MIND-FART#21: 元気？

Friday, 11th January

18:16

A couple of days down the new year... 

How are you?

My year started pretty okay. It's just that I feel like I'm in a rut. I mean, I planned things I should/need/want to do but here I am, messing with these words... and you.

How are you?

I started work again after two weeks of winter break and I'm slowly getting back to who I was/ I think I am as a teacher. Those +fourteen days of not teaching gave me a little scareー day one back in school felt like I don't know how to teach anymore. Wait, have I known how to, in the first place?

How are you?

My planner's goal page is still blank. How does that sound? Very bad to me. I'm not usually like this.

How are you?

I don't know why I'm sitting here, looking at people passing by, trying to read a new book I randomly purchased online, being forced to hear some unknown mellow music from the cafe's speakers, sipping the latte the barista whipped up for me. I don't know why I stopped here. I'm supposed to be somewhere else.

Perhaps, I'm supposed to be here?

Also, I'm starting to like this cafe's playlist. I still don't know the songs.

xx,

Alyssa

MIND-FART#20: No Love, Just Med School Regrets

I thought I've already forgotten. Guess I'm not over it yet. 

The last time I talked about it with my Mama was when I got here in Tokyo five years ago. Geez, that was five years already? Time flies swiftly.

Back in university, I was under a pre-medicine program (though any four year course can be a pre-med one but you know, I'm talking about the closely-related ones), Biology. I majored in Zoology, which is the closest thing I can major in (see UPLB Biology) if I'm planning to enter med school after. I didn't take language electives and took more units (BOT142-Economic Botany and ZOO191-Special Topics: Animals in Biomedical Research) in preparation for med school. I even took the grueling National Medical Admission Test/ NMAT, a nationwide examination that one needs to take if he/she wants to enter any medical school in the Philippines. I had a pretty okay score, which would allow me to enter some schools... if only I pushed through with it. I didn't. 

I left for Tokyo. Not because I wanted to but because I needed to. There was this citizenship change (which I'm thankful for, now). There was also this thinking that I had to stop being a burden to my Mama (hahahaha) and work. Back then, I thought I could just look for a med school here, study, and do part-time work. That would've worked out if I only had millions of money in my bank account and if I had great Japanese language skills. I had neither. I still have neither even now lol.

So I pretty much let it go and settled for a job that would feed my family, instead. For someone who is bad at Japanese, working as an English teacher is an easier choice (for me, compared to some other ones). So I traversed that path. I am still in that path. To be fair, I think teaching has grown into me. I enjoy it. It's a tiring yet very fulfilling profession. But it's okay. I'm doing okay with it. I studied some teaching stuff and got myself a teaching diploma. I even wanted to put up my own school at one point.

Not until I came across with a sponsored ad on Facebook about an international medical school orientation in Tokyo, which I later saw on Instagram. And here I am now, thinking, is it a sign?

Should I go? It's just an orientation anyway. Should I try it? Will it just be a waste of time? For days since seeing that ad, these are the things occupying my mind. Not to mention the disadvantages I'd have if I ever I feel crazy enough to push through with med school at 26 years old. I know age is just a number but you see, my mind is not as sharp as before (as if it was even sharp to begin with hahahaha). And lots of other mountain-like doubts.

So what's the point of this post?

I don't know either. 

MIND-FART#19

I was sorting my socks, contemplating on which to keep and which to throw. I have a hundred and seven pairs.

And I told you I have a hundred and seven pairs. Too many for a pair of feet, eh?

"Well,  I think I have lots of everything than necessary. I should save up instead of buying duplicates." I said.

You agreed and asked why did I buy lots before.

Instant happiness, maybe? Thinking about it, how sad was I before to acquire these myriad of thingamajigs and whatnot?

"I'm glad you are happy now", you said.

"Me, too."

Artworks from unknown artist/s at the Tokyo International Art Fair 2017 (Photo by me)

Bliss (Photo by Kenji)

Summer flowers (Photo by me)

P.S. What makes you happy? Ask yourself this everyday. Make a conscious effort to seek for it, for no one can truly do it for you except you.

MIND-FART#18: Mid-week Irony

Coming to Japan, I'd say I ~gradually~ became more courageous in terms of letting my feelings out. I'm not talking about my daily rants on Twitter but you know, the real deal. Maybe the lack of Japanese speaking abilities from my side was and still is the reason for it; I tend to express what I feel right then and there because they can't understand me- my facial expressions well maybe yeah, but the curses I'm sending their way, not really. 

How ironic, taking comfort from the fact that they won't be able to nor try to understand me when all I ever wanted was to be understood. 

Well, maybe I really don't.

Happy mid-week! Hope you're hangin' in there just fine!♡

MIND-FART#17: Perpetually Curious

Earlier today, I had a brief chance of showing my colleague a book I just started to read. I was reminded of a conversation we had before about novels. And out of nowhere, my colleague blurted "I think you're a deep person. You like art, poetry, and this type of novel (pertaining to the novel I just showed her). Aren't those things deep?" 

I was caught off-guard. It was a question I haven't been asked before, let alone have had the chance to ask myself.

Am I a deep person?

As far as I'm concerned, I'm pretty shallow. In a sense that little things make me happy; a half-assed compliment, a free drink, a postcard, or even a seat in a packed train to work would make me happy. I would even tweet it heh~

I'm not deep in that sense, I guess.

What I'm sure of, though, is that I am in a continuous search of learnings, whatever those are, whatever their forms are... a novel, an artwork... ahhhh I'd receive them with arms wide open.

Don't call me deep. Call me perpetually curious. 

And yeah, curiosity may have killed the cat but satisfaction brought it back. *wink*

Stay curious,

Alyssa

♡

MIND FART #15: A Strawberry Shortcake Realization

I don't really eat cakes unless it's my or someone's birthday... or if I go to a cafe and the only options I have to ease my grumbling tummy are cakes and the like. Last Monday, I've had strawberry shortcake for breakfast, sakura cheesecake for afternoon snack, and strawberry shortcake with pistachio cream filling for dessert after dinner. Am I turning into a cake monster? Ha.

But I didn't just write this entry to let you guys know what cakes I ate some days prior to this post or what my recent favorite cake is which obviously is strawberry shortcake haha. It's just that while I was gloriously enjoying every bite of my third cake (of the day) while contemplating on random things happening in my life lately, there was a sudden snap and a thought came to me:

Destruction is beautiful.

Destruction is beautiful, too. How odd it was to think that way while eating strawberry shortcake? A little odd? Very odd? 

As for someone like me who likes taking photos of almost every thing intact and perfect before I literally put my hands on it (or maybe "terrorize" is a more apt term), food, trinkets, and whatnot, I was caught off-guard. Maybe it was the sugar rush from the cakes I ate or something, but it was a relatively new idea for my system that I am willing to accept.

It was this point that abovementioned realization came to me. Good thing I took a photo of the cake before I "terrorize" it haha

Do you see what I mean now?

No? Oh well, even if you don't, please do yourself a favour and bear in mind that destruction isn't always synonymous to ugly or something lesser than beautiful. It can also mean beautiful... like the strawberry shortcake... like the almost-empty plate above. 

So, no matter how broken or devastated you feel right now, it doesn't and it won't make you less beautiful. You are "beautiful in your own broken way", as the cliche saying goes. 

And you know what? There's more. If ever you decide to be whole again, if ever you want to be whole again, you can, too. Do so, be so, by all means ー just like the kintsukuroi /きんつくろい pieces that were once broken but are still or better yet more beautiful when reconstructed, regardless of the presence of the marks they previously had.

Remember, you are and you will still be beautiful, with or without battle scars, darling. ♡

MIND FART #14: Cheese Cares

✧✧✧

Why do I even care, geez

I just need some cheese

I don't really wanna, please

But hey, it's alright

Someday you'll sleep so tight

No more tears at night

✧✧✧

Just thought about this while I was browsing my Twitter feed earlier today. Originally posted it there but deleted it after a few minutes, just because. 

Oh, the thoughts that snow and silence can bring.

I hope that your hearts are always warm. I sincerely do.

MIND FART #13

One day you're fine, and then you're not.

Sometimes you can't help but just look at everything blankly and sigh.

If only I could frame or laminate moments of utter joy and bliss just to make it last longer, I would. 

[I took this photo during my visit to Sony Showroom in Ginza.]

Love and happiness to you,

The Pseudo-amnesiac

MIND FART #12

I'm so ecstatic to tell you guys that finally, I'm on a proper work break!!! By proper, I mean paid leave and me not contracting influenza A, pneumonia or any sickness for that matter except from mild colds! *fingers crossed* But yeah, I'm feeling like I'm walking on sunshine, whoa oh~

*confetti*

This just means two things: (1) I'll be having ample time to sleep; and (2) I'll be having lots of chances to catch up on my long-abandoned hobbies and other thingamajigs I've acquired for the past year (which are left unused still)!

So pumped up for what the next days will bring me! I hope I really get to be productive this time! My 2-week project is still brewing but I'll be posting about it here soon, so watch out! :)

Wish me luck!

♥,

The Pseudo-amnesiac

P.S. I kinda missed writing non-themed and random posts like this! More to come in my Mind Fart series! *kisses*

MIND-FART #10

I was in close contact with my feelings. Well, I thought I was, at the very least. Was.

I lost them.

MIND-FART#1

Did I make the most of loving you? Did I or did I not?