sadomasochist

i've moved. it's starpish from now on. add me as a friend. rax made the layout, gandaaaa.

however, this blog has been so much a part of my life and i can't give it up. so, starpish will be for my dailies and life in pinole while this, this will be kept for special things.

stay tuned.

sadomasochist

we don't celebrate valentine's. or so we say. somehow both my valentine's with jope have been unforgettable.

for valentine's last year, he gave me his first ever love letter. some couples get and give letters all the time but we don't. we've been together seven months then and that was the first letter that he gave me. i found it very sweet.

this year, he gave me a teddy! i know it is so baduy to give teddy bears these days but wait, there's a story behind this. before i left for the states last year, i asked him to buy me a teddy because i wanted to have something to hug since we'll be away from each other. jope is not your typical (and very predictable) romantic guy, and he cringes and finds this really corny. so no, he didn't buy me a teddy and gave me his elmo voice recording toy instead.

but this year, he gave me a teddy! and while i'm not really a teddy person, it made me cry. he loves me so much that he will do things that he swore he'll never do, if it would make me happy. i bet he was really uncomfortable when he got the teddy, but he did nevertheless.

his name is deathcab. he has a flower in his tummy too.

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dear jope,

you never fail.
my heart is yours, destiny.
love forever.

semper fidelis,
cathy

late this afternoon, i was singing ang dancing to pinoy ako, the song from pinoy big brother. like i told my sister and cousins, whenever i hear that song, it makes my feel proud that i am pinoy. makes me want to "pakita sa mundo kung ano ang kaya ko."

so yeah, good vibes.

bill, my mother's partner cooked tacos for dinner. for the first time since i got here, we ate dinner together. me, mom, bill, and kuya jr. over dinner we talked about lots of things, ranging from mexican food to teas to coffee. and then it happened.

my brother and i argued over coffee and the airconditioning in the offices in the philippines. he said that offices in the philippines had poor airconditioning, citing my tita olga's previous office as an example. i disagreed, saying that a lot of workplaces in the philippines had okay to excellent airconditioning. and then i said a lot of things have changed since you moved here. and then he went berserk!

he was talking at the top of his lungs, a little short of screaming. i was on my way to the kitchen to wash the dishes but i answered back. if you know me, i won't just accept things that i don't agree with especially when i know i'm right.

especially when you're saying crap about someone or something i love. see my brother, i don't know why he's the forever naysayer of the philippines. he's always bulok kasi sa pinas, walang ganyan dun, mga tao kasi dun ganito ganyan. and yet he wants to go home! i smell hypocrisy. anyway, i love our country, i even sing out loud to pinoy ako because i'm proud to be pinoy. and yeah, maybe the country is stuck in a rut in deep shit, but i still love it!

and when i love someone or something, expect me to be his/its number one defender. because i believe and i have faith in him/it. much like how i will defend my brother to my death if some one talked shit about him.

while i was washing the dishes, bill told me "i don't understand what you're arguing about, but you're not winning this one, are you?" with a sigh i said "with him, you can never win." and then proceeded to wash the plates. he was still saying things but i just turned a deaf ear. i guess some things you just have to let slide.

rawr.

i was really mad, i cannot understand how some people just can't and won't at the very least listen to another's point of view. but then again maybe, like a friend and a lover said, maybe it's his way of coping with being here. i now understand how it is to be stuck in a place you don't want to be in but have to. it kills. and maybe he has to keep telling himself that it's so bad there just to make himself believe that he's way better off here. and maybe that's hypocrisy, but if it's what gets him through life here, then who am i to judge?

life should not be lived with absolute rules. i may not agree with my brother, but he's my brother. no matter how i abhor people who say shit about things i love, i've got to let this one go. i love my brother more than i love my pride.

so yeah, i'll talk to you later. i've got to do my brother's laundry.

sadomasochist

tutuban at 168, puede. pero divisoria? no.

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eight more days in to go. you understand why i don't get to blog no more, don't you?

sadomasochist

through an email, yoyo asked me if i still loved him, even with all the changes, bullshit, and everything that has happened to him since he left a couple of years ago for the states. without a doubt, i do and that hasn't changed.

for those who don't know, yoyo is my best friend since kinder. he left for the states three years ago and now he's with the US air force. airman buhay.

when he asked me that question, that was the only time i realized how much we have grown and how different we are from who we were the last time that we were together. but no matter how much we've changed, it didn't change how much we love each other, how we're still each other's safe place.

and then i thought about life after october 8, and although i'm still crying, i found a new hope. life as we know it will never be the same again, but that does not mean we will stop loving.

sure, it will of course change. i will miss jope's incessant nonsense knock knock jokes, his funny, weird and sometimes nakakainis experiences in class, his unshaven chin, and the comfortable silence we share together.

i will miss helping out bebe with her baking, picking her up at the lrt station, telling rodney to take a bath and clean up, listening to tita about her day at work and sleeping beside her as i have the last fifteen years of my life.

i cry a little each night as the day grows near. i dread being so far away from the life i love. but then there's hope, for those things will never be gone. love is forever.

sadomasochist

it was after watching an episode of sex and the city - the one where carrie googled petrovsky or some other lover - that i first tried to google jope. he was yet to be my (boy)friend then, just a former professor i had a huge crush on. i had no idea who he was, apart from the three hours per week i had with him on my first term, junior year. i found his old tripod website and my god, it was damn funny. i fell for him even more.

earlier this evening i asked him about the stuff we did for the first time together and we recapped about a year of firsts. skim boarding, 168, dress up dinners, jet ski, globe platinum theater, engagement, hay there are so many. but the best first was what started it all: falling in love with someone we barely knew.

anyway, back to google-ing, i googled him again tonight and found websites/blogs of his former and current students. made me proud that he's touching lives, making a difference, turning tides. i'm glad that a lot of them do appreciate what he's doing because he puts his heart into this. he is what he teaches, a living, breathing example of what he says in class. he loves these kids and he cares about them. whenever he tells me about a good day at work, he gleams.

i don't really know how to end this, i really meant to write something about google-ing people, but i am so proud of jope that i'd rather stop here and just make this post all about him.

sadomasochist

mahilig akong magpamasahe. masokista kasi ata talaga ako. maraming beses na akong nagpamasahe, mapa-spa, beach, home service, nasubukan ko na. sarap ng pakiramdam pagkatapos, para kang lumulutang. pero minsan naman bwisit lang talaga.

warning lang, wag kayong magtitiwala sa mga masahista sa beach.

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bad trip magpamasahe sa puerto galera. una, bawal na raw magpamasahe sa kuwarto, sa me buhanginan lang puede. okay sana, kung hindi punong-puno ng tao ang beach. eh ni wala ka ng matapakan, puro tao! pangalawa, nagkalat ang mga masahista. kahit sino na lang, basta me t-shirt na me pangalan sa likod nila, masahista na.

nung bakasyon, nagpunta kaming magkakapatid (sabit ang 3 kaibigan) sa puerto galera. may kilala raw yung kapatid ko na masahista, magaling raw kaya naman sabi ko magpamasahe kami. anak ng! ewan ko kung pagod na ba siya o wala lang talaga sa sarili kasi parang pumipisil lang siya ng paninda sa palengke. kung anu-anong pagpipindot at paglalamutak ang ginawa sa akin! at hindi pa diyan nagtatapos ang disaster. hala, sige minasahe ang mukha ko, eh puro buhangin ang kamay niya! at ang pinakamalala niyan, tinuluan pa niya ako ng baby oil sa mata! buti na lang nakapikit ako kundi, naku, nasoplak na siya sakin.

bad trip talaga. come to think of it, olats talaga ang puerto galera. ang liit ng mga pseudo-hotel, hindi na malinaw ang tubig, punong-puno pa ang beach dahil sa sobrang daming tao (pero one in a million ang may itsura). parang sm megamall kapag malapit na ang pasko.

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pagkatapos ng horrendous experience ko sa kamay ng masahista sa puerto galera, akala ko makakabawi na ako sa bora. pagkatapos naming mag-sunbathing ni jope kinontrata na namin yung masseuse ng red coconut, massage after dinner. 

excited pa naman ako. bago magsimula yung masahista, tinanong niya ako:

"buntis ho ba kayo? baka ho kasi malaglagan kayo eh."

wow naman, ayos! ewan ko kung nagbibiro lang ba siya o seryosong nagtatanong. napa-inhale tuloy ako sa hiya sabay sabing "hindi po, busog lang po ako."

hayayayay.

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natuto na ko. dapat sa mapagkakatiwalaang spa lang. last week bumisita kami ni jope sa the spa. ay, sarap. bumalik ang tiwala ko sa mga masahista.

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eh kung subukan ko kaya sa bulag?

it sucks when some people fuck things up for you, but it sucks even more when you fuck things up all by yourself.

sucks most when you know you had your chance but you fucked it all up. and you can't do anything about it.

you can't even say what it's about because hell, it's damn shallow and well, you actually said it's okay. but yeah, maybe it means that much to you.

i guess there are things that you just have to let go. (but damn, i almost had it. i almost friggin had it but i had to fuck things up. ah.)

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(second part edited. sorry, no more tickets.)

sadomasochist

best friends forever.

i don't remember how many times i've said it or wrote it down in a letter, but i'm pretty sure i've said it a couple of dozen times to different people. i meant it at the time, yeah, but like most promises, not all were kept.

this morning a friend called me to ask if it ever happened to me, if i ever grew out of a friendship. you wouldn't believe how many of my (best) friends hate me now, thinking that i have forgotten them. see, i didn't forget them, neither do i love them less. situations change, people grow, and well, that's that.

i don't think i'm a worthless friend, but maybe to others i am. blame me for wanting to keep things real. i don't want fake hugs and fake air kisses and fake introductions as "the bestfriend" just because we are too polite to admit and say that well, we have grown apart, that we don't have the slightest idea how life has been for each other. and since i'm being honest (and a little gauche) here, maybe i don't give a shit.

some friends you grow out of, and that's the end of that. some things can't be relived and are better kept for reminiscing.

but some friends you keep. in retrospect, i have found that most of the ones i keep are the low-maintenance ones. you don't have to move the world to show them you love them, because they already know you would if you had to. you don't have to update them with every little thing that's happening to you because they already know. they know you. and you both know that what you have is real.

no need to say BFF.