There are days when I think I'm losing my edge. But usually that just happens when I have nothing to sink my teeth in. Lately I have though, and it's great. Maybe I'm just in search of validation. But I still have my edge. And then that just scares me.

What happens now?

I honestly don't know.


Just when I think I've gotten everything under go control, there it goes again.

india.arie

corinne bailey rae

fiona apple

imogen heap

sarah maclachlan

Every song tells my story.

Grabe.

Gusto kong umiyak pero hindi ko kaya.

I should just laugh it off.

Ha.

***

Wala lang.

Mukhang natapos na rin ang pagka-senti ko. Patawad na lang kung medyo malabo ang mga sinulat ko kahapon. Ang dami lang talagang mga g*go sa mundo. At syempre nakakamiss din ang pagdadrama ng walang dahilan, noh.

Isa akong masayang tao. Masayang-masayang masaya!

Balewala na yung mga problema sa pag-ibig, hindi naman talaga yan problema e. Ako pa! Ako ata ang nagpasimuno ng buong kalokohan na ito. Medyo nababaliw lang naman ako paminsan-minsan pero sa totoo lang alam ko naman talaga na walang kwenta lahat ng pinagsasabi ko.  Tulad nga ng sabi ko dati, nag-iimbento ako ng sarili kong mga problema dahil mas makulay ang buhay na ala-telanobela. Di ba?

Yun lang naman. Para malinaw lang sa ating lahat na hindi ako sawi.

Oh dear. My Tagalog is getting really rusty. 

***

Not another Valentine's Day. I mean, who would be retarded enough to come up with such a lame excuse of sick commercial gimmickry? Call me cynical because I guess I am. Valentine's Day is yet another torture device for people who just don't happen to be happily coupled-up come February 14. Obviously I'd be singing a much different song had certain things been different in certain ways, and I admit that (yes, I do!).

Denial, denial, denial. Over four months of relentless denial and you know what? Didn't quite work out for me. And the worst thing about is that, while I am sitting here in my room, my fingers tapping away feverishly, my mind racing through those few memories, he doesn't care at all. Not at all. Why am I the one left all alone with my heart bleeding all over the place? I have so many questions, so many what-ifs, so many should-have-beens and could-have-beens. I know there's no one else to blame but myself. It was a terrible lapse of my better judgment and now I'm paying for it. I allowed myself to get carried away. I allowed myself to be deluded that maybe, just maybe, things might work out. I allowed myself to be so open and vulnerable.

I lost something I will never get back. I lost something to a person I will never hear from again.

And what's even worse is that I don't regret any of it. In fact I choose to cherish the memory of it, trying to preserve its picture-perfect image in my mind. I know it was just a snapshot, a preview you might say, of even better things to come.

But until then, if you ever find a moment, spare a thought for me.

***

It's been a very long while since I last wrote a super saccharine, cringe-inducing piece, the kind of which filled pages and pages of my little plaid diaries. Funny, for as long as I can remember I've always been the cheesy, emotional, hopeless romantic one. I could elaborate on that phase of my life with sarcastic glee (after all, I am at my best when I make fun of myself at my worst) but that's a tried-and-tested route by now. I have sworn off everything cheesy and all that it implies. You can't blame me for that. I'd either have to be a complete masochist or just plain crazy if I'd stay the same happy-go-lucky, wide-eyed idealist I was when I was fourteen. After all, it's been more than five years now...

Five years, five disappointing bittersweet heartbreaks. Five. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. My sentiment exactly. You'd think after all the drama and dysfunction I'd know better. Ha. Well, it's not as if things got progressively worse, but they didn't get any better either. What about that latest one, you ask? To be perfectly honest, I still haven't figured that out yet myself. It was like a beautiful, cozy fairytale that suddenly pulled out from under me and doused my head with a bucket of freezing cold water. Talk about a rude awakening. And to think I practically gave everything up. And for what? A sweet, winsome beginning that somehow, just somehow, twisted itself into an abrupt ending. I'm still scratching my head in bewilderment and wondering whether I should be crying my eyes out or laughing my head off.

But seriously, no sympathies please. The last thing I need is pity for pity's sake.

***

Snow is cold. Very cold. And it makes me sick. But I still love it nonetheless. It's all gleaming white outside my window. Apparently the winter service that clears out the snow hasn't arrived yet and there's a soft blanket of white everywhere I look.  But my poor sick self has to stay in with my own version of something soft and white - a huge bundle of tissue paper that looks like it'll need replenishing soon.

Oh forget about the cold. I just couldn't resist! Another round of pictures and snowballs (and even more sniffles) but it was all worth it.

***

Sigh.

Ever watched Heroes? Or Gilmore Girls, maybe?

Peter Petrelli is irrestible. Go Google him.

There's nothing better than curling up to the latest episode of Peter Petrelli and a whole bar of Cadbury Dairy Milk.

Mmmmmh.

I still can't decide which one is more scrumptious.

I'm such a sucker for dark-haired guys with dreamy eyes.

***

This weekend has been one long hangover. Well that's not entirely true. Most of it was spent either being hungover (as I just said) or in the process of getting hungover (you know what I mean). All of it of course, was under the guise of the IUB Open 2007, our little annual debating tournament for which I contributed a small part of behind-the-scenes action. Mostly I was sent scrurrying all around town searching for plain blue balloons (which for some some reason only exist in the back of a dusty department store shelf) or picking up dainty little things at our local Ikea.The three-day drinking spree kicked of with the Friday social night, otherwise known as the "exclusive party hosted by those debating guys" which featured absolutely free drinks for all staff members (that includes me). The next day saw me with probably the worst hangover I've ever had ever since I took a sip of my first Beck's bier. After huffing and puffing on the aforementioned balloons, I was again ready for Phase Two - the Debate Party, this year dubbed as Supreme Debauchery Reloaded, where again I had access to a couple of free drinks. It was an excellent party, as far as I remember, obviously jam-packed, great DJ, and only one cute guy from the whole lot of them (and even he turned out to be quite boring... oh well). The next day I somehow managed to drag myself downtown for the Grand Final, which I think was quite a good debate, although I was still reeling from the previous night's activities. Which then very smoothly leads me to tonight, the infamous Staff After-Party. I decided to take it easy, just a few beers here and there and I called it a night. I really can't afford to miss my 8:15 class or show up to the Academic Council meeting looking terribly wasted.

 

***

Happy New Year. What else can I say? I've had a slow start, not the big bang I usually have at the beginning of another year. No resolutions, no promises, no lists of things I have to do this year, no pondering about what I've done in my life so far, nothing. Nada. Zip. Nil. Zilch. Or some other synomyn for that. You get what I mean, right?

If you know me well enough you're probably wondering what in the world is wrong with me. Like whatever happened to the Kristina you know? The crazy bundle of adrenaline that nothing could ever pull down? Or the Kristina who..... ayayyay. I'm just tired. Really I am. It's almost 3 in the morning and I really have nothing else to say. So much for the warm, enlightening missive I had in mind. But that's that.

And while I'm at it I might as well provide something the least bit substantial for you to chew on. I'm graduating (if all goes well) in four months. And then I'm going home for a while. Grad school? No. Work? Maybe. That is, if anyone in their right mind would think of hiring a 19-year-old girl who claims to have a Bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science with possibly some knowledge of something useful to do.

To round off this rambling piece let me say this: I'm still waiting.

Stay tuned for more...

***

I love Christmas. Believe me, I do. It's by far my favorite holiday. And it's such a pity that right after that warm Christmas feeling rolls off the absolute worst season comes and jumps in your face - the sick commercial gimmicry that is otherwise known to the dreamy-eyed masses as Valentine's Day. But I digress. My first 17 Christmases were spent at home, with my family, just like any other Christmas. On my 18th Christmas I was with my grandmother and my aunt and her family in New Jersey. And last Christmas I was on a plane back to Manila. This year it's worse. I will be here. In Germany. In IUB, I mean Jacobs University Bremen (as of Spring 2007). Today I was cutting out paper snowflakes and rummaging for Christmas decorations from all the crap in my basement locker. And not to mention, listening to Christmas songs that made me want to cry (or puke, depending on which song of course). So basically it's my first Christmas away from anything that can be remotely called home.

Of course IUB is home in plenty of ways already. I've been living here for more than two years. I have met so many interesting people, made amazing friendships, and learned more than one thing about living my life. But it's not home. It can never be. It's a worldly place. No one is particularly in that Christmas mood. You can't feel that Christmas is in the air (hmm, but I guess you can blame finals week for that). Which reminds me, I actually still have another final on Tuesday. That leaves me only five days to get into the proper Christmas spirit. How I wish I were home.

***

"Oh sure, that's easy."

Yeah right.

Nothing's ever easy. I have just finished correcting 53 final exams for this course.  I wrote two questions for it (yes I did, and don't be so baffled about it), and now I realize that nothing, and I mean nothing, can ever be too easy. And I have the numbers to back me up.

Naturally that doesn't just go for electrical engineering. If I wanted to sound horribly clichéd I would say that the same goes for life in general. Why is it that absolutely anything, given the right kind of thinking, can suddenly become a metaphor for life? Why do we have to keep comparing life to something else as if we weren't living our life already? Or maybe life is just too muddled up and convoluted that we have to factor it down into its prime components, simplify and deconstruct, strip it down to its bare essentials in the hope that somehow, in that dire process, we can find what it actually is we're looking for.

But anyway, that's besides the point.

***