A year after...

It’s exactly a year (literally) when I wrote my last blog post. You can say I’m quite lazy to update my blog. Many things had happened since then. I graduated then I reviewed for the board exam and eventually passed the exam (yey!). I got my license after many dramas.

I studied Nihongo for about 2 months and met new friends. I was treated like their youngest sibling and called me “bunso”. I will never forget that I did a speech with Japanese audience (11 Nihonjin!) even though my grammar sucks. Since I have stage fright, I could feel my knees shaking. Kokoro ga doki doki shite iru! ( My heart beats so fast!). Nihongo no kurasu wa tanoshikatta desu! (Japanese class was enjoyable!)

And now, I volunteered in Chummy Chum Foundation for children and this afternoon was my first day. Making popcorn and cotton candies was fun. Packing coloring books and making balloon to give smile to children was worth giving time for.

Here's their page. Volunteers are very much welcome.

http://www.chummychum.org/

I was thinking that new experience opens new opportunities and meeting new faces will eventually making new friends. I can say that I’m letting myself be on the outside world and seeing what’s around me.

So… what’s next for me?

Back to School with My Girlfriends...

It is the first week of our (finally… LAST) semester. After the huge thesis drama, me with my girlfriends decided TO BE classmates again. Actually, we planned it last semester to be in the same class. We patiently waited for a nice schedule and ta-dah!... we’re classmates again.

Because of the faculty’s schedule mess, we didn’t meet our professors. So we ended up doing NAILS… Maru does our nails.

I got string of hearts design

They even took pictures while I'm asleep.

Kiannesans got FISHES! Hehe!! Isn’t it CUTE?! (Upper Left)

To add up, I recently followed the blog of aLacel (one of my girlfriends/classmates). I was stunned and embarrassed that she blogged our conversation about mother earth last April. It was entitled “A Kapit Bisig Para Sa Ilog Pasig Conversation” For me, I felt like it was an ambush interview :-p. It was so hilarious and you’ll know why if you read link below.

http://alacel.blogspot.com/2009/04/kapit-kapit-bisig-para-sa-ilog-pasig.html

Even though it was embarrassing, I loved it because it really shows that I’m REAL.

(*this really popped out on my mind)

Just a theory… Maybe, they are INTIMATED because I’m TOO REAL…

Coming back to Tarlac!

Yesterday, we went to my mom’s home province, Tarlac. I was given a chance to come there after so many years (actually, I don’t remember when the last time I’ve been there, it was probably almost ten years). I was with my mom, big bro with his wife and daughter, Aunt Carol, Uncle Alex and my four cousins.

(My big bro eating hamburger!)

My big bro was our driver. I always admire my brother in terms of driving. No matter how far it is, he makes it to a point that we can be on the place fast safely. One of his friends says that he was like the hero in The Fast and The Furious (hehe!).

(My snack, the accident we saw in the road and my Aunt Carol with my cousin, Adong)

On the way, I ate a lot of Fudgee bar to keep me awake throughout the journey. We saw some historical places (specifically Death March) and sadly an accident on the road. When we were getting nearer to our destination, we noticed that for many years the place developed. In old times, you can only see sands, rocks and lahar on the way. The road wasn’t even cemented at that time. Now, you can see beautiful houses instead of the classical nipa hut and the road is cemented (making the travel easier, hehe!).

(Uncle Alex, Aunt Precy and

Jovelyn's jackfruit mania!)

When we arrived, we went to Aunt Precy’s house (mom’s cousin). I really loved the jackfruit that we ate there. We even brought the fruit on the way to the sapa (stream).

(Me, on the stream)

When I was little, I watch my cousin bath in that stream. Back then, I afraid of leeches on the stream. I didn’t really intend to get wet in the stream however I slipped when I was taking a picture standing on the rock (I am really clumsy as ever!). The water is clear and refreshing. I think that stream is the best place we went so far.I told you that it has been about ten years before I was able to go again there. Surprisingly, my Uncle Alex was about more than thirty years. He even saw again his ex-girlfriend (*note: my uncle is 61 years old). It was funny because Aunt Precy said “alaala ng lumipas” [memories of the past]. Because it was a rare chance to go there, my mom together with my aunt and uncle visited our [far] relatives.

(The water was clear and I even took a picture of a flower that blooms on the stream)

When we went back to the city, I experienced a bit of headache. It was three hours of travel to go there and staying for more than two hours and again travel back for about four hours. It was raining on the road and it was cold. Even though it was only for a couple of hours, I enjoyed the visit and I’m hoping that I could go back there again.

A day with MACKELOGS!

I was with Mackelogs last Saturday. He set the day and invited friends (of course, I’m one of them). At first I wasn’t sure if I can come because I have a lot of things to do. Eventually, with my schedule fixed, I was able to go with them. However, it turned out that I was the only free to hang out with him. Bad luck isn’t it? But we’ve enjoyed the day even if it was the only two of us.

It was rainy and we went to Mall of Asia (MOA). We window-shopped, seen a fashion show and ate in Pupung’s. The food was great. Mackelogs said it was a “new discovery” because it was his first time to eat there.

I ordered “grilled liempo” with white sauce because the last time I ate there, I’m having dysmennorhea and I didn’t appreciate the food. MJ ordered “bangus belly”.

It was a delicious meal. We even have another round of rice and white sauce. As I’m writing this down, I and Mackelogs started to make our friends jealous to what happened that day, haha.

It was our bonding moment. He poured out his heart and started to tell me his break-up with (let’s call the person…) “M”. I started to think that Mackelogs called out his friends to unwind and release the stress that he got from his break-up. He talks about it and it was really heartbreaking for him. One quote from him, sort of like this, “That person got all the things I wanted”, pertaining to the third party. Then afterwards, I made him read a text message I got from another friend.

I guess…
The greatest LESSON I’ve learned in life is to:
NEVER invest deep feelings for someone,
NEVER hope that they’ll love you the way you want them to,
NEVER expect that those sweet gestures and sweet words are true
‘Cause eventually, everything becomes a past
Sooner or later they’ll just drop you off and will leave you nothing

So train yourself to let go of the things you fear to lose
So that when they’re gone you won’t feel DUMB and PATHETIC all along.

Anyway, I have my faith to Mackelogs that he can get through this. I know he's a strong person. And eventually, he can find someone who’s much better than M. I really believe so.

The GRAND Case Presentation

After a long hard work, at last, our grand case presentation is over. I was a bit worried about it the night before that I sleep about three in the morning (and must wake up at 5 am) because I remembered the last time that we had a case presentation. I cried in front of everybody. Haha, it was so embarrassing actually.

My part was PATHOPHYSIOLOGY. I was the one who explained the process of an illness. To my confusion back then, I don’t know what I will explain. The choices are Preeclampsia, Cephalopelvic Disproportion and to add up, Cesarean Section. I knew back then that CS was out of the question because it was a surgical procedure. I did diagrams for the three cases. Because a grand case presentation is a group requirement, I didn’t object that they choose to present CS even though it was wrong.

And now the drama. There are four critics assigned to us. In the room, there were three groups to present. And to our bad luck, we’re the first one to present. I called it FIRST BLOOD. Because of lack of time and guidance, our presentation was a mess. In my part, because CS is not a pathophysiology, I took numerous critiques. I also took some harshness from Professor M, one of the critics. When he was the one who’s talking, I got scared because little by little, his voice was getting louder and louder. Little by little, his eyes were really opening wide and I think that his eyeballs may pop out into its sockets anytime. It was then that tears started to fall down. I’m really such a CRYBABY! Then, when he saw me crying, he asked with his eyebrow arched, “Why are you crying? Is it because you really worked hard on this?”. The funny thing was I answered “No sir, I was just shocked”. I thought to myself that “you need not to shout on me to get your point”. Even though there is someone as harsh as Prof M, at least the rest of them were kind enough to correct us calmly. One of them is Professor C.

I think we are lucky that we have Prof C again as our panel. We’re also lucky we aren’t “first blood”. Revision and a comprehensive exam, that is what we must finish and we’re ready to advance to the next year level, OUR LAST YEAR.

The CONNECTION is OFF!

It’s been a week when my internet got no connection. So I haven’t been posting for a while. However, I’ve type some events so I can post it when I have a connection. So the next posts will be the last week’s happenings…

Because I don’t have connection, I started to take pictures and did some editing to it. One of them is the picture below. I think I’ll use it as my blog’s photo.

Justice PREVAILS!

I felt really happy right now. I can relax now. I came home from my duty and when I opened my e-mail. There was good news for me.

This guy who added me up in Friendster and stole my photo … *drum roll*… is now unavailable. My report was answered with proper action. He got what he deserves! From now on, I will NEVER accept any friend request from a stranger.