tata

My Real Blog

2006-06-27T04:05:00.000-07:00

Whoops!

Tata's Blog is now at http://tatatwin.livejournal.com.

WE MOVED!!!

http://tatatwin.livejournal.com

Keep the comments coming! =) See you all!!

Ex Libris UP and the Goblet of Fire

2005-10-11T01:33:00.000-07:00

Ex Libris UP

presents a special screening of

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

November 16, 2005, 7:00 pm, Cinema Four, Rockwell Powerplant Cinema

Tickets at Php 300.00 each. Please contact Tata (09183216136), Gabi (09192735418) or any Ex Libris UP member you know.

All proceeds will go to Ex Libris UP, which is a recently-established organization for booklovers. Since we are new, we are raising funds to finance our various projects, which include the following:

- the establishment of scholarships for deserving UP students
- the acquisition of literature that is already out of print in the Philippines
- the construction of our own small headquarters in the UP campus
- the organization of lectures on reading and literature
- and other various noteworthy literary causes (i.e. book launchings, etc.)

More on Ex Libris UP:

Ex Libris.

Defn. Latin: “from the books”; “from the bookshelf of”…
label identifying the owner of a book in which it is pasted

Ex Libris UP
Ex Libris is an organization of UP students who are the most diverse group of people you can find anywhere on campus, bound by one passion: books. J

Do you consider yourself an insatiable reader? Do you consider being trapped inside a bookstore overnight as your idea of Heaven? Ever lusted for a book but couldn’t afford it? Ever wished that you could trade some of your old books for the chance to read a certain book out on the market? Ever looked through the Main Lib’s books and wished that they had a more updated and extensive collection? Ever wanted to be part of an org where people are as crazy about books as you?

UP Ex Libris hopes to be the answer to all your book-related problems.

***

We noticed that among the organizations in UP, there is none geared to promoting the appreciation of literature, especially in the generation of cyberspace and computers. We believe that books are treasures, and that their value to students, as well as to the Filipino youth at large, should not be unacknowledged. Thus, we created Ex Libris UP.

We would like not only to share our love for literature among ourselves, but to those who have not the leisure or the means to do so for themselves. These are the majority of the UP students who cannot afford to buy books, or have access to the books they want because of the limited resources of the campus libraries, etc. We have an organized system of booklending that enables each and every member to have access to many other books through the other members’ collections, encouraging them to read more, broaden their literary horizons, or simply bask in the companionship of fellow booklovers.

We hold meetings in which we foster good fellowship and good reading. In these gatherings we share opinions, views, critiques and real life lessons from books; explore other genres, share our favorite books and personal literary experiences with each other, and pool resources together to buy much-desired books.

Help us bring books back to students. Help us keep Ex Libris UP alive!! For the price of 2 large frappuccinos, or a single lipstick, or several hours worth of DOTA, Counterstrike or Warcraft, you can help us this endeavor.

Ex Libris UP and Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

2005-10-11T01:26:00.000-07:00

Ex Libris UP

presents a special screening of

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

November 16, 2005, 7:00 pm, Cinema Four, Rockwell Powerplant Cinema

Tickets at Php 300.00 each. Please contact Tata (09183216136), Gabi (09192735418) or any Ex Libris UP member you know.

All proceeds will go to Ex Libris UP, which is a recently-established organization for booklovers. Since we are new, we are raising funds to finance our various projects, which include the following:

- the establishment of scholarships for deserving UP students
- the acquisition of literature that is already out of print in the Philippines
- the construction of our own small headquarters in the UP campus
- the organization of lectures on reading and literature
- and other various noteworthy literary causes (i.e. book launchings, etc.)

More on Ex Libris UP:

Ex Libris.

Defn. Latin: “from the books”; “from the bookshelf of”…
label identifying the owner of a book in which it is pasted

Ex Libris UP
Ex Libris is an organization of UP students who are the most diverse group of people you can find anywhere on campus, bound by one passion: books. J

Do you consider yourself an insatiable reader? Do you consider being trapped inside a bookstore overnight as your idea of Heaven? Ever lusted for a book but couldn’t afford it? Ever wished that you could trade some of your old books for the chance to read a certain book out on the market? Ever looked through the Main Lib’s books and wished that they had a more updated and extensive collection? Ever wanted to be part of an org where people are as crazy about books as you?

UP Ex Libris hopes to be the answer to all your book-related problems.

***

We noticed that among the organizations in UP, there is none geared to promoting the appreciation of literature, especially in the generation of cyberspace and computers. We believe that books are treasures, and that their value to students, as well as to the Filipino youth at large, should not be unacknowledged. Thus, we created Ex Libris UP.

We would like not only to share our love for literature among ourselves, but to those who have not the leisure or the means to do so for themselves. These are the majority of the UP students who cannot afford to buy books, or have access to the books they want because of the limited resources of the campus libraries, etc. We have an organized system of booklending that enables each and every member to have access to many other books through the other members’ collections, encouraging them to read more, broaden their literary horizons, or simply bask in the companionship of fellow booklovers.

We hold meetings in which we foster good fellowship and good reading. In these gatherings we share opinions, views, critiques and real life lessons from books; explore other genres, share our favorite books and personal literary experiences with each other, and pool resources together to buy much-desired books.

Help us bring books back to students. Help us keep Ex Libris UP alive!! For the price of 2 large frappuccinos, or a single lipstick, or several hours worth of DOTA, Counterstrike or Warcraft, you can help us this endeavor. :)

i wish

2005-08-30T05:05:00.000-07:00

I wish I was a child again. I wish I could be the little girl who could fill pages and pages of Barbie notebooks with stories about all the characters she fell in love with: Shang and Mulan, Simba and Nala, Wendy and Peter Pan, Ariel and Eric, Tanis and Laurana, Luke Skywalker and Mara Jade... It didn't matter who or what I wrote about, because I knew what I wanted and how I wanted them to unfold. I wish I could be that young girl who could be inspired to write about a half dozen things from listening to a single song, over and over again. I wish I could write down anything and everything, and run to my parents and show them what I'd written down and hear them praise me and tell me that I am a young Josephine March. I wish I knew exactly what I wanted to say and how I wanted to say it. I wish I can enter those kiddie writing contests and write about talking trees and little girls who wanted to grow up into princesses---and win. I wish I didn't hear so many voices in my head--- Longinus and Horace and Plato and Aristotle and Castelvetro---all of them telling me what I should and shouldn't do so that I'm paralyzed, just afraid to make a mistake. The only voice I want to hear again is my own. I want to hear it loud and clear, like when I was little. Where is it, now that I need it more than ever?

***

Yup. From that little tirade you've just read, you can guess what I've gotten myself into:
CW 110 short story due in three days, and no story as of yet.
The drama!
Will go listen to music. I think the situation calls for Hans Zimmer's Gladiator soundtrack. That always seems to get me in a thinking mood.
But then again, all I might think about is Sparta. Argh! Blasted CL 121 paper. :) It's haunting me, I swear.
Like I can pass a short story about Sparta in a course on writing realistic fiction. Get real, Tata.

***
Just a little food for thought.
Athens or Sparta? Sparta or Athens?
THe internal debate rages on...
OK. Back to work. Must squeeze out something tonight. Then hopefully I can make sense of it tomorrow and Thursday before D-Day on Friday. Go me.

the end of summer classes, of star wars and american idol

2005-05-26T05:01:00.000-07:00

Summer's over!! Goodbye math and soc sci!! :)

Celebrated the summer by having Kady sleep over last Friday night, then we met with Kannika and Vilma on Saturday. It was great having the Befuddled Belles to talk to...we talked for hours at Figaro's until the waiters started giving us dirty looks and we had to leave. haha. Then it was on to Fully Booked, the best bookstore in the country. Too bad the prices weren't student-friendly. In fairness, 80% of the books in Fully Booked are books that can't be found anyplace else. Like the whole bookshelf of Chinese books, ranging from Confucius comics to myths and legends. :) And the entire collection of Neil Gaiman's SANDMAN comics; even SANDMAN bookmarks and cards, exquisitely illustrated by Japanese and American artists. *drool* And the Fantasy section had everything from Ackroyd to Zelazny!! Darn, we could have stayed in Fully Booked forever.

The outing would have been PERFECT if only Kady's phone hadn't been stolen. From literally right under our noses! We were too busy ogling the phenomenal Young Adults section; we hardly noticed the middle-aged woman who kept sticking her derriere in between us. Someone should have lectured her on the politics of one's PERSONAL SPACE. She spoke so loudly too. Something about a library and a collection, yada-yada...

In retrospect we should have been suspicious; what was a middle-aged woman doing in the Y.A. section?? And she was too close for comfort all the while. At one point, we were practically kissing over Tamora Pierce and C.S. Lewis. But still, how could we expect that she would steal kady's phone??! Argh!!! We all should have taken a closer look at her. Because she suddenly disappeared, and Kady's phone along with her. :( :( :(

Kady's phone was in the back pocket of her jeans. It was not easy to filch that without Kady noticing. But Kady didn't feel a thing!!

Later we tried re-enacting it. We put a phone in Kady's back pocket and tried getting it from her, and Kady felt everything. God! These thieves are good. But then, they'd have to be, I guess. ARGH ARGH ARGH!!!GrrrRRRRRRR!! May the person who stole her phone get the bad karma she deserves!!! Sayang, Vilma's given up her MANGKUKULAM ways and we can't jinx the thief. grrrr.

MOving on. Away from painful topic and onto another painful topic: Star Wars, Revenge of the Sith.

I can't BELIEVE that I spent two years of my high school life raving over... nothing. OOhh, George Lucas really let me down on this one. And I thought nothing could beat the inanity of episodes one and two. Well. Episode three did. :(

It's sad because I grew up loving Star Wars (clarification: Episodes 4, 5 and 6). My father loved the philosophy of it, the concept of the Force---the Light and the Dark---and Yoda, because Yoda came up with the coolest (and truest!) lines. My childhood memories are rife with moments wherein our dad would thunder out Yoda lines like, "There is no try. Do or do not". And dammit, he was serious.

My techie brother Ogot loved the technical aspect of Star Wars, the ships and the gadgets and the droids; and for a while he infected me with his obsession. Watching the dogfight scenes in the Star Wars films (yes, including Episodes one, two and three), we could identify the ships and the models; the prototypes and the classics. That's why while we were watching Episode 3, when Mama whispered, "Pssst! How do you know which ships are the good guys and which ones are the bad guys??", Ogot and I sat up and stared at her in utter disbelief.

I took it upon myself to lecture mama on the 'good guy' ships and the 'bad guy' ships. I started explaining to her the intricacies of the Naboo fighter, the Jedi starfighter, the X-Wing, the A-Wing, the B-Wing, the Y-wing. Those were the good guys, I said. "How about those big ones??" Mama asked. So I continued extrapolating on the Corellian corvette, the Calamari cruiser, the Nebulon B Frigate...blah-blah-blah. All this while Anakin was showing that all he was good for was showing his impressive abs and Amidala was sleeping in her pearly-debutante gown and poofy hair-do (and Lucas expects us to believe she actually slept in that thing??!! graarrr!!!).

But Mama still couldn't understand the essential difference between 'evil' ships and 'good' ships. A Geonosian fighter was the same as an E-wing starfighter. And Luke's puny X-wing was the same size as the Death Star. Yeah right.

Defeated, I slumped in my seat. And my genius brother Ogot solved Mama's problem with a simple, "Mama. Ganito lang yon. Kapag X, A, B, E o mukhang letter yung ship, good guys yun. Kapag mukhang sobrang kakaiba (read: alien, spider-y o sobrang hi-tech), e di bad guys yun. Iba rin sound effects nila."

Oh-kay. I turned back to the screen to watch Threepio attempting to console Padme, who burst into tears without any reason I could think of (of course she cried ever so prettily, without smearing her makeup. Chalk it up to another reason why I detest Amidala. hehe).

Argh argh argh. Sayang talaga. Episode three was soooo disapointing.

Top "WINNER" scene would have to be Darth Vader (newly-created) asking the Emperor in his James Earl Jones voice: "Where is Padme? Is she safe? Is she alright?" (We couldn't believe what we were hearing. I mean, the guy just tried to strangle her!!?). And then the Emperor replies gravely, "I'm afraid she died. ... it seems in your anger, you killed her." (NO DUH).Darth Vader goes on: "I couldn't have! She was alive! I felt her! She was alive! It's impossible!" (LOSER LOSER LOSER). And then he raises his arms and yells, ala ICE AGE, "NooooOOOOOO!!!"Gak. Someone in the back burst out laughing.

It seems that we have a new word for Loser: Hayden Christiansen. Ack. His acting was horrible. But the script itself was cheesy. Whatever happened to George Lucas' previous genius? I mean, this was the man who came up with, "Get this big walking carpet out of my way!", right??

HOw the mighty have fallen.

And it didn't help any that all the characters seemed to have said, "I have a bad feeling about this" at least twice. Betcha even Artoo's beeps and whistles constituted something to that effect. Wouldn't a simple, "Oh no" have sufficed? NOOOO. I have a bad feeling about this. A bad feeling about this, I have. GAAAK!!!

Sorry. Just so disappointed. :(

Ok. I'm spent. But wait, on to American Idol!Carrie won. Bo lost. Boo-hoo. :( :( :(

Constantine and Anthony forever!!!

Ok. Dinner time's coming up soon. :) Gotta go!!

shopping center

2005-04-25T19:36:00.000-07:00

I now see the wisdom of having a blog on Blogspot. Blogdrive, for some reason, isn't compatible with the computers of the UP Shopping Center. And since I'll be in UP during most of the summer, I have to be able to post something using the SC computers, diba? :)

Ok I'll admit, I like the pink spotty blogspot thingie... :) The novelty of it hasn't worn away. New screen, new concourse, haha. It's like starting blogging anew.

Inggit ako kay Sheng at kay Kannika. Imagine having Neil Garcia as their poetry prof?!! Kaya dapat magkwento sila. Hmph. :)

I wonder how Vilma keeps two blogs. And how does she classify which entries she should post in which blog? Lalang.... :) Ako, out of necessity itong blogspot na toh..

Another senseless entry. Pang-practice lang toh ng typing skills ko.

Ok. Back to my Soc Sci 1 paper on Teenage Subculture...how we teens view Relationships, Love and Sex.

Musn't shock the poor elderly lady prof with my so-called 'knowledge' on that area (thanks to romance authors *wink* Gotta love 'em, right, Vilma? :)). Will assume the innocent, conservative voice in my paper (which in REAL LIFE, I am. O wag tatawa!! :)) Here's the beginning.

I feel that I can speak of how Filipino teenagers nowadays view ‘Relationships, Love and Sex’ with some degree of believability because I am a Filipino teen myself. However, I should point out that my own views differ from those of my peers because I belong to a highly conservative family, and I grew up learning--- and living--- a lot of different things.
My mother and father are both educators. For them, teaching is a 24-7 job; a teacher cannot leave the classroom and adopt a ‘normal’ existence, no! A teacher must be a teacher (read: the bastion of moral integrity, a shining example for the students to follow, etc.) always. And so my siblings and I grew up under the most conservative---and dare I say rigorous---tutelage. Because of this, my own views on relationships, love and sex deviate from some views of an increasing number of teens.

I can picture those who know me very well chortling. :) Hoy. Totoo naman e. :)

Hmmm... Should introduce more people to the wonders of the romance genre. Vilma, help me!! :)

Tata's one and only blogspot post

2005-04-02T18:03:00.000-08:00

Hey. This is just so I can post comments on the blogs of my friends who are using blogspot. Wanna check out my real blog??

http://tatatwin.blogdrive.com

See you!! :)