Insomia again

Ok, so it has been about a week now since I haven’t slept well and it has been almost two weeks since I wrote down anything significant here in my blog. But yes, Fanatical Teacher is insomniac lately…. thinking of the most recent things that has transpired in his life. The most recent one being that he has given his resignation letter at the school he is presently teaching, simply because he can’t handle the complaints being lodged against him by the parents of the students that he teaches.

I have talked with the College Secretary, and he said that I did a brave thing and also he agrees that this may be the best step for both of us. I gave him several reasons why I left — one of those reasons has to do with the fact that I am severely affected emotionally by the complaints. Second, I think that I still need to develop confidence in what I teach which would only come about when I am done with my graduate studies. The final reason is that I still need to develop life skills that are much needed in the workplace as well.

Last night, the speaker at the bible study had a chit chat with me and was wondering why I work freelance. I guess he rarely encounters people who are freelancers at my age. But the thing is, I work best when I am alone.  In fact, I think that being a freelancer is the best step I have ever taken to date because it has challenged and forced me to face some inner demons such as the way I relate to people.

And yet most of the time, I just deal with people online. It’s quite different when I meet the person face to face. I am still trying to be a more authentic person — no wait, I am trying to become a more compassionate and warm person.

It’s tough. Especially since I know for a fact that I am a rough person at heart. I’m a highly defensive person because I feel that I have been deprived of many things in life, including real love and acceptance that I haven’t had in my own family even until now. Only two of my siblings truly tries to understand me and I thank them for it. It’s quite surprising that it is my dad that is more understanding between my parents, and I have seen him try to do something to bridge the gap between us. It’s a long road ahead, and time is slipping away. I just pray that I would be able to do the right things. And I pray that this year would prove to be more than just a highlight in finishing my graduate studies and taking other certification programs, but I hope that this would indeed be a year of growing into loving God and others as well.

Slowly Getting into the Rhythm

Although it is already the third week of January, I am still getting into the rhytm of my schedule. For one thing, I managed to organize my email in gmail and also in yahoo into different folders. It was interesting as I was organizing them, as I began to realize that there were people that I regularly interacted with through email.  But other than that, I also noticed that the bulk of activity of my email is still mostly related to my work. Is that a good thing or a bad thing? I really do not know. I am just happy that I finally managed to do it.

For those waiting for the launch of the DGroup blog, I am still making final touches to it. I can barely keep up, especially with what’s going on Fanatical Teacher’s life at the moment. more stories on the way. For now, I hope that I can get back into action in the gym. For I certainly gained weight from binge eating over the weekend!

I Love Google Desktop

For those of you who happen to have gmail accounts or are frequent users of Google, Fanatical Teacher is excited to share with you that Google Desktop just rocks! It’s like a personal organizer only much better! It automatically indexes your files for you on your computer, and if you are connected to the internet, keeps you abreast of the latest news, the weather and updates you if there’s new mail coming through your email account!

It’s even better than the RSS feeds, which collates the news from different websites for one to read up on in catching up with the latest global news!

The Google Desktop is great for those whose work involves a lot of data encoding, internet searching and emailing! But even those who don’t surf the internet that much or tinker with their computers could benefit from this as well!!!

So go type Google Desktop and download the program! I’m sure blown away by it! If Enigma is reading this, this is perfect for your work in keeping up to date with the news as you won’t need to go to websites in order to find the lates buzz!

Till then, see have fanatical days ahead!

Spring Cleaning

I’ve decided to clean up my chaotic room. Oh yes, in the next few days Fanatical Teacher will be covered in dust and would probably get a cold because of the dust mites that are hidden in the crevices of the books and clothes that are inside the wardrobe. I’m doing this because I am running out of space, and a majority of the space in my room is occuppied by student papers I have finished checking last semester and student records.

Hopefully, by the end of next week I would have been done with cleearing my room of such debris.

Going Freelance

Fanatical Teacher has been a Freelance Writer/Researcher for about nine months now. And frankly, he doesn’t have much to show for it at all in terms of financial gain yet. In fact, it wiped out the savings of Fanatical Teacher last year, as clients were not paying on time. But overall, Fanatical Teacher still had one of the best years of his life. Last year was a year of revelation.

Most people think that freelancers have a good life. The Teacher discovered that most people have this notion that freelancers could wake up at any time that they want, and that the schedule that they have depends totally on what they want to do. Although there is truth to that statement, it was discovered by Fanatical Teacher that this is not the entire picture.

Yes, it is true that there is freedom in terms of schedules. The liberty of waking up at one’s pace and not because one has to rush towards the nearest MRT to go to one’s place of work is exhilirating. Yet freelancing is not for the weak of heart either. It involves a greater deal of discipline because all aspects of discipline is determined by oneself. For instance, almost all freelancers I know fret about how they would get through the day, and how they could come up with other projects in order to provide for themselves and their families. Yes, famililes are involved in this too especially if the freelancer happens to be married. Freelancing in the true sense of the word is being a businessman and establishing one’s business.

Fanatical Teacher has great ambitions in life, but behind all the smiles that one can see in this blog, Fanatical Teacher is actually going through birth pains in his quest to establish himself as a reputable freelancer writer/researcher. And it has already been pointed out by Enigma and Dark Materials that since I keep mentioning that I am a writer/researcher in the blog, then it should be done with utmost intergrity with the use of the English language.

Sometimes, Fanatical Teacher thinks about becoming a regular employee again. But then, the past year has taught him that he can do much more on his own. He discovered that he can be disciplined in how he manages his time. He also found out that he needs to be more cautious and prudent with the way he handles his finances. Fanatical Teacher also dreams of working abroad, primarily because he wants to see the world and also so that he could tell his own tale when he comes back to the Philippines. Is it really worth it to become an OFW? Fanatical Teacher has heard enough stories that could paint a picture of a thousand frowns, or echo a million murmurs in the dark that symbolizes the pain and trauma that most OFWs suffer without ever being able to share it to their loved ones.

But for now, Fanatical Teacher will keep doing what he does best. Teaching, writing and doing research work. May this year prove to be fruitful and not just a challenging one for the heart and soul……

Diligence

On Wednesday night, Fanatical Teacher went to Makati to drop by the office, and also to join a bible study. The topic is about diligence and the passages that was used included Proverbs 21:5 and Proverbs 12:24.

At the moment, fanatical teacher is just writing these things and will edit it later. The topic was really good. It talked about a man digging for gold, seeing opportunities from nothing and even mentioned about being diligent in handling God’s Word, and in wherever God has placed us right now.

The speaker also mentioned about trials, and there was a long question and answer portion about — loving the things we do, about the different businesses that our parents have and children who do not wish to continue in the family business.

Well, that’s about it for now. I just wanted to write these down so that I won’t forget them when I sleep.

Reminiscing the Christmas Party at Art Inc.

Okay, this is a bit delayed, but I just wanted to share some of the pics of last year’s Christmas party at the office. As most of my friends know, Fanatical Teacher works part-time for an advertising company managed and owned by the husband and wife tandem. I’m not sure if they don’t mind revealing their real names but here so I will just call them The Diva and The Man. Here’s a picture of the sweet couple! They’ve been married for more than two decades! Wow! For me that’s really admirable, especially in this day and age that so many relationships break up and end up in a divorce or annulment. Having worked in a law office that specialized in family law and handling 90% annulment cases, Fanatical Teacher has somewhat developed a certain pessimism about relationships. Oh well, enough of this.

So, let’s go with the food! Of all the Christmas parties I have ever been to this is one party that really had the interest of living healthy! We were all kidding about this because the company is involved with the Nestle Wellness campaign. In the process of getting involved with our client, we were slowly changed by the information that we were being bombarded on health and fitness.  The picture below shows three types of pasta sauces. There’s the pesto sauce, then there’s the putanesca and then there’s the garlic and oil sauce. All of them mixed with virgin coconut oil. It was so delicious that

Gymboxer ate a lot of pasta!

I ate a lot and didn’t think about the calories I was indulging myself in. I wasn’t able to take a picture of it, but the fruit salad was also memorable! It had a certain texture to it and a crunchy feeling due to the nuts including in it! That’s truly inventive because it was my first time to eat fruit salad with mixed nuts like almonds! Mmmmm!

Here’s opur lovely nutritionist that is part of the team for the Nestle Wellness! She was the one that mentioned “count your blessings and not your calories!” during the Christmas party! Ha ha ha!!!While Here’s Fanatical Teacher in love with Amarula! It’s like Bailey’s, even better! Fanatical Teacher got drunk with two full glasses of the thing!!!

O course, it wouldn’t be fair if I didn’t introduce you to the other fabulous ladies of the office – OfficeGirl and Artsy Perksy! The one on the left is OfficeGirl, the one we ask if we have a check already while Artsy is the resident Art Director. Hmm, what does this picture remind you of?

One of the highlights of the night was that there was a game involving riddles. None of those who were teaching at different universities were able to answer ANY of the clues! Isn’t that funny? Here’s Mailbox sharing the clues.

 So there we have it folks! The Art Inc Christmas Party! Incidentally, we were so busy that we had our Christmas Party last December 29. So it was more like a Christmas Party and New Year’s celebration rolled into one. If you want to view the other pics of the Christmas party, just check out my flickr account name — takethispicture.

Until then, Happy New Year again folks!

Of Deaths and New Beginnings

Today’s the second day of the year, and Fanatical Teacher is already grateful for still being alive. Oh yes, for the Teacher just came from a funeral parlor as a father of a churchmate died. Other than that, I also watched on cable television last night at the spa that there were about 1,000 plus casualties of the recent New Year’s festivities due to firecrackers and also from stray bullets.

Stray bullets! According to the news, the number is more than double this year than last year! From the lasts tally, the number was 37 stray bullets! Good thing nobody was reported dead among the many people injured and brought to the hospital. But man, I left the house at about 11pm just to accompany my friend who wanted to watch the fireworks display in Makati. I didn’t know that it would be that dangerous to go out. Thank God I am still alive!

Yet more than dodging stray bullets, I am also reminded of the many opportunities and possibilities this year. At the wake, I was reminded of what is most important in life. Relationships.

When I think about that, I wonder where would I be a year from now? Will I meet new friends this year as I did in 2006?

2006 was the year that I met fellow geeks who were into comic books. Not to mention, I made friends with a few students from DLSU just by hanging out at Starbucks working on my laptop. More than this, I also gained new officemates as well.

Will this year be any different? Or is this year a chance to redeem “old” or at least rekindle the ones that have alreay waned due to my own limitation and inadequacy as a person? I really don’t know. But I do know this — death reminds me about the importance of life and living it to the fullest. And a new year presents a genesis of hope that one could become a much better person than the one others knew of the previous year before.

Happy New Year!!!

For the second year in a row, Fanatical Teacher celebrated the new year in chaotic Metro Manila. Oh yes, it was indeed chaotic, considering that Fanatical Teacher joined with Gymboxer to watch the fireworks display in Makati City. The city government of Makati organized a fireworks display and concert. It was fun. It kinda reminded me of those videos I saw in CNN of New York City and Times Square. There was a big electronic timekeeper that counted the last 60 seconds of the year! There was a lot of confetti in the air, and the place was filled with people of all ages, both local and a lot of foreigners, ex-pats who live and work here in Manila.

It was pretty cool, of which one of the highlights for me was that I ate Bibingka. I didn’t know that there were two ways of cooking it. The old fashioned way which takes much longer is to cook it using coals and putting the cooking pan in between them. There is this a small coal pot that is placed on top of it aside from the one underneath. According to another chef friend of mine, there are Bibingkas now that are cooked using the modern gas stove but the consistency is different and also the texture of the food changes as well.

Here’s me going for the killer stroke of food bliss! You can barely see it here, but the sugar they used was Muscovado, which is a lot healthier than the white refined sugar as well! The line was so long for the Bibingka that I had to wait for an hour for my order to come out. It was almost 2am when I got mine, at which time mt stomach was already growling from hunger!

While I had my share of Bibingka, Gymboxer took advantage of the Putobumbong being sold on the street! Man, I tell you these are the things that make life worth living for! Of the different food stalls that were there, I was really proud of this one because they are selling authentic Filipino cuisine! We really ought to have more of this out there, and they ought to be more presentable and CLEAN. That’s the main problem that I notice in regards to tourism. Our street foods aren’t really looked upon as realiable as that of Thailand, were tourists don’t mind eating them! Our tourists have to go to the malls and visit places like Dads in order to taste authentic Filipino cuisine, but at a price that could rival appetizers of five star hotel restaurants.

Hmm, the Ninoy Aquino statue. It was facing the concert venue. The fireworks display took place at the back of the Makati Stock Exchange building. I took this picture because I felt it was interesting. People were excited about the New Year, and yet how many people actually remember the past in order to not repeat the same mistakes and sins of our fathers in the future, or in this case the “new year”? Ninoy Aquino died for the Filipino people because he believed there was hope and that we could make a difference. I hope that this 2007 I too will make a difference in peoples’ lives.

After the countdown and fireworks display, many people left and only those into rock and roll lingered to watch the perfomances of the bands Itchy Worms of Hello Moto fame and Six Cycle Mind. The street was littered with garbaged, but what I admired about the event was that there were trash collectors sweeping up the place all the time, and that there were enough policemen in the vicinity monitoring the event as well. In fact, even the patches of green were covered with nets and signages so that one doesn’t step on them and destroy them in the process. This is probably the most organized event I ever attended, because it was able to consider the different needs and factors that would transpire during the entire night.

And so, after the concert we went home and here’s a last glimpse of the fireworks on show that night. Happy New Year everyone! May this year prove to be a challenging year for everybody! On my part, I pray it would be a time of deepening relationships with people. May this be a year that would draw us closer to God, and make our existence more meaningful. Speaking of meaningful events, this New Year countdown that was organized  by the City Government of Makati was actually a fund raising event for those who were affected by the typhoons in Albay. The event was able to raise half a million pesos that night. So it wasn’t simply a fireworks display after all. It had meaning and significance for the people who are still suffering from losing their houses and loved ones. That made me sober, sad and grateful for what I have because I still have 521,600 minutes to live a year full of seasons of love — and yes, I am borrowing words from the musical RENT here.

Happy New Year everyone!!!