Tracks before the Train

Somewhere, some time before trains were invented, some people already had the inkling to pave the way for building tracks.

One afternoon, I suddenly had the urge to buy some really nice plates and platters only to come home and find the new room (where I recently moved in with a friend) without chairs and tables, nor forks and spoons. But I was still ecstatic in anticipation of the many sumptuous, interesting dishes these plates would be serving.

Then again, I remembered we have no stove, not even a rice cooker nor a toaster. And we are not actually allowed to cook inside the room.

After Church

It rained. And we had to call a cab. While waiting for it, I looked at the city. I thought it wouldn’t be long until the city vomits through its gutters what we have been feeding it.

I realized it has been a while since I got stuck in the rain right in the intestines of Bacolod. I immediately thought of home. But, which one? Hehe. Just moved in, by the way. A room right in the intestines of Bacolod.

I Remember Going Japanese

I am recollecting photos and notes of the places I've been to into some sort of a travel journal. Today, I look back at those days of running across hotel corridors wearing nothing but a yukata, eating raw horse meat, shrinking in the heart of shibuya, hunting for used cd's, missing trains and getting lost, and being painfully on time. (Check out my facebook account for more photos.)

Location: Tokyo, Kumamoto (2003)

One Step Polaroid Land Camera

Just got an old one from a secondhand gadgets store. Do you know where to buy films?

Stuffed

Once upon a time, all the stuffed toyz in our house stuffed themselves in a corner. (Look how scared the rabbit is, while Pooh beside it seems just as happy.)

no air

...

the writing to do

Again, I find myself inside the labyrinth of writing. What with a litany of things to write. Most of them, I should have written weeks ago as per necessity and requirement in my work and my masters. Plus the freelance responsibilities I hurled myself into. And then, there are also the perpetual story and poetry ideas swimming, swimming inside my brain. What's the right thing to do with a lot of writing to do?

Rising from The Ruins

I stayed up and out late last night by The Ruins in Talisay City, my head heavy with a library of stories to write about while forking the remains of my slice of Brazo de Mercedes and guzzling down the footnotes to my interviews with beer. In the middle of sugarcane fields stands what was left of a mansion of Italian architecture which was built in 1920s and was burnt right before the Japanese occupation. Roofless and without doors and windows, a sky of stars blankets over the ruins, and a play of shadows and dim light surrounds it; that, and an orchestra of crickets.

Excuse me for the long sentences. I just woke up and my brain bleeds with article ideas from my conversation on my way to the site with the owner's wife, thoughts both moving and wishful from the owner himself, menu moments with the young chef while my panna cotta waits to be judged accordingly, up to the vivid memories shared by the only remaining daughter-in-law of the man behind the mansion. Of course, the structure, the ruins could spawn a novel, an epic itself from how it was built up to how it withstood the fire and the elements of time and weather for more than 80 years.

For sure, just as it was not constructed overnight but over sleepless nights as continuous pouring of a Grade A mixture of concrete was said to have been the SOP, I could not possibly solve the puzzles and rebuild the mansion by picking up its pieces in a day. I would be needing nights and have to let my brain bleed some more. If only I could write in blood.

Huh? I think I should go back to sleep. (In the meantime, enjoy the photos from http://ifoundme.wordpress.com/)

The Nth Beginning

Today, I start again. Get back on track. Bow. And run towards the sun. Breathe. Walk. Into You.