First Term

Next week, my first term in grad school will be officially over. I’ll be submitting, a twenty-page term paper, a book review, an essay, and some documentation for an IMC plan (which is a groupwork).

Although the past four months have been crrrazzzy, I think grad school managed to impart some important lessons.

1. Manage your time well. When you’re preparing for an event for work and you’re critiqueing a journal for school, it’s important to schedule tasks and update priority lists.

2. Patience, patience, patience. When you’re waiting for the professor to arrive and all you really want to do is sleep, it helps to re-learn this virtue.

3. Make friends. You can still be bubbly like an undergrad. The only difference - you dress like your professor.

4. Late-night train rides are therapeutic. Clears away stress.

5.  Buy food before coming to class. OR ELSE, (if you’re like me) your brain might not function after 20 minutes.

6. Organize your notes. Don’t scribble on office memos and proofs.

7. Do your assignments on weekends. BEFORE you go out with friends or your boyfriend.

8. Apply in your work what you learn in school. (and vice versa) This is the tricky part — you get to appreciate your work (this is a rare case mind you) because of the concepts you learn in class.

9. You may or may not want to resign from your current job. Blame no. 8

10. You may or may not finish grad school in time. HAHA. Blame yourself.. and procrastination too.

Ciao!

Three days without Coffee and another chance at that far-fetched love

Today I drank half a cup of coffee and chatted with an old flame for something like five minutes. Tomorrow, I won’t drink coffee and I won’t talk to someone from another world.

Tomorrow, I’m attending my second class for my first term in grad school. Tada!
Yes, finally, I’m back to school!

 

I’m taking up my dream course, Masters of Marketing Communications. And it sounds so good that it makes me feel like a super person. It gives me that added oomph, extra push, and one more bright spot in my window. Well, I’m excited about it but that doesnt mean I’m not stressed out. Now that it’s my first week in school again, I feel older.

Especially when I see undergrads move and talk like tomorrow’s just another day at school. In grad school, I don’t feel that way. I guess it’s because it’s not like undergrad school where there are classes everyday. And another thing would be the hours. The classes are at night and so when it’s time to pack up and head home, the streets are filled with corporate slaves (haha, count me in) all shuffling to get home earlier than usual.

The feeling of being one of them. People who pay the bills. People who have to get up in the morning to do things they’re paid for. Or maybe things they aren’t paid for but still they do these because.. well, why do they do it?

*This is trash written. All I’m really trying to say is that I am happy because there’s another new thing to do. It’s my thing. I go for the new so I finish things as soon as I can and get on going. Motion is my comfort zone.

Short Summer

It’s raining when I woke up this morning. It’s only May, when the sun is supposed to be hot, infuriating, and irritating. But it’s not. Whatever happened to the summer days?

F4 again. Korean version.

It’s been almost a week now since my cousins and I are staying almost all night just to finish this newly discovered obsession, the Korean TV series “Boys over Flowers”. For most Pinoys, this TV series will remind us of the famous F4 – the Taiwanese version, which first aired locally some time back.

I can still remember how we gushed over Dao Ming Si’s (Jerry Yan) quirky yet adorable temperament over the short, spunky Shan Cai which Barbie Hsu plays. Together with Hua Ze Lei, Xi Men, and Mei Zuo Ling, Dao Ming Si completes the infallible and cool clique, F4 (Flower Four). I still can’t understand how these strapping heirs to Taiwan’s biggest corporations picked this name for their group.

Anyway, I find the Korean version more interesting and the characters are a bit more developed. Especially Hua Ze Lei’s (which is named Ji Hoo in this version). Aside from the love triangle between Dao, Lei, and Shan Cai, there’s still that charm which Korean actors exude when they act out on screen. I don’t know about you, but I think the Korean version will be more appealing than the Taiwanese one. Yes, the story line is still the same, but then you might want to give it a try. Some of the twists are more exciting than those in the original version and the locations are way better. Anyonghaseyo. Happy watching!

Oh, and don’t forget to swoon over Gu Jun Pyo (Dao Ming Si) because he’s much more affectionate and appealing in this version.

Here I go again..

Hello little girl. It’s me. It’s still me. A lot of things might have changed over the last couple of months, but I am still the same person that I used to be. I still enjoy reading and spending time alone. I still don’t like radishes and turnips. I still talk to myself every now and then. I still like doing the laundry on weekdays. I still want to finish my Masters degree by 2011. I still want a job in an advertising agency. It’s still me.

I just lost one important person and I feel sad and tired almost every time everyday. I do try to find some things to smile about and to think of reasons why I should be productive. I should still read the books I am reading and I should still go to work because the job pays the bills. I should still speak my mind and not be contented with silence just because it’s easier. I should still live up to my principles and fulfill the dreams I have when that person was still with me.

It’s just so hard to wake up in the morning and feel the absence. There’s always that extra chair in every table and room I see. There will always be pictures and videos of her laughter, her stories, and her love. Sometimes, I would find her in the extra cup of hot chocolate which my Lolo prepares every morning. I would also find her in the rocking chair with extra pillows beside the radio which is always tuned in to their favorite AM station. There she would be in the many novenas under her pillow on the bed. She would also be in every news on TV. I can hear her reacting to almost every story, making me realize how the times have changed. She would also be in every chicharon and champoy I would eat for the rest of my life. I don’t feel bad in finding her everyday. I feel blessed to have been left with so many memories, pictures, and advices. She will always be more than enough because she has always given more than enough.

I love her so much that the very idea of her not being around just kills me every time I remember that she’s gone. I am so scared of forgetting her. Please don’t make me forget because the memories are all that I have.