confession #5 of a certified wi-fi junkie: The Mid-Sem Report

Returning to Dumaguete in June was like returning to a new city with new hangouts that (joy, joy!) have free wi-fi--McDonald's, Jollibee, plus some others that charge per hour--and a National Bookstore at the corner of Silliman (joy, joy!) with walls made entirely of glass. As of last sem, there was wi-fi only at two internet cafes. Imagine that. Civilization, as most cities know it, has finally set in in Dumaguete.

 

But the best news--wi-fi-wise--is that we also have free wi-fi in school (for a limited period) and at the marine lab =D And I hope to hitch on my neighbor's (yes, I have a neighbor now on the second floor) DSL once I get my own wireless router. So work, school, house--I'll have everything covered hopefully by the end of this month. I HAVE been working on controlling the addiction, too. I no longer stay so late in school surfing. Only till 10:30 pm at the latest =D

 

In fact, for this semester, I have resolved to put on the habits of a new lifestlye altogether, in the hope of a healthier, more decent existence. To wit:

 

1) Only fruits and nuts for snacks. Less rice and sugars. Eat on time. Back to white-meat-only, and always with vegetables.

 

No more marshmallows and candy for me =(

 

All the biscuits and crackers I used to stock up on, though cheaper and more filling, are now no-no's because of their transfat content that not only blocks your arteries, but damages the tissues there as well. And decreases the amount of good cholesterol in your body. New York has already decided to be a transfat-free city. So there.

 

These days I always have Nagaraya (original flavor only) or apples or pears or bananas in my bag. (I’ve made an interesting discovery: when you offer bananas to people, they usually don’t accept.)

 

Although just this week, I succumbed to the temptation of buying junk food with MSG from the grocery =P And I've eaten pork barbecue two nights in a row this week, too. Plus a heavenly vanilla sundae cone after a tray of Chicken McNuggets. And today, the best lechon I’ve ever tasted in my life! Uh oh….

 

2) Exercise.

 

I might as well talk about this in past tense, since the habit is faltering. But I HAVE managed to take brisk walks at the boulevard at sunset as often as I can (meaning four to five times a week), sometimes breaking into a jog when the wind is right =) I'd have lost the habit sooner, too, had it not occurred to me that the walks are also good--if not necessary--for my mental health. Which just goes to show that I value my sanity much more than physical vanity (and it rhymes!).

 

For the first time in my life, I'm actually exercising for a relatively regular, sustained period. Wow. I'm really getting old.

 

3) Wear shoes with heels and blouses with sleeves when teaching.

 

When I first started teaching last sem, because I'd always had the impression of Dumaguete as a Bohemia-by-the-beach, I'd go to class in what would technically qualify as a sando and slippers. Partly because most of the clothes I brought here were like that, and partly because it really is hot here, and heat when there's no body of water nearby to dive in can drive me crazy.

 

I don't know why, perhaps it was the stirrings of me finally starting to become a lady (as in The Lady and the Tramp haha), but last June, just before I returned, I had the profound realization that I should look more "respectable" when I teach. So I shopped for a new wardrobe: more teacher-like blouses WITH SLEEVES that I can still bear to wear even in the heat, and new pairs of pretty sandals that my father nevertheless calls slippers. I still can't bring myself to wear closed shoes.

 

To complete the transformation, I needed to buy a full-length mirror to ensure that I do not look ridiculous before I go out each day. I’d spent the whole of the last sem seeing myself only up to my waist in the mirror by the door. And then I'd rely on my hazy reflection in my neighbor's french windows to see the rest of me as I passed by.

 

Is this starting to sound like a high school journal? I've always felt that I'm living my life in reverse. I used to be such an angsty kid who only wanted to talk about philosophy. Now I watch the local soaps at night to swoon over my favorite actors hahaha.

 

Scientist kuno

 

Aside from these three new habits changing the way I spend my time, I’m also at the marine lab four times a week to do the analysis of my coral recruits a.k.a. baby corals no more than six months old. They’re very small, usually 1 mm in diameter, sometimes less, and I have to look for them using a magnifying glass first, and then count and identify them using a stereo-dissecting scope. This is my payback for getting to dive in Palawan (particularly Tubbataha) and Batangas last summer, collecting these specimens that I’m analyzing now.

 

The work isn’t as horrible as it sounds, you know. There’s no joy like finding a tiny recruit delicately formed like snowflakes in a cup ;-) I’m also fortunate that this is funded work, so I don’t have to worry about spending for my thesis. Plus, it means that I can hire assistants to speed up the pre-scanning so I can present the results at my first-ever scientific conference in October =D Please do pray that I can write up a paper by that time, and that it will be good enough to be published in a journal.

 

I’m glad I decided to do the work here instead of in Manila, where the specimens were originally shipped, because aside from the less stressful pace here, I can just walk to the beach after to unwind. And I get to teach again.

 

“Ma’am”

 

The evaluation results from last sem came out, by the way. The nice thing about it is they type up the actual comments of the students. I got hilarious lines like “She is intelligent and beautiful” (when my co-teacher read that, he said “I got ‘He is handsome and adorable’” Don’t you just love the students here?). But I was really happy, because they also said “She knows how to make things easy for us to understand”. This for me is a tremendous affirmation, because from the start, I’ve had one mission: to make science more accessible to students, and to teach them how to learn.

 

Another common comment was “She is approachable and friendly”. As if to demonstrate that, on the same afternoon I got the evaluation results and before I got to read them, one of my current students came up to me after class and said, almost hyperventilating and with a very distressed look, “Ma’am, hadlok kaayo ko ron. Nagkuan man gud mi sa akong boyfriend karon. Unya kanang… Ayaw lang ka-shock ma’am ha?” At this, I braced myself. This is usually the prelude to pronouncements of death. “Pwede ba ka ma-pregnant kung nag menstruation ka?” Sorry na lang sa mga di nakakaintindi ;-) I got the same question two weeks later, this time from a guy. They make me feel like such an expert. Hah!

 

What do you like least about this teacher? “Um…sometimes she gets confused a little bit about what she’s saying….” Haha. That I cannot disagree with. Especially last sem when I was still learning what I was teaching. Honestly, right now, I still get startled in the middle of talking in class, as if I’d just woken up, and I look at my students, wondering what I’m doing there, why they’re listening to me talk

 

As for my Master’s classes, I have the legendary Angel Alcala as my teacher at last, for my Ichthyology elective. He’s one of the big reasons I chose to study here. (Imagine he’s published at least one paper every year since he graduated from college! I just learned that today). Incidentally, one of his granddaughters is my student now.

 

The Company I Keep

 

Most times after class, I hang out with two of my new classmates: a Japanese dive shop owner who wants to migrate to Canada, and a 64-year old Vietnam War veteran balikbayan, both of whom relocated to Dumaguete from Cebu last June to start their Master's. I helped them find their way through the bureaucracy during enrollment (I deeply sympathized with the experience), so I guess they think of me as the general guide for where to eat and where to hang out, etc., too. They’re both very nice and sensible to talk to. My other two classmates are in their mid-40’s; one is from Romblon, the other from Indonesia.

 

 

 

Uh, yes, I do hang out with people my age from the lab (well, maybe not my age exactly, but at least within my generation). They’ve made me part of their movie group, so I got to go into the theater for the first time last June (fortunately, I’d brought a fan…). And we’ve gone out for videoke together three times. In this sense, Dumaguete is not civilized yet. We checked out a new videoke place one time, and the next day we saw a big streamer outside saying “Wanted: Entertainer with pleasing personality”. Here, videoke still means dark, smoky corners and girls in mini-skirts =P

 

But all in all, I find it amazing that until now I haven’t found anybody in Dumaguete to talk to, I mean in the kindred sense. After awhile, they all look at me strangely or change the topic, so I, too switch back to safe, normal mode. Maybe I’m just not looking in the right places. Not even the cats here are kindred. They all look scared and suspicious, symptoms of being unloved for too long. There’s a gray one with four white paws that passes through our porch every night, always giving me an alarmed look as I sit in the living room across the open door, before she continues on to look for the monobloc chair she used to curl up on.

 

 

Only the dogs here are my kindred. I have friends everywhere who smile and give me the ultimate greeting: standing on their hind legs as soon as they see me. Including my teacher’s five-year old Chihuahua, Marie, who trots along on a leash everywhere her mistress goes. One of the “strays” from the marine lab, Amanda, even ran with me for more than a kilometer at the beach one Saturday afternoon, across a rushing creek and the airstrip and back, only a day after we’d met. I only learned yesterday that they’d shot a dog at the airstrip before. Four of my friends at the house were ordered shot by the owner, too, and just last Friday, the cute one at the marine lab, Longtail, was also shot by a guard =( Too much death around me. As if love were so easy to find and replace.

 

As this seems to be God’s will for now, I try to cherish this solitude while it is with me. I am tired of talking to myself, so I try to have other people talk to me, even if they can't hear me talk back to them. Recent acquisitions from National: Einstein’s collection of writings, and Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s Memoria de mis putas tristes (Memories of My Melancholy Whores), his first novel after 10 years. I’ve also taken out Loren Eisley, Ernest Hemingway, and Margaret Atwood from my cabinet to keep me company. As you can see, I've also gained back the enthusiasm for taking pictures of myself with a tripod.

 

Routine is good, after all. For a change. Normalcy, I mean. I don’t think I’m ready for any more emotional upheavals anytime soon. Tama na muna ang drama!

 

Until the next development, hugs and kisses to all my dearly beloved, wherever in the world you may be =)