Unloading.Analyzing.Speaking to Myself?

Seven years in a foreign place that has become a home cannot be discarded. 

I miss..

The rolling waves crashing against the shore as I watch from the bayfront… The waves looking like soap suds or bubbling champagne, the bluish tint disappearing onto the brown earth. The sea is everywhere.  It is an island after all.

The fresh breeze from the ocean, my hair moving while I peer from my dad’s car window…

Sleeping at the backseat of my dad’s car as he drives me to school early in the morning. I am trying to catch some sleep before dealing with calculus and physics and computer science at the Clifton Dupigny Community College.

The cool shallow rivers…with surrounding trees that speak of some local mystery, of ghosts, of obeah (witchcraft)…

The antique looking, but updated public library…It keeps some rarities that I enjoy spending my free hours on…reading a thick book of mysteries or well-preserved classics…

Lying down on a table in our verandah in a shirt and shorts…listening to, and watching the rain pouring down hard outside… The drops feel cleansing.  The air is cool.  The mountains are filled with mist.

Hiking at Fort Shirley.  Breathing in history…the place where the French and English have battled.  Lying down on freshly mowed grass, gazing at the clouds. The sun is not harsh, but calming.

Joy rides.  Looking at the contrast of mountains and nature in all its glory, to mansions built on the edges of hills…Wondering at names of places like Massacre (pronounced as Masak) which tells of its violent history.  Morbidly gazing at cemeteries built by hillsides.

Taking a walk downtown, loving how the people have kept their culture intact while becoming modernized in fashion and technology…

Specialty and souvenir shops…

Rum and raisin ice cream (YUM)

passing by cricket games…loving the contrast of black skin on white uniform…

Asian gatherings.  Meeting with people from Japan, China, Taiwan, India, Sri Lanka and the Philippines… uniting with people who are also considered foreigners

Creole day…national costumes…Speaking in patois (patwa), a combination of French and Afrikaans… at least they do speak patois…I listen uncomprehendingly, but immersed in their feeling of pride.

Calypso, which has annoyed me before, but I now appreciate this fast moving, sometimes political music which can well be mistaken as noise by some who cannot understand.  I want to understand.

Sunday mass.  Whether you are Catholic, Born Again, Baptist or Anglican, you are in for an hour and a half or more of singing and praising.  Monsignor Jno. Lewis even sings his homily. Women are in dresses and hats.  People say hi to everyone, and go around to hug their friends during the "Peace be with you" part.

Sitting on a bench at the verandah to watch the sun set and disappear into the sea. Looking at the seemingly endless horizon

As a DIA graduate, commenting on films and commercials is quite an ordinary past time.  I cannot call the ads I have created for my school projects works of genius, but I can recognize some tv ads that may be clean technically, but just don’t get the real POINT of the product, or give people false information…or present questionable values

check out the following:

Anlene: ok its noble that it aims to fight against osteoporosis but once you get the disease there is no way you can reverse it! So they should have shown PREVENTION, not a MIRACLE as suggested when the old lady who was already stooping suddenly danced for the ballet.

um, the skin whitener thingie or age defying formula…PONDS I think I am not that sure with all the array of whiteners and skin moisturizers in the market…at least this is the one that promises a change in 7 days…check out the husband who sleeps far from his wife who suddenly becomes cozy with her when she BECOMES PRETTIER, YOUNGER LOOKING, WHITER whatever. How superficial.

This other one is quite recent…about the deodorant underarm whitener…Guy runs away from pretty, white skinned girl with dark armpits…Sad.Really.

LIQUOR ADS are generally crap.  There is one with Bamboo…Message I got was that if you drink, you are supposedly COOL, astig…nah.  There is even a part of that same commercial which is really technically well done but gives Bamboo’s face a demonic look with all the bluish smoke around his face. WORSE are those with the girls in bikinis.  Totally exploitative.

Then there are those commercials that promote SELFISHNESS…those supposedly delish snacks that you just have to keep for yourself. Ah, the pleasures of obesity.And newfound enemies.

there’s more…for now i take a break…*Sigh*

When you are used to creating, manufacturing and merely producing can get you down.  Creative freedom is the lifeblood of artists, and it is criminal to contain them in a fixed world where writers have a small dictionary, and artists have templates and other people’s storyboards. Let us not die from this savage thirst. If paid to manufacture, then create during your leisure time…

to fellow writers, illustrators, animators and even for those who imagine a brighter world…inventors, philosophers, innovators

Writing blogs sometimes make me feel egoistic to the extreme; writing vignettes and even mundane experiences from my own life, expecting readership or a following(hehe, now that is really a delusion of grandeur)…It’s very Jessica Zafra-ish…rants, rants and more rants…sometimes these are what I write…and it’s strangely therapeutic…for me anyway…

I need the therapy right now.  The heavy rain and chest-high floods in Pasong Tamo washed away what little optimism I had left when I woke up an hour after my alarm went off… I knew from the start that it was going to be one of THOSE days…I had left the house without breakfast, a raging headache, and before I reached the UN avenue LRT station, soaked pants… I even tried negotiating with a cab to take me to work, but the taxi driver did not want to be caught in the Makati traffic, and the flooded streets.  I think it was a blessing in disguise…I could have ended up paying one way fare higher than my daily salary…

I reached the office within the grace period, a miracle.  Though at times I could probably question myself why I was rushing to work… Everyday, I get to see really nice co-trainees *thank God for good people!*  However, there is one person who annoys the hell out of me.  She speaks so loud, but does not want to be disturbed, accuses me (parinig!) of moving her things and cramping her space (she sits by the aisle!!!) I go to work and do my job with my pulse pounding at my neck, afraid that i will FINALLY lose my temper (I do have a LOT of patience)… But sometimes I wonder if I will ever miss the foul mouthed and unwelcoming ***** when I move on to a much better job?