This is It

I'm still high after watching Michael Jackson's This Is It movie with Matthew this afternoon. It was like W-O-W! I can't even put it into words. All I know is that I was always on the verge of tears all throughout the movie that highlights the behind-the-scenes documentary of his rehearsal weeks before his scheduled London concerts. Anyway, I'm not a good movie critic and couldn't give a far better review like every one else but I'd like to share what I wrote after learning of his sudden demise some few months ago.

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‘Remember the Time'

Yes. I remember it very well.

I remember the obsession of wearing white gloves on my right hand. The effort I made perfecting my moonwalk on our tiled-toilet floor. I remember trying to do the spin move but always end up banging myself somewhere hard or pointed corners.

I wasn't even born when he and his brothers rocked the music world during the 70's, nor I was aware that he conquered the music and millions of fans around the world when he'd gone solo by early 80's but the moment I heard and start seeing him on television, I remember imitating every Michael Jackson move I could master.

I fancy him from how he wore his black fedora low to cover one side of his face, to how silly but good it felt doing the grab-the-crotch move then shout at the top of my lungs like what he does in his music videos. Up to that dance-like-a-zombie MJ style that I enjoyed so much I never thought zombie could dance that good with the King of Pop leading every step.

‘Ben’

How cute it was to watch that 13-year old Afro-haired Michael Jackson, who wore this yellow tie to complement his orange suit, serenading someone named Ben. Since I heard that song, I felt someone out there could also be my Ben. Or how I wished I was Ben and MJ would be my best friend. It felt so right as if every words of his song was directed to me. That it doesn’t matter if people never liked me and all those bad things anyone would say against me because I got MJ who believes in me. That I don’t have to look that far because all the while, he was just there beside me.

‘Beat It’

I never understood then what this song was all about but, heck! I felt like dancing my ass around the house or getting myself into trouble. The tempo was so right it felt like it’s just fair to beat someone. I never backed down from any fistfights and little did they know I always have MJ singing inside my head singing ‘Beat It’ over and over every time trouble finds me.

"I just can't stop loving you"

It seems to me that wherever Michael Jackson goes, he's like a god of some sort. Either the throng of fans cry their hearts out when they hear even a single word like 'Hello,' 'I Love You,' or 'God Bless You,' or one line from his songs. People would be shouting at the top of their lungs until there won't be any voice left. Or they'd just faint dead if he'd moon-walk. He got this something that will make you lost in trance and you'd just be too amazed to speak any word while he performs and for a moment or two, for all you know, you feel like crying too, even if you're just watching him on television.

‘Bad’

Ever since the allegations of child molestation came to surface, I didn’t really know who to believe in. He became the joke of the town. He was the topic everywhere. I read everything that is not the MJ I knew before. I never read anything about how great performer he was. All I read was he’s a molester and his Neverland ranch was not a place to be for the young boys. There are some articles confirming his sexual eccentricities, based on scientific evidence and other stuffs I could barely dig in. Some are just smack-to-the-face injustice that further degrade his personality and people started to forget his musical genius. But all the while every body had their chance to ridicule him, he remained as he was. While media kept the hype about his personal life, he continued to make music. He continued to be a father to his children. He chose to stay close to that elusive quiet life that we never gave him until the very last minute of his existence.

‘Earth Song’

I was at work at the time MJ was pronounced dead somewhere in L.A. hospital. I was too busy working when I heard this song playing over the radio and how I felt like crying for how poignant it was to hear the earth actually cry for help through MJ's voice. Not until it was played like four-times over the radio that I realized the icon behind the song has passed away.

‘Heal the World’

Love him or hate him, I believe Michael Jackson made this a better world through his music. His music paved a way to break that invisible barrier that divides this nation. His accounts of what truly happens between you and me and the rest of the world through his music woke us from a deep slumber and realize that all we need to do first is to look at that ‘Man in the Mirror‘ to make it right. Never mind his eccentricities over the last few years or the media ridiculing him every chance they can get, his message has always been clear: a better place could start within us before we can heal the world. He never lead a perfect life but he made an example to make a change. I hope that’s what we all remember of him. For me, he’s the best thing that happened in the last 50 years. He is the epitome of what an artist should be.

‘Gone Too Soon’
The king is dead. But the legacy he left will forever go down from generation to the next. The thrill you feel every time he performs will linger. The number of fans will forever grow. His music will always be played in our minds. The change he wanted will be continued by his children and millions of followers. He died but in our hearts, he'll always be there.

“If you enter this world knowing you are loved and you leave this world knowing the same, then everything that happens in between can be dealt with.” - Michael Jackson

to be continued...

"the right time and at the right place, again, we'll be together"

Funny, she thought, how you read old letters from way back. They give you different meaning when you re-read them. Only, even if it's a hundredth time you read them, it gives you the same feeling. You see a different, even more confusing meaning but nevertheless, it gives you the same sting on your chest. Some promises were made and most of them were broken into a million pieces together with your heart.

She almost cried, felt like she's transported back in time. The heart that never healed thumped against her ribs and each words were like shards of glass, bleeding her ever bruised heart.

what i've always wanted for Xmas

is this...

unloading a burden

i wonder where they are right now. i wonder if they will be recycled into something. or if someone had picked them up and read them all, as if to understand the inked words written from across the world to reach the heart of the one she loved before. i wonder if someone will recognize those faces who seemed inseparable at the time those photos were taken. i wonder, oh, i wonder.

No more Erap jokes, pls

This was written few years back in the heat of the last Philippine elections. I am re posting it after knowing that there is a brewing comeback of a former deposed president who's not even a pending case or rotting kneecaps would stop him for running for another position. Pardon most of the language. I was irked at the time this was written. I wouldn't know if this would help us choose who will we write on that precious little paper by the time election comes again. But it has the same question and we still have some time to think about: who will it be? who will you vote for?
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THE atmosphere of Philippine elections is some 60 days away. It's almost suffocating that everywhere you turn your head a face of a political (local or national office) aspirant is pasted on the walls, or the streamers of former and seeking for re-election senators is above you or fighting its 'advertisement' space on the overpass where people passing it hardly notice. And when you turn on your television, never a thirty-minute watching the tube went without those annoying jingles drumming up our eardrums just to keep the voting public to remember who to write on those precious ballot papers.

And how about those celebrities, who we watched from almost more than 50 movies and TV shows, suddenly shifts seats, from a popcorn/comedy star into more serious role by vying a public position such as senator, congressman, city/town mayors and for-god's-sakes-i-should-not-mention-any-of-it?

For those shitholes stars, whom we watch most in the movies and act like lords and bigots, can they, too, save us from distress and deprivations? But wait, what do they know? What if they win, can they pencil a law that would further help our country, especially the needy ones? Or just like others they will just sit there in the senate or wherever public seats they occupy signing autographs and posing for a picture much as they did most of their careers?

The Philippine election comes every four years for highest office and every three years for the local and national and this is where the country's public bets, whom we heard or not, seen or not, young and old local inhabitants or citizens who thinks have the qualification to run or vye for a public office, get together and state what they have in their agendas and promise a better future for each and every one of us and use their gift of persuasion for us to elect them in the coming election.

I understand if a former senator or mayor or congressman seeks another term or re-election. We've seen them. Might have proved their dues and we can't blame if the number of them wants more tenure to better serve the public.

But to see an actor or two trying to ease their way to the mass public telling us they can make a change but not really allowing us to see their platforms or what knowledge they have for the country. Why do we allow such people to manipulate our way of thinking, or reflect our choice of bets when all they do is use their charisma to win a position in a government and have yet an experience for such task?

They might have not learned something from what happened some five or six years ago when a former action star turned President of the Philippines was ousted from his seat by a powerful public uprising indicating his lack of knowledge of running the country, and some case of corruption, et al.

Many celebrities have a high name recognition because we see them everyday, if not always, on television or advertisement and they can spend less time preaching what do they know or what they can do because they can assume we already know them.

But if we really care for our poverty stricken country, we should know, or at least be aware of whom we vote for and who we give our future to. They, the so-called entertainers, have built their circus act on television. We've seen enough of them and let's not let them cause another uprising because of another reason of lack of acumen. They are popular but that doesn't mean they have the specifics of becoming a good, if not the great, leader we always aim for. It's not them who pay the price. We are the one who suffer if they fail. We lose. And yet we point our fingers to them when we were really the ones to blame because we voted for them.

But we cannot accept defeat every time an actor-turned-politician ends his term with so much garbage left behind. Let's make the right choice. Exercise our right of suffrage carefully, not carelessly. Actors are enjoyable to watch. But to see them be one of the reason the Republic fails, there can never be a better place but the role they portrayed on the television.