For everything else, there’s mastercard.
Gawad Kalinga was AWESOME.
Oh did I write it with a full stop? Wait, that’s wrong.
Gawad Kalinga was AWESOME!!!
Alright! 
If there is one prominent change that occurred during this 6-day trip, it would be reflected on my skin complexion. HAHAHAHAHAHA you might want to observe, as you skim through the photos, how my skin transformed from light brown, to golden brown, and finally to nalaka skin. Good thing it’s going back to normal now. XD
**
First day!
Arrival, Lunch at Chicken House, Negros Showroom, tour around Bacolod, met the awesome kids at GK ERH Village!
Second day!
First day of manual labour; made our own cement mixture, divided ourselves and plastered the hollow block walls with cement in two different houses. FUN!!
Third Day!
I guess we did a really horrible job at plastering the walls with cement, so they made us dig the ground and collect soil to level part of the land some 100 meters away. damn. Tiring, but AWESOME FUN! Plus, dinner at some awesome restaurant courtesy of Ricky’s relatives who came all the way from Iloilo. I LOVE FILIPINO FOOD.
Fourth Day!
More digging, and PAINTING! Painted two houses, one with blue, and the other one with yellow. More digging and carrying soil. haha. FUN!
Fifth Day!
Tour around Bacolod! Went to a farm, to an ancestral house that was transformed into a museum, etc etc. Singapore Night in the evening! BALUT EATING CHALLENGE!! MWAHAHAHAHA.. Jamming sessions till 3am in the morning! AMAAAAYYYZENG
Sixth Day!
BYE BYE BACOLOD, PHILIPPINES! ):
AWESOME EXPERIENCE MAN.
All of us really had an amazing time, and are looking forward to come back. To those who did not go for some reason, and are still interested, there’s always next year (:
Now I can say that
I am a GK Advocate!
Windows Live Writer is awesome.
Damn. I’m actually typing this post using
Windows Live Writer.
I can actually see how it’s gonna look like on my blog while typing this awesome post!
SEE WHAT I MEAN??
This is so fahkeng AWESOME AWESOME AWESOME!!!!!!!! oooooooooohhh!!!
MWHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHA
********
This school term is finally coming to an end – whew – after 20 weeks or so of non-stop IB madness. By right, everyone in Grade 12 should have died already, but since we’re so cool people we’re still alive. Nevertheless, we somehow have acquired unique – whatchamacallit? – zombie-like attributes now, given the fact that we have not slept much for 20 consecutive weeks. Well, I absolutely have no idea why the school decided to merge two terms together. It was like twenty weeks of non-stop schooling. The grade 12s have been running to and fro almost everyday, like some insanely busy workaholic apparitions carrying stacks of research papers and internal assessments, chasing teachers who appear to be sadistically enjoying seeing them with gargantuan charcoal-coloured panda eyes, half-asleep, half-awake, no one really knows, desperately trying to catch up with a million deadlines. It was basically capital punishment at its most beguiling and dissimulating level, masked under what is conceivably the most humane form of torture possible, school. IB!
Although I love the IB (and the school! )
sense the masochistic aura oozing MWAHAHAHAHAHA
somehow, the long school term has made me sick and tired of doing work. It was simply too draggy. Tsk.
Now, everyone feels like
“NAH DUN WANT TO DO ANY MORE WORK LAH TOO TIRED ALREADY”
“SCREW IT LAH”
“CAN DO TOMORROW, I GOT FREE PERIOD”
“HEY CAN I BORROW YOUR HOMEWORK?!”
“I DON’T WANT TO GO FOR FRENCH…”
“WTH, I NEED 2 SKIP LUNCH, GTG DO MY HW. BRB. TTYL!”
“I’M SORRY… UMMM… MRS HAMMOND CAN I SUBMIT MY ENGLISH HOMEWORK AFTER SCHOOL?”
And because of that the quality of my IB work is starting to plummet in a similar fashion to an old man who’s beginning to lose his libido as he gets older. SAD! ):
On a happy note,
GAWAD KALINGA IN SEVEN MORE DAYS!
see you Bacolod!
Lapit na lang gid… magkinitaay na gid kita! Kung pwede lang ko maglakat subong, subong na gid ko naglakat!
ROFLMAO!
Wrapping up november.
I finally spilled it.
Hopefully no one else will find out the mess I’ve made myself.
Because it is not, and it will never be.
But… even if it is, which sane person would want to continue feeling this retarded feeling?
Anyway, I’m not emo. I’m just reflecting on something. Screw it! argh!
****
But don’t get me wrong!
I’m not sad. Because this month has just been awesome for me.
Sound of Music. XES. Group 4 Project. French Idol. IB assessments. Awarding. And everything else. There was so much to sacrifice on my part, but in return, God has returned all the blood and sweat with countless blessings.
There’s too many people to thank, that I couldn’t mention anyone because I am afraid of leaving out people. So I’m not going to mention any person!!! OK!!! HAHA
Unfortunately, I am too lazy to reflect on the things that happened this month. But no one should complain because anyone who knows that I exist in school should know that I have been totally drained out from all the activities which I never foresaw clashing together all in the same week. Haha ok that sounded really mean. But they’re all in my head. 
Memories that will linger for many many years, unnecessary to be written down in words because at the first place, words themselves are unable to express the profound sense of gratitude welling up deep inside me. To all the compliments and commendations I’ve received, I really cherish every single one of them. Thank you, thank you, thank you, from the bottom of my heart.
To my friends, you have been really awesome. You have always made my day. You invisibly pull the ends of my mouth and make me smile. In the classrooms, in the corridors, in the clean toilets, dirty toilets, in the microscopic canteen, up the slope, down the slope, in the grade 11-12 centre which we are going to miss forever. Your jovial disposition makes me spastic. Your words of encouragement are like energy boosters. Your words of advice should be published as books and sold to problematic people like me, because I think they’re way better than those self-help books you normally find in boring bookshops. Your jokes tickle my every nerve in my body. Your camwhorings are addictive. Your tears are like daggers that pierce through my heart. Your friendship warms the soul. I love every single moment with you guys. And yeah, the holidays are here. It’s been a year, and that painfully reminds us that we have only a year left together. It’s dumbfounding to know how fast the earth revolves around the sun when you’re with the awesomest people in the world. I wish time was slower. We could all migrate to Pluto and spice up that uninhabitable, cold, barren pebble in outer space. I’m going to miss you all for one month.
And to my friends and family in the Philippines, I’m coming home. And I can’t wait to see you again.
Stole some photos on facebook… et voila.
Three years. and counting.
I have long surrendered myself to the fact that my memory sucks big time; that the only things I can remember in life are those things that I find absolutely necessary for school examinations; and that memories that are worth to be cherished could simply just disappear like a piss on the roadside – it evaporates like water into the atmosphere, but leaves a mark and a smell just strong enough for me to trace out its mere presence.
It didn’t even occur to me that today actually marks my third year of existence in Singapore until my friend sent me a message. As far as I could remember, I was crusing 30000 feet above the earth inside Singapore Airlines with four other Filipino students I have never met before, and then after three hours I found myself stepping into a new country. The day before that, I could remember my mother wailing and crying outside the airport as if she was going to lose me forever. It was also the first time EVER that I saw my dad shed some tears. My brothers were still young at that time, so probably they did not really have a bit of inkling how that separation meant for mum, dad, and I.
It was hard to adapt. I was so young, and I was already living on my own. I gained freedom and power over myself, but I lost the comfort of home and the company of my loved ones. It was a lopsided trade-off that I had to bear. I had to wash and iron my own clothes. I had to wake up to the tintinnabulating cries of my alarm clock. I had to eat boarding school food. I had to do my own grocery. I had to travel on my own. It felt as if the whole world turned upside down.
My secondary three and four years were a cornucopia of horrible, wonderful, and memorable events. It was such a perfect blend of emotions and experiences and a homogenized mixture of happiness and sadness that I can’t really say if there were moments were I felt only one of the two at a specific day. I went to an exciting school filled with students filled with so much enthusiasm, team spirit, joy and happines. Yet I never actually remembered myself in that institution feeling the same way as my classmates and schoolmates. The school has this culture that has the power to make those who want to be cherished feel truly cherished, but I was wondering why I did not feel that way at all. It was a good two years, just that it wasn’t exactly as memorable as I hoped it would be. But like what I said, those two years were a perfect blend of emotions and experiences. I stayed at a ramshackle boarding school that in itself, is a useless, lifeless concrete structure standing atop of a small hill, a building that exudes an aura of despondency and disconsolation to anyone who observes its lonely majesty over the horizon. Nevertheless, it was a place that was filled with the most exciting and interesting people I have met in my life. From a distance, it was an amazing sight to see these people gathered together, interacting with each other, eating together at the dining table, sharing unified and opposite views. From a distance, in the eyes of a local student, most of them were simply geeks and nerds, people who didn’t have a life aside from studying from dusk till dawn. As a living testimony, living with them has proven this conception to be a misconception. Each of them was such an interesting human being in his or her own way that made the boarding school such a colourful place to live in. Some of them were indeed geeks and nerds, but they weren’t just simply geeks and nerds. They were unique and interesting. I don’t know. I just felt very exuberant and jolly and satisfied at the company of my hostel mates. And that has made my two years worth remembering.
And now, I’m on my third year, and life in Singapore has gotten better. I guess my mum was always right. It takes time for anything to settle down. Well, I knew it would take time to settle down, but I never expected that it would take me only until now to keep myself calm amidst the unrelenting storms in life. Life in my new school is so much better. I have finally felt a sense of belongingness and pride within my new school. There are so much more privileges in my new scholarship that sometimes taking a time off from my studies to do less sensible stuff makes me feel awkward and guilty. School has been so much stressful and fun at the same time. Boarding school life has lost a little bit of euphoria since i’m now living in a condominium and I have less companions in the house. Well, I believe everything has to be balanced out. And God does it really fairly.
I’ve been wondering if these three years were worth it. It always comes into my mind the fact that if I didn’t leave the Philippines at all, I would have been in my second year in university by now, and in no time would be graduating and getting a decent job and earning a decent pay to repay my mum and dad who have almost immolated themselves just to raise up my brothers and I.
I hope these years have beeen worth the time and money sacrificed. Because I’m not like many young people in this country who are so much blessed in life that they need not to worry much about what lies ahead in the future. Though I am one of those I would considered privileged to savour much more of any successes they achieve in life, because for them, reaping the fruits of success would mean the whole world for the people whom they love.
Happy three years, Rowland.
********
I can’t possibly post every single picture I have, but, oh well, here goes some of them.
Oh yeah, and this may be of interest to you:
Normal day, let me be aware of the treasure you are. Let me learn from you, love you, bless you before you depart. Let me not pass you by in quest of some rare and perfect tomorrow. Let me hold you while I may, for it may not always be so. One day I shall dig my nails into the earth, or bury my face in the pillow, or stretch myself taut, or raise my hands to the sky and want, more than all the world, your return. ~Mary Jean Iron
It’s a beautiful day.
It’s a beautiful day, and another term has begun on this very beautiful day. o.o
Do you know that feeling, that feeling when you can’t seem to give a shit about waking up and taking a bath and eating your petit-dejeuner? I doubt anyone does anyway. But do you know that feeling? That you just can’t stand the fact that you’re waking up early in the morning to go to school. Why do you even need to go to school anyway.
But once you reach school… do you ever get that feeling, that feeling when you see everyone’s smiling at the sight of everybody else; at the uniformity we achieve by wearing the same, horrible uniform, knowing that no one is alone in that very awkward and unglamorous fashion crisis.
I am sad and happy at the same time. Sad that challenge week has come to an end, sad that I haven’t gotten the chance to unwind, relax, and enjoy the beaches of Phuket, but happy to be back in the company of the people that I have left for a week.
“And yes, Jose, you look glamorous – like, totally” is what’s running on Jessica’s mind. d:
Headband courtesy of Danusha.
Physics test tomorrow on simple harmonic motion. DIE.
United Nations.
1 x Filipino
1 x Indonesian
2 x Singaporeans
1 x Malaysian
1 x Norwegian
1 x Nigerian
From bushy to bushless.
BEFORE
AFTER
No, no.
I’m not selling skin whitening lotion.
I had my head shaved for a good cause.
Saves money for shampoo and barber costs.
But, actually, I haven’t collected donations yet.
I’m going to start soon.
Singapore’s National Day, the Philippines, Beijing Olympics 2008, and Paris Hilton.
Today was SJII’s national day celebration. It was fun!
I must say, the way they celebrate National Day here in Singapore is totally different in the Philippines. Back home, I could hardly see people celebrating and jubilating, or match-making apparel in obeisance to the colours of the flag, or even bothering to sing independence day songs. If anyone did, it would be awkward for him or her to do it all alone in a crowd of unenthusiastic bums. I guess the spirit of independence has died off; in a way, we’ve been doing it for more than 100 years now. Every thing becomes increasingly less interesting over time.
*********
I totally hate THE TV network now. Seriously. But I’m not bringing my anger to court whatsoever. We support the pursuit for peace and harmony.
Why do they have to flash the effing commercials at the time when the Philippine delegation was to come out in front of that whopping ninety-thousand audience to walk around the insides of that gorgeous metal nest?!? I felt like smashing the TV. I waited so long for them to come out and parade themselves around the track! Then, it just came to me the fact that I actually totally missed that part because the TV station went for a commercial break when ideally, they shouldn’t be. A commercial break at the wrong place, at the wrong time. I didn’t want to see the parade of some small country in the Atlantic or some secluded strip of land in the Pacific, or some minute delegation of countries which I have never even bothered to know about. I wanted to see The Philippines. I don’t care whether one person, two, three, or even six hundred of them Filipinos paraded, I just wanted to see that placard saying “The Philippines”, the name that originated from that Spaniard king who died of syphilis, the name that sometimes I am proud of and sometimes I am not proud of, the name that many foreigners misspell innocently. The name that is The Philippines. and I just wanted to see that beauiful flag, red, blue, white, and yellow, in unison. A Czech Republic flag under the presence of the bright shine of the sun and the dazzling glow of the stars. I wonder how many Filipinos here in Singapore were as outraged as me.
But I must say, Beijing’s done a fantastic opening ceremony. It was amazing! And the Olympic torch! It was.. WOW. Expect lots of smog tomorrow though. The amount of fireworks they used was just overwhelming. The whole sky above the Bird’s Nest was literally covered with the smoke.
*********
Amanda and I had a discussion before about naming nationalities. US people are always referred to as the Americans, Canada people as the Canadians, Germany people as the Germans, France people as French, the Netherlands people as the Dutch, Thailand people as the Thais, Taiwan people as the Taiwanese, China people as the Chinese, Burma people as the Burmese, Vietnam people as the Vietnamese, Japan people as the Japanese.
Rowland: Do you know how we call the people from the Philippines?
Amanda: Ah, I know. Philippinese.
Gosh.
*********
I think by now, probably all of you may have already seen it, but I’ll post it anyway.
School bags.
I miss De Casalle and SJI International, and my Singaporean and non-Singaporean friends, although it has only been less than a week.
Nevertheless, it’s so good to be back home, so good to be able to be with my family and my Filipino friends. (:
rowlandanthony
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