Latest Posts by brucebruce - Page 9

i don't know why...

...i continue to feel surprised every time someone in my life shows me how much he/she cares. i'm so thankful to be surrounded by such devoted, considerate, and loving people. you all deserve to know my gratitude, and i'm going to work much harder at expressing it.

RIP, ugly betty :(

it's so disappointing that this cancellation comes after the hopeful announcement that the show would be moved from the friday night death damnation slot to wednesday night. but given the rather ugly quality of the past two seasons, i think it's time to let go.

as a tearful goodbye, i've posted one of my favorite moments from season two, maybe from the whole series. ugly betty may be done, but amanda is FOREVER.

la la la la laaaaaaaaa

new bike. new bed. new watch. new desk. new wallet. new phone. new shoes. new house. new roommates. new semester. new year. bring itttttttt

(via leslieannp)

a great new year's resolution.

contact lists.

these days, a new cell phone means a new phone book--a new list of names and numbers that you can access easily with the press of a button. many cell phone providers conveniently offer to reprogram the numbers from your old phone into your new one. having little to do while my family was partaking in the chaos of after-christmas sales, i decided to reprogram the numbers into my new phone manually.

as i went through the list, i noticed that there were several numbers that i didn't really need to store in the new phone. of course, there were the numbers of the acquaintances and the partners for school projects that i didn't really talk to after the first time i met them or we had worked together. but there were also the numbers of people who had at one time been my close friends.

i hesitated to let go of those numbers, i think because it meant that i didn't really foresee a time when i would try contact them, or that they would even try to contact me. i thought about things that kept us apart--distance, time, forgetfulness, school, differing social groups. and it was surprisingly disheartening.

but then i looked at what remained after i chiseled away at the old numbers in my digital phone book. i scanned the names, recalling the last time i had seen each person--maybe a couple of months, weeks, days, even minutes. i thought about the next time i would get a new phone and would have to select from this batch of numbers and decide which ones i would keep. i thought about the numbers that i would add in the future.

i guess what i value the most are the numbers that i had kept since my first cell phone: the numbers of my siblings, parents, and best friends. people who have supported me, loved me, taught me, made me laugh, kept me going--and continue to do so to this very day. and i felt pretty glad. i think that with time and change comes the need to let go, to clean out our phone books of the traces of people we've somehow lost touch with (or maybe even lost completely) along the way--but i think what matters is making the most of the time with the people who stay with you throughout it all; those people who are on speed dial, whose numbers you could dial with a keypad without having to check the number under their name. and with things like facebook, twitter, skype, and mobile phones, the connections we have with these people should be stronger than ever, even if we leave them to go to school or to go back home. and of course, there's always the chance that we could find ourselves reprogramming the numbers of the friends we once thought we had lost back into our phone books.

happy holidays, everyone! i wish you all the best in the new year :)

play me on wordswithfriends--username: cabanayan

note to self!

the right thing to do is often not the easiest thing to do.

yeah maybe it's from fifth grade BUT I NEED REMINDERS SOMETIMES OKAY

the sartorialist is in australia.

<3

what the hell do i know?

one thing that i've noticed upon coming home to arizona is that i've given more scrutiny to the individual behaviors of my family. it sounds almost clinical or psychological--but it's not a process i actively engage in for some sort of cold, scientific purpose. i think it's just part of being away from them for so long; i feel like i've become more sensitive not only to the things that make me miss them, but also to the things about them that i don't miss at all while i'm at school in los angeles (or in the case of this past semester, australia).

what i'm interested in is what i do in response when these things make themselves evident. i catch myself chastising my siblings, parents, or friends, either out loud or quietly to myself, when they do something or act in a certain way that , from my perspective, is wrong or disrespectful. i feel a sense of entitlement, like my self-supposed worldliness enables me, even obligates me to tell them what's right from what's wrong.

i guess what i struggle with is this protective desire to better my family, to make them more cultured, to make their lives more enjoyable, to broaden their sometimes narrow worldviews (again, from my perspective). but the fact of the matter is that i am one sibling away from being the youngest member of my whole family. relative to the older five members, what the hell do i know?

honestly, and i don't say this to gloat, i think the answer to that question is: a lot. one thing that's nice about having a large family is that we all bring so many unique perspectives to the table. random facts: my dad joined the u.s. navy in the middle of college while in the philippines, so that he could raise money to send back home to my grandparents; my older brother and older sister have been in relationships for almost ten years each; my little sister is the youngest of five children; i'm the only one who's attended university in los angeles. these aren't necessarily earth-shattering differences by any means, but they illustrate something i think i understand a little bit better: the members of a family all have different experiences and think and act in different ways that may sometimes clash. i think what makes the family strong is how they stick together through it all.

so while i definitely don't think i should try to force my ideas about what's proper on anybody in my family, i don't think it's necessarily wrong to share them, as long as i do it tactfully and respectfully. i'm lucky that they know it's just out of love.

my B-FRIEND.

i secretly dream that he is dedicating this to me

...in new york, concrete jungle where dreams are made of, there's nothing you can't do...

...except get married, if you're gay.

if the past has shown us anything (see: the civil rights act of 1964), it's that the rights of any minority group, whether it be a minority defined on the basis of ethnicity, sexual orientation, or religion, shouldn't be up to a majority vote.

time to speak up; hence, the blog reset. i hereby declare a preemptive new year's decade's resolution to regularly post something on tumblr (or whatever blogging tool comes out in the next ten years). i can't be quiet anymore!

if anything, it'll be good practice for the writing section of the MCAT

the first night. uni PUB!

felt so young

g'day, AUSTRALIA.

i think one of the scariest parts about blogging is sitting yourself down and then flipping through the catalog of emotions and experiences, looking for what you think is relevant or noteworthy, both for your own reading pleasure and for that of others. for me, it felt like the catalog i began once i arrived in australia was filled to the brim with a myriad of feelings, from overwhelming excitement to daunting fear. it’s challenging to write this blog itself, because i still don’t know exactly what i want to talk about. i guess i’ll start from the very beginning.

the immersion began from the moment claire and i stepped off of the plane. having been in the air for the past fourteen hours, we headed for the restroom—or rather, the toilets­—and then looked for the exit—or rather, the way out. noticing these disparities between australian and american english, as well as the chilly weather outside of the airport, i arrived at the first of multiple realizations: we’re in a different country. not entirely different, or even very different; but definitely somewhere foreign, somewhere new. somewhere where the weather is at its coldest in july and where i have to look to the right before i cross the road.

almost immediately, i felt a mingled and intense surge of emotions and feelings: excitement, breathlessness, fear, happiness, anticipation.  it’s strange to describe this, because it felt nearly visceral, but everything had a certain glow, a sort of aura of unfamiliarity and newness. i even vaguely recalled feeling this way when i visited england and france, or when i first arrived at USC.

we jumped on the bus (from the left side), fresh from the plane ride and ready for another three hours of travel to canberra (with an accent on the can, in contrary to the manner in which i previously pronounced it) from sydney, which lies to the north. although we were unable to see a lot of sydney because of very high freeway partitions, we noticed some interesting things: houses resembling those i had seen in the british or french countryside; rolling, grassy hills layered with trees; an awkwardly long (but narrow and low ceilinged) tunnel. upon arriving to canberra, we were greeted by a friendly student who drove us to our college (australian for "dormitory"), where we quickly settled in. we rushed to enrol (yes, only one l) in classes, obtain student IDs, and then begin our first weekend in australia.

yeah, so there’s a lot i’ve skimmed over/totally ignored. gotta start somewhere. i’ll elaborate on specific aspects (e.g., canberra itself, what uni is like, etcetera) later. i'm just glad to finally get started.

blogging FAIL.

no one but myself to blame!

well, there was also that trip to orlando.

and to san diego.

and...my outright laziness.

i feel like i started off the blog very quickly, at the very cusp of summer, with the renewed energy that comes with staying up until the early morning and waking up in the late afternoon. although i said that i'd blog about my preparation for australia, i've actually done the most of my preparing in the past few days, with only 2 days left to go before i board my flight.

i enjoyed the freedom to procrastinate. and that renewed energy only compelled me to seek other pleasures of summer, like finishing then we came to the end and watching vicky cristina barcelona. (both were excellent.)

but i just felt hesitation whenever i thought about my future travels, like figuring out what i wanted to do in australia would require tedious, almost scholarly, research, through the purchase of cumbersome travel guides and skimming of foreign websites. and now, everything feels rushed, and crammed together like the clothes in my bulging suitcase.

but i don't know that it's all bad. as much as i wanted to plan out every minute of the next six months, i'm reminded that traveling should be about adventure and spontaneity. and while i know better than to completely abandon making any plans, i'm sure that i'm going to have an amazing time.

it was a pretty great summer, after all.

i remember seeing some of keri smith's works (products like wreck this journal and tear up this book) at urban outfitters, and was pleasantly surprised to find that she had written something that would be very appropriate to my travels in australia. in how to be an explorer of the world, she boldly and artfully claims:

"everything is interesting. look closer."

i think that all too often, we (myself included) lose sight of just how interesting everything really is. things may not always be discussed or presented to us in an obviously intriguing manner, but i think that if we really just pump the brakes and take a minute to think about it, there's a lot that could hold our attention.

i'm still contemplating what i want this blog to be about, but smith's work really helps--it reminds me that i want to use this blog to document what i find notable or perplexing about the world around me. going to australia is a convenient excuse to do this, because it's a totally different place with a totally different culture and a totally different group of people, but it's no different from the place i'm in now in the sense that i should be able to explore this place and think about it critically. and of course, i should be able to find things that i think are interesting.

my favorite part are the guidelines for being an explorer of the world. rule #8 is particularly pertinent:

"document your findings (field notes) in a variety of ways."

...yeah...i need to actually blog and not link

this is the travel blog of my dearest friend, claire, who will also be going to australia with me! make sure to check her blog often--it's definitely gonna be way more updated and brilliant and descriptive and interesting than this one, haha.

a real update soon! i want to describe how this trip came to be--and claire is definitely an integral part of that story :)

48 days.

okay, so i  probably definitely won't do this every day before i go to australia. but hey, at least this made me miss photoshop.

and i'm not staying in sydney, either...but more on that later.

awwwwwwww, here it goes.

the last time i went on a major trip outside of the country, i went to england and france during my junior year of high school. when i boarded the plane that would take us from france back to the u.s., i thought to myself:

"wow. what an unforgettable experience. i'm gonna remember this for the rest of my life."

unfortunately, beyond what i can remember by looking at the few pictures that i took with my digital camera, i really don't remember much about that "unforgettable experience." i can remember what the paris skyline looked like, but i don't really remember what standing on the top of the eiffel tower felt like. i remember that we ate authentic fish and chips in london, but i don't really remember what it tasted like.

i don't know if the "let's-see-how-much-we-can-do-in-two-weeks" nature of the trip, my poor memory, or just the fact that it's been three years is responsible for my inability to remember that trip. it's probably a combination of all three. i wouldn't expect this issue to get better with age.

HENCE, THE TRAVEL BLOG.

in case you don't know, or if you couldn't tell from the ridiculous title of this blog, i'm studying abroad in AUSTRALIA. for four months. that's way longer than two weeks. so, this blog isn't only gonna contain what i see and what i eat; it's gonna be a document of what i feel; what i taste; what i hear; what i think. yeah, it sounds a little corny--but that's okay. i want to remember every single detail of this trip. i hope you'll read this often and enjoy reliving the experience with me, even if i italicize and bold my words excessively.

so, in the weeks leading up to my departure, i'll be making posts about how i'm preparing to survive in another country for an entire semester. i'll talk about places i want to visit, things i want to do, any traveling tips i come across, and how much i'm freaking out/hyperventilating/sh*tting my pants/crying as july 15th approaches. STAY TUNED, MATES.