i am sick. i have been out of our house for 6 days and have been eating hotel food for that same length of time. 

i am at the airport waiting for my flight in 6 hours. 

I thought i would manage since Iloilo is also polluted but it turned out Manila is way way polluted. Worse, my 5-star hotel accommodation is located in the 5-stars of the polluted districts in Manila. They also have 5-star wi-fi provision--it's at P300 for 1 hour worth of wi-fi use. 

and so I succumbed to a bad case of allergy on the 4th day. 

i can't imagine how anybody manages to "live" in this city. it's just the really dirty, polluted, unwalkable, unfriendly to public transport users; just very unlivable. 

good thing the Green Urbanism conference was a success, otherwise i would be hating this city for the rest of my life. 

Lola, thank you for inspiring me to become a storyteller.
I hope i can become the same to my son, as you have been to me.

though shall not steal thy friend's bonsai.

yeah.

i stayed for weekend at my parents' house to find out that one of my ficus bonsais is missing. And the culprit? some LGU employee who came over and brought MY Bonsai home with her.

MY bonsai. jesus christ. can you imagine somebody actually stealing her colleague's daughter bonsai?

really??

because i can't. what person in his/her right mind would do that? it was just an ordinary ficus but it as one of the three different species of ficus bonsais i have in my parents' garden. and the culprit, guess where she's from? she came from the uplands. yes, in the cool rolling hills land where there are probably more of that ficus species than in my parent's area. what a loser.

it's the same thing with people begging--sometimes i think to the point of coercing--their travelling colleagues for souvenirs. Imagine having to waste at least a day of your vacation shopping for souvenirs because "everyone in the office said you should bring some." it's the stupidest thing ever. and i never ever let myself be talked into that shit. i think the only person i personally and willingly bought souvenirs for was my grandmother. i got her a scarf in cebu when we were there for a stopover on our trip to mindanao.

i mean, really? she stole my bonsai? or if she didn't, i bet my ass she "coerced" my mother into giving her that bonsai because my mother would never ever give my stuff away except at gunpoint. i know my mother.

unbelievable. just unbelievable.

come one, why would you steal a bonsai?

desktop, literally.

Desktops are an interesting bunch. I've seen a handful of blogs and forums posting pictures of member's desks and i'd say that --wow---desktops are a totally different world. Like they have a psychology of their own different from the owner.

We have only a couple of desks at home. One is a drafting table converted into regular desk to hold a mishmash of things. It was my husband's drafting table from architecture school, a very heavy table made from scrap coconut lumber. Sometimes my 4 year-old use it as an inclined plane to jump start his toy cars and send them flying across our bedroom. And i am always guilty to use it as a place to put my hair clips and my end-of-the-day trash that i take out from my pockets. It drives my husband crazy. He said that THE desk is not supposed to hold hairclips, especially when they easily tear HIS onion skin-like tracing papers.  And also because it has too many things on it already--his aging computer, his film camera, his junk art fixed lamp, his T-square (complete with the strings that help it slide back and forth smoothly), 3 of his countless sketch pads, numerous ball pens ON the table placed in a way that they do not ROLLLLLLL (because it's inclined and it can't hold a pen stand unless it's a fixed, screwed pen stand)--yes, some are felt tip (or at least the calligraphy pen is).

The other desk is like a public desk. It houses the desktop computer that is free for everyone to use but only after my husband has given his permission. Sometimes, my siblings' (yes, my siblings live with us) stuffs would find their way on this desk. They would often end up in trash bins--the real trash bins. You see, even the use of this public desk is highly political. The desktop computer on this desk contains the CAD and sketchup files--yes, they are the ones that pay and see to it that there is food in the fridge and that both my husband and I are able to drink beer at the beer places at least once a month.  With the basics of survival secured, i could easily feed by addiction to cheap white wine using my own money sans the guilt.

And have i mentioned I do not have a desk at home?

but here is a picture of my desk at work:

yyeah, and at work all i do is surf the net and read online forums. there's practically nothing in my organizer as my calendars are blank. but there's a libeskind book there (that is the property of my husband--i dunno how it found its way to my office desk) and some list on post-its, none i've done yet--NOT!!!

As you can see, it's relatively clean and free of piles of paperwork. I made sure to include only the side of my desk where it is still--YES!--clean. If i tilt my camera a little to the left you'll get the picture of HELL. In there, there's at least 10 watershed reports that have been trying to get my attention for the last few weeks. I tried so hard to give them some but it doesn't help. They do not decrease in number. In fact, the last time i checked they were about 5 and now they're 10. I should really get the stuffs on my desk to practice some family planning--or a population control method that actually works.

But no matter, i love this desk.

In fact, in my last four years of significant development work, this is the only "true" desk i ever had. In my previous project i had to content myself with heavy, weather-worn, wooden desk. It was about the same age as my grandmother and I think it really wanted to retire. I felt sorry for the desk. The desks in my other short shots i never really considered MY desk, as most of my engagements were short-lived. So short i didn't get a chance to put ugly valentine's day stuffed toys and pollen-exploding flowers on them.

And i think that any respectable, rational, clear-thinking, intelligent person should never stuff her office desk with ugly stuffed toys and pollen exploding flowers from boyfriends. Reports that give you visions of hell, maybe, because that's what the office desks are for. And i because, man, your boyfriends deserve some privacy, too. (Yes, desks are ours to use and use freely to express our individuality, and the expression of individuality are sometimes overdone that the lines between what's private and public are blurred. think: facebook.)

Well, unless you live to work--which, is a completely different matter--then you should have a fridge and a pull-out bed installed in your desk, and if space would allow, a dresser, and ironing board and a closet. and something to hold the washing machine, too.

eh.

and i present: the desk at home. 

The Year that Was.

It's the second time i traveled with PF by plane. The first time was in 2007, when we went to Davao on a study tour for our graduate diploma in urban planning. We did flew back home together from Manila in January of 2009 after our son's uretroplasty, but that's just one way so it does not officially constitute travelling together--half-travelling, maybe, yes.

The flight to Cebu was early, 6:15 in the morning but the airport is just about 30mins from our apartment. A group of friends who left Iloilo City 3 days earlier were to meet us at the place of accommodation. ABD, CBD, and JV, formerly ABD's bff but now already CBD's.

"Very nice, cozy place. almost looking like a pub," ABD's text read.

Ooohh. Anything that has slight resemblance to beers or to places with beers is always good.

So at 4:30 am we left our wailing son with my father. Imagine: toothless 3 year old face soaked in tears wailing don't go don't go in hiligaynon; in his right hand a miniature Optimus Prime big truck, in his left hand a miniature Chevy Camaro that is Bumble Bee. The repeated storytelling cum reminder the night before about the trip that his parents is supposed to take the next day did not, errrr, work and the whole apartment unit was left to endure the wails of a 3 year old.

It broke PF's heart.

But we had to hurry up. it might be difficult to get a taxi and our airline is 99% unreliable to sticking to the flight schedule. I crossed my fingers that there will be no flight changes today so we can have a good day.

It turned out the airport officially opens at 5 am and we had to line up for 10 minutes with the rest of the punctual travellers at the airport lobby. It took the check in counter another 10 more minutes to prepare themselves for the passengers so basically we were able to get the boarding passes just 20 minutes prior to boarding time. On a grumpy day, i would probably hit the roof but i have been looking forward to and was excited for this trip so much that I amazingly remained in high spirits. Just the thought of the pub-looking hotel is enough.  

Not half hour after we've checked in the weirdly accented PA announcer informed that our flight is ready for boarding.

At least the plane was on time.

By 7:30 am we were sat at the porch of Florentina Pensionne, waiting for our room to be prepared. A sleepy ABD met us as we have our 1st instant coffee of the day. The street of the pension house was a quaint, quiet, homey street. reminds you of suburbs. And we are just across a bungalow that has been converted to a recording studio and some rtw workshop, which, sans the signs would look just like, well, any 80s bungalow. It was so quiet you wouldn't know there was a recording studio. It is very possible that the one-hit-wonder odong band recorded their, what else? The only hit and wonder single they had. 

We had our first picture taken while we waited for the coffee, courtesy of the very sleepy ABD. JV and CBD hung out in the porch with us. They ate their breakfast while a took my first picture of the day. CBD's and JV's picture with their breakfast things.

About 9:00 am we went up to our room, admiring the rustic feel of the house. Okay, it was fake rustic but it wasn't super fake rustic to turn me off. It was definitely backpacking type, but that's what i also prefer. We were on the 3^rd floor. CBD welcomed us with envy thinking our room had a veranda. But it was a fake veranda. I ended up sleeping the whole morning off while PF worked. And a quick lunch at Neo Neo. We tried looking for some local carinderia ala iloilo’s first kitchen but it was too hot at 1:30 pm and we were already hungry. So Neo Neo it is.

ABD came up and checked our room just before the sexy things could happen. Very nice, he said because we could see a lot more from where we were. He said our day will officially begin when we meet later at 6pm for an orange party. “Call time 3:30 pm,” he informed us through text. It was very unusual for me, more so for PF, to abide by “little” ka-ekratan rules. PF does not easily give into these inconvenience unless it cost him his pinky finger. Amazingly, he consented on the orange day and wore the orange shirt that he'd had on since we left Iloilo. He consented even if it made him so conspicuously a member of these Orange club. He's always had the repugnance towards things that are kulang sa pansin. A flock of orange-wearing-adults is not far from being KSP; you could say that.


We were at the porch at exactly 3:30pm, Philippine Standard Time. 

Maritess was in yellow. I hated the fact that she broke the rule. Not only did she break the rule but she was wearing my favorite channel’s shirt in the wrong color of the day. And she dyed her hair red. Short. The kind that hugs the scalp; the kind of hair that is so not like mine.

HMFFH. Whatevvvv. Yellow is not orange.

She took a drag of her cigarette looking our way, discreetly. She didn’t know I knew. She was looking our way. She was doing things so self-consciously. And the very self-conscious her blew the smoke away from us. We were waiting for ABD in the little porch. We didn’t know she was, and it is most probable she didn’t know we were. She took a drag of her cigarette again. I think she smoked menthol.

I liked her charcoal black fedora hat.

Still, yellow is not orange. It doesn't matter if I liked her hat.

Or what do i know? Maybe she is color blind?

Oh, Maritess, Maritess. Maritess is one character I didn’t know would somehow change my life forever. And she is not colorblind.

And ABD arrives. Grand entrance. In perfect orange. 

....to be continued.... (well, isn't it obvious?)