Four Seasons

Serendipity. I sensed a speculative something in the horizon, with which from the blackish sky backdrop looked like the 11th plague of Egypt. Gazing up toward the murky heavens, they portrayed the heavy dust particles that were about to pound an unarmed enemy. I looked at them intently and realized that they were in fact as yellow as the three-quarter-shaped moon that shone that magical Friday night. I am referring to the leaves of trees blown heavily by the western wind. On my way to the office for a late night of work, I stared at the heavens to watch these pseudo imago butterflies fluttering their spiritless, no-cuticle wings in pure ataraxia. While few enjoyed the slow descent to a temporary kibbutz, others contented themselves with a steady-state, non-flitting aerodynamic lifts. Like butterflies, leaves falling made my eyes narrow with a half-stunned, half-euphoric, semilunar, open-lipped semblance. At one point I stopped and wondered at this wonderful site to behold that nobod...

Numbers and complex solutions fuel me. I crave mind-boggling formulas and mathematical theories. I go where Pythagoras, Des Cartes and Pascal abound. These are the reasons I love the engineering profession. I never liked the teaching profession. When mom advised me to get a degree in education and be a teacher, I retorted in complete disagreement, "Send me to an engineering school, and I'd make you proud!" In my country, pursuing a degree in education is the cheapest and the easiest in town. Borderline students or even those below the intellectually deficient category, most often than not, would go for the degree. Only a few would take up engineering or medical courses. From the start, my ideas were never parallel to a teacher's. Thoughts of piles of unchecked papers and overnight stays in the office to finish a class grade and lesson planning scare the heavens out of me. Moreover, I never liked the idea of being with students. But I could never blame mom for ...

The efforts of the Department of Education in the Philippines are nothing but little in comparison to the major bottlenecks facing the nation’s education system today. I share the same thoughts with those who desire that the education in my country be given much bigger priority with regards to government attention and annual budget. You would agree with me that everyone has the right to quality education. It is the sure key to breaking the cycle of poverty and providing every youth better opportunities and venues to lead better lives. The quality of life for the future Filipino generations depends on the augmentation of the knowledge and skills through good education. But where is good education in a country such as ours? In my pursuit for a redesigned system of education, I write and send forth this letter to all students, not only in the Philippines, but to all poverty-stricken third-world countries with diminishing school standards and forever hoping for a first-rate educatio...

If you have nothing to do in life, don’t kill yourself, please. Strange thing, this surprising thirst for invisibility. For the past weeks, in those bouts of endless displeasures, a cloud hovered over this lonely head and sprinkled it with drops of desire to be part of the unseen, to be the mysterious guy that humanity couldn’t see or feel. Amongst pickets of work and subject requirements, and everlasting streams of tasks to surmount, this eerie sense to dissolve like wheezing smoke is ever-seething akin to tireless ambers in the euphoria of rage. To be unremembered like old yellowed greeting cards. To greet the daybreak with absolute blankness of friends’ names and humane sensations. To walk along Brookings alleys and not observe replicas of my sequestered abyss. To skim through sunup and sunset, masked, unspoken; nothing but worthless imaginings and giggles boomeranging inside of me like aimless sparrows in grandpa’s serene fields of dozy corns. Many a times, I craved for inv...

It is not just a plain story of one being out of town. Or not seen for a week. Maricel is in the Philippines. Peter is in a place hundreds of miles away. They haven’t seen each other for over a year now. I have always questioned the efficiency and value of a long-distance relationship. Even before I experienced it myself way back, I knew, with sorts of things that could almost certainly play inside your mind, it would never work. Think of the pain that it might create in you and your partner in all variety of ways. Communication is the essential ingredient in the love concoction and being a great distance apart could injure the bond. However, there are few stories that defy the belief that long-distance love won’t work. The partners hang to the thought that love drives in a mystifying route and whenever confronted with situations like lonesomeness or flashing doubts or impatience, all there is to do is to trust. If there is truth to the principle that absence makes the heart grow...

Love must withstand the strongest of winds. Whatever it takes, hold on to it. Let me detail the story of my Dutch friend Jacque; hers is a poster family for divorce. She was five when her mom discovered that her dad was having an affair with another woman. The discovery sparked series of unhealthy events between her parents, which eventually ended up in a divorce. For a while, Jacque and her younger sister bounced around between their parents before their grandparents had the custodial responsibilities. The custody issue confused her as much as the reason why her mom did not even attempt to acquire the rights to keep them both. Her mom frequented the night bars and so did her dad. In her heart, she carried hatred for everything-for her hardhearted parents and for a life wretched and unfulfilled. She lived in fear of being sent away, as most defenseless days of her existence, her grandparents threatened of sending her to either her mom or dad if she not would oblige on things they w...

With the existence of online technology, who isn’t into blogging? Many of those who are spending hours in the web are most likely maintaining online sites where they write anything they do, from protesting on the streets to commenting on the recent calamities to crying from heartbreak to sharing hobbies and shopping list, to even the daily weather condition. A quick googling will reveal that a blog is the newest form of journalism with a reverse chronology, unfiltered content, comments, links, a relaxed attitude, and appropriated text. It is a short cut for a web log, a place where you can cover your own event and present it in an informal tone you want. A blog is your rants in a journal that is made public and readers post comments online. I would have wanted a journal under lock and key much like the one I made when I was a toddler. I do not have any recollection as to where my highly confidential journal has been clandestinely resting now. Suspicion points though to one of the ...