It is at the peak of vulnerability when we become slaves to our frail emotions. The moment when all the encapsulated tidbits of neglected feelings uncontrollably blew into a horrible monster we have never seen before. The worst part is keeping it all to yourself. 

(Kopiko-induced sentiments)

The Walled City

One scorching sunny afternoon, my brother Jalal and I played tourists in the metro! Our destination: Intramuros, Manila or better known as The Walled City. Back in the Spanish era, (ahem! ako na ang may nalalamang history!), this used to be the capital and the seat of Spanish sovereignty in the Orient for over three hundred years. The walls of Intramuros were built to prevent threats of invasion by Chinese, Japanese, Dutch and Portuguese pirates. (naks, parang The Great Wall of China ang peg!) The walls stretched to 4.5 kilometers in length, enclosing a pentagonal area of approximately 64 hectares. Before you proceed, I shall warn you of the amount of photos in this entry! It's overloaded! I lack time putting them into collage!

First Stop: Silahis souvenir shop packed with Philippine made crafts and artistries, we even found some vanishing Maranao cultural goodies such as the kulintang, kubing, dubakan (musical instruments) and a replica of the Sarimanok. 

That huge drum behind Jalal is a Maranao palace drum that is used when the Sultan wants to convene his people. 

Next stop: The Papier Tole Shop. It's a souvenir shop where items are mostly made of paper. They claim to have started their business since 1668!! 

A batallion of them!! Cute!!

I love the adobe stone walls and pavements in this portion of The Walled City. It's magnificent how the place was restored to it's original structure after it was ruined during The World War II. 

Next: Casa Manila. It is a "colonial lifestyle" museum where the Spanish way of living and their influence in our culture is being highlighted. Too bad taking pictures inside was prohibited so we just took photos in the zaguan (corridor) and patio.

Guess what I wished for? :p

Next: The sentry wall top. We climbed the top of the sentry wall beside the ECJ building where we got a nice view outside Intramuros: The Manila Golf Course. 

The sun seemed to roast my skin I couldn't bear to face it and smile!! I, instead, pose for a side view. 

There you go, rabbit!!! Nyahehehehehehe...

Jalal trying to replicate my pose!! Awkward!! Eeepp!!

 This is now called the ECJ building housing some government offices. This used to be a palace where Miguel Lopez de Legazpi, that conquistador former Governor-General of the Philippines was residing.

In our journey back to the Spanish era, we found a "futuristic" graffiti wall where them punks express themselves by painting stuff on it. It's called freedom, men. Freedom. Emo. Whatever. 

We wandered around until we realized the sun was almost setting and we haven't reached Fort Santiago yet.    Thank God there we sikads around which transported us to our main destination. Haha! 

This is The Walk Way to Martyrdom. They "traced" the footsteps of our National Hero, Dr. Jose Rizal, from his prison cell to Bagumbayan (now, Luneta) where he was executed. 

Guess who was there to give us a FREE historical lecture!!! Ta daa... Carlos Celdran in the flesh!

We sat behind the REAL Tourists..feeling touristy all along. :p

When they left, we continued exploring the place. Look what we found!!!

O, nasa Intramuros pa rin tayo ha? Pasig River lang yang nasa likod ko. Nice, right? You see, Philippines is a beautiful country with rich history and culture. It's always a great idea to go back to our history and find out the transitions that happened culminating into what we we all are now. :)

The question is, have we been any better? 

To cap it all off, I wouldn't leave without a photo with my crush Dr. Jose Rizal. Yes, I'm a fan and I don't care when they say that he doesn't deserve hero-hood because he didn't really fought a war in it's literal sense. Whatever, haters. He's still my hero. \m/

My brother and I wandered for roughly 3 hours but it was a fulfilling day for me! Alhamdulillah. Visiting Intramuros is one of my pre-review plans and, thank God, my brother visited me and willingly accompanied me in another one of my insane fits! :) 

I still have some unfulfilled pre-review plans but I guess, they won't materialize due to my Pedia Ward sched. ;'(

Born 29 weeks age of gestation (AOG).

Preterm infant under blue light phototherapy.

He clasped the tip of my finger as my heart broke over the huge probability of his non-survival. :'(

Photo taken using my iPod without any filter at all. 

Walking The Walk

The long Holy Week holidays compelled everyone to go on a vacation, but for me, it's more of a staycation. Hehe. I was on a postduty status yesterday and aside from sleeping more than half of the day, I spent it surfing the web and started reading Malika Oufkir's account on her life in the hands of the Moroccan Royalty (Stolen Lives). It's disgruntling that the only time we are supposed to be available is the time that almost ALL of the establishments in the metro are closed in observance of the holy week. Oh well. 

On the brighter side, this is, I guess, the only time that the metro calms down. No disgusting traffic and no nauseating crowd. Oh, how priceless serenity is. :) 

So, earlier this morning. I dragged my housemate Ate Sai to Roxas Boulevard for a morning walk. It felt like a ghost town indeed, although there are still few motorists on the road. Less carbon monoxide for our lungs. 

If not for the garbage thrown all over and the people living on the streets, this would have been a beautiful street. :'( 

Yachts at Harbour Square. 

Wearing my medschool jacket. Proud MSUan! :) 

We walked and walked from Pedro Gil to the stretch of Roxas Boulevard until we realized we were already at the CCP! Hahaha!! So many health buffs jogging or bicycling and enjoying the perfect morning sun. I miss jogging around the Iligan City Hall Complex where my housemates and I would come at least thrice a week in our desperate attempts to becoming healthy (and slim). The last time I jogged was before clerkship!!! Ages ago!! Wah!! This hospital duties really rips off our healthy lifestyle. Tee hee. Blamingtheweatherman. 

I wouldn't leave CCP without this ballerina statue photo. Remember this?  Haha. Future daughters, you got one crazy mom waiting for you here. Better start stretching your muscles now. :p 

Thank you soooo much Ate Sai for riding on with one of my few insane fits! :)

****
P.S.
Can't wait to go back home and jog around the MSU Grandstand Oval. :)

Looking Through The Eyes.....

Literally. That's how we roll at Ophtha. Another loved rotation because, again, it made me learn things I didn't know before. I was inept at ophthalmologic exam so this was another challenge for me in gathering skills at looking at the back of the eyes called the retina and identifying the optic disc, the macula, the fovea and determining abnormal structures as a manifestation of a systemic disease.  

Googled photo. 

Ophtha residents' duty schedule has been envied by any other PGH residents. They're relatively the most benign training. Their patients are not benign but they got the most relaxed schedule. They don't run bloods for the surgery of their patients and they don't need much assists. So cool!!!   

Kaya pag tinamad ako, mago-ophtha ako!! Hehehe. 

Cataract extraction and insertion of lens. 

It was included as a bonus question in our end-of-rotation exam the best and worst part of our Ophtha stay. 

Best: 

a. The residents are so chillax. They're not always in a state of hurry, thus, not creating hypertoxicity among interns. They're intern-friendly as well. :)

b. The building. They're the only department with a separate building called the Sentro Oftalmologico Jose Rizal donated by the government of Spain in honor of our very own National Hero, Gat Jose Rizal, who is the First Filipino Ophthalmologist. 

Worst:

That the rotation lasts only for two weeks. :( It's so sad that it ends when we already get the hang of it (and the time I discovered how gorgeous this certain resident is. haha!)

**************

Internship update:

We are so back into the fragile arms of Pedia, the time when the clerks are off for their vacation in preparation for internship. Waaaahhh!!! I'm ready to be killed. 

"If I Should Have A Daughter"

I've been watching this video over and over again since Jing posted it on her blog. 

"If I should have a daughter, instead of "Mom," she's gonna call me "Point B," because that way she knows that no matter what happens, at least she can always find her way to me. And I'm going to paint solar systems on the backs of her hands so she has to learn the entire universe before she can say, "Oh, I know that like the back of my hand." And she's going to learn that this life will hit you hard in the face, wait for you to get back up just so it can kick you in the stomach. But getting the wind knocked out of you is the only way to remind your lungs how much they like the taste of air. There is hurt, here, that cannot be fixed by Band-Aids or poetry. So the first time she realizes that Wonder Woman isn't coming, I'll make sure she knows she doesn't have to wear the cape all by herself because no matter how wide you stretch your fingers, your hands will always be too small to catch all the pain you want to heal. Believe me, I've tried. "And, baby," I'll tell her, don't keep your nose up in the air like that. I know that trick; I've done it a million times. You're just smelling for smoke so you can follow the trail back to a burning house, so you can find the boy who lost everything in the fire to see if you can save him. Or else find the boy who lit the fire in the first place, to see if you can change him." But I know she will anyway, so instead I'll always keep an extra supply of chocolate and rain boots nearby, because there is no heartbreak that chocolate can't fix. Okay, there's a few heartbreaks that chocolate can't fix. But that's what the rain boots are for, because rain will wash away everything, if you let it. I want her to look at the world through the underside of a glass-bottom boat, to look through a microscope at the galaxies that exist on the pinpoint of a human mind, because that's the way my mom taught me. That there'll be days like this. ♫ There'll be days like this, my momma said. ♫ When you open your hands to catch and wind up with only blisters and bruises; when you step out of the phone booth and try to fly and the very people you want to save are the ones standing on your cape; when your boots will fill with rain, and you'll be up to your knees in disappointment. And those are the very days you have all the more reason to say thank you. Because there's nothing more beautiful than the way the ocean refuses to stop kissing the shoreline, no matter how many times it's sent away. You will put the wind in winsome, lose some. You will put the star in starting over, and over. And no matter how many land mines erupt in a minute, be sure your mind lands on the beauty of this funny place called life. And yes, on a scale from one to over-trusting, I am pretty damn naive. But I want her to know that this world is made out of sugar. It can crumble so easily, but don't be afraid to stick your tongue out and taste it. "Baby," I'll tell her, "remember, your momma is a worrier, and your poppa is a warrior, and you are the girl with small hands and big eyes who never stops asking for more." Remember that good things come in threes and so do bad things. And always apologize when you've done something wrong, but don't you ever apologize for the way your eyes refuse to stop shining. Your voice is small, but don't ever stop singing. And when they finally hand you heartache, when they slip war and hatred under your door and offer you handouts on street-corners of cynicism and defeat, you tell them that they really ought to meet your mother."

Now here are the three things I know to be true:


1. Right now, I'm crawling to the end of internship I want to end it so badly.
2. I want to go travel somewhere before the review for the board exam starts and try to find that missing piece I lost somewhere along the journey of life. 
3. I look at myself in front of the mirror and ask "What happened to you? Where are you now? Why do you not care?".