12/31/2015 ‒
Some things I learned after almost six days in Seoul

Yeah, I'd like to apologize to the two ladies who are in this photo. But I like this photo so much, so there. This was on the train back to Dongdaemun from Nowon, taken on 30 December.

You get used to the cold. It was below freezing the entirety of Sunday, and for most of Monday. We survived, for the most part, but all the walking on Monday - Rainy and I were looking for an art supply store that was particularly hard to find - got me tired and pretty susceptible to chills. I had the thought of writing an essay titled "The cold never bothered me anyway" but, well, scrap that.

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12/24/2015 ‒
Perhaps for the last time...

I've been doing these blog entries - the Christmas eve ones, where I send a group message and document the replies for kicks - for almost a decade now, and this year is the first time I thought I didn't feel like it.

But, I argued to myself, don't drop it now. I have to write a few more blog entries, after all. Hit the self-imposed monthly quota of four. Stock up on a few more - there might, might, might be no Internet access in Seoul.

Also, this is a tradition.

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12/22/2015 ‒
Twenty-one days later

As it turns out, yes, I have not written anything here in the past twenty-one days.

And trust me - not that anybody is reading this - I have been meaning to. It's just that, well, the past few weeks have been weird. Well, not so much weird as busy, on many fronts.

I have been writing, yes. I have been writing elsewhere. The past couple of months have seen a lot of activity over on earthings!, the music blog I edit, the music blog people keep on calling "earthlings" for some non-obvious reason. For one, Rainy and I have been working on a seven-week series on K-pop, something that has surely made me the most uncool person ever, according to some of the supposed coolest people ever. Well, I should know, because I was that person at one point.

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12/01/2015 ‒
Deck chairs shuffling on a sinking ship

I thought I'd be writing a lot of reaction pieces on Philippine politics at this time, but I haven't. I've been juggling a lot of things, more or less: obligations I knowingly got myself into, obligations forcibly shoved down my throat, obligations that get what's left of me excited. That, and, you know, the nature of politics itself.

So, what's happened? Rodrigo Duterte finally decided he'll run for president. If reports are to be believed, some politicians running at the local level have switched allegiances. What I can believe is that there are people who are acting as if he's the Messiah who will singlehandedly save the Philippines from whatever it is it needs saving from.

There was a thought I was supposed to make about that. All this is proof that Noynoy was bluffing when he said the Filipino has a lot more hope now he's in charge. Filipinos, or at least a vocal segment of it, have gotten so disillusioned that they're pinning their hopes on a man with a tough-as-nails reputation, an unfiltered honesty and an un-statesman-like mouth. But, frankly, what do I get from making that argument?

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