Mass Comm graduates are fortunate enough to have their recognition rites and the university graduation rites fall within the same day, with ample time in between for a luncheon celebration. Graduates from other colleges in UP Diliman had theirs on separate days.

My family and I had to wake up really early last April 27, because we were repeatedly advised to arrive early at 7 AM because seats for guests were apparently limited, and that the college recognition rites were to start strictly at 8 AM. Wake up early we did, but the rites didn’t really start on time.

It was a relatively brief recognition rites. Everyone was called on stage together with their parents to receive their certificates of merit and rolled pieces of blank paper. There were the usual speeches and a couple of intermission numbers. One of which was an audio-visual presentation prepared by one of our batchmates. I appeared in the video, lying at the Sunken Garden musing at the sky.

I sort of got irked with what the college dean said in her speech, that as part of growing up we should become pragmatists instead of idealists. The guest speaker, Maryo de los Reyes, said something with the same thought, that we should always learn to work with the prevailing order and compromise. My goodness, what kind of uninspiring commencement speeches are these?

Anyway, the program ended a little more than an hour before noontime. My family proceeded to have lunch with my parents’ godparents at some buffet restaurant. I went in famished and I ended up eating too much. We even had to go home right after lunch before going back to UP for the university graduation rites because I had to spend some time in the toilet.

Tags: Cine Adarna, graduation, recognition rites, UP Diliman, UP Mass Comm

It’s been more than a week since I graduated from the University of the Philippines College of Mass Communication with an undergraduate degree in Film & Audio-Visual Communication.

Sigh. It was a long, tiring day. Not to mention, quite hot, especially during the beginning of the university graduation rites at the Ampitheater behind Quezon Hall.

Tags: graduation, Quezon Hall, recognition rites, UP Diliman, UP Mass Comm

I passed by UP last Monday to do some errands. I didn’t have any more undergraduate classes left, only a handful of final academic requirements. I met with some friends at the Batibot in Mass Comm, and hung out for an hour or so. I also quarreled with my thesis partner one last time, regarding our written thesis.

Last Friday, I passed my last academic requirement ever for my undergraduate years in college. It was a final paper for PI 100. After sending it by email and receiving my grade, it felt quite anticlimactic. Was that it? Am I done with BA Film & Audio-Visual Communication? I don’t have anything else to do to complete my course? I had expected it to feel liberating of some sort. It wasn’t quite like that.

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Tags: college friends, thesis, UP Law, UP Mass Comm

Last Friday, I had my last exams for my undergraduate years in college. After the exams in Mass Media Ethics, our notorious professor, as he is traditionally known for, kept us in class till almost midnight to watch two decades-old Hollywood films. We watched Lost Horizon (1973) and The Abominable Dr. Phibes (1971).

We were prepared, however. We had pasta, chicken, chips, and dessert to sustain us for more than ten hours in class. Props to these sweet cupcakes which one of our classmates brought!

Tags: academics, cupcakes, UP Mass Comm