A slant on Bangkok's skyline

View from my room in Zenith Sukhumvit in Bangkok in 2005. I attended a workshop organized by FHI for MSM workers then. I was impressed with the "very diagonal" horizon in this small patch of the cityscape.

Burnham alien light-scape

Sometime March 2006, I took a quick break and headed for Baguio with family and friends. It was unseasonably cold then, and Burnham has just completed its transformation into an Atienza-inspired light show. The green-ness somehow reminded me of alien invasions - either simultaneous hatchings of body-snatcher pods or the tommyknockers were comin' a-knockin' on our doors.

Flag carrying bric-a-brac

Jeez, I could just imagine this right up there with the hula girl for the dashboard and the snow globe paper weight. Taken from a souvenir shop at NAIA 2, on my way to Bangkok last July.

Liwaliw blogger takes a walk

I'm reviving my blogger site. From now on, this blog will contain snapshots of curiosities I encounter while going around the city as well as my other travels. Earlier, I experimented with moblogging with my phone; it didn't work, unfortunately. For my regular ruminations on whatever "Liwaliw," I still have my I.Ph blog.

Cuddle fierce

Kid you not, I took this pic while beside a group of giggling girls, swooning over its "cuteness." I don't get it: menacing eyes and flesh-tearing fangs are cute now?

Intramuros snap

En route home, after a meeting, just stopped and snapped - Queen Isabella in amber glow.

Moving on, moving out (?)

Before anything else, I'm posting this now:

http://glenncruz.i.ph

I've signed up with Blogger in 2003, but really got into blogging 2005. Blessing in disguise, this recent Internet outage due to the ongoing repairs south of Taiwan has made me consider other options. For the past weeks, US-based services like Google's and Blogger's were dismal, and that's understating it.

I've first got acquainted with i.ph at the iBlog 2 summit last year. I've began to seriously look into the service only last week, spurred mainly by the Internet outage, the encouragement of a Globelines tech support (which was rather displaced and non sequitur) to explore and enjoy more local-based sites in the mean time, but was prompted by learning of markpaul's blog.

So dear folks, especially those who I've shared community space here on Blogger, I may be very soon migrating to i.ph - your opinions most welcome, please visit what I've done so far "over there."

Seeking soothes for brain pains

I told the receptionist that I was there last the night before. Is it okay to have a massage for two consecutive days? Opo, okay na okay lang yun, sir... Yeah right. I could see pesos signs in her eyes. But I wanted to relax, specifically to get into relaxing mood towards slumberland without the introductory twists and turns caused by hyperactive problematizing mind. I had several options: eat comfort food, go out drinking and get half-blind-drunk, or this, my newest discovery just a few establishments away from my house, a massage therapy clinic, service worth 200 bucks (being published as 199 but would you really raise hell for them not having a peso as change?). I didn't have enough cash to get all the comfort food I wanted. The drinking prospect wasn't really attractive either - alcohol hangover day after? No thanks. So it was down to this: another rub down of "aromatic" oils, a masseur jujitsuing one's road-weary, aching muscles (I was about to say musculature, which while technically true, connotatively it sounded wrong).

I went to Lucena for a meeting with project partners, just to see together if we're doing alright for the Global Fund round three, phase two. The project manager was there; I got the opportunity to talk to her about some other preponderances. The whole-day meeting was okay, but the off-line tete-a-tete was mind agonizing. For this, I had to leave Manila just after sunrise. Then, I had to race back to Manila for an 8pm meeting with the Board. More pressing concerns. The night before, I went in for a massage session thinking it would be best for me to feel relaxed before I take the harrowing prospects of another major road trip day. Well, it seemed to work for awhile, until day's end (which was few minutes before midnight).

The massage session last night was crappy, compared to the previous sessions I had. I thought the masseur was too young (but definitely up the alley of my dear friend Macy in the looks department - mental note: gotta tell him this - no hanky-panky allegedly welcome in the establishment though). I thought he had smaller hands, considering my sizable "bodaciousness." Or maybe because the previous sessions were both handled by this masseur who had the right tactics to "manhandle" me, just the way I like it... uh-oh, that sounded wrong again... hee-hee, at least I could get some reader interest with all this subtle innuendo... hmmm, I've heard of this phrase in a song before...

In fairness, the massage still worked its charm. While it didn't do anything to prevent my mind from thinking of those baffling, overwhelming scenarios now becoming a mainstay of my 2007 professional life, at least, I didn't end up getting frustrated with futile attempts at sleep. My mind drifted off... concerns beautifully fading out to nothingness... and then all peace of slumber. Woke up slowly - luxuriantly? - today, until I recalled a lingering dream image. Good thing I just bought a second-hand book on dream imagery from Book Sale a week ago. Looked it up. I didn't like the conjecture. I'd be damned if I'd add wondering what it all meant over all other thoughts. Dedma.

Maybe I need more time to relax my mind. I don't think the massage clinic can help me with that. My alter-ego's kinda chiding me with getting a shrink. Is there one worth 199? I won't bother with the one-peso change. In absence of attractive choices, I blog. Nothing to detail about work, just things of relatively superfluous significance, like getting a massage. [End of session.]

Rush hour announcement

Inexpensive, rockin' gift-giving

I don't want to harp more on this; several blogs back I've already dissected my financial woes. But I had the opportunity to reverse this deppressing situation a bit, and just in time for the holidays. If there's one of the joys I experienced this year, that would have to be (re-)discovering music that I like. More precisely, that would have to be Limewire and uTorrent. Music downloads have been like "comfort food" last year. I successfully nipped off my deppression on the thought of not being able to give something during the season of gift-giving when I decided to burn what I thought were my best (re-)discoveries, and give them out to relatives and closest friends. One limitation though, I thought my kind of music weren't exactly something that would thrill my Mom and Dad, aunts and uncles, and the more senior of my colleagues. I prayed they'd understand.

I essentially had three collections given away. There was the 100 Best New Wave Songs, the list courtesy of DigitalDreamDoor.com. I've been giving this collection to friends this year, not only during the holidays, but also birthdays. Of course, the new wave-attuned generation of friends appreciated it very much. I redid the cover for this collection: I googled for all new wave related image or symbol and I came up with a Keith Haring artwork. I thought then how amazing that Haring has come to symbolize popular culture of the eighties.

Another collection, which I essentially collected from downloads in uTorrent, was Madonna's very best, or what in my taste was her best work. I called the collection "Her Majesty Madge," and contained 70 tracks. This one went to the "girls." What conversational piece that li'l gift was! Three albums though I had to buy online: I'm Breathless (soundtrack of Dick Tracy), Who's That Girl? (another soundtrack from one of Madonna's box-office disasters), and American Life (which seem to have already gained a reputation as an all-time low of her studio albums). Well I thought American Life was still fairly good; some music critics now think it was just too ahead of its time. And all I can say to that is "that's what majesty is all about."

Lastly, the one for the younger set of cousins and my younger brother, was a melee of mostly Britpop's best, including some Britpop sounding and sensible imports (from the US and other places) as well as more current hits. I called it "Wired Up with a Twist of Lime," after the blog entry I wrote about discovering the joys of downloading MP3s. I noticed that lately the rock/pop hits that catch my most attention seem to hail back to either the 1980's New Wave or 1990's Britpop. I included also some "rock classics" and remarkable singles from artists I consider my all-time favorites. The selection process was a bit painful: as I was only able to fit so much on a CD, there were tracks that I had to remove. The selection was initially 200-plus; I could only fit 190 on a CD.

BFF and housemate Eon didn't receive any of these collections. I didn't need to bother burning them on CDs and gift-wrapping them for him. As soon as I finished sorting my collection, Eon, whose self-esteem is currently propped up with a new iPOD acquisition, started uploading the selections to his player. He also "borrowed" the Wired Up collection for his nephew.

How much did I spend for the holiday gifts? Direct cost was around 45 to 50 pesos for each CD, including the jewel case and the laser color printing of the cover (there were indirect cost like the amount of time I spent online and the transportation for buying CDR's and other stuff). But more than the inexpensive value (I'd be a cheapskate for considering just the cost), I think these were the most meaningful I've given away so far. These tracks were music I really, really liked - I similarly did something like this two years ago when I gave away my favorite foodstuff then (that would be Bizu's cookies).

Maybe on succeeding blogs I will put the track listings of these compilations. Hopefully blogmates will tell me what they think of them. And oh, for those who are curious, I'm not planning to sell these compilations (Eon was joking that I've turned myself into a "producer" of sorts). These are for sharing to friends and loved ones, that's it.

Jerky year-ender

I thought I'd never get the chance to blog again. Well, I wasn't able to towards the end of the year. But now I've got a bit of "free time" to myself. No, not really. I just decided not to work for awhile; to say that the last days of 2006 (and consequently, the first weeks of 2007) was quite toxic is an understatement. If I made some good hits in the better part of 2006, I'd say that December went in and balanced everything by giving so much misses. There was the Global Fund to start with (both the current third round and the upcoming fifth round AIDS projects), then there's the ASEAN Summit's civil society forum, PNAC's partnership forum and the consultancy pet project.

The Global Fund's continuation of the round three AIDS project was for an extended time, since June 2006, suffering a series of starts and stops. With a considerably diminished amount of funding, and with the local government's plodding awakening to sustain the efforts, the project was ditched in a frenzy of implementation issues, most markedly with supporting management cost that would ensure equal if not better quality of results with a smaller pot. It's running now, whether it's efficient and effective is yet to be known. There was confusion and agitation in the consortium-type modality among NGOs in the four sites in Bicol region; in Southern Tagalog's two sites, it was debated who and how will the meager funds be managed. As for the other cluster areas, I'm not fully aware, but I'd bet that they were not having an otherwise easier situation.

The fifth round AIDS project was also a classic case of rumbles and grumbles at the top of the management chain. At the bottom, also known as "us implementing organizations," anxiety when it's going to begin was about to take its toll. The grapevine saved our sanity one day, when a juicy announcement sprouted that the call for project proposals was to be published on major newspapers. I trolled the newspapers - and realized in the process that newspapers don't come cheap anymore - but with each day of not seeing any announcement, enthusiasm drained by the buckets, indifference and bitterness took over. Eventually, the call came out (learned not through the newspapers, but through an e-group) just a week before the deadline. After several sleepless nights of rushing all the writing, on the day of the deadline, I was already feeling that numbness associated with sleep deprivation. Adrenaline was already rushing as I started that day working on the last portions of the proposal. Then came in a text message from colleagues; they've found out that the deadline was moved to January 3. I felt something drain inside; it could be blood or adrenaline or both.

On the day of the LGBT Pride March (it's traumatic organizing have to be reserved for some other time), I have a plane ticket to Cebu kept inside my bag. Just a few days ago, we were rushing into the staging of a civil society forum counterparting the ASEAN Summit. Our particular interest of course was supposedly the special declaration on HIV/AIDS. But we now all know of its postponement, allegedly due to the threat of a typhoon but now more popularly presumed because of so-called terrorist threats. So there I was, clutching onto the plane ticket, just in case. It didn't push through, much to civil society leaders' disappointment for the wasted support funding. At this point, I was really doubting whether any of the other initiatives would push through.

2006 was a high for me in participating in PNAC activities. It started with the universal access initiative, then the AMTP-IV operationalization, the national M&E system, the MSM consultation and the side trip to the PNCA in Davao City. As culmination of these efforts, it was thought the first partnership forum be held at year-end. We expressed our intent of participating in this one as organizers. However, the PNAC principal members, at the peak of the rush of organizing, decided to postpone to February. With good reason. But at this time, I was feeling already too frayed with all the "urong-sulong" goings on.

Pet projects were not able to draw me away from these development work pains. Just one pet project, actually, by year's end. We were looking into providing technical assistance (a consultancy) for a company's workplace diversity program. As with previous experiences with corporate clients, negotiations for something before the year ends should really have been done way before December. As expected by December principals on the client side were hard to follow through (read: locate), what with extended vacations, personal ambitions and such other pre-occupations (which actually, ours is one having to compete for attention with other activities like, what else, Christmas parties). Long story short, the development timeline earlier determined would now have to be delayed. All in all, while still regaining so much lost oxygen during the family noche buena, I saw myself doing so much in the last quarter of 2006 without really an opportunity to relish on concrete results.

As I watched the fireworks in Makati on New Year's Eve, I was thinking about these and realized that I'd have to brace myself for some rude awakening. Welcome 2007!