Soap for the soul

  A friend gave me a bar of soap which she said might help lighten the big, dark scar on my left leg. But it took me some time before I actually used it. It was more out of not wanting to disappoint her that I tried it rather than a desire to recoup on the promise of fairer skin.

While unblemished skin is regarded by most people as an asset, my not having such is not too bad. I have learned to look at my unsightly scar as a reminder of the kind of person I am. Like a battle scar, it speaks of what I am capable of doing in the presence of danger. My unconcern for disguising it also shows my distaste for pretensions and excessive vanity.

But when thoughts turn to emotional scars, sometimes I wish someone would concoct  a double-acting soap with properties to lighten, if not get rid of, the hurts. I wish that with daily  use, the "kirot" would subside and in its place a resolve to forget the reasons behind the pain. The scrubbing and the rinsing should at least make faint the anger and the resentments until they are no more.

Is the placenta soap working on lightening the scar on my leg? It's too soon to tell! But  I will be marketing soon a soap for the soul. Its active ingredient is  "Forgiveness" and I can vouch for its effectiveness. Since I decided to use it, the wound in my soul has started healing.The dark scar, slowly fading. Oh so slowly, but getting there!

Mat & Mot

The department's dynamic (and oh so cute!) duo

UP Lantern Parade 2007

Sunday dinner at Sicilian

We're celebrating Papa's, Ling's and Neneth's birthdays here.

UP Psych Handog 2007

Boyette's homecoming

After more than 12 years, Boyette got to spend 5 days on holiday in Manila, en route to a new assignment in Guam

Mga Kaibigan

High school classmates, College buddies, Former and present colleagues, SVD & parish friends...

On being 51 to her 85

                                                 

     When Mama was 51, I was 17. I was midway through my freshman year in college. Where was she, what was she doing at the stage of her life? Did she have the same concerns about her children which I am going through at present? Did she have doubts about decisions she had made. Was she as uncertain of the future then as I am now?

     I remember being at the crossroads. Feisty and independent yet full of insecurities. Discovering exciting things yet also looking back to the comforts of familiarity. Did I cause her much anxiety? Was she proud of what I was trying to do at that age?

     I also remember that those were the most trying of times. Were her fears more for Papa than for us at that time? (Martial law=incarceration!!!) How did she cope with this crisis? How did we survive?

      It would have been nice to ask her these questions. It would have been enlightening to hear her answers. But her illness prevents her from telling me about the mother she heroically tried to be all these years. Nonetheless, it is great that she continues to teach me life's lessons at age 85!

 (Photo by Gari Buenavista - http://pananaw.multiply.com)

Mama's 85th birthday celebration

Or January 31, 1923 so we celebrate again next month

Surprise party last Dec. 12, 2007 attended by Mama's friends from the Handmaids of Sacred Heart Parish & her favorite relatives. Dinner was at Ling's house.

Filipiniana

Our first family portrait for our annual Christmas card taken in our new home

Mama's 80th birthday

These are the slides from the power point presentation shown during her surprise birthday party at Fairchild Cafe.

Ramilo Reunion 2006

Reunion held at Ate Norie's videoke place in San Mateo, Rizal on December 30, 2006.

Ling's House Blessing

Family affair only with close family friends, the Cosios. Blessing was by Fr. Jerome Cayetano, SVD.

Grocery Store Wars

My Bench

I no longer sit there. No more brooding over lost loves and friendships. No more regrets over what might have been and what I should have done.

I will sit there again soon. To give thanks for the gracious blessings of family and friends who have stayed. To reflect on where I am going and to conceive in my mind how I will make my dreams come true. 

Nature according to me

My chalk and oil pastel interpretations of the Lord's glorious creations!

Christmas decor mania

I couldn't resist the call of making my own Christmas decor. Especially since I could get the raw materials from the source and I know I could replicate if not create more exciting versions of the beautiful decorations in department stores, at maybe half the cost. So upon the suggestion of Mia, I have posted them here for everyone to see.

LCM

My Love Affair with Meringue

I bought this cookbook last week just because it had a recipe for meringues in it. Looking at the picture, I could almost taste the sweet, satiny texture of this simple, straightforward concoction of egg whites and sugar. Instantly, my endorphins kicked in!

I've had a long standing affair with meringue. I think it must have started when I was in elementary when Roxanne Arcilla sold little, pink and white ones to us, her grade 6 classmates. From then on, I've tried any version I could lay my hands on. There was the cheap, firm kind you could buy in the sari-sari stores. Then there's small, white airy ones made in Lucban, Quezon in those cans with blue and white labels. But my all-time favorite are those from Panaderia de Molo - the light beige, slightly burnt, gooey ones with casuy. Last night, I had a taste of Parisian macaroons in Bizu. I'm guessing that somewhere in the heart of that dessert is meringue, what else. From a melange of flavors and colors, I chose only two: rose and caramel. Wooh, I thought I was in meringue heaven!

When I get the time to bake (which I probably never will!), that picture in the cookbook will materialize to feed my senses. In the meantime there's dark cherry, mint, vanilla, lemon, etc. calling out to me. Soon, my loves, soon!

MULA SA AKING BINTANA

                            Image by Gari Buenavista (http://pananaw.multiply.com)

Agaw-dilim, Agaw-dilim

Bakit pangamba ang dulot mo, agaw-dilim?

Katahimikang bumabalot sa naghihingalong araw

Bumubuhay sa mga alaalang nahihimlay.

Agaw-dilim, malupit na agaw-dilim

Sa iyong pagyapos, tila lakas ko’y nauupos

Ulirat ko’y pilit ibinibigkis

Sa mga pinipilit limuting hapis.

Agaw-dilim, agaw-dilim

Pakiusap ko sa iyo, agaw-dilim

Aking tanong, ihatid sa puso ng tinatanaw ko

                                          “Paminsan-minsan ba’y naaalala mo rin ako?”

Automatic Confession

Just in time for Holy Week!

Villa Escudero 2006

The Darwin kiddoss were over for Christmas. Here they are enjoying the man-made falls and the swimming pool of the resort.

Bong's birthday

Start:

Nov 22, '07

When I turned 50

There was no big celebration. I don't even remember what we did on that day. More significant was the personal retreat I had in the Dominican House of Prayer in Tagaytay. Two days of looking inside of me, taking stock of what I've become so far.

Kara's high school graduation & dance

Graduation held in Club Filipino - April 10, 2005

High School dance held in ... - April 17, 2005

Silver Wedding Anniversary Celebration

Pighati sa UP Sunken Garden

Green upon green
Grief upon grief
On my bed, On My bench
A face I cannot recall, Words that I've been waiting for
They are one and the same.

The tears on this breezy morning are not new
The salt stings, they blur scenes
Played in a mind that foolishly hopes
Images of waiting...waiting in vain.

I don't want this, I no longer need this.

The well of despair in my being
I will dilute
With the cold green tea in my hand

The spark of the forgotten feeling
I will douse with lines
From the pain-drenched journal in my other hand

I will let the scent of newly-cut grass
Soothe me, intoxicate me
Until the longing is no more.

Family Portraits

Primadonna pictures

These were taken to accompany an advice column I was supposed to write for a glossy fashion magazine. Wrote the first column and posed for these pictures but alas, the magazine never came out.

Graduation pictures

More pictures

http://myspace.com/jangrc
More pictures in another site

Do penguins fly?

Kiwi!

Memories of my neighborhood in the 60s & 70s

You are of my generation and a certified Quezon City resident if you remember:

1. The Ysmael Steel robot on Espana Extension (now E. Rodriguez Ave.) which seemed to be 100 ft. tall. A joke went this way when I was in high school - "Gusto mo ng summer job? Malaki ang suweldo pero madali ang trabaho. Araw-araw, ipapasyal mo lang yong robot ng Ysmael Steel!" (Oh well, it was funny then!)

2. The Malt Shoppe on Timog Avenue. That was soft-serve vanilla ice cream in a blue paper bowl. You had a choice of different syrups and toppings. My favorite was caramel syrup with nuts!

3. The creek you could cross from the street behind our house to get to Sampaloc Ave. (now Tomas Morato Ave.) Once my yaya picked me up from school and we used this way as a shortcut to go home. I slipped and fell, getting all slimy and wet. Bistado ang yaya! Nagtitipid pala. We walked home when we should taken a ride home.

4. The original tiangge on Morato Avenue. It started out as a flea market selling antiques. The front of the Morato building was transformed into a flea market on Sundays. There were lots of interesting stuff which I couldn't afford to buy but I looked, anyway. Then the range of goods expanded and the parking lot wasn't enough. So some people moved to a vacant lot somewhere in front of the original site. Soon the whole length of Morato would be filled with stalls selling what have you. (One Sunday we even rented a stall to sell blankets. I think we sold one). But after a while, Manoling Morato, the man behind the concept realized he had created a monster (as in monster human and vehicle traffic jams!) and stopped his tiangge in the original site. It would last a few more months until a building was built on the vacant lot. It died but without spawning into various forms and in different locations in the metropolis.

5. Timog Ave. and Sampaloc Ave. without the restaurants, bars, and shops. These streets were pleasant, tree-lined residential areas housing genteel people in large, sprawling bungalows.

6. Vermont's Modiste Supply on the way to Kamuning market. It was a treat looking at the multi-colored threads and buttons, the notions, the odds and ends which made H.E. life more fun than it really was.

7. The original Max's Restaurant on Scout Tuazon St. When all they served was fried chicken. When you could take-out fried balun-balunan (gizzard) and atay (liver) in little paper bags. Yummy! Everyone knew where it was because when people asked directions to my house and I said "malapit sa Max, they never got lost.

Please add your memories to this list!

Ling's Birthday

Start:

Nov 30, '07 08:00a

Yehey!

First day of classes for the 2nd semester, 07-08

Start:

Nov 9, '07 08:00a

Why oh why on a Friday, no one knows!

Bangkok 2006

Kara opted to celebrate her 18th birthday by visiting and SHOPPING in Thailand. No big coming-of-age party for her!

Bong's Awit ng Petiburges

 http://media.imeem.com/m/iy-ptEdJ2_/aus=false/

Cantiller Family 2006

Aparri

Photos from my celfone...Where the South China Sea and Cagayan River Meet

One more

May oras pa ba ako para sa isa pang blog?

Ang mga papel, laptop, at libro nga ang katapat ko ng ilang linggo na.
Laman ng aking mga panaginip at pangamba.
Ito dapat ang tapusin ko at hindi magsimula ng iba.
Ngayon, at now na!!!

Hihirit pa ba ako? Napatula na nga ako kaya eto na ang unang blog entry ko! Hay!

All Souls Day

Our words immortalized in Ling's work in granite.

We remember our dead today. We look back at the last days but we try to forget all that which caused us doubt, confusion, and pain. We recall how we smiled at the foibles of old age. The scent of tears, we smell when we glimpse once again the last attempts at living.

We forget. We weep. We forgive. And we love forever.





(See http://tibok.multiply.com for Ling's other works )

The Look

There's a story behind the look. Someone described me in this picture as "radiantly beautiful". But this person might think twice about saying it again if it were revealed how the image of me got that way. Well, the secret is about to unfold.

A request from the editor of a glossy fashion magazine for a columnist from our department was referred to me by my boss. With little hesitation, I agreed to write an advice column and one of the requirements was I had to submit a picture they would put with the column. So after I had written, submitted, and edited the final version of the column, my work got the editor's approval. But not the ID picture I submitted along with the column. It was too teacherly, perhaps. Not consistent with the image of glamor they wanted to project.

So they scheduled me for a photo shoot. Huh, me in a photo shoot?! What happens there? What do I need to do? What clothes should I wear? PANIC! But the editor told me to just relax and they would take care of everything.

And take care of everything they did. The shirt in the picture is theirs, way too large for me but held back behind me by a bulldog clip to make it appear it fits me perfectly. The lips are Angela Jolie-like (Well, not really!) because of something called "Venom". It's like a balm applied to the lips which plumps it up (As warned, it did sting a little). My straight-as-a-pin hair was made even straighter by a straightening iron. And smeared with gel in some places to make stray wisps of hair behave. Of course, there's the foundation and blush expertly applied to disguise the brown spots and wrinkles and instead show in-the-pink-of-health cheeks. And then the eye make-up to open up my eyes some more! Even my smile disguised my wicked thoughts then. "Why am I subjecting myself to all these just to be able to see my words in print in a magazine?"

Yes, this picture was a result of a conspiracy to fool those who would behold it! But you might think that surely there is something in the picture that is genuine. Oo naman - my shoulder, the color of my hair, and my pearls!

So those of us who admire the models and actresses with seemingly blemish-free skin in the magazines, think again!!! If an ordinary person like me could be made to look this way, how much so with the celebrities whose bread and butter depends on looking glamorous and divine?

And incidentally, the magazine never came out (But that's another story)!

Did Freddie Join Us?

Seems irreverent to think of Freddie as a moth... small, brown, seemingly inconsequential. Why not a large, grand Monarch butterfly instead? But they said that would have made it hard for him to get inside Kalye Juan and join in our celebration. Oo nga naman!

And come to think of it, that was how Freddie was. A puny-looking, quiet man hiding the National Artist who used his words to portray his anything-but-grand view of the world!

I think he enjoyed our company that night. I think he was mighty proud of all that we had become. Love you, Freddie!

Photo by Fe Muit

Mactan Island

Ang mga puno sa isla ng Mactan, Katatagan ng mga Pinagbuklod-buklod!

The KIWI

He knew what he wanted. He knew his physical limitation yet he circumvented this. He knocked down all the stumbling blocks in his life. He did not give up. He toiled long and hard. He shed a tear for his triumph. Not allowing the prospect of death to get in the way of his dream!

I envy the KIWI!

The Ego, ignored

I read an entry in one blog which said that the Ego holds one back from expressing his creativity. That is probably true for me. I want to create art but I am always so afraid it will not pass the aesthetic standards of people . Well, most especially because I happen to have a sibling who is an artist! Like most things that I do and say, I am afraid I will be judged negatively. So, I always keep to the safe side of the road. Seldom venturing into the exciting but dangerous beyond-the-limit land. The ego, personified!

But I have come to a point in my life that reacquainting myself with my Id seems like a good idea. No longer afraid of being ridiculed or criticized. No longer hostage to my high Agreeableness score in the Big 5 (After all, I also have a high Openness score!). No longer caring if my work pales in comparison to L's.

And so the attempt to capture the flowers in Sonya's garden. And so the (so unlike me) vibrant colors. And so I unveil my art!

"The Ego produces Resistance and attacks the awakening artist." (Steven Pressfield The War of Art)

Parang ang layo mo

USC Talamban Chapel, Cebu

Kung minsan, parang ang layo-layo mo
Lalo na kapag nagagalit ako... sa mundo.
Sa mga taong di umaayon sa mga pagkilos na inaasahan ko
Sa mga pagsubok na sunod-sunod
Sa mga pangangailangang di matapos-tapos
Sa aking pangungulila sa mga kaibigang nawala
Sa kadilimang sumisilip mula sa kalaliman ng aking diwa.

MINIMITHI

(DESIDERATA)

Salin ni Pete Lacaba

Lumakad nang mahinahon
Sa gitna ng ingay at pagkukumahog, at alalahanin
Ang kapayapaang maaaring makuha sa katahimikan.

Walang isinusuko hanggat maaari,
Pakitunguhan nang mabuti ang lahat ng tao.

Sabihin ang iyong katotohanan nang tahimik at malinaw;
At makinig sa iba, kahit sa nakayayamot at mangmang;
Sila man ay may kasaysayan.

Iwasan ang mga taong mabunganga at palaaway,
Sila ay ikinaiinis ng kalooban.

Kung ihahambing mo ang sarili sa iba,
Baka yumabang ka o maghinanakit; sapagkat laging
May lilitaw na mas mahusay o mas mahina sa iyo.

Ikalugod ang iyong mga tagumpay at saka mga balak.

Manatiling interesado sa iyong hanapbuhay,
Gaano man kaaba; ito ay tunay na ari-arian
Sa pabago-bagong kapalaran ng panahon.

Maging maingat sa iyong negosyo;
Sapagkat ang daigdig ay puno ng panlilinlang.
Subalit huwag maging bulag sa kabutihang makikita.
Maraming nagsisikap na makamit ang mga adhikain;
at sa lahat ng dako,
Ang buhay ay puno ng kabayanihan.

Maging tapat sa sarili. Higit sa lahat, huwag magkunwari.
Huwag ding libakin ang pag-ibig:
Sapagkat sa harap ng lahat ng kahungkagan at kawalang-pag-asa,
Ito ay lagi-laging sumisibol, tulad ng damo.

Tanggapin nang mabuti ang mga payo ng katandaan,
Buong-giliw na isuko ang mga bagay-bagay ng kabataan.

Pag-ibayuhin ang lakas ng loob,
Ito ay pananggalang laban sa biglaang kasawian.
Subalit huwag ikaligalig ang mga haka-haka.

Maraming pangamba ang likha ng pagod at pangungulila.

Bagamat kailangan ang sapat na disiplina,
Maging magiliw sa sarili.

Ikaw ay supling ng sanlibutan.
Katulad ng bituin,
May liwanag kang taglay.
At anupaman ang iyong gawin,
Itong sanlibutan ay narito
Sa paligid mo.

Kung gayon, pakisamahan ang Panginoon,
Anuman ang pananaw mo sa kanya.
At anuman ang iyong pinagkakaabalahan at minimithi,
Sa maingay na kalituhan ng buhay,
Pakisamahan ang iyong kaluluwa.

Sa kabila ng lahat ng pagkukunwari, kabagutan,
at gumuhong pangarap,
Maganda pa rin ang daigdig.

Mag-ingat. Sikaping lumigaya


Galing sa "So far, so good" http://elsalvadordelmundo.wordpress.com/2007/06/23/minimithi/

Baguio mist

View from "Oh My Gulay"

The cold mist enveloping the distance. Miles, heights and depths away. I can see them but cannot reach them without falling. Do I fly to them? Do I close my eyes until the mist lifts , then plot my way up to the heavens? But I do not relish an arduous climb! So do I just stay by the window entranced by the unreachable , unquenchable beauty of my dreams?

Bohol pier, August 2007

The light is what keeps me going

In the darkness of this soul

There is that elusive glimmer

Someday, no longer just the view but...There.

LCM Outing in Tanay, Rizal

May 19, 2007

The mermaids are now mothers and grandmothers. They are no longer concerned that bathing suit sizes are XXL but are still proud of blemish-free and fair skin. Since I possess neither of the latter two, I comfort myself that at least I still fit into a size 10 (Horrors!)... The free-flowing water from a virgin spring washes away all the cares of the day. The freezing cold water invigorates, makes us maidens once again. If only for a few hours, reminds us that we are invincible, that we have taken on much, much more and have triumphed!

Sampaloc Lake

Our childhood memories of this beautiful lake, cold and rushing through every bit of my being. Once again, a picture of a carefree youth when wild hair would not have mattered. When effortless smiles were easy to come by. Alas, they are no more.

But with the lake behind us, Ling and I, we will always be young!

Feeling 15 at 50!

It's fun! You never really outgrow it. You just sweep it behind a dusty curtain which you open surreptitiously when no one else is looking. You take a peek once in a while to reassure yourself that the teen-ager is still there. Deep inside this creature with a creased brow and unsightly bulges, is a young girl whose day is made with a special someone's smile! In place of the champion who is thinking of how to change the world is a flirt who would rather think if her change of hairstyle will get the boy to take a second look. Beneath the serious mien when deep in discussion with him is a giggly adolescent who is really thinking of how sexy his voice sounds when he says her name!

Would I want to be 15 again? Maybe, with my 25 year-old dreams, my 35-year-old body, my 40 year-old spunk and my 50 year-old soul!