the world under a red umbrella

scene from a recent past

writing about 5 years of immersion seem anticlimactic. something more dramatic should cap off the years spent hiking kilometers of bad road, scolding kids, sleeping in chapels, and haggling with jeepney drivers. something like levoscoliosis. bwahahahhaha!!!!

i do have that annoying ailment. i think my body is on strike. it has refused to cooperate with me anymore on matters of strenous physical activities. it even prefers a hard bed over my 20+ year old mattress!

but this is it. my body has declared that it will no longer carry me and carry out my obsession with mountains and kids. mountains and kids. you'll be surprised at how deeply they learn from each other. but that's for another post.

i will no longer handle the immersion next year. my body has even convinced two of my umbrellas to retire and so they lost themselves.

next year i will be bound to my cubicle and a boring 18 loader. i will content myself with a moderating class and try my best to help them win at least one class contest. i shall be consoled with trips to asia that may or may not happen over the summer. i shall sit in idleness and take all gossip seriously. i will make powerpoints of all my lessons and strategize to make kids at least notice church history. gad, i could even write a book with all the free time i have!

and i shall miss the scene above. i shall pine for corned beef and danggit and tuna cheesemelt. ...gad!

the joy that's in it

let me tell you my plans.

i want to be able to travel the world for the joy that's in it. i dont want to go as a tourist. to be a tourist is simply to look at the surface of things. i could look at webshots for that. i want to be with people. to be able to talk to them and maybe learn their language. i want to be able to go to places not in the tourist map. i pray God will grant me that.

i want to go to Thailand and teach Burmese refugees for the joy that's in it. I want to stay for two months (if XUHS allows) and teach English to these kids. I've heard how they love to learn from volunteers. i pray God will show me how to get there.

i want to have a laptop for the joy that's in it. i want to be able to make my lessons and letters and powerpoints and movies without the hassle of going downtown or waiting for my turn at the pc. i know i can do much with that technology in my hands. i pray SOMEONE will give me one. haha.

i want a blue-eyed baby for the joy that's in it. ok, this is probably too far-fetched and nobody out there would willingly donate blue-eyed baby sperms to me on a test tube. but i'd want to be able to claim a relative who wont look like me. there's no logic there, i know! but i want, want, want! i pray somebody blue-eyed will stumble on this blog and e-mail me. hahaha! eewww!

it's free to dream. that's all i want.

and oh, i want world peace.

for the joy that's in it.

too tired to be kind

i hope that you will understand how important it is for me that you do not disappoint me.

i am tired of being too understanding.

i am entitled to be angry. i'm not used to it. but i need to now.

i have my limits after all. sometimes one just needs to stop making excuses for everybody.

i am too tired to be kind.

what is essential is invisible to the eye

ten minutes ago, i was at the height of overwhelming curiosity...
nine minutes ago, my eyes were wide with awe and disbelief...
seven minutes ago, i felt uncomfortable stirrings of envy...
two minutes ago, i was wallowing in self-pity...
a minute ago, i opened blogger and signed in.

it took stories captured in photographs to make me feel all these emotions. a picture paints a thousand words. in this case, those pictures just gave me a novel!

so what is my antsy self about this time? well, friendster started it. this amazing site helped me reconnect with my childhood buddies. its with great amazement that i found out that many of them have been surfing the world for years! woah! and here i am still dreaming about it with thailand as the ONLY feasible place i can afford to go to.

just to make myself feel worse (i can be masochistic), i opened my own friendster photos. to my shame all i see are immersion pics, xuhs pics, and siargo pics. worse, any viewer could see the glamour of my work! teacher.me. NO snow, NO fireworks, NO disneyland, NO blue-eyed blonde anywhere! just mountains, dilapidated chapels, dust, sweat ( i swear the viewer could smell us!), islands (how unique. there should be a yacht somewhere), and to my horror, CORNFIELDS! before my heart sank down to my banana peels, i gave a sigh of disgust. everyone has been everywhere but me.

why? because i choose to teach.

you can say this is an after-effect of bro. francis' how do you keep the music playing but after i got over (a little) my envy of my globe-trotting friends and shame over my rustic lifestlye, i went over my photos again. i did nt see snow, fireworks,temples,disneyland but what is there is just as awesome. can be even more so!

i saw how i choose my life.

i still envy my friends but i cannot be ashamed of my choices. those pictures that i have are NOT ABOUT PLACES, its about PEOPLE. and thats the most essential thing. heaven is where my heart is. it is with the persons i chose to invest my life with. and when i look at those pictures again, the words they say are more romantic than snow falling over bridges, more powerful than a dozen fireworks, more grand than a royal palace, more awesome than mickey mouse. i see my life and i see people who make up my life. and i am grateful.

ten minutes ago, i opened blogger and signed in.
five minutes ago i was overwhelmed by sadness.
three minutes ago, i was ecstatic with realization.
a minute ago,i said I AM GRATEFUL.

now, i publish.