Friday, October 22, 2010

Another Poem!

The following is the last poem I had written in college. It came about during a low point in my life (or rather, what I thought was the lowest point at the time), and I had written it to express exactly what I was feeling without actually saying what was going on. When I finished, I said to myself that this piece, though complete in itself, cannot end just as it is; it must have a 'sequel', especially since it ends on a dour note. However, it's been over ten years since that time, and I've yet to write that final, uplifting conclusion. Not that I haven't tried, mind you... its just that I've not been able to connect with a feeling or emotion that could complement the one found in this piece. Ah well... some other time, perhaps. Until then, do read on and tell me what you think:


My Story of 'Hope'

When I was a young boy, Hope sprang in me true
And inspired me to fly into the sky blue.
But when I first tried on that clear summer’s day
I just came crashing down, all to my dismay!
I said to myself, “I failed, but I’ll cope
One day I will fly as long as I’ve Hope.”
I was up the next morn all cheery and bright
Wond’ring if today I will reach the sun’s light.
Looking behind me, I brushed all doubts aside:
Hope gave me wings so the wind I can ride!
But despite my new gifts I still couldn’t fly;
Upon hitting the ground I gave a pained cry.
Nevertheless, Hope made my spirit strong.
“I will touch the sky! That is where I belong!!”
And thus, everyday, I continued my quest
Never relenting, always trying my best.

The days turned to weeks, the months into years
Yet I’ve nothing to show for my effort but tears
Because both my wings are now tattered and torn,
My feathers so shabby, my spirit forlorn.
What happened, you ask? Well, it took quite a while
But now I see why my hard work proved futile:
Each time I failed I’d get up and keep trying
Unaware that Hope within me was dying
For each time I climbed up higher and farther
I’d fall to the ground much faster and harder.
Hope can get hurt, and whenever I fell
I gave it a wound I could never make well.
And now Hope has died… I’ve given up trying
I have thrown away all my dreams of flying.
If each time I fly I know I will fall,
Just crash and get hurt, then why try at all?


Monday, October 18, 2010

Christmas... in September?? Madness!!

Can anyone out there explain this to me: what is with the Christmas songs being played in the malls and over the radio… in SEPTEMBER?? Halloween isn’t even around the corner, yet “I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus” and “Christmas in our Hearts” can suddenly be heard almost everywhere. And take note that this phenomenon is unique to the Philippines and nowhere else; our country holds the distinction of celebrating the world's longest Christmas season. Many websites, Wikipedia included, attest to this. But none of them answer that most important of questions: WHY?

Why have Filipinos stretched a holiday season, which officially begins on December 16 and ends on the first Sunday of January (about 3 weeks), to last up to 5 months?? What exactly is the logic of associating every month that ends in –ber with snow, presents and Santa Claus?? Oh wait, don’t tell me… it’s BRR, not BER. Cause it’s supposed to be cold. Veeeeery fuuuuuunny, ha ha ha… :p

If you ask me, this reeks of holiday marketing. Obviously, sales are up for nearly every potential gift item available because of the Christmas season, and of course malls and their tenants would like to capitalize on this and squeeze their customers for all their worth. Thing is, it will be Rudolph and his North Pole pals who will be doing the squeezing, as mall display windows all over the country will have reindeer, Santa and his elves pressing their smiling faces against the glass, virtually inviting kids (and by extension, their loving but unwitting parents) to come in and purchase one holiday trinket… or ten. I’m sure that, back in the days when Philippine Christmases only lasted one month, these marketing folks would get together after the holidays, and as they discussed/bragged about how much they made from this year’s holiday sales, one of them suddenly wondered aloud “why can’t we have more days like this?”, and the others around him would say “hey yeah, that’s a good idea, let’s do that”. And ever since then, malls began playing holiday jingles a week earlier each year, thereby getting the unknowing shoppers in the mood for some holiday shopping, until finally we’re arrived at this point: “Jingle Bells” before “Trick or Treat”!!

Of course, the media are in on it as well, and so we are bombarded with “I’m Dreaming of a White Christmas” in our cars and in our homes well before Oktoberfest. And as we listen to the music and reminisce on all the lovely holiday memories we have, we begin to wonder, at the back of our minds, “maybe now would be a good time to do some holiday shopping for my Christmas list”. Ho-ho-ho… and no, that’s not Santa, but your ‘friendly-neighborhood’ sales & marketing team at the local mall enjoying the fruits of your labor through the purchases you made months before December 25, all because you heard some Puerto Rican singing “Feliz Navidad” while you were driving to work this morning. Ho-ho-ho, indeed…

Then again, maybe it’s not actually that simple. I might be mistaken in pointing to malls and sales personnel as being the sole culprits for this ‘Christmas in September’ madness. Maybe… maybe the customers are to blame for this. Yeah, maybe regular Filipino folk like you and me brought this all about. With all the bad news that greets us every morning as we pick up the paper and read the headlines, perhaps we’re just longing for anything, even some old overplayed song, to remind us that there is still some good news to look forward to. Or perhaps it’s because of the conditions we live in, our country being 3rd world and all, that we as a people clamor for those times and feelings that we associate with joyfulness and hope. And what other regular annual event is able to bring our country together with such hope, positivity and love?

As an adult, I will admit that Christmas no longer stirs within me those warm feelings of anticipation and excitement that it used to back in my childhood, and I know for a fact that I share this sentiment with many of my peers. (Well okay, it still does on occasion, but never as it did back in the day.) But I still look forward to it. I still think it is a joyous time that should be spent with loved ones, and I do admit to being addicted to that feeling I get every time I wake up on Christmas morning. And perhaps that is all that this ‘madness’ is: an attempt to extend the warmth that is in abundance in almost every Filipino home on Christmas day. By listening to all these holiday songs months before the holiday itself, we are able to recall and relive those wonderful feelings again and again, and by so doing are able to get through the day with a more positive atmosphere about us. Positive attitudes being infectious, it is highly likely that your upbeat manner could inspire others to behave in a similarly optimistic fashion.

And now that I think about it, what’s wrong with that?

^_^


The following are the lyrics to a song featured in the 1978 special “Christmas Eve on Sesame Street”. It is a wonderful song that expresses the importance of keeping the Christmas feeling of warmth and goodwill towards others with you every day, even beyond the holiday season. Click on the title to watch the video.


KEEP CHRISTMAS WITH YOU ALL THROUGH THE YEAR
From the TV show "Sesame Street"

When Christmas time is over and presents put away, don't be sad
There'll be so much to treasure about this Christmas day and the fun we've had
So many happy feelings to celebrate with you
And, oh, the good times hurry by so fast.
But even when it's over there's something you can do to make Christmas last:

Keep Christmas with you
All through the year,
When Christmas is over,
You can keep it near.
Think of this Christmas day
When Christmas is far away.

Keep Christmas with you
All through the year,
When Christmas is over,
Save some Christmas cheer.
These precious moments,
Hold them very dear
And keep Christmas with you
All through the year.

Christmas means the spirit of giving
Peace and joy to you,
The goodness of loving,
The gladness of living;
These are Christmas too.

So, keep Christmas with you
All through the year,
When Christmas is over,
Save some Christmas cheer.
These precious moments,
Hold them very dear
And keep Christmas with you
All through the year.


Friday, October 15, 2010

Contest Time!

We interrupt this weblog to bring you this special news bulletin:



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Tuesday, October 12, 2010

I was a poet, bet you din't know it!

The following is a poem I wrote back in my college days, about a girl whose name I truly never learned. Yes, I used to write poems, strange as it may sound! It was mostly to pass the time away while I was stuck in my apartment room with nothing to do and nowhere to go, but also I found it to be a pleasant outlet for pent up feelings I couldn't normally express otherwise. Nowadays there are too many distractions for me to be able to sit down and focus on writing more of these; however, I do hope that one day, I will have the chance to do so again. ^_^


I Wish...

I wish that I could tell you, as I sit here and write
Just how much I think about you every day and night
You’re constantly on my mind, you’re always in my head
I should be cramming now but I’m writing this poem instead
If we could get together, I’d make you understand
All the things I feel for you as I’m holding your hand
But then I don’t even know you; you’re just a face I see
Every other day in our school gym as you attend P.E.
I wish that we were classmates, coz then we could be friends
And I would be there for you until the very end
I wish that I knew someone; a friend who knew you, too
And I would get that person to introduce me to you
I wish that I could hold you, if only for a while
And then I’d say the sweet nothings I know will make you smile
Maybe if I had more courage. . . if I wasn’t so shy
Then maybe I’d have greeted you each time you walked on by
But alas, I am a fool, and it is a proven fact
That whenever you passed by I did not know how to act
So many times you were so close, many a time so near
That if I leaned in closer your lovely voice I would hear
I really wish I knew you, I really wish I could
One day read this poem to you (for you, of course I would!)
Until that time I’m just this guy who doesn’t know your name
And ‘til I do I guess I’m still playing the wishing game

Monday, October 11, 2010

Gurus: full of wisdom, or full of themselves?


The cartoon panel above is from the “Ziggy” comic strip by Tom Wilson. It features the title character, Ziggy, climbing to the top of a mountain seeking the meaning of life from a wise old hermit, also known as the “guru”.

The image of the guru is pretty stereotypical: first, he is quite old, symbolizing that along with his advanced age came the wisdom that can only be attained after experiencing many of life’s trials and journeys; second, he is a hermit, most probably because after acquiring all the wisdom he now has, he has come to realize that true happiness cannot be found in material possessions or other worldly desires, but through spiritual enlightenment, and he has now tasked himself with purifying his soul in isolation to achieve this; and third, he can only be found in the most difficult of places (in this comic, he’s on the top of a mountain, but “gurus” in other media may be living deep within caves, in the middle of uncharted jungles, behind multiple firewalls and online aliases… you get the idea), in effect becoming a literal metaphor with regards to the difficult journey that is often necessary when one seeks to attain wisdom.

It is this image of the guru on the mountain that I’d like to dissect.

Let me get straight to the point: I think this guru on the mountain is a jerk.

By definition, humans are social creatures. We need others just as much as others need us. So what’s up with this guru’s “oh, I need to free myself from worldly desires, so I must detach myself from the rest of the world to do so” line of thinking? How does isolating oneself from others help you reach enlightenment? Perhaps this guru thinks that the less spiritually-gifted masses are actually “tainted”, and if he truly aspired to attain nirvana, then he must not associate with them. Does he actually consider himself to be better than everyone else?

His decision to isolate himself on a mountaintop is rather interesting. It is as if he’s on this lofty perch up in the heavens, looking down on everyone else. Does he really think that highly of himself? Has the realization that he knows more than most people caused him to develop some kind of God complex?

To be able to call himself a guru, he must have amassed a ridiculously high amount of wisdom before going off to live the life of a hermit. Again, this is shown by the fact that the guru is a very old man, and thus must have gone through all kinds of life experiences to learn what he knows. But remember, although he is a guru, he is not immortal, meaning that unless he has discovered the location of the fountain of youth, we can conclude that his lifespan is no different from any other human’s (so at most, he can live to be about 120 years old). Analyzing this further, we can assume that he climbed that mountain back when he was still physically fit, so he was anywhere between 60-80 years of age. My question here is: would it be possible to accumulate all the wisdom there is in the world – or in the universe, even – in a span of 80 years?

I ask this because I’m curious as to why this guru decided to isolate himself on top of a mountain and, as a result, has stopped acquiring more wisdom. (Remember, wisdom comes with experience, and the moment a person stops gaining new experiences he essentially stops furthering his wisdom.) If he had, in fact, gotten to the point where his wisdom approaches omniscience, then great, the guru truly deserves his almost godly position on top of the world. However, I think it most unlikely that a person, a human being can learn all there is to learn in the span of a single lifetime. For us humans to get where we are now – with our laptops, the Internet, air travel, advances in medicine – required 5,000 years of trial and error. That’s five millennia worth of experiences, and no single human being has ever lived that long. And despite all our species’ accomplishments, we’re still not done yet. We are well aware that there is still much to learn, and so we continue to do research, to explore, to experiment, to experience numerous failures, before finally arriving at the desired result, then we do the process all over again in search of something new. Each and every productive member of human society contributes to this process… everyone, except the lonely guru on top of his mountain.

He is such a jerk!

He assumes to be THE keeper of wisdom, yet we’ve just proven that that is impossible, given that he only has the lifespan of a normal human being. If he had just the regular amount of wisdom that other knowledgeable folks have, he should have realized that the acquisition of wisdom knows no end, that it is a continuous process; thus, isolating himself from the rest of the world is actually the DUMBEST thing he could do if he truly claims to be wise!

It is quite apparent that not only is this guru a jerk, he’s rather arrogant as well! Who does he think he is, looking down on us like he’s better than the rest of us?? Who died and made him all-knowing?? What right does he have to act all high and mighty, when it is rather obvious that he doesn’t really know all he thinks he knows??



… and why, you must probably be wondering, have I taken to assailing a lonely old man sitting by himself when he hasn’t actually done any harm to anybody?

To answer that, let me tell you about an experience I had back in my college days. It happened during an argument I had with a longtime friend. Long story short, he had asked for my opinion and suggestions to a personal problem he was facing, and in my desire to help him out I came up with a solution that would involve him putting out cash as penalties if he didn’t abide by the rules of the solution. The cash penalty, you must understand, wasn’t because I was trying to make money from my friend’s predicament; instead, it was an effort to dissuade him from straying from the path towards the solution he desired, and which I truly believed he could attain. I never thought for a second that he would ever have to pay the cash penalty, but apparently he thought differently. He thought I was trying to take advantage of him and his situation. And he got mad. I mean really mad. And no matter how I tried to explain the truth of the matter, it only seemed to make things worse. Finally, he said something I will never forget: “You think you’re so smart! You always make it a point to make me feel stupid whenever you’re speaking to me!”



I never saw that coming, mostly because that was really not my intention. But whether I meant to or not, I had hurt my friend with my know-it-all attitude and my arrogance. And it seems he had kept this fact hidden from me for many years, until finally he couldn’t stay silent about it any longer. In this instance, it is probably debatable whether the fault lies with him or with me; I mean, for all anyone knows, he may actually have inferiority issues that I had absolutely nothing to do with in the first place. But what’s troubling to me is that this was by no means an isolated incident: since then, at least one other person who I consider a close friend has said practically the same thing to me, and it also happened during an argument. Was this an example of lightning striking twice?

Perhaps the reason why I’m so hard on the old guy is because sometimes (not very often, mind you, but once in a while) I find myself in his shoes, on top of my own mountain, thinking so highly of myself while looking down on everyone else. I must admit, I swell with pride whenever I get to dispense my own little tidbits of knowledge & wisdom, and also while watching those that receive it do so with a mixture of awe & gratefulness. That is, until I realize that I am again playing the role of the guru, and so I must make a conscious effort to come back down to earth where I belong. Otherwise, I risk being struck by lightning once again.

One more thing I realized whenever I became the guru: it’s lonely at the top.

Monday, October 4, 2010

Yep, that's my name, don't wear it out

Hello there! Welcome to my blog entitled “It's Zhahn, not Jeen!” And for my first article, I’m going to explain exactly what the title means. (I’ll bet you’ve been wondering that ever since you landed on this page.)

Back in the decade I was born, the name John-Paul was gaining in popularity, initially due to the Beatles and later helped by the two popes who carried that name. My parents, wanting their first child’s name to be unique, chose to go with the older French variant, Jean (pronounced ‘Zhahn’)-Paul. And that is the story (short version) of how I came to have my name.

Initially, I was cool with it. I had a rather unique name, yet it sounded enough like the regular English name that people could substitute the other pronunciation and they’d still be right. So, I thought it was a great name… at first.

Soon, like all growing children eventually must, I had to start going to school. (Okay, to move things along, let’s skip the parts about my extreme case of separation anxiety during the first week or so of preschool and just go straight to the meat of the story.) So there we all were, twenty-or-so bundles of energy talking at light speed and making a terrific racket, when in comes… the teacher!

(Although we’ve never seen her before, because she’s more than twice the size of any one of us 5 year olds, and since no one was calling her “mommy”, it was safe to assume she was the class teacher. Also, when she came in, she was clearly not happy to see us for some reason… perhaps it had something to do with the fact that everyone was talking and no one was seated in the chairs?)

So, after scaring all us kids into our seats and threatening us with a punishment worse than death if we didn’t stay silent, she started taking class attendance. She eventually came to a name where no one replied ‘present!’:

“Jeen-Paul!”

“JEEN-PAUL!!”

“Hoy! Di ba ikaw si Jeen-Paul?? Ba’t di ka sumasagot?!!”

Well, coz that’s NOT my name, you were calling some girl’s name, duh!

… is what I wanted to say, but obviously I didn’t. I just nodded in agreement, like any terrified preschooler would.

And so it began. Year after year, for much of my student life, I could always expect for at least one (though usually more) of the faculty have me go through that cringe-inducing moment where I must sit and listen as my unique French boy’s name is somehow mangled and mispronounced to sound like a girl’s name.

Yep, and it still happens to this day, can you believe it?! A year or so ago, I’d made a doctor’s appointment, and when I came to his office I saw that he had recently hired a new receptionist. So I introduced myself, said I had an appointment, and she began looking for my old file. After a while, when it became apparent that she couldn’t find my folder, I offered to help look. I found it rather quickly, and handed it to her. As she scanned the top of the folder she exclaimed “ah, no wonder I couldn’t find it earlier. It says here your name is JEEN-Paul, not John.” *face-palm*

So how did my moniker & I survive all these years – nay, decades – of ‘verbal abuse’? Well, I decided to make a game of it. Whenever I knew that someone was about to read my name for the first time, I would prepare to place that person in one of two categories: either they were smart enough to know how it is pronounced, or… they just weren’t smart enough. Yes, yes I know, I was such a mean young lad… but hey, they started it!

And my little game continues! So tell me, the next time you come across the name “Jean-Paul”, how will YOU pronounce it? Let me put it another way: would you dare call Van Damme “JEEN-Claude”?



"Don't call me JEEN!"