and again.

Yeah.

as you all know i've left the island. i'm all done with the rasta life and had gone back to being an urbanite.

i'm also now engage in a different project, which i apparently enjoy notice my lack of posts lately), though i  kinda miss the action that i get in things transport planning.

this week keith and i will start on our yoga sessions. i've decided to quit TRYING to return to running and do something else. i've had the 8 years to enjoy running, anyway and it is probably time to venture into something new, something that my body and my age would easily relate to. yeah, like yoga.

No, actually, i would love to return to running but i've been having health issues that i'm not sure would really agree with the demands of running. for one, i've had fainting spells after my "recent" runs (2 runs--months ago-- to be exact). the latest of the 2 was a lot worse than the first and i knew it was time to listen to what my body has been trying to tell me. getting a running partner is one option but the "runners" at home have different work schedule, and keith, who was once my running partner (yeah, like 6 years ago), cannot run anymore. he has a leg condition, a broken-and-re-attached-by-a-rod femur condition (if you care), that prohibits him from doing strenuous exercises like running. actually, it's not an issue of a broken bone but after coming out from that accident, his left leg became about half inch shorter than the right. you can just imagine what running would do to the joints of his uneven legs when he gets older.

so yoga, it is.

again, on sunday, keith and i will start our yoga session in the house cum office of this vegetarian organization that is located almost 2 blocks from our place. keith personally asked for this yoga session; i didn't talk him into it. and i am glad he "volunteered" to do it this time.

and the developing shop TOTALLY destroyed my 1 roll of 36 frames exposed black and white film (kodak bw cn400). one of these days i am going to make a list of all legit film developing shops in the city and rank them from best to worst. the worst so far is the KODAK SHOP right in the corner of iznart-yulo street. film processing takes more or less 8 hours and yeah, they totally destroyed my kodak black and white film. said it was EXPOSED. of course it was exposed! that's how you take pictures--you get your film exposed. when i asked why the film was returned WITHOUT the frame numbers the developer guy said: "it was our first time to develop a black and white film."

Dang.

and you HAVE to work in a film developing shop.

(that answers the lack of photo posts lately--if ever you wondered.)

Mother Studies (# 0.1): Freedom

and what it truly means.

I contemplated on not going to college because I wanted to be free. At 16, I wanted to get a job so I can leave the house and live away from the noise, the rules, the endless criticisms and guilt of being a dependent in my parent’s household. My teenage confusion and my parents’ conventional, small town ideas did not really mix well.

But I didn’t and had thoughts of suicide. For peace of mind.

Then I had a kid and got married, got myself a job that pays the rent and I started, though gradually, embracing the thought of actually leading my own life. I’ve always thought that money—a stable flow of money—is all that it takes to get a life.

I’ve got a place that I do not have the right to anything. I cannot even decide who should live in it. Or what my mother should or should not put in it. my mother turns it into a warehouse and I am not supposed to complain about how her garbage takes up so much living space and how it encourages the rats and cockroach to breed twice as much as they ordinarily would, because that would make me a very difficult, unsupportive daughter. And having to live with my mother’s garbage is not even enough to repay all the money she spent on me. In a Filipino family, only a daughter’s life can pay for all the hardships her parents went through raising her. I never knew how true it was until this time. There are days when I feel it’s too late. I’m done. I’ll forever be my mother’s slave.

Buying a house of my own is one possible option I was given, but it came with a condition that the house must be big enough to accommodate my mother, my father, my unmarried siblings and my mother’s garbage. And my own family. Or I can just tell my kid and my husband to get a tent and camp at the garage. It would be a decade more before I could afford something spacious enough to fit all those. Because if I get anything less I become an ungrateful daughter who prefer to abandon her parents and siblings in need. Honestly, a nagging, screaming mother is the last thing anybody in the world wants.

And because as family, my mother said, we have to stick together until death.

What if my husband’s parents demand the same? What do i do? Cut myself in half? Lengthwise or transverse-wise? I wonder.

I’ve got a son I can’t even help plan a future on. HELP PLAN, take note, NOT DECIDE. I think it is the saddest and most tragic thing an old parent could do to a daughter with a family of her own—decide on his/her grandkid’s future on his/her own. Or concluding on her/his own that she/he has a better way of raising her/his grandkid. It is even more tragic if the grandparent was treated the same way by her/his own mother or in-laws years before.

I guess history really does love to repeat itself. It’s like it has a default factory defect. Whatever factory produces this history repeater should start closing down, otherwise it will just repeat one mistake after another. Imagine having a history gattling gun. Could you?

I planned on ending this family tradition in my time and give my kid the freedom that he deserves because I DO NOT OWN HIM. and so should ALL parents to their kid.

But how could I give? I do not even have it.

while you were out...

i left the island and went partying in the city.

yeah. island life is exciting but it tends to get monotonous and bland after a while. 

and i've used up my stay. 

on my 7th day in my new work and new office, the sun was amazing. i thought i finally found a good scene to get a picture of. and i was without a camera. so i brought it the next day. and the next and the next, but all that the sky gave me was a muted sun. 

bleh.

Our Tuesday Night Music Club.

Last night was Alfredogs night, to 4 of us, at least, because the other two travel-happy ones are again out on the road (rather on a plane) to HongKong.

ABD brought along a handful of high school kids and for a while i was happy to see myself in them from 15 years ago. When Keith arrived, i kidded them kids that they'll look exactly like Keith does 15 years from now. I am not sure if the thought horrified them considering that Keith had longish hair and clearly didn't look like anybody doing serious office work. Meanwhile, i looked like a lady pastor, in my skirt and flats, lacking only one heavyweight bible to complete the whole Lady Pastor fashion. Maritess (PSD) was in suspenders and her bangs unevenly cut.

I'm taking back what i said earlier. I'm now sure the kids were horrified. When they get home, each one of them would be swearing he doesn't want to see himself degrade into something like "us" come 15 years.

But ABD kept them happy in mocha and strawberry shakes, and sizzling spicy sausage and mushrooms. (what the hell was i saying here!?) And sent them home about 30 minutes past the agreed send off time. What can we do? The kids were enjoying the reggae band.

I told them to leave early so we can start talking dirty, adult things. And flashed a smile.

Some frustrated Crazy for You singer (may i correct myself: sessionist. Yap, she was JUST a sessionist) thought she was great on stage but the "I see you in the smoking air" did not work. Apparently. We gave half smiles. Frustrated Lady Sessionist (FLS) started calling out for song requests and when no one asked, she chatted with the guitarist as if they were good friends who just bumped into each other on the side and decided to have a small chat. Then when that didn't work, too, because the singer/guitarist didn't want to have small talk on stage, FLS started answering text messages on stage.

Singers who can't tell that something is very very wrong with "I see you in the smoking air" should be put to jail.

And it was a reggae band, for chrissakes. Grow some brain.

Meanwhile, in the next 3 hours i would be continuously blinded by camera flashes from the group of students who thought last night was the best night to take night out photos for facebook. Beeeh. But you could say i was just jealous because my elvis presley camera did not come with a free blinding flash. Whatever. Keith took his camera out and started taking pictures of the candle on our table. Slightly annoyed, i nagged him about wasting precious frames. But my voice was obviously overpowered by the crowd’s and the band’s, and because our Tuesday Night Music Club venue has terrible acoustics.

Then I requested for Santeria because I can’t remember “What I Got’s” title. Today I searched the internet and found “What I Got” in youtube in less than 5 seconds.

“Very violent song,” Keith told me.

“Tell me that again,” I said. Santeria is really a murderer’s song neatly package in beach-y beats.

We clapped. The band sang some Tropical Depression’s, a Yano song (the singer pronounced Ya-no ‘Yuh nuh’; I heard it “anna”) and some Jason Mraz that the audience—excluding us—requested. They played covers really well. The other guitarist (Keith said is the son of the local luthier) is even better and plays a 7-stringed guitar. They all look like they do not have day jobs but seemed happy.

It’s a good thing.

I took a picture of them, on a 50-second exposure. I hope it turns out well.

Keith took a picture of ABD. His camera, manufactured in Bagets era, is a girl version of my Elvis Presley. I also took a picture of ABD and PSD from the opposite side of the table. I also hope it turns out well.

"'It has been taken CARE of', is the correct form," ABD lectured. Yes, we have random grammar lectures every now and then. It just pops unexpectedly in the conversation but nobody in the group is a self-proclaimed grammarian. It's just the way things go. With us.

Grammar happens.

Keith and I found ourselves playing charade in the middle of a noisy bar.

“I enjoy both of you. You easily amuse each other,” ABD said just as I guessed the word “eagle”.

Keith, by the way, is the terrible-st charade player ever. I don't want him to be my charade partner again.

At half past midnight, we went home intoxicated from/with/in (???) laughter.

Photo post: Morning Shots

Here's the recent addition to the photo post list.

Most of the photos here were taken in Iloilo City, except for a handful that i took in other places.

I'm using a normal lens (58 mm) and ISO 100 colored films. No flash.  I still hope to be able to use a black and white film someday but as of the moment, i do not have access to a b &w film that can be processed using the c41. there is someplace i can get a b & w (fuji neopan) but it's processed using the d76. As far as i know, c41 is the only way most developing centers here process films.

but i am not complaining. just looking forward to the day i'd finally shoot in black and white.

Yulo Street, Iloilo City in the morning.

Quirino Bridge, Iloilo City.
This bridge leads to Lapuz and Barrio Obrero, Lapaz.
The shadow belongs to my friend who took morning shots with me.

Arroyo Street, Iloilo City.

View of the grain silos from Muelle Loney Street, Iloilo City.

Forbes Bridge, Iloilo City
(It connects the "island" city to the main Panay Island.)

a modern building at Bonifacio Drive, Iloilo City.
(One of the buildings in the City that i like.)

Another view.

Former Iloilo Rehabilitation Center (IRC). 

Guimaras Museum.

Masonry of the crumbling old Spanish building that once housed the United Distillers.

Window space, abandoned architecture.

  

Gaisano City, Iloilo City.

Abandoned architecture.

Abandoned but drawn on architecture.

Wall. Abandoned architecture.

Boyz in the hood.

  

Husband and wife.

man portrait.

Man portrait.

Teen portrait.

 They were hungry. They looked very hungry. It was not good for us to come there and took their pictures but they wanted us to photograph them, and i still feel guilty for having somehow exploited their poverty for a "good photograph". 

We thanked them, gave some small change for coffee and left hurriedly.

Telloy.
He cuts my father in-law's hair, my husband's and now, my  son's.
Then one day, at work, my female boss told me she'd be out early for a haircut.
"Who does your hair?" I curiously asked her.
"Oh, the neighborhood hair-cutter Telloy. It's where the old (not to mean age-related) Ilonggos have their hair cut."

Waway.
He drives a sikad (pedicab).

Chris.

The three stooges.

Boat men.
They willingly let me into their parked boat so i could take a picture of the water taxis.
I am still not comfortable taking pictures of strangers but they requested that i take their picture.
I think they expected to view the shot after but i told them i'm on film. 

Telloy in his shop.

Water taxis.

VIrginia Bridge, Guimbal.

I dedicated some 20 slides for that morning's picture-taking. On my way home, i again took the very back seat in the van expecting to get a better picture of the Virginia Bridge. 

And i did. 

FIN.