When stars go blue

Awww. What a title.

The other night a house mate and I decided to spend it on the rooftop of our boarding house to escape the heat of our rooms down below. We welcome the approaching December winds, and the rooftop is a calming and soothing refuge for our tired bodies who walked one of urban Manila's most depressed areas earlier during the day. We consciously but implicitly agree to spend our time there and talk about almost anything (how the day went, the food we're eating, the tambays around the corner who speak with weird Californian, valley girl accent, the cockroach traversing the veranda's rails, anything), but that night, she was her usual self. We've had this tens of times of before. And yet somehow, every night that we decide to spend our last waking hours together, I expect it to be different.

Maybe because she was tired that night. Or because she's painfully in love. We talk for a few minutes while I find the most comfortable spot - and position - in the place and as soon as I do, she's gone. The wind takes her. Me noting the wind earlier is not intended to suggest anything. She just floats away, while I look at her from my cozy spot, not with longing (desiring) eyes; without anything.

That night the spot was in the center of the veranda, lying down first plainly on the dusty floor, then later with my bed sheet and a pillow. In this position I have an unobstructed view of the sky. It too was clear, and for the first time I saw the stars as they were meant to be seen; twinkling brightly against the dark sky, without the shameless light of the moon in the periphery, and without any structures around to remind you of the earth where you stand - or lie. Heaven embraced me that night, a dark cocoon offering nothing (not even protection) but sheer awe while trinkets of light flirted with me (they did, believe me). Do they want me to follow them? And then touch them, feel them burn my skin and soul? I want to know so I did, but they quickly hid behind a thick blanket of clouds, teasing me even more.

But where was the girl? I guess the stars took her and hid her behind the clouds.

I pick up my bed sheet and pillow, and I sigh, half-frustrated, that I let the lights take her. But then I suppose, in fact I know, she's happier there.

Where do you go when you're lonely?

A city by the river

It's easy to fall in love with a city like Marikina. Last night a friend and I decided to visit the many peryas and bazaar set up along the riverside by the city government in preparation for the Yuletide. The place was teeming with Marikeños, and one could immediately feel the sense of community pervading the atmosphere. I've never experienced anything like it in any place I've been to, much less here in Metro Manila where I grew up.

As my friend described it, it couldn't be any happier than any fiesta anywhere in the country. But for someone who grew up in communities where feasts are hardly celebrated, my point of comparison come pathetically only from TV shows and magazines; travel guides with pictures of people in flamboyant costumes dancing and prancing on streets to entertain (foreign) tourists or, if I subscribe to their position, their patrons (saint or no saint) . But what makes Marikina extra special is the intimacy of the place, of the now-positively-famous Marikina riverbanks.

I can't stop myself from romanticizing a river that runs across a town. It is not the cleanest, mind you, but the Marikina river is relatively less "colorful" than Pasig, and way clearer than the typical urban esteros. At least water here has current, and gazillions of janitor fish swim about. At least there's life here. What's more, people really don't mind being around the river. There were about 5 carnival spots along the riverbank on both sides, and at least a hundred food booths and tiangges. Entire families have their picnics on green spots beside the river, and with the volume of people in that place last night, the place was surprisingly clean. These people must be really proud of this place to actually care for it.

Introduction: Points of Departure

I find it incidental that my first venture in the blogging world coincided with the first day of my literature class. I should clarify: I've been blogging for a while (around 4 posts now) in Yahoo! 360, not really to blog blog, but only to try out its features. To be honest, that site's a fine thing - it beats friendster.com and myspace.com by a mile in terms of user-friendliness and ease of use, and of course, it's got the Yahoo! server for better photo uploading and sharing sessions. But then again, I've never really been fond of the online social networking culture, which made the all the effort to customize my account and fill up fields and forms a total waste of my time.

Now on this blog and my class. I will not admit that it's the "literary bug" that bit me to take blogging seriously, because it did not. Contrary to most assumptions, I decided to pursue further studies in literature not to be a writer and not, more importantly and this point I should make clear, because I'm "inspired." I've already given up on the possibility of me writing for a living for, if it's still not obvious, I'm kind of boring and unimaginative - writing-wise. But who said one needs to write prize-winning entries for blogs?

Tomorrow is the second day of my literature class. The course is an introduction to post-colonial studies; a subject I am fond of, but I cannot claim expertise nor mastery. If it's any help, I took several courses on post-modernism in undergraduate Sociology, which exposed me to the whole "post-" phenomena. Whatever it is, I hope both their "post-"'s mean the same. Scholars are wasting valuable intellectual resources debating over its meaning - which they are most welcome to use for ending global poverty - if Chomsky's "post-" is nowhere near Said's. Or they can also dismantle nukes. Or unseat Presidents (the bushy one or the short one).

My bad. At least Chomsky's not missing the big picture.

Now, why this blog? Simply because I decided I should keep one.