the kangaroo communique --> back-up style!

Registration, by the way, was incredibly tedious. I won't say 'hell' because that would be exaggerating the entire exercise, but let's just say I left school that afternoon murderous. Interestingly enough, this is the first time I finished registering in one day since I started my master's degree. That's got to count for something, right?

Last weekend of 'freedom' was spent with friends on Saturday, and family on Sunday. Went to my older brother's new place: it's a townhouse that's a stone's throw away from Holy Spirit. It was abymssally hot and I was terribly sleepy, but few things beat the joy of chilling out with your parents, your brothers and your sisters-in-law with the kids running around, eating Ferrero Rocher and talking about nothing at all.

My cat's been my only real company at home during the day, and my younger brother swings by in the evening to do work. His laptop finally gave out on him, so he doesn't have much of a choice. Been falling asleep to the sound of him working these past few days. Going abroad appears to have fixed my sleeping schedule: I don't stay up at ungodly hours, and I tend to wake up with the dawn.

Just had my first of two classes - no formal lecture, of course, just some questions and a bit of small talk. Spent more of my time catching up with a colleague, who gave me some interesting news. I've missed her a lot, I realize, but I haven't been very good with people these days. She hasn't been either, though, and we said as much to each other. There's some camaraderie to be found in being disconnected, then connecting with people who decided to disconnect the way you did for a while.

Won't be on campus again until Saturday, if I have any say in it. Home's just too comfortable these days.

---

Been wrestling with a general feeling of uselessness. Sure, I'm free and yes, it's wonderful, but I don't have a job, and after three years of earning it's kind of hard to fall back on that. My friends all appear to be moving ahead too, which doesn't really help.

Such as it is. I'll get on my feet again eventually. In the meantime, I ought to enjoy my break because I doubt that I'll get another one after this is finished.

---

I'd normally let an issue like this resolve itself and not chip in my two cents unless prompted to, but this debate on the RH Bill is becoming ridiculous. The Ruling Powers down hear (read: the Philippine Catholic Church) have it in their heads that they're waging a war against heathen, and the flock MUST obey them if they are to save their souls.

We were made to pray "for the sanctity of the Church" and "the well-being of all families" against the RH bill during last Sunday's service. Suffice to say, I did not kneel, and I did not pray at all. I believe I was the only one.

Perhaps I will stand next time. I can't walk out - it'll break my parents' hearts, and they are the only reason why I continue to suffer through Mass - but I can resist in my own way.

For any of you bishops in the audience, this is how I live my faith. Fucking deal with it. And no, you can't excommunicate me. I'd sure as hell like to see you try.

---

For the interested: I chronicled my entire trip abroad. I've listed down the entries here in chronological order:

► Vancouver, May 5
► Vancouver, May 6
► Vancouver, May 7
► Vancouver, May 8
► Vancouver, May 9-10
► Toronto, May 11-13
► Toronto and New York, May 14-19
► New York and Washington D.C., May 20-22
► Washington D.C., May 23-26
► Washington D.C./New York again/Toronto again, May 26-31
► Vancouver again and coming home, June 1-5

No pictures yet. I'll have to sit down a while and sift through them before I show anything off.

---

Now, for the mandatory fic dump.

► DEVIL SUMMONER. // From blossom to dusty blossom.
► SUIKODEN TIERKREIS. // Everybody knows I hate you except you.
► SUIKODEN TIEKRKREIS. // Tireless hunger in your eyes.
► METAL GEAR SOLID 4. // Take care of all our dreams.
► GINTAMA. // We outgrow love like other things.
► FULL METAL ALCHEMIST. // Don't trust a statistic you didn't fake yourself.

Got a lot of backlog, but my activities on LJ and my own need to catch up with downloads keeps me from posting them up in a timely fashion, or working on others.

Missed out on updating this for a while again, since we got pretty busy. I'm currently typing all of this out from my brother's apartment: it's our last day in Toronto before the last Vancouver run, and my folks have gone off to do some last minute shopping things. Peter and I are done packing, so we're chilling out and waiting for them.

---

May 26

This was our last day in Washington do to whatever we could, so after sleeping in and eating brunch at our leisure, my family elected to hit the Mall again to cover the Museum of American History. That place had some of the coolest exhibits I've ever seen, and one incredibly impressive exhibit on America's involvement in the different major wars along with some of their own on the home front. Military history and the like are among my favorite topics of interest, so you can only guess how much time I spent bouncing around in there, gawking at everything.

(Have I mentioned, on a related note, that we caught field trip season while we were in Washington, so we've been constantly swarmed by crowds of irritating children? I sometimes wonder if I've ever been so unappreciative of heritage and culture at those ages.

Shut up, I'm an old woman.)

We spent most of our morning and afternoon there, and then we split up to check out places we were interested in. Mom hit the art galleries; dad, Peter and I wanted to take a look at the Museum of the American Indian. Everything about that place was amazing, and my only regret is that we really, REALLY didn't get to see a lot of it before closing time. I was hoping to pick up a good book on Native American beliefs - something like a general reference on systems of religion, worship and philosophy - but there doesn't seem to be one in existence. That saddened me greatly, because the one exhibit we really got to go through tackled that topic, and was so fascinating. ;;

My feet were smarting from the collective pain of constantly walking since Toronto by that period. I think I spent most of the remainder of our last day in bed.


May 27

We got kicked out of the hotel by 12 because of check out times, and since our flight had been pushed back into the evening, we were left to stroll a bit around town and lounge in the lobby until it was time for us to head off. That was the start of all the shit, I believe.

Because of horrendous weather conditions and lots of air traffic, our flight was pushed back at least seven times, which resulted in my family and everyone else waiting for flights coming from New York waiting in the departure area for over four hours. The long delay made us miss our connecting flight to Buffalo (and, subsequently, an extra afternoon and evening with my brother Philip in Niagara on his birthday), so after riding a plane that smelled of piss (no joke; I don't want to think about whatever went in there before we came around), we were forced to putter around for a hotel at 2 in the morning upon our arrival to spend an extra night in NYC. We nailed one, but they dinged my parents for a crapload of money that didn't quite add up to the services and room quality of the place we were stuck with. It was one of those hotels that used to be really classy but is now falling apart all over the place.

At least the shuttle driver who took us over to our hotel was really cool.

In retrospect, the situation really wasn't so bad because I had my family with me. I think I would have been a lot angrier (and maybe a little insecure) if I had been traveling alone. The last delay I had to go through was back in LA, when I flew off for a conference. That wasn't very fun. :\


May 28

Our flight to Buffalo was, thankfully, NOT delayed, and we managed to get our suitcases upon landing without a fuss (they had been checked in the day before and had gotten to the airport way ahead of us). Philip was there to pick us up, along with Russell, one of my white brothers. The road trip going to Niagara was fun. XD

Russell accompanied Peter and I on the Maid of the Mist tour, which was so damned awesome... the last time I had been to see the Falls, I had been very young, so encountering them again at an age where I could truly appreciate their beauty and power was something else entirely. After that, we all spent a night out on the town, checking the place out. They really built a tourist town on the Canadian end! It made me miss the company of my friends back home.

The only solution, it seems, is to come back there with them someday.


May 30

Did some last minute touring of Niagara (Russell, Peter and I hit the Journey Behind the Falls this time and got thoroughly soaked) then went for a pit stop at Niagara-at-the-Lake (lovely little town; got to eat Canada's best ice cream, or so the sign said) before heading home. Didn't get to see Geoff since we arrived pretty late, which kind of sucked. Blame it on all of those damned delays...

Attended Mass with Phil and his family in the evening, then spent the rest of the time settling down and bonding. The little bro and I were dragged out early the very next day to go around the Greater Ontario area, checking out some of the universities that my folks are aiming to send my brother to. I went, of course, because these are the places I will have to seriously consider myself, since we might be moving.

Phil, Peter and I picked Liza and Liana up as soon as we were home so that we could catch Kung Fu Panda 2, which was pretty damned good for a sequel. After that, we picked up ginormous sandwiches for dinner, and the bros and I talked on things - family, growing up, moving out - while waiting for my parents to get home.

---

This trip, it seems, has been all about thinking back, looking forward and wondering where the hell I am now, in more ways than one. I am occasionally surprised at realizing how I really feel about things, and I'm also becoming increasingly aware of the fact that there's only so much time to do everything I need to do, and all of the other things that I simply want to do.

Interesting, really, this process of getting older.

On other news, I'm on my second (and heaviest) day of my period. I will be in transit. Fun.

We were utterly defeated by the American Museum of Natural History for several reasons:

1.) It was bloody fucking huge.
2.) Peter's boil was seriously acting up, so he and I took it slow.
3.) We met our cousin Eric and two of his kids, which is about as awesome as going through all of the lovely exhibits.
4.) It was bloody fucking huge.

I'm now looking forward to the Smithsonian. I barely remember the place, but I do recall thinking it was amazing. Then again, I was incredibly young - museums tend to be pretty amazing for impressionable little girls.

Eric dropped us off at a pharmacy that was supposed to have a doctor on call later in the afternoon because Peter was having a really hard time with his boil. Suffice to say, that didn't work out too well - the doctor wasn't going to do any procedure, which left us trying to figure out what to buy for home treatment and the like. Bit of drama on that part, since there were phone calls, disagreements over how to treat him (to lancet the thing and squeeze the pus out or not?) and even talk about us canceling the rest of the trip and going home if it got bad. Fortunately, after lots of parental fussing and treatment (caked blood and pus on gauze looks disgusting, by the way), it looked like Peter was definitely going to be fine by morning as long as he rested. That meant leaving him behind, though, and going to the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

They say that even if you were to visit the Met once a week for a significant period of time, you'll always stumble across something new even in sections that you've already visited before. I can completely believe this - the place has three floors, but it is MASSIVE. I was literally dragging my parents from room to room to see the stuff I was really interested in and one of the suggested exhibits (Temple of Dendur - they constructed an entire frigging wing for it to show you how the temple is supposed to look), and my feet were killing me, but I didn't want to stop at all. We only got to cover bits and pieces of three areas, but we left incredibly happy.

Parents bought me a painting on the way to Central Park - dad wanted us to cut through it on our way to the subway station. Apparently, my parents never managed to actually walk through the park in all of the times that they've been to New York, so it was a real treat, seeing them that happy while enjoying the place all the same. We got rained on close to the end of the route, but we were all prepared.

Stopped over at the hotel to pick up Peter and rest our legs a bit. Funny moment happened while flipping channels:

Me: *after Peter hits an adventure film - Conan the Barbarian, I think?* ...Is that Arnold Schwarzanegger?
Peter: No idea --
Guy on Screen: *while tumbling through a hole* RAAWARAWARGGGHHHH--
Both of Us: *stare*
Peter: ...Yep, that's Arnie.

Our next stop was the Empire State Building, in which we spent about two hours lining up just to get to the elevator to the 80th floor. Overheard a funny conversation while we were going through the line: two members of the staff were fanboying Supernatural ("Dude, how are they going to top last season? They beat the DEVIL, man!"). Anyway, after spending the entire day standing and walking, I did not appreciate the line-up at all - or more like, my body didn't. Still, all of us hate lining up even more than we hate cramps, so we rushed up the stairs to the observation deck.

The view of New York City at night made it all worth it, and then some.

There was another line going back down, but it wasn't so bad. We dropped by the hotel again to change Peter's bandage, then headed out to eat at Carmine's, which was one of the restaurants suggested by our little tour tour book. Servings were huge, atmosphere was great, people were friendly and the food was just glorious. Overall, it was a great way to top off our last official day in New York.

Parents woke the bro and I up early this morning to do our packing (all of us decided to crash early rather than pack our stuff before bed) and rush breakfast before hopping into a cab to the Amtrax for Washington D.C.. Peter and I barely felt the three-hour ride since the both of us decided to watch Glee and the last two episodes of Supernatural (WTF WAS THAT ENDING). The view from the window was pretty interesting for me as well - I've got a thing for abandoned buildings and countryside.

We landed at the Grand Union Station, which was a super pretty place to be in. The taxi ride en-route to our hotel took us through the National Mall area, which gave us a good look at some of the spots we'll be touring later. Oh, and front desk gave us an upgrade to this really huge suite; the guy's reasoning was that Peter and I weren't going to fit on a double bed anyway. I suspect that the token of good will was partially due to the fact that our hotel is close to George Washington University and they want smaller rooms available to people who really can't afford the bigger stuff, and since we reserved ahead and there are four of us... well, there you have it.

Either way, things are looking really good. I jokingly told Peter that he better pay attention in Mass later: he owes the Big Man a whole lot.

Doubt we'll be touring since it'll be evening after we finish Mass, so I suppose this means I ought to enjoy this room while I can.

Haven't been able to sign on for the past two days because we were on the move and such. Taking some time out to write this before my parents pretty much kick my bro and I out the door again.

Sore throat was gone by the time we had to fly to Toronto, but it was replaced by this allergy-cold sort of thing that I must've gotten from staying in our room - it was apparently pretty dusty in there. If you think about it, that put me between a rock and a hard place: staying inside rooms meant suitable warmth but a lot of dust, and staying outside meant good, fresh air but cold conditions. We were already heading out, though, and the only thing that I could possibly be concerned about was if my 'cold' was going to make landing and taking off hellish.

Our old maid picked us up and brought us to the airport, where we proceeded to go through the simplest check in and registration process that I have ever had to go through. Dad was amazed at how everything was so smooth, and how most of the proecess was automated. I told him that since we're used to crushing ineffeciency, we forget how most people actually expect things to work out versus expecting things to go horribly wrong. We then met up with our other old maid and her husband at the White Spot for brunch. It was really, really nice, hanging out with them and actually seeing the kind of people they are - I was very young the last time I was in close contact with them, and you know how that sort of thing goes. It's touching how much gratitude and respect they still have for my parents: they really feel as though they wouldn't have had anything of value if my folks hadn't brought them to Canada with us back then. From the stories I have heard from them and my folks, this might just be true.

The last check right before hitting the boarding area was a bit hassling for everyone except me: Dad got tagged for bringing in the food that our maids prepared for us (some of it had gravy), and my bro and my mother were randomly tagged for a full body scan. The plane ride itself was also the most turbulent flight that any of us have been on in a long while, aaaand they didn't feed us or provide free earphones for their in-flight entertainment systems (thank god for my headphones). Beyond that, though, all was well - I finally watched Toy Story 3 (nice way of finishing the series, imho), and since my folks were seated beside me, I got to watch them watching a movie together, which was super cute since they were leaning against each other and holding hands. Still going strong after thirty-seven years, and all.

Landing was super smooth, and my ears didn't feel the shift in air pressure at all in spite of my cold. My brother Phil picked us up with his little girl, and it was an adventure traveling through Toronto airport in order to get to his car. Place is fucking HUGE, let me tell you. It is also apparently thrice more expensive to fly in and out of Toronto than any other place in North America. Maybe even the world, if I was hearing Phil correctly.

Car ride to Phil's place was short and sweet since he and his family live nearby - we're staying at one of the apartment complex's guest suites, which is tiny, hot (since the entire tower's air conditioning system is offline for maintenance) but otherwise very swanky (lol full glass shower stall). We all ventured down to my bro's unit (which is, like, three doors away from our suite) and ate all of the food that our old maids packed for us (Dad admitted that he suddenly didn't regret the hassle of bringing it through the airport). We must've ended by midnight or so, and only because Phil does the graveyard shift and we didn't want to keep him up for too long.

Hands down: my first official day in Toronto was amazing. The subway system looks like something out of the movies (old trains, dingy stations, street performers in the tunnels, bustling crowds, strange people lurking around), and the city itself just has character, from the people wandering the sidewalks right down to the buildings themselves. It's been a long time since I've been in a city this huge at an age where I can really pay attention to the details, and believe me: I was looking every which way to try and catch as much of it as possible. We walkd down a bit of Yonge Street to get to the square on purpose so that we could get a good look of the place. I now understand the appeal of window shopping - the stores were all so different, and given the fact that I'm in the Philippines, it was pretty awesome, seeing adult sex shops, video rentals, fortune telling shops and kink stores spilling from every corner. The crowds themselves were a treat too; we even met crazy people on the way. My parents weren't too thrilled, but my bro and I found it cool.

We decided to take this city bus tour that does the entire route through the central area and lets you get off wherever you please. In spite of the fact that it was cold and slightly rainy, my bro and I stayed on the top deck of the bus the entire way to get a really good look of the place. It was totally worth it, because if the buildings weren't awesome, the pieces of art that they have scattered around were in their place. It was at that moment that I fell in love with Toronto, and I think that if I ever had to move back to Canada, it'd have to be here. There's just so much happening; it makes perfect sense now, how writers seem to love the place.

All four of us were freezing, tired but happy by the time we got off the bus. Stopped by McDonald's for a bit of food and to catch our breath, then we headed down into the Path, which is apparently the largest underground shopping mall in the world. All of the people who should've been up in the streets were down there instead, since it was bright and warm. We didn't walk around too much, though, since we had to head back to the station near my bro's place to meet up with him and his family. They drove us through Missisaga, the area that they used to stay in before moving to Sherway. Totally enjoyed the quick stopover we had by the lake in his old neighborhood: there were swans (they're bigger than my niece, holy shit), mallard ducks and Canadian geese!

Ate dinner at this lovely Vietnamese place with wonderful food and huge servings - we all just sat around and talked again, which is the best part about staying close to family. Got home late, of course, but I managed to stay around with my bro for a bit to hook up the internet on this thing and just catch up.

Little bro dutifully informed my parents and I, first thing this morning, that all three of us were snoring now. I apparently do that when I'm sick or really tired, ahaha. Now we're off to breakfast with Phil's wife and kid before heading out for the day.

The original plan was to go for the museum since the weather was supposed to take a turn for the worse, but when noon hit and there was no sign of that so-called thunderstorm, we took a chance and zipped down to the Toronto Zoo.

Most.

Kick ass.

Place.

EVER.

(Pics will follow eventually.)

My new favorite animal is the snow leopard.

Now that that is out of the way, let me babble briefly about the GPS that Phil lent to my dad. It's incredibly smart and can be programmed to calculate routes that best suit your driving style and speaks in this interesting, low female voice.

I want to name it after that computer system in Eden of the East. Yes, I am a dork.

We met up with Rob (my white brother) and his wife Regina for dinner after we finished walking the entire length of the Toronto Zoo (my legs still hurt like a bitch, by the way). We ate at this lovely Chinese place, and I am one to believe that the food really was excellent and it wasn't just me and my little bro starving after walking everywhere on a light breakfast and no lunch. We also got to meet up with this guy who has apparently become one of Philip's good friends while he's been staying here. A bonafide Chinese genius who calls himself 'yellow and geeky'. He appears to live up to this title well.

Peter wanted to stay up to watch stuff for a bit, and I took so long settling in and checking online accounts that out of desperation, he actually clamped down unto my shoulder and whined unto I turned on the next episode of Supernatural. Oh, family.