adventures in neverland

“wisdom comes to us when it can no longer do any good.”   ―  g abriel garcí­a márquez ,  l ove in the time of cholera going to this particular shopping mall depresses her. maybe it's the old linoleum tiles whose colours don't match at all (some are white, some are orange, others green. put together randomly as though the workers are tripping on drugs), or the toilets that have no tissue papers and smell of piss all the time, or the young men and women who distract your quiet contemplation of what to buy by grabbing your arms and offering you pirated dvds, others to give you flyers announcing the availability of newly constructed condominiums and houses that are available at "affordable" installment schemes. she also dislikes the very bright lighting, the plastic plants and flowers, the stench of cigarette smoke, body odour and sweat. the whole place reminds her of an old, dying man. the smell of death is unbearable. she wonders when will the owners hav...

summer is indeed upon us. the onset of the sunny season always makes me lazy, melancholic and nostalgic. it makes me long for those innocent days when summer means a two-month break from school, seeing friends and cousins whom you have not seen for a long time because of school, and spending time on the beach, or on the tennis court, or on the mountains. this is the season too that i always equate with watching movies. lots of it. i remember it was the summer of eighty four when i watched on betamax brooke shield's endless love and blue lagoon and since then, she had become one of my most favourite actresses. i loved her looks - a combination of girlishness and womanness (especially in endless love). ah, she's a goddess in the real sense of the word. brooke, i think, is the only sex symbol that did not really bare on the big screen. she had body doubles. of course the oh so gorgeous martin hewitt and james spader in endless love and christopher atkins in blue la...

i just survived the first quarter of my not so fun, not so fearless forty five years on this shallow earth. three months went by without much excitement, not much fanfare. days went by so fast, as though the hours were being dragged by an airplane traveling at the speed of lightning so it can reach uranus or jupiter in time to witness the end of the world from a distance, detached, unmoved. when i was younger, i always thought that i'd write thirty when i turned forty. i always thought that at that age, i must have tasted, smelled, touched, stared, felt, drank, swallowed whatever it was that would make life as colourful as it should be. i always thought that forty would be the best time to go before i lose my youngish looks, my svelte figure, my thick, black hair. i'm vain and i'm ready to pay the price. but the gods seemed to have other plans for me because i woke up with a maddening head ache and smelling of beer and cigarettes on january the fourth two thousand a...

reclusive hollywood superstar greta garbo - famous for muttering the classic "i want to be alone, i just want to be alone" in the movie grand hotel , a line that perfectly captured her elusive and lonesome nature -- would love this island. with a barely existing cellphone signal (the better way to be incomunicado), the absence of electricity during the day that forces everyone to stay outdoors and explore the exotic place instead of lounging in the air conditioned room watching the idiot box, the island -- surrounded by clear, blue waters and skies -- is just the right place for getting lost and disappearing from everything familiar and modern. it's perfect for summer. isn't summer all about escaping the maddening crowds and being alone and getting lost? not necessarily to revitalise your spiritual life (mount banahaw would be perfect for that. or a monastery), though it's perfectly alright if that's your thing, but to commune with nature. get drunk...

sunset is lovely. the burst of fiery colours: shocking bloody red (or vermilion for the fashion forward fan), yellow, orange, is breathtaking. a dragon's breath dancing in the air. it signals the end of the day and the start of a new adventure. as the sun, always giving, always selfless, gives way to the ascending moon, serene, gentle but so darn self-centered. some of the photos i have taken about that part of the day when everything goes quiet, turns a bit dark, the air hints a bit of mystery, a bit of romance, showers a little bit of sadness. i don't exactly remember where i took some of them, though one or two were at the famed roxas boulevard, the avenue of broken dreams, of the homeless and the brave, who despite their poverty continue to fight for life. hope you like them.

while cooking lunch today, i was reminded of a little fight (ok, not really a fight but a small argument), that i had with my mother several weeks ago when she was in my flat for a few days for her monthly medical check-up in the city. she doesn't trust the doctors (read: albularyos or the so-called quack doctors) in her queendom, so she makes it a point to drop by my fiefdom and consult the medical practitioners  -- who got their phds in harvard and other ivy leagues -- here. %%%%%%% i was famished when i reached my flat at around seven in the morning from a party that lasted through the wee hours. since the old witch was in the bathroom doing whatever it is that eighty year olds do in the privacy of that tiny room for hours, i decided to just prepare my own breakfast: fried rice, sunny side ups, and whatever was left from the previous night's dinner. i saw adobo on the table. yum! after a few hours, when she emerged from the bathroom smelling of my kiehl's her...

paul woke up with an unbearable headache and found the whole country in grief. it was two in the afternoon and the room was bursting with the summer sun that penetrated through the glass sliding doors that led to the terrrace. he forgot to shut the blinds last night before he went to sleep. he felt sticky and hot. he was bathed in sweat. for a while, it hurt to open his still drowsy eyes. with his eyes shut, he groped for the strings on the side of the door and closed the blinds. with his eyes now opened and the room enveloped in the darkness, he found the tv's remote control underneath the pillow and opened the cold, black, fifty-inch gadget mounted on the wall. the room was now sparkling with the lights and vibrant colours emanating from the television. then he headed to the bathroom to wash his face and look for medicines for his headache and hang over. before he could even wash his face and swallow panadols to ease the paralyzing...