…The GorgEous ChroNicles…

You’re just too good to be true.
Can’t take my eyes off you.
You’d be like Heaven to touch.
I wanna hold you so much.
At long last love has arrived
And I thank God I’m alive.
You’re just too good to be true.
Can’t take my eyes off you.

I love you, baby,
And if it’s quite alright,
I need you, baby,
To warm a lonely night.
I love you, baby.
Trust in me when I say:
Oh, pretty baby,
Don’t bring me down, I pray.
Oh, pretty baby, now that I found you, stay..

i walk a lot nowadays. to get to the nursing building, i have to walk rwnd 0.8km. so i usually "log" around 3-4kms / day.:D i love it! i get to fill my plate wid food and still not gain weight…(so far, anyway!) but the part i don’t like about walking is that my mind gets kinda muddled and starts functioning on its on… droning out words i would love to write/ type down but obviously i cant coz i’m walking nga!

sigh… sorry guyz, i can’t upload pix coz i dont have a cam here Plus! i still don’t have a laptop…:( its starting to piss me out now, actually. coz due to technological advances, a lot of the stuff we need for study, to do our assignments, research, even juz the announcements and rules and guidelines of the uni, subjs and everything is online. "…go to LearnJCU."<- oh, i’m starting to really hate that. since i can’t hog this (only!) computer we’ve got here in raph’s all the time… i have to trek to the library. and it’s not at all pleasant when its 12 or 1 pm or 6 or 7pm. i try to avoid doing that. going to the lib, i mean.

so, instead. to those who are interested (omg, im starting to sound like one of those ppl advertising our free lectures and stuff already!!) i’ll instead try to give y’all a snapshot of what its been like livin and studyin here at jcu, townsville, aussie…:D

nope, don’t call it tissue. it’s a serviette. (what the??)
tissue- 1. those stuff in yer bod composed of cells.(hahaha!i had to study this agen!)
           2. that thing you blow yer nose into.
serviette- that piece of paper you put yer knife and fork down to, or other uses can include wiping yer lips after eating and stuff like those.
i know i sound crazy, but please bear wid me, i learned this the hard way! :(  (aka the embarrasing way)

ahh language. and i had always thought i was proficient in the english language. but sigh… some things do have to happen so u could be brought back down to earth sometimes.  i know the philippines is so inculturated with american culture. and haha! ignorant me used to think… so what? but as it turned out, we are more inculturated than i first thought we were. people actually ask me if i’m from america. coz i speak "funny" with an "american accent" ( i never even gave it a thought that i’ve got an accent!) and a lot of the teeny weeny things i used to talk forgranted are different somehow… flashlights are torches. bell peppers are capsicums. candies are lollies(even the gummy bears, not juz the lollipops). erasers are rubbers. and of course, i havn’t even got to the accent part. those of you people who plan to get their ielts exams ought to know how important reviews are. i used to think if i could pass the ielts, i’m gonna be owkei… but as it turned out, the ielts examination was only the beginning. if yer taking ielts  and who don’t know what the hell is he/she talking about, what yer listening to right now is EXACTLY how they speak. my first "aussie conversation" filled me with a sense of deja vu.  it was when i was buying a train ticket.  i’ve gotten pretty used to it by now. but you could only imagine my confusion when for the first time in my life, i was forced to speak, read, write  purely in just one language. when i used to be able to express my self in a whole lot of words, i am now just limited to my english (the aussie way too) vocabulary. it was kinda frustrating. but im getting over it.:D

so, what tales have you been hearing about australia?;)
the wild outback? the crocs? the aboriginals? the beach centered lifestyle? the gold coast? the sydney opera house?

nope, its not all desert.:D with all the kangaroos jumping about. though we do have kangas jumping around campus. heheh… theyr wild though. i wouldn’t even dream of getting near one. seeing as those hind legs of theirs are so powerful i know il juz see a kick coming and i’m history.

but aurgh! how can i even paint a picture of what townsville looks like? wait… idea… check the hyperlink…;) i’m loving it! eventhough the sun’s so hoooot it burns!!! i now have super sun protection each time i go out. esp midday… sunnies(aussie word. sunglasses.) sunblock and umbrella. hah!

i dunno. i think if you were an international student and you juz need a change of scenery from yer gloomy universities from wherever you are, jcu is probably gonna be fabulous. if you wanna take a sem "off" but study at the same time, i think you’ll love it. sun? sea? sand? got it…;) plus some extras thrown in… reef. island get-aways. friendly people. the strand. thuringowa riverway. and more or less just 4hours of lectures per day, if yer a die-hard, you can enjoy everything every single day.

one of these we’re actually having this international food night. i can’t hardly wait. i guess the prospect of wonderful full-flavoured food is juz too tempting.(though the food here i the college is owkei… it can get bland on some days.) what do you reckon should i make?:D hhahah! again, ielts ppl… a questionfor ya, guyz… what is the significance of chicken pork adobo to the filipinos?;;)

hmm… yeah. i just might make chicken pork adobo.:D

anyway, ignore me.

…ever had that feeling that yer mind is simply too noisy for its own good?

that it seems to be incessantly purring and buzzing without you wanting it to?

right now, my oh-so-naughty mind always seems to be so full of activity to the point that i sometimes wake up feeling tired. which is kinda weird considering im at my most sedentary period ever. i dont think il have the luxury of being able to enjoy anything resembling this period anymore. yet, in contrast to my lack of physical activity, my mind seems to thoroughly enjoy "something." a something it loves toying with, turning it over and over, inside and out… and it continually bothers me. am i making any sense? i believe this post is one of those "somethings" that my mind is playing with right now. i dont seem to have a point, yet some part of me believes i do. yup, im definitely making no sense.

or maybe, it juz wants to be shook up. it wants "something" to occupy the time while i want it blank. maybe coz im not meant to be one of those people who are meant to cease thinking. yeah, i must admit, its what im good at. one thing i could say im proud of. seriously love thinking.

they say there’s juz a thin line separating the sane from the insane. and most of us cant notice it when we cross it. even after we cross it. hmmm… funny thought: have i crossed it?:)

owkei, whatever… i reckon i should juz shut up at this point.

…i was supposed to know how it was going to be…

by now i was supposed to be all right…
but i have juz started to feel all wrong.

…dumdumdum…

sometimes i wonder if i will ever reach that state wherein il be so damn contented i could die…

but that’s basically it, isn’t it?

i’d be done wid my life should that time come…

it’s ironic, really.

iv met people who would kill juz to be able to have a decent job so they can feed their families…

and people who hardly even need to lift a finger and… you know the rest.

often i wish i was some ethereal being.

that sometime in my sleep, i cud leave my bod and roam the world…

and know whats happening everywhere real time.

its gonna be awfully convenient.

all il have to do is sleep and i cud see the world…

yet like the box of chocolate you covet at a candy shop,

after you take the first couple of bites,

it isn’t new anymore.

it wasnt really hunger that u were satisfying.

it was curiousity.

and then the next lolly would look more attractive.

yeah… floating eerily round the world may seem exciting at first…

but after some time…

i would eventually get tired of it.

and the next lolly would look more attractive.

ei, don’t blame me for babbling…

…i doubt if this post was meant to be read anyway…

i finally saw my first kanga last sunday.
i never thought i’d find him here in our area…
theyr juz not here.
but we saw one on the bruce highway anyway.
it was a baby…
yet it wasnt jumping.
it was too small.

it was too young.
too young to know it shouldn’t be crossing highways
where cars run at 100kph and couldn’t stop in time…

...if there’s one place you have to go to… let it be this country.

…say you had a chance to get to aussie… what are some of the things that yer apt to do…?

1.check out the beach scene?

2. surf the waves?

3. stock up on roxy? billabong? quicksilver? ripcurl?

4. slip, slap,slop on sun protection?

5. party the night away?

6. grab some roasted chicken from red rooster? (love this part)

7. or maybe some exotic sounding ice cream from yer local baskin robbins?(love this more)

8. search for a kanga? (sob!)

…i still havn’t seen any… its been a month, right? what’s wrong wid me?=(

dyahe moment no.2

i didn’t know how to turn my tv on the plane on… sheesh!

dyahe moment no.3

the first time we called mom and sis, my sister was ranting about how weird their currency was.:D as the value of the coin went up… it got smaller.

so, as i was gonna pay for my train ticket to get me from brisbane’s international airport to the domestic one. about 3minutes before that, i had juz finished with the forex and received my first australian money.

the lady informed me that it costs $4. and naturally, with new coins on my hands, i tried to pay her with the coins i had. and i gave her the only one that had a 5 on it. i mean, it was the smallest, so it must have been $5 right?? the size of the coin gets smaller as the value blahblah… Wrong!! it was 5cents. i wanted to die right there and then when she told me… "this is only 5cents." like i could get on a train for 5cents…

i find it weird… and im sure so will you, that its been 12 days since i arrived on this continent known world-wide to be the natural habitat of the koala and the kangaroo… yet up to now, i still havn’t seen any.:D

i don’t know if any of you felt that instance when it totally dawns on you that yer in a new place… but i do. each time i travel, leaving iloilo behind isn’t good enough for my senses to actually feel that i’ve left the place of my birth already. it’s usually a new thing, place or landmark that jolts me. like the cool wind against my cheeks as we go up the mountains of guimaras… or pal’s terminal 2 when i go to manila… the circumferential road of bohol… the lights of Davao from up a mountain. stuff like those. maybe i’v prepared my senses a bit too much that i’l be going to australia soon that the jolt didn’t come until around 5 days after i arrived. nope. it wasn’t all these foreign looking people(though as one guy pointed out to me, im the foreign looking one now…of course, duh.), or even all the dyahe moments, that woke me up from the stupor i was probably in and made me realize that i’m finally away from the place i had always called home.

it was a manhole cover. yes! i know that sounds crazy!!! anyway, i was accompanying my sister to her new school, which was only 2 blocks away… amazing.:D the deputy principal gave us a tour of their campus. and we were there walking when i looked down and happened to see… "Made in…" i was soooo used to reading "Made in the Philippines" that it so totally blew my head off when the next word was "…Australia". hey, that can’t be!i mean, my senses could tolerate being told that the yoghurt were made in australia, or that the linen were made in china and it could even tolerate being told that the frying pan was made in france. but the manhole cover?? they don’t import manhole covers from aussie to the philippines. c’mon, could the philippines even afford to do that?! and i was dumbstruck… No. coz im no longer where i expect me to be. im already in australia.

it was a kinda sad revelation.