Knightly Advice

JC gave me some wisdom of the world and I got dizzy.

If I had to outline the lunch syllabus, I suppose this would be it:

The perils of being nice

Jaded but human

Alpha Vs. Beta

The Feminine Drama and Challenge Addiction

And lastly...

To be vulnerable... sometimes death seems more welcome...

So life is a bit upside down right now and so I thought meeting with a friend to listen to their woes and be supportive would be good. Instead, my mind got flooded as he analyzed the varying dynamics of dating relationships. Having just broken up with his girlfriend, he's been on a mission to understand what he had gone through. He's studied, dissected and discussed his findings.

I was overwhelmed for everything he said made sense and made me wonder if I'm hopeless. He named my private obsessions and insecurities in a textbook sort of way. And I felt exposed in my naivete of some things.

How can I live any other way? I've been socialized just the way you mentioned, JC, and now I am a cog in the machinery of human relationship.

I am a toaster.... that debates with my private fears... perhaps I am alive... a mere scaredy cat in a corner navigating through the fears of potential beloveds standing at corners in front of me... I am the perpetual friend who's mastered being platonic to an art form.

Confused by the demands and declarations of false suitors who pride themselves in a game where I bear witness to freefalls of insincereity, I am discouraged in trusting my instincts. And what if I follow my instincts despite my fears.. Shall I call it a disaster if my fears slow me down and I see that his fears have him too and we speak of dreams and love in fitful spurts?

What is love? What is instinct? What is madness? How do I distinguish anything?

JNET

Tea with Three

Yaa baba!

Instead of getting on a plane to go to another world, I accepted an invitation for tea with three musicians from Turkey. Last evening I had an introduction to their language and culture over tea and a "double apple special with cranberry juice" in a hookah. I enjoyed my time and decided to have a second day with the Turks.

The opera singer needed to practice speaking English as well as talk about playing together. Mystic and his brother wanted to go out for a morning hike and so off we went to climb a mountain, discuss music, politics, and coach them in speaking English.

I think my favorite part was watching the three gather over tea and cookies. My past experience of "hanging out with the guys" was watching conversation degenerate over beers. That's an experience like watching monkeys in a cage; odd and strangely entertaining and after 15 minutes becomes utterly boring. But watching the three Turks mindful over tea and conversation was surreal.

I don't think I've watched men interact where sarcasm wasn't on the table as a main entree. These three were respectful, encouraging, hospitable, intelligent and fun without sticking in a slapstick routine. It was refreshing and I was presented with several performances through out the day from arias to pieces played on the baglama.

Guys gathering over tea... what a concept... it seems too radical and foreign! It was absolutely cool.

JNET

Pitching For Love

I spent Saturday at the LACMA. My favorite part was sitting on the grass listening to a afro-latin band while people danced under a sunny sky. Sunday, I went to the Getty for lunch with N for a pretty place to sit while it rained in Los Angeles. It was a nice escape to sit in the hills contemplating Degas and art. N and I talked about writing, video blogging and then dug into the girl talk.

Hearing "I love yous" in succession after returning from my trip has been more unsettling than being jet-lagged and I wondered why it is so difficult to believe in a town where "dreams come true."

"Buy my CD!"

"Read my script!"

"Go to my show!"

"Come see my art!!"

And I had to conclude that perhaps a lifestyle of pitching and selling one's ideas perhaps to a point of mental and emotional prostitution has a domino effect on the Los Angeles plane of love.

Being excited to make a new friend, I feel thrown onto an invisible clock and I become a project that must yield dividends as soon as possible. A fledging relationship is interpreted with predictions bringing up estimations like a movie about to be released.

"I think we'll open at 14 million this weekend."

"I think we'll have a great time this weekend. Some wine, a show..." yada yada yada

What is real passion for life when there is no directness and vulnerability?

It was a friend's litany of lovespeak and sentimentalizing of simple shared events RIGHT after prospecting my roommate that made me wonder if maybe Hollywood has altered him. In a world where people juggle projects as they pursue others, quality of life seems to find a new dimension. My friend's "I love you" had lost value and I was saddened that he was a machine of words. I suppose I needn't care because I had only platonic feelings toward him but I found it disturbing that he could improvise so well. His insincerity was a serious mind game that I couldn't let pass. This somewhat good person was getting sucked into the matrix. I spoke with him in hopes to get him off the grid. He's heavily plugged in for he is wreaking mini havocs in his journey to pitch.

by The Swirly Girl.

And so TIME is my ally and not my enemy as it is to others in this neurotic town. Do I want love? Of course. It's the most important thing to me that I listen for in the spaces of silence where pretense takes to the bench.

Until then, I will face getting berated by girlfriends who'll watch me let "that good one get away." I'll deal with the frustrations of pitchers who'll use finesse, guilt and then anger to place me into their cages. And I'll have to have faith that indeed truth exists and that love is patient.

JNET

The Heart Of Desire

by HD .

"By believing passionately in something that still does not exist, we create it. The non-existent is whatever we have not sufficiently desired."

-- Nikos Kazantzakis

I received roses and was treated to lunch today at work.

"So what did you wish for?" I was asked immediately.

Something wonderful, of course...the same thing I've wished for since I can remember wishing on birthday candles and shooting stars....as well as wishing wells and first stars of the night.

My mathematician once told me that he was eradicating the words "wish" and "hope" from his vocabulatry and I felt very hurt that he would take away such magical words away from his life. But I understood where he came from. Some people clothe their wishes and hopes with passivity.

Ahhh but my wishes and hopes are not mere copper pennies and passing thoughts across the night sky. My passions and desires aren't blown away and forgotten after the candles are out. I am the space and clearing that I am creating to manifest these wishes and hopes of mine.

To have what one's heart desires, I must develop my heart of desire.

JNET

Disconnected in Paradise

This is one of the better internet cafes I found in the Philippines at Markati. Most places I encountered were little dives stuck into little corners. I would've written a great deal more while on vacation but I didn't have the luxury of my laptop and internet access was not at every corner like it is here in America. I had been spoiled having DSL at home and being able to wander anywhere in my place to write.

My cousins and I lamented not having our cellphones, our laptops, our DSL. I missed my piano. We broke out in heat rashes and were eaten by mosquitoes, dealt with brown outs (what do you mean no electrictity for the next 6 hours???!!!) and lapses of time with no running water. Baths by bucket became protocol.

I stayed in places where no one spoke English nor cared to and the people mainly wore blue jeans and tee shirts. The fashion statement was practicality and easy maintenance. Survival. Why wear heavy material in a hot day? I suppose I had romantic notions of people living in tropical places. I wasn't drinking out of coconuts and having mango smoothies. A coke was less expensive than water.

We had our dresses and outfits that enjoyed celebrating the feminine form and we stuck out conspicuously and drew stares.... some not so friendly. We were a bit self-conscious after noticing that most girls wore tee-shirts and shorts at the beach while were were the only ones in bikinis. I've never felt soo naked at a beach before.

It was a bit comedic with parents trying to coax us to go into the water at the beach and 'go play'.... They were thrilled to take us to the beach after hours of driving but then they had to pry us off the table to get wet as we negotiated through our bags for a handy tank or something to cover ourselves.

Spending time in Olongapo was the most difficult. I stayed in places where no one spoke English nor wished to and I had no transportation except for jeepneys and tricycles (motor cabs). Not speaking the language I was stranded at home or left home. Only stick shift cars were available for renting and I wasn't open to driving in the craziness of an unfamiliar territory where rules were definitely different... plus, my family wanted to rent a van to accomodate 8 people and I didn't feel comfortable driving a huge vehicle. I was the only person that knew how to drive a manual car.

And so I spent most of my time marooned indoors with a book and no where to go except my head because I couldn't be part of conversations. In short, it was an compromised vacation and I wished I was at work because I knew at least I could make money though I would be working insane hours again.

I missed my piano and did not have my ways to relax and unwind. My extensions toward communicating and being expressive were cut off which also meant that my sense of safety and feeling under control with each moment was also out the screenless windows. I found moments where I was absolutely stressed out to terrified to apathetic.

I missed having cold water and ice. Water quality wasn't safe so I drank soda everyday. Not healthy... I experienced my own personal madness. When I finally came to a space where I could have something safely cold, I indulged and wanted to numb my mind. I was isolated the bulk of my vacation, separated because I didn't speak the language. I think everyone was relieved that I at least always carry a book to occupy myself.

I was sorry to not enjoy a place where so many of my colleagues have given me rave reviews but I only stayed in a nice place for a couple of days of my three weeks out of the country. I saw the beach only twice. The pictures of parasailing and jetskiing was one of the days at the beach.

JNET

The Pervading Shadow in Paradise

Despite breathtaking beaches, pristine water, and lush greenery, being entralled by the hills, the huts, the sand, it was unsettling to see the vast poverty of the Philippines.

A day at the spa would take several days' wages of the average person that surrounded me. There are lots of university-degree graduates working jobs that are not providing them with advantageous positions.



People aren't dreaming to that extent. The modus operandi was survival. I saw the devoid of childhood in a child's eyes, bitterness and envy, regret, despondency,... ignorance...

unawareness... in people's faces. And I wondered what governs over being content and resourcesful creating a boundary within. What kinds of ways of thinking were acting as chains...

A self-perpetuating box made valid for whatever reason... and reasons indulged, some of them believable, some fantastic.

I don't understand a system where to thrive is an anomaly.

JNET

A Day at the Spa For 1400 pesos

Ja & I sat in a steamy sauna after being slathered with honey and kalamansi. A milk bath with rose petals punctuated our spa day after a thermal stone massage and having our bodies wrapped in a papaya concoction. It was pure luxury at 1400 pesos which comes out to be roughly $30 US DOLLARS! The package included a lot more.

Most of the persons working at the spa had attended university and had degrees in physical therapy and made 200 pesos a day (4 dollars). A weeks wages would afford the general public what was so easy to afford for myself and my cousins.

The economy is very strange in the Philippines. I wish I understood it. Things seems to have been strange for a very, very long time.

Entrance into the Ayala Museum in Markati at the tail end of my trip was 350 pesos (7 dollars)... costing less than a blouse I purchased in Baguio.

And yet the woman at the spa was very warm and generous though her world is different than mine. She and her husband had three children in college. There was a tinge of struggle that I felt present to her life.. a life that said "I have enough" unconvincingly through a sad sweetness.

She mentioned that it was the US dollar that helped and that the most comfortable in her country had access to family and money that lived outside the country. Those without family abroad struggled the most.

She shared quite a bit... very quietly and candidly answering my questions as she scrubbed me with salts and treated my skin with fruits and essential oils. She was kind...

I would've returned every day if I could but a new leg of my trip was about to begin; my descent down the mountain into the province towns...

JNET

It All Began in Baguio

s
by estan.

After crossing the Pacific Ocean with one brief stop in Japan before landing in the Philippine Island of Luzon, mom and I packed ourselves into a rented van for a 5 hour drive to the Baguio region (the mountains and cool spot of the country... temperature-wise) for a family reunion and cousin C's baptism.

It was surreal... after days of working past midnight and frantically packing and preparing in the later hours, I was wide awake to watch the sun rise as we made the steep climb into Baguio. We arrived at my uncle's home by 5:30am. The city was already awake and people were out and about.

And so breakfast was set down and plans were made to spend the day at the beach (another hour and a half DOWN the mountain). We packed ourselves into two vans and had a picnic.

I napped in a sawali (bamboo beach structure) on a picnic table. I felt like my family owned the beach. It was gorgeous.

That relaxing and lazy day set the table for a wild buffet of experience. Family arrived in more batches and uncle accomodated only part of the family in his five story home. A birthday party and my cousin's baptism at the Baguio Cathedral was the starting point of family activity.

I took loads of pictures... many that I could not burn them onto a CD so they're sitting in cousin M's computer who is still in the Philippines (I am currently in Japan before heading back to the States)... until then I'm borrowing from flickr...

I did upload a few pictures from the last leg of my trip though.... Check them out.

JNET