slacker mommy files

    I am a bookworm. Any body who ever saw me in college would, for the most part, have seen me in more than one occasion, sitting in a corner with my nose deep in a book — mostly novels of the fantasy, gothic horror and sci-fi varieties. All of them, American or British novels. It was only this year that I have given thought to read local novels by local authors like Lualhati Bautista and Andres Cristobal Cruz. You see, I read mostly to entertain myself, to get out and explore worlds vastly different from mine, and to contemplate of various abstract subjects without tying them to anything that is tangible to me. Somehow, I don’t see any local books that do that, yet.

    When I read Luahati Bautista’s ’Gapo, I was made to face the harsh reality of things twenty to thirty years or so ago; I was brought to a time when the American bases were still in Olongapo, and racism was rampant among the American soldiers, African-American soldiers, and the Filipino residents of the city.

    The story revolved around the characters of Michael Taylor, Jr., an illegitimate son of an American Naval officer; Magda, a prostitute who is also a friend of Michael’s; Modesto, a Filipino working in the American base; and Ali McGraw, a Filipino transvestite who was looking for love from anyone. Their lives represent the condition of the Olongapo society under the shadow of the American soldiers. They endured the hardships of ridicule, marginalization, poverty and abuse, not just by the Americans, but from their own countrymen as well. It was a sad reflection on the miserable human condition aggravated by racism and the lust for the American dream.

    I have nothing against Americans; some of my internet friends are Americans. What disturbed me about this story was the Filipinos’ blind faith that the Americans will save them from poverty and destituteness; they believed that the only way they will ever be successful, the only way they can get out of the pitiful live they lead was to get to America, by any means, and never look back. It was sad for the novel mirrored reality in an almost exact clarity.

    But I believe that things have changed since the time illustrated in ’Gapo. I believe that people now are more or less comfortable in their own ethnic identity that they would see themselves at par with people from different nationalities, especially now that the world is much more smaller thanks to the internet. I believe that any Filipino can hold his own against any person from any such country and not cower. I believe that, or at least, I like to.

    I have former classmates, as well as friends and relatives abroad who walk and work among the people there, and they are just as successful as the rest of them. They are at par with those foreigners in their foreign lands and I salute them; they make me proud to be a Filipino. Pinoys like Efren Penaflorida, Jr. are testaments to what Filipinos can do and can become. The nightmare of the novel ’Gapo can easily be dissipated if we start to act not just for ourselves, but for our families and neighbors as well.

    I am just a mom who stays at home to look after her kids. I do not have a profession, nor do I even have a college degree. But I will try to do my part by trying to raise my kids to be respectful, responsible, humble and true to themselves. People talk about changing our society by voting this candidate or that candidate and expect changes to take place overnight. That is just plain stupid. changes don’t happen in the blink of an eye. Changes begin from inside oneself, then it spreads in the home, than on the street, then it infects everyone else. I would like my children to live in a better country than I grew up in, so I’ll raise them to be better citizens of a country they will grow up in.

    Yesterday we went on a road trip to Nueva Ecija. Actually, my mom-in-law and my brother-in-law were going to meet up with some business associates The original plan was to go to Subic after their meeting and have fun strolling around there or going shopping in the duty-free shops. It was a good plan.

    6:00 AM – I was doing my daily rituals before taking a shower. We were supposed to be off by 7:00 AM so I thought I still had a lot of time. So I was a bit surprised when I heard Mamajo’s voice, then Tey’s and finally Leejay’s, all conversing loudly downstairs. The SUV Tey borrowed from our community chairman has a plate number ending in 9, thus it was banned to go out on Metro. To go around this ordnance, we have to be on the NLEX before 7:00. So I had to hurry up; I rushed the kids under a hot shower to alleviate the cold; dressed them in their pajamas (They would be asleep all through the drive including me. It was one of those days when their body clocks are totally inverted. In short, today was vampire mode day.); then carried them down to the SUV outside the house. Leejay then got his turn to prepare himself for the drive. He was further rushed as the coding ban was fast approaching. We really had to leave if we were to beat getting pulled over for a ban violation.

    6:55 AM – We were going down EDSA on the way to NLEX. Fortunately, we had some time to spare and there were no MMDA traffic enforcers about so we were able to skirt a traffic violation. After 10 minutes Lyka has finally fallen asleep. Kylee was still breastfeeding but eventually she was asleep too. I was also getting sleepy but somehow I just can’t find sleep. So instead I just had conversations with the rest of the family. Before we knew it, we were already in Nueva Ecija, about 9:00AM in the morning. Mamajo was surprised. In fact, we were all surprised. It was our first time to take the SCTEX to go to Nueva Ecija. Despite the rather pricey toll fees, it was definitely worth it to save the time we would have taken had we gone through Sta Rita to Gapan.

    10:00 AM – We were already in Sta Rosa, Nueva Ecija and we were trying to determine where the Mamajo, Tey and their associates would be meeting. It was supposed to be in the Rustica restaurant but somehow, we kept getting lost. Eventually, after several U-turns, we came to the restaurant in question just in time. Still Lyka was fast asleep. Kylee, on the other hand, was awake again and quite restless. I tried to give her some of my fried rice but she just took a couple of mouthfuls and then she’s done. She just kept breastfeeding after that. Leejay, his cousin Jonathan and I ate our lunch then, and it was some big lunch. We enjoyed it very much indeed.

    1:00 PM – We decided to go back home then as we had nowhere else to go. Besides, we were all tired from the trip and we could use some good long sleep, especially me. The trip back home was rather faster than coming to Nueva Ecija, also this time, the drive was rather uneventful. After two hours we were back in Metro Manila. All throughout the drive, Lyka was sleeping deeply. When we finally got inside the house, she woke up. It was like she didn’t leave home at all.

    My daughter’s deep sleep is one of her remarkable traits. She can sleep so deeply that she’d be oblivious to anything and if anyone tried to wake her fro her sleep, she’d be so cranky you’d never think of waking her in the middle of even her nap. It could be from this long and deep sleeping habit that she got to be as big for her age as she is. Now, if only Kylee would sleep like that, or even have the appetite to match her sister’s. Ah well, that’s a different story.

    If you have a Facebook account, chances are you may also have a Farmville game account. Farmville is among the most popular Facebook games to date with about 76 million monthly users. It is a farm simulating game where you get a plot of land, and decide how to cultivate and manage it. It is also a social game since the game promotes occasionally taking care of your neighbours’ farms as well as sharing with them some of the unfortunate animals that wander in your farm and vice versa. Other game features include trophy collection from achievements done in game, as well as special collectable items that have to be gifted from one player to another.

    In lower levels, farm management including ploughing, seeding, and harvesting is easy enough to do manually. On higher levels and with successive farm expansions, manually clicking individual plots can take up to 30 minutes or more: a very time consuming past time. As a solution to this, some independent programmers created different software to make your farm management easier. One of these is the Farm Helper. The current released version is 1.7 and there is a free download of the demo program. You can purchase the pro version from their site at $6.99.

    If you are short on cash, or would rather not shell out money for Farmville, there are some other alternatives that you can choose from. I have three free programs that I have tried and they are quite useful; two of them are farm grid clickers while the last one is a free bot program.

    The first one is theGrid Clicker which Leejay favours to use. Refer to the video for a demo of the program.



    The second one is the Farmville Auto Clicker 2.0. With this program, you can open the Farmville application at full screen and still be able to use it. It is one of the simplest auto grid clicker that I have used.

    The last one, and the one that I currently use, is the FarmHellper Bot. It is an all-in-one run-then-forget-about-it program, and it is easily customizable to your preferred gameplay. You can automatically select which seed you will plant in your farm, as harvest the fields, trees, and even the animals. It has a lite and pro tab, but since it is still in beta phase, you can download the pro version for free.

    Farmville is one of the most addictive past times around in Facebook. Try out any one of these programs to take out the slow clicking time and save time to customize your farm.

    I have a dilemma. There is this one relative that I have, and let’s just say that he was unceremoniously evicted from his family due to his own fault. Whatever happened between him and his family was not my business. Still, I felt sorry for him. So, I took it up to myself to try and be a friend to him, if only to help him through dealing with what happened to his family.

    The problem started when he tried to tell me his side of the story. It was originally my idea. I thought that if I knew what his side was, I might better understand him and all the events that had happened. Instead, when I got his next text message, all I got was how his family was cold towards him, how he felt disrespected as the head of the family. I admit, I was actually expecting some sort of remorse, or even a confession that he actually admits he wronged his family. The way he portrayed himself as a poor under-appreciated, mistreated father was just too much for me.

    See, I had lived with him and his family for some time in the past. I have heard all the stories of his “escapades,” as well as the version of the story from his wife and kids. I have even seen some of his transgressions with my own eyes. I understand that he tries to make himself believe that he had been the best father he can be if only to alleviate his guilt, but please don’t take me for a fool. Now, I try hard to ignore his “pitiable” situation, so he texts me, just to keep myself from replying with something that I would regret later.

    I am not so sure if I have done the right thing, or if it would have been better if I hadn’t done anything at all. I was trying to help a man go through a tough time in his life, but it is another matter to try to make himself look the injured party just to make himself feel better about all of it. I have seen him amidst his transgressions but never breathed a word about it to him. I tried to understand him, even decided to try and bridge the gap between him and his children. But to make me look like an idiot, that is just low!

    I am not a perfect person. I have my times of weaknesses, but I try my hardest not to console myself by painting a different picture of me to others. I am just mad. I feel betrayed; my faith in that person was horribly shattered because he can be such a good person, yet he chose to be a hypocrite. Now I have no clear idea just what to do, or to feel.

    It’s already February. There is only three more months, including this one, before the presidential elections. The time for forging promises has come. Politicians stand on their soapboxes worth millions of pesos and court voters for their say so. It may look like the same old story; politician gives out promises, politician breaks promises and politician sucks the nation dry. Somehow, from what little I see here in my hermitage, it seems that the youth is finally taking the political scene seriously.

    Among those who try to give voice for their ideas and criticism is Gloc-9. Also knownas Aristotle “Aries” Pollisco, this local talent was once a protégé of Master Rapper Francis M himself. His latest album Matrikula (Tuition) is a rather bleak view of our own society dressed up in Pinoy Rock. It showcases the state of the nation as seen from the eye of the artist.

    I have heard of Gloc-9 before, and I have known him only as a collaborator to the Parokya ni Edgar song Bagsakan. I have only given him my time when Leejay sent me a link to one of his songs and told to me give it an ear. What I heard made me stop in my seat. Most of the raps that I heard on the local airwaves are shallow and brassy to the ears. Though they have a good beat, these songs would just go into one ear and out the other; they are of no significant consequence. Then here comes this one guy who really had something to say. His music is something that grips you like it was alive. It will make you think and reflect, and at times, it will move you.



    The song Balita is an adaptation of the 1970’s song by the same name, sung by ASIN. Like the original song, it describes the current state of affairs of the people. On one hand, they are all the same issues: poverty, hunger, corruption, the war in Mindanao; but it has been a long time to hear these matters voiced outside of a picket line or a public demonstration. What more, it is quite something to hear it from someone who is not known to be an activist, other than probably Francis Magalona himself. It was like a wake-up call to all who would listen, especially the youth.

     Listening to him, I’d forget that he was a rap artist; instead I’d remember the handful of times I spent talking with the activists I met in UP. His song Bayad Po, which is a collaboration with folk singer Noel Cabangon, is a glimpse in the lives of common people struggling with poverty and misfortune. It is a heart-wrenching piece, and one that should stick to mind, to remind us of how lucky we are with what we have. In all, Gloc-9 has set the bar for local rap artists, and has opened the eyes and ears of his audience to the truth out in the streets.

    As I end this post, I leave you with another video from Gloc-9’s Matrikula album. This is a “parinig” to anyone who has ears.

PS: The shirt featured here can be ordered from zazzle.com. It is not a Filipino company, but I thought the design was appropriate.