The Marocharim Experiment

My friends say that I am a walking pall of gloom.  Not that I’m emo or anything, I just happen to not be the life of the party.  I don’t care if I use 17 less facial muscles whenever I smile.  Deadpan people, people knocked dead with a frying pan, and frying pans run over by exploding steamrollers have a higher emotional quotient than I do.  Cheery, bubbly, artificially-happy people upset me.

I was a McDonald’s at Katipunan when this cute, petite cashier started beaming as she took my order, and asked if I wanted to upgrade my large fries to that “Shake Shake” promotional thing for Kung Fu Panda.  “Sure,” I replied, knowing that I have four options less than what they sell at Potato Corner for a fraction of the price.  After taking my order of a cheeseburger, large Coke, and the bag of barbecue-flavored french fries, I sat sullenly on a table and, well, read the instructions:

For best results, shake in front of face.

The flux was that about?

I guess “The Million-Dollar Man” Ted DiBiase was right: “Everything has a price.”  A couple of months back when we had a road trip to Tagaytay City, there was this Flying V station by the highway where the gas boys, in the effort to attract customers, danced to the tune of “YMCA” by the Village People.  Pump price?  More than P50.  Sight of gas attendants dancing classic 1970s disco hit sans Indian headdress, sailor outfit, police uniform, and patent leather body suit at 3 PM heat?  Priceless.

*     *     *

On musical notes, there are three things that pissed me off this weekend:

• Annoying falsettos of Leona Lewis.  I don’t know what’s up with “Bleeding Love.”  It reminds me of the 1980s, Tiffany, and girls with the hiccups reaching a point of orgasm.
• “ABBA:” The Musical.  IKEA products, not ABBA, are the greatest cultural exports of Sweden.
• Apple bottom jeans (jeans) and boots with the fur (with the furr…).  ‘Nuff said.

*     *     * 

Notes from professional wrestling: I was in high spirits last week when CM Punk cashed in his Money in the Bank opportunity and became the new World Heavyweight Champion.  I’m a big fan of independent wrestling promotions (especially Ring of Honor, Combat Zone Wrestling, and of course, ChickFight), and I am a big fan of CM Punk’s ring ability.  There was this spoiler that Bryan Danielson of ROH had a very successful dark match win over Lance Cade.  Danielson is one of the very best in the world today, and he deserves to be thrust in the limelight.

My shallow expectation: CM Punk vs. Bryan Danielson in the very near future.

CM Punk’s win offset the worst pro wrestling news I had in years: the return of the Ultimate Warrior (25 June 2008, Nu-Wrestling Evolution).  Boy, if Warrior sucked before, he sure as hell sucks now.  If you can stand it, watch the match on YouTube… I wish he’d just tear down the cockpit door, get to the capsule he came from, and make his way to Parts Unknown.

I was at a bus when I heard an OPM translation of Rihanna’s “Umbrella,” which went something like, “Para di ka na mabasa ng ulan / ulan / ulan / hindi, hindi / di mabasa ng ulan / ulan / ulan / hindi, hindi…” Needless to say, I was pissed.  Last I checked, I began this whole schtick of translating lyrics: fine, I’m delusional and selfish.  For two, my philosophy of translating lyrics is to capture the essence: to stick to the original as much as possible.

Which means I would have rather have had it that whats-her-face sang “Payong / payong / yeh, yeh, yeh / sa ilalim ng payong / payong payong / yeh, yeh, yeh…”

Peeved as I was, I still wanted to translate lyrics of a popular song… like, “Always Be My Baby.”  Not the Mariah Carey version, but the David Cook “American Idol” version… here goes:

*     *     *

IKAW PA RIN ANG IIBIGIN
Translation of “Always Be My Baby” by Mariah Carey/David Cook

Minsan sa ‘ting buhay
Naging tayong dalawa
Akala ko’y habambuhay
Pag-ibig natin sa isa’t isa

Gusto mo nang lumaya
Handa ‘kong magparaya
Dahil sa aking puso
Ikaw pa rin ang mahal ko

Bahagi ka ng buhay ko
Ikaw pa rin ang nasa puso ko, oh
Kahit ako ma’y iyong lisanin
Alam kong ikaw pa rin ang iibigin
Narito ako
Hihintayin ang pagbabalik mo, oh
Pilit mo man akong kalimutin
Alam mong ako pa rin iyong iibigin

Di kita iiyakan
Di kita pipilitin
Kung gusto mo na ‘kong iwan
Dapat ko lang tanggapin

Ngunit panahon lang
Aking hihintayin
Dahil balang araw
Babalik ka sa aking piling

Bahagi ka ng buhay ko
Ikaw pa rin ang nasa puso ko, oh
Kahit ako ma’y iyong lisanin
Alam kong ikaw pa rin ang iibigin
Narito ako
Hihintayin ang pagbabalik mo, oh
Pilit mo man akong kalimutin
Alam mong ako pa rin iyong iibigin

Balang araw babalik ka rin
Lalamig ang gabi na hindi mo ako kasama
Balang araw babalik ka rin
Konting panahon lang, ‘king mahal, maniwala ka…

Bahagi ka ng buhay ko
Ikaw pa rin ang nasa puso ko, oh
Kahit ako ma’y iyong lisanin
Alam kong ikaw pa rin ang iibigin
Narito ako
Hihintayin ang pagbabalik mo, oh
Pilit mo man akong kalimutin
Alam mong ako pa rin iyong iibigin

*     *     *

Renz Verano, I have your next big hit.

A friend of mine sent me an e-mail about a certain Friendster blogger named “ihatecofi,” who has some rather caustic comments about “Orcs.” Thanks to a Google-search, I found that the blogger maintains a separate blog at “Make Poverty History,” where he has even more caustic comments about “Orcs.”

Instead of pissing me off, the blogger made me think a bit deeper than usual.

Some weeks back, I wrote about the political life of what I call the “call center generation (CCG).” The hallmark of our generation is business placement outsourcing, whether it’s in a windowless office or a home-based job that requires an Internet connection (I belong to the “windowless office” category). While I do appreciate The Warrior Lawyer’s thoughtful perspective that the CCG is the “first truly globally-oriented generation of Filipinos,” I still see things in terms of a less-than-optimistic light. The challenge to the CCG is the motto of Friends of the Earth: “Think globally, act locally.”

Anyway, the BPO is like being caught between a rock and a hard place:

• Factor 1: Outsourcing represents an aggressive, unsustainable economic policy that drains human resources and many forms of capital;
• Factor 2: Outsourcing represents a convenient and (hopefully) temporary means of employment to address basic human needs and other canons of taste.

I’m not an economist, but from what I do know (please correct me if I’m wrong), institutional economics - represented by thinkers like Thorstein Veblen and John Kenneth Galbraith - eschews the rigors of mathematics in favor of a socio-cultural approach to economic perspectives. Perfect, since I think that an economist will explain Factor 2 in terms of line graphs and funky equations.

Veblen, in particular, is known for the concept of “conspicuous consumption.” In The Theory of the Leisure Class, Veblen observes:

Conspicuous consumption of valuable goods is a means of reputability to the gentleman of leisure. As wealth accumulates on his hands, his own unaided effort will not avail to sufficiently put his opulence in evidence by this method. The aid of friends and competitors is therefore brought in by resorting to the giving of valuable presents and expensive feasts and entertainments. Presents and feasts had probably another origin than that of naïve ostentation, but they acquired their utility for this purpose very early, and they have retained that character to the present; so that their utility in this respect has now long been the substantial ground on which these usages rest.

“Veblen goods,” or in a word: Starbucks.

I won’t be sanctimonious as to say that I do not enjoy the occasional frappé, the less-than-occasional pack of Dunhill Filters, or the definitely-not-occasional trips to malls. To keep up with the Joneses is something consistent with - or even corollary to - capitalist society, which is manifested in this case by outsourcing. Alcohol and coffee become necessary as social needs to survive in stressful work environments, even if in some cases, indulgence in luxury goods and activities come at the expense of basic necessities like food and transportation.

The horror of it is that after hours of inbound tech support and outbound telemarketing, it takes a cup of coffee and the atrocity called San Mig Light to make you feel human (before you send me hate-mail, I’m a Pale Pilsen guy). It is reminiscent of Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle, although with a more corporate twist, sans the horrors of slaughterhouses in the 1900s…

But that’s another story.

I just turned 23 yesterday to the tune of beer and a sore back. What better time to start my year off by talking about politics. Again.

* * *

I don’t see why The Government should be in denial right now. Whether there was a coup plot or not, the mere fact that there is talk of a coup should be enough for The Government to heed the warning: it is unstable. The legitimacy of the administration has long rested on quicksand, so much so that thunderbolts and lightning - of the political sort - bode well to be heeded. History lessons.

I’m not talking about an Antonio Trillanes IV who would hostage five-star hotels for the lauriat buffet catering. I’m talking about 1605: the Gunpowder Plot. We’re not talking about ranking officers in the Army making a barracks out of a hotel. We’re talking about ordinary people disgruntled enough to consider the unthinkable; to store gunpowder underneath the House of Parliament and blow it up. Guy Fawkes got arrested, and we all watched V for Vendetta.

This is, of course, not a prescription for our ills. Yet this is the formula of a coup. People forget about tanks and rallies and blog entries. People do not forget ideas.

* * *

Following the “investigation” surrounding the recent “coup plot” by Atty. Homobono Adaza - which begs me to ask what the frock was that all about and why he’s worth arresting - I myself would take a less-than-optimistic view of what will happen in the next few years. After all, AFP Chief of Staff Alexander Yano said it himself. Consider these quotes:

“Coup d’etat or no coup d’etat, what was clearly manifested in the arrest of Attorney Adaza, et al, is the collaborative vigilance of security forces, both the AFP and the PNP, against possible destabilizers.”

“Destabilization may be carried out in different ways, not only thru a coup d’etat.”

There’s a danger to all of this, if I may say so myself. Everyone’s a possible destabilizer, including myself. You don’t have to blow up anything these days to be a destabilizer, as long as you have an innate capacity to become one, that it is possible for you to become one. One man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter… and a government’s destabilizer.

“Destabilization” is a catch-all catchphrase for just about everything these days, which is a serious problem. When you lump up the discontented with wretched criminals and terrorists, that itself is instability. That itself is unthinkable. To do so is to destabilize the very foundation of democracy: the dissenting opinion.

So you do not have to destabilize anything to be a destabilizer. All you need is the possibility of becoming a destabilizer, with the possible intent to challenge the order, to change things for the better, to have the gall to stand up to the political powers-that-be and say, “Hey! There’s something really wrong here.” Destabilization can be carried out by having an opinion, by having an idea, or in the case of Adaza, being at the wrong place at the wrong time.

“Collaborative vigilance?” Institutionalized fear, as I read it. Although you really can’t destabilize something that’s already unstable to begin with.

So if you’re all for change, if you’re all for the improvement of your lot, if you’re all for making your voice heard, if you have that one idea that will change things for the better, consider yourself a possible destabilizer.

I think Tonyo summed it up best as he helped me upgrade my old WordPress installation to the latest version (via Yahoo! Messenger and a phone call): atake de corazon, which I think is pidgin Spanish for “heart attack.”

It’s not that I’m technologically inept, it’s just that I’m borderline scared to do anything that requires serious site management, like SQL and databases.  Back when my blog was still in BlogDrive, I tinkered with a lot of CSS to get TMX in the familiar black-and-red.  Having a domain of my own (which reminds me that I have to pay for it soon, as soon as I can get a handle on Jehzeel Laurente) means that I need to have a little more commitment.

“Commitment,” like its romantic counterpart, basically means having the balls to take a serious step.  I had to upgrade my WordPress for three reasons:

• WordPress Whatever.point.Whatever I used before (the blue one with the big editing window) was obsolete;
• I have a lot of spare time in my hands, and;
• I wanted to see why my dashboard was pestering me with a “Please Upgrade Now” reminder that has the uncanny ability to piss me off.

Woe upon me that I can’t smoke in the Internet shop, since I can’t stand the jittery feeling of backing up what I can of the website FTP.  So I decided to give Tonyo a buzz, who reminded me that I should backup my SQL (whatever that is) through “cpanel” (wherever the heck that was).

After a long exchange of messages that reminded me of “The Matrix,” Tonyo called me up, and figured that the best thing for me at that point was to use one of those automatic upgrade plugins.  It was a cross-your-fingers thing, so much so that I was turning pale just following the instructions.

Hot damn, it worked.  WordPress 2.5.1 looks like Friendster.

I guess I have a lot of things to learn about the Interweb: search engine optimization, Internet marketing, Digg, RSS, and so on and so forth…

“Famous five-minute installation,” my ass.  Preparing to upgrade WordPress took me two hours.  The plugin did it for me in three minutes.

WTF moments: I had an early birthday present from a thoughtful post by Ronin AnimeLover, who writes:

The youth are now proactive, not only in the streets but also in cyberspace as well. People are now taking their outrage from police-controlled environments to the untrekked world of digital information, a.k.a. the Internet.

And with their struggle supported by the launching of the blogs of Jun Lozada and Among Ed, respectively, and joining the ranks of the respectable political blogs of MLQ, Lester Cavestany, and Marck Ronald Rimorin, to name a few, it won’t be too long before the cloud of the Philippine political blogosphere gathers like water drops condensing into a massive thundercloud.

I like the idea of the youth being socially proactive through the Internet and all, and I like the ring of “water drops condensing into a massive thundercloud.”  All of a sudden, political meteorology sounds like such a good prospect.  But what really got me squirming - both with flattery and shame - is that the blogger lumped me up with Manolo Quezon and Lester Cavestany.  These are two people who deserve everything about being “respectable political bloggers.”  I, on the other hand, translate songs by Aegis.

Who?  Me?  Respectable political blogger?

I think it will please the likes of Arbet and Jester-in-Exile if I lifted my self-imposed political blogging moratorium and wrote more about politics, and if I postpone my post on the possibility of Renz Verano singing a Tagalized version of “Always Be My Baby” (I have it in my Drafts).  Which means I’ll end up doing two things: post the translation anyway (I still have to check if the measure matches) and lift my political blogging moratorium.

To be honest, even I can’t stand it.

I’m going to turn another year older tomorrow. Yup, Marocharim turns 23 on the Fourth of July. That itself is a pretty good reason to take a good, long look on the 22 years you already led, and the road that lies ahead. That itself is a pretty good reason to look at exactly where you are, and what steps you’ll take next.

Twenty-three is anything but a crossroads; at my age, I already have set a course for my life, and to a certain extent, I’m making it happen. Among my many ambitions and dreams, I always wanted to be a writer. If anything, I never imagined myself to be famous, much less rich. My life is still rather Spartan: not in the sense of 300, but living within what I can of the pittance I get for my pay. As you claw your way to a “destiny” that seems to be within your reach, you find yourself clawing for your cellphone, texting your parents, and asking them if they can spot you a thousand to tide yourself over until the next payday.

There’s rent to pay, lunch to eat, and painkillers to numb the gunshot-like pain at the base of your skull shooting down your left arm after a day’s worth of writing. Or as my friends call it half-jokingly, my “source of inspiration.”

I guess that if there’s anything I learned the past year, it’s that I really can’t separate myself from what I do. Granted that I don’t make a lot of money and pester my parents too often for a small loan, but I am in the extremely enviable position of making a living out of my passion: writing. I’ve been somewhere holding a pen, lugging a typewriter case, or tapping away at a computer keyboard for most of my life that I really don’t know what else I can do. I no longer think of writing as a means of making a living, as much as I do think of it as living. As life itself. As happiness… as sensibility, as meaning.

Everytime I get up from my bed and take the long commute to the office, I sometimes question that thought; if I pursued a different direction in life more than one that has me popping pills and smoking cigarettes like crazy. I sometimes shed tears, wondering if I ever failed at yet another decision in life just because I felt like looking at things through sentences and phrases. Those tears dry up quickly, knowing how many differences I make with just a few thoughts, with some sentences, and doing things without the wax. From there, no matter what road I will take, I’ll still end up somewhere: somewhere I’m destined to be.

Where that would be, I do not know. I am absolutely uncertain about the steps I’ll take. But I am, however, certain that one road will lead to another. All this is meaningful. All this is happiness.

All this can be written about.

All this… is life.

Once you get used to artificial lighting and a giant concrete wall blocking your view of the world, you lose track of time.  It’s a good thing I don’t do night shift, or else my body clock will be seriously messed up as it is.  “Early” is a state of mind, so I managed to ditch my daily after-work ritual - proofreading - and managed to get out of the office building with a full view of a cloudless, crystal-blue sky.

Had the Sun been ten degrees cooler, it would have been perfect.  This isn’t heaven, darling.  And this sure ain’t Sparta.

In a four-letter word, EDSA.

I have to go all 300 for the morning MRT commute, which does traverse EDSA.  Whenever I ride the MRT and have a clear view of the street-commuting peons down below, I feel like King Leonidas sans the cinematic steroids:

Madness?  This is EDSA!
Commuters?  What is your profession?  (Outsourced labor!  Ha-whoo!  Ha-whoo!)
Ready your breakfast and eat hearty, for tonight, WE RIDE IN HELL!

If historically inaccurate cinematic testosterone is not your thing, then afternoon commutes have their own sense of emo-ness.  There’s nothing more emo than waiting for a bus at 5:30 in the afternoon at the very artery of an alienating metropolis, despairing, forever waiting, wondering if there’s a place for you in this world beyond the back of the bus.

If that’s not emo-ness, I guess you have to stretch it a bit further.  You do find your place: somewhere in between.  You either talk about Lifehouse concerts you’ve already had reserved tickets to, or you talk about the aisle of a rickety deathtrap where you’re faced with a gauntlet of elbows and asses.  If you’re virgin, one swerving move by the driver could have you getting fellated through your jeans.

Then you ask yourself about the meaning of life.  If that’s not navel-gazing, I don’t know what is.  There’s really nothing existential about riding a bus at 30-degree heat, trading sweat with the working class.  These are the moments when you, an activist, revise Marxist theory (dum dum dum!) and include call center agents and their kind among the 70% majority of the Philippine proletariat.  Hey, if you’re as politically-inclined as I am, EDSA does hold a special place in your heart.

Never mind if you feel the urge to head to that commemorative plaque in front of the EDSA Shrine, drop your pants, and defecate on the engraved name of President What’s-Her-Face.  You have to do this at a particular angle if, like many Filipinos, you believe that the Virgin Mary is omniscient.

Robert Frost once wrote:

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I -
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

In my case, that road is called Katipunan.

I don’t know about the next person, but I’m starting to find the phrase putang ina - and all its derivatives - completely and utterly meaningless.  “Putang ina,” often contracted to “tangina,” is of course the Filipino equivalent of “your mother’s a whore.”  While it’s used in the same way and frequency as the curse-word “motherfucker,” the direct translation is different and rather difficult to say: “Sumasampa ka sa nanay mo.”

Putang ina is supposed to be a very offensive phrase that violates the dignity of mothers and women everywhere, but if you use a curse too often, it loses its power.  People flick middle fingers too often nowadays that I stopped using it; these days, I use The Shocker.  Putang ina can be used to begin a sentence, as a conjuction, as an interjection, as a verb, as a noun, as a conjecture, as an adverb, as an adjective, and so on and so forth.

There is no single mode in Filipino or Taglish that putang ina does not fulfill.  Putang ina can be a subject, it can be a predicate, it could be an object, it could be a referent, it could be a signifier, it could be a signified…

What was once a genuinely offensive figure of speech is so common, that you might as well be offended by the word “The.”

I surmise that there was a time that putang ina was the stuff that would make a good plot device in a Ronnie Ricketts film: the hero’s mother is called a whore, the hero goes berserk, and an old schoolbus explodes.  These days, it’s too common; putang ama doesn’t have the same kick.  Putang aso mo is merely a reiteration of the word “bitch.”  Puta madre?  Nah, too common.  Puta ka?  You’re not exactly Vilma Santos.

So don’t be so surprised why I use the words “dickshit,” “monkeyfucker,” and “dogfister.”

I blame it all on emo.  We glorify heartache and unrequited love so much that sometimes, we forget what real pain is all about.  Real, honest-to-goodness, physical pain: the kind you get from botched (and yet completely necessary) tooth extractions.

The saga of my miserable tooth has come to a rather climactic end this morning.  Rather than opt for oral surgery, the dentist decided to take out my tooth by hook or by crook.  Four ampules of anaesthesia and a nerve-block didn’t do anything to numb the godforsaken molar.

Anaesthesia will never work.  So the dentist decided to pull it out the hard way.

When confronted with physical pain, it’s perfectly OK to cry.  If you twist your ankle the wrong way and the hilot comes in to force the joint into place, there’s nothing wrong about wailing like a banshee.  Now if you have a numbed mouth and a dentist prying away at the offending tooth with a pair of dental pliers, crying is really not an option.  Nor is screaming with the primal, guttural tone of a caged animal.

I just squirmed in that dental chair.  Like I was chugging a bad lime tequila, or that leeches were making their way up my rectum.  Perhaps even rigor mortis.

The tooth extraction seemed to last forever.  The pliers made the death grip.  It was a good thing I took a piss early in the morning, or else I would have wet my pants with sheer, excruciating pain.  Twisted ankles, tweaked knees, and a broken heart are nothing compared to a heavy-handed dentist pulling out your impacted and decaying molar with sheer brute force.  If that’s not pain, I don’t know what is.

Snap!  I thought it was over.  Nope, the dentist managed to snap the tooth, leaving part of the crown and the roots of the tooth behind.  There was no other alternative for the dentist but to pull it out.  Sideways, upward, a bit of rotation, lateral movements… I didn’t know whether to cry, take a shit, or go blind.

Did I mention it took two dentists to do this?

After four dental appointments and eight ampules of novocaine, the tooth lost by knockout.  The soonest I got back my wit and normal blood circulation, I took a picture of the offending tooth:

I could have taken a clearer picture, but my hands were too unsteady to immortalize the offending tooth.  The red stuff on top is actually a cyst: hardened pus that was responsible for the anaesthesia not working.  Now that I managed to kick my tooth’s ass, I could probably go one on one with Manny Pacquiao right now.

So talk all you want about the pain of loving someone who doesn’t love you back, or the pain that comes with your self-inflicted emotional misery, or the pain of belonging to someone else when the right one comes along.

Some people will blog today about the pain of a broken heart.  I, Maro-Freakin-Charim, just blogged about a dental extraction without anaesthesia.  Who’s got the pain now, eh?