Revenge of the Nerds

#114: High School Reunion



With our 2nd Year Honors Class Adviser


Winners of the Time-Warp Charades


Class Pic (Almost.)

Slave For You

#113: You Drive Me Crazy

I've proven it. It's not my hormones going haywire or whatever you can link to Pre-Menstrual Syndrome. There's really something that triggers the temptation to "strike the rock." This morning, he called me to make an issue out of a non-issue so I could feel that after many days of successfully juggling all the requirements of the world for this brand milestone, I've still managed to fall short. And this is after showing me that he's willing to fake sickness to skip work or skip a leg of the project for a 'shallow' reason. (His words, not mine.)

No no no no no. I will not take that. I immediately called our technical group to verify the concern. It was apparently a case of lack of understanding of the real issue on top of a lack of understanding of the real substance of a brand manager's work. (Someone pointed out that I have longer brand experience than this person does but he insists on asserting his omniscience and royal highness.) And I've never heard him say to me, "Thank you" or "Great job."

Last Saturday, during our Praise & Worship gathering, the first teaching revolved around Ephesians 6:5-8.

5 Slaves, obey your earthly masters with respect and fear, and with sincerity of heart, just as you would obey Christ.

6 Obey them not only to win their favor when their eye is on you, but like slaves of Christ, doing the will of God from your heart.

7 Serve wholeheartedly, as if you were serving the Lord, not men,

8 because you know that the Lord will reward everyone for whatever good he does, whether he is slave or free.


And while I'm not a fan of superficiality or fakery, I am a believer in self-control and in submission to the Lord.

I have a friend who always answers this lovely line whenever I ask him how he is: "God is good. All the time." Then he waits for me to answer, "And all the time, God is good." He may be going through the darkest nights or the driest of days but he continues to start with, "God is good all the time."

So ask me now how I am with the things at work.
Let me answer, "God is good all the time."

Ghost

#112: Gone. Be Gone.

I’ve washed my hands several times, furiously, with soap, then dishwashing detergent, then with coffee, then with some rice milk scrub. I’ve soaked them in alcohol, then cologne, then sanitizer, then body spray. I’ve tried to mask the smell with juniper lotion, then with more alcohol, then with more spray. The smell of onion still sticks to my hands.

I cooked clams and onions pasta yesterday and for a change, I didn’t ask one of our maids to help me out. Everything from concept to execution was in my hands. Now all the stink is in my hands as well.

I’m being hounded by the ghost of an onion.

Shepherd Me

#111: And I Shall Not Want


Shepherd me, O Lamb of God
Let me know that You're enough
You withhold no wondrous thing except
When You've designed a grander plan of love

Shepherd me, O Lamb of God
Let me trust Your gentle heart
Pastures green or valleys dark
We will never be apart
Shepherd me, O Lamb of God

If I set my eyes on what You give
Or what you take away
Instead of who You are to me
I find it hard to say...

Shepherd me, O Lamb of God
Let me know that You're enough
You withhold no wondrous thing except
When You've designed a grander plan of love

Shepherd me, O Lamb of God
Let me trust Your gentle heart
Pastures green or valleys dark
We will never be apart
Shepherd me, O Lamb of God

----------------------

That's one of Windsongs' original songs based on Psalm 23.
This morning, Psalm 23 was what the Lord gave me during my Devotional Time.

"The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want.
He makes me lie down in green pastures and quiet waters.
The Lord is my Shepherd, He heals my soul.
He leads me in the paths of righteousness for His name's sake.
And even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,
I fear no evil, for You are with me.
Your rod and staff, O Lord, they comfort me.
You prepare a table for me in the presence of my enemies.
Surely goodness and Your love will follow me all the days of my life.
And I will dwell in the house of my Lord forever."

In the Youth group that I teach every Sunday, before we sing our worship song, I ask my kids to chew on the song's lyrics and share how the lines apply to their lives. I think that's a good exercise to make us realize that the Lord's comfort is real and is just a prayer, just a song, just a breath away. Today, the Lord wants me to do that exercise with Him.

"I shall not want."
I want certain things. I expect certain things from certain people. But the reason why things are not the way I want them to be is that they are not how the Lord wants them to be. He gives us many many reasons not to want. When we do, it's because we are wanting unnecessary things.

"Let me know that You're enough"
When we make Him our portion and our lot, we will find that He is enough. When we work with all our hearts and we know that we did our work for Him, His satisfaction alone is enough. No one else has to notice. No one else has to validate. No else has to know. He is enough.

"You withhold no wondrous thing except when You've designed a grander plan of love."
I remember this quote I nicked off one of the commentaries posted on the net. It says, "I have wanted so many things in life that I did not get. But I've gotten what the Lord deemed that I should get. Not all of this has pleased me, but it has pleased His good and perfect will."

"He heals my soul."
The way I've been sounding the past how many days, it's as if I'm broken. No, I'm not broken. Nothing so silly or shallow should break me. If I am less and less of myself, then I should praise God because then He could mold me to be more and more like Him. He heals. He is able to give peace that surpasses all understanding. And because of that, I should be able to have comfort that supercedes all of my heart's complaints. I will trust His gentle heart.

Of Lunches and Laughter

#110: And Of Me Boring Me

Lunch today was at 4pm. Alone. Spaghetti and water. (Because I left my money upstairs and couldn't pay for the Spaghetti-Taco-Soup-Iced Tea combo I originally wanted.) The waiter probably thought I was weird. Which is fine because he's not exactly that far from the truth.

I brought something to read. Articles on the US's competitiveness in the light of China's growing strength...which I didn't get to read anyway since I found it better to stare at rain puddles while waiting for my food. Stare at that silly Coke machine in the middle of nowhere as well. Who will want to stick coins in a machine under the rain to get a bloody can of Coke? Fancy free electrocution to go with your carbonated drink, ma'am?

Dinner was another story. I was with my old officemates and they were laughing at me like crazy. And I was just telling them about my spaghetti. And about our maid who converses with our mynah bird which barks. My dear friend Rachel asked if the people in Coke already know I'm silly. I said they probably have some vague clue but I don't think they get me. (Heck, I don't think they even get the concept of lunch.) This is the first time in many, many days that I've laughed this hard.

Oysters with Spinach and Cheese, Oysters with Spicy Salsa, Oysters till you can eat oysters no more. Then on to anoother place for this dessert called Roma - white mousse with mangoes and caramel drizzles. Good company and good food. How can you go wrong?

A friend asked me why I'm feeling that I'm becoming less and less of who I am. As I was mulling over the answer, I remembered another friend from Globe who asked me this question more than a hundred dinners ago, "If you were a member of the opposite sex, would you like you?" My answer: "Yes. Because I'm not boring." Which elicited a round of applause - part in agreement, part in incredulity at my simplistic answer. (The others rambled on with sentences that ended with 'World Peace.")

And I guess that's what I miss. Laughter. Lots of laughter. Not the ones you squeeze out so you can be polite... (or so you can get the approvals that you need.) Real ones that make you bend over and bend backwards while clutching your stomach with one hand and slamming the table with the other. Also lunches. Lunches with people rather than with books or magazines. Lunches with people you really like. Not lunches with strangers that are uncomfortable at best and torturous at worst. And I miss myself. The funny one that laughs a lot, looks forward to lunches, and can say without batting an eyelash, "Because I'm not boring."

And this is my answer.
Laughter has become scarce.
Lunches have been reduced to meals.
And I have become boring.

And that's just my simplistic version. Wait till I bore you with the comprehensive one.

Fly By

#109: Float On

The weariness refuses to leave the corners of her eyes and thoughts refuse to stick to her brain. They just fly by her like the days that more and more become the same. She gathers them like one gathers hairstrands from a brush. Slowly. Not thinking but thinking. Tugging then staring at the clump that must've left her bald at some hidden spot. Wondering but without wonder. Like how she washes her hair - half-asleep and in slow motion, while ticking and unticking mental lists of things that matter now, then in a blink do not. She'd rather stay in bed asleep all day than go through another day awake but uninspired. Darkness at least lends rest. And so as she unwillingly trades her robe for her work clothes, she takes comfort in the thought of the pajamas that will embrace her at night. And she floats through the days that make her less and less of what she was.

Do Not Strike the Rock

#108: Learning from Mr. Moses


Do not strike the rock.
Calm down, Gladys. Do not strike the rock.

You see, that was Moses' downfall. They were on their way to the Promised Land - he, leading and the Israelites, following. (Well, grumbling but following.) The Lord had shown His faithfulness time and again and had proven Himself to be worthy of their complete trust. But when Moses was told by the Lord in Numbers 20 to take the staff, gather the people (the grumbling ingrates rescued from slavery), and speak to the rock before their eyes and let it gush forth with water to satisfy the community and their livestock, Moses went only as far as taking the staff and gathering the people before losing it. In what I imagine to be a thunderous explosion, he booms, "Listen, you rebels, must we bring you water out of this rock?" Or maybe it is a fiery hissing such that Moses hissed with eyes blazing, "Listen, you rebels, must we bring water out of this rock?"

Then Moses raised his arm and struck the rock twice with his staff. Water gushed out and the community and their livestock drank. He was able to get the antsy mob their water. He got his intended result, right?

Well, yes. But at such a high price tag. In verse 12 of the same chapter, the Lord brings down His judgment upon Moses (and Aaron): "Because you did not trust in me enough to honor me as holy in the sight of the Israelites, you will not bring this community into the land I give them." Youch.

Three key things:

1. Moses did not obey the Lord's instruction, choosing instead to show his frustration by striking the rock, not once, but twice.

2. Moses did not trust God enough in that situation. Maybe he couldn't control it any longer. Maybe he needed to strike the rock to let off steam. Or maybe he needed to strike the rock just to make sure that water will really come out and not leave him looking like an idiot - asking some rock to please kindly give the annoyed (and increasingly annoying) crowd water. Or maybe it was just for dramatic effect. Bottomline is, he leaned more on his staff, on his action of striking, on what he was expecting the people to say, than he did on His God.

3. Moses did not honor the Lord as Holy before the people. Not only did he claim the act as coming from him (and Aaron) in saying, "Must WE bring water out of this rock," Moses also displeased the Lord with the way he chose to disobey His specific instructions. And this was a disobedience carried out before the people. You see, the Lord wanted to show His grace to the Israelites by displaying His wonderful provision in the middle of nowhere, but Moses chose to eclipse that with his drama.

And so Moses was not allowed to enter the Promised Land. He saw it from afar but his 40 years in the desert leading the people did not end in actual enjoyment of the fulfillment of the Lord's promise.

This becomes extremely relevant to me because I am so close to the actual unfolding of one of the Lord's particular promises. But each day that brings me closer to it pushes me closer as well to the brink of 'striking the rock.' The list just keeps getting longer every day. And the task of throwing out each item in the name of patience, restraint and respect just keeps getting exponentially harder. I've been wanting to explode for how many days now that all that's keeping me from completely losing my cool and giving someone a piece of my mind is the gentle tug of the Lord's soft whisper, "Do not strike the rock."

And so I hold back and trust in the Lord's sovereign hand. He is after all the One who designated this person to be my thorn, my burden and my boss. His ways are always perfect. Ask Moses.

Deuteronomy 32:3-4

I will proclaim the name of the LORD.
Oh, praise the greatness of our God!

He is the Rock, his works are perfect,
and all his ways are just.
A faithful God who does no wrong,
upright and just is he.

Who's the Boss?

#107: Know the Know-it-all


Excerpts from one of my favorite books about career:

One of the types of bosses is the KNOW-IT-ALL.
He doesn't believe you have ideas.

These bosses never listen. In some ways, they are worse than the bosses who steal your ideas. The Know-it-all is generally not smart enough to steal your ideas, because he doesn't believe it is possible to have a better idea than his.

The Know-it-all cannot admit to being wrong and that makes this type of boss dangerous. Know-it-alls are always covering up behind themselves.

However, that is not the only threat he poses to you. The fact is, you will gain no meaningful experience from this boss. Because the Know-it-all doesn't allow you to think for yourself, he has nothing to teach you.

Know-it-alls end up being so taken with their own misguided ideas and so incapable of listening to the people who work for them that they take down whole divisions.

Try to avoid this type.

TGDF becomes GDF

#106: Goodbye Dear Friend



This month seems to be a month of goodbyes. I spent my Friday night with Tin (a girl-friend who's leaving for Seattle to take additional units for early childhood education/development and do her internship), plus Francis and Gerard - the two engineering goons we take turns bullying (or maybe it's the other way around. They bully us.) Francis calls us "TGDF" which stands for either Tin-Gerard-Dikya-Francis, or "Thank God DIS Friday." I told him to stick with engineering and leave Marketing to the creative ones (i.e., me). Haha.

Dinner was at Brazil, Brazil. For Php545++ you get non-stop grilled beef, pork, chicken, sausages, corn, bananas and pineapples which they bring to your table at intervals that follow no predictable pattern PLUS buffet which we no longer found a use for after one round because we found it much better to just have the food tossed straight to our plates. Drinks are set on two price points: Php70 for the normal stuff (softdrinks, teas) and Php130ish for the fancy ones. Go for the fancy ones. "Brazilian Dream" is a heavenly mix of pineapple, bananas, strawberry and milk.

After dinner, I was so stuffed (with grilled pineapples, I think) that I needed to take a walk to make the food go down. (Or else I will have a heart attack.) We decided to do our 'walking' inside the mega-bookstore that just opened. "Fully-Booked" to me is what "Toy Kingdom" is to a kid. The new layout is more confusing than the old straightforward one. It's now full of diagonal shelves with receding ceilings, weird ramps and stairs. It's like entering a shop designed by Dr. Seuss. But it's still Fully-Booked - the bookstore with the most up-to-date inventory of books and the best selection of notebooks/journals/ticklers around - so I still love it. If Tin hadn't threatened to go home and leave me there, I would've stayed till closing time. I left with a new book, a new notebook and a big grin. We then headed to Starbucks to try and solve all of Globe Telecoms' problems. (All four of us were Globe Management Trainees so we foolishly think we can do that.)

Now if there's no Coffee Bean around, you ask yourselves whether you want good dessert or just a good place to lounge around. Seattle's Best has a better range of desserts - from their lemon squares to their rum cakes to everything. Starbucks has horrible stuff. You might as well eat pillow stuffing. But see, related to pillows and stuffing, Starbucks has better interiors and couches so for our particular purpose, Starbucks was the best choice.

When it was time to end the night, there was nothing special with the goodbyes. There were no promises to keep in touch or to meet up again soon. It was almost as if we were expecting to see each other in the next Globe project meeting the following workday or bump into each other down Globe's halls. It was as if we were all holding on to the illusion that we were still in the same place in life...and that we were still the same people we were 4 years ago when we all crossed paths.

Yo Bro!

Closer Than Before

#105: Keep Me Company, Gavin

It’s stupid. I can’t keep a plug on my tear ducts. Two days. Just two days. I’m checking my planner and there’s a Technical meeting tomorrow I have to attend. No, I don’t have to attend it. I don’t want to attend it. When you’re on the brink of something that will massively change the life you know and have enjoyed for 25 years, a bloody meeting on packaging cost efficiencies can wait. If you don’t know when you’ll next see the brother you’ve been sharing most of your life with, wouldn’t you want to spend each minute you can with him between now and the airport?

I can’t even work now. The tears won’t stop. I’m a mess. Of course it doesn’t help that Gavin DeGraw is singing in the background. But while listening to his song is not the wisest thing to do at this point because it just turns on the waterworks, it’s the best way I know to make my surroundings echo what I am feeling.

I want comfort food. KFC (I’m not caring that much now that it’s a Pepsi account.) And I’m calling Comfy Mano to meet up with me. He will understand why I’m being silly sentimental about my brother’s leaving. His younger brother also left two years ago. Being one of just two kids is both good and bad. We had opportunities to do things (travel, art classes, music lessons etc.) that wouldn’t have been possible if my parents were constantly worrying about where to get money for the tuition of the 5th or 6th kid. But as I was looking out the car window on my way to meet up with Mano, I kept on chewing on the thought that maybe having just two kids in the family is not a good idea. Maybe I’ll have more.

“When your brother leaves, it will make a big difference in your family’s life. It will mark the point in which you will already start living separate lives,” he said, completely parroting the exact sentiment running in my head for how many days now. I went back to the nights we’d spend together hanging out at the family room – not exactly conversing but taking comfort in the fact that while one is doing an entirely different thing (which you have or want nothing to do with), the other is just there. Just breathing but there.

You see, our house sleeps awfully early. By 10pm, my parents are already in bed with the maids signaling the end of the day by turning off the house lights one by one. Only the family room continues to be awake with the glow of both the PC and TV screen, and the familiar sounds of usually hilarious shows - canned cackles, most of the time. The light in the family room, and not the light on the porch, is my indicator as I pull into the garage that someone is still up. Or to be more precise, that Barry is still up. And it's always a good thing to have someone still up when you get home.

Yesterday, we had this Farewell party for him. I organized it because I’ve never been comfortable being mushy with this ogre who used to wrestle and box with me when we were kids. I can’t hug him because that’ll be more funny than heartwarming. The gathering of close friends from church, (along with the scrapbook I painstakingly put together, the songs and the verses I had for him), was the best way I knew to make him know that I loved him, I love him and that I will continue to love him across the distance. I can’t tell him straight. I’d either laugh or cry. And so, I’d rather blog about it.

Gavin continues to sing in the background. It’s weird. I can listen to this song a thousand times this day. And it’s not even apt. It’s a love song and it’s better off as the anthem to underline my brother’s emotions as he leaves his girlfriend. (I’m sure she’s doing her own crying as well. We’ll probably cry together on Wednesday; which explains why my brother requested me to drive her home from the airport.) But I can’t help but steal some lines from “More Than Anything” and keep them for my brother.

“I’m gonna hold you closer than before…”
“I’ll be free for you anytime…”
“Tell me all you need and I will try…”

All these while wondering when I’d see him next.
All these and more.