the (not so) secret life

I don’t know you
But I want you
All the more for that
Words fall through me
And always fool me
And I can’t react
And games that never amount
To more than they’re meant
Will play themselves out
Take this sinking boat and point it home
We’ve still got time
Raise your hopeful voice you have a choice
You’ve made it now
Falling slowly, eyes that know me
And I can’t go back
Moods that take me and erase me
And I’m painted black
You have suffered enough
And warred with yourself
It’s time that you won
Take this sinking boat and point it home
We’ve still got time
Raise your hopeful voice you had a choice
You’ve made it now
Take this sinking boat and point it home
We’ve still got time
Raise your hopeful voice you had a choice
You’ve made it now
Falling slowly sing your melody I’ll sing along…

AAAAWWWW KRIS ALLEN…

Haven’t posted much. Possibly because all I can say is I’m so in love. Oh and I got bored the other day… so I bought a condo unit at the Bellagio in The Fort.

And bakit may multiply account na ang nanay ko?! Hm?!

ironic how today’s graduation means absolutely nothing to me. come to think of it, last year’s and this year’s grad are both blah. last year’s was simply a rite of passage from college to graduate school since we have been stuck in ateneo for another year anyways. this year, it’s purely ceremonial since there’s nothing worth celebrating. sure, a masters degree in finance sounds woah, but did i even learn anything? was it even worth it? maybe not.

Considering the remarkable time I spend online, it’s unpardonable that this blog hasn’t been updated for more than a week. But that doesn’t mean that nothing much is going on. Oh hell naw. To be honest, I’m actually very hooked on “work” lately that I put off most other things, such as working in the Math Dept (yeah my contract isn’t over but I hardly show up. I’m done. Cut back on my salary, see if I care), reviewing for the CFA exam, blogging, or going out. Hmm, back up a little, nope, I still go out much. But there, work is a total blast. It’s practical math, intuitive economics, and creative writing - all my favorite things - combined. The writing part comes easy for me and it’s motivating to hear that they think I write really well. It’s non-stressful, non-routine, and basically non-boring. It allows me to work in the morning and in the morning only - even in crazy early mornings (which I don’t mind because I’m totally a morning person) when I simply roll out of bed, fix a cup of coffee, and open my laptop. My new laptop with the big-ass screen that I got from work. I can take a siesta in the afternoon (which is a must, else I run low on energy at night) and go out every single night. I can work from anywhere in the world, anywhere with high-speed internet access that is. I get along with my workmates really well even if I’m the only girl in the FX analyst team. Funny thing is, I envisioned myself working from home - possibly just trading stocks, currency, or options - by the time I hit 40 and retire. But now, it seems like I’m already where I want to be 20 years from now. Incredible. Just plain incredible. See, I wanted to be able to work from home someday because I wanna be a hands-on mom, and I guess that plan’s already in the works. So, hmm, is this me wanting to start a family already? Maybe. Amazing how I seemed to stumble upon the fast-forward button for my life. I’m (We’re?) already looking for a condo unit to own, browsing for furniture for my (our?) future home, and checking out baby cribs and baby clothes… Am I really growing up too fast or is everybody else just extremely slow? 

WE GOTS NEW HP LAPTOPS FOR WORK!

Plus 5 books that cost about $30 each. And it’s only our second day. WOAH. All we do is sit down, pay attention, do some reading and research when we get home, and come back the next day. And we get to hang around with uber uber cool people too. And it’s nothing - I repeat, nothing - like the corporate world. That’s a good thing, believe me. Sayang lang my crash-shopping for corporate wear, haha, because after our training, we get to work from home. That’s right. Trading in our pajamas, as they put it.

2%. They got 2% of all the applicants for the FX analyst position. There’s 4 of us in the program, and we’re all Ateneans - which is good because we all get along and which is bad because we’re all competitive. But the working environment is not a dog-eat-dog one, it’s pretty much laidback. But don’t get me wrong, the people training us are geniuses. And I mean FX GODS. Imagine, the one giving the lectures dint finish college and the other guy dint major in math or economics, and yet they make tons of money out of FX trading.

Just… WOW.

And did I mention that I’m the only girl in the group?!

Too much, too soon. Am I lucky or what? This year has been great so far. And it just keeps getting better.

• March 5, Thursday: AI season 8 is officially the worst AI season EVER. The past episodes rely solely on entertainment value and much less on talent, compared to the previous season. David Cook, David Archuleta, Michael Johns, Jason Castro, Carly Smithson, Syesha Mercado, Brooke White vs. Danny Gokey, Lil Rounds, and Anoop Desai? I seriously wish the other contestants would step it up a couple of notches. In last season’s Top12, I wanted more than half of them to win, even if they had different genres as their fortes. This year, it seems as though the contestants have been reduced to their own sob stories and end up coming off as one-dimensional. This is why I am officially detaching myself from AI fanhood. How can you watch a season that puts people like Norman Gentle and Tatiana del Toro in the Top36?!
• March 6, Friday:
• • Watchmen is now officially part of my borefest movies list. Profound movie quotes and cool special effects aside, the film adaptation did not in any way do justice to the graphic novel. Half the time I didn’t even know what was going on. Not worth the hype and definitely not for those who are not fans of the original masterpiece.
  • Thanks to the surge in Meralco’s stock prices, I am officially a wad of Benjamins richer. In fact, I think I can afford to be unemployed for a couple of months. But being the workaholic that I am, I will carry on my stress-filled lifestyle by reviewing for the CFA, training for an FA position at CAPEX in hopes of being promoted as CFO or CRO this year, and joining an FX analyst development program. All in three months altogether. Am i bored or whuuuuut?
• March 7, Saturday: 
• • Ours is officially the best thesis EVER. Jaah and I got a text message from our favorite person in the Math Department (who else?!) saying that we had to pass another copy of our unabridged paper to the department chairperson so that it could be reviewed for the SOSE Awards. At first, we felt hassled - the first thing you think when you see Tups’ name in your inbox is wtf bitch - and we swore that all we would do is submit another copy of the paper and nothing more. If we were required to have another defense/presentation then to hell with it. But then magis got the best of us when Tups implied that ours was the first and only group that she endorsed to the chairperson for the SOSE Awards. So bring it awn. Besides, it would look awesome on the resume.
  • I am officially a f*cking liar. I attended the SOSE Open House to help with the registration for the Math Department. It was interesting watching parents accompany their clueless soon-to-be-freshmen kids sign up for the department talks. Ateneo-ness is soooo different from the perspective of those who haven’t spent a couple of years in the university. It wouldn’t be long before they accept the fact that Ateneo falls short of their expectations. Some incoming majors were asking us about the AMF program, and as much as I’d like to advise them to jump ship immediately, I had to lie through my teeth and say that it is a very promising program. When they asked me about the graduate program so enthusiastically, I couldn’t bear to dishearten them. It’s like staring through a five-year old’s eager eyes and telling them that Santa Claus does not exist. And neither does heaven nor does love. I know that they will soon find out, and I can only hope that once they do, they deal with it and survive. 
  • Eheads are officially over and done with. Their concert was a blast, even if my friends have been commenting that the first one was waaaaaay better. It’s ironic how I’m now about to become a huge Eheads fan now that their band is, well, non-existent. I loved their less mainstream songs like “Poor Man’s Grave”, “Wishing Wells”, and “Julie Tearjerky” more than the familiar ones. It amazes me how much they sound like a foreign band and versatile they are in terms of music genre - a rare characteristic, especially for Pinoy bands.
• March 8, Sunday: It’s official… We are… you know… OFFICIAL. 
• March 9, Monday: I am officially prepared to brave the urban jungle. Owing to my hellish MRT-devirginization, it’s been a really long while since I last took the metro. But today, having taken the MRT from Ayala to Cubao then the LRT from Cubao to Katipunan and having bought myself a prepaid train ticket, I officially declare myself an intermediate commuter. Promotion to advanced level will take place immediately after I am able to ride all forms of public transportation on my own. Prior to today, riding the cab was the only means of public transportation that I take alone. Now that I’ve studied the map of the train stations from Taft to Monumento and from Recto to Santolan, I feel like a tourist in my own goddamned country… but an empowered one nonetheless.

Welcome to the post-academic heaven, where the day starts at 11am and ends at 3am, where schedules are virtually empty, and where stress is non-existent.

And I am in math dept purgatory looking up at my coursemates in heaven. Thank god I gots Serena with me. Haha.

Imagine… Yesterday, I went to the dept before 9am because I was asked to proctor a Ma19 test until 1030. Originally, my planner said that I was to stay in the dept until 12nn only (reviewing for CFA) but Ate Edith asked if I could announce a free cut at 1030 and proctor another test at 12. Since I was the only GA in the dept at that time, I had no choice but to say okay. I barely had time to eat lunch, in fact, I think I just dashed to Prince David to charge my MyPhone (redundant…?) then I had to speedwalk back to the dept. With an empty stomach. Under the sweltering heat.

FUCK.

When I got there, one of the teachers asked me to announce a free cut and Ate Edith asked me to proctor a seatwork from 130-3pm. Daaaaaamn. She said I could just leave the seatwork and ask the students to drop by the dept to pass ‘em. But then I couldn’t leave the class naman right after I distributed the seatwork because a lot of students were coming in late. So I left the class at 230pm. I just dropped by the dept to get my stuff so that I could go home. I hadn’t even stepped outside Ateneo grounds yet when my MyPhone (redundant nga) started ringing. It was an unknown number so I dint answer. Then the caller sent me a text message; it was one of the math teachers asking me to sub and teach Lagrange multipliers for her Ma19 class at 3pm that day. FUCK. HER. 15 frikken minutes before the bell?! And what the hell do I remember about Lagrange multipliers?!

I hate last-minute things like these. This is slavery, I tell ya.

I love my new crash pad!
Ten reasons why I love 1703 West of Ayala Condominium, Gil Puyat Avenue:
1. It’s within walking distance to Greenbelt, Glorietta, Warehouse135, Saguijo, and just about any gimmick place in Makati. And oh, RCBC tower (which matters only if I decide to work @ CAPEX)
2. I share it with Marj, Pola, and Yen - three savvy girls I definitely get along with.
3. The lobby is awesomely hotel-esque and the entire place is well-maintained.
4. Our shower has a heater! Our room has an aircon! And a full-length mirror too!
5. We have an actual stove in the purty purty kitchen.
6. McDo, Ministop, and BPI are less than 50 steps away.
7. Gym with a working treadmill. Nuf said.
8. CY wouldn’t have to go far to visit me. We can see each other every damn day.
9. We have cable, wuhooo! (as if I watch TV often)
10. There are plenty of pirated DVD stalls just around the corner.

Au revoir Prince David and Katipunan!

I can’t believe I watched You Changed My Life in GB1 yesterday… Opening night and, more than an hour before the screening time, the line was already so fuggin’ long. We were s’posed to watch at GB3 but the tickets were sold out already. (BTW, we saw Christian Bautista there)

The movie was… ehh. Well, you know how I feel about pinoy romantic comedies, especially those that use song titles as movie titles. It’s just indicative of the amount of originality and creativity infused in the film. The only semblance of “creativity” was how the producers shamelessly promoted John’s and Sarah’s endorsements in the movie: Belo, Greenwich, Biogesic, and Jollibee. Branding, tsktsk, low budget obviously. I tried to keep an open mind, believe me… but the movie was everything I expected it to be: shallow, cliche-filled, and just plain ohhhh pleaaaaaaase. Typical. Some things just never change.

When John Lloyd first appeared on screen, the collective “awww” from the audience was too hard to pass up. POTEK. I just don’t get all the fuss about that guy. He’s neither cute nor hot - in fact, he even has a daddy-ish vibe about him and I don’t see the appeal. He’s not even a good actor; Rayver Cruz, Joross Gamboa, and Gio Alvarez (aba kilala ko naman sila, so don’t call me an elitist) outperform him by a mile. For one, John Lloyd’s English diction needs much improvement. He’s been in the acting industry quite a long time already and I don’t understand why his acting doesn’t come off as natural. He doesn’t transcend the role and the discriminatory viewer is always aware that he is just acting.

Sarah Geronimo, on the other hand, has a natural sincerity about her. It’s hard not to emphatize with her character - not because I can relate with her experiences, again, ohhhh pleaaaaaase. But her quirkiness is simply contagious and I can’t think of a better actress for her role (although that’s probably because I haven’t actually watched a lot of pinoy movies in this genre).

From the perpetually annoying “bebe ko… bebe ko? bebe ko! bebe ko…” to the hilarious POWER HUG! POWER KISS!… maybe the movie wasn’t so bad after all, props to Sarah, Rayver, Joross, and Gio. But please bonk me on the head if you catch me about to waste my time on another one of those films.

But then again, at the end of the day, it’s who I watch it with that really matters.

Remind me again why I have to attend Risk Management class today when:

1. Our teacher has consistently been coming to class unprepared and I end up either not learning, learning something wrong, or not paying attention at all.

2. We spend half the period listening to our teacher make a speech about how disappointed he is with our performance. I don’t understand how he can have such high expectations for his students when he is clearly not qualified to teach the subject matter and it seems as though he isn’t taking the necessary measures to remedy this shortcoming.

3. I think I can gain a better understanding of the topics if I spend the time reading the book on my own instead. After all, his lectures are pulled straight from the book and his additional input, if there be any, are mostly erroneous.

4. The reasons to attend class are the same reasons to ditch class:
    a. Midterm exam results will be given today. I’m sure I did pretty okay with the exam; not an A, but definitely not a B-minus. But with the way our teacher has been discussing our answers to certain questions, I’m expecting the worst. Although I’d like to know how I did, I’d also like to keep the last remaining shred of respect I have for our teacher.
    b. Teacher evaluations will be conducted today. While I’d like to copy this entire post on the evaluation sheet, I’m afraid of doing something that I will someday regret. As a student, it’s a difficult position to be in when your teacher happens to be a close friend. The math department is to blame for placing us in this position. However, our teacher should also be held responsible for making sure that this awkward relationship does not compromise his teaching and our learning.
    c. Today is the very last day of class, possibly for the rest of our lives. The previous set of classes have not been very good and as much as I don’t want remember those as my last classes, I fear that, given the way that Risk Management classes have been going, there’s no way to go but down.

As much as I’d like to act like a responsible student, at least for the last remaining days of our academic lives, attending class just borders on impractical and pointless.

I heard the news from my mom that Mary Saludares passed away after a fatal car accident in Edgewood last week. Up to now, I’m still in disbelief. After reading all the blog posts of Mary’s friends (mostly from ballet), sadness about her death is somehow replaced by a nostalgic yet light feeling of blessedness for being one of the people whose lives Mary was able to touch. She was truly one in a million. Rarely can you ever find someone who can make you feel comfortable in an instant. She was one of my first few friends when I danced for Steps, possibly the most graceful dancer I have ever gotten to know.

Anyway, the news…

Mary Saludares, a 20-year-old member of The Washington Ballet Studio Company, was struck and killed by a car Friday night in Edgewood, State Police said.

The award-winning company was scheduled to perform Sunday at 4 and 7:30 at at Howard Community College’s Smith Theater as part of the Candlelight Concert Society’s Family Series, but The Washington Ballet announced in a release that it had canceled the remainder of its tour. The release said the group was on tour in Harford County when the accident occurred.

According to the State Police, Saludares was crossing Route 24 at Edgewood Road just after 10 p.m. when she was struck by a southbound silver Chevrolet Impala driven by Robert Kane of Abingdon. Saludares was pronounced dead at Upper Chesapeake Medical Center.

State Police were investigating the accident.

“No words can describe the pain of losing Mary,” said The Washington Ballet Artistic Director Septime Webre. “She was not only a beautiful dancer, but a radiant soul who emitted peace and joy. The entire TWB family mourns her passing and extends its thoughts and prayers to Mary’s family.”

Saludares began dancing at the age of 6 under Sofia Elizalde and Raul Sauz at Steps Dance Studio in Manila, Philippines. In 2006, she received the highest Royal Academy of Dance Award, the Solo Seal. She had the honor of being the first Filipino entry in the 2006 Adeline Genée International Ballet Competition.

In 2004, she received the Luva Adameit Award in the first NAMCYA Ballet Competition in the Philippines. She later attended the School of American Ballet and The Washington School of Ballet’s Release Time year-round program. She was selected to join The Washington Ballet Studio Company for its 2008-2009 season, achieving one of her dreams of moving from student to professional.

Saludares is survived by her father, José M. Saludares Jr.; her mother, Marissa S. Saludares; and two brothers, Patrick Vincent Saludares and Bryan Joseph Saludares.

Students and staff are being offered grief counseling services. A memorial service is being planned for early March in Washington to honor Saludares. A private family funeral will be held in the Philippines in the coming days.