what's in my bag?

This is a meme I got from Lala's blog. I thought of the meme today because I brought my new laptop backpack to ballet today (I'm currently writing this entry on my laptop in the studio while waiting for rehearsal, this is soooo cool). This is my new orange backpack that I was lovingly given last Christmas:



And these are the contents:



Of course, there's my laptop on the right. Going from the top, we have:

1. My knitted ballet shorts. Actually, my ballet bag usually contains my ballet clothes - leotard and tights - only. My warm wear, I leave in a little plastic basket in the PBT studio in Meralco. Since I took this picture while wearing my tights and leotards, I used my knitted ballet shorts as representive of them.

2. My Gaynor Minden pointe shoes. They look kinda scary because they're made of fibre glass. They're also not as clean as they used to be. I usually leave my ballet shoes in the basket in Meralco, but not my pointe shoes because somehow, stuff disappears in the Studio. Pointe shoes aren't really klepto-bait but I'm not taking any risks. While ordinary pointes cost around 2,500-2,800, Gaynor Mindens cost 5,000 a pop. They last really long, though.

3. My blue umbrella. You can never tell when it's going to rain in this country.

4. My red and black wallet. It's the only red thing I own (not including clothes) so I worry that it doesn't go with the rest of my stuff, but a wallet is only found inside the bag, it's not really an accessory after all.

5. My blue pen. I have a red and a black pen at home. I don't know why they're not in my bag.

6. My coin purse. I think I got this from Waya from a Bora trip she took once. It holds all my coins, it's off-white and has a smart batik strip down the middle.

7. A blue floppy disk. For whatever things I need to save and transfer suddenly. Right now it has my old blog entries from Jete, I'm transferring them and laying them out in a book I plan to self-publish. If ever I get around to it that is.

8. My tri-color lip gloss. I don't think they look different from each other, but other people assure me otherwise. It was a gift from Quincy's girlfriend from when Daddy went to visit him in Orange County.

9. My keys, one to the weekday house, another to Lucas' room. The keychain is a pretty wooden window with a mirror inside and tiny jewels outside, a gift from Fran a birthday ago.

10. My Vanilla Vanille perfume.

11. Masking tape. To tape my feet with for when I put on my pointe shoes.

12. Decolgen No Drowse. I had some in my bag back when I was sickly and for some reason, I just keep them there.

13. My blue brush. It's the same color as the new repaint of Lucas' beetle.

14. My hairnet. Well, one of, the other one is on my head. A bunch of hairpins are beside it.

15. Rubberbands. I know rubberbands are usually bad for your hair but I don't wear them the normal way; instead, I place two hairpins at separate points of the rubberbands and twist them around my hair to hold the ponytail. The hair does not get entangled to the hair then, the way it would if you just used the rubberband. I have to use rubberbands because my hair is too heavy for normal ponytail elastics to hold, it always come loose for some reason. There are few things I hate more than a loose ponytail/bun when I dance. I want my hair tucked away, snug and tight, and not in the way.

16. My leopard print pouch where I put my hair gear and my lip gloss. I think there's a nappy in there, but I'm not displaying it.

I think there would have been more in my bag on another day, depending if I have school or a show or whatever. Like other days, I would have brought my journal but I must have left it at home with my other pens. As for now, this is mostly stuff I bring to ballet class. The laptop is essential because I find it's more productive to type away while waiting for rehearsal, I get lots more done and I have more time to sleep. Or go out, in which case I don't have more time to sleep, but you know what I mean.

My cellphone is also supposed to be in this meme, but I used it to take these pictures. And it never stays in my bag for long, anyway.

dancing queen back in action

I haven't blogged about ballet in a while, so I thought I should for a bit. I was reading the archives of my sleepyhouse and thinking how I would write about the same problem or same bone of contention again and again. And how it made this blog dull and repetitive.

So just the facts. And some nice thoughts.

We've been back to professional ballet for a week and a half, and we have shows - a series of intermission numbers (hahaha) for a doctor's convention, two performances in La Salle Greenhills, more stuff in February because it's arts month, as well as a short trip to General Santos (on the weekend, but my Dad has no choice, it's the only dealbreaker - also partly why I can't go out and have fun on the weekend, I have to save my absences for PBT-related stuff).

We're dancing The Nutcracker and Fiesta in La Salle, then Andres excerpts, The Saga of the Coronary Man and Mantones de Manila in the doctor's convention. I kinda like the varied repertoire, even though I know learning all the new choreography/trying to remember choreography we haven't done recently will be harder than doing just one choreography over and over.

We've been learning Mantones de Manila. Arnel is my partner and as usual, he's sort of freaking out about partnering me, as it still unsettles him that I sometimes leave him behind, especially when he's freaking out over the parts he doesn't understand. I'm supposed to be partnering Nino but his contract isn't finalized yet, so they're working on that. I really do look forward to partering him. A good partnership is always ideal.

Okay, I'm very satisfied about this entry, not going on and on like I achieved some grand epiphany. I promise to be more interesting from now on.

we go all the way for veracity

I'm very excited about my thesis. In my class yesterday, I was made to realize the importance of finding a primary source of data, instead of secondary, like reading about the phenomenon in a book or in an encyclopedia and not witnessing it firsthand. Since I had thought of comparing the pas de deux to the couple dances in our folk and ethnic dances, I had only thought of looking at the folk dance groups who perform these dances (you know, tapes of the Bayanihan and the Ramon Obusan etc) and reading the folk dance transcriptions that are available. Then my teacher suggested it would be better if I went and saw the actual dances first hand.

Yes, she meant go to the actual tribe and wait for them to perform the dance for me. I never thought of that. I was then going to chuck the idea when she then suggested I could apply for a research grant for this, in return for a short monograph of my findings, and God knows the Philippines would like more hands-on research on their local dances. They would fund my going to the place and the publication of my monograph, assuming I budget correctly. And then I could use the findings in my thesis, which will be a bigger body of work.

Maybe I was just being defensive about my Research Professor's opinions on my thesis when I was justifying its importance too much and writing all sorts of surrounding explanations that weren't quite necessary in my problem proposal. She didn't see right away what it was that I wanted to say because I surrounded it with too much backstory. When she did finally get what it was that I wanted to do, she was more receptive to it and told me yesterday that she would like to work with me more on my topic. Was it Brother Mike who said, "Less talk, less mistake"? Ah, yes, there's a reason why the bastard's so rich.

I'm quite stoked to see where this is going. It's nice when the pursuit of higher knowledge agrees with you.

the whipping girl, unabridged

I am not the boy in the plastic bubble. Though I wouldn't mind, were I a boy; both Jake Gyllenhaal and John Travolta are hot.

Before I tell you the problem, first a little backgrounder that you might need. I have spent most of my life teaching at that studio on the weekend. I didn't go to a dance festival in China with the other dance majors because I had to be in the studio. I don't go anywhere actually on the weekend, I diligently stay at the studio, where I work my butt off. I don't go out Friday nights so that I can go home early and wake up at 6 and be happy teaching my 8 o'clock babies class. That studio on the weekend is my life.

This is the problem. When things go awry, I am to blame because I am the eldest and the one who's supposed to command responsibility. So even if I did all the things I needed to do, because there is dissension in the ranks, it is I who has to drop and give him ten.

And so, I am then accused of being selfish, inconsiderate, uncooperative. Somewhere along the way, I manage to point out that it's really not me who screwed up. And then, bam, case in point, my doing stuff on the weekend. I have the entire Monday to Friday (till 9pm) to do what I want, why do I have to include the weekend as well? Why do I have to plan to go to the beach on a weekend, never mind if I had planned to leave after I was done with my work in the studio? Why do I have to go out on the weekend at all?

But, like they said, I have the entire week to myself, to do what I want. I saw Blade Trinity tonight (technically last night) and would be in love with Ryan Reynolds if I wasn't already so in love with somebody else. Who told me that no matter how bad things get, there will always be more good so that the bad won't matter. Ryan Reynolds and his new abs don't stand a chance.

(But let me just say that if you're wondering if you should see Blade Trinity, go see it if you like high action vampire movies and to see Jessica Biel kick ass. Even if you don't like all that stuff, go see it anyway, if only for that scene where Ryan Reynolds is chained to the floor, shirtless, kneeling helpless yet glib in front of Parker Posey, who's slapping him around, all dolled up in stilletos and fangs. My mouth watered, eee.)

I'm okay. I'm not feeling like the world's most loved daughter right now, but I'll live. There's more good than bad. I saw some of that tonight and I'll see more of that in the coming weeks. Yay for me!

the whipping girl

Have you ever met/worked with/have to deal with constantly anyone who likes to see the world only the way he sees it turn and won't believe you if you tell him otherwise, even when proof that he is wrong comes crashing down on his head? Have you ever tried to be patient about somebody who blames you for everything wrong with your siblings for the mere fact that you're the oldest and supposedly responsible for every action they make? Have you ever felt you do not belong to yourself, that you never will?

How would you feel if the person who makes you feel this bad is the man who spawned you? And there's nothing you can do, you just sit there and take it, you just sit here and try not to rock the boat. Because even if you've fixed the problem, or aren't even the source of the problem at all, God forbid that he sees you actually loving your life, because he'll take that part of you and try to turn it into something ugly, something that's destroying what he has worked so hard for, something you'll feel bad for wanting, doing, needing, enjoying.

Problem is, it's not that bad that I feel I have to run away from home. But sometimes, I am absolutely thisclose to packing.

I hate feeling like I've been grounded. I'm thirty and I can't leave the house. There should be stupider things but I just right now can't think of any.

(Strange then that the book I'm reading while in prison is Beauty by Sheri S. Tepper and in the last chapter I read, her father the Duke of Westfaire locked Beauty up in a dove tower for misbehaving. Hahahahaha. Sigh, at least I still have a sense of humor. Kill me when I lose that completely).