January 16, 2007 1:02 am
Congratulate me… I’ve had another rough day. Yippee. I’m dripping with sarcasm. As of the moment, I’m beat. My right hand and fingers are hurting, and my eyes can’t make out faraway objects. That’s what you get from writing down study guides in three subjects (which I still haven’t finished), and spending most of the evening reading up to your nose. As if the mental torture of the day past wasn’t enough. Sheesh. It started with our quiz in Mathematical Economics. And oh boy, did I mess that one up. It was my fault, really. I completely forgot about the first topics of the quiz’s coverage. Those were like, so last year. I didn’t even know they were going to be included in the quiz. So I wasn’t able to review them. So my mind went blank. So there goes about a third of my score, too. Blank. There you have it: how I totally butchered that test. That’s strike one. Oooh, I can almost picture Ma’am Navarro’s stern face, breaking into a mixture of devilish delight and strong disapproval as she frowns/smirks over my paper and my pitiful results… Just joking. That was just my imagination talking. Then I met a couple of Koreans at the Sunken Garden as I was on my way to CAL. I think they were also the ones that had stopped me on my way to Econ before, because they told me, “Do you have time now?” It was still 3:15, we were dismissed early in my Econ 191 class, and my next class was at 4 pm, so I had no excuse. Besides, I don’t lie to people anymore, especially since they looked like they needed help. So that’s how I met Jean (guy) and Mi (girl). We sat on the grass, and Jean took out some sort of album and starts asking me questions about God. At first, I thought they were some sort of Christian missionaries or something. Jean showed me diagrams of God and humans, and pairs of creatures. Then he asked me if I believe in “Father God.” I said yes, of course. Then he asked a question that bowled me over and almost sent me rolling the down the slope. “Do you know the Kata Mata (I don’t know if I’m spelling this right)? The Holy Mother of Heaven?” he said. Holy Mother of – what?! It turns out that they believe in a divine family where there are two supreme deities: one is male and the other is female. Jean then showed me Bible verses, which purportedly supports their belief that God has a ‘wife.’ From the “bride” in Revelation to quotes from Genesis: “Let us make man in our own image… male and female he made them,” among others. It was so weird. And every time I try to explain to them, from a Christian point of view, of how those verses should be interpreted, Jean would say “Oh no, don’t think. This come from God. This what God says,” which was of course, illogical for him to say. He was in fact, telling me to take their word for it that these verses mean what they wanted them to mean, claiming it to be “what God says,” and telling me not to interpret in any other way. By the way, Jean did almost all the talking. Mi just played the supporting role, and kept on nodding and smiling. Finally they asked for my name, address and phone number. I was having second thoughts because after all they were virtually strangers, and it was personal info they were asking for. But again, I didn’t want to lie. So they told me they’d contact me o Wednesday and that I should think about it. Oh great. Just great. It was one freaky experience, but maybe God has His reasons. It could be an opportunity to share the Gospel with them, God-willing. Just one thing: Next time, be ready with your Bible Rem. Anyway, that was strike number two. The last round of the series of unfortunate events came from my Spanish class. Actually, Ma’am Villar spent almost all of the time criticizing our dialogos and telling us how disappointing we were. Towards the end of the period (she must have noticed we were running out of time), she gave us our first exam results and preliminary grades. My score in the exam? 49/70. Do I hear cheering and applause? Never mind. And how about my preliminary grade? A whopping 2.0 (88.9, to be exact), the same grade as my dialogo. To get a 1.0, I need to be in the 98-100 range. A 3.0 would be between 74 and 77, if I remember right. And a 93 would just give me 1.5. Imagine that? Who says UP professors have such high standards? I’ve never a professor that more generous in giving grades than Ma’am Villar. For that, she deserves the Gawad Chancellor for Outstanding Faculty Member. Asar. If that wasn’t depressing, I don’t know what is. And that’s strike three for me. I’m out. 2:32 am … but still standing Considering all that I’ve been through, it’s a wonder how I haven’t slept it all off and that I’m still wide awake at this hour. Blame the coffee and the chocolates. When confronted with such stressful and depressing circumstances, what does one do? To whom does one turn to? My answer: food. Yeah, good ‘ol comfort food. I bought myself cans of ice coffee (even if considerable amounts tend to send my tummy tumbling), bars of chocolate (even if lots of it give a headache and aggravate my bouts of migraine), and took out food from Mcdo (even fastfood fare is unhealthy). And I had already had dinner, at that. You could just imagine my depression-driven appetite. Or the sheer elasticity of my stomach. And, in fairness, they worked. I’m not depressed anymore, just a bit… out of sync. And, so far, there are none of the usual caffeine-cocoa-cholesterol side effects. And it’s better to eat while studying so you don’t get bored and tired easily. But there’s one unanticipated side effect, though – now, I can’t sleep. By now, it’s almost 3 am and I’m still all perked up. And all the while I thought I had already grown immune from the effects of caffeine… Well, maybe if I try to get some sleep, I’ll make some progress. I just hope I don’t end up twisting and turning all night, instead. Labels: ragings, rantings |
