Saturday, April 27, 2002
The American bangungot. The thing with the American dream is that it is not only Americans who labor under its promise of a better future. The truth is that most Americans now look at it with jaded eyes and it is the foreigners who are blinded by its glitter. This larger than life perspective on the promise of life in "the States" is in no small part a result of Julia Roberts smile, Bruce Willis' bulging biceps (eww, what a turn of phrase!), Arnold Swarzenegger's smoking gun, Meg Ryan's happily-ever-after love affairs, and _____ (put name of celebrity here)'s __________(think of any stunt that a Hollywood actor has done and fill in the blank).
I've seen so many people give up a rather comfortable existence here just so they can earn American dollars. Earlier this year, three of my officemates quit their jobs to go to the US. Two of them were singles, in their mid to late 30s, who were anxious to see what opportunities awaited them at the other side of the Pacific ocean. Their anxiety was in part fueled by the fact that they've stayed at the University for more than six years and yet nothing of significance to their careers happened. I could understand why they were willing to risk everything. Maybe they felt they were single anyway, they were still quite young, and there was nothing tying them down here.
Unfortunately, I couldn't say the same for their friend. She was single alright but she had an adopted son to raise. Besides, it wasn't as if she was destitute. After working for several years, she was able to buy her own house and get a nice car. But she wanted to go to America because her career was going nowhere and she had to think of the child she had to raise. So she sold everything: the car, the house, and the stuff inside the house. She left her adopted son with her mother and went off to America to find a better future.
Now she's breaking her back working as an aide at a nursing home. Now she's taking care of big-boned and cranky senior citizens instead of her office job. Whereas before she had a rather comfortable home, now she lives in a cramped apartment she shares with other Filipinos. In six months, when her visa expires, she'll be forced to move from place to place and evade deportation back to the Philippines.
If it's any consolation, however, she'll now be sending precious dollars home to see the son who will never know her through school.
Wednesday, April 24, 2002
I've seen so many people give up a rather comfortable existence here just so they can earn American dollars. Earlier this year, three of my officemates quit their jobs to go to the US. Two of them were singles, in their mid to late 30s, who were anxious to see what opportunities awaited them at the other side of the Pacific ocean. Their anxiety was in part fueled by the fact that they've stayed at the University for more than six years and yet nothing of significance to their careers happened. I could understand why they were willing to risk everything. Maybe they felt they were single anyway, they were still quite young, and there was nothing tying them down here.
Unfortunately, I couldn't say the same for their friend. She was single alright but she had an adopted son to raise. Besides, it wasn't as if she was destitute. After working for several years, she was able to buy her own house and get a nice car. But she wanted to go to America because her career was going nowhere and she had to think of the child she had to raise. So she sold everything: the car, the house, and the stuff inside the house. She left her adopted son with her mother and went off to America to find a better future.
Now she's breaking her back working as an aide at a nursing home. Now she's taking care of big-boned and cranky senior citizens instead of her office job. Whereas before she had a rather comfortable home, now she lives in a cramped apartment she shares with other Filipinos. In six months, when her visa expires, she'll be forced to move from place to place and evade deportation back to the Philippines.
If it's any consolation, however, she'll now be sending precious dollars home to see the son who will never know her through school.
Wednesday, April 24, 2002
Can we please stop saving the world? Everyone in Malacaņang and those just dying to get their foot in the door are now scrambling to explain their side of the issue. It seems that a group calling itself "Freedom Forces" have been caught red-handed plotting to put up a military junta. Now that names are being mentioned, these "forces" are distancing themselves, insisting that when they said collective leadership they merely meant a group that would advise the President on what and what not to do. They never contemplated setting up a junta.
Heh! Your logic stinks. Granting that all you wanted to do was to "advise" the President, what made you think that the advise would be welcome? The fact that you guys are now without any position, having lost in your bid for one during the elections, means that the Filipino people do not exactly appreciate the stuff your brain comes up with. This is why you lost: because we didn't want you messing around with our lives.
The problem with having Catholicism as the national (though not official) religion is that you have tons of people (from ALL walks of life) raring to try their hand at being small-time messiahs. Everybody is out to save everybody else. And this is why everything is a mess.
Tuesday, April 23, 2002
Heh! Your logic stinks. Granting that all you wanted to do was to "advise" the President, what made you think that the advise would be welcome? The fact that you guys are now without any position, having lost in your bid for one during the elections, means that the Filipino people do not exactly appreciate the stuff your brain comes up with. This is why you lost: because we didn't want you messing around with our lives.
The problem with having Catholicism as the national (though not official) religion is that you have tons of people (from ALL walks of life) raring to try their hand at being small-time messiahs. Everybody is out to save everybody else. And this is why everything is a mess.
Tuesday, April 23, 2002
I was making myself useless around the office, surfing the remaining 30 minutes before 5:30. I was following link after link after link and I suddenly came upon this site on Cover chains. Here's a list of covers of and by Radiohead.
Sunday, April 21, 2002
Sunday, April 21, 2002
How things are. I haven't been able to write as much as I want to lately. I've been busy in the office, trying to make all the deadlines that seem about to blindside me all at the same time.
There's SemEnder, a newsletter for the posh parents of our equally (if not more) posh students. The grades will be sent out on the week of Apr 22-27. This means that I have to be done photocopying and folding about 2,500 copies by Wednesday, at the latest. Latest estimates put the number of those reproduced and folded at around 1,500. Whew, there's a lot more folding to be done and my arms and back are already protesting. It would have been easier if I had help. Well, after being hunched up at my table folding and folding and folding hundreds of copies without so much as a "Hey, what are you doing?" thrown at me, I finally realized that my officemates are not inclined to help me. I'm not so sure I want their help either. Last semester, Minch helped me fold some of them and I was appalled at the lack of quality of her folding. It killed me everytime I saw how the corners weren't aligned. I'd refold them whenever she wasn't looking. Which meant double the effort for me.
Another thing lined up is the University website that I've been working on for what seems ages now. The layout is all done. All we have to do is place the text on the page, something that I promised to be completed in March. Hey, it's not like I purposely meant for the work to be delayed. As you may have already noted, I'm taking care of so many other things (the folding!) besides the website. If it were up to me, I'd want everything to be done by June, before I go back to school. Based on how things are moving, however, it looks like there's not much chance of that happening.
I've also been fixated lately with revising the layout of this page. I lose my motivation to write whenever I realize how I'm not exactly loving the layout. I also want to make things a little simpler--get rid of all these boxes at the sides, plus the other pages, and just stick to this weblog. I never get to update the other content anyway, so why waste your time checking out the other pages?
There's so much to do and there's so little time. I wish someone builds a time machine already.
There's SemEnder, a newsletter for the posh parents of our equally (if not more) posh students. The grades will be sent out on the week of Apr 22-27. This means that I have to be done photocopying and folding about 2,500 copies by Wednesday, at the latest. Latest estimates put the number of those reproduced and folded at around 1,500. Whew, there's a lot more folding to be done and my arms and back are already protesting. It would have been easier if I had help. Well, after being hunched up at my table folding and folding and folding hundreds of copies without so much as a "Hey, what are you doing?" thrown at me, I finally realized that my officemates are not inclined to help me. I'm not so sure I want their help either. Last semester, Minch helped me fold some of them and I was appalled at the lack of quality of her folding. It killed me everytime I saw how the corners weren't aligned. I'd refold them whenever she wasn't looking. Which meant double the effort for me.
Another thing lined up is the University website that I've been working on for what seems ages now. The layout is all done. All we have to do is place the text on the page, something that I promised to be completed in March. Hey, it's not like I purposely meant for the work to be delayed. As you may have already noted, I'm taking care of so many other things (the folding!) besides the website. If it were up to me, I'd want everything to be done by June, before I go back to school. Based on how things are moving, however, it looks like there's not much chance of that happening.
I've also been fixated lately with revising the layout of this page. I lose my motivation to write whenever I realize how I'm not exactly loving the layout. I also want to make things a little simpler--get rid of all these boxes at the sides, plus the other pages, and just stick to this weblog. I never get to update the other content anyway, so why waste your time checking out the other pages?
There's so much to do and there's so little time. I wish someone builds a time machine already.
A peek into the future. This is what the tarot cards promised. Tempted with the prospect of looking into how things will turn out, I had no choice but to say "yes". Well, I'm glad I did because the future looks so much better than my present.
A more financially gratifying future is being laid out for me by the forces in the cosmos. Either a new job or a new opportunity awaits: both of which promise more money for me. And consequently, more taxes for the government, but I don't want to think about that right now. Also in the cards is romance. Well, this is welcome news. (Yes, Kate, I know you may be sniggering right now, but it really is a pleasant possibility.) The upshot, however, is that any romantic liaison being cultivated with someone from a legal background is bound to fail. Uggh, there goes my future with The One Who Shall Not be Named (and yes, Kate. he's NOT Valdemort).
You can see how I'm in an optimistic mindset right now. I had a tarot reading about a year ago and the cards weren't exactly nice to me. It seems that, finally, Whoever is Controlling Everything in the Universe is now pleased with me. It's not such a surprise since I've been a good person for the past year. He he, I've earned it.
I'm getting all worked up with my tarot-divined future but I still haven't resolved to myself whether or not I believe in tarot readings. The pathetic loser in me wants to believe in it so badly, what with all the goodies supposedly lined up. The cynical me, however, is screaming and violently flailing her arms, trying to beat the optimistic (aka Pathetic Loser) side of me into admitting that all this is just a "pot-of-gold-at-the-end-of-the-rainbow" kind of thing.
© WHO CARES ABOUT COPYRIGHT? Please ask me though before you use my stuff. Linking is free.
A more financially gratifying future is being laid out for me by the forces in the cosmos. Either a new job or a new opportunity awaits: both of which promise more money for me. And consequently, more taxes for the government, but I don't want to think about that right now. Also in the cards is romance. Well, this is welcome news. (Yes, Kate, I know you may be sniggering right now, but it really is a pleasant possibility.) The upshot, however, is that any romantic liaison being cultivated with someone from a legal background is bound to fail. Uggh, there goes my future with The One Who Shall Not be Named (and yes, Kate. he's NOT Valdemort).
You can see how I'm in an optimistic mindset right now. I had a tarot reading about a year ago and the cards weren't exactly nice to me. It seems that, finally, Whoever is Controlling Everything in the Universe is now pleased with me. It's not such a surprise since I've been a good person for the past year. He he, I've earned it.
I'm getting all worked up with my tarot-divined future but I still haven't resolved to myself whether or not I believe in tarot readings. The pathetic loser in me wants to believe in it so badly, what with all the goodies supposedly lined up. The cynical me, however, is screaming and violently flailing her arms, trying to beat the optimistic (aka Pathetic Loser) side of me into admitting that all this is just a "pot-of-gold-at-the-end-of-the-rainbow" kind of thing.
© WHO CARES ABOUT COPYRIGHT? Please ask me though before you use my stuff. Linking is free.
