Melancholy still...

Oh, oh, I would go through all of this pain,
Take a bullet straight through my brain!
Yes, I would die for ya, baby,
But you won’t do the same.

Why can't I walk away?

...when you know you tried hard and lost it, gave it a shot again then tried harder but lost it again, but again gave your hardest with your last shot of claiming, but it still rolled out of your hand... then... it's time to give up... No guilts, no regrets, when you know you gave your all and everything was not just meant to be... :(

kahit sobrang sakit na, hirap na hirap pa din ako pakawalan ka. gusto ko na maging masaya, pero...paano yun ikaw yung saya ko? ang tigas talaga ng ulo ko.

Blurry

Everything's blurry to me lately figuratively and literally. My eyes are having problems again and as of now I'm writing this entry with my face just 4 inches from my monitor.

I'm trying my hardest to get moving with my life. I'm using all my strength just to get up everyday. And put on a nice, decent face for my mom to look at. I'm happy that she's here but I'm also anxious to get my privacy back. So I don't have to pretend I'm okay. A friend told me yesterday after hearing what happened, "Sana di mo na lang nakilala ano?" I don't really know what to answer at this point.

Here's the song that's currently playing over and over again in my head since last night. I really should stop listening to these things...but I can't help it. I hope someday my heart will cease to try understanding his heart.

So I put on my make up put a smile on my face
And if anyone ask me everything is ok
I'm laughing cause no one knows the joke is on me
Cause I'm dying inside with my pride and a smile on my face...

new look...?

Maybe...

I'll just dream of you tonight...

I'm feeling sad again. I don't want to cry anymore.

Everyday is a struggle...

Closing Cycle by Paulo Coehlo

One always has to know when a stage comes to an end. If we insist on staying longer than the necessary time, we lose the happiness and the meaning of the other stages we have to go through. Closing cycles, shutting doors, ending chapters - whatever name we give it, what matters is to leave in the past the moments of life that have finished. Did you lose your job? Has a loving relationship come to an end? Did you leave your parents’ house? Gone to live abroad? Has a long-lasting friendship ended all of a sudden?

You can spend a long time wondering why this has happened. You can tell yourself you won’t take another step until you find out why certain things that were so important and so solid in your life have turned into dust, just like that. But such an attitude will be awfully stressing for everyone involved: your parents, your husband or wife, your friends, your children, your sister, everyone will be finishing chapters, turning over new leaves, getting on with life, and they will all feel bad seeing you at a standstill. None of us can be in the present and the past at the same time, not even when we try to understand the things that happen to us. What has passed will not return: we cannot for ever be children, late adolescents, sons that feel guilt or rancor towards our parents, lovers who day and night relive an affair with someone who has gone away and has not the least intention of coming back. Things pass, and the best we can do is to let them really go away.

That is why it is so important (however painful it may be!) to destroy souvenirs, move, give lots of things away to orphanages, sell or donate the books you have at home. Everything in this visible world is a manifestation of the invisible world, of what is going on in our hearts - and getting rid of certain memories also means making some room for other memories to take their place. Let things go. Release them. Detach yourself from them. Nobody plays this life with marked cards, so sometimes we win and sometimes we lose. Do not expect anything in return, do not expect your efforts to be appreciated, your genius to be discovered, your love to be understood. Stop turning on your emotional television to watch the same program over and over again, the one that shows how much you suffered from a certain loss: that is only poisoning you, nothing else. Nothing is more dangerous than not accepting love relationships that are broken off, work that is promised but there is no starting date, decisions that are always put off waiting for the “ideal moment.” Before a new chapter is begun, the old one has to be finished: tell yourself that what has passed will never come back.

Remember that there was a time when you could live without that thing or that person - nothing is irreplaceable, a habit is not a need. This may sound so obvious, it may even be difficult, but it is very important. Closing cycles. Not because of pride, incapacity or arrogance, but simply because that no longer fits your life. Shut the door, change the record, clean the house, shake off the dust.

I should stop listening to sad love songs.

One step at a time...

Hindi mahirap umibig...

pero mahirap magmahal... at higit na mahirap ang magmahal ng tapat at totoo.

I should learn this

If we spend too long holding on to the one who treats us like an option... well miss finding the one who treats us like a priority...

Talking to myself, about you

I am trying to understand everything. I've analyzed every word, every action. You're just afraid of change. That you won't know who you are if you suddenly feel something different. But change is inevitable. Change can also do you good. Make you better than what you already are.

I can't really put into words what I think you feel. You've mentioned one time that you have this sudden dependency on me. And you quickly shook that off, saying it shouldn't be happening.

I should have seen this coming. But I'm not going to try to change you. Because I've loved you for who you are, what you are. I just hope one day you'll realize feeling this way isn't so bad after all. That you can be happy by loving another person. And at the same time still be you.

I gave you all i had but you tossed it in the trash...

am i such a bad person to be deemed a waste of time?

Nothing hurts more than realizing he meant everything to you, but you meant nothing to him.

A discovery from you

Watching Chibi Maruko Chan now brings tears to my eyes. Her innocence will always remind me of ...

Table for one

For a few months, she has been coming back to the place where they first met. The waiters have deemed her a regular already knowing she would always order that sugar coated dried squid and red iced tea. She said she told him it was her favorite. Then she'd eat it very slowly with the wooden chopsticks deliberately to pass the time.

She'd sit on the same table, watching people walk by. Intently starring at the top of the escalator, looking if a familiar face would appear. She'd check on her pocket mirror from time to time to see if her lipstick was alright, remembering how he took notice of her ruby red lips the day that they had met. He was dazzled he admitted when they finally became a couple, three days after. He said she was more pretty than her picture, more than he had imagined. He planned to leave after lunch, thinking he was tired and grumpy from grueling days at work. But he invited her to a movie too and another date the next day. then also on the following day.

But then when hours pass, she'd slowly lose the light on her face, sipping the remains of the melted ice in her plastic glass. She'd grow anxious, looking at her watch, sensing another day is about to end. She wondered where he could be, what he's doing. Does he ever remember when he told her that he wanted to be with her always. If that was ever at all possible.

A few months after, they would meet there again. She'd be in tears. He'd be offering her his handkerchief. Unable to look in her eyes. He told her they should stop seeing each other for a while. He needs time to think. He needs time for himself. She knew they might not see each other again. She handed him a gift, something she'd saved up for his special day. Thinking this day would not ever come. Her friends told her he was rather selfish. But she understood him and she just let him go.

But now all alone she comes back. She did not stop loving him and with the littlest of hope, she returns to the place where they first met.

She'd stand up when the waiters ask her if she wanted anything else for they were taking final orders. She'd decline politely and pay for her bill. They know she'll be back again next Saturday, to wait for him. For she knows, this is where he'd always find her.

The end where I begin...

Sometimes we have no other choice but to walk away.

Before the worst

It's been a while since the two of us talked
About a week since the day that you walked
Knowing things would never be the same
With your empty heart and mine full of pain

Let's try to take it back before it all went wrong...

To the one who calls me Chipotle

Although you're real far away from me now.

Even though it hurts.

I love you.

Picture fun in Taiwan Storyland

We learned of Taiwan Story Land from a blog and seeing they had fun picture taking there, my sister and I decided it is a visit worthy spot. Fortunately it was near our hotel, about a few blocks walking distance. It's at the B2 level of the K-Mall, situated across the Taipei Main Station. It's a theme museum of Taiwan after the Japanese occupation 1950s-1970s (and it explains why Taiwan had so many Japanese restaurants) and it's a real interactive place, where you can play pretend being in the era.

We passed by Storyland the first day, but it was closed due to the storm.

This is Storyland's 'mascot'. He's kinda cute isn't he?

The photo above is sort of the apparel street while the one below it is a toy/candy store. The ticket to Taiwan Storyland (priced at NT280) includes coupons that will let you purchase toy, food and other souvenirs sold inside the different themed shops.

We had to take a picture of this ancient product sample. What do you think does it do? LOL.

Here, Pia and I pretended to be students. She's the lazy one, while I was the teacher's pet.

More pretend fun for me -- left by the bus, knowing how to ride a scooter and hanging out with locals. Camwhoring is real fun in this place.

And since we had been accumulating a lot of coins (change everywhere), Pia and I decided to get a souvenir photo at a japanesy photo booth located inside one of the rooms.

The tour just took a few hours unless you really want to do editorial shoots it would take a whole day probably, specially if you've got a bunch of friends with you. If you love picture taking and cute novelty stuff, then Taiwan Storyland is a must-visit.

I want to hold your hand

And when I touch you i feel happy, inside
It´s such a feeling
That my love
I can't hide
I can't hide
I can't hide...

:(

I need peace of mind and heart

I should be excited with a trip I'm going to in a few minutes. But all I could think about is the silence. Got this prayer from Joy, a writer friend, who's always there to help with her words.

Prayer for that special someone

I want someone who will think about me first when shopping for his Christmas gifts,
and who envisions a life with me in his future years.
Someone who gazes at me as though I were
the most precious thing he has,
and seeks to feel my hand whenever I’m not there,
I want someone who treasures each moment he spends with me
each laughter shared, each adventure taken, each lesson learned throughout the years.
I want someone who thinks fondly of me before he goes to sleep
and thinks about me again when he awakes
who finds meaning in what we have,
and who looks forward to all that we have yet to discover
in life, and in each other.
I want someone who sees the real me
and loves me just the same.
I want someone who can grow with me
and who is happy in seeing me grow.
I want someone who can be intimate with me
and yet is strong enough to set me free,
so I can be the best of me.
I want someone who can make me smile,
and who smiles in turn because of me,
someone who can make me a more loving person,
a stronger person,
someone who is neither selfish nor insecure
and someone who will love my loved ones with me,
who will be strong enough for me
when I can’t be that strong anymore.
I want someone who has a life of his own
yet is able to weave it gracefully with mine.
Together we will create a new and more beautiful life together
not that we’re empty without each other
but that together, we will fill up each other’s cup until it overflows.

This is my prayer for that someone,
and may God who knows my heart better than I know mine
grant that which is most beautiful of all!

Walking around the Taipei Zoo

I'm jumping days ahead of our other "tours" and will be writing about our journey to the Taipei Zoo. We took the Wenshan-Neihu line from the Main Taipei station where the last stop was the zoo (so it's easy to find). We went there comparatively early at around 9 o' clock because our flight back to Manila was also that evening. According to Wikipedia, the Taiwan Zoo is currently the biggest zoo in Asia. Since the zoo was really huge and we had time constraints, my sister and I decided to just visit the animals which we wanted to see, which includes the panda, the lion, the elephants, the koala and the penguins. If I visit Taiwan again, I'm going to go to the zoo again.

Breakfast at Dante's Coffee. The food was surprisingly good!

The longest escalator ride I have ever been on.

The entrance of the Taipei Zoo. Wearing sneakers for a comfy trek.

And the kinds of zoo poop greet us. rotfl.Which ones do you prefer?

The anticipated panda sighting. There are viewing times for the panda, which was handed out to us when we purchased our tickets. It confused us to what it meant at first but we finally figured it out and was able to see the panda in the nick of time.

And here are some of the elephants we saw. And they liked showing their behinds a lot. Lol. All of our elephant pics were like this.

And the zebras were like this too. hahaha. I suggest you bring an umbrella when visiting the zoo. It can get real hot and sticky. We were already 'wilting' when we got to the "Africa" section.

We found solace from the heat inside the "South Pole" section of the zoo. I love penguins. I find them cute, in the same category as rabbits, pandas and koalas.

This baby seal wanted to go home with me. Sadly I was already short on NTs and the white fur will be all gray and dirty in Manila in a few weeks time.

By this time we were very tired (the ice section is also way, way up the zoo's map) and we were literally dragging our feet. So riding the train to where we started was such a relief for our very tired soles.

The koala bear's glass viewing area is usually the first stop in the zoo. But the koalas were hiding when we arrived. So we checked them out again before we left and there they were. Lazily eating and hanging on the tree branches.

Before making a mad dash to the subway (we had a plane to catch) I really had to make this funny pose.

And our last meal in Taipei was at a food court near the hotel. And we also bought and ate special Mister Donut bears for dessert. Again. :)