SUMMIT

Autumn.
That time of the year when dried out leaves bid farewell
To branches that hold them dear.
Brown, dry, fallen.
On the ground, crisp as freshly washed linen,
Taking the hue of the earthen soil beneath.
At times, on grass.
On lush greens moistened with cold dew drops at dawn.

Autumn.
A time of dying, a prerequisite to breathing.
To breathe, to give way to life anew,
When branches give birth to sprigs of green
And pink
And yellow
And purple.
Flowers.
Tiny buds making its way out of their home,
Out of seeds, out to where the breeze blows
At the gentlest sign of spring.

But, spring.
Doesn't come until after the cold.
Not until a young, brown leaf gets crushed
On the ground, covered with thin, gray, dusty ice.
Not until the frozen silence conquers the heavy rustling
And falling
And dying.

And dying.

Autumn. #

MY FAVORITE MISTAKES (in Filipino Grammar)

The Philippines has always been proud of its high literacy rate, always more or less at the 90+% rate year in year out. On top of that, 56% of the population are well-versed in the English language that we are even more particular in grammar and vocabulary compared to native speakers. In fact the middle and upper classes of society have coined the term "Grammar Nazi" to pertain to people who spot and correct grammatical errors at point blank. This becomes very common, especially in the age of social media where more than half of the posts you see by Filipinos are actually expressed in English. What fancies me, however, is the fact that we are actually very prone to drawing ourselves into the same pitfall --- that is, get really bad in our native language's basic grammar 101s.

So as much as grammar nazis hate the famous subject-verb agreement errors popularized by pop songs ("she don't love me") and favorite homophone mistakes (your and you're, their and they're), I'm listing 5 of the most common Filipino (Tagalog to be specific) grammatical errors that I encounter in daily conversations.

1) Nang/Ng - similar to the they're and their etc, this Filipino homophone is the most favorite mistake of all time. Nang is an adverb (pang-abay) therefore should be followed by a verb or an adjective, while Ng is a preposition ("of" in English) thus should be followed by a noun.

e.g. gumising NANG maaga, gusto NANG umatras, vs. uminom NG tubig, nagtakal NG bigas. And don't mistake it with the contracted "NA + ANG". It's a little similar to "already" e.g. wala NANG pera, or mayroon NANG kuryente

Nang is also a substitute for "noong", as in NANG siya ay umalis. Also a substitute for "para" as in maligo ka NANG bumango. But those are more on the formal use.

2) Verb conjugation in the Past Tense - Generally, if the verb begins with a consonant, past tense becomes first letter + in + the rest of the verb. If the verb begins with a vowel, you write "in", and then the verb. This goes true for verbs requiring a direct object (tuwirang layon).

e.g. kuha = kINuha ang... , amoy = INamoy ang... , patong = pINatong sa... , inom = INinom ang...

But of course there is an exception for verbs beginning with the letter L, wherein you use the format "ni + verb"

e.g. lagay = nilagay ang... , luto = niluto ang...

So it's actually wrong to say nikuha, nipatong, niganyan, niganon. They're probably just trying to sound cute. :P

3) Verb conjugation in the Present Tense - For present tense, the repetitive syllable will always be the first syllable of the verb and not the "KA".

e.g. Nakaiinis, not Nakakainis. So it's actually wrong to say Nakakapagpabagabag because it should be Nakapagpapabagabag. :)

4) Spelling 101 - the SMS and social media age has brought about major changes with the way we spell our native words. It's HINDI and not HINDE, LALAKI and not LALAKE, SINABI and not SINABE. And because Tagalog is simply pronounced as spelled and vice-versa, please, we need to hear the /i/ sound and not the /eh/.

5) Raw/Daw = you use RAW if followed by a word ending in a vowel. DAW is used when preceded by a word that ends in a consonant. Exceptions are letters W and Y as they sound like vowels.

sinabi RAW ni Pepe, not sinabi daw
inamin DAW ng kriminal, not inamin raw
palay RAW ang ani, not palay daw
mababaw RAW ang ilog, not mababaw daw

BONUS: Taglish conjugated verbs = I just love seeing words like "nag-swimming", "magta-Timezone" and other horrible conjugations of both Tagalog and English verbs. They seem to be generally acceptable now, but only in as far as human understanding is concerned (lol). I myself could not think of a straight rule for this, but it really pains me to see Tagalog letters in between English words, like:

pinakuluan = binoil
pinadala = sinend
kinulot = cinurl (how do you even pronounce that?!)

And because they are both grammatically and aesthetically ugly, can we please just settle with them being unacceptable? :P


I gave you the jumpstart and you may think of several more. We may laugh, yes, but we're not being grammar Nazis here. Anybody who hasn't made a mistake in either languages is by the way called a grammar freak already. And I'm not saying that we Filipinos should just stick to English either. Our language is part of our identity, and the rules around its grammar is not meant to alienate any speaker or writer, but to simply act as a guide to its art form, and for the sole purpose of communication and universal understanding.

Oh and the next time you greet someone hello, say KUmusta and not KAmusta --- because it's actually from the Spanish "como estas." :) #

LIVING IN THE NOW

The first time I drafted a resignation letter, I stared for more than a freaking hour at a blank MS Word page. Knowing myself, I planned on writing something dramatic, and ending it with a bang. But I ended up searching Google for a sample resignation letter format, something more direct, since no one would really care anyway.

Poignancy hits me nowadays seeing a lot of good friends leaving my workplace. I think to myself, “That was me, almost 3 years ago.” I suddenly miss those days of stress and transition, the exciting thought of starting anew, and the wave of relief when you finally get your last pay. Seeing people leave can be a bit sad. Yes, it's only a “bit” now, because I've gradually been numbed over time.

When I was younger I used to believe that the relationships I have built in my workplace would be the only thing that would hold me. You can’t blame me, my first officemates were all warm and cool at the same time (shameless shout-out to my EA and FGI friends out there), and we had a lot of ideals and hobbies in common. But people grow, and so do our dreams. It was painful to let go of 3 and a half years of good memories, but we all come to a point of decision --- and I decided to move out where I know it’s not going to be comfortable. One by one, we did. And to this day we honored an unwritten promise --- no excuses, and no turning back.

This time though, I’m the one who’s being left. But I know I understand things better now, and perhaps I owe it to that part of my past. Now I know why the people I left cared the least. They probably were happy, and we have different priorities anyway. Plus, they were stable enough to not let anybody else's decisions affect theirs. And I understand why some younger people would react like it’s the end of the world when their friends leave too. I used to think the same, but I always remind myself that though making friends is part of what we gain, that’s not the reason why we go to work. 

People get used to ways, to habits, to people, and then the daily routine eventually becomes a system. When something suddenly changes, that’s when our system gets a glitch. And when we can’t cope with change, that’s when we lose. It’s ok to miss a lot of things --- besides the people, sales meetings, field work and stressful phone calls, I still miss the EDSA traffic and anniversary sales. Believe me, I still could not memorize my new pay dates (yes I know, that sucks), and there are Mondays when I wake up worrying if I left the logbook with the Warehouse. Then I realize, it’s been 3 years and I now have a new set of worries to attend to. When I wake up to those kind of days, I just smile, and then go back to living in the present. It's your journey so you have all the control over the steering wheel. If you keep looking at your rear view, holding on to the past, you won't see the astounding beauty ahead of you.

Time permits us to handle things differently, including change. We experience similar situations, but in different perspectives, thus we approach them differently too. And if we just allow ourselves to grow and accept certain inalienable truths, there’s no need for unnecessary drama. But it will all happen over time. That’s why all I can say is, it sure feels good to be older. # 

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MY SUICIDE NOTE (Just in case)

This last letter goes out to my beloved family, friends, and people who might thought to have known me.

The year 2014 has been nuts. April came and I suddenly felt like I'm pressed against a wall of a tilted ship, with all the stuff in the boat inevitably rushing towards me. Life gets really hard at times, especially when you feel like all of a sudden, someone's creating earthquakes below the ground, resulting to some major damages on the surface. But honestly, I also once believed Earthquakes are opportunities to rebuild. Nature reclaims what is hers, destroys all those man-made nonsense, and in the end we go back to basic.

People who knew me well also knew that there were only 3 things that I hated when I was alive. One, expectations. Great expectations. Second, boring stuff --- you know, highly predictable patterns. And third, storm surges. I'm not a huge fan of calm waters, but neither do I love tons of problems simultaneously getting in the way. It creates massive panic that results to unwise and impractical decisions. Today was one.

I killed myself not because I was betrayed and disenchanted. The past months, I was shocked to know that some "friends" have that other side in them which in my wildest dreams I never would have thought. I reached a point where I realized people either faked it or simply hid the truth from me. But that's fine, I mean that's reality. I'm human, and so are they. They were my "friends" but I was not. If anybody's apparently capable of doing unthinkable things, I'm surely not one to judge. I go forward. I was probably just naive.

I killed myself not because I broke my own heart. The past months, I found out that someone I like actually likes someone else, and that he dated a couple of people who I actually know. I like him but he doesn't like me back. But again, that's fine, I mean it was my choice anyway and I can always like someone else and be happy again. And that doesn't give me a reason to start hating either. I was probably just naive.

I killed myself not because this world was unfair. The past few years, I worked long hours, didn't sleep very well, didn't get to travel around and spend my money on myself so much because I thought I had better things to prioritize. I've always loved writing, but when my essay got published in a major newspaper this year, I can't go telling people because I have a lot in my turf to protect. It was crazy and horrible at the same time. But that's fine, I mean I enjoyed every bit of the experience while I was alive, and it felt good to look back that everything I did was out of my own free will. I was probably just naive.

I killed myself not because I didn't have much friends. Though I was not bullied, people did not like me so much either. Sometimes I felt like a wallflower, and a lot of times I asked myself what's wrong with me. But I realized having a few good friends is already a good thing in itself, because the more I tried to fit in, the more I felt screwed. I was happy, because I know I have my family, and I was loved by people who chose to accept and appreciate simply what's me. I was probably just naive.

And I killed myself not because I was naive. People thought I was the nice guy, because I never thought anybody will intentionally hurt me --- until they actually do. That's why when I get hurt, I get even (see? I told you I'm not nice). But although I used to get embarrassed with my naivete, I realized that was the exact same thing that held me together. If I allowed myself to get hurt because of things, people, and words that should not really matter, I would have killed myself rather earlier than today.

Today, I killed myself --- the self that knew fear, distrust, envy, and anger. I killed the self that destroyed the self that could have bloomed a long time ago, a self that should have known nothing but hope, love and faith. The Earthquakes were all meant to rebuild me. And though you will never know how crazy things get inside my head every single minute, I know I'm still sane --- because I believe it was my God who created those ripples, and it is only He who can reclaim what is His in His time. #


"I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me." - Philippians 4:13

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