Sweet Surprise!

Last sunday was  sweet. I met with my friends and movie buddies Ana and Json for another movie date at Robinson's Galleria...or so I thought! I was truly surprised and touched by the effort they made to make me feel special in a way.

What was supposed to be an ordinary movie sunday turned into an awesome, sweet, fun and memorable day. They secretly invited some of our friends and co-worker way back in Accenture.Totally unexpected but it was really good to see them although only two mommies came in and the rest did not make it on time:)

I've always been gullible and most of the time clueless, oblivious about the things around me. So when I met with them to supposedly have dinner first at Max's, I didn't suspect anything when they kept hindering me from ordering although I was really starving already. I kept bugging them if weren't we supposed to order food but they kept saying "later" and entertain me with stories and jokes. Well, turned out, we're waiting for the rest of the people they invited. But the biggest surprised that night, was a bouquet of flowers they gave me! Totally sweet, they even choose the color they know I always like- shades of purple!

It wasn't the first time they did that, over a year ago they also surprised me when I resigned from accenture. they made this very cute scapbook filled with messages from almost everyone I was close with in the company that time. And a year before that was on my birthday, this cute birthday card, a purple earing, a purple scarf and I think a purple cake too!

Am sure gonna miss them when I leave for Cebu next week...But every goodbye makes it sweeter for the next hello. And distance does not hinder for those who are really true friends. And I know I got friends in them and they have in me. I love you Ana and Json! Thank you so much guys:)

Json, me, Ana and Mamita Grace:)

With the two sweet mommies in between- Mommy Liza and Mamita Grace:)

Dinner at Max's Robinson's galleria

 

Sweet and admirable Ana:)

Json, me, Ana and mamita Grace

 

With the flowers they gave me:)

THE CULPRIT- ANA and JSON:)

Oh how Inspiring!

So am really an avid reader, blog reader, poem reader, stories, stories and more stories!
I think it's an awesome means to peak at someone else's life and learned from it, enjoy and savor it. I feel really good whenever I get a chance to be inspired by other peoples brilliant mind and works. Here's few of a very inspiring stories I found out from Paolo Coelho's blog who is by far a very good writer:) You can check his blogsite here: http://paulocoelhoblog.com/

How Poor We Are



One day a father of a very wealthy family took his son on a trip to the country with the firm purpose of showing his son how poor people live.
They spent a couple of days and nights on the farm of what would be considered a very poor family.
On their return from the trip, the father asked his son, “How was the trip?”
“It was great, Dad”.
“Did you see how poor people live?” the father asked.
“Oh yes”, said the son.
“So, tell me, what did you learn from the trip?” asked the father.
The son answered:
“I saw that we have one dog and they had four.
“We have a pool that reaches to the middle of the garden and they have a creek that has no end.
“We have imported lanterns in our garden and they have the stars at night.
“Our patio reaches to the front yard and they have the whole horizon.
“We have a small piece of land to live on and they have fields that go beyond our sight.
“We buy our food, but they grow theirs.
“We have walls around our property to protect us, they have friends to protect them.”
The boy’s father was speechless. Then his son added:
“Thanks, Dad for showing me how poor we are.”



DREAMS




As a child, we all have dreams, aspirations, unimaginable feats we’re unrealistically trying to achieve.
Why is it that when we’re young, we’re so imaginative and willing to believe?
Is it because we are still so innocent?
What happens between childhood and adulthood that makes us all forget who we really are?
Maybe it’s this ideology that we’ve all taken up as a coping mechanism.
Don’t expect much and you won’t be disappointed. Maybe it’s the realities of life that makes us push aside what we really want just to get by.
That’s the process that I find most unfortunate of all processes in life. There’s this ever encompassing idea that dreams can be too big for one individual to handle.
We’d rather give up and settle than run that extra mile.
We’re distracted by things we think we need and when we are unable to grasp it, our world goes awry.
Everything is wrong, but nothing is really wrong.
The difference between childhood and adulthood is the ability to put your dreams into actions.
The child inside you believes..while the adult inside you acts.
If it’s just one life that we have now..it’s everything in between that makes it a great ending.




MISTAKES




The German philosopher F. Nietzsche once said:
“it is no use living arguing about everything; it is part of human nature to make a mistake now and again.”
And the writer James Joyce shares the same opinion
“A man’s errors are his portals of discovery.”
Yet we all know people who absolutely insist that they are right even down to the smallest details.
We ourselves are often included in this category: we don’t allow ourselves to make mistakes.
All that we achieve with such an attitude is the fear of moving forward – because certain steps call for new decisions whose results are unknown to us.
The fear of making a mistake is the door that locks us up in the castle of mediocrity: if we manage to overcome this fear, we are taking an important step towards our freedom.




Character of the week: Spring




Never cut a tree down in the wintertime.
Never make a negative decision in the low time.
Never make your most important decisions when you are in your worst moods.
Wait. Be patient. The storm will pass. The spring will come.
Robert H. Schuller


No winter lasts forever; no spring skips its turn.
Hal Borland


Behold, my friends, the spring is come; the earth has gladly received the embraces of the sun, and we shall soon see the results of their love!
Sitting Bull


Spring is God’s way of saying, ‘One more time!’
Robert Orben


They say it’s better to bury your sadness in a graveyard or garden that waits for the spring to wake from its sleep and burst into green.
Conor Oberst


If those who are the enemies of innocent amusements had the direction of the world, they would take away the spring, and youth, the former from the year, the latter from human life.
Honore de Balzac


It is not a small a thing to have enjoyed the sun, to have lived light in the spring, to have loved, to have thought, to have done.
Matthew Arnold


Italy, and the spring and first love all together should suffice to make the gloomiest person happy.
Bertrand Russell


The beautiful spring came; and when Nature resumes her loveliness, the human soul is apt to revive also.
Harriet Ann Jacobs


The day the Lord created hope was probably the same day he created Spring.
Bern Williams

If you forget me

Inspired by a particular blog i just read. I really love pablo neruda and this blogger transalated his poem into our national language which is in Filipino (Tagalog? which is which huh!). So enjoy IF YOU FORGET ME both in english and filipino. I never realized how rich our language is. Am amazed at how nice it sounds:)

If You Forget Me

I want you to know
one thing.

You know how this is:
if I look
at the crystal moon, at the red branch
of the slow autumn at my window,
if I touch
near the fire
the impalpable ash
or the wrinkled body of the log,
everything carries me to you,
as if everything that exists,
aromas, light, metals,
were little boats
that sail
toward those isles of yours that wait for me.

Well, now,
if little by little you stop loving me
I shall stop loving you little by little.

If suddenly
you forget me
do not look for me,
for I shall already have forgotten you.

If you think it long and mad,
the wind of banners
that passes through my life,
and you decide
to leave me at the shore
of the heart where I have roots,
remember
that on that day,
at that hour,
I shall lift my arms
and my roots will set off
to seek another land.

But
if each day,
each hour,
you feel that you are destined for me
with implacable sweetness,
if each day a flower
climbs up to your lips to seek me,
ah my love, ah my own,
in me all that fire is repeated,
in me nothing is extinguished or forgotten,
my love feeds on your love, beloved,
and as long as you live it will be in your arms
without leaving mine.

Tagalog version drafted from this blog: http://www.junlisondra.com/2007/07/

Kung Kalilimutan mo Ako

Nais kong malaman mo
ang isang bagay.

Alam mo kung ano ito:
kung aking tanawin
ang kristal na buwan, ang pulang tangkay
ng taglagas sa aking bintana,
kung salingin
ko ang abo malapit
sa apoy, o ang kumulubot na kawayan,
tinatangay ako ng lahat palapit sa iyo,
na para bang ang lahat,
bango, liwanag, metal,
ay mumunting bangka
na naglalayag
patungo sa iyong mga pulo
na nag-aabang sa akin.

Ngayon, kung unti-unti
at ika’y tumigil sa pagmamahal,
banayad ko ring ititigil
itong pagmamahal.

Kung bigla
at ako’y iyong kalimutan,
huwag na akong hanapin pa,
dahil nilimot na rin kita.

Kung pag-iisipan mo
nang matagal at taimtim,
itong mga simoy na sumasanib
sa aking hininga’t nagpasya
kang iwan ako sa aplaya
ng pagmamahal na sa akin ay umugat,
alalahanin mo,
na sa araw na iyon,
sa sandaling iyon,
itatanghal ko ang aking mga bisig
at ang mga ugat na ito’y mag-aalsa
upang humanap
ng ibang isla.

Ngunit kung sa bawat araw,
sa bawat sandali,
ay maramdaman mong itinadhana ka
para sa akin nang mayroong
di-maitatangging pagsinta,
kung sa bawat araw ay mayroong bulaklak
na aakyat sa iyong labi
upang hanapin ako,
ay! mahal, aking mahal,
sa akin ang lahat ng apoy ay magliliyab,
sa akin walang mawawala o malilimutan,
nabubuhay ang aking pag-ibig
sa iyong pagmamahal, sinta,
at habang ika’y nabubuhay, mamamahay
ito sa iyong mga bisig
nang hindi ako nililisan.

Top 3 Love Poems:)

I had an amazing afternoon today, so I'm in the mood to name few of my all time favorite love poems!


It's scorching hot, so hot that I'm having trouble sleeping in my room. You see, I no longer have and AC, so I have to content myself with this small electric fan but it can only do so little that I can only sleep for 3 hours and boom- it's over! My room is too hot, am like a chicken grilled inside an oven! To somehow alleviate this problem (I really can't complain so much can I?) i resorted to come early in the office and take a nap but another problem presented itself. It's too noisy for me to sleep. People coming in and out the sleeping quarter didn't seem to care that someone else's trying to get that much needed sleep. Why would they slam the door so hard, knowing that there's a lot of people inside. But hey,  what can I do? Maybe I'll post a note or something for them to have the courtesy of closing the door gently. You think that will work? Hehe. SO what's my point here? Well, because I couldn't sleep at all, I went out and it felt like I see the world the first time!


I've always loved to walk, it's what I fondly called unwinding whenever I'm stressed out. It's a reliever. So the view in global city is really nice, especially during sunset when the light of the day is fighting off with the impending darkness and the hotness of the day is flirting with the calmness and coldness of the night to come. The buildings look majestic with their lights on, people coming out from the building ready to go home and retire after a long, hard day at work. I like watching the city. I'm surely going to miss this when my grand plan of living in the country side comes to life!


So there up in the high street I wander, searching where Krispy kreme is located and there I found it! I like this alone time, but then I'm always alone so when I have moments like this, it kinda felt sad sometimes because I would have loved to share the view, the moment and the feeling with someone. I'ts nice to look at the world with someone by your side. I don't really mean a lover-it could be anyone! Perhaps a friend, a co-worker, a brother, a sister or maybe my mama. Just to have someone would be fine.
So this inspires my post today. As I was walking, I suddenly remember Elizabeth Barret Browning's line in the poem " I loved thee with a love I seemed to lose".


Now it's too hard choosing my top 3 poems. You see, I happen to be so fascinated and so in love with poetry. So maybe I'll start with love poems.
So there, devour with me my top three fave poems and fave poets as well!


Top 3: This is one of the first few poems I fell in love with in high school. I don't have too much knowledge of poetry and of great poets back then (and even till now!) it's like my love affair with poetry starts here.

How Do I loved Thee (Sonnet XLIII) 

 Elizabeth Barrett Browning

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height

My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight

For the ends of Being and ideal Grace.

I love thee to the level of everyday's

Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light.

I love thee freely, as men strive for Right;

I love thee purely, as they turn from Praise.

I love thee with a passion put to use

In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith.

I love thee with a love I seemed to lose

With my lost saints, --- I love thee with the breath,

Smiles, tears, of all my life! --- and, if God choose,

I shall but love thee better after death.

Top 2: Who doesn't know Pablo Neruda? I thinks he's an awesome poet. what with his heart wrenching poems and all. I wonder how many times he has fallin in and out of love to have such vast emotions as portrayed in his poems! And it's just too hard to choose a favorite among all his poems because frankly, there's too many amazing ones! But this one will do for now:)

Tonight I can write the saddest lines

Pablo Neruda

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.

Write, for example: "The night is shattered,
and the blue stars shiver in the distance."

The night wind revolves in the sky and sings.

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
That I loved her, and sometimes she loved me too.

On nights like this one, I held her in my arms.
I kissed her again and again under the endless sky.

She loved me, and sometimes I loved her too.
How could one not not have loved her great, still eyes?

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
To think that I do not have her. To feel I have lost her.

To hear the immense night, still more immense without her.
And the verse falls to the soul like dew to the pasture.

What does it matter that my love could not keep her.
The night is shattered, and she is not with me.

This is all.
In the distance someone is singing. In the distance.
My soul is not satisfied that it has lost her.

My sight searches for her as though to go to her
My heart looks for her, and she is not with me.

The same night whitening the same the same trees.
We, we who were, are the no longer the same.

I no longer love her, that is certain, but how I loved her.
My voice tried to find the wind to touch her ear.

Another's. She will be another's. Like my kisses before
Her voice, her bright body. Her infinite eyes.

I no longer love her, that is certain, but maybe I love her.
Love is so short, forgetting so long.

Because through nights like this one I held her in my arms,
my soul is not satisfied that it has lost her.

Though this be the last pain that she makes me suffer,
and these the last verses that I write for her.

Top 1: I think  e.e cummings is really genious. I like his style. I like how unconventional his poems are. I like the thought that poetry doesn't have to follow what is the norm- the rhyming and the all that. I love him and I lov this poem to the bones that I felt like this is mine and nobody shoud take this away from me else there will be consequences!!! hehe:)

Somewhere i have never travelled

e.e cummings

somewhere i have never travelled,gladly beyond
any experience,your eyes have their silence:
in your most frail gesture are things which enclose me,
or which i cannot touch because they are too near

your slightest look easily will unclose me
though i have closed myself as fingers,
you open always petal by petal myself as Spring opens
(touching skilfully,mysteriously)her first rose

or if your wish be to close me, i and
my life will shut very beautifully ,suddenly,
as when the heart of this flower imagines
the snow carefully everywhere descending;

nothing which we are to perceive in this world equals
the power of your intense fragility:whose texture
compels me with the color of its countries,
rendering death and forever with each breathing

(i do not know what it is about you that closes
and opens;only something in me understands
the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses)
nobody,not even the rain,has such small hands

Hello April!

April is almost fading and I haven't had one entry for this month yet. What happened to that grand plan of mine to discipline myself in posting regurlarly in my blog?! well, as theatrical as I am, the grand plan remains a plan! hehe


The truth is,  there's so many things going in and out of my mine and though I loved to put them into words, I don't seem to have the energy, or is it the will to jot it down.?


Now that just make me missed the old high school days when anywhere and anytime something strikes you, you'd easily go and grab a pen and write down your thoughts, your feelings, your emotion!. The anger, pain, extreme happiness and outrageous loneliness creeping through your veins! Ahhh-teenage life:)


I actually went home for a short 9 days summer vacation. (I posted few pics from this summer escapade below:). Also, I've been busy attending graduation of my 3 siblings, planning for that family outing which is the first in the family mind you:) and of course, cooking here and there. You see, when I'm home, I automatically assumed the responsibility as the official family chef, as if I'm a good cook at all! But yeah, it's one of my latest fascination! I'd like to be able to whip fantastic dishes every now and then and am actually thinking of taking a crash course for culinary...that is for later this year of course. And don't make me go planning again coz nothing seems to happen or is it just me? I almost perfected the art of planning and starting but never able to finish anything. Talk about jack of all trades but master to none. Argghh!

Btw, my top three this month is coming up...

When Hello meets Goodbye

It all started with a single glance that lingers awhile and turned into constant staring and eye meeting from a distance as days go by. Pretty much we started exchanging awkward smiles that turn into a shy hello. In no time the hellos turned into a series of short stop in the lobby/hallway for small talks. Man it was a sweet ride! Magical it seemed, you awaken something in me - a kind of feeling that actually was buried a decade ago. I guess it's too soon, it was just yesterday that we said hello and now goodbye felt like a blow:(
Farewell, till we meet again. Thank you for the 2 weeks "heaven feeling":) 

SUMMER Lovin'

I've never subject myself in a diet before...and now i felt like I need to discipline myself and limit food intake if I can! I've tried some routine- tea, half rice, healthy food, no to junks and soda and few sit ups! ( gee, I hope this works!). What's the point? Well, summer is ready and I am not! I wanted to hit the beach by April or May and forgive my vanity, but I'd like to wear some nice summer outfits! {aka swimsuit:)}. My body has never been fit for summer and I've never really felt confident wearing anything skimpy. I'm posting here awkward moment from years back to encourage myself and get that summer body!!!

2007

2008

2009

2009