This Is My Thesis Playlist

I am someone who can't work without music. And since I am currently undergoing the biggest challenge that ever faced me as a college student, I had to construct a very nice playlist which I call... the Thesis Playlist.

This is the best playlist I have constructed for academic purposes so far. It's a mix of alternative to upbeat to the most cheesy songs you could think of. I decided to post the song titles that comprise my playlist should there be any untoward incidents that may lead to the death of the playlist on my laptop.

Stellar - Incubus
I miss you - Incubus
Warning - Incubus
Are you in - Incubus
Summer Romance - Incubus
Stellar (Acoustic) - Incubus
Pardon me - Incubus
Love Hurts - Incubus
Midnight Swim - Incubus
Make a move - Incubus
Talk show on mute - Incubus
Drive - Incubus
Nice to know you - Incubus
Wish you were here - Incubus
Pantomime - Incubus
Tangled - Maroon 5
Sunday Morning - Maroon 5
Stutter - Maroon 5
Runaway - Maroon 5
Misery - Maroon 5
Never Gonna leave this bed - Maroon 5
She will be loved - Maroon 5
How - Maroon 5
Gotten - Slash ft Adam Levine
Give it away - RHCP
By the way - RHCP
Can't stop - RHCP
Other Side - RHCP
If it's love - Train
Hey Soul Sister - Train
Obvious - Westlife
More than Words - Westlife
Blurry - Puddle of Mudd
Out of my league - Stephen Speaks
Let's just fall in love again - Jason Castro
Thunder - Boys like Girls
Always - Bon Jovi
Wonderwall - Oasis
True - Ryan Cabrera
I'd Lie - Taylor Swift
Alone with you - Parokya ni Edgar
The Man who can't be moved - The Script
Hanging by a Moment - Lifehouse
Wait Forever - Gary Valenciano
Only in Photographs - Honor by August
My Favorite Game - The Cardigans
Uncharted - Sara Bareilles

The titles seem to tell a story, donchatink? Nevermind though. The ones in bold face are my top hits. nice tune, nice lyrics. I suggest that you too start constructing special playlists (I have another one which is my "kinikilig playlist") so that you can have standard songs to work with. For me, I prefer that it is a mix of everything to balance your ears out. :D


Okay, enough for the break. Must work with thesis again-- while listening to the Thesis playlist. Ha!

O pwede naman din pala magblog diretso sa blogger website e! Haha. Kapal lang talaga ng mukha kong makapagblog pa ngayong wasak na ko sa thesis.

PS. This post is labeled "final stretch" and I promise to do my best to really make my acad life that way. So help me God.

Lemme try this blogging app I have installed on my phone. Oh wait-- the landscape keyboard won't work! This sucks. But anyway, it's nice to have this thing. It's like twitlonger minus the twitter logo and only that it's posted on a crappy blog rather than a microblogging network to see. Anyway, good morning! I'm on the process of making my way out of this difficulty called thesis. Pray for me, buddies.

Just tell me if you want me out of your life, sir.

Nonverbals won’t do it.

Do you know what triggered me to telling you how I feel? Kasi ang sakit sakit na. The emotional rollercoaster is actually recorded here in this blog. I was—am—so hurt, that the best possible way of ending the pain is to tell you that I care. It felt good for quite a while.

Little did I know that the pain could only get worse. It’s more painful when you know that the other person is aware that you are hurting, but he still does it. Oo nga naman. Sino nga ba naman kasi ako. Kapal naman ng mukha kong mag-isip na may pag-asa pa ako.

Ang bobo lang. Sobrang bobo lang talaga. That was the most irrational thing that I have done so far.

And yet, it’s the bravest.

You know that I love you. You know that I love you enough that I can let you go if that would make you happy. You know that I’m willing to endure heartbreak just to be with you, even if it’s not the way we wanted us to be. You know that I can wait for you.

But I can’t do those forever. And yet I don’t want you to be just another bad memory. I don’t want you to be just another wrong person.

I know there’s no better way of doing this.

"If it doesn't break your heart, it isn't love. If it doesn't break your heart, it's not enough. It's when you're breaking down with your insides coming out, that's when you know what your heart is made of..." 

--Switchfoot, Yet

And you know you haven't lost me yet.

Always my Favorite STW Photo

From Dante Shepherd's Surviving the World

Close Encounters

I have been living in a dormitory somewhere in Malate for nine months now. Like public schools and pre-war buildings, dormitories also have a lot of stories to tell--stories that involve the sixth sense and unusual encounters with people who used to live.

I have heard a lot of stories as such since elementary. It is of general knowledge that almost all public elementary schools have urban legends that say they all became cemeteries or hospitals sometime in the past, which made them very nice habitats for spirits and other creatures that require what is called the third whatever (the third eye, third ear, third nose...). I have studied in a public elementary school that used to be a WWII hospital (true story) and our classes are held in gabaldon-type schoolhouses, which are basically old, creepy, high-ceiling classrooms with long and creepy hallways.

Being inside this classroom can be very traumatic for a lot of reasons. This was my fourth grade abode.

Don't walk around here too much during early mornings or late afternoons if you're an imaginative kid. You don't know what you might see. ;)

Spending six years in that institution, however, did not give me any share of creepy stories. My classmates have testified that they saw white ladies, black ladies, red ladies, green ladies (girl scouts? LOL) and weeping ghosts of all sorts. When I was in second grade, my seatmate pointed to the broken capiz window that leads to the storage house and claims to see a hanging body inside. Peksman mamatay man, cross my heart hope to die. I said, "ay oo nga no" when until now, I firmly believe that the hanging body is nothing but a piece of white cloth tied around the busted light bulb.

It wasn't until high school that I encountered (or so I think) the third kind myself. We were in our AdChem class and we were stressed from the academic work, the heat, and hunger. Our classroom is connected to another one, and the storage room for laboratory stuff was there in between. While my seatmate stares at nowhere, something caught our eyes--a floating lady wearing a white filipiniana dress. At 11am. Without any school program being held. In the storage room for chemicals and test tubes. Does that make sense? For us, it did not. Soooo...

I shrugged that experience off. The gal did not do anything to me so I don't care whether I saw her or not. I do not claim to have a third whatever, but recently I had an unusual experience here in the dormitory.

I temporarily live in an area where stray cats and rats as big as cats abound. When there are banging on walls and noise outside, I already assume they are the ones to blame. However, there was this one time that I was alone in the room and I was on my desk facing my laptop. I heard constant thuds on the wall and the noise seems to be coming from inside the room, as if someone is hitting something against it. I did not pay attention, then I felt the weight of footsteps, as if someone is walking behind me. Again, I did not pay attention. To tell you the truth, I found it unusual--but I was too engrossed in crying over a Thai movie that I totally ignored those supposedly creepy stuff.

It all finally made sense earlier when my roommate (and future sister-in-law) Ate Avon shed some light regarding the whole thuds on the wall, walking behind me thing. Turns out, there is a ghost kid playing around the room--our room--during afternoons. The thuds on the wall, they say, is him hitting it with a ball. Awesome.They say there are more than five of us in here. There's also a dude wearing a barong and the playful kid I mentioned earlier. Stories of doppelgangers and moving mirror images are also usual. Gosh, this sounds somewhat like Silent Hill 4.

Do I believe in these beings? Not really, until I see them. And when I do, I'll probably think that I'm just too hungry that I am starting to hallucinate. Haha. But well, if they are true, then I can live among them. After all, they were once alive. Just don't share with my bed, please.

Metaphors and Quotables

Lem: pano mo babaguhin yung framework nang hindi nagagalaw yung data?

KC: nasubukan mo na bang maglaro ng UNO Stacko na inuuna yung bricks sa ilalim?

Lem: Ah, oo. Dapat hindi pasmado. O_O

***

Pam: Hirap gumawa ng report kung wala ka namang alam! Buti pa sa GMANews TV, oras oras palagi kang may alam!

***

Lem: Ayoko nang mag-thesis. Ayoko na. Ah! (rubs eyes)

KC: Ok lang yan Lem. Ang mga tunay na lalake, marunong umiyak.

Lem: Sira. Natalsikan ng kalamansi yung mata ko.

***

Ninin: Isipin mo, para yang nilaga. It takes time. Malay mo kailangan pang palambutin yung baka.

Pam: Parang sa prito, kailangan munang mainit yung mantika.

Ninin: Basta siguraduhin mong may sindi yung kalan. Saka sabayan mo na rin ng sinaing. Tapos ihalo mo na yung gulay sa nilaga 'pag malambot na yung baka. Masarap ang kalalabasan nyan, hindi katulad ng kung ipinilit mo kahit na hindi pa dapat, pagkasubo mo iluluwa mo lang din.

KC: Ikaw na. Ikaw na ang dyosa ng metaphors, Nins.

***

(Staring at my thesis draft with my adviser's note: "Where's OrCom here?")

KC: Where's OrCom? Ayan! Marketing! PR!

Lem: Sakop din kaya ng OrCom ang Marketing ang PR! E di lahat pala ng thesis ng batchmates hindi rin OrCom, dahil kadalasan HR-related yung dinadali nila!

Gem: E sino bang prof sa department ang graduate ng OrCom? Yung mga adviser naman natin di naman OrCom yun e.

KC: Sa susunod kaya soplain natin sabay sabing "magaling ka pa sa'kin, ano ba course mo?" HAHAHA

Gem: Kayo na rin kaya ang nagsasabi saming OrCom is the Jack of All Trades!

***

Lem (looks at Gem's leftover rice): Uhhh... Gem, kakainin mo pa ba 'yan? Wala ka nang ulam e.

Gem: Hindi na. Gusto mo ba?

Lem: O sige akin na. Yes! Gumana ang Filipino etiquette sa panghihingi ng tirang kanin!

***

Ate Avon (to me): Ano ba'ng nangyari sa'yo kanina? Bakit para kang na-rape?

***

Dion (to Khits): Ang cute mo kaya kapag nalalasing.

KC: Ayos, may spark!

Angel: Khits, kung kani-kanino ka pa nang-aasar, kay kalbo ka rin pala babagsak!

Ninin: Khits, kung kani-kanino ka pa tumitingin sa lalaki ka rin pala mapupunta!

***

Joed: Sir, ang galing sa  pinag-OJT-han namin. Pag wala kaming magawa binibigyan kami ng assignment sa ibang department. Nakarating nga ako ng warehouse nun e.

KC: Oo, para ka ngang bisor e, pati sa HR nakakarating ka.

Joed: Sa warehouse “tsip” ang tawag nila sakin.

Ganyan na ang mga sinasabaw. Hoooooooo.

dear target respondents, as of now we are in a lose-lose situation. i annoy you, you stress me out. there's a better way to this. we can make this a win-win situation. you reply and allow me to interview you, i leave you alone and not bother you again forever. you let me graduate, and you don't know how much that means to me.

kung ayaw nyo, hindi naman masamang magreply. titigilan ko na ang pangungulit ko sa inyo. sabihin nyo lang para makapag-move on na ako. nakakapagod maghintay sa wala, umasa ng sagot, at umiyak. oo, mahina lang ang umiiyak. ganun ako ngayon, nasstress sa lahat ng bagay. sa ngayon, yun na lang ang pwede kong gawin e. alam nyo kasi yung pressure? less than two weeks para mag-pilot test, data collection, analysis at kung anu-ano pang kalokohan matapos ko lang 'tong thesis na to. parang awa nyo na, magreply kayo. nakaayos na ang flight ng nanay ko pauwi para sa graduation ko, di ko na rin mabilang ang nagtatanong sakin kung nakapag-exam na ba ako sa law school. tapos na ang acknowledgments section ng thesis ko dahil ngayon pa lang, alam kong maraming naniniwalang matatapos ko 'to on time.

ayos lang naman kung ako lang talaga yung mabibigo ninyo, pero ayokong masaktan yung mga mas matindi pang mag-pray para sakin. ayos lang naman kung pride ko lang sana yung nakataya, pero hindi e. ayokong makita yung disappointment ng lahat ng taong naniwala sakin.

minsan nga lang nakakapagod talaga, gusto ko nang sumuko kahit na pinipilit nilang kaya pa.

3 chapters, a truckload of tasks, less than two weeks. Lord, I need Your grace now more than ever.

Uncharted

Yes, this song is by Sara Bareilles but the best parts of the video are because of Adam Levine and Josh Groban. :"> Still love the song even with my eyes closed, though. ;)

2420

Palong-palo ang discussion/report/case study/strat plan/comm plan/whatev ng GSK HR/OD Team 2420 (yes, naalala ko rin ang condo unit ni kim!) kahit na napuyat tayo at natulog (at syempre gumising) na kaharap ang makeshift whiteboard  na puno ng kababalaghan (read: SWOT Analysis, strategies, tactics, yadda yadda). Napanaginipan ko pa nga yung pangalan ng "super plan"! Yun nga lang, nakalimutan ko na paggising. :(

Thank you, Mina (the sleepy strategic cat), Anne (the epitome of serenity), Dion (the unsung HR god), at Kimy ("should i give up or should I just keep chasing pavements?) na nagbukas ng kanyang unit para sa amin. :> Pati na rin kay Ms Lei hehe. Benta yung hype ng batchmates kanina, tara mag-boot camp na tayo!

Dahil dyan, ipa-copyright na natin yung strat plan natin. Lalo na yung Flextr. >:)

Tips for Suicidals

Someone anonymous asked on my Formspring: ano helpful na advice sa mga taong suicidal?

I answered:

wag maglaslas dahil di naman effective yun. kung magbibigti, siguraduhing mataas. kung iinom ng lason, isipin mo chocolait para di twisted ang mukha pag inabutan ng rigor mortis. kung magbabaril, sa dibdib dapat, wag sa ulo. parang yung ginawa ni angelo reyes na kunwari e may symbolism pero ang totoo e gusto lang nyang maging pogi sa burol.

PS. mag-iwan ng pera sa pamilya para pambili ng sariling kabaong, tatlong timba ng sky flakes, 20 kahon ng zesto, at apat na bag ng mani. bago mo ituloy ang plano mong pagpapakamatay, mag-secure ka muna ng lupa sa sementeryo. nawala ka na nga, nag-iwan ka pa ng alalahanin. lastly, humanda kang makipag-face to face kay satanas at marealize na mas matindi ang haharapin mo sa kabilang buhay kesa sa tinakasan mo dito sa earth.

ang pagpapakamatay ay gawain lang ng mga taong duwag at mahina. gather yourself, buddy. pray. kaya mo yan.

you just don't know how much courage it took for me to say that.

Quick Holla to my Fellas!

This blog post is a shoutout to my thesis buddies Angel Lencio, Dion Pagdonsolan, Ellis Tan, Eric Wong, Joed Tumang, and Mina Loyola. Thank you guys for being true to your words when you say "We're in this together." Thank you for the constructive criticism and the advergame links. Nakakaiyak sa sobrang touching. We can get this over and done-- just like last year. Whatever it takes.

Of course, this is a "hello" to our adviser Sir Villar as well. Heeheehee

For a moment, I forgot. Then I remebered.

Last night (or early this morning) I posted this. I was on the verge of giving up. Last night, I felt I was a bit tad tired of bearing all these emotions and acting like "wala lang" every time. You know me, I easily get tired of tasks but loving is a totally different thing for me. Pero kagabi, akala ko last na talaga.

But alas, halfway through the post, I remembered you and all the things that made me happy, how much effort I have put (and, though you may not know it, you have also given your share), how determined I have been, how so darn close and how sure as heck I am with this. I remembered the virtual tin box, the thing that's all I ever wanted, the unused pens and diaries, 1 Corinthians 13, 1 John 4:8... basically the whole shebang. I remembered how I prayed for you to be one of this year's miracles.

And earlier, I saw this on my friend's tumblr:

like it spoke to me.

Yes, crying, crying, and crying even more may be part of loving a person, but that's when you know that you really do. With every tear comes the feelings that otherwise wouldn't have been there in the first place. Where is the boundary between love and foolishness? Well, maybe there's none. True love is never foolish; it is just because we are raised on a belief that love should be two-way that we believe that loving without taking is foolishness. Truth is, love can still exist even if it's unrequited.

So to you, the "you" I have been talking about for almost a year... this sidekick's not giving up anytime soon. And I want you to know how blessed I am to know you. Have I not, I wouldn't have realized all these. Take care, I still hope to see you soon. :)

sa sobrang gulo ng pag-iisip, walang title ang post na ito.

ikaw lang ang taong nakakapagpasaya sakin ng sobra. ikaw rin ang dahilan ng pinakamatindi kong pag-iyak. ikaw lang ang may kayang makapanakit sa'kin ng sobra, na yung mga taong nagpapahalaga sakin e nagagalit na sa'yo, pero pinagtatanggol pa kita.

nabura mo ang linya sa pagitan ng "pagmamahal" at katangahan. nang hindi mo alam. hanggang saan ba ang hangganan ng pagmamahal? saan nagsisimula ang panloloko sa sarili na may pag-asa ka pa?

o may hangganan ba ang pagmamahal? o totoo bang meron? bakit kapag ako na yung nagbigay, hindi bumabalik? dati hindi ko naman hinihiling yung ganito. pero ngayon, mahirap na hindi umasa. bakit pa kasi ako umasa. bakit pa kasi ako sumugal. dapat pala, dati pa lang di na kita kinausap. siguro ayos ako ngayon at walang blog post na ganito. hindi na sana nadagdagan yung mga sulat na di mo rin naman mababasa.

pero habang tinatype ko to, naiisip kita. hindi mo naman sinasadya. wala ka namang alam. hindi mo alam na kapag nagkkwento ka, iniisip ko na sana ako na lang yung iniisip mo ng ganyang katindi. o kahit hindi ganyang katindi, basta iniisip mo rin. hindi mo alam na nasasaktan din ako kapag nasasaktan ka.

hindi mo alam na ngayon pa lang iniisip ko na kung pano ako magpapanggap na masaya pag sinabi mo na ang "maganda mong balita" na wawasak ng hardcore sakin.

ako pa ang nagsabi sayo na hindi dapat matakot pag nagmamahal. hindi natatakot, pero nawawalan rin ng pag-asa. ang dami ko pa namang metaporang naisip para lang kumbinsihin ang sarili kong sulit sa'yo ang pagsugal, ang pag-dive sa malawak na karagatan, ang pag-settle bilang pangalawa sa merkado, ang pagsakay sa bus kahit na malubak at nakakahilo ang daan. sa huli, malulunod rin pala ako. hindi ko rin pala mahuhuli ang puso ng target market. hindi rin pala ako makakarating sa dapat kong pupuntahan.

pero kung sakaling magbago ang isip mo sa di malamang kadahilanan, nandito pa rin ako. kaya ko pang magtiis. pinili ko naman 'to e. dahil yung nagpapasaya sakin, at yung nakakapagpaiyak sakin ng sobra... ikaw pareho. galing mo sir.