Perils of Friendster

Tried opening my old yahoo account an hour ago, wishing there's something worth reading. Lo and behold, i came upon the email Chris sent me about Friendster and how it can be a world of superficial acquaintances, a place of insincere empathy, of shallow love affairs and a preying ground for stalkers, weirdos, and 15 year olds who'd orgasm seeing text containing any combination of words with dick, shaft, hole, mountain, cyclops, ice cream, salt or bicycle in them. It is the realm of the pretentious, the pseudo-intellectual, and more often than not, the aesthetically challenged.

With that said, I shall show you the afflicting horrors of Friendster and its denizens in a brand spanking new column aptly titled:

The Atrocities of Friendster

(WARNING: majority of the pictures can be very scary that you may never ever want to post a picture of yourself anymore!)

To those whose pictures are posted here, im so sorry but you guys really suck in the photography area. (Please take note that im blaming the photos and not the appearances in order to make things easier for you to accept). -karky

Case 1: John

Jon, I just want to say three things to you before I lock myself up in my room and hang myself:
1.Wearing jeans to the gym is just. plain. wrong.
2.Looking at your hair magically transports me back to 1996; the time when the Gwapings and vertically striped shirts with collars reigned supreme.
3.I've seen six year olds with better bodies than you so for the love of everything that's holy; PUT A FUCKING SHIRT ON.

Case 2: Patrick

ROMNICK SARMIENTA! What ever happened to you? I was your biggest fan.

Case 3: Bhabe

After an hour and a half of scouring Friendster for portraits that represent everything that is repugnant and awful in the world, I realized a few things:
1. The world is brimming with ugliness.
2. It's surprising how I haven't committed suicide yet after this activity.
3. I should come up with a pseudonym and stop using my real name.
4. I'm going straight to hell.
5. You guys suck.

Case 4: Sherwin

How to be the star in the prom:
1. Use CY Gabriel bleaching soap liberally on your face.
2. Bring a corpse as your date

Case 5: Gelo

Jericho Rosales is that you?

Case 6: Chard

A rare photograph of a man-sloth. This one hasn't moved for three years hence the thick layer of algae growing on its head. Either that or it rubbed it's head in fecal matter. What a Shithead. get it? Shit head?

Case 7: Melai

Photographer: Pare smile naman dyan!
Orc: Anong pare? Babae ako noh!
Photographer: Di nga?
Orc: SNAK ES AD ARGHHHH!!! (Translated from Orc language: SHOOT THE DAMN PHOTO OR I'LL EAT YOU AND YOUR UNBORN BABIES!!!!!)
Photographer: There is no God. *cries

Case 8: Billy

Ang "Batang Baller": observe the matching sando, baller ID and armband. After this studio pic was taken, he attempted to play basketball in the streets of Tondo wearing this ghastly ensemble where he was summarily beaten within an inch of his life

Case 9: Guido

Mike: I cornered this mutant after he crawled in through the window and found his way to my sofa. He's still there, and I'm still praying to God that he NEVER, as in NEVER EVER take that pillow off where it is right now.
Tim: Oh my God; remember the cartoon series 'Toxic Crusaders?' What the fuck happened to his face? It looks as if he filled the toilet with Muriatic Acid and dunked his head in it.
Mike: 1,000 pesos says there's a hideous man-eating monster under that pillow.
Tim: Nah, I don't want to take your money Mike, you need it for a new Sofa.
Mike: True.

Case 10: BJ

no comment

Case 11: Christian

Mike: God, even Earboy wants to be Superman.
Tim: And what's up with the tablecloth?
Mike: It's tablecloth? I actually thought it was graphing paper.
Tim: What's graphing paper?
Mike: Nevermind

Case 12: The Gang

Uhh

Case 13: Loren

OH MY GOD! I'LL PAY ANYBODY 5,000 PESOS TO GET THIS THING OFF MY MONITOR!!! I DON'T KNOW WHAT THIS IS BUT IT LOOKS LIKE IT APPLIED TOO MUCH ASTRINGENT ON ITS FACE OR IS HAVING A HEART ATTACK! EITHER WAY, I'M PRETTY SURE IT'S CARNIVOROUS.

Case 14: Phil

Some people pretend they're rich. Some people pretend they're superheroes. This guy pretends he's heterosexual. Awful job chap, awful job.

Case 15: Jack

Well well well! Congratulations for inheriting your mother's boobs! Feel free to write me an angry email. No need to put little hearts and flowers at the top though cause the idea that you would like them there is pretty much established. The same applies to attached pictures of you in a fluffy pink tutu, you hunky piece of meat you.

Case 16: Rodel

Pau: The science committee presents their latest discovery: The Abominable, awfully disfigured snow fag.
Mike: Shhhhhh!!! It can hear us!
Pau: His Her Its face sorta reminds me of a barren desert.
Mike: And look! There's some sort of insect crawling out of its ears!
Pau: Would you sleep with this thing for 50,000 bucks?
Mike: Hell no!
Pau: 55,000 bucks?
Mike: Deal!

Case 17: Totnakerns

Imagine waking up with this thing beside your bed. It's like the worst nightmare you could ever have. Imagine the type you can never wake up and actually die from. Imagine that. Only gayer.

brain drain

had another interesting at starbucks today. shared my table with another unexceptionally smart person (the last interesting morning was with max). too bad i forgot his name (shows how stupid i can get sometimes). its so intriguing how people can get so knowledgeable about a lot of things, majority of which are stuff we often see as unimportant, but once "the smarts" talk about things like they're one of the most interesting topics in the world, you suddenly enter their world of dorkiness, wishing that someday you'll be like them. these people just have that certain aura i can never really explain exactly, that can get people intimidated by them and at the same time drawn to them.

--
a lot of my friends are graduating this march. major reality check kar! im happy for them that's for sure, but its gonna be hard for me to go to their grad parties, unable to feel the unexplainable happiness that they'll expectedly be feeling.

--
its been a long, long, long time since i honestly talked about this feeling of regret whenever i pass by ateneo. when i see myself wearing my MC uniform, i sometimes have to remind myself: 'you're smart.' and i am. i definitely am. leaving ateneo after almost three years their doesnt make me less of a person, nor can it already give other people the idea that i'm not as smart anymore. correct me if im wrong but i even think that im smarter than some of those ateneans who are at the moment ordering their togas.

uh. too much of the self-upliftment.

my footnote to youth

post valentines message to everybody.

From the Eraserheads song “With a Smile”: ‘cause in a world where everybody hates a happy ending story, it’s no wonder love can make the world go round.

Youth has always been the favorite victim of that complicated, vague word we all call love. It is amazing though how such an experience, the tremendous feeling of loving somebody, can be so simple to the youth, to those who feel it for the first time. As the cliché goes, love is blind. Kids today sure prove hat saying as true. Amidst all the chaos and injustice happening at the present, those in love act like there is no other feeling in the world than blissfulness. It its love that gives lovers the feeling that nothing else matters other than their pure love, or so they call it.

Love to youth can be a do or die thing. The youth has always been the great defender of love, fighting for it up to the very end, without caring about the consequences of their actions. It’s very evident nowadays, kids doing anything for love. Some elope, some get pregnant to keep the relationship, some engage in premarital sex all for the sake of expressing their deep affection for the one they love. A lot of parents think that the love the youth believes in is not the type to be taken seriously. I honestly think they are just selfish – selfish in a way that they hinder their kids from being happy, even if it is just for a moment, just because they’re so caught up with the reality of reality.

To me, it is the greatest feeling – being in love. I still think and feel that love is still, and will always be the same. Call it pathetic, impractical even, but when you really think about it, love may be the only genuine thing that we can get from all the lies and deceitfulness in this world. My advice to adults then? Give love, the crazy, foolish, kind, another chance. It won’t hurt if they leave reality behind for a while and love like nobody’s judging them.

sabrinka

fuck. wasnt able to post anything about my dear fab friend who just had her birthday, two, err, or a day ago. anyhoo, ISABEL AGATHA a sweetest birthday greeting to you. my god, is this true? for i don't know how many years already, one of the sure events in my to-do-for-the-year list is to go to your party and have fun. i bet next year, i'll have to edit that list. sab, im hoping that this wont be the last 'sab's birthday' i get to spend with you. you're leaving soon. not that soon actually, but it's near enough for me to start getting teary-eyed just thinking about it. i love you honey, you know that. hope you had a fab time last saturday. you deserve all the love in the world.

my insights

reflections: Ermita, A filipino novel by F. Sionil Jose. read it, it's captivating to the very last page.


Such colorful individuals we are in this huge canvass that is called life, and yet there’s this one thing that would always unify us, and that’s happiness.

“We move on, we build and create because we are unhappy” –Didi Gamboa

Ermita, to me, is not about “an enclave of privilege and affluence, and the putrefaction of a society.” F. Sionil Jose’s “Ermita”, I believe, is a story about that great search for genuine happiness, not just by Ermi, but also by all the other characters, amidst their backgrounds, social status, beliefs, and way of living. It is their search for that “something unknown” that actually made the whole novel more interesting, more captivating to the very last page.

Happiness can never be found in things that are physical, that’s one thing I picked up from the novel. Happiness can only be found in love, the kind that demands nothing in return. It is in this genuine love that a person can feel the contentment, that unexplainable happiness, only a few of us could ever experience and appreciate.

Robert Fulghum said: “I believe that dreams are more powerful than facts – that hope always triumphs over experience – that laughter is the only cure for grief.” I believe so too. I believe that hope, the ultimate driving force, makes us strong individuals as we face different challenges along the path to happiness. It is already innate in us humans to look for something more. Sadly though, a lot of us, myself included, find happiness in all the wrong places. I can’t blame them. Even Rolando Cruz thinks so too: “There is so much dishonesty today, not just in government but in business. Perhaps sex is the only honest thing left.” My god, is Rolando right in saying that? If so, will we ever find true happiness? What if the real hindrance to our own happiness is ourselves?

Living now in a materialistic world, it is so easy for money and power to trick us, letting us feel that there’s no better joy than acquiring them. Those with weak and distorted foundation fall easily into the trap of deceit. True though that for a moment, one would feel the “happiness” that money and power bring. If I were to become powerful, and rich, a lot of people would automatically love me, adore me even. By then I could afford everything, though I doubt that I’ll be contented. Too much dependence on the material and the physical, including sex, can bring negative effects to ourselves, to others, and to God. Dependency, in fact, is the inability to experience wholes, or to function adequately without the certainty that one is actively cared for by another. Take Ermi for example. She had everything during her peak – luxurious cars, mink coats, a well used passport, and the like, but she was never completely happy.

Dependency, on the contrary, can be healthy too. We all have desires to be cared for by persons stronger than us who have our interests truly at heart. Come to think of it, we need the presence of others to be truly happy. We need to know, to feel, that we are also needed by others. If not, then existence has no value.

There are definitely things that money can’t buy – happiness is one. It is not in having everything that a person becomes truly happy. It is in having some, and being thankful for all the gifts received, appreciating them as much as one can. Happiness is always rooted in love, the will to extend one’s self for the purpose of nurturing one’s own or another’s growth.

When happiness comes knocking, never let it pass, for it only comes once. No one is too old to experience happiness; there’s no such thing as too late. All you have to do is be sensitive of its presence. For all we know, its been there all along. We were just foolish enough to believe that there are far better things. Reality is, not all situations have better sides to them. All that’s left is what’s there the whole time, wanting to be appreciated for all its effort. No one wants to be like Ermi, regretful in the end, right?

restless

my life is so steady right now that i need something exciting to break the consistency that's taking over my system. help me put here. all i need is a little difference and that's it. too tired of school, cant say im fed up with all the parties.

All we need is our lives in a suitcase,
They belong to a friend of a friend,
And as we drink to ourselves we'll amuse ourselves,
Underneath the sky, underneath the sky again.