Nicole vs. Daniel Smith - a farce

I haven't been watching updates to this story closely but it's pretty obvious that Suzette Nicolas a.k.a. Nicole accepted the bribe, thus the recant statement. To begin with, I don't think she was even raped. For a girl to go out and have a drink and, admittedly, to make out with the man she was with, it was a modus operandi to deflect the shame she has inflicted on herself. From the time I heard on the news that she was not subjected to a medical exam/procedure following the supposed rape, I knew the reason why she didn't want to was because it would be pretty obvious that what had transpired would be consensual; otherwise if wounds were inflicted she would not have hesitated to go through said exam. What seems to be more disgusting was how so many people fell for the scheme. And how much time it took only for the end to get to this point. Who looks more stupid? Nicole, Daniel Smith, or the Filipino people? I am more inclined to say the latter.

New Macbook, New Blog Life!

I finally got it! I never thought I would get to a point where I'd be blogging again. I came across the Huffington Post's guide to blogging at the library and of course I got inspired to get into blogging again. I'm still wondering what exactly to blog about though. We'll see what happens when I'm done reading the book, and once I've navigated my way through the rubrics of this neat little package called a macbook...See you around!

Macbook or Macbook Aluminum?

I really don't have much need for a new computer right now--I'm just indulging myself since I got the insurance money from my accident last year, but if and ever I do go and get one, I wonder if I should be getting the new macbook aluminum, or just settle for the white macbook with 120 gig. Or even better, should I be getting a Nikon d90? hmmmm....

I miss snow and I miss Portland

I miss Portland already, it seems like ages since I was there, but just to show you how nice it was (this was taken on the first day of snowfall over there), this was how it looked when God decided to send a nice white blanket on earth that day...

christmasy christmas

Once again, this is one of those random moments when the idea bulb just popped and said, "hey, why not blog again?" It takes a long time in coming, I know.  But you just never know when it hits you, don't it?  It is Christmas day in fair Carson City, as of this writing.  It is an unusual christmas day, however, as we are buffeted with strong winds and sprinkled with bursts of rain now and then.  On a christmas day, you would expect me to be somewhere else, not home, not here; but unfortunately, Auntie's not feeling well today and has decided not to go elsewhere.  Chris and Derrick are supposed to pass by to pick me up, but they may have decided to go against it and to just go directly to the party at George's place in Cerritos. It's just crazy.  I know I should have done a zillion things - like went to San Francisco to be with Karen and her family, or fly to New York to visit Nay Alice and Rodney, but, as fate would find me, I'm stuck.

Silly ramblings alright. But hey, don't make this ruin the rest of your christmas.  I'm fine, (at least, trying to be) and will enjoy the rest of my evening watching tv (which I seldom do on a weekday). Merry Christmas, y'all!

Spring Forward, Fall Backward

They say time flies when you're having fun, I beg to differ - here in America, whether or not you are having fun, time flies.  And flies real fast.  

I am now on my second autumn in America.  As I type this out, I had just confirmed that I am indeed getting a pay raise at work, and will be retaining the usual 9 hours that I have been following at work since November of last year.  Although I immensely enjoy the money I have been earning lately, I had my share of the stresses at work.  

You see, I work for an online printing company in West Los Angeles, a frontliner for customer service (a.k.a. receptionist), who handles day-to-day walk-in clients, who flock in a handful a day. When I started, there was a time when I would be praying very hard before starting work that no untoward incident happens (e.g., 1) client does not get the order on time, hence makes a scene and throws tantrums; or 2) client demands for a job that is really not supposed to be ready at that time and starts some nasty-name calling-with-door-banging episodes on the way out; or 3) the boss a.k.a CEO who, for some reason, just randomly finds fault with anybody he sees on his way to wherever and starts picking or finding fault with just about everybody.  But thank God, maybe I have been very careful, or he realized that I am doing my job to his satisfaction that example number 3 does not happen much often anymore.  And we have since added more people and distributed the responsibilities so all I need to do everytime an irate client complaints about late jobs and the like is to bring out this spiel: "I'm truly sorry for the inconvenience, but I will have my escalation manager look into the matter as I am not in the position to decide over this, but rest assured that I will recommend a [refund, in case of delay/store credit, in case the job was short, messed up, missing/or a reprint, if the other two are not feasible to the client in front of me].

After a little more than a year, I am actually starting to like what I do!  I have since been doing livechat, taking chat requests from clients inquiring on how to upload files to the website, accomodating payments, and tracking down orders.  Modesty aside, I have been complimented by a lot of clients on my brand of customer service (blushing).

What I like most about this job is that I get to interact with different types of people.  It is never a dull day at the Digital Room.  There is always somebody who walks in and brings in interesting jobs, who would, every now and then, give his/her ten cents' worth of ideas on politics and the economy, experiences on world travels, and potshots at the colorful people who live in nearby Hollywood.

Life in these United States has never been so colorful.  I am getting the hang of it.  

Dispatches from the West

Time flies when you're having fun. Or so it seemed.  It's been five months since I flew out to California in pursuit of a life that seemed to be beyond my reach when I was in the motherland.  I left the Philippines without a clear idea of how long I was going to stay, or what I was going to do, or what future lies in store.  All I knew was that this was going to be my first vacation of some sorts, after a few years.  I jumped on the plane to Los Angeles, via Taipei, where I was blessed to have been seated next to an elderly lady who was also bound for Los Angeles.  I had mixed emotions, this being the first intercontinental trip I was taking, as well as the first out-of-country travel.  The moment the plane took off at around 1:30 pm, Phil. standard time, I was misty-eyed, as I thought of the family and friends that I was leaving behind.  What got me to leave was a very complex issue, although, looking back now, I think as though it were all part of some grand master plan for my life, since almost everything just fell into place, as perfectly as it would a jigsaw puzzle.  
I should say, my life is quite comparable to a jigsaw puzzle.  In search of those pieces, I decided to leave the country and put a stake at a life I never dreamed would be possible.  I used to scoff at people who leave the country for dreams of a better life abroad---in my mind, I thought they were cowards who do not have the face to help uplift the country from the squalor it was in.  I had a good life in Manila. I may have been a government employee over there, but I was considerably earning a salary quite enough to make me comfortable, with room here and there to make a few splurges, plus the opportunity of traveling to the countryside for work--for free. People might say I was having a blast.  Indeed I was.  When the opportunity opened itself that I was able to secure a visa to the US, I had no intention of leaving right away.  I pondered the idea really hard before I decided in May that I should go and try it out, anyway, there's absolutely nothing to lose--I have roughly a year to go on leave, and if things don't turn out well, I could always go back if I wanted to.  

Moving on, I arrived in California the tenth of July.  My aunt and cousin picked me up at the Tom Bradley International Airport at past 5 in the afternoon.  The first thing I found peculiar about the sky in California is that the sun sets in the side opposite to how it sets in the Philippines.  Hmm.. Maybe that has something to do with the positioning--I realized that I was on the occidental side of the globe, thus, the rising and setting of the sun were in a totally different orientation compared to the other side of the globe.  For three weeks I was in a daze. I thought I was dreaming of being in America.  I enjoyed looking at the houses, a far cry from the houses that I would see on the roadside every day of my life when I was in the Philippines.  Nice picket fences, plastered walls, well-manicured lawns, cars on the garage, your typical American idyll.  I was fascinated.  I was taken.  

The next couple of days saw a growing anxiety in me, the honeymoon phase of my trip was over.  It was time to go to work.  (to be continued.)