What I've disregarded in the past has come back to haunt me - to make me realize the gravity of the situation.

I've shrugged the US recession off as something which I think I won't be affected with, and which I can live through.

Even when my fellow officemates got laid off work, I just felt sympathy, not empathy, something I shamefully admit. I haven't grasped the very meaning of recession and how serious its consequences are to those who've been slapped by it.

Until now...

Accounts of how life in the US is now lived have been shared, together with the painful admittance that relatives can no longer lend a helping hand, even if they so willingly want to. Left without a choice, others have even let go of the hope they've held on to the lands of opportunities and just chose to go back - with the new hope that they could start anew with the bread they've earned through years of odd jobs and hard work.

These things made me think back a second, sent a jolt of lightning my way to awaken me from my happy-go-lucky slumber, and made me come to a realization. It is only this time that I've come to fully understand what others meant of uncertainty in life. Truly, it is more true now that it has ever been.

Depressing as though it may be, the only thing I have against all these is my optimism. I cannot afford to feel otherwise as it will only make things worse for me and for those who've felt the blow of recession the most. I am a The Secret believer and if there's one thing that it taught me, it is that I attract everything I always think of, and that unfortunately includes the ill feelings within me and the things I endlessly rant about.

I must put an end to this. I must go back to practicing that best new year's resolution I've come up with - Stop or lessen whining and just do what I must and be optimistic. Life indeed gets better with that thinking in heart.

So amidst all these crises and global recession, I can't help but feel that change is just around the corner waiting to be found. With all these happening right now, there's no way to go but up, and there's no path to take but the path to a better place...

I bid farewell to this post with a message to one of the most powerful men in the world - US President Barack Obama:

What the others cannot do, that's what you must do...

What the last administration failed to do, that's what you must succeed on...

For the betterment of your country...

And of the whole world.

USAP Marketing Presents The Macalooweez - 2peat Champs!

We won again! Second time in a row, baby! Yeah! Hahah! All hard work and practicing till almost midnight paid off! The Macalooweez has once again earned the right to be called champions! As I said, "We are The Macalooweez and we defend what we deserve!" With our dance presentation themed The Macalooweez take it to the streetz, we definitely rocked the dance floor! Also, with the judges being dance authorities themselves, we sure made an impression of how dancing in a dance competition should be like! We not just bagged ourselves a whooping P30,000 we also got the much-anticipated prize of one more year of bragging rights! Hahahah! Kidding! We're just really happy we did it with flying colors as the result. We all hope the USAP Marketing peeps are proud of us. We proved ourselves worthy of the investment, right? :D Thanks again for all your support! And thanks to the Kupy for the Macalooweez logo! :D

And now, give it up for the USAP Dance Competition 2007 and 2008 Champion!! Enjoy! *drum rolls*

USAP Marketing Christmas Presentation (Champion - December 2007)

USAP Marketing Dance Presentation - The Macalooweez (Champion - December 2008)

Meet Nymphadora Tonks

I am a "The Secret" believer and for months now, I've been thinking of buying myself a digital camera, which has to be a Sony Cybershot, nothing less. So when the opportunity to buy a Cybershot presented itself, I just had to bite, I had to take the bait. And so I did. So thanks to a colleague of mine who offered her Sony Cybershot at a generous price (and a generous way to pay it at that), I now have a new gadget to play with!

So meet my newest toy, Nymphadora Tonks (Tonks for short, she doesn't want to be called Nymphadora), a pink Sony DSC-T70 Cybershot. You can already say I'm a Harry Potter fan, I named her after none other than the bubbly witch from Order of the Phoenix, who sometimes (or most of the time) wears her hair pink. It's unfortunate (for me) that Sony didn't release a purple Cybershot, it would have been a more appropriate color for a purple-lover like myself. Hehe! But I'm still okay with pink, at least it's still cute and girly. Haha!

The moment I got my hands on Nympha.. I mean Tonks, I immediately busied myself exploring the amazing features she offers. I have to say, she is everything I dreamed my camera to be. And I think she already likes me too! Haha! She's captured my smile with her Smile Shutter feature when she was having a slightly hard time capturing the smiles of others. Haha!

Oh, look at us!

She's a beauty, ain't she?

I love you Harry....

Hi Harry,

It's already been 2 days since you've left us and I hate you for doing that! Why did you give in? You know very well that losing you would make us feel terribly sad and still you chose to leave. You know we love you very much and that you mean the world to us so why give up at the last minute? You even gave us hope that you'll soon come back healthy as just the other day, you seemed to be yourself again and then the next day, you just gave up. You've crippled us, Harry. You are a part of our family and now with you gone, nothing would ever be the same again. =(

I never thought we'd lose you, honestly. I've always thought that you'll be with us for a long time and maybe that's exactly the reason why I sometimes took your existence for granted. I'm very sorry, Harry. Truly, I am. I'm sorry that I wasn't able to see and feel that you're already suffering inside. Had I known that, I would've given you more attention and cared for you more and maybe, you'd still be with us right now. Maybe right now, I wouldn't be just reminiscing the times I played with you while I'm writing this post but instead, I'd be playing with you for real. It would be just like the old times, me calling you and you not responding to my call (hehe), me squeezing your chubby cheeks while you just sit like nothing's happening. Oh, how I wish I was doing that now!

You left so suddenly that you made moving on terribly difficult. But despite that, you've left us with only good memories to cherish. It hurts to think of those happy moments now but hopefully, someday, we'll be able to accept the fact that you're in a much happier place now, watching over us like you've always done and just being adorably cute. And when that day comes, these memories will not bring us tears anymore but paint a smile on our faces.

Harry, thank you for loving us as much as we loved and continue to love you. We will miss you. =(

Don't be sad wherever you are right now, ok? We love you so much...!

Loving you the most,
Daddy, Mommy, Ate Abbi, and Kuya Ced

Along the Green Mile

Monday proved to be a day of realization - it was because of one movie, The Green Mile. I never heard of it before although it's been around since 1999 and I was only given a chance to see it on Monday. I didn't even plan on watching it, my dad just happened to like the movie and told me it was good. I gave it a chance because I had nothing better to do.

Little did I know that as the movie unfolds, I'd be facing a situation that I'd later on label as a traumatic experience. I've only had one traumatic experience in my life and so this counts as the second one. Some of you may already be aware but for the sake of those who are not, I'd try to summarize it as best as I can.

Its story is about a man whose job is to supervise the electrocution of vicious criminals. His career led him to meet a man who was wrongly-accused of killing two girls as he tried to heal them with his miraculous God-given healing power. Unfortunately, he failed and that's when people saw him and so misunderstood the situation. He had no witnesses of his miracles at that time and so he was left with no choice but to accept the punishment. That situation alone is saddening as it is but what made the movie a traumatic experience for me was to witness the "failed" electrocution of someone - it was successful because the criminal died but "failed" in a sense that the other supervising police officer deliberately put a dry sponge on top of the man's head. Putting a dry sponge instead of a wet one will cause torture to the person when he is electrocuted and will literally ignite and leave him sparking and burning in flames. People just watched as he screamed in pain. That time when I was watching it, I felt I was there watching the whole scene unfold and I felt fear and shame as I could not do anything to stop the torture. I know it was just a movie but I guess that's what what trauma does to you - I forgot for a few seconds that I was watching something fictional. And that's also the moment when the realization came.

I realized that somehow, humans tend to be meaninglessly cruel to each other. I say meaningless because we want people who've wronged us to be punished by death when we have no right over that person's life. I'm not being a humanitarian here, all I'm saying is that if we really want to punish someone, then ending his/her life is not the appropriate solution. You just let him rest in peace, and that I think is doing someone a favor. If you really want to let him suffer as much as you have because of what he's done, then have him imprisoned for life. Having him locked up with no hope of ever experiencing the sun against his face is the greatest punishment there is - it's like living with no choice of having any other purpose in life - except to live for the sake of repentance.

How ironic it is that we have the capability of killing someone but no power to bring him back.

It just goes to show that we are tested everyday not to give in to that capability of ending someone's life no matter how much pain he's caused us.

The movie is right - this world is just so full of dirt - envy, lies, jealousy, power-hungry people, money, murders, and so much more. It is already a miracle that we are able to survive such a gruesome place. And our secret? We unconsciously drive these dirt away from us by looking only at the great things in life.

The secret lies in focusing ONLY on the good things in life that make us happy. Never mind these dirt and entertain the beautiful things life offers us and they'll surely decide to stay. That's what I do and they really stay to keep me even happier.

The Sweetest Birthday Surprises

I've never been surprised on my birthday in the 21 years that I've been in this world. I've been surprised with gifts that I didn't think I'd be getting, yes, but not been given a surprise birthday party, yet. Okay, let me cut the introduction and get to the bottom of this! My friends from the office decided to make my birthday extra special and they went out of their way to surprise me a day before my birthday (read: they planned the surprise together with my family and boyfriend)! There! Haha!

What really made it extra special was the fact that they surprised me at our house. I didn't expect them to go all the way to our home sweet home and I was expecting that they'd do it in our office and on my real birthday (Haha expecting! Feelingera! Cause it has already become our tradition to surprise our friends on their birthday). So imagine my surprise when Mike and I got back from running an errand for my Mum and they suddenly appeared singing Happy Birthday and holding a cake (read: frozen for a good 10 seconds and just staring at them like I've seen a ghost! LOL!). That time I was thinking, "They're here. What are they doing here? Sarah, Ico, Ronan, Maje, Anna, Zac," and it took a few seconds before I realized they surprised me. Hahaha! They also gave me a purple tumbler with a collage of my pictures with my friends as the design. Oh well, aren't they the sweetest friends? =D

But that's not yet the end of the surprise! On the day of my birthday, my Web Analytics Family (the sole Junior Business Analyst included) also gave me a surprise Happy Birthday! I was working at that time (I think. Haha!) when someone tapped me on my shoulder and when I looked up, there they were holding a Purple Cake (Ube flavor, yum!) and singing Happy Birthday! They also gave me a pillow which says "World's Sexiest Woman." Haha! =D How true! Haha! Kidding! =P

I need not go into details of the surprise and how I looked like, I'll just let these snapshots do the story-telling of how my 22nd birthday was celebrated. At the end, you'll see for yourself how sweet my friends are and how special I felt on my birthday. =D



Thanks to our official photographer, Ronan, who documented (took pictures. Hehe!) the event. More pics here, and here, and here. =D

Missing Creativity Though Not Regretting

I hate to admit it but I'm kind of like missing writing, writing creatively (that is, if my articles before can be considered creative enough. Hehe). But yeah, I kind of miss my copywriting days here at USAP. At that time, I felt like I was stitching together beautiful words to produce creativity out of something as plain and as dull as say a catalytic converter or oxygen sensor. These car parts are among the hundred automotive parts that I needed to carefully understand in order to come up with readable and, if I'm lucky, interesting articles for online visitors to take notice of. It was difficult, really, as I needed to write something I never knew before existed in car parts! Hehe! But even though that what was I felt most of the time, writing these articles gave me a sense of satisfaction and self-esteem as it juiced out the creativity and writing skill in me. After all, writing was and still is my passion (though it may not be obvious =P) no matter what I write about.

But passion's flame sometimes flicker and for the sake of not letting it completely lose its fire, it needs to take some time off. It needs to be kept in a place where no air can ever die it out. And for people, like myself, who've had a chaotic experience involving their passion, giving it a rest is highly prescribed to preserve the little self-esteem left to them. I need not go into details of my bitter experience as I've ranted about it so many times before, I've already gotten over it. Thank God!

This "bitter" experience led me to pursue another career which to this day I never regret my decision to do so. It opened up another ray of hope for me that I could still do something else (as I clearly thought it would be the end of my writing career and feared that I'd not know what to do anymore) and which has become my newfound passion - Web Analytics. Numbers may not have been my forte as digits and words are clearly from different worlds but pursuing Web Analytics has made me the perfect example that writers/journalists can indeed be friends with Math and its subjects. Hehe! I've tapped the analytical and numerical skills in me but of course, I still can't say that I've mastered them. But I know I'm learning them with the help of Maia, my boss. Each day has become educational as I learn something new and I am able to understand something which I could not have understood before. Each day is a step closer to knowing fully what Web Analytics is all about. Each day has become exciting!

Though I've uttered praises for my new career, it hasn't been all smooth-sailing. My colleagues and I still find ourselves working with a blindfold, hoping we're doing the right thing. And recently, we've come to realize that we're having identity crisis on what we're really doing. But we're positive that we'll someday be able to define what our tasks really are.

Learning it proved to be not-so-easy given my background but it is not impossible, or to put it in a more positive term, it is achievable. Also, with Web Analytics, I felt the weight of my work, I felt my importance to the company I'm working for. But this is not to say copywriting is not important. I know it is though I may not have felt it before. It is actually with Web Analytics that I've come to realize the importance of keywords and keyword phrases which I was asked to write about as a copywriter. However, I'd have to admit that being a Web Analytics Specialist made me feel that my work suddenly makes sense. After all, as Avinash Kaushik, author of Web Analytics An Hour A Day, said of Web Analytics,

"It's sexy, it kicks butts, and is a goodwill ambassador!" (comparing it to Angelina Jolie. LOL!)

Oh and by the way, Avinash Kaushik also only happens to be one of the Great Trinity (as I'd like to call them, hehe) or the founders of Web Analytics! =D