Kirin beer

Kirin Ichiban. Yan ang kompletong pangalan. Natikman ko nung kumain ako sa Kimono Ken sa Morato nung gabi na nakipagsapalaran ako sa warehouse sale ng National Bookstore sa may Quezon Avenue.

Ayan ang beer na swabe ang lasa, mas magaan pa sa malabnaw na San Miguel Light. Di katulad ng Red Horse natin, ang Kirin Ichiban ay walang sipa. Kung tutuusin, ito ang beer na mala-tubig. Hustong kapareha kung marami ang nakain na sushi na nasawsaw sa sauce na maraming wasabi.

Hindi ko siya irerekomenda sa mga naghahanap ng malalim na karansan ng serbesa. Ito yung tipong gagamitin mong pangbanlaw kapag masyado nang nagkakasiyahan ang mga tao at ayaw mong may mga lasing na nagwawala sa selebrasyon.

Helping others help themselves

Naglalako ng paninda para ipamigay at hindi para pagbili

Papunta ako ng Bataan ngayon para magbigay ng session sa mga dalaga at binatang nakaranas ng paghihirap. Ang ilan sa kanila ay inabanduna, may ilan na pinabayaan. At ilan ay inabuso.

Ang layunin ng pagtulong ko sa kanila ay hindi para lang iproseso ang kanikanilang mga karanasan. Pero sa dulo ng pagtulong, ang nais ko ay sila mismo ang tumulong sa sarili nila at sa iba.

Pag-uusapan namin ang komunikasyon, partikular na ang pakikinig.


Dahil maulan, at medyo hindi pa talaga ako nakakabawi ng tulog, tinatamad ako. Commitment na lang talaga kung bakit pupunta ako ng Bataan. Wala naman kasi itong bayad.

Nobela na may direksyon sa pagkapon ng manok

Hindi ko lang mataim na ang magandang libro na maganda ang istorya ay ibebenta ng mura. Kaya pagkakita ko kaagad nito sa garage sale sa may Balanga, Bataan nung weekend, binili ko agad. Syempre, tiningnan ko kung meron pa silang iba pang kopya nito. May bigla akong pagnanasa na kunin lahat ng kopya para hindi siya iblandra at ibenta ng mura.

Nasa Bataan ako para magbigay ng psychosocial session sa mga dalaga. Binubuo namin ang grupo ng mga future peer counselors ng isang center-based na programa.

Balik sa libro, nabasa ko na siya noon pang kolehiyo ako. Hindi malalim ang kwento katulad ng Love in the Time of Cholera ni Gabriel Garcia Marquez pero kahilera ng House of Spirits ni Isabel Allende sa galing ng paggamit ng mga salita sa hanay ng magical realism.

Para sa mga nagsisimula o gustong magsimula ng bisyo sa pagbabasa ng mga nobela, maganda itong starting point. Hindi malalim pero hindi mababaw. Mahusay ang habi ng salita. At may kirot sa puso at kalawang sa utak ang tama ng pagbabasa nito.

A treat after day's work

I facilitated groupwork activities with some young women staying in a residential unit in Bataan. This was to prepare them to be cohesive for another big event that they'll be involved with the following week. My work here started at 4AM and ended at around 2PM. It wasn't that horrible because I like waking up and working early in the morning. The venue was like a cheap public-accessible resort with three swimming pools.

After a long day's work, I grabbed myself an ice cold Antonov, watch people basking in the sun and getting tan, uttered a short thank you to the One who led me to this kind of work, of helping people help themselves.

Life is beautiful.

A university guy's thought after being mesmerized with this beauty of Bataan

It will be a lost if life is meaningless. And the world is nothing but a random product of big bang. We exist and we die. A life reduced to the start of one point and ended at the same point. It's not even a line. Big bang makes geometry rotten tomato.

It will be a very sad world when beauty is reduced to theories of preferences influenced by ruling class.
I agree that life can be seen as a struggle. But explain life solely as a struggle between bourgeois and proletariat, is bland, colorless, odorless soup. Water is then more exciting, than that.

This world in precision and chaos, of meaning and poetry, of sunny side ups and pan cakes is fullness in itself. And wouldn't it be a wonder that there is mystery and meaning and unexplainable search in it. That even the dullness of life is considered divine and complicated.


All these life and the search for it is innate. A vacuum longing to be filled.

Borrowing his thought two days after ze climb

The pleasure of risk is in the control needed to ride it with assurance so that what appears dangerous to the outsider is, to the participant, simply a matter of intelligence, skill, intuition, coordination- in a word, experience. Climbing in particular, is a parodoxically intellectual pastime, but with this difference: you have to think with your body. Every move has to be worked out in terms of playing chess with you body. If I make a mistake the consequences are immediate, obvious, embarrassing, and possibly painful. For a brief period I am directly responsible for my actions. In that beautiful, silent, world of mountains, it seems to me worth a little risk. A.Alvarez

That total of ten hours hiking

I keep on saying this mantra: It does not matter how slow you go, as long as you don't stop. I think it was from Confucius. Yes another brilliant Chinese that I keep quoting whenever I feel threatened. Hahaha
The sun is up. Compared to the night before that was raining hard and long, the day I went crazy is a sun-filled day. Thank you God!

I saw myself eating my own words when I found myself hiking in Bataan. Five hours of walking, balansingm grabbing roots during uphill and downhill, avoiding sharp wild grass Just to see the waterfalls promised by my ex-boss in an NGO that works with children in conflict with the law.