Negatives found.

january 7, 2012.

Airport: yesterday was a terrible flight mix up.

Today, just before leaving for Davao, I found the negatives I lost. It's the film roll that bears the last photographs of my grandmother.

A month after i took her portraits, she died, in my hometown, on a Friday morning, just before sunrise.

Back in our Town

Amazing, amazing band, Ivy.

(fan video can be accessed here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BUxSQdjACvE)

Back in our town

You were the only one who really knew me.

Laughing out loud.

We always knew you could see through me.

Everything is all right. Everything is all right.

Under the sun

Whispering foolish things, you could really hear me

You were the one

The only one, I would let near me

Everything is all right. Everything is all right.

Back in our town

You were the only one who ever loved me

I’ll let you down

I never felt you’d let go of me

We by the sun

Wondering slowly on the street together

Back in our town

Everything seems to last forever

Back in our town

You were the only one who ever loved me

And here I go

When nobody never ever knows


Everything is all right. Everything is all right. Everything is all right.

And here I go. When nobody knows.

And here I go. When nobody never ever knows.

Back in our town

You were the only one who really knew me.

Ivy (from the album: Apartment Life)

Features James Iha (Tinted Windows) on guitars and vocals. 

Quick, painless and easy.

The thing about growing up is that one learns to grow guts to face bigger life issues. The catch is, as one grows up the fears become more and more real. Once, when i was in grade school, i kept a expense log book (actually, it was just a school pad) where i account everything that my mother gave me, from the daily allowance to the writing pads. Although i never learned to love expense accounting and avoided it in my adult life, that school-pad-accounting helped me prioritized on my material needs and learned to save up for my wants (like P5.00 corndog for recess on fridays). I was haunted by a baseless idea that i was making our family poorer by just existing.

The demography and economics i dealt with in university provided bases for my fears.

I am now in the stage where my contemporaries are getting married, busy being stage parents, busy climbing up the ladder of success, and making long term plans. The only long term plan I know how to make is the one that makes use of people's tax money. I am in the stage where majority of my contemporaries have social security, health insurance and housing loans. I am supposed to have those kinds of things, too, but somehow i overlooked them, thinking that all those "preserving the culture" and saving the world researches were more important, even if they were barely enough to pay the rent. And this again, because the only plan I knew to make I cannot even use to fix my life.

It appears now that there is high probability i will die poor and homeless.

Last night, I struggled to sleep and woke up to a nightmare that I thought was real. In the dream, my kid and I were in a sort of festival and he somehow slipped from me, and I couldn't find him anymore. I searched and searched for him, I even sought help from the police but it seemed he just vanished and he's just nothing but a statistics. A boy of 5, missing.

In the jeepney, I thought of my death. My left lymph nodes are little swollen; I'd probably die from an ear cancer. I have not pooped for days. I'd have colon cancer by the time I am 35. My kid would end up collecting trash to buy food. The guilt is even more unbearable. My head hurts thinking about this.

Waway and his Che cap.

Waway drives people around in his red pedicab. He rents it from a pedicab operator for P35.00/day.

He was introduced by a landlord when we moved in to the compound. I was wary of him because he was so skinny, dark and he smelled. He looked like a pot-smoking hobo in pedicab. He still does. 

I took this picture a year ago for a personal project. He was very self-conscious when I asked to take his picture. My husband and I just got back from a morning appointment and we were in a hurry to get back home. It was a very hot, glaring day.

Before getting off the tricycle I asked my husband if it was appropriate for me to be taking Waway’s picture. We were a few meters away from the compound and I could see Waway lazing in his pedicad parked at the gate. He said I should take Waway’s picture. It may be the only picture I’d take of him. When we got off, there were no tenants around.

“’Way, I’d take your picture.”

“Now?” He straightened his body, surprised. 

“Yes, now.”

“Okay.”

He failed at faking confidence. 10 seconds it took to adjust my camera.

The midday sun was too bright and for split second i thought of cancelling it. 

If people without homes in first world countries live in their cars, Waway lives in his pedicab, or at least that’s what most people said about him. They said he was from Aklan. They said he came to Iloilo in the 90's. He doesn't bathe.  He wears the same set of clothes every single day, until they're not fit to be worn anymore. He smokes menthol cigarettes and never drives right after eating, also, when there is a Pacquiao fight. He never seems to get sick. He uses  a tattered cap to protect his head.

We have a handful of caps that the boys at home do not use. And clothes that Waway could use. But I don’t think he wants people to feel sorry for him.

One weekend afternoon, arriving from art class, I told him I already have a print of his photo. He just smiled and said, “Do I look handsome?”

“Of course, you do.”

And he went to pick up a hailing passenger.

Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA)

I've been out and travelling for the last 7 days. and before that, buried in tons of work in preparation for the tour. it was that stressful, arranging travel for 14 adults who work for the government. the red tape is amazing. everything was decided on the last minute. but i will write more on that when i find time. 

in the mean time, here is something for the very important internet news that everyone should read about. this is a direct copy and past  from WIKIPEDIA.

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The Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA), also known as House Bill 3261 or H.R. 3261, is a bill that was introduced in the United States House of Representatives on October 26, 2011, by House Judiciary Committee Chair Representative Lamar S. Smith (R-TX) and a bipartisan group of 12 initial co-sponsors. The bill, if made law, would expand the ability of U.S. law enforcement and copyright holders to fight online trafficking in copyrighted intellectual property and counterfeit goods.^[2] Presented to the House Judiciary Committee, it builds on the similar PRO-IP Act of 2008 and the corresponding Senate bill, the PROTECT IP Act.^[3]

The originally proposed bill would allow the U.S. Department of Justice, as well as copyright holders, to seek court orders against websites accused of enabling or facilitating copyright infringement. Depending on who makes the request, the court order could include barring online advertising networks and payment facilitators from doing business with the allegedly infringing website, barring search engines from linking to such sites, and requiring Internet service providers to block access to such sites. The bill would make unauthorized streaming of copyrighted content a crime, with a maximum penalty of five years in prison for ten such infringements within six months. The bill also gives immunity to Internet services that voluntarily take action against websites dedicated to infringement, while making liable for damages any copyright holder who knowingly misrepresents that a website is dedicated to infringement.^[4]

Proponents of the bill say it protects the intellectual property market and corresponding industry, jobs and revenue, and is necessary to bolster enforcement of copyright laws, especially against foreign websites.^[5] They cite examples such as Google's $500 million settlement with the Department of Justice for its role in a scheme to target U.S. consumers with ads to illegally import prescription drugs from Canadian pharmacies.^[6]

Opponents say that it violates the First Amendment,^[7] is Internet censorship,^[8] will cripple the Internet,^[9] and will threaten whistle-blowing and other free speech actions.^[7][10] Opponents have initiated a number of protest actions, including petition drives, boycotts of companies that support the legislation, and planned service blackouts by English Wikipedia and major Internet companies scheduled to coincide with the nextCongressional hearing on the matter.

The House Judiciary Committee held hearings on November 16 and December 15, 2011. The Committee was scheduled to continue debate in January 2012,^[11] but on January 17 Chairman Smith said that "[d]ue to the Republican and Democratic retreats taking place over the next two weeks, markup of the Stop Online Piracy Act is expected to resume in February."^[12]

please check this site for more on that.