My younger brother graduated from high school yesterday.

It’s been a while since I’ve last been to OLGM. I’ve only visited the school at most five times since I graduated from its grade school department six years ago. My past teachers, when I bump into them, always express their disappointment at the fact that I rarely visit my grade school alma mater. Which is lamentable for me too, since I studied in OLGM for far longer than I studied in Ateneo or longer than the time it’d hopefully take me to complete my undergraduate studies in UP, and also because I graduated as my batch’s valedictorian. Visiting appears to be the least I can do to show gratitude or something. I don’t know if they were serious but some of my teachers were sort hinting that I should come back after a few years and speak in a future commencement ceremony.

Anyway, one change I noticed in OLGM is that there is a much higher ratio of Korean students now. This is a guess, but from how I observed my brother’s batch, one of every four students in OLGM is Korean. We had one or two Koreans in our batch too, but I’ve never had a Korean classmate in my seven year stay in OLGM, so I find it such a novelty. They’re here to study English, I suppose. Which is sort of sad because they seem to be doing it at the expense of learning Science or Math. I’ve always believed that Science and Math should be taught in a student’s native tongue. How can someone learn Math or Science well if it’s being taught in a foreign language that person is not very fluent at? I don’t know if it’s a trend, but most of my Korean batchmates were struggling with their studies. But if it is a trend, I’m sure it’s not because Koreans are generally poor-learners, it’s because the lessons and subjects aren’t taught in their language.

Anyway, I digressed too much. If ever my grade school alma mater do get me to speak in a graduation ceremony in the future, I’d tell the students that if there’s one thing they could emulate from their Korean colleagues, is that the Koreans will always go back to Korea after studying abroad. We definitely need a similar or stronger sense of nationalism and responsible citizenship to make it work here.

Spent the whole day yesterday at our store, alternating from bagging, cashier-ing, updating the barcode database, to just plain bumming around observing the customers. I also went out to have my hair cut. A haircut in town just costs 40 pesos! Well, this is coming from someone who got used to having 70-90 peso haircuts in Quezon City.

(If you haven’t answered my visitors’ survey, I’m inviting you to do so. Please?)

Damn, it’s beginning to get so hot nowadays. I hate it. It makes me irritable, stressful and it gives me terrible headaches. Those who say they love the summer heat probably have airconditioning in their rooms or offices.

On another note, I finished my last exam yesterday. I’m now off from school! What’s summer got in store for me? I won’t be taking summer classes in school, and it would seem that I’d spend most of my summer days in Bulacan, since I promised my mom that I’d be helping out in our grocery store and eatery. Hm, I hope it doesn’t end up as dreary as it appears.

Haha. I’m sorry. This would be my last video-linking for today. Voltes V is not a super sentai series, but it was probably even more popular than Bioman.

Here’s a little trivia from Wikipedia:

The cancellation of the Voltes V show back in the 1970’s in the Philippines was not because Ferdinand Marcos, the dictator of the Philippines, thought the show had messages of rebellion or that activists might use it as a tool to create a revolution… It was cancelled because the television station that aired Voltes V then was the number one station in the country, surpassing other two government-owned TV stations. To negatively affect the ratings of the station that aired Voltes V, Marcos banned not only the airing of the robot anime, but well as the other top rating television shows including Charlie’s Angels. Marcos stated that the violent contents had a negative effect on children. The Voltes V cartoon series was only able to resume its TV run after the People Power Revolution that eventually toppled Marcos in 1986.

Here’s to a childhood filled with Japanese team heroes and mecha robots!

I just have one exam tomorrow and that would be all for my fourth semester in UP Diliman. Four more semesters to go (ideally), and I’m off from college. Not that I’m in a hurry. I’m even thinking of taking a second degree so I could stay in Diliman longer. Hehe.

I attended a second cousin’s wedding yesterday. I was an abay (groomsman)…

…which is odd for me, because I barely know my second cousin and I don’t know the guy she’s getting married to.

It was fine though. I got to wear the barong for the first time in a couple of years.

I miss this sentai series! This one, Maskman, is my favorite among them all. I wish they would air it again, for old times’ sake. I miss late 1980’s and early 1990’s super sentai shows. I grew up watching Bioman, Maskman, Turboranger, Fiveman and Jetman all the time! I used to pretend and dream of becoming a sentai superhero. Haha! Thanks to YouTube, I found all their OBBs. Childhood reminiscing overload.

I wonder what the implication is, of growing up idolizing so many Japanese super heroes.

V For Vendetta is such a seditious movie, I love it! I was actually wondering why President Gloria Arroyo didn’t ban or restrict its exhibition here in the Philippines. It might be because (1) people would get more interested if she does so; (2) she can bank on the fact that watching a movie is expensive nowadays so not a lot of people will troop to watch it anyway; (3) or on the assumption that the Filipino film audience is not critical enough to draw the parallelisms and similarities; (4) she and her minions haven’t seen it so they don’t realize how it spites them right on. Here are some quotes from the movie…

“People should not be afraid of their governments, governments should be afraid of their people.”

“The truth is there is something terribly wrong with this country.”

“Fear became the ultimate tool of this government.”

“Those who are responsible will be held accountable.”

“FREEDOM! FOREVER!” [I don't think this was from the movie, as I don't remember it being said. But it's the tagline in the film's posters]

Ideas are forever, arrest “coup plotters”, gag the media, ban rallies, you still cannot quell discontent. Gloria should hate this movie. It’s practically a call to rebellion (in a rousing, entertaining, Hollywood kind of way).