Updates

the awesome post-birthday weekend

Some people I know celebrate their birthdays for a week, even a whole month. I just eat a lot at home on the day, and then it’s business as usual.

This weekend, though, felt like an extra helping of blessings for my new year.

Friday, the completely unexpected GeekFight win

I’ve heard of GeekFight, and I have friends who have joined GeekFight, but I have doubts about my geek trivia skills. I know some things, but just basic info, certainly not the esoteric ones that get asked in hardcore trivia shows like this.

J found out that the Committee GeekFight for Nov. 9 is themed “Power of Myth” – Philippine myths, Greco-Roman and Norse myths, religions ancient and current – and he seemed to have great faith in my knowledge, which of course made me more nervous. I almost backed out the night before, thinking of the hassle of driving to Quantum Cafe and finding parking on a Friday night and losing. 

Well, I’m glad we went because we won.

The Modron Squadron!

We won! On our first game! It’s hilarious how our attitude changed from “It’s okay we’ll just wing it let’s just drink beer and have fun” to “MOTHERFUCKER WE HAVE A CHANCE TO WIN THIS SHIT COVER THE FUCKING WHITEBOARD”.

In the D&D universe, “Modrons resemble geometric shapes with humanoid limbs and represent a living, physical manifestation of law without regard to good or evil.” (Wiki)

Twelve teams fought in “Power of Myth”.

A highlight from the event:

Q: How is the monster from Cloverfield classified by the DOD?

Someone answers: Isa syang class-S na halimaw.

Crowd: “TAPUSIN! TAPUSIN! TAPUSIN!”

Needless to say, I had a fun Friday night.

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Before the game, we tried Quantum Cafe’s food. These are really good:

Full Shroom, pizza on whole wheat (PhP 190)
Kare-kareng gulay! (PhP 220)
The kare-kare comes with sinantolan instead of the usual bagoong, but it’s a fun alternative.

I’d like to return to Quantum Cafe just to try the other dishes.

Saturday, Bwakaw, UP date

We weren’t able to catch the Cinemalaya and commercial run of Jun Lana’s Bwakaw, the Philippines’ entry for the Foreign Language Film category at the Oscars, so I was overjoyed to find that the UP Film Institute was going to screen it for a week. We caught the Saturday 1 pm screening.

Bwakaw features a heartbreaking performance by Eddie Garcia as the aging homosexual, Rene. It is a beautiful, sweet, affecting story told with grace and control. It has the elements that can very easily allow it to lapse into a cloying melodrama – a dying dog, a lonely old man – but it never does. Instead it finds brightness in a sad life, and inserts humor in the most absurd situations. (How incredibly funny is it to see Gardo Verzosa constantly fanning himself?) And something must be said about the amazing cinematography: J said the film is so immersive that he half-expected to find himself in San Pablo after stepping out of the Film Institute. I agree. The people I saw the film with had this look in their eyes after the show, like they had just been clobbered over the head. Maybe they were expecting the same thing, the San Pablo of Bwakaw: wind-swept trees, unpaved roads, an old man with a dog in his arms riding a tricycle home.

I loved the final image of the film: Rene walking up a path and disappearing into the trees. We are not told where he is going, but at least now we are sure he is going somewhere.

Am I glad I got the chance to see this film on the big screen.

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After lunch at Chocolate Kiss, we headed to the Christmas bazaar. I got these beauties:

Bracelet (PhP 70), ring (PhP 100), peacock-cock-cock earrings (PhP 100)

While in UP, J kept hiding his cell phone screen from me while texting. I wondered about that. He usually even lets me read his texts.

We got to their house, and found out why:

Surprise!

J was with me in Bulacan, and noticed the conspicuous absence of cake during my birthday. So he asked the family to buy me a cake, and more besides.

My thanks to J, J’s ma, his Tita Jo, and the rest of the family for the surprise dinner party!

Sunday, something new for my nails

I regularly have nail polish applied to my toenails, but not to my nails, because I’m a klutz and I chip them easily, sometimes even as soon as I step out of the salon.

So I tried UV soak-off gel nail polish, which the advertisements (and my friendly neighborhood salon) promise will last for two weeks. Mani-pedi using UV gel nail polish is more expensive than using acrylic nail polish. Mine cost PhP 550 at B&W Beauty Salon.

It’s more expensive in the bigger salons, I’m sure. (Some salons, I heard, offer the service for PhP 500 just for the manicure.) That’s a con, but the pros are 1) the polish will last longer, and 2) it dries instantly. No need to ask someone else to open your can of soda after meeting with your manikurista.

I didn’t take pictures of the procedure, but the UV machine looks like this:

Read more here: http://gojackiego.com/2011/12/say-hello-to-gel-nail-polish/

I can’t make this a regular thing because of the cost. Maybe I’ll have gel nails for special occasions? (Once a year?)

My nails! So shiny!

I am loving, loving, loving my 26th year so far.

That’s true.

editing the closet, news of poetry

I planned to go on a jog, but my room was bothering me, so I hunkered down and cleaned my floor and bundled up the shoes and clothes that I no longer use (or, in the case of clothes, those that sadly no longer fit). I filled two large garbage bags, and my closet was finally able to breathe. The shoes that remained I removed from the shoe boxes to save space. I hate how every space I inhabit feels so small and temporary – maybe because they are. I still can’t bring myself to buy items purely for decoration. I have to be practical. I have to be able to fit all of my essentials in one traveling bag. I just know that one day I will be packing up again to a new place.

I would love to live someplace spacious and permanent. Where I can hang a picture on the wall, buy a vase to put flowers in. Sit down with J, have dinner we actually cooked. Settling down, now there’s a phrase. Not marriage, just a place to stay. The opposite of wanderlust. I guess it bites you once you get over your first quarter century.

Guyito to watch over me.
Early morning. View outside the window.

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In other news, Room Magazine‘s Labours issue (35.4) is coming out soon with my poem, “Hospital Work”. Can’t wait to get my two compli copies! Lorrie Miller sent a teaser in the mail:

As the final issue of our anniversary volume, we are launching issue 35.4, Labours at the Roundhouse Community Centre on Sunday, December 9 at 2:30pm, she writes.

If you’re in Canada, do come and enjoy the poems. The issue will be on newsstands in two to three weeks.

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How about a children’s book for Christmas? You can order my book “Jeremy’s Magic Well” online.

Winner, 2009 Gig Book Storywriting Contest

Nominee, 2012 National Children’s Book Awards 

In Jeremy’s Magic Well, Jeremy’s father is mostly away, working as a cook on a foreign ship. Thanks to a magic well, Jeremy is able to see and talk to him. Following his father’s advice, he overcomes his fear of David, a schoolmate bully, and discovers that the two of them have something in common.

Also available are books by Kate Osias, Andrea Dela Cruz, and other fine writers.

‘storm clouds’ on ava.ph

Oops. I know the long weekend is over, but happy to find this on AVA (“Genre Reads for the Long Weekend”, written by author and book blogger/reviewer Chris Mariano):

“…imagined worlds become springboards to explore universal themes of loss and regret in award-winning writer Eliza Victoria’s A Bottle of Storm Clouds (Visprint, Inc). From fantasy (‘Ana’s Little Pawnshop on Makiling St.’) to science fiction (‘Night Out’), Victoria explores parallel dimensions, myths come to life, and everything else in between in this short story collection. Her lyrical stories have previously appeared in print and online, earning her fans here and abroad. There’s something here for quiet afternoon during your Boracay getaway (try ‘An Abduction by Mermaids’) or a late-night bedtime read (her ‘Sand, Crushed Shells, Chicken Feathers’ will give you appropriate chills). It’s a heady dose of myth and magic that will make you wonder why you haven’t explored more Filipino speculative fiction before.”

Also mentioned are Chinggay Labrador’s Popped 3 and AS Santos’s Voices in the Theater.
My book, A Bottle of Storm Clouds, is available in all major bookstores. :)
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And while you’re here, a couple of podcast recommendations for your nightly jog (or whatever else you wish to do while listening):

Both are beautiful stories. Enjoy.

‘what literary character scares you the most?’ on manila bulletin

Ronald S. Lim from the Manila Bulletin asks several authors what literary character scares them the most.

Here’s my answer:

“This is not a character in the strictest sense, but the entire town in Shirley Jackson’s widely anthologized story ‘The Lottery’ scared me. The story hooks you in with an innocent opening paragraph about this idyllic town in summer – The morning of June 27th was clear and sunny, with the fresh warmth of a full-summer day; the flowers were blossoming profusely and the grass was richly green — which quickly devolves into something dark and horrific. Jackson’s a master in subtlety, and as a reader you will not be able to discern the horror (at best you will feel the low hum of unease) until the very very end. And it’s scary because the idea is not far-fetched or unthinkable – it can actually happen.” — Eliza Victoria, author of “Lower Myths”, “The Viewless Dark”, and “A Bottle of Storm Clouds”

Read more here. Answers from Cecilia Brainard, Samantha Sotto, Scott Chua, Yvette Tan, Mina Esguerra, Queena Lee Chua, Kate Evangelista, AS Santos, Kate Osias, and Nikki Alfar.

back from the grave

So to speak! That was a relaxing 4-day stay in humid Bulacan, which would have been more relaxing if it wasn’t so humid. Gluttony! I don’t have any pictures from the birthday weekend, but if I had, it would have been nothing but pictures of food.

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I read a bit of Area 51 and re-read A Secret History. Also saw:

Brave

This is a visual feast, from the green lands of Scotland to Merida’s luscious red hair. But to quote Roger Ebert, “‘The good news is that the kids will probably love it, and the bad news is that parents will be disappointed if they’re hoping for another Pixar groundbreaker. Unlike such brightly original films as Toy Story, Finding Nemo, WALL-E and Up, this one finds Pixar poaching on traditional territory of Disney, its corporate partner. We get a spunky princess; her mum, the queen; her dad, the gruff king, an old witch who lives in the woods, and so on.”

That’s about it. The film is important for being the first Pixar film with a female protagonist, and not just any female protagonist – Merida is a princess who is not a damsel in distress. She can be an empowering role model for little girls who have seen this film, but the film itself pales in comparison to other Pixar tales. I just think they could have done more with the characters.

The Fourth Kind – The film opens with Milla Jovovich walking toward the camera and saying, “My name is Milla Jovovich, and I will be playing blah blah blah.” The film, which deals with alien abduction (known as the fourth kind, in the scale of alien encounters) is disturbing enough, but the filmmakers try too hard to make us believe that what we’re seeing is actual footage. Please.

Plus something from IMDB: The real Nome is 51% native Alaskan, but there are no indigenous characters in the film (at least none stated to be). 

Now that just makes me angry.

Man On A Ledge – Has an unbelievable premise, but sure, it’s a fun watch.

The Thing  (1982) – It’s an alien monster story with an actual formidable monster. (Shame on Cloverfield.) The characters’ paranoia spills out of every snow-covered scene. Very well done.

Star Wars IV, V, and VI (Remastered versions)

You and I have heard all the spoilers and have seen all the memes – “Luke, I am your father” (though in the film Darth Vader only actually says “I am your father”), Yoda, Chewie, Han Solo in carbonite, “You are my only hope” from Princess Leia, R2-D2 and C-3PO, and the Ewoks that take down an empire – but this was the first time I saw the original trilogy. I know! Took me long enough. Years ago I saw Episode IV but might have been too young to appreciate the story. I tried seeing Episode V last year I think, but got confused and got incredibly drunk (no connection to one another).

I love it. The franchise deserves it’s crazy fandom. Princess Leia is badass. Episodes IV and V are really good, but I think Episode VI is a misstep. Ewoks? Really? Here’s the two films building up the rebellion (and Ep. V seems to be a promise of greater things to come) and then – ewoks? Is George Lucas a furry?

But my criticism comes decades too late.

Also, I saw the remastered versions (thanks to J), so when the Jedi ghosts appeared to Luke Skywalker in the last scene, I was greeted by the visage of Hayden Christensen! I thought I was hallucinating.

Christ.

hey weekend

No work on Friday! We have planned to go to Tagaytay or Baguio, but logistics problems prevailed, so that will have to wait till we enter my birth month. :)

Speaking of my birth month, J got me some early gifts, including this pair of earrings. Whee.

J’s ma got home from a long vacation in the US. We got bagels. This is turkey ham, sun-dried tomato cream cheese, carrot and pineapple cupcake. Boom. Calories.

Have you tried Sebastian’s crazy awesome crazy-awesome flavors? Try Green Mango with Bagoong (fish paste; this is actual bagoong on the green mango ice cream) and Balsamic Strawberry (strawberry ice cream with balsamic vinegar syrup).

Lovely sky from Sunday afternoon. Look.

Don Jaucian talked to some horror writers and asked them what local stories they find scary. Answers from Yvette Tan, Ian Rosales Casocot, Karl De Mesa, David Hontiveros, Douglas Candano, and moi. Read the article on the Philippine Star.

The Book Depository is giving 5 percent off on one book order, so I finally got Leningrad by Anna Reid.

argo

On November 4, 1979, a group of young Iranian revolutionaries break into the US Embassy in Tehran in protest of the United States’ support of the deposed Shah, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. Then President Jimmy Carter has allowed Pahlavi to enter the United States, and the revolutionaries demand that he be returned to be tried and hanged. All of the employees inside the embassy are held hostage, save for six US diplomats who are able to sneak out of the building. The six escapees manage to get to the Canadian embassy, but are stuck there. To take them out, Tony Mendez (Ben Affleck) of the CIA devises a plan so crazy it just might work: create a cover story that the six escapees are not diplomats working for the US Embassy, but are Canadian filmmakers scouting for a location in Iran for a science fiction film called “Argo”.

I have been telling people to watch the Affleck-directed films Gone Baby Gone and The Town, but these are small films that get pulled out of the cinemas after a week or so. I am happy that more people will be able to see this film on the big screen. Argo is a completely immersive experience. It nails the  grainy look of 70’s thrillers, it stars the best ensemble cast I have ever seen in a film (Bryan Cranston! Alan Arkin! John Goodman!), it has plenty of humor but can be edge-of-your-seat tense, and it is a political thriller that tells the story as best as it can without simplifying the politics.

This is based on a true story, so right at the start you are already given the biggest spoiler of them all – they will be saved. DUH. I knew that, but listen: during the film, I completely forgot. And that there’s the mark of a skillful storyteller. Daredevil what? Give all of the awards to Ben Affleck. (And while you’re at it, can you please tell him to please direct another film with Casey Affleck in it please?)