Thursday, December 23, 2004
It's beginning to feel a bit like Christmas!
I feel as if I haven't blogged in ages. Actually, it's just been 10 days, but I used to write a new entry almost every day (hey, Ma'am Lanot, I got that one right!). Haven't had the energy to do so lately though, so I'd sort of been taking a sabbatical from blogging for some time. So this entry's going to be pretty long, as I'm going to compress all the things I have to say in one entry.
Dec. 16, Thursday
was the night we had our first (and only) Philosophy written exam for this semester. It was the midterms exam, and it had the weight of 40 percent of our grade. Did I study for it? No. I don't think many of us did. For some reason, it's hard to study for an exam where you are allowed to bring your books and notes, talk to your classmates, and move around the classroom.
We had two questions to choose from again, but I chose the first one, which goes something like this: Explain Sarte's "Hell is other people" and Camus' idea of the absurd. Do you think the hero in the Myth of Sisyphus can respond to Sarte's and Camus' view of the world? Spent half the three hours allotted to me scrambling for answers in my texts and in my notes, and asking Jace about everything under the sun. Had to race through the writing part of the exam (all 4 pages of it) because I had to get to the novena mass in the Gesu by 8:30, though I ended up being late anyway.
Yeah, Hell is other people alright. "Other people" specifically being Mr. de Jesus. But hopefully, I'll at least get a C+ there. Please, God, let me at least get a C+!
Dec. 17, Friday
was the day of our block Christmas party. We'd been debating over the location until the very last minute, but we ended up holding it in the old place...near Eagle pond behind CTC and SOM. Food was outrageously plenty. Mitch brought pizza, Jace--pancit malabon, me and Ma-ann--brownies, Danielle--drinks, Kim--chicharon. The others brought utensils and stuff.
I'd spent the weeks preceding that saving up money and buying gifts for my friends. Most of the gifts I bought were shared with other friends in order to buy something nice and still not run out of money. Yumi, Cerz, Jihan, Ina and I especially enjoyed giving our gift (a copy of Wicked, the book) to Jace. Though, I personally wanted to kick his ass when we overheard him talking to his mom, who was shopping for books, looking for Wicked, for him, on the phone. And I'm glad Yumi liked the Ateneo jacket Jihan and I bought her, though I don't think her mom was too pleased about the ATENEO sewn on the back.
And to follow Yumi's lead, here are my thank yous:
to Jace--for the A.K.A. Fellas CD. No, Jace, I hadn't known you were giving me that :P And as I'm sure everyone already knew, I'd been wanting a copy for ages. Just didn't have the money for it. I'm already wearing out the CD.
to Jihan--oh yes, for the Kitchie Nadal's CD. Ditto for this one. Hehe...yeah, I'd known what you were giving me ever since we got our grades for last sem, and I'm not ashamed to admit that I'd been looking forward to it for the last couple of months. Between the A.K.A. Fellas CD and the Kitchie Nadal CD, my family's going to hit the roof over being subjected to it night and day.
to Yumi, Cerz and Darls--for the book. Hehe...since you knew it was what I wanted, I'm sure you already know my reaction to it.
to Hanniel--for the CD :) Sorry, haven't listened to it yet, but I will.
to Kim--for the massager. Hehe...I thought at first that the humongous blue jackstone piece was a paperweight, but, based from the other's and your entries, I finally realized that it was a massager :P Oh, and thanks for the chicharon too!
to Billy--for the mug...which was supposed to be for the exchange gift that didn't happen...so I just, uh, volunteered, to take the mug off your hands.
Did I leave anything out? Hope not...
Dec. 18, Saturday
was the day of our annual children's party in Parong-Parong. I slept at around 11:30-12 the night before. Woke up at 2:30 am to take a bath. We left for Bulacan at 3 am on the dot. Couldn't sleep on the way home. When we got to Bulacan, which was at around 4 am, I asked to be allowed to sleep for around 30 minutes. Took me some time to fall asleep though, so I only got around 15 minutes of downtime, before mom woke me up at 4:45. And we started working on the preparations.
217 kids registered. A whole lot more unregistered appeared at the gates of the chapel on that day. We even ran out of chairs for them. The parents haven't change. They still harassed me because their kids weren't registered, or they didn't quite like the gifts their children got. No matter what we do to modify the system, there are always a platoon of unregistered kids who come to the party and cry in front of me when I can't let them in. But what can I do?
There was this one part wherein, in the guise of a dance contest, my mom asked us to select kids who seem especially less fortunate from the bunch. We had 48 shoes and slippers, and we chose those who seemed less able to buy decent shoes. While we were doing so, trying to be as discreet as possible, and trying to act as if we were really just picking out the ones we thought danced best, the others caught on to why we were randomly pulling kids out of the bunch and taking them to the stage area, where the shoes were. So, everytime I climbed off the stage to select more kids, this girl, and a bunch of her friends, would run up to me, holding their hands high, shouting at me to choose them. But she didn't look as, uh, less fortunate as some of the others, and her feet were bigger than the shoes, so I just kept acting as if I didn't notice, or I told them that the purpose of the game was to dance. One time, she really chased after me, and I had to bolt.
I liked the emcee my mom got though. He didn't realize he had to organize games, and he had to wing it, but he was good! He was so patient, and the games he thought of were new and fun. And he managed to keep the kids in order.
By the time the party ended, though, I wanted desperately to crawl into bed. Between the lack of sleep, the complaints of the kids and their parents, the parents who coach their kids to lie to us about their ages, the kid who got in by using another kid's name, the kids who chased me down, the endless walks back and forth from the chapel to the house and back, and the idiotic guys watching the party who were hooting at me and my cousins, I felt like a zombie. Slept my way through the ride back home. I would have wept with joy because it was over if it wouldn't have been humiliating.
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I spent most of this week in the store, or doing things related to the store. We had two Christmas parties for the employees this week, one yesterday and one this afternoon, so we spent a lot of time buying groceries, packing 100 bags of them, fixing their salaries, 13th month pays and going to the parties. Spent a lot of time in the bank, and I can honestly say that I am glad I don't have to see the faces of the people in the bank for quite a while.
And now, it's all over. Finally, Dec. 23, 10:30 pm. The last novena mass had ended an hour ago, and tomorrow night, it'll be Christmas eve. As the title goes, it's finally beginning to feel a bit like Christmas!
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Just a sidenote: My brother said something a few days ago. He said that he thinks he finally believes in the saying that all things come in three. All things such as death. In the past week or so, 3 deaths have been on the news:
1) FPJ. I know everyone knows this already, but yes, one of the top candidates in the last presidential election is dead. He was buried last Wednesday, which caused a lot of traffic and the Malacanang to put up a lot of security because about a million or so people went to his funeral. I guess the government was scared that FPJ's fans would rally against them for "taking away", as they say, FPJ's dreams of serving the nation.
This may sound...I don't know, crass? or something...but imagine if he had won the election. Our president would have been...Noli de Castro. *shudder*
2)KC de Venecia. Joe de Venecia's youngest daughter. Their house caught fire last week, and they all thought she was with her brother in Starbucks. They didn't know she had changed her mind about going with her brother, so when the house caught fire, they didn't think to look for her. They just heard someone yelling for help, then her sister got to talk to her on the phone for a while and hear her begging for help. They found her in her brother's bathroom, bundled in a wet blanket. They said she died of suffocation, but I think she got burned too because when the stretcher was taken out, there was a lump under the blanket.
Man, I hope she really did die of suffocation and not of the fire itself. What could be worse than being burned alive? Her death got to me a lot more than FPJ's. Maybe it's because she was only 16...four years younger than I am. She's so...young. And to have died in a fire... At least FPJ was old. And he didn't suffer.
3)The grandson of Dolphy. I don't know much about what happened to him. All I know is that he was 14 and got shot.
All these deaths. Makes you realize just how mortal you are.
# Lyn found a missing piece @ 6:27 PM 
