Vanessa Doctor was a Famous Dragon Slayer in a past life. Discover your past lives @ Quiz Me

I knew it! Woohoo!

My Vampire Name

The Great Archives determine you to have gone by the identity:

Victoria Burns

Known in some parts of the world as:

Concubine of The Night

The Great Archives Record:

Adrift in the night, hiding from the sunlight. This one moves from place to place, never settling.

The workaholic's dilemma (or what makes me a writer this week?)

1) my job at FT pays me to write (so I'ts not just for this week but for the whole duration of my employment on the 42nd floor of a makati high rise)

2) i have an event to write about due saturday 6pm which, hopefully, sees print next week (*crossing my fingers)

3) I just submitted the final draft of the PNAC project last night, pending approval from government agencies and NGOs on Monday next week

4) i had reoriented myself with Korean movies and starting to write about them in stray sheets of paper from my old journal. (It's not online but I'm thinking of starting another one especially for this purpose)

(note: i just edited no. 4 from stray sheets of PEOPLE. freaky. )

5) i have told my friend to compile all the dating horror stories i asked him to collect at the start of the year, and will finally commence on that "dating hell" book

6) with the help of the light of my day, i will finally begin to write that much awaited (yuck feeling! by my friends lang naman) graphic novel.

So why do I still feel incomplete? :(

PRE-CHRISTMAS SENTI

I am in a place flanked by Christmas decorations and surrounded by busy garble and Santa Claus music. There is a recurring pain in my back which this old swivel seat tries really hard to aggravate. I am cold and I am hungry. Add that to the fact that I think the red coat I am wearing does not, and mean does not, match with the pink and white striped knit blouse I have underneath.

My fashion sense is as fleeting as my recollections of a wonderland Christmas season. I remember how I was last year, on the eve of His birth. Everyone had gone home for the holidays and be with their families, while I stayed behind. Sulked. Refused to go home because of work and, more gravely, because I was scared to face my parents.

I was then a bearer of bad news. And I couldn’t muster the courage to go home and tell my mom and dad how naughty I’ve been the past year and how I absolutely DID NOT deserve cheer. Nor did I deserve gifts and warm food.

I can’t really discuss the details of what I did here. There are spies lying about. But it had something to do with me and the University I attended. Anyway, all is well now and I finally told them when I came home during the holy week.

But enough about that.

Last Christmas, I was all alone at the condo unit my friends and I shared along Katipunan. While everyone was busy preparing noche Buena, I was in a bare room, with cheap wine from the office giveaway basket and some luncheon meat. I didn’t really bother going downstairs to buy food. I knew I was going to call it an early night.

As if that wasn’t depressing enough, I didn’t even bother to call my parents. I didn’t want to suddenly burst into tears and end up pissing them off with my news. Hell no. That Christmas, I vowed to spread cheer around. Not my problems. Never my grief.

I called a friend who was planning to go out after the 12 midnight meal with some friends and asked if I could come along. He said he wasn’t really sure. I was becoming asphyxiated by the silence and the bareness of the condo so much I needed to drag myself out of there literally.

So I hailed a cab and spent about an hour touring the city, looking for bars that were crazy enough to be open on Christmas eve. I ended up at Hard Rock Makati. Alone. My friends texted me frantically with reminders not to look too friendly or gullible, sit in the corner and never make eye contact, or else foreigners would mistake me as a pick up girl.

When I got there, I sank myself into the corner seat close to the band and smoked to death. My friend, who finally decided to go out, followed me. But it was already 2am and I was starting to see dancing colors infront of me. I don’t really remember what I drank. And if my friend had been late a few seconds, I would have been approached by this porky looking guy who had been desperately trying to make eye contact the entire night.

At my near drunken state, I probably would have talked to him. Thanks to my friend who arrived in the nick of time.

But that was then.

This Christmas, though I don’t feel it this early on, I will be going back to Davao to see my family. I really don’t care if the people in the office think it’s unfair that I leave on the 23rd.

Once you’ve already tried spending the holidays by your lonesome, drunk and all, you’ll definitely kill just to make the next one right. And not even the hottest bozo in this place (who, by the way, thinks he’s so fucking great) can talk me out it.

And no, I won’t be drinking cheap wine this time. Knowing my family, there will definitely be lechon, lengua, ham, pasta, and all kinds of fruit on the table. And I will also be reunited with my favorite tokwa’t baboy from Davao Dencia’s Restaurant.

As for the important people I leave behind in Manila for a week, there’s always the phone. There’s also the Internet.

(drama ko talaga!)

This is one of the spur-of-the-moment pieces I made that didn't see print yet. Wrote it two years ago, when I was 20.

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RESPECT, THE HARD WAY


“Just graduate on time and I’ll leave you alone.”

That’s what my mother told me a few years back out of exasperation for my rebellious behavior. Being the teenager I was, it was not a surprise why I adored getting myself in trouble and hurting my parents pockets and hearts at the same time. I was invincible. I partied each day and went out with a diverse group of people. Those kinds whom the average well-meaning household wouldn’t let into their pretty little homes.

The only thing my parents said which threatened me so much to acquiescence was when they said that they’d be dragging me back to that provincial hellhole we called our hometown. That shut me up.

I couldn’t possibly go back home now that my life here in the city was giving me all I ever wanted and more. I never thought I had this wild side. I was proud of who I was then and the things I did. Let anybody try to challenge that and I’d swear nobody would dare attempt to go through the same things I did.

I wanted to scream with delight. I was, after all, independent. Seventeen years old and living all alone. What more could a kid ask for? I was too caught up in my own destructive pleasure I failed to see who were getting trampled on by my actions.

Now I’m 20. In a month I’m about to enjoy that independence my mother promised to grant me. Whenever I look back at those times I drowned myself with the belief that I had complete control of my life, I laugh. A few months after savoring the so-called teen independence, it came crashing back at me. Threefold. It hurt.

The pain was excruciating. The humiliation, enough to send me running back to my parents for mercy, for help. I constantly reminded myself that I could go through my problems alone. I couldn’t. I needed friends. I needed my family. Suddenly, I thought about my mother’s words. I did not want to be left alone anymore.

My definition of independence was a distorted one. It led to my downfall. I’m glad I swallowed my arrogance and asked for aid. I would have been nothing by now.

Most people my age don’t want to hear sermons about handling independence. Youth, with all its passion, has not been gifted with understanding and humility. The one thing that hits me most is the fact that I had to learn the hard way.

I was a stubborn child. It was probably what I deserved. At present, I’m not sure If I already know how to deal with life. But what I’ve done and who I’ve pained are enough for me to slowly work my way back up again. I see homeless people and think, it wasn’t their choice to live a life like mice, but they endure it the best way they can.

That’s where I differ from them. I have a choice. A lot of choices. It was just unfortunate that I made the wrong ones at an early age. I cannot say I regret having been the wild kid I was. It was the quicksand situation I needed to wake myself up.

Independence doesn’t mean having the liberty to do anything, anytime, without retribution or without getting reprimanded. It means having the balls to admit that the world does not revolve around you, and having the humility and courage to acknowledge that you do need other people and you can’t go through life alone no matter how strong you think you are.

Youth has the power to intoxicate you with lies. Pride cannot feed you. What it can do, however, is numb the pain for a while but that’s all there is to it. And you know you can’t live on painkillers your whole life. At some future time, you’d have to own up to your mistakes.

Independence means facing reality with your head high but with feet on the ground. It doesn’t and shouldn’t take a major downfall for one to realize it. I learned through physical pain and tears, not only mine.

I see now that there were other options. There were other roads that would have been the better ones to take. For most of us, courage is the road not taken. We try to hide behind the façade of invincibility. Like I said, youth makes one drunk. It’s not necessarily a complete submission to an outer societal force. We don’t have to conform with dogma. But there are rules that need to be followed. It doesn’t diminish one’s individuality to acknowledge the presence of these rules.

For free spirits like myself, they may seem like the chains that bind us down. What they really are, in reality, are the ties that hold us together. To make sure that in pursuing ourselves and who we are in this world, we don’t fall apart. We don’t self-destruct.

Responsibility is the key to learning independence. It is not something we naturally are born with. Independence is earned. It depends on how you try to earn it that makes it more refreshing when you’re finally awarded with it. For me, it was the anguish I contributed to the world that made me appreciate and take care of myself more prudently and gently.

I was not proud of the destruction I caused. I never will be. But I have learned not to abuse the little liberty I have over myself. That’s what made it fruitful.

SO NEAR YET SO FAR

I had a ten-peso fish crackers for lunch.

As the days go by and the long wait toward payday becomes longer as I near it, I begin to realize the power of a one-peso coin. See, it's like this. If you are in McDonald's and the meal is Php49.00 and you only have Php48.00 in your wallet (including the 5cent and 25cent coins you managed to fish out from a portal in your raped bag), that means No Happy Meal for you. And it has been NO FANCY FOOD for me these days.

The bills I have been harping about these past weeks have finally been paid, but not without draining 99% of my savings and of others who were oh-so-willing to help. My dream of having the ultimate bachelorette pad is slowly becoming a reality.

The next things I need to worry about now are the appliances. But those aren't really urgent, as I could always buy cheap food from downstairs and not need the ref or the lutuan just yet.

I find it refreshing, the way I now buy turo-turo food from the building's friendly neighborhood karinderya. But of course, nothing beats meals that are cooked from our very own kitchen (the materials, we will soon have).

This is so exciting. I am excited. (No really, I'm blogging because I'm bored and have nothing else to do in this office)

Btw, stories on the office and my officemates will have to be transferred to another blog lest I be fired before I take my graceful exit sometime in the future. Har har har!

CLAP CLAP TO HIGH SCHOOL!

I am becoming more proud of Ateneo de Davao University by the day. I just came back from Nescafe's Ad Lib event an hour ago, hands full of coffee goodies I should give out to friends if I don't want to die of caffeine overdose one of these days.

Anyway, I saw two of my old high school friends at the event. It was a cute picture. One was part of the Nescafe marketing team, the other was from the PR firm that hosted the event, and me, the person writing about it. Need I say I got a lot of insider stories and longer chats with the organizers? Oh, not to mention a GC to a swanky department store!

At ang galing talaga ng products ng high school school ko! Woohoo!

I would have wanted to stay and drown myself in free drinks and sweets but I had to go back to the office and finish abstracting. Tumakas lang kasi ako.

Woe to the twentysomething living multiple lives. She gets all the fun, but never too much of it. I always leave bitin. Grrr...

BTW, I now have a crush on Philstar's Igan d'Bayan. He's not striking, but, as I said to the light of my day, "he looks so meek, he's cute." Plus, he had a very artisty aura around him I couldn't resist staring with the eye at the back of my head. hee hee. (What am I saying??? He's from the other broadsheet for chrissakes!!)