In the year 2006 I resolve to: Teach my dog to fly. Get your resolution here

go, kaiser, go!

saw the video recording of dad's show 'aspects of love'. he did with the new voice company, which has a reputation for doing controversial productions such as 'the vagina monologues' (they're most popular show) and 'sacriledge' (about a nun wanting to be a priest, which dad was also part of). it didnt take long to figure out why the musical 'aspects of love' was controversial. if you're not too lazy to read the summary i'll write below, you'll see what i mean.

alex, 17, meets and falls in love with an actress, rose, 28 (i think). they use alex's uncle's far away vacation house to hide out in for a week. they do stuff, of course. ahem. alex's uncle, george (played by my dad), 70+ (again, i think), finds out about it somehow and decides to drop in on them, leaving his mistress, julietta, age unknown, in italy. so george drops in on them, gets to talk to them, especially rose. and he's cool about them and everything, and lets them have their fling. he leaves. but by that time, rose had fallen for him. so rose leave alex, and disappears. a long time after that, alex visits his uncle's real house, but his uncle is not there (george is apparently in italy. ahem. with julietta). instead, alex finds rose there. obviously she's been with george. things get heated up. in the end... they end up sleeping together that night. next day, they fight. george walks in on them. he decides that rose is better off with alex, and returns to italy. but rose rejects alex, and follows george. rose meets julietta... and they actually get along well. TOO well. george, julietta and rose end up as... a threesome. ahem. and then rose marries george. at the wedding, julietta and rose kiss. and i'm not talking about a peck on the lips. george watches amused. end act one. yes, act one palang yan. act two opens about 12 years (once more, i think) later with rose hitting it off in the theatres and touring the world. alex sees one of her performances, and comes to see her in person as well. some old sparks fly... sorta. rose invites alex home. then george is shown with their daughter, jenny. there are some hints of incestuous feelings. rose and alex arrived, warmly welcomed. alex becomes close to his cousin. and as they grow up, alex and jenny fall in love. george doesnt like that. at one point, alex is tucking jenny into bed (NOT doing anything), and george is outside the door thinking they ARE doing something... and he has a heart attack and dies (poor daddy.) alex blames himself, and leaves jenny. at the funeral he meets julietta for the first time... and a new flame kindles. the rest is left for speculation.

incest, pedo, and gay. o diba, kumpleto!
we're seeing the restaging in singapore in may next year.

then we brought mom to tita cindy's house coz her barkada was getting together there. all the wives were having lunch at the house... and all the husbands went out to eat at brazil brazil in metro walk. true to my nature... i was "one of the boys", tailed dad to metro walk to eat meat, meat, and more meat.

went shopping with dad in mega afterwards. i'm afraid i tired him out quite a bit. all for nothing too, we didnt find anything i wanted. the only thing that made the trip worthwhile was eating churros con chocolate in dulcinea.

attended the de lara reunion in the evening. we got there late, and the food still wasnt ready. everyone was hungry. some of my boy cousins decided to go out and buy beer instead of waiting. the rest of us just hovered around until mama ting (owner of the house we were in) came out of her room and realized she had guests. haha. there were three kinds of pasta with three different sauces, plus yellow cab pizza. we had picture taking sessions in front of a huge snowman lantern propped up among a cluster of plants. the 9th wonder of the world... a snowman in a tropic jungle! i find it tends to get easier to bond with my cousins every year. i drifted back and forth from sitting with the smokers (old, young, and younger) outside, to sitting with my cousins at the table inside, and sitting with my aunts and uncles on the couches. mama ting gave out pearl bracelets to the girls, and cash to the boys. damn, really, why couldnt i have been a guy? i shouldve just asked for mig's share coz he wasnt there. he'd never have to know. haha!

after that chad took us to saguijo bar in makati. really nice place! not such a great layout, but its clean, no smoking allowed inside, and wholesome too (i mean i was worried about not being 18 yet and then we see 10-year-olds running about!). we saw 4 bands perform, one of which was the itchyworms! ang astig nila! nakakatawa kasi ang kukulit nila! you can tell they have so much fun. they all looked like geeks (lahat sila may suot na tie!) but they can rock the house. they played the best too coz they werent too loud and you could hear and UNDERSTAND the vocals. got to greet kuya chino. left handed guitarist pala siya. asked him where "ate karen" was. apparently she was in cebu.

got into bed a 2am.

woke up this morning at 10:45. cursed, jumped out of bed and into the shower. i had enough time to clear the dining table before kami, jo, and therese rang the doorbell. kwentuhan to the max. pinapak rin namin yung fridge - food for the gods, cake, keso de bola, ice cream. and now we have tons of chocolate and lengua de gato to add to that.

i should sleep now coz the days arent going to get any easier on me! LOL!

on the day after christmas, the alarm went off. my eyes opened. i predicted it was going to be a good day.

i was so wrong. it was a damn GREAT day.

"I might be the only person on the face of this earth that knows you're the greatest woman on earth. I might be the only one who appreciates how amazing you are in every single thing that you do, and how you are with Spencer, Spence, and in every single thought that you have and how you say what you mean and how you almost always mean something that's all about being straight and good. I think most people miss that about you and I watch them, wondering how they can watch you bring their food and clear their tables and never get that they just met the greatest woman alive. And the fact that I get it makes me feel good about me." - from the movie As Good As It Gets



on the side, added to my list of favorite actors are:
jack nicholson - sobrang gago kasi eh. love his characters.
gweneth paltrow - not just a good actress... she makes a hot guy.

***

five months, i'm sure we had all changed to some extent. but i guess the evidence of our friendship was the fact that it seemed like no time had passed at all... and we simply slipped back so easily into our routine of crazyness.

food, studio pics, arcade, karaoke. we scored a 100, our highest, on the song currently stuck in my head. *points to music line* yeah. baduy. oh well. it was damn fun.

after a four hour flight from india to thailand, we reached the bangkok airport at 4 in the morning. i was hungry. walked around looking for hotdogs since i hadnt had a decent one in 5 months. none of the stands were open yet. found kfc instead. god is good. chicken strips, mashed potato in gravy, fries and coke at 4:30 am.

having about 6 more hours to kill till our next flight to manila, and the city of bangkok probably still asleep at that hour, we decided to rent a dayroom and sleep. so we got ourselves a small hotel-like quarter and slept. on a soft bed. the kind of bed india does not have. lol.

lots of balikbayan boxes at the baggage claim in ninoy aquino airport. just as mom predicted, haha. dad picked us up. one of his first questions was "wanna go to starbucks?"

got home with a mocha frap in hand. we were surprised to find trisha, lola, and pia in the house. went crazy. distributed gifts/pasalubong. had dinner: karekare! BEEF!!! went to sleep very tired.

woke up around 11 the next day. lalaine called. my parents decided they'd let us meet up after the vergara party. shocked everyone coz i was in a skirt. there was roast BEEF!!! my cousins continue to grow taller. i used to be the biggest... now i feel the smallest. i'm beginning to think that somehow mom's threats to bonzai me were actually accomplished somehow.

starbucks at katips catching up with my "mamee" with oreo cheesecake. ahaha lots of kulitan. nothing really made sense. rather like it that way.

yellow cab pizza for christmas eve. yummmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

woke up late again the next day. valenzuela party. was surprised to find out tita nadine at maddie were in town. come to think of it, that's the second time thats happened. spent a lot of time talking about college/school. ate lechon (waaaaaaaaa not beef but i missed this like hell too) and dessert (rhum cake, chocolate cake, mango pie, food for the gods).

lola's in the hospital. on christmas day. =(

things are changing... the de lara's no longer reunite every year... lolo's gone... papa ato's gone... tito tito's in a wheelchair looking sad and tired, the first time he wasnt going around the party taking pictures and smiling all the time...

lol, i guess i am a bad... whatever... writer, storyteller, conversationalist... all bark no bite. i really do prefer listening. *shrug* or maybe i really just dont have anything to tell.

maybe i really should just take up med.

going to eat dinner with the rialps now. merry christmas. god bless us, everyone.

One day Friendship and Love met...

Love asked,
"Why do you exist if I already exist?"

Friendship smiled and said,
"To put a smile where you leave tears."

Love asked,
"Well, if that's what you do, how come there are still many people crying?"

Friendship said,
"It's my fault... instead of doing my job, I sometimes end up doing yours..."

harumph...

technically, tomorrow is my last day of class, but since nobody's going to college tomorrow, i can consider today the last day. wahaha. watched the choreography fest and danced a bit during the jam session.

makepeace and i were went to see king kong. long movie. pretty slow. some parts were really entertaining though. like when the t-rex was swinging on the vines trying to eat ann. benta! but still too long... 3 and half hourse just to see him fall off the empire state building. sad story. its ironic... the last line said was "it wasnt the airplanes... it was beauty that killed the beast." ultimately ann was the cause of kong's death.

visited naz in the evening. makepeace was supposed to stay a while at my place after that to do work, but it was already way too late. if i'm up to it, i'll complete some stuff tomorrow and go to college just to give them in... and if i'm too lazy, well... ahem... "what work??"

this time tomorrow, the plane bringing me home takes off.

after dropping off naz's work at her house (poor thing's back is messed up and she's been confined to bed), i headed to big chill. met up with most of the gang there - ira, anoushka, salloni, janeya, sachita. then ira led the way to chris' house. chris' cousin, valerie, let us in. took a tour of the place and formulated our plan. makepeace showed up. waited for the signal.

when christina walked through the door and into the foyer, little did she know that a pack of fiendish scheming girls were hiding in the adjacent room. little did she know that as ira walked her to her room at the back the house, the girls came out of hiding and positioned themselves for the kill, hiding behind the wall. little did she know of what awaited her when ira baited her to come back towards the foyer...

"SURPRISE!!! HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!"

jumping, screaming, hugging.

it was perfect.

christina then realized why val had insisted she go out, why they had bought lots of food, why none of us had greeted her that morning, why we had made up some excuse or the other saying we couldnt come to the get-together she had planned...

it took a while for the shock to die down.

we lit the candles on her cake and sang for her (me on guitar, having just figured out the chords half an hour ago). then the food came out. splurge! splurge! watched chris open her gifts that we had travelled all around delhi for. the music played and our feet followed. sometime during the headbanging, my head started to ache. took it easy after that.

some of the guys left, those that stayed hung out in chris' room with a couple of her other guests. makepeace, nush and i hogged the bed. sorta sung a bit. somehow the kid's choir back in don enrique came to mention... "blesSED bi GHHAAAADDD!!!" (supposedly supposed be "blessed be God") and somehow the laughing never stopped.

went home after throwing up in chris' bathroom. discovered i had a fever. haha, i feel like i revert to being a kid whenever i'm sick like this. curled up on the reclining chair wrapped in my blanket with a pillow behind my head and a glass of juice in my hand.

its been a while. haha, i missed being connected through 1's and 0's.

sports day - really lame actually. but i guess it was fun in the sense that the week was really light coz all the practices and we got to just hang out and chill a lot. some of them participated in the marching. i wouldnt have joined too but... ahem "i'm allergic to short skirts." my friends ran track too. idol ko si nush! galing tumakbo! at si sachi and haba ng stamina! my gad. wish i was an athlete. i'd gladly join teams but by now the expect a level of competency from previous training which i dont have. oh well.

band forming - i hope this really takes off. nushka: vocals. lead guitar: ira. rhythm guitar: makepeace. bass: chris. sachi: keyboards. me: drums. manager: janeya. groupies: naz, salloni, ritika, nima. all we need are coaches. phew.

ear piercing - upper side of the right lobe. silver. very sexeh.

christmas gifts - working on them. almost complete. i think.

reading - with my net incapacitated, i turned to one of my old hobbies to fill the time gaps left by procrastination. 6 novels down. more to come.

wardrobe - new tops mostly... sweater, jacket, pull over, two baggy tees with design, two slogan shirts, one kurta. two new pairs of sandles. and... one surprise for the folks back in the philippines. heehee.

stuffed toy - a cow. which is shaped like a pig. hence the name cig (cow-pig). also named that coz nush was smoking when we were thinking of a name.

surprise party - i hope i didnt give chris the url to this blog. lol! planning stuff for her. long list of little gifts that will amount to a lot. we'll split the costs between about a dozen of us. gonna show up at her house unexpected.

outings - plan to go to rock concerts this week. and a horror movie where makepeace buys the popcorn.

if i remember anything else, i'll update y'all.



MISS KO NA ANG PINAS!!!

after our general pysch class yesterday, we found out R.M. was absent. time to rub our hands together and plot world domination.

...

or just go see HP4, hahaha!

went to priya's. bought the tickets and got free harry masks (which we actually wore and walked around in, looking like idiots). watched in anticipation as naz made her first withdrawal ever from an atm. ate a mcdo. browsed through stuffed toys.

and before we went into the cinema...

"let buy cigs!"
"are you mad?"
"c'mon yeah!"
"fine, we'll share."
"the guy wont sell to us."
"who looks 18?"

up to this point i had been rather oblivious of the conversation.

"lara, you buy them!"

blink. realization dawns.

"two marlboro lights. and four mints."

and then i realized i didnt know how to light the sticks. tried using the lighter dangling from a wire beside the stall. the guy tried telling me how. but i dont understand hindi. so he signalled for me to put the stick in my mouth. i snort.

"they're not for me."

walked away. makepeace and nush found a place to buy matches instead. watched them puff as i chewed lazily.

"yeah, i'm just in it for the gum."

laughs. our class rep caught sight of us. she got tempted to do a little experimenting. but like me... nah. hehe.

the movie was fun. compared to the book, i'm sure it had numerous shortcomings, but since i didnt quite remember everything in the book, i didnt have much basis of comparison, and thus i wasnt as disappointed as i was with the first three flicks. aslo, the movies do get better. lol.

called up chris just to bait her. poor thing, she had so wanted to see the movie with us but she had to practice for the singing competition they were participating in.

met one of naz's friends from school. naz was visiting her coz she was sick. brought her chocolate too. haha, why didnt my friends ever do that for me?! haha then again i never did that for my friends either. well i'm sure there'll be plenty of chances in the future. i dont think this world is gonna run out of sickness. and i dont think i'm gonna run out of friends.

ne? ;)