Have you ever been caught lying? I don't think I've ever really been caught lying. I mean yeah, I've probably made thousands of little white lies in my life, most of which have been found out about 5 seconds after I've said them.

Things like

"Did you clean the sink like I asked you to?"

"...yes."

"No you didn't."

"I didn't have time."

I once lied to my teacher in 3rd grade to save face. She had reprimanded me unfairly in front of my entire class, bordering on humiliation. To top it all off, she set up a private audience with me that afternoon to give me a chance to apologize to her for setting her off that way. Being 9 years old, I thought the whole ordeal was my fault, and I showed up feeling like the most wicked child in the world.

So when she asked me to explain my "behavior" in class that afternoon, I burst into hysterical tears and told her that my parents didn't love me, that they ignored me, and that the rest of my family mistreated me.

It was a total lie. But it distracted her from wanting to squeeze an apology out of me, and made her feel sorry for me instead. In fact, she was so worried that she set up a PTA meeting with my parents to discuss my *ahem* issues.

It was only when I was older that I realized that what she did to me was wrong. I didn't do anything wrong, I was 9-years old for godsakes. She shouldn't have humiliated me like that. She must've been PMS-ing or she's an evil bitch. I'm not sorry I lied. I hope she finds out I did.

But yesterday I lied, and I am deeply sorry for it. It was to a customer. A regular of several years at that. V.I.P.! She always orders the same thing. Grande skim Caramel Macchiato, extra dry, with extra caramel drizzle. Then she sits in the corner with her little spoon and eats it up. Every day. Every. Single. Day.

She's alright, but on some days, when I'm in a touchy sort of mood, it sometimes ticks me off how she'll stand beside the bar and watch us make her drink everyday, and I mean WATCH US, like a sentinel, or like the coffee police. I don't think it would tick me off as much if she actually chit-chatted with us a bit, but she never does. I don't know if it's because she's an ice queen, or if she's just painfully shy.

So today, after having steamed her skim milk and finding that there was not enough to fill up a Grande cup, I cheekily topped up her drink with 2 spoonfuls of whole milk foam. Take note, not even the actual milk itself, just the froth on the top that is maybe 90% air, and 10% actual milk. She was watching me of course, but I didn't think she knew I was scooping whole into her skim.

So, I hand her her drink, smile, tell her to have a nice day and all that, but she looks me in the eye all of a sudden.

"Did you put whole in this?", she asked me.

"No", I said. Naked lie, right there. I knew it as soon as I said it.

I can pin-point several reasons why I did it. Number one, admitting to it would be potentially falling into a very ugly trap. Second of all, it was only the tiniest, most miniscule bit of whole. Seriously. Thirdly, I hated the way she was watching me. When a customer watches me like that, I get pressured to make the drink faster than I usually do, and I hate that feeling. Didn't help that it was a highly customized drink.

She took her drink and went to her little corner. I breathed a sigh of relief. But somehow I felt awful. Supremely awful. Worse than than how I felt in the 3rd grade. Sure, it was a petty lie. But it was precisely the pettiness that made me feel worse. I was betraying a paying customer, taking her money and giving her something that isn't what she thought it was. It was a petty lie, and worse, it was a completely unnecessary lie. A bold-faced, naked lie. Where was the justification for it, really?

And of course, it always feels worse when you actually get away with it. Fortunately (?), I didn't.

She came back. She handed me the drink.

"What's wrong?", I asked her. Hypocrite.

And in the tiniest, most timid voice ever (I've never actually heard her say anything aside from "grande skim extra-dry extra-drizzle caramel macchiato"), she said, "I saw you put whole in my drink. I can't have whole, not even a tiny bit, because it really gives me an upset stomach."

There it was in the Grande cup she was holding, the coffee-stained milk, stained almost as badly as my integrity. She spoke so softly, so shyly, as if it was she who should be ashamed of complaining that she was handed the wrong drink, and not the shame-faced liar who had made it.

So that's why she watched us like an owl every time we made her drink. She wasn't a prima donna. She just didn't want to get diarrhea. And she wasn't snotty, she was just really shy.

I will not repeat the apology I made, but I meant every word of it. There was no contesting the truth in my apology, and the other spoken realizations she heard from me. I had never been so sorry towards a virtual stranger in my life.

She got a new drink on the house, she got a coupon that entitled her to a free drink, and when she left she smiled and waved as if she had truly forgiven me. Not that she was ever truly angry in the first place. She was too nice. I, on the other hand, would have thrown a fit if I had been in her shoes.

I think I already know what the moral of the story is.

---

I have a new customer crush. It's been awhile since I've had one. Most of the time, the hotties are one-time wonders. They come, order, stay for a while, and walk away with their latte never to be seen again.

This one comes every now and then. He looks like Jake Gylenhall. And he works in the store a floor below us. I know because it says so on his ID. I put a heart on his hot chocolate today with caramel syrup. He'll never see it. The drinks come with lids.

---

I've learned that there 3 kinds of difficult customers

1) The ones who complain but who actually want to give us a chance to make things better. They're not actually "difficult", they are actually real, decent people who are honestly dissatisfied with their drink but don't act like it's the end of the world.

2) The ones who want to be angry. They like their anger, and they like the attention it commands. They don't want to make things better. They burn bridges. And their satisfaction is in seeing us scurry and chasing after them.

3) Junkies/ druggies. They're a bit like number 2, except they're high and usually rude from the start. Rude, difficult, and totally out of it. If they storm out angrily over some weird/ bogus complaint, most of us don't bother chasing them down.

So I was on the verge of a nervous breakdown a while back. In trying to be a superwoman design student and a model employee, I successfully eliminated my social life, my family time, sleeping time, and my spiritual life. I lived in the same house as my mother but never had real conversations with her. I gave up all hope of just sitting with my friends for an hour over coffee. I learned to function even though I would randomly fall asleep here and there during the day. I haven't prayed in ages. Having time to plop down on the sofa and watch some telly for even 15 minutes became a distant memory of the past.

I guess the last straw came when extra homework was dumped on us, and I saw that the only possible way to squeeze it into my impossibly tight, meticulously planned schedule was to quite my job and not sleep for the next 3 days. I turned around, walked out of the classroom, found the nearest bathroom, and broke down. I didn't know what I was crying about. I suppose I just completely lost it. And I suppose I had it coming.

I realized that I didn't even have any time for myself. No time to feel my feelings. No time to think and hear my own voice. No time to quiet myself down and just sit still. Everyday the past few months, I'm up early, and with my body still begging for sleep I get ready, eat a quick breakfast, then I'm on the go to school or work (sometimes both in one day), and when I get home, I immediately get started on homework till I fall asleep with my hand still holding the pen.

What followed the next few days was a break down, experienced in small increments. Meaning, instead of one big breakdown, I had a series of smaller ones, involving collapsing into sobs randomly at work and school. I felt so trapped in my own life, or that I was being stretched in 5 different directions. All my commitments are like little pet monsters that I've been feeding well this whole time, and now that I've run out of food, they've started to eat me. I began to resent everything I was committed to.

And so, it has become clear to me that it is time to revise this little program I've been following. I simply cannot go on this way. I'm not asking for time to out every weekend. I don't need to see my friends every week. All I want is time to watch a DVD at least once a week (without falling asleep), time to have real conversations with the people who matter to me (i.e. my mother), and more importantly, time to just sit quietly, peacefully, and think of nothing. Time for myself. Time to feel gratitude, and oneness with all. I miss connecting with my spirit. A girl needs to renew herself every now and then.

And so, I have spent the next few days telling myself that it's okay to be imperfect, and it's okay to be a little late for class sometimes, to not have fantastic marks in class, and to sometimes have a spontaneous meet-up with friends, and to spend money carelessly (but not too carelessly). I think I've loosened up a bit, as evidenced by the silly little mistakes I've been making the past few days, like mindlessly toddling into the wrong train (which took me in the opposite direction of where I wanted to go), and accidentally super-gluing three of my fingers together (I wish I had taken a photo).

I've since been on the recovery path from my 4 days of craziness, and I think I'm beginning to feel grateful about life again.

I'm glad I'm doing what I'm doing, I love my job and my course, I love my life, not because it's always easy or pleasant, but because I feel it is rich with meaning and value.

morning has broken

Discovered a new old song today. I love the prayerful way Cat Stevens sings "Morning Has Broken". I believe that the truest prayers pleas, or requests for a favor. The prayers that really open us up are the ones where you're just simply grateful, for big things, and small things, and everything in existence.

Morning has broken, like the first morning
Blackbird has spoken, like the first bird
Praise for the singing, praise for the morning
Praise for the springing fresh from the word

Sweet the rain's new fall, sunlit from heaven
Like the first dewfall, on the first grass
Praise for the sweetness of the wet garden
Sprung in completeness where his feet pass

Mine is the sunlight, mine is the morning
Born of the one light, Eden saw play
Praise with elation, praise every morning
God's recreation of the new day
 

First of all, I have never seen the photographs, only little cropped thumbnails they've been printing in the paper with all the supposedly "obscene" bits, i.e. breasts and genitalia cropped out. I would rather see them for myself before judging whether they truly are "pornographic". What I do remember thinking when I saw those thumbnails was how beautiful and evocative the lighting was. Someone even commented in an article that even Henson's detractors must admit that the photographs were beautiful.

Pay attention, folks. This is an important time for the art world. Art that matters is that which raises questions, which stirs debate, which forces society to look at themselves and examine the grounds on which they base their moral standards and laws upon.

Why is it okay to splash videos and images of clothe but highly- sexualised adolescents in magazines and MTV, but wrong when a an artist of Bill Henson's stature photographs them in the nude, but unsexualised?

Bill Henson's detractors claim that his photographs are material just waiting to be snatched up by pedophiles and child pornographers. (And interestingly, I was told that Australia has a pretty rampant pedophilia problem. Take note that I have not found evidence to support this claim.) Does not the pedophilia problem then lie in the very fabric of Australian society and not in a bunch of artistic photographs of nude adolescents?

Will shutting down this exhibition really help in eradicating child pornography? Or does it just expose the extreme and possibly unhealthy levels of malice in society?

There was a time in the era of sepia where it was actually fashionable to have your prepubescent child photographed naked. Now we can get lynched for taking a photo of someone else's fully-clothed child playing in the park. There's perverts and pornographers out there. Don't take any chances. When can a photo of a nude adolescent just be a photo of a nude adolescent again? We live in times of suspicion.

Let me tread dangerously near the line even more. I was disappointed with PM Rudd's views on the whole issue, saying that we should just "allow kids to be kids". I don't get this whole belief that kids should be completely isolated from their inherent sexuality for fear of loss of their innocence.

I just believe that people are born sexual by nature. It is not something we "become" when we hit puberty. Rather it is something that we are but isn't immediately realized. It is so much a part of us that often, the first characteristic we notice about strangers and people in general is their gender. Age, and physical attributes only come second.

And I feel that it is unhealthy to suppress such a natural thing in our kids in the name of innocence. I'm not saying we should teach them to act and dress like little lolitas, and throw them to the child pornographers. I'm saying that a photo of a naked adolescent wouldn't be such a malicious thing if we healthily recognized, embraced, and integrated certain aspects of human sexuality that we consider ugly and therefore choose to keep hidden in the shadows.

Children can be sexual creatures. This does not give perverts or pornographers license to exploit and violate our children. Rather, it can open our eyes as to why the problem continues.

Overall, I think this whole Henson uproar is an interesting example of how art can change and challenge society.  In all major societal changes, there must be a force acting as the catalyst for change. But because too much change can be dangerous, there must also be a directly opposing force to counteract it. The key is balance. All opposites must exist in a delicate state of tension to avoid unhealthy extremes. As a law, if a force becomes too powerful, its collapses under it's own weight, giving room for the opposing force to dominate and so on and so forth. There will come a time when the balance will shift and society will become tolerant of those photos.

And speaking of malice in art...

We drew a guy in life drawing yesterday. Oh em gee, he was quite yummy. A real fine specimen of the male specie, amazing hip bones (drool), and quite well-endowed.  And every time he would pose, he would close his eyes, and he looked rather beautiful.  I was trying so hard not to stare at him.

I mean, when a model is posing it's okay to stare at because you're drawing him, but in between poses it's generally rude to stare. I also feel that there is some sort of unspoken rule that you should never talk to the nude model. It just feels inappropriate.

But after our mid-class break, when I returned to the classroom a little earlier than everyone else, he was there reclining on the dais, draped in nothing but a sarong, and reading a book. There were only a couple of other students in the classroom. I had this natural inclination to chat him up because it felt rude that everyone was talking to each other, but ignoring only him. Then I started thinking that it felt wrong to talk to strangers whom you've just seen naked, so I decided to just ignore him, too, which was probably the same reason why everyone else was ignoring him.

But somehow my attempts to sort of go along with everyone else in any situation never work. He called my name. I looked up in surprise. What does the naked man want with me? Anobaaaaaa I'm trying not to stare at you inappropriately so stop talking to me, I'm supposed to draw you, not talk to you.

Anyway he basically asked me if I was Filipino (I get asked that every day by random strangers)  and if I knew any Spanish because he was learning Spanish and the talk went this way and that, and it was an actual conversation, even if he didn't have any clothes on.

I am a total failure as an artist. Here I am being trained to be a professional,  and I can't talk to the nude model without blushing. I'm exactly the kind of artist you shouldn't ever pose nude for.

When I am in the zone, I can look at a naked man and see him as an arrangement of lines and contours, 3-dimensional shapes, and light and shadow, and be completely desensitized. But once I lift my chalk pastel from the paper and dust off my fingers,  a yummy naked man is a yummy naked man.

Then again I am known to stare in an absolutely shameless manner at guys in wet shorts when I'm at Bondi.

Lesson learned today: you gotta think with your own brain because in the end, you know best.

Ok, so I have this teacher whom I really want to impress, and it's precisely that reason why I always seem to fail horribly in her class. It doesn't help that she's an ice-queen, a harsh critic, and just plain intimidating. And it's not like she doesn't have the right to be that way. She's a book illustrator. A damn good one. She wins awards and shit. And  because she has done so successfully in one of my dream jobs, I look up to her as much as I hate/ fear her.

I make beautiful artworks when I am NOT in her class. Once I start on something in her class, I tend to try too hard and end up making stupid decisions because I want to please her. Her subtlest comments can make or break me. I've churned out some pretty horrible stuff in her class, stuff I wouldn't make if I weren't in such a state of anxiety.

Anyway, today I decided that was all going to change. I decided it was absolutely ridiculous how anxious I'd get before her class and how desperately I wanted to please her to the point that I wasn't enjoying learning anymore. Besides, her opinion is not the be-all and end-all of my career as an illustrator. Even if I consistently bomb in her class, it doesn't mean I can't carve out a career of my own.

Also, I decided I was tired of trying to please her and consistently failing, and realized that I never would anyway, and so I might as well just create to please myself, final assessment be damned. And so with that mindset, I walked into her classroom not giving a f*ck to put it mildly. It  helped that today's medium was chalk pastels, which I am quite comfortable with.

I laid my paper out on the table. She pointed out that it had ugly creases all over it. I gave her a tight lipped smile. E anong magagawa ko, diba?

I started on my still-life drawing amidst an out-of-nowhere lecture she was giving to the class about how if we wanted a career, we all had to grow up because if we didn't care, then she didn't give a damn about us either. Up yours, maam.

I attacked my work with focus and confidence, I knew what I was doing, and I was working in the natural way I like to work.

Half-way through, she pointed out that my work was getting muddy and that instead of working it, I should just start a new one instead. I gave her a tight-lipped smile, and turned my focus back to my work, shutting her out.

T*ngina mo. Feeling mo ba ikaw lang ang may alam kung paano mag-chalk pastel? Feeling mo ikaw lang ang magaling? You don't know everything. You're not God. You're not the alpha and omega of my future s an artist. I will be better than you someday purely out of revenge, and I will do it my way.

My classmate came over and glanced at my work. "It's looking good, Ala."

"Thanks, I'll remember that when I get my 60-mark." (A 60 is a passing grade, but an un-special one).

I didn't give a damn. Maybe my work sucked, but I could only do what I knew how to do. And frankly, I didn't care what she thought anymore. I was doing it my way, the only way I knew how to do things, and the way I did it best. It was all about making me happy. Me, me, me.

Throughout the class she kept passing by, shooting meaningful glances at my work, and keeping silent (which admittedly made me just a little nervous). But soon my drawing started to come together, just like I knew it would.

By class's end, I handed my work in. "It's very nice", she said.

That stunned me. Wow. She's never said anything nice about anything I've made. The fortress I had been holding up against her all day went down long enough for me to mutter a rather sincere "thank you". Suddenly I didn't  hate her so much.

Major demon slayed today.  I've got its severed head on a stick.

2nd lesson learned today: magpakatotoo ka!

My workmates always let me do the chalk sign boards in store, and this is the one I made for our Coffee of the Week, Cafe Estima.

O diba? Have you ever walked into a Starbucks with such damn fine chalk board signs?!

Too bad I'll have to erase it by Monday when our Coffee of the Week changes. Bugger.



You, Me, and the Tree
At the Botanical Gardens last Tuesday. What a beautiful Autumn sky.



Ohmygash! Faneekees!

Freakishly large bats. Everything in this country is freakishly large.



Coffee and cigarettes, the Sincek Diet.

Me with my favorite Frienemy, Nelson.

---

I never though Robert Downey Jr was sexy till now.

God, I love his 3D, futuristic work station in Iron Man. I can imagine myself designing puppets on that thing (geez, how sad).

And yeah, yeah, yeah I loved the movie and all that. Everybody does. I don't need to explain it yet again.

Will maybe watch it again on tight-ass Tuesday.

---

I think I'm sick. I feel flu-ish. Oh no.

Do you think you've ever found your gift? The one thing that you just seem so innately good at, it almost seems as if you knew it even before birth? We all have a gift, and I believe we're each crafted a specific way to perform a specific purpose.

I've always felt that I particularly have the gift self-expression, and it was evident at a pretty early age. All the things I can do well like drawing, writing, or performing, are all just by-products of that gift, the gift of being able to produce output.

We all have our ways of connecting with The Higher Power. To me, when I'm creating, I feel like I'm praying. I feel like there's this energy centre at the top of my head that just opens itself, like a satellite dish catching signals from The Source. Where else does all this creative power come from? I am only a channel.

And I always wonder if it really is possible for a person to be creative, and not believe in God. For what is creativity but an act of faith? Why embark on any creative project if not for the hope and belief of producing something beautiful at the end of it? Why would we venture out into dangerous, foreign territory if not for the hope of discovering something worthwhile?

We only feel dissatisfied with our output when we feel we have repeated ourselves, created not out of faith, but out of fear and our own self- judgement. This is why every true act of creativity is a risk, a leap, an act that requires courage.

And what is creativity but an act of transcendence, of growing a little bigger than we were before, of evolving into a higher being, of being one step closer to that Omega we're aiming for? Can a person aim for perfection and yet not believe in a higher power somewhere inside of him?

I could spend the rest of my life peacefully doing what I am already good at. But I'm really glad I got a big kick in the butt, which really shook me up, and forced me to come up with this:


Otherwise, how would I ever know I could do it?

It is truly an astounding thing to discover that your ideas can actually work.

---

But yes, the show is finally over! 3 months of hard work to make her, then a few shining moments of coming alive under the stage lights, before going back to being a dead thing, a lump of painted polystyrene tossed out on the street, ready to be transported to my garage where she will be housed indefinitely till I decide what I want to do with her.


There was a lot of clowning around backstage. Being dressed in head to toe black makes you want to start acting like a ninja.



Or like a creature of the night.


Though other people chose to be gold, not black.



I've got backstage photos and onstage photos in my albums.

I turned 25 in the shower. I suppose that's a good thing. I sort of did it on purpose, to symbolize renewal. And also because I didn't want to begin the next quarter of my life looking like shit and covered in paint and polystyrene.

The puppet is a beauty. I'll be working on her some more today.

Anyway, I wrote this yesterday i think:

It's a few days before I hit 25, and already I've got birthday greetings pouring in. Starting with my workmates.

They surprised us with a cake during our last meeting. Awwww. I was a happy girl. :-)

And on Thursday I turn a quarter of a century old. I never imagined myself to be 25. When I was a little girl, I couldn't wait to be 17. It seemed the perfect age. Everyone in Archie Comics was 17. My favorite New Kid on the Block was 17. All the character in teen movies were 17. My favorite magazine was Seventeen. I thought 17 was the be-all and end-all age, the apex of life, where I would be able to wear bikinis, go to cool places, and have boyfriends.

Thus, I never really dreamed past 17. 18 seemed a foreign, and alien world to me, a far-off planet untouched by Ala-kind. 25 seemed even more far-out.

Well, 17 didn't turn out to be the apex of my human development. I actually don't really want to be a teenager ever again. It's a stressful time. You think you're all that and you know everything. You have so much drive and energy that you waste on whinge-ing and tambay (hanging out).

I rather like being in my twenties. I'm old enough for my parents to actually take my decisions seriously. I don't break out as often. I've found a hairstyle I like, and I dress the way I want. I know what kind of friends I want to have. I don't feel like I have to be drunk every weekend. I like responsibility. I feel like a woman (no, I know I'm a woman), and it's not in the length of my hair, or the clothes I wear. I don't hate things just because it's cool to hate it. I can talk to my parents like an adult talking to another adult. I have some of my own money to spend, and my own savings.

So... it's nice being in my twenties (and in my mid-twenties by Thursday).

What do I want for my birthday? Black boots, a new iPod, and all my dearest friends and family surrounding me in a warm nest of looove and affection ;-) Hahaha!

A place to keep your doggy in while you go off for a holiday is called a kennel. But a place to keep your kitty in is called a cattery. I discovered this when a "Meadowmist Kennel and Cattery" transport vehicle cut me off while driving to school the other day.

"Cattery" is a funny word. It sounds like some sort of jail cell for catty women. I imagine a padded cell full of catty girls doing their nails while spreading nasty gossip about each other. I can almost imagine a police officer arresting someone and saying "Do you where catty women go?! To THE CATTERY MWAHAHAHAHAHA!!!"

Oh boy, the words I learn in this country. Do you know that I have used the word "spruik" in a sentence? And that I've used the word "besotted" in ordinary banter? This country makes me say funny things. Like cattery.

---

Apparently I did myself proud at work today and got on my boss's good side. I know not how. She has described me as a complacent person.

Complacent. Placid.

Well, maybe so, but only in that part of the universe that is Starbucks. Work is work. I want it to go smoothly. Any trouble would be added stress to my life. I go there to do my job and earn money. It was never my dream to be a barista, and I won't be there for the longterm. Therefore, I have no ego in the work place. Other people can fight over so-and-so's work ethic/ leader-ship style/ milk-foaming abilities bla bla bla. But so long as I'm not being stepped on or disrespected, I'm pretty easy to work with and will do what others say.

---

Last Sunday, while driving home from Bunnings, my spontaneous sense of adventure brought me to a hundreds-year old manor from an era when people actually used to dress like this.


Look at the old fireplace. A family once walked on those floorboards when they were brand new. And look at that old, old, peeling wallpaper!


This is outside by the barn, and some old codger dressed as a.... I don't know.

And this is... the gunsmith? His guns were real old ones, too.

A couple weeks ago there was a report on CNN that a Starbucks barista in the US, Sandra Andersen, donated her kidney to a female customer to save her life. Wow. Talk about pushing customer service to a new limit.

Made me wonder what lengths I would go through for a customer. Imagine the exchange! Are you in need of any internal organs to go with your mocha? Before you know it, Starbucks cards will also double as organ donor cards. Do I get an extra large tip for that? (Too bad Australians are not into tipping... my charm is wasted on a nation of non-tippers. I could be rich by now.)

I am all too familiar with the barista-customer relationship. It's a great relationship, and it will continue to be great so long as you don't majorly, majorly stuff up their coffee, and if you see to it that you always have the espresso bar to separate you from each other. You get to know each other always at arm's length, through chirpy, glib little exchanges once a day, without ever letting familiarity really take root and begin to breed contempt. You'll never get to know each other's despicable views on sex, politics, and religion. You'll never hear each other's secret, racist thoughts (which everyone secretly harbors in this multi-cultural stew pot). It's always how's the weather, how's work, how was your weekend, how's your broken arm?

Not to say that customer service isn't sincere. But it's definitely a distinct mindset  you have to switch on, one that is sometimes prone to cracks and fractures,  and would be unsustainable in the real world. This is the nature of customer service. It makes me wonder what spirit of compassion summoned Sandra Anderson to make the leap from customer service to humanitarian service.

I can think of only one or two customers I would donate parts of my body to, and it would have to be something minor like blood, hair, or fingernail clippings. Well, fine, maybe a skin graft.

I have, however, lent or donated my time, advice, listening skills, Magic Sing, and comic books to certain customers. Don't I get some sort of award for that? Or maybe a big tip.

---

This is what I look like when I'm making my puppet.

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I first discovered Craig Thompson when a chance meeting with my friend Gabriel at the launch of "Fully Booked" at Fort Bonifacio turned into a crash introduction to the world of graphic novels. Gabriel approached me, introduced himself as a reader of my blog, and before I knew it, I was being given a personal tour of the store's extensive graphic novel section by a certified comics geek. And because he was so deeply passionate about the subject, he insisted on buying me my first "gateway book" into the world of graphic novels, even though we were virtual strangers. And that is how a copy of "Goodbye, Chunky Rice" landed in my hands, which I love dearly and quickly landed a spot amongst my favorite reads.

That chance encounter was one of the coolest random things to ever happen to me, and I will never forget how generously Gabriel shared his passion with me.

So last Saturday, to celebrate my Two-Years-in-Oz Anniversary, I trekked to Konokuniya with a friends bought myself a copy of Craig Thompson's 600-page, autobiographical graphic novel, "Blankets".

All I can say is that I devoured the book all in one go and felt something inside me ache the entire two hours I spent reading it. I have never read anything so honest, and vulnerable, and just achingly beautiful. I slept at 2am, and the next day I spent every spare moment poring over every beautiful hand-drawn panel.

I'm feeling that steady sort of inner peace that comes when you know you've finally reached a good place after slaying your dragons and befriending your demons, and you know you have no regrets.

I will have been here two years come Saturday. March 15. How can I ever forget that day? I had been crying for a week before I boarded the plane. I've described that day many times as a funeral. It was the death of an old life. I knew that even if I did return to the Philippines, I would never have it back. It was such a solid sense of finality, like the thud of a coffin as the gurney lowers it into the hole in the ground and gravedigger starts heaping dirt on it. No turning back.

And if you've ever left home, you will probably understand what I'm feeling, how much the past two years mean to me, and how sweet it is to have gotten where I am. Sweet.

I don't want my old life back anymore. I want newness. Even if I were to return, I would want to do things differently. I like how dynamic my life is, how I can feel it moving forward day by day, step by step.

I came here with an empty life. Now it's got new friends, new experiences, new places, new opportunities, new everything. I have just what I need, nothing in excess, nothing that wastes time, nothing that is insignificant.

Look at the people who are in my life now, the people I work with, the new friends I've gotten to know. Did I ever dream they existed before I moved here? How they came into my life is such a big, wonderful surprise. Maybe ten years from now, some of them will still be in my life. Sometimes, it only makes sense years later.

I'm studying art and design. I relish every single day of it, and never forget how damn lucky I am to be doing this. There is no place I would rather be, and nothing that I would rather be doing than improving on my craft and practicing it with discipline and commitment.I can't believe I mulled over the the question of going back to school for so long. Why did I stop myself from pursuing what I love? I can't even remember all the idiotic reasons I invented to not study art. I think I used to say that it was selfish and useless or something like that. Now that I've cut the bullsh*t and I'm here, it makes absolute, perfect sense for me to be here.

I'm not sick of this place yet. I'm not bored. I'm still enjoying getting to know the people who haven't been in my life for very long. I'm not ready to settle into complacency. I enjoy even my everyday life, waking up, making breakfast, going to work, driving down the street... even those ordinary things are still beautiful and meaningful to me, because I went through a lot to be able to do them.

I thought of having a big party to celebrate. Then I thought I'd rather just be quietly happy and appreciative of ordinary, every day life. I think I'll go to Borders and buy myself that 60-dollar graphic novel I've wanted for so long. Maybe I'll go to Starbucks and draw people. I'll treat myself to a nice meal somewhere.

Sydney friends, I know you were all expecting a big party, but I'm honestly too tired to prepare a lot of food, and clean the house to make it presentable and all that. All I want is a chat, and a beer with all those friends who have also left home to be here and have their own milestones to celebrate, or those who know people who left home to be here and want to celebrate with them. Only condition is that you have to join in the toast (yes, there will be a toast).

I will let the day unfold spontaneously.

----To whoever wrote this, I am really, f*cking honored.

Actually, I am honored every time someone takes 2 minutes off their day to drop me a comment or an e-mail. Even if I seldom reply. I'm really bad at that, I admit. Even ask my friends.

My blog does not have any advertisers, because I never write from a neutral stance and I probably don't write enough about celebs, pop culture, chismis, etc, and all those things that people like.  It has never won an award in those annual blogger conventions, because I don't write on any one topic, and they don't know what category to put my blog under. It has still never reached number 1 on Technorati's Top 100 Blogs (although I do remember it reaching number 4 at one point).

But if I am one of the Top 10 Pinoy Bloggers on Wikipilipinas, then I must be doing something right.

---
Need a quick lift? Climb up on to the roof of your house and watch the sunset. Do you know that you can sort of hear your neighbors from up there?


Well, it was Mio's idea. Damn hippie!

Presenting to you, protoype AKA mini version of "Bronzed Goddess", topless, sunbathing, cat-headed babe of the Nile.

The teacher didn't like the earrings I put on her ears on my technical drawing of her, so I put them on her nipples instead.


Also finished my gray-scale project for my color theory class. We were asked to pick a reference picture and make a gray-scale interpretation out of it using collage and gouache.

I picked Gustav Klimt's "Danae". I think she turned out quite well.

Continued from this entry.

Class one: Drama

I haven't done any formal drama classes in more than ten years! I really, really enjoyed it, everything just came so naturally to me and I felt like a duck in water. It felt as normal as eating, and breathing. I miss acting. I really do. I had such a blast.

Class 2: Acrobatics

We did some hardcore, Cirque du Soleil shit man! Haha.

We did some low-risk balancing acts which involved having your classmates balance on your thighs, making pyramids, and other um... tricky looking acrobatic tricks that are really, really great for impressing people and look really dangerous but are actually really simple. Damn, wish I took photos. Nin would have been impressed with some of the shit I did.

Class 3: Dance

I'm glad that I at least have some coordination, and some rhythm, even though I grew up being teased that I was the worst dancer in the family (and the worst dancer in class, even). But dude, I was better than some people in class. At least I eventually catch on. I don't look great, but what I learned from this class was that things could be much worse.

We did Bollywood. Indian techno and lots of hip-popping and pushing-outward motions from side to side with our palms. You get the idea.

Day 4 of class:

The culmination of my 3 days of class was this beetle puppet made out of an old umbrella:
There are more photos here.

* Note, author was dead tired while writing this but has decided that the day cannot end without this entry being written.

So there I was walking down Circular Quay towards the Opera Bar with friends Carl, and Cat. It was 6 pm, after-work hours, and everyone was out for Valentines. Everywhere there were couples, couples, couples. Elderly couples in comfy old sweaters holding hands in the park, young couples in their tight, sexy dresses, and black suits, yuppies starting a an after-work romance over a few cocktails.

Right past the Gelatissimo stand, I saw a more unusual-looking couple walking towards us. They stood out not only because they were same-sex, but because they looked so hip. They were dressed so relaxed-cool, and the one on the right had a nice, lean frame, and walked with a certain, off-beat swagger that just drew attention. He was wearing big black shades even though the sun had that late afternoon soft light.

How sweet, I thought, a hip, young same-sex couple out on Valentine's day. Or so I thought.

As we drew closer to each other, both groups walking at a slow, leisurely pace, I couldn't help but notice swagger-boy's hair. It was bleached blond so exquisitely. And that goatee, that jawline, I had seen it before. Something about him was compelling, and strangely attractive, the green cardigan, the camera around his neck, the black shades, the metrosexual-ness.

As we passed each other, I said to my friend Carl in a voice that was too loud to not have been heard, "That guy looks like Daniel Johns".

Two steps later, Carl says to me, "Dude... that is Daniel Johns".

And immediately, I turned around. I could feel my jaw hanging open and my eyes bugging out, and I remember seeing the green clad figure walking away from me, now about 15-20 feet away and slowly growing even more distant. Was it really him? Beside him, the guy he was with (long brown hair, brown jacket... his bandmate?) was looking at me and laughing at the petrified, starstruck, fangirl who thought he was just a guy who looked like Daniel Johms.

This was it, the moment I had been dreaming of for years. Effing destiny! Yes, there was a reason why I ran into him after he divorced Natalie Imbruglia! And he was walking away! I knew I couldn't let this moment pass. I knew that after he disappeared around the corner, I might never cross paths with him again. So before I lost him forever, I decided to let him know how I really felt. And on a total whim, on pure gut instinct, I called out- no!- screamed out, "I LOVE YOU!!!"

Yes, I did it. In public, too. I am not ashamed.

And in the most magical moment of my life, he turned around smiling and waved at me before walking onwards. He waved at me! Me! And he was laughing! I could see his teeth!

Why I didn't run after him for a photo, I don't know. It would have been awkward. To tell you personally, I've never liked having my photo taken with celebs. It's always awkward and embarrassing, and I feel like I don't ever want to see them again afterwards. I liked how I had my moment, and some friends as witnesses to vouch for it, nothing more. I think I like it better that way.

Anyway, I just about hyper-ventilated after and made 3 long-distance phone calls just to tell people back home I saw Daniel Johns. Happy Valentines Day to me!!!

* P.S. I said "I love you" to Daniel Johns before Nin today. But Nin totally understood. Recalling our phone conversation:

N: Hello?

A: Nin, Nin, ohmygodohmygodohmygoooood guess what, guess who I just saw!!!

N: Daniel Johns?

*P.P.S. In my life, I have had the pleasure of screaming "I love you!", to two men in rock that I adore, the other being Dave Matthews.

I've been reading a book called "Four Letter Word", which is a compilation of fictional love letters written by 40 or so different authors, each with their own renown (though the only one I know among them is Neil Gaiman). The aim of the book is to resurrect the dying art of the love letter. It never occurred to me to treat the art of love-letter writing as a genre in itself, and I've been casually enjoying the book as a good bedtime read. I love all the different shades of love the authors experiment with, blissful love, stalker-love, bitter love, heartbreak love, quiet, happy love, etc.

Do you keep love letters? I've gotten a few of my own in my lifetime. I remember clearly the very first one I got. I was 12 years old. It was from a tall, pudgy, bespectacled Kostkan, written in pencil, on a shred of intermediate pad.

At that age, I lived by the belief that boys had cooties, while secretly wondering on the inside whether I was desirable to the opposite sex.

But alas, I had not interest in this poor, awkward Kostkan. At that age, I don't think any guy would have had a chance. The letter embarrassed me, and I snubbed him, and eventually threw the sad scrap of paper away.

I regret it now.

My first boyfriend, who was 15 years old, used to write me love letters, on even sorrier scraps of notebook paper. These scraps were not even torn away evenly from the rest of the sheet, and his spelling and handwriting were atrocious. Also, he liked to use too many dots............ like that.

I didn't get the chance to keep them because somebody in school stole my file-o-fax one tearful day, and the letters were in there neatly tucked away. (I heard he has kept my letters to this day, though. I am embarrassed to think of what I possibly could have written him on those sheets of intermediate pad).

My first love wrote me a song called "Angel", and it is to my deepest regret that I threw the only copy of the lyrics away after a horrible break-up.

I also regret not filing away poetry from a handful of admirers. Bad poetry, I must say, but written in a moment of true, sincere, inspiration. (At least for a couple of times in my life, I experienced what it was like to be someone's creative muse).

Love letters are a dying art in this tech-savvy world. My ancestors left behind piles of hand-written confessions of love for their grandchildren to read through long after they're gone. What will my grandchildren leaf through after I'm gone? E-mail? If the technology is not outdated by that time, that is (and only if any of them even know my password- ha!)

I learned my lesson a few years ago about love letters, and that is to never throw them away, or at least not all of them. Always keep one or two from each relationship. Years from now, long after the relationship is gone, you'll read through them and remember that somebody loved you for who you were at that singular moment in time. It also reminds you of what a loving and loveable person you can be. Even if the relationship may have ended messily, reading an old love letter reminds you that at one point in time, somebody looked at you and saw pure gold. It is also a written record of a soul laid bare, exposed and vulnerable, reminding you of the pure gold in the writer that you once saw and may have forgotten about since then. It is a pure, genuine moment documented on paper.

Can you really read an old love-letter without it eliciting some sort of emotional response from you, be it a giggle, a tear, or your gag reflex? Even reading love letters intended for someone else can produce an "aaawww" from any reader. I have kept love-letters that, to this day, make me cry when I read them.

One of my favorite remnants of the love-affair between my lolo and lola is an old sepia photograph of my lola. Her hair is set, her lips are painted, and she is wearing a pearl necklace and a gorgeous smile. She is not staring directly at the lens, but a bit off-center, as if she is focusing on something magical and far-away. On the bottom corner is written in delicate, fountain-pen handwriting: "To my dearest Romy, I will love you forever, Love, Alice."

I also remember going to see a museum display on Ancient Egypt, and getting the shivers after reading an English translation of a shred of tattered, yellowing scroll on display in a glass case. In thousand year-old handwriting, it read: "Greetings brother, I hope that you are well. You know that I love you, so why do you not love me?". It was written so long ago yet I could still feel his pain, the very same pain of unrequited love that all of us humans still suffer from.

I refrain from reading the few love-letters I've kept too often lest I become desensitized to their message. I hide them away in some place where I can I forget about them, but also make sure there's a chance of me stumbling upon them in the future.

And with that, I have already composed a short, sweet, love-letter that is already on its way across the ocean on the back of a postcard to get to its intended recipient by Valentine's Day. I hope the Philippine postal service does not fail me.

They knocked down the fence outside my bedroom window yesterday to make way for the new fence. We've been fenceless since yesterday. Without the obstruction, I can see all the way past the cow pasture to the soccer field two blocks away. I also have a fantastic, panoramic view of the sunset. I'm enjoying being fenceless while it lasts.

This morning, after ignoring my alarm twice, I was suddenly jolted into sitting position by a very low, loud, guttural sound from my window. It sounded very close. The shock caused me to be wide awake. I jumped out of bed, pulled up the window blinds, and saw this, a mere 7 feet away. They were just there looking at me like they had never seen me before (which they haven't, because the fence was always there).

We stared at each other like that for three minutes, me and the cows. Curious animals, they are.

---

And yes, I am sad about Heath Ledger.

I think everyone should experience working in customer service at least once in their lives. Coming from a high-profile profession where people automatically put me on a pedestal, it's interesting being the polar opposite: the absolutely ordinary and invisible customer server behind the counter. The one whom you chat with everyday when you order your latte, whose name you may or may not know, whom you might not even have noticed all this time.

Even just three months into my fledgling career as a customer server, I've already feel like I've learned a wealth of very useful knowledge, mostly about people. You meet and talk to a lot of people on the job, men, women, old people, young people, nice people, mean people, lonely people... the whole spectrum of everyday, commonplace folk.

Naturally, I can't help but compare this job to my old TV job, even though they may seem worlds apart. In truth, they're not so far apart. My old job required me to put on my "celebrity costume", get on the camera, put on the smiley, veejay face, and talk to the people. My new job requires me to put on my barista costume, get on the bar, put on the customer service smiley face, and talk to the people. The TV job attracted a "fan-base". The barista job attracts a "fan-base" in a way. I have customers I favor and customers who favor me. There are customers whose face I can put a genuine smile on when I greet them every morning, and they come into the store looking forward to it. Like the veejay job, I do take requests. And instead of introducing music videos, I introduce drinks.  "Up next, a medium, skim, half-strength, no-whip mocha ready on the bar!"

Sometimes, being a barista is like micro-showbiz. If you like attention like me, you get plenty of it as a barista, but without the despised intriga. Also, unlike showbiz, people don't compare the way you look to the others in your league (which was something I personally couldn't give a rat's arse about) and people don't ask for your autograph, although you do get recognized in public sometimes ("Hey, you're the Cafe girl!").

But the comparison doesn't end there. Working in showbiz, I often get asked whether the celebrities I worked with had attitude problems. Well, let me tell you one thing I've learned and it is this: ordinary people and celebrities have the same attitude problems. It's just on different social scenes and on different levels. No matter what social class you were born into, or you were adopted into, or worked your way into, always there will be someone lower than you. A rich famous b*tch who treats the so-called "lower" people like dirt isn't any different from a fair dinkum shiela who treats people lower than her like dirt.

What is not written under the job description of a customer server is that we are sometimes punching bags of the bitter, the insecure, or the plain bitchy. As a customer service worker, we are the receptacles for all the immaturity, anger, self-righteousness, and secret feelings of inadequacy that people cannot bring themselves to take out on their loved ones, work mates, etc.

A customer will sometimes they make a big ruckus if we don't get his grande-soy-warm-extra-caramel-latte because the espresso bar is the only venue where they can have that much needed feeling importance. Maybe they feel oppressed in the work place. Maybe they feel that nobody listens to them or respects them at home. So they take it out in the only venue where they know that the customer is always right. After all, customer servers are taught to bow our heads and turn the other cheek. We are the lowly people whom you can be rude to... and still be right. (Yeah, right).

The calm, composed woman with a baby in a stroller can morph into a whiny, cursing, 6-year old brat over a cappuccino that wasn't made to her specific standards. It's amazing.

Then there's the handicap man who started screaming that he was being discriminated against because we asked him to leave the store... after he deliberately insulted one of the employees.

Yes, we customer service people do aim to please and consider it a failure when a customer is not 100% satisfied. But please... it's just a latte. Is it worth throwing a fit over? We'll make it again for you whether or not you throw a fit. A barista who takes pride in his work will accept any complaint made about the quality of his output, or even the quality of his service. But when a customer starts swearing, and name-calling, and getting personal, it's a whole different ballgame.

Which brings me to one of the great things I've learned so far: the person who is nice to his significant other, his mother, and his boss, but rude to his waiter or server is not really a nice person.

Because the truth is, even though the customer is always right, being "right" doesn't change the fact that you were a big, fat jerk towards your server. And you can be sure that your server will never forget it.

But hey, we're talking of the bad customers we get every once in a blue moon, the ones that live on forever in the service horror stories that we pass on.

And on days when you really do feel invisible and lowly, there will sometimes be that one customer who'll tell you you're doing a good job, from completely from out of the blue, as you take his empty mug. Or the one customer who will make the effort to go up to the bar just to be able to tell you personally that that was the most wonderful cup of coffee that she had ever had. Then there's the Christmas cards and boxes of chocolate we got from appreciative customers during the holiday season.

You really learn a lot about people.

So, how did you treat your server today?

You were the stuff of my adolescent day dreams, my teenage dream boy, the first bad boy I ever liked, and the reason why I learned to search the internet for photos even when the internet was a fairly new thing.

I saw all your movies.

R.I.P.

I believed in you.

Oh my god, oh my god, I LOVE Gwen Stefani's new perfume. It's so easy to wear, very light, breezy, and lingers nicely. I'm really not a perfume girl, and the only scent to ever capture me was Clinique Happy Heart, which they I don't think they even make any more. That was the only perfume I ever bought for myself (well, aside from Angel's Breath in 80s). But now I want Gwen's scent. It's weird how I'm actually interested in a perfume. But I'm not willing to shell out 110 AUD of hard-earned money just to smell nice every day (I already smell nice, besides... like Palmer's Coco Butter :-p).

Anyway, today me, my sis, and my cousin Chini went to Glebe Markets (bought a cute, flirty, little rellow jumpsuit hehe), then after that we passed by this vintage store that sold ultra-retro, 80s, shoulder-padded stuff and 80s ballgowns, tried them all on, and giggled to death taking photos of each other. It was such a silly afternoon.

---

And here I am with an obese, miserable, depressed teddy bear we saw in China Town. I mean... geez! It can't support its own weight. How did they even get the damn thing there? And how are customers supposed to buy it? How are we supposed to take it home? It's not even cute! It probably ate its creator. And all the littler bears on the floor are its food.

---

Like all you working people, I told myself I wouldn't shop but I ended up spending everything I earned today as soon my shift ended. How can one resist the store-wide sale?

Ok, the bounty:

They were so romantically old-world. They crinkle up and curl when your feet aren't in them because they're so soft! I got the second pair 50% off. I wanted to get the silver pair too pero tama na. Haay, I love them. They look like doll's shoes!


From 79.90 dollars, to 20 AUD. Everything in Cute' is 20AUD actually. I love it, it's sorta 90s but looks fresh. I'll bet it'll look cute with those chunky clogs that were uso in the 90s. But they look cute with my satin slippers too.

The best part? It's got a bow in the back :-)