to the relationship, with or without commitment. There is nothing wrong with this, except that this tend to be a bigger gamble at a possibly big heartbreak, especially when we end up giving our heart to someone who was not serious about us to begin with.

When we let them have the chance to take us for granted, we have to admit that it was our fault up to a certain degree.

Thus, before you even decide to give your whole heart to anyone, make sure he is COMPLETELY AND UTTERLY SERIOUS about you. Let him show you that. Give him the chance to show you that. You don't need to be difficult or cruel to him. But you shouldn't be all about him either. You can be sweet and caring, but only to a degree that is natural for you to be to other people around you. Let him become a genuine friend, first and foremost.

If he is indeed serious, he should make it known at the proper time. Don't push things to happen before they are meant to happen. If a man never comes through, it only means that he is not serious about you. Never fall for a man who loves his ego too much that he is afraid to risk his ego over you. That person will never be man enough for you.

A man who is serious about you will not be afraid to face your family. He will be more than willing to get to know your friends. He will care about most of the things that you care about. He will never have too little time to spend on you. He will make an effort to show his sincerity.

There are so many great and wonderful men in the world, but only a few who would truly take you seriously. It's not worth risking your heart over those unwilling others. So make an active effort to guard your heart before finding that person worth risking your heart for.

Why do we invest (emotionally)?

Invest (v)
- To spend or devote for future advantage or benefit
- To devote morally or psychologically, as to a purpose; commit
- To endow with authority or power.
- To endow with an enveloping or pervasive quality

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As with financial investments, there is always a risk to spending or putting something of value into anything. We typically invest in something, decide to devote time and energy on something hoping that it would turn out good and productive in the end.

Why then do we choose to invest emotionally? Perhaps it's like other types of investments. When we see the possibility of something good coming out of something, we choose to take the gamble and put a little of our self into it. We put a stake on something when we start to build an affinity to it.

Why do we invest in romantic relationships? We enter romantic relationships to find out the possibility of being together until the far future. You don't go into it expecting it to fail or end, although we should admit that it is still always a possibility.

So, the investment is a little of ourselves, our emotions, and our commitment. The payback we are wishing for is a wonderful future. But let's admit it, we don't always get what we are wishing for. More than anything else, emotional investments are most uncertain.

The real question is, why do we even attempt to invest emotionally, even on things that has relatively no future? Why do we keep on loving people and hoping that these people who would perhaps not disappoint? Why do we give someone else that power over our happiness?

In the end, life turns out to be one big gamble, especially on the matter of love and romantic relationships. You will never have the chance to win unless you bet on something. Oftentimes you don't win, cause it's a million-to-one chance. But if you do win, it would really change your life. It's just up to you, are you brave enough to bet with your heart?

Attraction, Respect, Love

Repost from an old, old, old post... Just don't ask me what my reasons were for writing it at that time. And don't ask my why I'm reposting it now. It's just something I wrote way back that somehow made sense, something that should be shared.

I'm not love-struck. I need not be. I just still believe.

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Attraction is logical. Respect is earned. Love is pure madness.

We can find a million and one reasons to like or not to like someone. That is attraction. It is based on rules, personal preferences that one makes consciously or unconsciously. The closer someone fits your preference, the greater the attraction. Charm, wits, a great body, a beautiful smile, wonderful expressive eyes, the right skin color and height, good social standing, secure financial position, the right career, the right name -- these are some of the things that may define the possibility of liking or not liking someone. In the end, it still is a conscious decision to like or not to like. It's largely black and white, not too much gray area.

There are some rare instances when we find people who fit all of our preferences. To us, they assume images which are god-like, almost perfect. These are often the people who qualify as Mr. Right, the one we think we have been looking for all our life. Sometimes it does work out, but sometimes it does not. At times, we get disappointed when we see the imperfections. We get disappointed because we realize that the things we have been searching for in a person seem unimportant and fleeting. There still is something missing. Thus, attraction may be a start, bit it is not everything.

Respect, on the other hand, is hard-earned. It is something that we only bestow on people whom we trust and highly regard, usually based on character and general disposition. It takes a while, a deeper knowledge of who someone is and how he deals with the world, before we can actually decide to respect someone.

In relationships, respect play an important role in almost all aspects. It takes a great deal of trust and respect before you can entrust someone with your life. Being with someone we genuinely respect gives us a sense of security. But still, respect is not everything. Though entirely difficult to earn, respect can easily be lost by some mishap or big mistake that a human being can fall into. Respect is an important thing, but it still is not everything.

Love is insanity, pure madness. Love is never over-rated. It can never-ever be explained or understood. Love does not require a reason because it is a reason in itself. Love does not measure, and love cannot be measured -- its depth, breadth, and height remain undefined. Love does not take any single form -- it could be anything. Love is illogical, it is madness. It does not know self-preservation. It entails moving, acting, and thinking in ways that are not typical of sane, logical people. Love does not require an explanation. The experience of love, both pleasurable and painful, is all that is needed to know love.

Why choose love? Because love does not reason. Love endures despite mistakes, it endures through trials and difficulties. Love never blames. Love knows no bounds. True love never ends. Beyond human reason, before the temptation at the garden of Eden, nothing existed but love. Love is the purest thing that remains. Love is everything.

Chocolates

One of the best things in the world -- Chocolates. But one thing you should know, no two chocolates are equal. Not that one chocolate is better than the rest -- it still depends on the person who appreciates it.

I, for one, loves dark chocolates more than anything else. I like milk chocolates depending on their type and quality and make. I don't like white chocolate -- I still believe they're not chocolate at all. But I like chocolates in general.

Top of mind chocolates include:

1. Truffettes de France!!! The most amazing truffles coated in cocoa powder that truly melts wonderfully in your mouth. My uncles always bring some everytime they visit us from Vancouver, but I discovered they have a store in Shangri-la. My officemates from San Miguel would testify to how heavenly these chocolates are. I'd have to warn you on two things though. These truffles are a little bit expensive. And, they melt really really easily in our climate so you have to put them in the fridge immediately.


2. Royce chocolates. Their chocolate-covered potato chips is something unique, and really good. There's that salty sweet taste that you will always crave for. I was also able to try the Bitter Nama Chocolate from Royce. Very rich dark chocolate, dusted with cocoa powder. Each piece satisfies more than anything else.


3. Godiva Chocolates. Another one of those expensive chocolates. So far I have tried a few pieces of their truffles and their tiny chocolates (the ones that range from milk chocolate to 80% chocolate, the really bitter type). They're good... but I haven't had enough to be able to say a lot about them. Maybe I need more. :p


4. Andes Mint Chocolates. I love mint chocolates, and this one tops my list in this range. They're just slim, tiny chocolates packed with so much mint and chocolate flavor. I just can't get enough of these.


5. Ferrero Rocher. One of my all-time favorite. The sweets consist of a whole roasted hazelnut encased in a thin wafer shell filled with nutella/hazelnut cream and covered in milk chocolate and chopped hazelnuts (description from wikipedia). I also love the gelato (italian ice cream) version of it that I found in Vancouver.


6. 3 Musketeers. Simple pleasures. Chocolate bars with a fluffy chocolate nougat filling in the middle. It is the chocolate bar I like the most.



7. M&Ms. Who doesn't love these little candy-covered chocolate treats? They have so many varieties now, but the classic is still the best. I also like the one with peanuts, and the dark chocolate and mint chocolate versions.


8. Kisses. Also a popular favorite, like M&Ms. Rich and creamy smacks of chocolates wrapped in foil. I particularly love unwrapping them. I like the ones with almonds inside too.

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Well, there are also chocolates I particularly don't like. I've mentioned white chocolates already. I also am not fond of chocolates with fruit fillings, like cherry or coconut, or whatever. I'm not a fan of Toblerone, but I will eat them nonetheless.

Note: Pictures taken from their respective sources online (can't remember them all actually)

On Being Superwoman

What does it take to be a superwoman? First of all, be involved with the right thing at the right time. I mean, you have to be involved with something that would demand so much from you that you wouldn't have any other choice but to be superwoman.

Take building a Science Museum, for example.

I've been barely four weeks into the Science Museum project. For this, I dropped my world of beer and bacon back in Ortigas. It was a place of complacency, but I had to give it up and take a big leap.

It's only been three weeks since I got into the Science Museum project, but I probably learned and did more than I did for six months where I previously worked. I've met and interacted with probably more than a hundred different people from different fields -- arts, science, design, construction, management, and what-nots. I've monitored 120-plus email threads -- not just individual emails but email threads averaging around 5 responses for each. I'm running out of pages in my everything-im-doing-at-work notebook. Hard copy of important files are starting to pile up in my file folder. My electronic files, on the other hand, have also started to accumulate, but not before I could segregate them into 10 or more different folders.

I practically have to be on top of everything that's going on with the development and execution of the science museum. I am the project development assistant... and for this I am superwoman.

So much demand. So many different challenges to face. For one, I had to learn about the different aspects of designing a special-purpose building. It was something entirely strange to me, an industry I have never encountered before. The past four wednesdays have been a crash course for me, and somehow I think I'm starting to catch up. It is also part of my responsibility to ensure that we are able to obtain all the permits and licenses we need for the project on time. On top of all, I have to be involved with monitoring the budget and the timeline for the project.

I somehow knew what I was getting myself into. I've anticipated this much demand from the work before I even started. Because of this, I made it a point to devise a way to monitor everything I'm doing and everything I needed to do, since I'm just bad at remembering things. I made a system, and somehow the OC person in me just resurfaced:

- The OC notebook. Mark with the date (compulsive date stamping, actually). Write down one by one everything that has been done or has to be done or has been discussed for the day. Refer to for the next day. Make sure everything that needs to be done is addressed.

- Post-its, post-its, post-its.

- Gmail is my ultimate tool.

- Paper clips and more post-its. I put together all related documents and clip them together, then mark their purpose. Makes looking for files a lot easier.

- Task list. An excel file with different task items categorized according to different aspects of the project.

- My lovely laptop. Without which I am nothing.

My system somehow works. There's still a lot of keeping up to do, however. And everything is just bound to become more hectic in the days to come. I'm bracing myself for that.

My World Online

I'm not so sure why, but I have this certainty of who I am online, in a different way from who I am when I'm out in the world. My fancy for the online world has started back in high school, the time of 30-hour per month dialup that I had to share with my siblings. There was one summer that I had to live through without using the landline (during the times when cellphones were still as big as shoes and are too costly to have) and thus resorted to chatting online. A lot of connections have been going on online. My first boyfriend started courting me by sending a note online. I've had a fling who became a good friend whom I first met inside a chatroom. I've fought with and made up (sometimes) with some people online. I've had friends fly off one by one abroad, and we've kept connections through the internet. I've even practically worked through my group projects in the university by doing most of them online with my groupmates.

I've lived through the high times of MIRC, ICQ, and now it's YM. I've had email addresses at hotmail, lycos, edsamail, but the ones I'm now using are Gmail and Yahoo. I am currently a slave to Friendster and Multiply. I check them each and every day. My sister mocks me for remaining a slave to Friendster in this period when everyone is moving on to Facebook. But Friendster is still valuable -- for stalking, err, keeping up with friends I haven't seen and haven't spoken to in a long while. I'm still not going Facebook, only for the reason that I don't want to become a slave to another online group fad. But that can change anytime.

I've had but a few blogs - one on Xanga which I kept only a few months, one on Friendster which I update very rarely, one on Multiply which is probably the most updated blog, and two or three anonymous blogs somewhere out there, containing some of my random insane musings, but has not been updated for a long while. One thing that I learned from blogging is, however interesting you think your life is, there is only a very few people who are eager to know about it. And yet, I continue to blog, thinking that I do have something interesting to say.

I know I have interesting thoughts, intriguing ideas, hidden somewhere in the recesses of my brain. I am admitted that I am a seeker of attention both online and offline. And thus, the number of hits on my page do matter to me.

I still have a life outside cyberspace. I would not say I am a slave to the corporate world -- yet I still move in it. At the moment I would like to think that I have the best job in the world, however bloody challenging it is and however poorly it pays. I have a social life that's good enough for my standards. I continue to pursue some of my personal interests, like music and business. I say I have everything a young woman could ever need, but not exactly everything I could ask for. For one, I have a non-existent lovelife, but I'm good with not having to deal with that at the moment.

However, my cyber-life (no malicious thoughts, please) has become a very important part of my being. It has become more of a need than an extra - it's like midnight snacks... something that can be considered unnecessary, but something I've gotten so used to that I can't eliminate it from my life.