"We Are All Birds For Today"

All I can say is.... "THE FREE BIRD LEAPS ON THE BACK OF THE WIND!!" joke. Ah yes, The speech choir competition! A day where all the ABMA and SOE students come together and shout with emotion! It was truly a day of excitement.

Honestly, we only had little practice done for our speech choir, so of course, the end-result wasn't really satisfying. It was tiresome, stressful and filled with pressure; but nonetheless, I had the time of my life since I was doing it with my ever so lovely block!! This isn’t sarcastic, I swear. Love you guys!

Our performance started great and spine-chilling with us singing “Hanging Tree” followed by the speech itself. We were very powerful at the start, but towards the end, we all sort of died down. Plus, the fact that we had no AVP… was kind of embarrassing… We actually didn’t know we were supposed to have an AVP… but theres nothing we can do about it anymore, so we all decided to learn from this mistake and move on.

Even though our performance was a little let down, I still had my own favorite part, that was the part where we shouted “FREEDOM!!” I felt the adrenaline rush through my veins! It was really good to shout that time since we were all nervous. I hoped our end was going to be my favorite but alas, it did not end so well hahaha…

As for the other block…. They all killed it. I loved every performance shown by the other blocks. You could truly feel the emotions that came with it. My favorite performance was by ABMA152 and ABMA155, no bias but they gave the best performance for me.

Even though we didn’t win and had huge mistakes, I know we tried our best and that we learned from this event. Congrats to all those who won and participated!

"Life as a Public Speaker"

I never could recall as to how I turned out to be a self-proclaimed public speaker, all I remember is that, I wanted to be able to speak well in front of others, and that's about it. Since I grew up with a family whose language consists of nothing but 80% english and just 20% tagalog, I never really did have a hard time with the english language.

I don't know how I did it or what I did to become confident in terms of my speaking skills, but I sure as hell know that I wasn't like this before. I used to suck at speaking in front of an audience or speaking in general. I never really liked when the teacher called me out in class and I had to awkwardly answer the questions she gave me.

Looking back at where I was before and comparing it to the present me, I'm quite shocked at the results. I am profoundly appalled as to how I've leanred to love and invest my time in using my speaking skills. That's why I was thrilled to hear that there was going to be a public speaking class during the third term.

Though I was so excited to finally go to my first class in the 3rd term- which is EPUBSP2- I found myself at the most unpleasant situation. Sir Deeno, my professor in EPUBSP2, asked me to step out since I realized that I wasn't enrolled yet!!! It was embarassing to have a first impression like. Still, in the end I have high hopes that Sir Deeno has changed his view of me from all the hard work I put into class.

After all those hard work and nervous breakdowns on every speech in the class, I was chosen to be one of the representatives in the Public Speaking Competition. I was so nervous! But nonetheless, enthusiastic as to what the outcome will be.

I was with five of my other blockmates, namely; Joshua Francisco, Mel Tambunan, Stephanie Kung, JM Fonacier, and Raph Caguicla. We had to make a 5 minute speech about the quote Albert Camus nade "Integrity has no need of rules". It was hard at first and I honestly didn't know where to start, but with the help of my parents, friends, and professors, I got to finish my speech.

To say, I wasn't really expecting something big on the day of the competition; I just gave it my all and hopefully pass the subject HAHAHA! But, something amazing happened! Me, Joshua and Steph got int the finals! Imagine that! three members from our block got in? Amazing, right?

Even though we didn't win in the end, I got to learn so much from just one competition and I got to spend it with these awesome and intellectual people! Congrats to us ABMA154 and as well to the other public speakers in the competition!

Zombie Movie Turned Wrong

Before going into the main topic of this blogpost, I just wanted to state that I'm not a very big fan of pinoy movies, to be honest. I'd rather watch anything but filipino movies at that point... "Why? As a Filipino yourself, Shouldn't you be proud of what your country produces?" Well, not really.

To be fair in judgement, the Philippines isn't as "progressive" in terms of being in the film industry. In fact, there are a lot more Filipino Indie movies worth watching than the ones produced my entertainment companies. To say, the Filipino film industry lacks in creativity, seriousness, equipment, and especially the money to be able to produce a movie that can go on par with an American or Hollywood made movie. So , whenever I watch a Pinoy made movie... I just feel off or feel like it's going to be a waste of money (lol)

So, we go to the main topic at hand, I will give my opinion to the Filipino I just watched recently, "Zombadings".... All I could say by the end and during the movie was.... No. I wasn't very pleased with the plot, cinematography, and content of the story... But I have to give credit on the so-called "creativity" of  the movie... I mean, combining a bunch of frivolous men, witches, and zombies in one movie is just absurd. So if I was a professional critique on movies... I wouldn't expect a high score to be the outcome. Of course, this is my opinion.

Via IMDB, the summary of the movie follows:
Remington is in love with Hannah but she finds him lazy and uncouth. Then he starts to change. Suddenly he is becoming neater, nicer, more sensitive. Is he doing it for her? Or is something beyond his control changing him into someone he is not? He discovers that his gradual transformation is tied to something he did long ago, to childhood transgressions and curses uttered in graveyards. Hannah falls for the new and improved Remington, but he starts falling for someone else. As the ghosts of Remington's past come to haunt him, so do the the Zombadings. Undead, fabulous, they threaten to rock this sleepy town to death.

A Romantic Movie Actually Worth Seeing

Despite my distaste for romantic movies, there are a few movies that make my list of "Romantic Movies Worth Watching" and Overboard makes the cut for my list. The movie itself is old since it was madde in 1987(and way before I was born), but nonetheless, I take joy in watching this movie.

You can actually give this movie the "Old but Gold" award. I mean, I was only six years old when I first watched this movie with my mom.and of course, I couldn't understand anything from the movie since I was an ignorant child back then. I got to watch it again when I was 14 and by that time, I was a little mature, but still... some of the romantic and cheesy scenes made me cringe. The last time I watched this movie was during this year; It was Christmas break and me and my mom just wanted to spend the day together and chill in the house, so we scanned through our DVD collection and surprisingly, the DVD of the movie came up. We were enthralled when we both saw it, so we decided to watch it.

The film was a clever comedy - with the star chemistry working very nicely between the leads (one wishes they would try another comedy again soon). The slow discovery by Goldie/Joanna of her real being and natural decency is a pleasure to watch. Russell is fine realizing that he is in love with his creation, and desperately scared of her recovering her actual past. MacDowell does well in his bits (especially his last shot), but he's missing from most of the film because he is not in proximity of the main action on land. But Herrmann's revelations of super-ego is fun, as is the conclusion of his attempted seizure of power.

Via, IMDB, The summary of  Overboard is basically a cruel but beautiful heiress screws over a hired carpenter, who later is the first one to find her when she gets amnesia. Looking for a little revenge he convinces her that she's his wife. (I don't want to spoil everything for those who haven't eatched it yet!)

A fuzzy Bear With a Warm Heart

I grew up loving book, thus, I got to read a few books about Paddington's tales and viewed them to be humorically interesting as a child, Of course, books from my childhood never left my memories; so when I heard that Paddington was going to be adapted into a movie, I got very thrilled. Things that relates to my childhood always excites me when I hear of them in the present. I don't really recall why that happens, but nonetheless, I always look forward to relieving the bits from my childhood. 

When I saw the teaser for the movie, I literally just went "Awwe!!!" due to the fuzzy bear that was Paddington. Though I was quite nervous of th content that was going to be shown in the movie and how it would turn out, I still was very excited to watch it on the big screen.

When it came out in 2014, I watched it with my cousin and sisters. My sisters were doubtful in watching a kids movie but I told them not to be reluctant since I was sure it was going to be fun to watch. So we all watched the movie and it turned out to have great content!

Via IMDB, The summary of the story follows:
"A young Peruvian bear with a passion for all things British travels to London in search of a home. Finding himself lost and alone at Paddington Station, he begins to realize that city life is not all he had imagined - until he meets the kind Brown family, who read the label around his neck ('Please look after this bear. Thank you.') and offer him a temporary haven. It looks as though his luck has changed until this rarest of bears catches the eye of a museum taxidermist."

In the end, watching the movie was very satisfying, and my sisters and cousin agreed too. The movie had a very nice feel of a family that cared for one another despite the unexpected intrusion of a cute and polite bear in their life, they still titled him as a true family member. 

Watching it for the first time was thrilling enough, so I'm glad I got to watch it again in my class!

"Runway Kings and Queens"

I'm that person who would always be in the prod or be backstage when it comes to event so I would have never thought I would be a part of a pageant, or even have the thought in participating in one, but my thoughts failed me when I was asked to join the SOMA Pageant 2016.

In the past, I hated the concept of pageants and how frivolous it was when they did the QnA portions. In all honesty, pageants used to be idiotic in my view like; what benefitss does it have to society? "Does the winner really gain an important title just because she's pretty with a rockin' bod?" I asked these questions over and over in my mind whenever I see someone watching BB. Pilipinas or Ms. Universe. When I heard that APC has a pageant for EVERY course, inlcuding a mixed one for all the courses, I immediately rolled my eyes.

So here comes third term, everyone was excited for SOMA week and I was too. Me and my block were ready for APPROJ and we were filled with excitement. It was just a normal day when an acquaintance of mine walked up to us and said "Hey guys!! Are any of you interested to join this coming SOMA Pageant?" and we all exchanged looks for a moment and most of us laughed and declined. Our block nominated Josh, Alex, Rachel, and Nikki to join the Pageant but they declined as well.

A month into the 3rd term, the screening for candidates opened, and we forced Rachel to join (Insert evil laugh here), and I told her I would do her make-up. Nikki and Alex followed suit when another friend of ours asked them to join, so they did. During the time Nikki was asked to join, the recruiter asked me to join as well, but I declined right away. A day after, he went up to me again, and asked me again. So something came up in my mind "What if I joined?", I laughed at myself when I though about it actually.

But weeks after weeks, I kept thinking about it. I realized I spent too much in the shadows and backstage... I was curious to what standing on stage really felt like... So I had this urge to join... and so I did. I joined the pageant, but with a heavy heart. It felt like among the people who joined, I had the least drive to win or to cooperate. When  I saw my co-candidates pactice with so much passion, I told myself to straighten up as well. I learned a lot from them and our coordinators; from the proper posture from answering the QnA's correctly. Sooner or later, the rehearsals we had daily became something to look forward to in my everyday life.

After weeks of practicing and hard work, it was a day before SOMA week, and all of us were nervous to walk on the stage with so many people. It was March 29, the Pre-Pageant. We started of with the intro were we introduce ourselves by partners, then next was the ramps. First ramp was the business attire and then on to the sports attire, then the last bit was the QnA part. To say, every candidate di their best.

2nd day of our ramp was officially the start of SOMA week, our theme wear. From colorful birds down to a fierce and elegant snake, we were all dressed amazingly thanks to our designers.

Finally the coronation night, the night all of us have been waiting for. Our intro was a dance and we were all shy to do the moves, but we gladly did it in the end. From there, we had to change into our sports wear, then to the formal wear. They announced the Top 5 and I was gladly in it along with two of my other blockmates!

In the end, we have our 2nd runner-up's - Princess Joy Labad & Muigs Macavinta, 1st runner-up's - Me & Alex Oliveros (My blockmate), and our Mr. and Ms. SOMA 2016 - Megan Olpindo & Leo Guinid!! 

We all had our share of victory, and I'm so glad I got to join and meet these hardworking people. A memory I will never truly forget!

Sana Dati

Out of all the movie or drama genres, I have one that I really don’t like watching; the typical love story with a married (or soon-to-be) couple with the relationship wrecker, aka the typical 3-way love story. When I was watching the movie, I felt the need to punch a guy in the face.

Sana Dati focuses on the love triangle happening between the cameraman, Dennis (Paulo Avelino), a novice wedding videographer serendipitously hired to cover the wedding of Andrea (Lovi Poe), the last love of his older brother Andrew (Benjamin Alves). Andrea weds Robert (TJ Trinidad), a failed politician-turned-businessman she met during an election campaign. Through Andrea, Dennis finally understands the reason behind his brother’s sudden decision to leave their family. Through Dennis, Andrea discovers another way to relive the perfect love that was abruptly terminated by fate’s cruelty.

First of all, the girl protagonist is really brainless. There are so much more ways to handle that situation in a calm and demeaning manner but she chose to run away and make her family feel bad as if she acted like they never cared for her. Secondly, she had the GUTS to flirt with her DEAD ex’s little brother? Not only that but she requested that they run away together? WOW GIRL, you need Jesus. I was actually really happy that Dennis left and never looked back and Andrea ended up with Robert anyway. I don’t understand how and why Andrea is stupid enough to leave her family again when the guy she has is already so perfect but… Who am I to judge when I haven’t faced love at a true view point. When the movie was nearing its end, Andrea chose to try and love Robert back, she left Dennis and Andrew behind and actually TRIED. I was only happy with the ending, the rest of the plot where… no.

I hate the plot, really. But the cinematography and the way that they delivered the story was amazing and awe-dropping. Despite it being an indie film, it was very well made and you can really tell that the film crew made so much effort in the scenes. A job well done to the director.