Point of information

Never in my entire life have i imagined that i would enjoy such an activity; i just found out that somehow in my whole being i have longed to witness something like that from the very beginning to the very end. How I love to witness another British parliamentary debate!

I had a lot of fun witnessing the first ever Inter-collegiate British Parliamentary Debate in Negros Oriental State University last Monday and Tuesday. It was very enjoyable to watch some students as the scribble through their paper and write any point of information that would contradict to the ideas of their competitors.

Hayz.. i totally loved the exchange of ideas...and most especially, he heated conversation between the two teams--the government and the opposition. "Sit down", "Later!", and "Later, please!" were just some of the words that the speaker said to their opponents whenever the latter would raise their hand and stand up just to point out an information on what they think is to be contradicted in the speaker's words.

I would love to witness another debate competition. it so totally awakens the excitement in me. Point of information: I hope another debate competition will soon follow, so I can satisfy my need to witness another one.

Scent of Apples

By Bienvenido N. Santos

When I arrived in Kalamazoo it was October and the war was still on. Gold and silver stars hung on pennants above silent windows of white and brick-red cottages. In a backyard an old man burned leaves and twigs while a gray-haired woman sat on the porch, her red hands quiet on her lap, watching the smoke rising above the elms, both of them thinking the same thought perhaps, about a tall, grinning boy with his blue eyes and flying hair, who went out to war: where could he be now this month when leaves were turning into gold and the fragrance of gathered apples was in the wind?
It was a cold night when I left my room at the hotel for a usual speaking engagement. I walked but a little way. A heavy wind coming up from Lake Michigan was icy on the face. If felt like winter straying early in the northern woodlands. Under the lampposts the leaves shone like bronze. And they rolled on the pavements like the ghost feet of a thousand autumns long dead, long before the boys left for faraway lands without great icy winds and promise of winter early in the air, lands without apple trees, the singing and the gold!
It was the same night I met Celestino Fabia, "just a Filipino farmer" as he called himself, who had a farm about thirty miles east of Kalamazoo.
"You came all that way on a night like this just to hear me talk?"
"I've seen no Filipino for so many years now," he answered quickly. "So when I saw your name in the papers where it says you come from the Islands and that you're going to talk, I come right away."
Earlier that night I had addressed a college crowd, mostly women. It appeared they wanted me to talk about my country, they wanted me to tell them things about it because my country had become a lost country. Everywhere in the land the enemy stalked. Over it a great silence hung, and their boys were there, unheard from, or they were on their way to some little known island on the Pacific, young boys all, hardly men, thinking of harvest moons and the smell of forest fire.
It was not hard talking about our own people. I knew them well and I loved them. And they seemed so far away during those terrible years that I must have spoken of them with a little fervor, a little nostalgia.
In the open forum that followed, the audience wanted to know whether there was much difference between our women and the American women. I tried to answer the question as best I could, saying, among other things, that I did not know that much about American women, except that they looked friendly, but differences or similarities in inner qualities such as naturally belonged to the heart or to the mind, I could only speak about with vagueness.
While I was trying to explain away the fact that it was not easy to make comparisons, a man rose from the rear of the hall, wanting to say something. In the distance, he looked slight and old and very brown. Even before he spoke, I knew that he was, like me, a Filipino.
"I'm a Filipino," he began, loud and clear, in a voice that seemed used to wide open spaces, "I'm just a Filipino farmer out in the country." He waved his hand toward the door. "I left the Philippines more than twenty years ago and have never been back. Never will perhaps. I want to find out, sir, are our Filipino women the same like they were twenty years ago?"
As he sat down, the hall filled with voices, hushed and intrigued. I weighed my answer carefully. I did not want to tell a lie yet I did not want to say anything that would seem platitudinous, insincere. But more important than these considerations, it seemed to me that moment as I looked towards my countryman, I must give him an answer that would not make him so unhappy. Surely, all these years, he must have held on to certain ideals, certain beliefs, even illusions peculiar to the exile.
"First," I said as the voices gradually died down and every eye seemed upon me, "First, tell me what our women were like twenty years ago."
The man stood to answer. "Yes," he said, "you're too young . . . Twenty years ago our women were nice, they were modest, they wore their hair long, they dressed proper and went for no monkey business. They were natural, they went to church regular, and they were faithful." He had spoken slowly, and now in what seemed like an afterthought, added, "It's the men who ain't."
Now I knew what I was going to say.
"Well," I began, "it will interest you to know that our women have changed--but definitely! The change, however, has been on the outside only. Inside, here," pointing to the heart, "they are the same as they were twenty years ago. God-fearing, faithful, modest, and nice."
The man was visibly moved. "I'm very happy, sir," he said, in the manner of one who, having stakes on the land, had found no cause to regret one's sentimental investment.
After this, everything that was said and done in that hall that night seemed like an anti-climax, and later, as we walked outside, he gave me his name and told me of his farm thirty miles east of the city.
We had stopped at the main entrance to the hotel lobby. We had not talked very much on the way. As a matter of fact, we were never alone. Kindly American friends talked to us, asked us questions, said goodnight. So now I asked him whether he cared to step into the lobby with me and talk.
"No, thank you," he said, "you are tired. And I don't want to stay out too late."
"Yes, you live very far."
"I got a car," he said, "besides . . . "
Now he smiled, he truly smiled. All night I had been watching his face and I wondered when he was going to smile.
"Will you do me a favor, please," he continued smiling almost sweetly. "I want you to have dinner with my family out in the country. I'd call for you tomorrow afternoon, then drive you back. Will that be alright?"
"Of course," I said. "I'd love to meet your family." I was leaving Kalamazoo for Muncie, Indiana, in two days. There was plenty of time.
"You will make my wife very happy," he said.
"You flatter me."
"Honest. She'll be very happy. Ruth is a country girl and hasn't met many Filipinos. I mean Filipinos younger than I, cleaner looking. We're just poor farmer folk, you know, and we don't get to town very often. Roger, that's my boy, he goes to school in town. A bus takes him early in the morning and he's back in the afternoon. He's nice boy."
"I bet he is," I agreed. "I've seen the children of some of the boys by their American wives and the boys are tall, taller than their father, and very good looking."
"Roger, he'd be tall. You'll like him."
Then he said goodbye and I waved to him as he disappeared in the darkness.
The next day he came, at about three in the afternoon. There was a mild, ineffectual sun shining, and it was not too cold. He was wearing an old brown tweed jacket and worsted trousers to match. His shoes were polished, and although the green of his tie seemed faded, a colored shirt hardly accentuated it. He looked younger than he appeared the night before now that he was clean shaven and seemed ready to go to a party. He was grinning as we met.
"Oh, Ruth can't believe it," he kept repeating as he led me to his car--a nondescript thing in faded black that had known better days and many hands. "I says to her, I'm bringing you a first class Filipino, and she says, aw, go away, quit kidding, there's no such thing as first class Filipino. But Roger, that's my boy, he believed me immediately. What's he like, daddy, he asks. Oh, you will see, I says, he's first class. Like you daddy? No, no, I laugh at him, your daddy ain't first class. Aw, but you are, daddy, he says. So you can see what a nice boy he is, so innocent. Then Ruth starts griping about the house, but the house is a mess, she says. True it's a mess, it's always a mess, but you don't mind, do you? We're poor folks, you know.
The trip seemed interminable. We passed through narrow lanes and disappeared into thickets, and came out on barren land overgrown with weeds in places. All around were dead leaves and dry earth. In the distance were apple trees.
"Aren't those apple trees?" I asked wanting to be sure.
"Yes, those are apple trees," he replied. "Do you like apples? I got lots of 'em. I got an apple orchard, I'll show you."
All the beauty of the afternoon seemed in the distance, on the hills, in the dull soft sky.
"Those trees are beautiful on the hills," I said.
"Autumn's a lovely season. The trees are getting ready to die, and they show their colors, proud-like."
"No such thing in our own country," I said.
That remark seemed unkind, I realized later. It touched him off on a long deserted tangent, but ever there perhaps. How many times did lonely mind take unpleasant detours away from the familiar winding lanes towards home for fear of this, the remembered hurt, the long lost youth, the grim shadows of the years; how many times indeed, only the exile knows.
It was a rugged road we were traveling and the car made so much noise that I could not hear everything he said, but I understood him. He was telling his story for the first time in many years. He was remembering his own youth. He was thinking of home. In these odd moments there seemed no cause for fear no cause at all, no pain. That would come later. In the night perhaps. Or lonely on the farm under the apple trees.
In this old Visayan town, the streets are narrow and dirty and strewn with coral shells. You have been there? You could not have missed our house, it was the biggest in town, one of the oldest, ours was a big family. The house stood right on the edge of the street. A door opened heavily and you enter a dark hall leading to the stairs. There is the smell of chickens roosting on the low-topped walls, there is the familiar sound they make and you grope your way up a massive staircase, the bannisters smooth upon the trembling hand. Such nights, they are no better than the days, windows are closed against the sun; they close heavily.
Mother sits in her corner looking very white and sick. This was her world, her domain. In all these years, I cannot remember the sound of her voice. Father was different. He moved about. He shouted. He ranted. He lived in the past and talked of honor as though it were the only thing.
I was born in that house. I grew up there into a pampered brat. I was mean. One day I broke their hearts. I saw mother cry wordlessly as father heaped his curses upon me and drove me out of the house, the gate closing heavily after me. And my brothers and sisters took up my father's hate for me and multiplied it numberless times in their own broken hearts. I was no good.
But sometimes, you know, I miss that house, the roosting chickens on the low-topped walls. I miss my brothers and sisters, Mother sitting in her chair, looking like a pale ghost in a corner of the room. I would remember the great live posts, massive tree trunks from the forests. Leafy plants grew on the sides, buds pointing downwards, wilted and died before they could become flowers. As they fell on the floor, father bent to pick them and throw them out into the coral streets. His hands were strong. I have kissed these hands . . . many times, many times.
Finally we rounded a deep curve and suddenly came upon a shanty, all but ready to crumble in a heap on the ground, its plastered walls were rotting away, the floor was hardly a foot from the ground. I thought of the cottages of the poor colored folk in the south, the hovels of the poor everywhere in the land. This one stood all by itself as though by common consent all the folk that used to live here had decided to say away, despising it, ashamed of it. Even the lovely season could not color it with beauty.
A dog barked loudly as we approached. A fat blonde woman stood at the door with a little boy by her side. Roger seemed newly scrubbed. He hardly took his eyes off me. Ruth had a clean apron around her shapeless waist. Now as she shook my hands in sincere delight I noticed shamefacedly (that I should notice) how rough her hands were, how coarse and red with labor, how ugly! She was no longer young and her smile was pathetic.
As we stepped inside and the door closed behind us, immediately I was aware of the familiar scent of apples. The room was bare except for a few ancient pieces of second-hand furniture. In the middle of the room stood a stove to keep the family warm in winter. The walls were bare. Over the dining table hung a lamp yet unlighted.
Ruth got busy with the drinks. She kept coming in and out of a rear room that must have been the kitchen and soon the table was heavy with food, fried chicken legs and rice, and green peas and corn on the ear. Even as we ate, Ruth kept standing, and going to the kitchen for more food. Roger ate like a little gentleman.
"Isn't he nice looking?" his father asked.
"You are a handsome boy, Roger," I said.
The boy smiled at me. You look like Daddy," he said.
Afterwards I noticed an old picture leaning on the top of a dresser and stood to pick it up. It was yellow and soiled with many fingerings. The faded figure of a woman in Philippine dress could yet be distinguished although the face had become a blur.
"Your . . . " I began.
"I don't know who she is," Fabia hastened to say. "I picked that picture many years ago in a room on La Salle street in Chicago. I have often wondered who she is."
"The face wasn't a blur in the beginning?"
"Oh, no. It was a young face and good."
Ruth came with a plate full of apples.
"Ah," I cried, picking out a ripe one. "I've been thinking where all the scent of apples came from. The room is full of it."
"I'll show you," said Fabia.
He showed me a backroom, not very big. It was half-full of apples.
"Every day," he explained, "I take some of them to town to sell to the groceries. Prices have been low. I've been losing on the trips."
"These apples will spoil," I said.
"We'll feed them to the pigs."
Then he showed me around the farm. It was twilight now and the apple trees stood bare against a glowing western sky. In apple blossom time it must be lovely here. But what about wintertime?
One day, according to Fabia, a few years ago, before Roger was born, he had an attack of acute appendicitis. It was deep winter. The snow lay heavy everywhere. Ruth was pregnant and none too well herself. At first she did not know what to do. She bundled him in warm clothing and put him on a cot near the stove. She shoveled the snow from their front door and practically carried the suffering man on her shoulders, dragging him through the newly made path towards the road where they waited for the U.S. Mail car to pass. Meanwhile snowflakes poured all over them and she kept rubbing the man's arms and legs as she herself nearly froze to death.
"Go back to the house, Ruth!" her husband cried, "you'll freeze to death."
But she clung to him wordlessly. Even as she massaged his arms and legs, her tears rolled down her cheeks. "I won't leave you," she repeated.
Finally the U.S. Mail car arrived. The mailman, who knew them well, helped them board the car, and, without stopping on his usual route, took the sick man and his wife direct to the nearest hospital.
Ruth stayed in the hospital with Fabia. She slept in a corridor outside the patients' ward and in the day time helped in scrubbing the floor and washing the dishes and cleaning the men's things. They didn't have enough money and Ruth was willing to work like a slave.
"Ruth's a nice girl," said Fabia, "like our own Filipino women."
Before nightfall, he took me back to the hotel. Ruth and Roger stood at the door holding hands and smiling at me. From inside the room of the shanty, a low light flickered. I had a last glimpse of the apple trees in the orchard under the darkened sky as Fabia backed up the car. And soon we were on our way back to town. The dog had started barking. We could hear it for some time, until finally, we could not hear it anymore, and all was darkness around us, except where the headlamps revealed a stretch of road leading somewhere.
Fabia did not talk this time. I didn't seem to have anything to say myself. But when finally we came to the hotel and I got down, Fabia said, "Well, I guess I won't be seeing you again."
It was dimly lighted in front of the hotel and I could hardly see Fabia's face. Without getting off the car, he moved to where I had sat, and I saw him extend his hand. I gripped it.
"Tell Ruth and Roger," I said, "I love them."
He dropped my hand quickly. "They'll be waiting for me now," he said.
"Look," I said, not knowing why I said it, "one of these days, very soon, I hope, I'll be going home. I could go to your town."
"No," he said softly, sounding very much defeated but brave, "Thanks a lot. But, you see, nobody would remember me now."
Then he started the car, and as it moved away, he waved his hand.
"Goodbye," I said, waving back into the darkness. And suddenly the night was cold like winter straying early in these northern woodlands.
I hurried inside. There was a train the next morning that left for Muncie, Indiana, at a quarter after eight.

Today

Today is the day my new life begins.

Last week was a week of struggle and all that. I have been through a lot of sickness already, even worst than last week. I went home last week and stayed at home since Tuesday until Sunday. I was in front of the television the whole time. My Mama had to go to the office. My sister also worked. My two younger siblings were not also at home; they attended their classes. So, I was left alone at home from Tuesday till Friday, and I was in front of the television the whole time.

It was I guess on Wednesday that I happen to watch an episode of Grey's Anatomy that I was really moved. I watched an episode wherein a bunch of graduating college students had a car accident. There were eight of them. Only three made it; the rest died due to complications of the wounds that they got from the accident.

It was supposed to be their graduation day, and they were on their way to the graduation program when the accident happened. Worst, their class valedictorian was with them, and she was in a critical condition that she could not even move her body and was (base on what I saw) paralyzed because she could not feel that the doctor was already touching her leg.

The class valedictorian really panicked. She was so anxious to attend the graduation ceremony because she was supposed to give a speech that day. She was in a total panic and kept on repeating that she had to be at the graduation ceremony and that she had a speech to give. The doctor really pitied her and just kept on listening to whatever she had to say while doing the best that he could to save his patient. Later, the doctor just asked the college girl to just give her speech, and he will just listen while doing his job. The doctor listened to her speech.

Later that day, the doctor was so damned eager to save the life of that college girl that he cried so hard. He really pitied her. He saw how determined that girl was to be at her graduation. He saw the same eagerness he saw in the eyes of his girlfriend to be healed from her disease. His girlfriend who also used to work in that same hospital was now confined there as a patient.

With all of the cancer thingy and the accident, it just came up to me that we can not really predict what might happen next; thus, we have to enjoy every second of our lives. We have to savor everything that happens. That college girl said that what she did all her life was study, study, and study. She turned down every offer of fun by her classmates. She told herself that she will do everything she wants to do when she graduates, but see what happened? She ended up being paralyzed. How can she do the things that she wants to do now?

Thus, starting today, I'm gonna do whatever it is that i want to do...with care, of course. I will do just what is expected of a true citizen to do for her country.

"Today is the day my life begins. All my life, I've been just me, just an avid reader and writer of who-knows-what. Today, I become a lady. Today, I become a daughter. Today, I become a citizen.Today, I become accountable to someone other than myself. Today, I become accountable to my family, to our future...to all the possibilities that life has to offer. Together, whatever happens, i"ll be ready for anything, for everything... to take on life...to take on love, to take on a possibility and responsibility. Today, I'm gonna love life and live it well...because today...is the beginning."


This post is inspired by Grey's Anatomy Season 5.

Dangaga sa conditioner oi

I went at a grocery store yesterday to buy a few loads of basic needs such as shampoo, detergent soap, noodles/canton, sopas, deodorant, energy drink, etcetera. I was uneasy to buy because Abby was with me, and I know for a fact that I am one hell of a shopper. It takes a lot of time for me to think over on which item to buy. And the fact that someone was with me made me feel uncomfortable because I was shy to keep her waiting. Although Abby was understanding enough and told me not to be shy and to take my time, it didn't lessen the uncomfortable feeling.

What I did was I just grabbed everything which i thought I needed. I grabbed them without looking at their labels. Just minutes after all the grabbing and loading, I was confident that I had all the things that I wanted for a few days.

Just this morning, when I was taking a bath, I discovered that I bought a conditioner instead of a shampoo. Whew! So here I am now...living a day of 'conditionered'. If only I checked the label...wa ta ko gaantus aning pagkapilitang buhok!
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Hayz..Sagdai na lang ang importante nakapanggrocery na ko!

Love to be home

I miss home again although it has only been three days since I left it.

It is true that nothing can ever provide the comfort that home brings to anyone. Just last weekend, I went home from Dumaguete City, and when we had our dinner on a Sunday night, it just occurred to me that I still didn't want to go back in the city.

When I announced it over dinner, Mama was so supportive that she managed to say, "You can stay here as long as you want. Indi anay magbalik a." As much as I wanted to utter happiness and to celebrate for my supportive mother's remark, I couldn't. I wanted to stay at home (as in for a long time), but i could not escape the fact that I have subjects to attend to. I want to pass everything now, so I would get my diploma this march.

So, bisan pa naghambal si Mama nga pwede ko kapadugay sa balay, di gid japon pwede. I needed to go back in the city to pass all my remaining subjects. Antus lang anay, lapit na lang gid.

Hahays...I miss home already...AGAIN!
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This is the new interior design at home. Talented gid si Mama a.

It's nice seeing you again

I love you.

I wanted to tell you this when, after four long years of not seeing each other, I met you just one and a half weeks ago. I just didn't know how to though.

Well, I found out from one of your social network accounts that you already have a special someone. I could really tell that you love each other, although I haven't met her yet. I didn't feel any kind of regret or something like that when I first knew about it. Pain? Well, maybe. I don't know.

I've treasured you for nine years now, and I'm still counting. (Haha). Funny, but true. It's been nine years, yes. I just don't how I couldn't let go of you no matter how hard I try. Or am I really trying? I don't know. Perhaps, yes. I've tried turning my attention to other guys, you know, but I guess it just won't work out. For how many times I've asked for God's intervention, so I would no longer feel this feeling towards you, but still nothing happened.

The feeling is still here...stuck inside me.

I wanted to write here that I was happy when I saw your photos with her, but I guess that would mean hypocrisy. I wasn't happy, honestly. When I saw the photos, I felt something cold touched me in my heart, and it was painful, as in really painful.
I'm not the type who cries over or gets haywired with this kind of stuff. Although I am hurt, I haven't cried a single tear, and I haven't been hysterical about it. At least, I haven't YET. I hope I won't.

Whew! I just want to shout at the moment, yet I haven't found the right place to shout at. I hope I can find one. Maybe, it will help. I mean, shouting...I hope it will help.
Again, I love you. I want to tell you this. Not now, maybe someday when we meet again. And when that someday comes, I hope to hear the same line from you.

I know

I know I haven't updated my blog...guilty!

There has been nothing special going on in my life. Well, what else could be new? Aside from me wearing a simple t-shirt, jeans, and a pair of sneakers, nothing seems to be new.

Well, I'll be guilty as hell if I'll keep on updating and updating my blog without finishing some stuffs, so I guess, it's acceptable if I haven't and won't blog for a couple of weeks. I have a lot of things to do. As in, super-duper many! I have this school stuffs like research that need to be done. Well, I haven't even started some of them yet. Aside from that, I also have many responsibilities to attend to in the pub.

I'm currently working on my magazine article about drugs. I'm not supposed to blog because it's undone yet, but then this is the only chance I've got. The internet connection has been disconnected in the past weeks, and it might happen again. If I won't post anything in my blog account now, perhaps the next time that I can post something here will be next century(?). haha