Sun Halo

There were several times when I saw this natural phenomenon at night. A circle around the moon. But it's the first time for me to witness it in the daytime. At noon. In Palau.

It's beautiful. I don't know if this was supposed to be a good or a bad omen. I just enjoyed it while it lasted.

sun halo full

amazing

BOOK REVIEW: Eat, Pray, Love

I know I am sooo late. Anyhow, I just finished reading the book last night after ignoring it for several months. No, I haven't seen the movie yet.

I would not say it is the best book I have ever read. It is just a narrative of a woman's heartaches, choices, travel, and...life. Everyone knows the plot by now. The author (Elizabeth Gilbert) went to Italy to eat and learn the language, she went to India to meditate, and to Bali because of what the old palm reader said.

In her journey, she learned, of course. Everyone who travels would learn something new each time. The Italy part just made me jealous. I really want to be able to tour Europe and to learn their rich culture. I like the India part the most. I like how she described her prayers and her struggles while praying. For most part of her struggles, I think I know how she felt.

I was not impressed with the Bali part. I think Westerners are too easy to impress when it comes to culture. They would believe any made up superstitions you tell them. I've been to the place and I would say that I was really impressed with the art of each house because they are generally Hindus. But their being Hindu doesn't go farther than that. In my conversation with our tour guide before, Nyoman (he eats beef), I get the idea that they are mainly maintaining the Hindu identity for tourism purposes.

Well of course, because I am also Asian and I was able to converse a teensy bit of Bahasa Indonesia, I think he's more honest with me.

Overall, it's a light read. It is based on a true story but I can feel the exaggeration of experiences on most part. It may be because I am not as sentimental.

RANT: QUANTIFIED

I once had a teacher in college (who later became my colleague) whose set of questions in a case analysis defense would always include, "is that quantifiable?" I wonder if she still does that today. (In case YOU'RE reading this, Hi ma'am!) At that time, social media was just about to peak. No Facebook yet (hello Friendster), no Twitter, no Tumblr.
That time, you know you are popular when you have more than one account because your original account is already full. There would also be a lot of 'testimonials' on your profile page.

Today, we measure popularity by the number of 'likes' or comments a post in Facebook has, number or followers in Tumblr and Twitter, number of blog views. I hate #teamfollowback in twitter, sub4sub in youtube, and 'please RT let us trend #somethingorsomeonestupid'.

I have decided not to become a slave of the numbers. I don't care about the number of followers, notes, comments or likes. I also would not make the social media my personal diary. I promised to discern information for the public from the outright trivial which nobody really gives a damn. I would spare the space of my friends' news feeds for the more relevant ones such as 9gag.com posts.

Dear friends, no one is as interested in your life as you.

Man, why do I sound like I'm PMSing? It's ok friends, post as much as you like, every little detail. I can always hide you from my news feeds in facebook and i'm pretty sure i'm not following you on twitter and tumblr. xoxo

Birthday Song

No, it's not my birthday. I just remember a couple of months back when the 'in' thing in Facebook was posting the number 1 song when you were born. I also read somewhere that that song would say pretty much your life's story. Out of curiosity, I checked mine. (I did not post the date for security's sake.)

Funny. 

More Drama Than Soap Opera

Today, a lot of things happened...to me, at least. When I say, "to me", what I meant was in my mind. So, yeah. I was not able to sleep until 3 am last night for some unknown reason. I had a feeling something bad would happen. The next day, surprise, surprise! Coach D'Antoni resigned from New York Knicks. I am affected because I know the fact that his plays are very well suited for Jeremy Lin. 

Also this day, my admiration, respect, and love for JLin went up 20,000,000%. The screen caps below would tell you the whole story.

To the New York Knicks management, please remember that your main star now is not Carmelo Anthony. A big number of your supporters are not really yours. They are JLin's. 

JEREMY LIN POST #3

I almost promised myself that I would not blog anything that has to do with JLin unless they win a championship which, honestly, has a very slim chance. In other words, I was not supposed to blog about him anymore as there are a lot more things and people on earth to blog about other than him. However, I was fumed (yes, i'm that affected) when I saw a youtube link this evening of the dirty play that Jason Kidd and Ian Mahinmi did on Jeremy Lin.

I almost put Kidd on the pedestal when he immediately hugged Lin after their first game against each other. But tonight, I realized that he is no different from any other player anywhere in the planet, specially in the slums. I know he wants a win. I would not mind a hard foul. But grabbing his hair after the foul to make sure he falls and another teammate awaiting his landing and hit JLin in the midsection with his knee and a shoulder slam while falling down is totally disgusting. Is this what we call a "homecourt advantage"? You can do whatever to the opposing team because you are surrounded by your fans?

Take a look:



...and the media kept quiet about it all because the Knicks lost.

LAST NIGHT I PRAYED...

...not to grow old. I prayed to God that He would let me die early, in my sleep. I know it's a morbid thought for most people but do you realize that being alive causes death? I am not prepared to die now, so I hope God would not allow that this early. But still, everyone dies eventually. FACT. So what made me say that prayer?

I have come to terms with myself. I have accepted that there is a possibility that I would never get married...nor have a child. Why, you ask. Because I tend to complicate things. I complicate things that are so simple. I realized that when I was teaching. Somehow, I feel a satisfaction when I complicate things and my students would have to squeeze all the juices out of their brains to get an answer. When they do get the answer, I feel so proud. I know those few students who were able to do it feel it too.

When I started working as an accountant, my former boss would always scold me because I always make my schedules hard for her to understand. You see, I explain the way I think...and I confuse her. For me, easy is boring. There is no sense of achievement in that.

So, the same thing applies to my choices in life. I like it complicated. The love stories I made up in my mind would not be acceptable to most guys or is close to impossible to happen in real life. That is why I have to accept the POSSIBILITY of growing old alone.

People always tell me to get married so that someone could take care of me when I grow old. My solution: don't grow old. Hence, the prayer last night.