Wow.. two weeks have passed since my last update! Am I really that lazy?

We went to Bagiuo last week, so that would be one excuse. But still, I sure wish I owned a laptop. It would make blogging a lot easier. Anyway, I'm going to try something new with this blogging thing.. I wonder if I'd be dedicated enough to continue with it.

Okay, since it's been a long time since I've updated my journal, I'm going to give you a brief summary of what has happened during those days that I was too busy to blog. According to the last entry on my other journal (on my website).. which I think is already very very old.. I just finished with our training and I just started taking calls. Well, Its been three month now. Yep.. I'm still working at that certain call center and I'm still a technical support engineer. What changed during those months was - I got to know the ISP team better - and everything seems to have gotten affected by that! Remember when I kept whining about my job? It's totally different now. And remember when I told you that the tech girls were scary.. well.. I was pertaining to the people from the webhosting department (hehe.. not all of them - lagot ako!) and not our team.

You probably would be hearing alot about my teammates on this journal so think I should introduce them to you. Now, who do I begin with?

You all know Corinne right? She needs no introduction anyway... harhar! Besides, she's from a different department. Hmm.. okay, I'll start with the current morning shifters (I'm now in the morning shift so I get to hang out with these guys more.) In alphabetical order, they are: Cris, Darwin, Jeff, Louie, Mheng, Mike, Patrick and Peapie. Cris and Louie are the Tier 2s, Darwin, Jeff and me are the neophytes, Mheng, Mike and Peapie are the oldies. Hehehe.

Cris is the official 'crush ng bayan' in the office and believe it or not, he is also the youngest to ever get promoted to Tier 2 - I'm even older than him.

Darwin is the newest victim of GTS. He's also a fresh grad and he also claims that he's only 20 years old.. plus, ang ganda ng asawa nya.. hehehe.

Jeff is a month older than me - in GTS. He's one half of the most famous couple in GTS - America's Sweethearts Devie and Jeff. He's rich and he's a 4x4 freak. Right now, he's in Hong Kong doing some studying about Cisco networks or something like that.

Louie is the other Tier 2.. the self proclaimed most deluded man. He already caught a girl in web dev and he's still searching for more! Yari ka pag nahuli ka!

Mheng... hmm.. this guy also doesn't need any introduction... Mhengdy is the bachelor of all bachelors! Having courted every girl in our office, he's still proud to be a bachelor!

Mike on the other hand, is our resident father.. his wife just gave birth a month ago.. He is also the guy with the really long hair - and good American accent - whom Liza noticed when we first entered GTS.

Patrick used to be a member of the web hosting team. He is a friend of Karl so I get to see him before during our training days. He looks alot like Legolas - the elf from Lord of the Rings.

Lastly, There's Peapie! I voted her as Miss Congeniality during our Christmas party because thats how she really is.. Allan R even told her once that the name Peapie really suits her personality - she's very 'kikay." Did I mention that she has a tatoo?

Okay, So these are the people in the morning shift. Next, here are the night shifters...

It smells like rugby (adhesive) in our office. That is one of the management's techniques to get us not to avail our meal breaks anymore.. They just send us to cloud 9 instead..
"Thank you for calling technical support, dude."

It's 6:30 again.. the dead hours of our job...

letse.. freeservers doesn't allow remote linking of images.. and i don't think that blogspot offers free web storage for images.. I guess I'll just be using one of this templates instead.. That means, I'll have to redo everything again.

It now only takes me a bottle of super dry to get me tipsy. After three years of training in the drinking field, it all comes down to just a single bottle of super dry... Well, it was proven yesterday. We went to libis last night on such short notice - it was just planned two night ahead. What I think happened was, the five girls of the isp team's night shift were planning on another 'girls' night out'. I don't know how the boys got involved in it but afterwards, the boys are tagging along. Then the night before the actual event, thanks to my thoughtful twin sister Joni, it even officialy turned out to be my birthday celebration - which is still two weeks away... Anyway, we went to the ever popular bargo and pier 1 - bargo being the concert queen Donna's turf and peir 1, Gerry's favorite night spot. Hehehe... It was a good thing that when we were at bargo, we just played billiards, thus donna wasn't able to perform, besides, Aries was sporting the sexy bedroom voice that evening - it wouldn't be right to waste in on videoke... hehehe... I really did stunk at billiards that night.. maybe its the super dry... or maybe it's really been a while since I last played - wait - we did play billiards a month ago and for me, that is just very recent. Well, it's either I'm not really good at it or it's the beer.. uhm.. it's really the beer... hehehe... seriously. Darwin is good at it. He's at his 'pa-humble' mode at first - "di ako marunong e... pano ba to?" - later on, the cue ball was spinning different curves and those colorful balls kept dissapearing one at a time.. It was a good thing that he was my partner during the doubles - hehehe.. i never did shoot a single ball! Devie was even playing better than me... even Rose.. well, what more do you expect from those girls. They can even outlast us guys in a drinking competition!


And then there was Pier 1! Gerry's night spot! hehehe.. They were right, the calamares are great!


I'm not really in the mood to give out the details about that yet.. maybe later.


I have my bread stick and my mongolian barbeque - what's missing is my mug! They really must have thrown it away when they were cleaning the cubicles. We don't have lockers here in our office, where do they expect us to place our mugs?! Wait... isn't it forbidden to eat in our cubicles? Hmm.. who cares? There are only three of here for the isp team. Tier 2 Louie, Tier 2 Cris, and me. They're both eating breadsticks anyway.


Another boring day in the office. It's always like this. We usually don't do anything after 4pm. That is why I've got time to do this journal now.

Hmm... how does this thing work? I grew tired of maintaining my own site so I think it would be better to have one of this blogging sites instead.. but the problem is.. I'm new at this! Uhm... what does this button do?

haha! I've jut created my very own template! Uhm... now what? What should I do next?

The banner above doesn't go well with my theme! Stupid Banner!

Sorry if I haven't updated for a very long time. It's just that I'm really getting busy at work. Naks! As if I'm really doing something there! Hehe... I just wasn't able to update because I was too lazy to do so. Since my last update, which I think was last Wednesday, I had to get up early (early for me is around 2:00 in the afternoon) because I have (and I still need) to exchange a check for cash. I was finally able to get my salary but unfortunately, its a paycheck. I had to go to the bank and exchange it for cash. It was my day off on Wednesday and Thursday. Our salaries were released on Thursday so I had to go to the office on that day. And during that day, I wasn't able to get up early so I got my check at around 5:00 PM. Of course, the bank was already closed by that time. Without no money and nothing to do, I just hanged at the office where Karl and Kheiy were. Karl was having trouble with the training so he just decided to waive the remaining days of the training. He made a letter addressed to our trainers saying something about sparing him from the waste of time or pain and anguish or something as dramatic as that, and instead, just give him a failing mark and he'll take his chances. Our trainers took it as a resignation letter so he had to face the head of Operations, Miss Blue. Miss Blue told him that with what he did, he'd given up his privileges (if there is any.) I don't know yet what will to happen to him, but I sure wish both of them, Karl and Kheiy, would get absorbed in the Billing department. I won't be hearing from them until Monday so I'm really aching to know what will happen next. Anyway, the new batch of trainees have started phase 1. Welcome to our own version of air-conditioned hell.
So, how was your week Neil?
After several days of complete whining, I finally learned to love my job. Is really helping me a lot with my 'spokening dollars' skills. Sometimes, I'd still blurt out something grammatically incorrect, but oftentimes, I manage to say things right. I'm actually capable of answering calls right now. In fact, it has only been 2 days and they actually made me responsible for doing most of the callbacks for the voice mails. Yesterday, I took 26 calls. Today, I did 23, which is really not bad for a neophyte. Although I really had a problem with one of my calls this evening - I was asked to configure a Mac OS. And since we live in a world full of IBM clones, I really had a very hard time answering the questions. I had to escalate it to our Tier 2, Teddy. Aside from that, I think my night went well. Some of the clients were really appreciative so they kind of boosted my self-esteem. One of the clients I had kept on saying "You don't know how much you've done for me, thank you very much!" over and over during the duration of the call. Of course, I was like: "Thank you sir! That is why we are here for." It's just really nice when people appreciate the efforts you exert in helping them. It just makes you want to help people more. Naks! This job is really getting through to me.
Sorry if the tone of this entry seems sluggish - I'm really tired right now.
I was supposed to attend Mede's birthday today. But I wasn't able to file a sick leave. I had no choice but to go to work - they'd give me a 'memo to explain' if I went AWOL today. Also, I forgot to confirm my test for Trend Micro again. Well, what the heck! I'm starting to like it here. Besides, I got more than what I expected from my first salary. Hope it stays that way. Also, there are more girls here. Hehe... CHICKS actually! I've heard that there's a 'girl' drought over at Trend Micro. I think I'm better off here. I've been cooped up in an exclusive school for boys for 16 years! I've got a lot of catching up to do! Liza M once told me: 'you don't know how fun it is to be in a co-educational school! It really makes things different.'
Liza A and I had dinner together at the pantry - Liza A already has a BF, mind you, and believe me, you don't want to mess with her. She was able to threaten, in front of several people, the director of NCC who was harassing her. Only a few women can do that. By the way, Corinne, Liza already knows about your Afghanistan and Somalia (or Japan) plans! Hehe... I think it was Ana Kat that told her. And hey, is Anifa really leaving too?
A lot of things happened during the small time that I wasn't able to update my site. Maybe if I'm in the mood, I'd write them all. For the meantime, you have to settle for this. I really need to get some sleep.
So, how was your week?

Ei, Karl! Daan pala ako dyan bukas. Kuhanin ko na sweldo ko SA WAKAS! Ano na balita? Pagmagpapasa ka ng resignation letter mo, sabay na ko. Para may kasama ako pag kausapin ni Blue. Di nalang ako papakita kay Sir Allan R, hiya ako e. I'll resign as early as I can while my friends are still around. I think Corinne will also resign as soon as she gets her passport. Mag-Jajapan na ata yun. Nyahahahaha... loko lang.



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I've read Ard's blog about the 'Pangako Sayo' teledrama and I didn't understand some of them because I don't really watch the show. But as I was going to work one evening, it was playing on the bus that I was in and I really couldn't stop myself from laughing. In fact as I heard the name 'Electika Powers', I snorted a little too loud. What were the scriptwriters of the show thinking!? I'll bet sometime later, they'll add a new character named Nucleo Powers, or Melchor-Gaspar Baltazar, or perhaps Maximus Aurellius. Wait, they already have that.. nyiknyiknyik... Seriously, anything is possible in that show.

"Huwag Nucleo! Huwag mong saktan si R2d2! Magagalit ang iyong inang si Amor Powers!"
It's my day-off today. Or is that night off?

I was assigned to handle Arishost calls today because the voice support for Arishost were all unable to report to work due to the heavy rain. Arishost is a newly established web host and domain registrar and it only has a few clients as of the moment. My buddy, Teddy is taking his day-off today so no one was there to look over what I was doing. It was a good thing that Sir Allan R assigned me to Arishost instead of ISP or I'll be destroying a lot of PCs with my wrong answers.
I don't want to be in night shift anymore. Most of the customers are calling this time of the day. The phone calls just keeps on coming in if you're voice support for ISP. But it's a different story when you're on Arishost's voice support. In my opinion, most of the Arishost clients are programmers and I have a theory that most programmers are nocturnal people. So I believe most of them call us late at night (or late in the afternoon here.)
Please don't ring Mr. Callmaster IV, Mr. PBX sir - I don't want to answer any more calls!
Today is my no-friends day. The only person that is online on my buddy list right now is Rye.

I'm really starting to like this! My job, I mean. Perhaps if I should just stop whining and instead try to make the best out of it, then I'll probably live happily ever after.
Its payday on Thursday! I'll get a month's salary on Thursday - yep, salary for a whole month! That is $50,000 in crisp green bills. Hehe... YOU WISH! Anyway, I haven't asked them if I could get my salary in advanced. It's my day off on Thursday so I won't be able to get my money. And I'm already aching to get ahold of it.
The T1 is down at our office for two hours today. The T1 (Internet connection) is the heart of our company. We use VOIP (Voice Over IP), which is basically a phone line that uses the high speed Internet lines as its medium of communication. every time the T1 is out, we have nothing to do - what is a call center for if it can't take calls, right? From 2:00am to 4:00am, we did nothing but talk. I didn't know anyone from the Tech support except for Teddy so I just went to the Billing section - at least Liza A was there. I didn't know that most of the Billing men already resigned. The only people there was Liza, Monina and Rye. They told me that they need more men in Billing. Mark B, Brian, and James already resigned, Ogie is now at Tech, and Josh doesn't count... I don't really know that Josh guy, but he was the butt of most of their conversations. For most of the two hours that I was there, they were talking about Josh being a fairy (figuratively) and his exploits in the office. Now I get it! Iah once called him Josh-lyn. And since then, we always thought that Josh was a girl.
I was really laughing hard when the three girls where talking about Joseph. Liza said that he's cute and that she wants to... uhm... the term was 'lapirutin' and she told us that he looks like he would bounce whenever he is thrown at a hard place. Monina told Liza: 'Naku, kawawa magiging anak mo!" Hehe... Liza has a weird way of describing 'cute.'
I got to answer 3 calls today! Yehey! I made 1 callback to setup Windows XP and I received two calls regarding dial up numbers and the Filter Only service respectively. I was able help them with their problems since Teddy was feeding me the answers. Hehe... Earlier I talked to Sir Allan R regarding my transfer and he told me that in order to do that, I'll have to be working for 6 months at GTS. Its a good thing that Allan R is very approachable. I sure wish that he's the head of Operations, not Blue.
Kheiy saw a ghost at the pantry! Hehehehe... She told me that she saw two people going to the pantry at her peripheral view (the side of the eye.) What was unusual was that the first one closed the door behind her and the other one just went through the closed door. She just ran to Karl who thought that there's some major catastrophe or something. Its really spooky come to think of it. And to think that I usually go to the pantry alone when I don't want to mingle with the Tech people. I told that story to Liza and now she's always with Rye whenever she goes to the pantry.

You know what Giles, maybe you're right. I just said all those things about my job because I didn't see the beauty of it. Maybe I was just a little nervous about it so I kept on making excuses not to confront it. It's just the fact that I'm really not good in English makes me want to avoid going to work. Now I know better. But still! Hehe... I'm still thinking of resigning. I'll just enjoy my job while it lasts.
I thought I was going to save lots of money today. I'm at night shift so I get to bring 'baon' because by the time we have our break, most of the stores at Pearl Drive are already closed. Yesterday, I did just that. I took some food from our house and brought it to the office. I saved 90% of my allowance that day. Today, I made a mistake. The only food available at our house was the 'sour' spaghetti - or the Futanesca or whatever it is called. I don't like it at all. I think its sauce is made from real fresh tomatoes that is why it is sour. I don't like it so I didn't brought any to the office. And that was my mistake. At 2:00 this morning, my stomach was already grumbling in protest. Teddy had some Oreos but my face just wasn't that thick for me to eat plenty of it. I was really hungry so I had to eat something but not Oreos (they can cause sugar rush.) It was a good thing that there were also two hungry souls on the floor. Chris (little Chris Gwin) and Teddy. We thought of ordering but since its a Sunday night, most restaurants don't have any delivery staff to bring us the food. Our last choice was to order from Wendy's or to go down Pearl Drive and wish that at least one store is still open. We decided to just go down and we saw that Hotshots was still open. It's the only restaurant with its lights on so we had no other choice. And knowing Hotshots, I had to bring out a sack of dough to buy decent food. In short, instead of saving 90% of my allowance, I spent 90% of it on food alone. Now I know better. But still! I won't eat sour spaghetti.
If you want to see something funny, use WHOIS on Microsoft.com.

Its really not the office environment anymore - something else is bothering me now. I'm the kind of person that can blend in anytime I want because in case you didn't know, I am the greatest pretender. In fact, I've made new friends already at the tech department. Of course it is still hard to mingle with the 'veterans' so I just stick with the semi-neophytes. For the tech, there's Jeff. For Billing, there's the two Lizas. Jeff has been around for a month already so he knows almost everyone there. But still, he's not the talkative type so it's a little less awkward when I'm around him. When I'm hanging out with Gerald, my other buddy who talks a lot with other people often, I feel uncomfortable because I always get left out of their conversations. Jeff's right, during my first week, I'll have the feeling that I'm an 'extra' - following people around, trying to set an identity. And even more unfortunately for me, most of the people I know are on a different shift, including Jeff. But who cares. Mingling with other people is really not that important to me. I'll get to see my COEB friends again this Saturday anyway. Hey Corinne, there's really something wrong with that ****** girl... hehe...
I met Teddy last night. And I don't like him as my buddy. Don't get me wrong... he's nice and intelligent and all, but he's very busy. He's answering calls almost every time and he leaves me struggling to match his pace. And I barely get to ask him questions. He's a Tier 2 (tech support guru) so almost everyone on the floor is asking him questions too. I'm really having a hard time because he's not giving me the proper introduction. And being the fast learner that I am (naks!), I'm still struggling in the dark. I don't even know how to use the basic tools! I don't know how to gain access to our UNIX shell using our thin clients, I don't know the databases that we use, and I don't even have a certibiz (our logs) account! And he expects me to take my first call tonight! It's only my second day!
As I've said, it is not the office environment anymore. It's the job itself. I'm very uneasy every time I go to work. I'm always nervous when I'm pressured to do something I'm not good at. In this case, speaking English with an accent. Heck! I can program a password authentication software using any language in just 10 minutes but when it comes to this... Its a little way off of my skills.
Sabi nga nila, sayang naman yung kakayahan ko kung ganto lang gagawin ko. Instead of focusing on technical knowledge, I have to focus instead on what? English accent? And the fact that I get nervous everyday because of this also doesn't help.
Next Monday, I'll be having a second chance at Trend. I didn't get to take the test before because I had to study for our stupid training. I should have followed Marcos' advise then. That test was more important than our training. Look at him now, he's earning 15K at Ambergis because he chose to fail our stupid training.
ANG TAGAL NG 15! Ang tagal pa ng sweldo ko! 6:00pm naaaaaaa papasok nanaman akooooo. LINTEK!

Okay, here's the plan... I'll sneak in, get the money and I'll run the hell out of there and never look back. Or, I could just go to work and try to live an ordinary life. Hmmm...
I'm in between dilemmas. As if one is not enough, I have to suffer multiple nested dilemmas, where one dilemma is within another dilemma. I'm thinking whether I should stay with or leave my job. If I stayed, should I transfer to another department, or should I just remain (unhappy) on my current status? If I left, should I help in our family business, or should I focus on other jobs? Well, as a basis for my decision, I chose to consult my ever reliable horoscope. It said something like, ‘the easy way is not the right path to growth.’ Yep, my horoscope said that. Check it out yourself. Its on Philippine Star, August 9, 2002, Capricorn.
Some help! If I took the really hard road, I'll be making the wrong decision and I'll be wasting my life trying to know what growth means! Here’s what I say: choose the happy road and you won't grow ugly. You'll be enjoying what you do and you'll get to sleep 8 hours a day - at the right time.
Tomorrow, I'll ask my supervisor to let me transfer to another department. They said that Web Dev will be having an opening soon. Yehey! For the meantime, I'll settle for the Associate for System Administration position, that is if my supervisor will let me transfer, of course. If she won't let me (my supervisor is a powerpuff, I've heard), then, I'll just resign. It's their loss. Mawawalan ng matalino sa GTS... ay... mali... madaming magagalit... hehe... mawawalan nalang ng, uhm, matangkad sa GTS.
Kheiy said that its because its my first job why I'm acting this way. She told me that as time passes by, I won't care whether I'm friends with my co-workers. When I get exposed more, I'll barely notice the people around me and all that is important is that I'm getting paid. Liza told me that I'm weird because I'm the one who passed the tech training and I'm the one threatening to resign. Karl on the other hand, said: "Nagpapakahirap ako para sa walang kwenta." And on that one, I'll have to agree with him. Although the context is very different (he's still training), I still believe that it is applicable to my situation. Why would I pressure myself in something I'm not happy with. I should be pressuring myself in doing something I like! Like sleeping. Uy, Corinne, what is the job description for the porn site blockers... I want to go there instead. Hehe... I envy those people, they are getting paid to browse porn sites.
Anyway, as you can see, I now have the time to update my site again. That is because I called in sick today. I'm not in the mood for meeting new people today.

It's been a while... since I have... hold my head up high... *naks*. Anyway, it's really been a while since I've written something here on my supposedly daily 'dear diary.' Hehe... I've been incredibly busy passing my training here with, you know, like, spokening dollars, you know (huwag nyo ko sumbong ha!) At last! After my three weeks of torture, I finally passed my training. Thanks Gene, Liza M, Liza 2, Marcos, Kheiy, Karl, Sarah, Ogie, James and most of all to you the Almighty One! (Para akong nanalo ng award a!) Okay, that's enough.
I've already started my buddy system training today. It's not actually a training, I just get to have a buddy who'll introduce me to my job. So far, I haven't met my real buddy yet. Allan R, our help desk officer, was the one who gave me a tour yesterday, then he later assigned me to Gerald, who gave me a few more pointers this morning. In our buddy system, I get to listen to some of the calls my buddy is taking. After a week of that, I'll be answering calls on my own. As of the moment, I haven't heard any calls that I can answer on my own. My mind still won't process as fast as I expect it to be. I tried thinking of the solution to some of the problems I heard this morning and all my mind could think of was: 'anong gagawin ko? anong gagawin ko? anong gagawin ko? anong gagawin ko?' And when I heard the solution that my buddy gave, that's the only time something would register on my mind. "I knew that. That's really simple." Oh yeah? So why didn't you think of that you big lousy dumbass?
I'm planning to resign after my first payday. I just don't see myself as a customer support engineer. For crying out loud! I barely even use our home phone and I simply just don't see myself as a phone person. Besides, a have a terrible phone voice! I just might scare our clients away.



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"Ok sir, I want you to go to your desktop and click on My Computer, then on Control Panel, and then on..."
"What desktop? What should I click? I'm sorry, you lost me, I'm really not into computers so..."
"Do you see an icon on your screen that says 'My Computer'?"
"Icon? I'm infront of my computer."

Yep, I've heard clients that don't even know what 'right click' is. If you think that is hard, try telling them to reconfigure their DNS settings. (huh?)


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LIZAAAAAAA! Babaeng walang asal! Ganyan ka, nang-iiwan ka! WAAAA! Hehe... Ang tagal ni Kheiy at ni Karl e! (Kayo na ba?) I won't be seeing you starting tomorrow. I'm scheduled for 9 to 6. I still don't have friends at Tech! The other new guy, Jeff, seems well acquainted with almost everyone - which leaves me the odd man out. Sabi nga ni Jeff, "Nakakakakapagod dito... kahit nakatunganga lang ako."


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Hoy blue ards! you're getting bolder by the minute sa blogs mo a! o baka dahil tagal na tayo d nagkita... hehe... grabe, kakagulat ka!


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PS: sorry for the Tagalog words, tinatamad na ko mag-ingles. No ingles, no ingles, nooo!

Hi, I'm Bill Gates, I'm rich and I'm MICRO - SOFT. Wait, that didn't sound right!
In my opinion, charisma is based entirely on what people say. Spoken words have a lot of power towards people. Just by saying the right things, people fall in love, countries wage war, and actors become presidents. Yes, charisma is not based on looks, nor on money, but on spoken words. If people like you because of the way you look, you are probably bombarding them with sex appeal, not charisma. That is what I believe. So what does it take to have charisma? I don't know, it's probably saying the right things at the right time. Yep, that may be it, but the real question is, how do you know what to say when?
I know a certain someone who gets a lot of girls by simply talking with them on the phone. He'd talk with them almost every time he can and he never rans out of things to say. And his preys dig him. Frankly, he's fat and 'unsightly,' (ahem) but whenever he speaks, his prey would always visualize him as some 'Greek god.' Is it the fake 'low-baritone' voice that gets them, or is it the things he say? Of course it's the latter, but having a good voice (much like that of Teddy Locsin Jr.) also helps. But was he really exhibiting charisma, or was he just deceiving them? Do you even consider it charismatic if almost all of the girls he had spoken with doesn't want to have anything to do with him after meeting him?
That brings me back to the question 'What does it take to have charisma?' If it is not from money, good looks, and flashy words, then what defines charisma? Perhaps, charisma is attained from the positive aura that one emits. There are people that radiate good vibrations. Whenever you're with them, you just can't help yourself from smiling, you simply feel comfortable around them. And that is the mystery of it. Besides, people cannot learn charisma, people are born with it.

If Hitler lived in the Philippines, he'd be a local celebrity by now. I saw an interview of the Marcos' children at ANC a few minutes ago and it seemed that the Marcoses weren't even ashamed of what their parents did. For crying out loud, your father was a dictator and your mother is the reason behind that! Didn't it even cross your minds that the depreciation of the dollar was your clan's fault? Don't you even care that you were the reason behind the corruption of the government and it's people's minds? Yeah, you were also victims... victims of the seven capital sins perhaps. I know I'm not in a position to judge but that is the truth.
It is a fact that Filipinos forgive easily. We forgave Marcos, we forgave Erap, some sympathized with the first death row victim, we were proud of Versaci's killer and we will probably forgive the next dictator that will abuse his power. Do we really forgive easily or do we just get sucked up easily on hypes caused by media? What we see is, unfortunately, what we only get. I saw Ping Lacson's movie while on a bus to Batangas and he has been my hero ever since! That is why I believe he is innocent and those envious of his ill-gotten wealth should just shut their mouths. It says so in the movie, don't you get it? He's the protagonist, he is good! I was just kidding if you believed what I've just said.

"Beat an empty barrel with a handle of a broom, hard as they were able. Boom, boom, boom. With a big umbrella and a handle of a broom, hard as they were able. Boom, boom, boom."

That was a verse I remembered from one of the poems we read during high school. I don't remember the title but I can't forget this verse. Whenever I see stupid acts, this verse always play on my mind. I think that the poem is about monkeys (or is it drunkards?) that had umbrellas and brooms which they hit repeatedly on empty barrels. For me it symbolizes stupidity. And the reason why it is currently playing on my mind is totally beyond my comprehension. Wait! The verse in my mind suddenly changed! It is now playing:

"Beat an empty barrel with a handle of a broom, (STUPID!) hard as they were able. With a big umbrella and a handle of a broom, (STUPID!) hard as they were able."

This is getting freaky (and corny), I'd better stop now.

We've started our technical training today and as usual, the first exam was a charm. I managed to pass our recitation about how e-mail, Internet, FTP, and other network tools work. We were given 6 hours to prepare a documentation about SMTP, POP3, Web servers, ping, whois, nslookup, dig, telnet, etc. And after that, we had a question and answer portion about our research. For the first time in history, I was able to paraphrase all those information I got from the net which I usually cut and paste before. Believe me, I managed to survive college doing that. But here, that'll just won't do. In six hours I was able to explain thoroughly what happens to the email as soon as the user clicks on send. As in really detailed like - "the client send a EHLO command to signal the SMTP server that it is ready to send data" detailed.

Anyway, I've got myself a new objective. Even though I really don't want this job as a customer support engineer, I'll finish this training because of the certificate of completion that they give out. Having that certificate would be like another achievement on my resume. After I get that, I'll transfer somewhere else. I get to train without paying them to teach me. In fact they are the ones that give me money in exchange for my training. But of course, things would be different if they increase my salary really high after I pass this training. I'll probably stay with them - a little more English skills won't hurt. I even think that I'm really getting comfortable speaking in English. I barely stutter now nor do I eat my words anymore. This could be really helpful for me - but the downside of it is that I'm really tired. I really don't look forward to going to work everyday. Now I know why Corrine would probably get a memo for excessive absences.
What I really like about this training is that even if we fail, we'll still get our 10,000 pesos. We won't go on to the next phase of the training but we'll still get to linger at the office and do nothing while waiting for our payday. That'll give us enough time to look for other jobs.

One down, 4 to go. I'm currently under the second phase of our training as a customer support engineer (the 'engineer' in our title really bothers me.) So far so good! Most of the other trainees doesn't even make it through the first phase, so for us, this is already an achievement. And I mean a major achievement. We felt that we've been through hell and back during this week. We've trained for 5 days and I'm already tired to last for the year. Yes, it's that difficult. We've just received our grades this evening and this is what I got:

Exam 1 - 25.20%
Exam 2 - 12.75%
Panel Interview - 20.60%
Overall - 6.45%
Total - 65.00%
Passing is 60%

Which means - I barely made it.

I met a new friend early this evening. Her name is Monina and like us, she's new to the company. She's on her third week already but what really bothered me is that she doesn't look new at all. She's really good at this customer support thing. In fact, she even told me that she started taking actual calls during their third day. The THIRD DAY and she's already at ease taking with foreigners! I'm on my fifth day and my belly still circumvents whenever I hear those little telephone boxes ring. And to think that the calls for me were only test calls! During one of my test calls, Anifa, the girl with the American accent, pretended to be the customer. I greeted her with the usual "Thank you for calling customer support, this is Neil... how may I help you?" and she replied with "Yes, I have an account with y'all." She said it in a deep American voice - not like the ones we hear on movies. Of course, with the help of the slow 'telephone quality' bit-rate, and the interference on the line, what I could make out of what she said was: "AYAVANACAWNTWIDYOL." And I was like:

"Come again?"
"AYAVANACAWNTWIDYOL."
"What?"
"AYAVANACAWNTWIDYOL."
"I'm sorry, but the line seems noisy so I'll have to ask you to speak louder ma'am."
"AYAVANACAWNTWIDYOL."

I was really nervous and I really couldn't stop myself from laughing at my mistake. I made her repeat what she said three times and that was only the first sentence that came out her mouth. Imagine what more when they start babbling about their inquiries or complaints.

"I HAVE AN ACCOUNT." She finally said clearly.

Like Corrine said, it sounded like "I have an account with AOL" and that makes it completely different of course - they must've dialed the wrong number (AOL is our rival ISP.)

Anyway, I'm glad we're through with that. Starting tomorrow, we will be focusing on technical issues. Maybe I'll do better at that - besides, when doing tech support, you'll need to be direct and straight to the point. Unlike in the billing support, a conversation might turn out like this:

ME: "May I know your e-mail address so that I can run some tests on your account?"
THEM: "Sure, that's L for Lima, O for Oscar, oh my, that reminds me, my dog's name is Oscar and I haven't fed him yet. I wonder what's wrong with me, I keep on forgetting a lot of important stuff lately, is it because I'm getting old or is it... blah blah blah..."
ME: *yawn*
THEM: "T, for tango, I repeat that's L-O-U-T, lout at pkfamily.com. My father gave me this nickname and I have been stuck with it ever since.... yada yada yada...."

As an SOP, we should not just cut off our customer while they're talking as a form of respect. We have to try to divert the conversation back on track. We can't just say: "Okay, I only asked for your e-mail account - will you stop it with that stupid story-telling!" Instead we have to go something like this:

"Oh that's a really nice nickname, your father can really choose great names, and your dog seems nice too. Anyway, is there something wrong with your account?"

Meanwhile, at tech support, a conversation would probably sound like this:

ME: "Just right click on the Internet Explorer..."
THEM: "Right click what?"
ME: "Right click on the blue icon on your desktop that spells the letter 'e.'"
THEM: "oh that..."
ME: 'Then choose, properties and then click on the connections tab... blah blah..."

which is a lot easier than having to entertain the caller.

I'm really sleepy now. I have to go work again tomorrow. I really miss updating my site. I'm really sorry that I couldn't do it everyday.

The customer support team is divided into two divisions: the Billing Support and the Technical Support. The people at the Billing Support seems really nice, unlike those that are in the other. Although I haven't been formally introduced to the people at Tech, I think that I'm not going to get along with them well - and unfortunately for me, that's the position I'm training for. In our training for Technical Support, we first must pass the training for the Billing Support. Our first week of training is focused mainly only on the billing system so we had to report to the billing people. Corinne is one of them so it makes working a little less awkward. While on our stay at the Billing support, Katrina will be the one handling us. She's nice and approachable and she does not intend on making our lives miserable. Yesterday, since it was Katrina's day off, we were handled by Iah. I think Iah's position is far more superior than that of Katrina because she gets to sit at the desk. Anyway, Iah is also friendly. Aside from that, she's attractive but she's a little chubby. My fellow trainee Marcos seems to have a hidden desire for her - unlucky for him, she may already be taken by the robust night-shift guy Mark. The tall guy, whose name I didn't get, talks with us a lot to give us tips. He's also friendly and approachable. We even got to listen to him while he took some calls. Brian, another night-shift guy, also gave us a welcoming introduction about our job. We were told that Brian is a little mischievous because he always tease his supervisor, Leah (whom we think is very serious about her job.) Patricia also seems nice, and so does Anifa. Sherwin also seem nice although I think he's not from billing. He just introduced himself to me while he saw me sitting by the stairs as he was having his cigarette break. I think he's cool. He looks like 8 Toleran from Cheese without the dreads and the tattoos and I think he's also in a band. So far, he's the only guy there that sports the real 'rocker' look. Not like those trying-hard-to-be-trashy look, like me. But still, it falls under the same category because most of the other guys there are dressed-to-bar-hop. It's a good thing that we don't have any dress codes. I don't have to wear polos that are tacked-in which emphasizes my humongous beer belly. I get to wear my favorite dirty jeans and over-sized white shirts with holes along the collar.

I was surprised to hear that some people at the web dev are listening to Jars of Clay! Many people do listen to Jars of Clay and not just freaks like me as I've thought. I remember a scene in 'A Walk to Remember' where the black guy teased Shane West's character because he was listening to crap music - which was 'Flood' by Jars of Clay, and I thought - hey, just because they're singing praise the Lord doesn't mean it is crap. Even Mark (Tropang T) listens to gospel music! But of course, he listens to the inaudible ones like Chevell, Pax217, POD, and others I haven't even heard of.

DEMMET! I failed our second test today! Who was it that told me that customer support is easy? I'll have them take our exams and laugh at them as their brains run down their ears. I'm so depressed! How am I supposed to get a salary greater than P12K if I keep on failing our exams!

I started my job two days ago as a customer support engineer trainee. I wonder why we are called engineers? If you look in the dictionary, engineers are defined as people who design and create stuff for the benefit of man. I wonder what are the things that we could create as a customer support engineer. Maybe we're supposed to design the perfect customer.

I'm already tired because we were on mid-shift today so I'll go straight to the point. I'm nervous and at the same time excited for my job. Although I'm still only on my second day, I believe I really have to exert effort if I want to survive my training. Just because it's only customer support doesn't mean it's easy and non-educational. People just stereotyped that because they can't accept the fact that customer support employees are much highly paid than them. I was mislead too. I thought that I could be lazy while earning money as a CSE, but I proved myself wrong. I'm working for Global Technology Solutions that services the clients of Cylynx, a company in the US, that is responsible for handling customer support services of several Internet service providers. Not only should I know how these ISPs work, but I should also know the terms and conditions on having an ISP account. I have to know about the services that our clients, which are the ISPs and web hosts, provide. On our first day of training, we were asked to memorize information about 9 different ISPs. We were asked to memorize all the services that those companies offer and how much they are charging for it. For example, for one client, Shadrach.com, we must memorize that they offer their unlimited Internet access at 56k lines at $17.95 for monthly billing, $53.85 for quarterly, $101.70 for 6 months, etc. etc... Aside from the rates for the ISP, we should also memorize the rates for their web hosting services. We should also must have knowledge about that ISP, we must know how it got started, where it is located, and even who is it's manager. We must also know the rules that they implement, such as refunds, charge backs and all those billing information. And that is only a quarter of the information from a single company - and we were asked to memorize nine ISPs. And we barely even reached the technical part! This morning, my mind is full of crap. And to make things worse, we got to listen to actual calls taking place, and it was very intimidating. In case I haven't told you this, GTS only accepts calls from the US, so all of the callers would be English speaking Americans. To make matters even harder, we couldn't tell them that we're in Manila and that we're not Americans. We must pretend that our office is located at Crystal Rivers, Florida, or on Charlotte, North Carolina, or wherever, depending on the company. They said if they asked for the location of our office, we should just tell them that we just moved there and we forgot how to get there.

We got to listen to a call taken by Anifa (I don't know how her name is spelled) and she has a very good command of the English dialect. She even has an accent. She can do normal English, country English, and even Indian English - Halu! Top that Popoy. Even the men have beautiful accents. They sound very... American - and I envy them. But they said that we shouldn't get intimidated. We'll eventually grow into it. Besides, they said that once you get the hang of it, it becomes fun.




Call Center Spoofs

Everyone makes a mistake but they told us to avoid making mistakes like these:

CSE: "Can I hold you for a minute?" Putting the client on hold.
Client: "You can hold me forever!"
Hehe... you don't have to hold your clients just to make them stay on the line.

CSE: "How can I do you?"
Client: "I think we're done."
Hehe... nice try! Since our ISPs are Christian ISPs, you can probably do you client missionary style.


* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

I also ran my journals on Textpad's Spelling checker recently. I just found out that TextPad has such functions and now I can fire my typist. And I also found out that Elvin was right, my site contains thousands of typos. Hehe... most of the mistakes were only typographical, promise... you have to believe me - or perhaps I intentionally misspelled some words... hehe....


* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

I can't seem to establish a connection to the net! DEMMET! Do they have customer support lines for this?

Which 'Friend' are you? I once saw a survey about which character you are most sympathetic with from the TV show 'Friends.' Are you Chandler, Joey, Monica, Phoebe, Rachel or Ross? Well, if you want my answer, I'm neither of them! I'd drop dead if you ever saw me making faces like those Chandler do, I don't try to look stupid like Joey just to get people to laugh, and I'm not as clueless and pathetic as Ross. The girls also didn't do well on my plausibility test. If I were as organized as Monica, I'd be filthy rich by now. If I were as appealing and confident as Rachel, I'd currently be in a happy relationship. If I were as carefree as Phoebe, I'd be in Belize, or Ibiza, or somewhere I wouldn't even care to know the name of. I believe I'm very extraordinary. And I believe I'm watching too much TV. Anyway, since I'm in the topic of finding myself in fictitious characters, I'll tell you who I'm like. I'm Deputy Dewey in the Scream trilogy. I'm Michael (the fat guy) on the Blair Witch Project. I'm Kaplan (the computer whiz) on Resident Evil. I'm Biscuit on Ally McBeal. I'm Samwise Gungee on the Lord of the Rings. These are only a few of the characters that I'm sympathetic with. Their greatest common denominator... they're all clumsy scardy-cats (and the women they star with seems to always outlive them.) To put it in another perspective, they are the only plausible characters (depending of course on their position on the movie.) That is how I feel I'd react if I were in their place and I probably, like them, won't hide it even if others see it weird. Plus, they do not hog the spotlight. Sure they have their little share in the limelight but that's it. I need attention too but I try not to overdo it - but that is beyond the point. What I'm saying is that in every movie or TV show, I always sympathize with the unique and clumsy characters because that's what I really am.

At last, for almost three days, I finally had the time to surf the net and write my journal again. I've been very busy reporting to the office where I'll be working at so I wasn't even able to visit my site's guest book. I had to go to the office almost everyday to undergo their screening. I had three successive interviews, none of which were easy - to think that I wasn't really interested at the job in the first place. I only got myself involved with this when Popoy, Oliver and I decided to look for a sideline while waiting for the right job. In fact, I didn't even want to work yet. I have only been vacant for a month after school was out and I planned on having a very long rest. I wasn't even vacant in that said month that I was supposedly resting. I was helping around in our family business because my father suffered from a mild heart attack that rendered him incapable of performing his regular duties. I don't even know what job to consider in passing my resume. The only reason why I agreed to join our job hunt is probably my dire need of cash. I needed lots of money because I wasn't able to keep track of all the expenses I've made this summer. I was using my parent's credit card and money wasn't needed up front so I overspent a little. I bought stuff knowing that I can still pay for it. And when the time for the payment of the bills arrived, I couldn't remember what I was thinking when I bought all those useless stuff. My allowance during my resting period just vanished into thin air and left me buried with debts. I bought more than I could pay and I needed money fast. That is why I eventually landed on this job.
At first, I liked the idea of having a job, even if the salary is small. Then, I changed my mind because I needed to rest more and I still have a list of things to study. In fact, my last entry in this journal was about the withdrawal of my application for this certain job. Then I was persuaded onto changing my mind again. And again, and again. I know that I've been changing my mind a lot recently but this time, I'm going to stick to my decision. I'm going to accept the job offered to me. Besides, the salary is not that low. After a training of two months, our salaries will rocket sky high depending on the results of our evaluation. And even if you did not do good on your evaluation, you'll still have a five-figure salary.
Now that I've survived their screening, I've decided that I should go on with it. After making me extremely nervous and uncomfortable during my three interviews (one of which is in front of a panel), I'm not going to turn down their offer. I've also made some new friends while I was going through that process and I think I'll get along with them pretty well once we are all working. Besides, one of my primary reasons for applying for this job is the further enhancement of my English speaking skills, which I believe is a very important necessity for professional engineers.
Anyway, I'll be starting my training Wednesday next week. I hope that everything turns out well.

I'm so angry and miserable. As if I didn't suffer enough in college, I have to suffer even more while having my supposed last days of vacation. Literally, I'm the ONLY capable person in our house. If I died today, our family won't survive. Being the eldest son of an immobile vegetable, I'm the only one who can drive, I'm the only one who knows anything about computers, I'm the only one who can do electrical stuff, I'm the only one who can replace those GODDAMNED burnt-out light bulbs, I'm the only one who can reach high places, I'm the only one who can lift heavy things, I'm the only one who can fix broken appliances, I'm the only one who can operate that stupid universal remote control, I'm the only one who knows how soldering irons work, I'm the only one who has to get involved in our family business, I'm the only one who everybody can boss around to do simple errands, in short, I'm the most useful member of our family - and I'm really getting tired of it because I'm not getting any compensation for it. I'd rather be working at an office and earning my own money already than be a slave in our house. I'm glad that I accepted that job. Now I can be lazy while earning money at the same time. And if anytime now, somebody knocks on my door just to ask me to put the 'sampaguita' on the figurine of Jesus on our hallway, I'll definitely yell at them. Haven't they ever thought of using a chair or a stool to reach high places. "Yes, you can do that - so don't bother me anymore! I'm not superman you know."

Sorry for not updating the site these past few days. I've been incredibly busy applying for a job (which I've finally decided to withdraw my application from.) The company is a call center and despite the fact that Trade Undersecretary Gregory Domingo commented that Philippine call centers are world class, (Philippine Star, July 7, 2002) I've still decided that I'm not cut out as a customer support team member. I'm supposed to have my second interview today but I'm totally freaked out! My job requires me to speak fluently in English for most of the company's customers are foreigners. In order to get the job, I'll have to pass 3 interviews, one of which is a panel interview where several criticizing eyes would be piercing my body. I don't want to exhaust myself in something I'm really not interested in. I asked my interviewer yesterday if transferring departments is possible, (I'd like to get transferred to their webdev department) but she told me that for the mean time - no.

I met Kuya She at Mega Mall the other day. He's currently working at Don Bosco as a Systems Engineer. He told me that most of the Kuya group works at Lynksys. He told me that I should try it out sometime. They give an allowance of ten thousand pesos and once you get regularized, they'd raised your pay EXPONENTIALLY! Hehe... just kidding. They'll just raise your pay once you get regularized, just like the one I'm applying for right now. For a while, I was tempted by what She told me. At least the environment at Lynksys, I believe, is homely because of the familiar faces there, but then again, I'd rather exert effort on something I'm really interested in. If by the end of July, I still haven't found a job that meets my requirements and I've ran out of pocket money, I'll take anything that's available. That means, I'll have two weeks to find a good job opportunity.

I brought Assunta and Rica to my bed and they can't seem to stop playing with each other. I tried to stop them because they were distracting me a lot but they bit me in protest. "Hey! no bitting. Keep your teeth to yourselves." I yelled at them.
Ming (Na Wen), our cat, just gave birth to two kittens a week ago. And for some unknown reasons, they were named Assunta and Rica. I hope we could think of other names as soon as possible, I'd hate it if those names became official. Besides, I prefer calling them Heart and Barbie. Hehe...

I'm not really in the mood for writing essays, updating web content, or watch TV shows.

Which of the following underlined words makes the sentence wrong?

What number follows these set of numbers?
0 1 1 2 3 5 8 _

necklace....$46
earrings......$4
watch.........$10
chain..........$6
ring............$__

How much does the ring cost?

A man has $2.10 worth of dimes and nickels. He has 3 dimes more than the nickels. How many dimes and nickels does he have?

If you were able to answer these questions, good for you. These are just like the ones that I was able to remember after I took the application test yesterday. Most of the other questions went by my brain and just disappeared without a trace. Maybe in my sleep, I'd just utter unknown vocabulary words such as specious, uh.. trite, uh.., uh.. and those others.. hey, I didn't even know such words existed. Maybe if Herb visits my site, I'll ask him if they ever use words like uh... robust, or ominous, or mitigate in their common dialogue in the US.

"Hey, you look robust today. Mitigate your training a little, you're looking ominous."

Three strikes and you're out!

Four people went job hunting this morning at Makati. Their objective is simple - that is to give their resume to the HR department or Front Desk of several companies. Their time limit: 3 hours. The obstacle: it's raining really hard, as in really really HARD! And the catch: a very satisfying job.

As the MRT trailer screeches to a halt, the green light flashes, and the flags go up.

"Survivors... GO!"

And they're off! You can hear their newly polished shoes squeak as it hit the wet paved road. Neil, Popoy and Elvin are in the lead at the first lap having given 1 resume. It looks like Oliver is having technical difficulties. He seems to be missing staple wires, but he quickly regained his pace as he went for the pit stop. Since one of the stop-points is unavailable, they will have to take a detour.
What a great show of wit and agility! They were able to complete the round safe and sound. Now for the next round. They are off to the next stop and the rain gets heavier and heavier. Their clothes seems to be gaining weight as it accumulates rain water. Not to mention their shoes that are getting soggy and squishy with every step they make. It seems that the racers are hitting the toll because they are slowing down a little. The enthusiasm they had when they started the race was swept by the rain down the sewer. But against the odds, It seems that they all are going to make it to the next round. Popoy and Neil scored another point and so did Oliver tying him up with Elvin at one point.
Now the rain gets more furious! At the pit stop, the racers take their time as they try to come up with a very important decision. Should they continue the race and risk their lives running the slippery streets of Makati? Or should call the race off and compete on another day?
Ladies and Gentlemen, it seems that the racers have casted their votes. And it's.... No! They've decided to call it a day! I'm sorry folks, but that is the ways it is. Our racers have decided to rest at Glorietta and call it a tie.
But wait! It seems that the show isn't over yet! As they crossed a wet street, Neil decided to perform a 'Double Foot Twist, Hands up, Belly Flop' with a difficulty level of -2.5. And he does it! The crowd goes wild! What a show!
And now the fully recovered Neil brushes the dirt off from his pants and walks-on as if he didn't perform that outstanding exhibition. Strike One for Neil!
After that spectacular event, the racers now rests at the fabulous stairs sponsored by Glorietta. It's time for a break.

"This show is sponsored by Mandarin Express"
"Dalawang Ulam, P45 lang!"

Welcome back viewers, after that long rest, the racers are up again. This time, They are heading back to Shaw Boulevard. The racers are now facing the obstacles of the MRT. Popoy is head to head with a lot of people as he tries to get the precious MRT tickets. With his skills and superb patience, Popoy graced the line and gets the ticket from the sales clerk. Good Job Popoy! And now, as they entered the track... what's this!? Neil is being distracted by a loud beep coming from his celphone! And... NO! He forgets to take his MRT ticket from the swiping machine. Strike Two for Neil. This calls for a time-out.

"This time-out is brought to you by:"
"The MRT!"
"P70 per lost ticket!"

Oh no! Neil lost his ticket so he has got to go get another set of tickets. And he's off! With his excellent display of agility, he got new tickets in no time and went down the stairs to the MRT. But look at the MRT! It's starting to depart! The racers are now running towards the sliding doors and Elvin got in first, putting him at first place, Oliver comes in second and the doors are beginning to close. Hurry up racers, the guard is already blowing the whistle! With a quick sprint, Popoy barely escaped the clutches of the sliding doors, making him the last person to enter the MRT. It looks like Neil didn't make it... I'm sorry Neil but strike Three, you're out!

I'm sorry Neil but you'll have to bring me your torch. Fate has spoken... You are asked to leave the council at once.

Neil: "This game has changed me, it seems that I've lost my self-esteem, I couldn't go back like this, You barely even know me..."

"Bosing, kukuha ako ng isang kaha ng Coke litro."
"Kolk?"
"Oo, Coke."
"Kolk?"
"Coke."

I fell in line at the cashier of our local convenience store to pay for the case of Coca-Cola. We don't buy our soft drinks per bottle, we buy them in cases at a weekly interval. It's cheaper that way. In that certain convenience store, we would leave the empty bottles at the guard, pay the bill inside the store, and wait for the items to be brought out of their warehouse. I've been buying there for almost 3 months now and the guard always assists me and tells me what to do. The guard there already knows me by face and as soon as he sees me, we just follow our routine. I leave the empty bottles at the door, he hands me a bill, and I pay at the cashier. Even the cashiers there know my routine. But today was different. A new guard stationed at the door gave me the bill.
"Boy, patingin ulit nung papel." he took the bill from me while I was in the line. Then he scribbled something on the piece of paper and returned it to me. I looked at it and saw that he stroke out 'Pepsi' and wrote 'Coke' above it. Didn't I already told him that?
I handed the cashier the bill and my payment. Then the cashier asked me: "Malamig? Hindi naman malamig binibili mo dati a?" "Hindi nga." I answered her. Our convenience store is weird, they charge extra for refrigerated items. Cold Coke is more expensive than warm Coke. "Cold nakalagay dito a. Guard, baguhin mo to. Mag-aabono tayo nyan."

"E ma'am, sabi nya malamig daw!" The guard objected.
"Hindi a." I replied.
"Oo e." he rebutted.

I specifically did not remember saying 'malamig' so I had the bill changed and payed the ordinary fare. Then as I left the convenience store, I remembered our little conversation,

'Kolk?'
'Oo, Coke.'
'Kolk?'
'Coke.'

Aaaaa... so that was it! Want to have some kolk kolk?

I went to school this morning to get my transcript, diploma and etc. My mother scolded me because it took her 4 hours just to get me out of my bed. I left home around 11:15 am, feeling drowsy with my lack of sleep and my upcoming cold. Nothing unusual happened on my way to school and I arrived around 12:00. Lunch Break.
I walked around looking for a familiar face, then I saw Roel exit Amici. He asked me if I've decided to be a teacher in our school, and I retorted with a firm 'NO.' He told me that Bong was at the Didacta, the CoE's faculty room. He said that he's a serious teacher - "Black is black, White is white... Walang kaibi-kaibigan." That's good he said, even if he scolded him and Jack once for making excessive noise.
I went up to the Didacta to check if Bong was there. I found Mr. Llorente instead. I really like that teacher bacause he always calls me by my first name. I asked him if Bong was around and he said that Bong was out for lunch. I'm not really used to talking with my instructors so I felt uncomfortable while thinking of a topic for conversation. My brain is a little anti-social so I just asked him how the CoE department was. "Fine, just as always." he said. But with the advent of the IT course, computer literate students were further divided into two groups. IT has garnered almost three sections he said, leaving only two sections for the CoE. Al-righty then. I just made up an excuse so that I can walk the other direction.
Then I heard Randel calling out to me. I walked towards him and as I reached the Student Council Office, the irritating Ilor Lescano got my attention and called me 'Elvin.' How many times do I have to tell him that I'm Neil, not Elvin! But who cares, I just passed by him and went to Randel. Randel was supposed to be our batch-mate but he had to stop for a year due to some reasons. He's now a graduating student facing the same problems we faced last year. He had also nothing to do so we lingered for a while in front of the SAC office. As I've anticipated, our conversation was about Bong being a teacher. He said that Bong is now one of the Jolliboys. Our CoE faculty members always eat at Jollibee at MP during lunch time. I had a first hand experience with that because I once worked for them as an on-the-job trainee. Randel is fun to talk with. We barely get to see each other so every time we meet, we have a lot of things to talk about.
After a few minutes, there they were, the Jollibee boys, walking towards the stairs to Didacta. I called Bong's attention and for respect, I greeted Mr. Barcenas who was walking with him. He returned to me a 'this-is-only-for-formality' nod. Okay, I know that the term there is 'plastic,' we're both good at it.
The other teachers walked on and Bong remained to talk with us. He said that it gets a little lonely at school when you go to places where we used to hang out. We've gotten used to seeing familiar faces everywhere we looked but now, no one is there. Now I know how it feels like to be an irregular student.
Bong's next class is at 12:30 and the registrar's office, which was my destination, will not open until 1:00. So, he invited me to 'sit-in' on one of his classes. It was a new subject called 'Coetech' for the first year students. That day, they were going to install Red Hat Linux. Dammit! We did that only last semester! I had a hard time sitting-in because I didn't know how to act around the class. Of course, I had to treat Bong as a professional so that his students would respect him. I'm not used to that so I just went out to do whatever I went there for.
But first, I decided to eat at Amici. I bumped onto Boogie along the way and just like Randel, we barely see each other so we had a lot to talk about. I ate the not-so-cheap spaghetti and he ate the very expensive rice meals. We were classmates during high school so Bong wasn't our only topic for conversation. He also learned that Medel's father had just recently died. Medel is a former classmate and one of Blue Arden's friends. Boogie said that he also did not attend the wake because he was afraid of Medel's appearance. Medel is a cross-dresser now.
Carpio then arrived to sit with us. He's also one of my classmates in high school. I was really awkward because I forgot Carpio's first name, and to think that he used to be one of my closest friends in high school. Anyway, I told them that I've got to get my clearance signed so I have to get going.
The process of collecting signatures was a breeze. I could have done it faster if Mr. Silvano did not stall me. As I asked him to sign the form, he said that he doesn't feel like signing the form and he wants me to sing for him to sign it. Or five-hundred pesos would do, he added. Then he asked me why I did this process so late, he was curious and he asked if I have a job already. I told him the truth and he was really surprised. Why just now? Well, I told him that my father suffered a mild heart attack so I had to delay everything. That was partly true. My father really did have a mild heart attack but that wasn't the reason why I haven't got a job yet.
After acquiring all the signatures needed for my form, I returned it to one of the registrar's assistant and she told me that I have to go back after one week. Now all my plans are ruined. If I had my TOR today, I can go job hunting on Thursday as planned. Disappointed, I went back to Bong's class.
The Linux installation was almost finished. They were at the process of copying the files so they have nothing to do for a very long time. That is when I had a conversation with Bong. He told me that our class should get together sometime before we totally go our separate ways. He proposed to go to Libis. Of course, I objected because I haven't got a job yet and I haven't got money. I suggested that those who already have jobs should treat the less fortunate classmates. Then we agreed that Francis would be the one to pay first. I wonder how much money the school will give Bong. He said that he also doesn't know yet. He has not signed a contract with the school and he had just received his time card. What the school gave him for his services last month was a measly allowance for food and transportation, not 17 thousand as I've heard. Anyway, on the 15th, he'll get his first paycheck. I'm sure that it's not lower that 15 thousand pesos.
It was already 3:45 and his class should have ended at 3:30. He also told me that his next class was at 3:30. Bong already has a reputation of 'the teacher who would consume all the time available.'
To my suprise, Mede (Potpot), barged in on Bong's class. He and Bong are not that close so I was wondering what he was doing there. He said that he heard that I was there and he probably came to pester me. Mede is always fast in getting news. Almost everyone on my class know that. He'd get news faster than the actual people concerned. I think he's psychic. As always, upon meeting me, he would trash my poor cell phone and he'd insult me by making me realize that I'm wasting my life. He said that I should get a job already. Hey, it's only been a month since graduation! I don't want to commit to a job I don't like. Then, as usual, he'd make a scandal. He said out loud that no one in that classroom was able to finish the simple task that Bong asked them to do. A group of students became conscious and tried to finish their task, further extending their class to 4:00. Then, as we were about to leave, rain poured really hard. Mede said that he could have been at his house already if it wasn't for me. Worse still, he made Kim wait for him downstairs and now both of them can't go home. Okay, blame me.
Bong asked us to sit-in on his next class which was Circuits 1, but we decided not to. Kim called my name out loud as he saw me go down the stairs with Mede. He was with Boogie and Jucutan. Jucutan is an intelligent lower year student as told to me by Elvin and Popoy. I get to talk to Jucutan more often when I'm at Don Bosco because he's one of the few familiar faces left there. Also, Ryan Magsumbol and Rica saw me, and as if on instinct, they shouted out loud 'TIIIIM DUNCAAAN!' in an impression of an NBA announcer.
I sat at the table were Kim and Boogie sat. Then Kim asked me to teach him Java. Kim always asks help from me regarding programming languages. I used to teach him Turbo C and Assembly Language programming but unfortunately, this time, I can't offer my services because I only know a little about Java. I felt guilty because I know that he thinks that I was lying just to avoid teaching him. He knows that he's not the fastest learner and maybe he thinks that that irritates me. But that's not it. I really don't know Java and I'm really lazy to review what I know. Afterwards, another conversation about Bong surfaced. Don't worry Bong, nothing bad was said behind your back.
The rain was still pouring hard so we can't leave the campus yet. Kim and Mede decided to eat and they took me along with them. I didn't eat because I have no money left. All of my money went to the processing fees which I had to pay the registrar. I kept myself busy while they were eating by texting Aris about my video card. I had to get it ASAP. Unfortunately, he won't be home until 8:00 pm so I told him to don't mind it.
The rain subdued and we decided to get going before it rains again. Mede stayed at Amici and Kim and I disturbed Bong's class just to tell him that we were leaving. Mede remained at Amici, Bong was teaching Circuits 1, Jucutan was with the guy who wears formal clothes, Kim went to Pasig to report to his girlfriend, and I went home.
Behold, a tiring day in the life of a squid.

I had nothing to do so I decided to tie-dye one of my shirts. I took out the cream 'camisa de chino' I bought from Bong and I experimented on it. I cut of the sleeves halfway and I removed to buttons. Then I decided to dye it yellow. Unfortunately I only had two packets of yellow dye and now I know that it wasn't sufficient to make a bright yellow color. The result of my experiment is a worn-out yellow shirt. Tomorrow, I'll dye it orange. I wonder what will happen.
I mailed my resume with a cover letter to Trend Micro this morning. It is composed of only a single page containing my 'so-called' achievements. I'm really getting bored here. Elvin called me this afternoon and thanks to him I've set up my schedule. Tomorrow I'll get my transcript of records. Then the next day, I'll get my SSS and TIN numbers. And on Thursday, we'll go to Ortigas Center and scout the area for good job opportunities.
I think I'm really going to be sick. I promised myself to sleep early this evening. And just to make sure that my cold doesn't get worse, I drank two tablets of vitamin C, a multivitamin, and a paracetamol. Now my cold won't get worse, I'll just die of drug overdose instead.
Also, I scanned most of the CoEB pictures I have here. It took me the whole afternoon just to configure the correct setting of the scanner. As I looked at the pictures that I've scanned, I got lonely again. I'm not usually like this, I'm never sentimental, until today. Maybe it comes with age. Or maybe I just had the time think about it unlike before. Because of that, I wasn't in the mood to talk this afternoon. My conversations with Alben, Elvin and Corinne were very much straight to the point and I just focused on uploading the files I've scanned.
I get it! Maybe it's all because of the drugs. Yes, that's it. Thirteen miles on Thirty-one, I'm flying!

I think I'm coming up with a cold. My eyes are sore, I've got a runny nose and my head feels heavy. Maybe it is because of my bad sleeping habits. My body's resistance seems to be on it's lowest peak today.
Anyway, I'm happy because I got the chance to reminisce. I checked my e-mail earlier and I received sets of pictures from Bong. It was our class' pictures taken at several locations of our school. Some of it were even dated a very long time ago, you can see by the way some of my classmates looked.
I miss those days. My favorite time was the 2nd semester of our third year. That is when we first got to know everyone better. I remember going to the DBTC Hall were we tried to learn how to play table tennis (I tried, they learned). I also remember the times we went out to play billiards. Bong, Prince, and I usually play at Tropical and when we started playing with our other classmates, we discovered other places such as Manhattan at Shang-rila, Amor, the MP Bowling Lanes, Lester's at Kalentong, Hard 9 at Shaw, Sure Shot at Sta. Lucia, and others. Of course the professionals have seen more.
I'll surely miss the times we drank at MP's Food Court. There were lots of several unforgettable events that sprang from drinking liquor at MP. Art got to say profanity in front of the dean, we got to tease or history teacher, we got to meet gremlins and wrestlers, and most of all, some of us got to sang the night away at the videoke.
There were a lot of pleasant things that happened during my stay at Don Bosco. I just can't believe that it is all over now. I guess I'll just have to move on then.

I was updating the site the whole day. Nothing big really happened (as always). Corinne called me earlier and we had a talk about jobs and careers. I think I'll be looking for a job anytime this week. I think I'm already ready. I think maybe she is right about passing my resume early so that companies can have it processed. And by the time they have analyzed my resume for interview, I just might be ready. Or maybe if I really want a job ASAP, I'll just accuse someone at the Inquirer of plagiarism so that I can have his position. Hehe... sound familiar?
I've been seeing Reese Witherspoon a lot these past few days. Only on television of course, her husband Ryan whats-his-face might get jealous. I've seen her in the movie 'Election' and 'Little Nicky'. In 'Election,' she plays a very irritating ambitious perfectionist. She acted great because I was really irritated at her. What bothered me was the fact that there are really people like her character in real life, and I've met them. In fact, I might have been like them sometimes (attitude is very contagious, you know). I wasn't only pertaining to the scenario in the movie, I'm pertaining to everything, from school work, to job hunting, to everything. There are people that do anything just to get what they want, even stepping on the people around them.
But... I'm not in the mood to get mad this time. I'm currently listening to my compilation of Jars of Clay sounds and I'm feeling spiritual at the moment. Anyway, Karma will give them whatever they deserve.

"Soaring on the wings of selfish pride, I flew too high and like Icarus I collide with the world I tried so hard to leave behind me."

- Worlds Apart, Jars of Clay

This was playing on my background as I was writing this article. Coincidence? Relevance? WELL, there is! Simple, you reap what you sow.

Grrrrr! It seems that my day wouldn't get any worse! Freeserver.com, my current host, does not allow large files to be uploaded. I planned on posting an MP3 of the Week column on my music page (Prince's idea) but my host wouldn't allow it! I'm going to give it one more try and if it doesn't work, it doesn't. Besides, I'm using PLDT VIBE so every single second is important.

I was studying DHTML and Javascript around dawn earlier. I cannot connect to the Internet because I had no more free ISP accounts. My last resort was the PLDT vibe but the service isn't really that great. Or Maybe I was just unlucky? It took me a hundred tries just to connect to the net and once connected, the line seems dead. I'm not receiving data and the page keep on displaying the "Cannot display page" error. I disconnected and tried it once more. I did not have the intention of wasting my life waiting to be connected so I opened up a folder of tutorials I have stored in my computer. Since I was trying to build this site, I looked for something relevant. I saw a folder containing tutorials about DHTML and I wondered what on earth it was (and why did I have a copy of it?) Well, the tutorial focused on creating cascaded style sheets which means if I have to implement it, I'll have to edit my entire site. Dumb Luck.
I really had to surf the net and I've still got stuff to post on my site. The tone emitted by the modem got more and more irritating by the minute as it clicks on and off-hook.
Audiogalaxy was shut down just this week. I've still got a lot of songs on cue and now they're all gone...

I didn't watch a movie as I've planned yesterday. Instead, I've spent the whole day watching cartoons. I was supposed to go out this evening but it rained hard so I just decided to watch the HBO Saturday movie premiere. Unfortunately, 'Get Carter' was on. I'm not a Sylvester Stallone fan so I didn't even last the first five minutes of the movie.
I should have been at the 'Fete de la Musique' at El Pueblo by now. My sister's already there with her boyfriend - they're probably at a bar with ethnic music like 'Grace Nono' or 'Pinikpikan'. The last time we attended the 'Fete de la Musique' was when it was held at the Fort. I wonder what ever happened to the Fort? I've heard that they've closed it already. I'm not a clubbing person so I'm not updated with these stuff. I only go to bars when there are rock bands present.
My little brother has beaten me to the Internet again. I didn't set up our Internet connection sharing so I have to wait for him to finish whatever he is doing before I can connect to the web. Last time I checked, he's at the #paulinian IRC chatroom. I think it's going to take longer than I expected. Hehe... He has just finished high school and he knows more girls than me.
I think I'll watch 'CSI' first, I have nothing to do anyway.

Well, I haven't updated the contents of this site since yesterday. I planned on scanning some pictures for the CoEB Prophecies but I was distracted a lot and I wasn't able to do so.
I always wake up late ever since school was out - usually around 1:00 to 2:00 in the afternoon. By the time I wake up, I have cramps all over my body from oversleeping. I think my body is retaliating because I'm always subjecting it to torture. I've been eating a lot since I have nothing to do, I'm always sitting in front of the computer, and I'm always oversleeping. Don't be surprised if you see me all bloated up. It is a good thing that our food supply is diminishing, that means I'll have to get out of my room, walk outside and buy food.
Tomorrow I'll go out and watch a movie so that my body fats won't get super-saturated. Maybe I'll watch Scooby-doo or Sum of All Fears. I haven't checked the papers yet for the latest listings of movies, is there something else showing? I'm kind of in a mood for a suspense film. But not like the slasher films shown in Star Movies. One day I saw this movie "Do You Want To Know a Secret?" and afterwards, I said to myself, I'm never going to watch movies of this genre again! But I did anyway... I saw "Urban Legends: Final Cut" on HBO and I've noticed that these movies are all the same. If you've watched a lot of slasher films, you can get the characters of one film mixed up with another. There's a goofy rookie cop, a slutty best friend, a goody-two-shoes protagonist, a mysterious boyfriend... Hey! A thought just crossed my mind, the protagonist is always a girl! Why don't they make a slasher movie with a guy lead instead. I imagined that he'd be screaming a lot.
Anyway, I'm hungry... I'm going to get some food now... and oh, rot in hell Abu Sabaya!