Haruki Murakami

This is one photo for the 26 Alphabets photo challenge of which I have yet to make a page for. Taken from one of the pages of a Haruki Murakami collection of short stories.

Letter “T” for.. can you guess?

In Lieu of a New Years Resolution

I’ve never really made a new year’s resolution. If I have done before, it probably was something we were told to do in class or a list of quickly scribbled, vague, random things on some paper that I knew I’d misplace soon. So I found this meme thing on ze internets that I think would be a lot better than a classic new years resolution. And after completing the list, I’m even more convinced. My list looks a lot more focused, decisive, measurable and realistic than any new years resolution I can ever write. And I’m not waiting til New Year either.. =)

The original meme can be found here: Clickie! And here is mine: (Also on a separate page permanently on header to keep track of easier.)

101 Things to do in 1001 Days

The Mission:
Complete 101 preset tasks in a period of 1001 days.

The Criteria:
Tasks must be specific (ie. no ambiguity in the wording) with a result that is either measurable or clearly defined. Tasks must also be realistic and stretching (ie. represent some amount of work on my part).

Some things on my list:

3. Watch 100 Must-See Foreign Films
6. Paint a triptych for my room.
15. Finish 26 Things and 26 Alphabets
16. Make solid perfume
26. Finish designer portfolio
29. Join a Christmas bazaar.
38. Go back to Europe
40. Attend Burning Man Festival
45. Make 1000 paper cranes
48. Lose 35 pounds
52. Study Capoeira
54. Keep my bag clutter-free for a month (see if it becomes a habit)
68. Make an outfit or headgear for Natassja, Igor and Santi
72. Feed some ducks
74. Participate in Earth Hour
93. Find and get okenite
95. Participate in Gimme Your Stuff
100. Piece together a charm bracelet

My full list here: Clickie!

The gold house..

Since we don’t have street names yet, as this village is new, it gets interesting how people tell visitors to get to our house. Ours is usually described as (at night) “the house at the end, the gold one with all the lights.” I guess our orangey walls and warm lights make it look golden. I think warm lights are much much better than stark white lights that wash out all the colours at night.

Mom and dad were walking Igor and Tassja earlier and passed by some landscaper/gardeners. Mom talked to them to find out their rates.

Mom: Which houses here have you worked on?
Gardener: *describes the houses for which they’ve done landscaping for*
Mom: To work on our garden, what would your estimate be?
Gardener: Which house is yours?
Mom: The golden-orange coloured one.
Gardener: Oh you live there? We thought Jericho Rosales lived there! (Btw, Jericho Rosales is a local celebrity.)
If it was me the gardener was talking to: *toink* huh? Ew no.

And our place being a bird sanctuary, there’s a lot of strange bird calls and cool looking birds. Before taking Santi for a walk, I saw this one on our wall:

Unwordy

It’s raining right now. Been raining for a few days now. I can’t remember a time when it rained during Christmas.. But then again, I have terrible memory. Funny, as wet as it is outside right now, in my head I’m all dried up word-wise.. Which you might have noticed with my weather opening line.

I haven’t written anything in a long time and everytime I have the time to sit down and write, I come up with a nice shiny blank. I like shiny; blanks not so much (unless it’s on a signed cheque). Somehow talking about how I can’t think of anything to write about comes easy. But I can only do so much of that before I sound all whiney. It’s just really puzzling. I used to be able to write once a day. There are a load of times I’d think of something to say but never getting around to actually putting it down, being busy and all, and when I do get the time to sit down, what I thought of before- events, musings whatever- they are all, by then, expired and unpublishable. But I like writing. I miss writing.

Which reminds me: New Year’s resolutions time. I guess for the coming year I’ll have a lot on my list. You can guess one which would definitely be on there.

So. Enough about not being able to write. I’ll force myself if I have to, but I will write more. I’ll be promising to do a lot more this coming year. But that’s for another entry. So for now..

I hope everyone is enjoying their own versions Christmas. I certainly am, the first in our new home and one of the best I’ve ever had.

It’s beginning to look a lot like..

Christmas.. =)

Draping Midterm

10 sketches by Sir Dan, 10 students. We drew lots, I got #7, didn’t like it and swapped with Kacci so I ended up with #3. Not as easy as I thought it would be. 4 hours, a few yards of red and black chiffon/georgette and about a bazillion pins and pinpricks later, I finished.. the front part.. sort of. Theres still some wrinkly bits in the front part that I will redo later. Here’s how it looks so far:

There’s just no escaping maths..

Quantum of Solace Premier Party

We were told to wear stealth black, and most did.. I got the invite last week and I completely didn’t understand what it was saying. It said “Flash the pen across the surveillance photo.” I saw a pen with 2 laser light thingies and an envelope with a picture inside. I thought the instructions meant we have to shine the pen at the surveillance camera at the party. Haha. I just peeked inside the envelope and it never crossed my mind to take the pen, get the photo out and shine the light on the photo. Which was what we were meant to do, as there were further instructions on the photo that appears only under the blue light. I found out just that night at Amanda’s.

So we arrived at the Ascott poolside, registered and were given 5 chips and a numbered paddle for the auction. Amanda didnt take her chips. Had plenty of ice cold Coke Zero and finger food while listening to the jazz band. We had photos taken with “James Bond” while waiting for the auction. We pooled all our chips upon being told the corresponding value for each color.. around 58k in total. And we almost got the first item, the sony camera, and we were bidding against the guys right beside us.. but they had more. haha. then sonja asked the guy for the extra chips they have and he gave it to us in one condition: that we go to their gig at mag:net at High Street this november 21. Of course sojna said yes but we still didnt get any of the items because by that time, there were many people who have collected enough chips that the bids were at 100k+ haha..

Anyway, after that we were escorted through secret passages going to the cinema.. where we played with the laser light on the screen with a dozen other people. That was more fun than I expected. Then the movie came on, I dont know about the others but I didnt like it that much.. But everything else was great, and we had a lot of fun.. So, thanks Steph!

Project Runway Philippines Finale

We saw the Project Runway Philippines Finale last week (thanks Sir Lev=) ) and I really appreciate the effort that the final 3 designers put into their collections. There was a bit of ‘cheese’ before the actual show, which I guess I should have expected, seeing as how everything in the country from politics to fashion is mixed in with the local kind of showbiz. Anyway, it opened with Philip Tamus, who sent a swimwear look down the runway first. He knows the female form which is seen from his clothes- lots of women would be able to wear them and look and feel great. I really liked how he can pile on the details on a bodice without losing the beautiful womanly shape. Then again, the color palette did nothing for me and I felt like I’ve seen them before. Nothing really new but he did a great job using his strengths and coming up with flattering gowns despite the fact that they’re in the most difficult color for a woman to wear- quite a feat.

Veejay Floresca went next and the Linkin Park track really got me excited to see what he’ll show. And I guess that was why I got so disappointed. You know how certain kinds of music makes you visualize a certain look/color/mood? It was like Jerome Lorico’s last season’s show, when his choice of music sort of gave me a preview to his collection. I was stunned then, I wasn’t with Veejay’s. The first few notes got me thinking of black and new metal and edgy models with attitude. Suffice to say I wasn’t expecting at all the colorless minimalist outfits trickling down the runway. I started wondering why he has almost the same colour palette as Philip, and I thought maybe they were prescribed to use eco-fabrics like in one episode of Project Runway (US) or something like that. And while I was thinking about that, the designs all started melting into each other and my eyes just glazed over.. I thought he even sent a dress walking twice. The fit wasn’t that good either. I felt really bad because I wanted him to do well since he has a lot of heart and I know all about the different sacrifices and pains that goes into producing outfits like that. I think about it now and the clothes (which reminded me of the desert area Luke Skywalker grew up in at Tatooine and Queen Amidala’s fighting outfit), considered individually, are actually really great but during the show, I guess they just didn’t make an impact at all. I myself am only starting to learn that it’s better to “wow” in a show and create toned down, more wearable versions of the showpieces later than to be too safe. But I’m not worried for him, he’s young, is learning and there are more shows to come his way.

Aries Lagat showed his collection last and although I wasn’t crazy about his palette, I was just happy that he used colour at all. I loved the sparkling hoodie look for men and the floating lapels and the backs that looked as good as the front. Everything was incredibly well-made and fit the models so well. It was great how the audience clapped when one model went out in one outfit, got unzipped by two other models and turned her one outfit into three new looks for all of them. He’s so good with pattern making, I like how he thinks and he has great showmanship. I think Aries might win, just for showing something new, clothes that got people excited.

My friend told me about a badly written article about this in one of the local newspapers and I have to agree. Someone who would write “a striking bald model (for the theatrical factor)” theatrical factor??! in parentheses no less! after “shift dresses” and “flowing gowns” when talking about what went down the runway is disappointingly getting it wrong in fashion as with the written word. Reading further I came upon the proclamation that according to the author regarding Aries’ clothes and choice of print: “difficult to judge if these pieces would still work when worn in the streets.” Huh. Makes me wonder if the author has actually been out walking in the streets here and the billions of streets in the world, observing what people are actually capable of wearing. I guess that’s why Manila unlike Harajuku and elsewhere has no ’street fashion’. Too many people are too scared to dare wear whatever they like because too many people are too judgmental. And anyway, whether the outfits can be worn in the streets shouldn’t even be a concern anyway, they’re certainly great for parties and special events. But yknow what, maybe an ‘author’ who says “achitechtural” shouldn’t be taken too seriously anyway.

YoU mag launch, among other things

I promise myself I will update more frequently. I have such a long backlog of entries that won’t make sense to post now so my past few (super late) entries have been about the more important bits of my ‘fashion life’. This one will be not different but it will be the last of these late posts. Promise!

Two Saturdays ago was the launch of YoU magazine and along with four of my schoolmates, I showed two punk rock inspired outfits at their show. I shall have proper photos taken as soon as I get them back, right now I only have a not-so-detailed runway shot of one of them.

So yea, it looks like a puff of pink because I did make a puff of pink.. a hot pink tutu. I’m especially happy about the back of the bustier, where the zipper is attached tot he bodice using rows of safety pins, but as I said, I’ll just post detail photos here next time. It was a nicely done show all-in-all, the place was really packed. So full, in fact, that I got stuck in the middle of it trying to get out for around 10 minutes without getting one inch closer to the exit. But it was all nice, really. The other schools who showed outfits were Colege of St. Benilde, SOFA and FIP. None of them went up the stage when they were called though.. wonder why. So I don’t know them.. if they were students of faculty.

Okay have to go, Pattern III class is about to start.. and kacci and gloomy apparently have some pressing chika to tell. Haha.

Un Nuit Au Maroc

Thursday last week, Amanda Agnes and Sari Lazaro organized a fashion show for their production class. It was one night of fashion in Morocco. Designer students from our school, LaSalle College International, showed their stuff: Athena Tandoc, Finela Gregorio, Engie Garcia, Marge Regala, Kristine Bautista, Miki Hahn, Sari Lazaro and me. It was a great show, thanks to Amanda and Sari.

The location nearly ruined everything but it still was a great show, thanks to Amanda and Sari, everyone who helped and the designers. The place, and I mention this only once, was Warehouse 135. It was such a bad experience I shall never come back there again of my own accord, but the YoU Magazine launch this Saturday (in which I will be showing some punk rock clothes) will be held there so that will be the last time. First, they had to be told to turn the a/c on while we were setting everything up. And there was no help or any kind of assistance from them at all. When we arrived there late afternoon, the place, looking all dilapidated under the unforgiving lights was dirty, with cigarettes butts everywhere, probably from whatever went on the night before. The toilet had a lot of cockroaches. The backstage was upstairs and I was always scared to leave our things without someone we know because this dodgy crook-like man was always hovering nearby. He won’t even fetch water for my friend who needed to take some medicine. And while the models were undressing, the crook-guy and another goon were stealing looks! Athena had to tell him to give us a bit of privacy and he took one step back. We had to compensate and hide from them when they should be helping make things better. While the show is on-going, I was watching from the balcony backstage, waiting for my turn, and one guy came up to me and had the gall to tell me to tell everyone else to not nudge the stupid tables because the club’s power breaker thingy whatever will explode. What?! That totally doesn’t make sense. And it isn’t even my problem if they have some hacked-up electrical wiring that could cause major accidents with a single nudge of a table. It’s their problem and they either fix it or someone ought to investigate that. They were really gross and rude and unprofessional. I don’t know where the people who work there come from or how they were trained (if there was any training at all) but since they represent that “club,” everything about it was revealed to me in very poor, but clear light.

So next time you think about going there, don’t be fooled by the sparkling lights that hide all the ugly reality and stay near the exits because someone just might nudge a table and cause an explosion: you are in a warehouse that declares the fact in cheap tarp in front and that’s all it really is.

Thanks to:
stylebible.ph
Flip TV
Konrad Ong
LCI photography students
everyone who made it a nice event.