Love in the Fields

When I was in my undergrad years, I often hear about a former professor of our Institute who is such a terror that nobody would like to be under his focus for even a second. As years went by, I often see him visit the school or my adviser at the lab. Today, I work for him, with him.

I thought he would really be a terror but not now. He is different and he is such a kind man who's got a patience as wide as the sea to a person like me. I cannot truly say he is fun to be with (because sometimes, I still feel that he could be a terror) but I always feel, when we are together, that he tries to bridge the gap. He is like a grandfather to all of us and it feels nice. But the reason I'm writing this is just to put down into words a joke he likes telling us. The joke was a text message from a friend of his.

The joke.

Why is it not good to make love in the fields?

Why?

Because the corns have ears,
the pineapples have eyes,
and
the beans talk!

Hahaha

Corny, I know. But coming from him, it would really bring a smile to your face. It's just great fun to watch him insist for an answer.

Looking Back, Part 1

Cambridge, England

There are some things I want to go back to (read: pictures I want to post). Here are some of the pictures I’ve taken when I was in Cambridge, England last year.

This college is along the Queens Road (if I remember it right). I’ve always passed by this building everytime I go to the department but now, I couldn’t remember what it is called. As you can see, it has a great architecture, which I bet would date back since the 14th-15th century. Imagine, this place was founded around the 12th century, while our forefathers were still in their bahags and living a peaceful life until the Spanish discovered the Philippines in 1521. I love old buildings and this place is full of them. When I walked around the town, I just have to touch the walls and think at the same time, ‘wow! People who lived centuries before me also touched this wall, must have also slipped in the icy, wet road…’ I am very glad that I had the chance to visit and experience this place.

This is another entrance that I love in Cambridge because of its history. This is the Trinity College entrance. The story is that the statue of King Henry before was holding a scepter in his left hand and the globe with a cross on top on his right hand. But as the story goes, there came a time when ‘drunk’ students played a prank on this statue by the entrance and replaced the scepter with a leg of a stool. Hehehe… Anyway, this is also obviously an old building and you could even see the three coats of arms that is the symbol (or so) of the college. The clock design must also be standard before because this one looks almost the same with other clocks I’ve seen there, including that of the Big Ben.

The next picture is inside one of the two Catholic churches in town, and the nearest to where we were staying (meaning: probably a 20 minute walk). The design again, is very medieval with arches and ‘domal’ structure at the altar, heavy doors, simple wooden pews, exquisite wall carvings, and stained glass windows. How romantic but the one and only time Eden and I were able to get the schedule right and attend the mass, I was reminded that religion is really a big business enterprise. We went to mass to pray and listen to the word of God but what do we get during the Homily? Mostly a discussion of the church’s finances! We were pretty much disappointed so we consoled ourselves by drinking hot choco and checking our emails after the mass.
This next picture is a punting scene near the Bridge of Sighs. It is a big thing to learn how to punt or just to sit back in the punts during the summer although I think it is all year round, weather permitting. Lucky enough for me, I got to experience punting and even tried to go for one of their traditions where you reach up and go over a bridge and then jump back to the punt when it had finished crossing beneath the bridge. For the avid Amazing Race viewer, this scene might be familiar to you. This was one of the detours in one of the legs of the third season.

But what did we really do there? We did research. Unfortunately, I don’t have a picture of the department where we’ve done our respective researches. (Why didn’t we take a picture of it, anyway?!) But let me tell you, I was happy staying at their library with their almost complete set of journals that runs from floor to ceiling (since I am petite, I always get a kick going up and down their footstools and ladders just to get to the journals I need!), very big tables or small tables set against a window or a heater, extra fluorescent lamps, automatic lighting system, free internet, do-it-yourself photocopy system, borrow-it-yourself system, and most of all, the enter- whenever -you- like- with- your- own- key system. I wish we have something like that here in our own department. It would truly make research more enjoyable.

Stroke or Stork?

A friend of mine who's studying in Japan told me of her Japanese lessons and her two other classmates, a Russian and Bulgarian. She was telling me that this Bulgarian was lambasting (her words, not mine) the Russian and their communist dream. I wondered whether she understood what they were saying because I remembered one funny dinner conversation we had with a Bulgarian...

We were having dinner one night at one of the restaurants in town. The table was like a United Nations, a gathering of people of different nationalities and one of them was this nice Bulgarian who looks like Santa Claus. At one point during the dinner, he was really excited talking about his son being in the rowing team. He said:

"It was really exciting. The boats just bum-ped each other most of the time! They have to take the best route down the river so they just bum-ped the other boats!"

Unfortunately, I wasn't used to his English yet so it took me a long time to understand what bum-ped means! Actually, it only means BUMPED. The second was this:

"Really, my time in the Philippines, it was really different. In the province, you can see there are jeeps running around, like kinks of the road! Really, kinks of the road. They even just run through the rice they are drying!"

Hmmm.. kinks of the road? Oh well, he just meant that the jeeps acted like they were the KINGS of the road. The last funny thing I remembered was this:

English girl: "So tell us about your tradition that's happening tomorrow!"

"Oh yes! We wear blue ribbon (I think that was blue, or was it red?) and then we send it off to the stroke for ... (I forgot what for...)..."

"What's a stroke?"

"Oh it's a kind of a bird! With long beaks (at this point he was demonstrating the length of the beak with his hands from his mouth)... You don't have it here in your country!"

"Oh, is it white? Long beak? (In the background: Yes, you don't have it here!")
Oooh, you mean STORK (in the best British accent I heard)?"

"Yes, yes, yes! A STROKE!"

Wow, all I can say is, Amazing! That dinner was really great! I miss that guy!

The End of Another Football Season

I woke up 12 mn Sunday evening just to watch the Finals of the World Cup 2006 between Italy and France. Earlier that day, I watched the replay of the third place match between Germany and Portugal. I was riding on high spirits that day, ever since Germany won 3-1. I know Germany is a great team but I was really impressed with what Portugal had shown that day. C. Ronaldo may not have scored but his skills are very apparent and very impressive. Anyway, it was really fun riding along with friends to watch the games first at Westin for the first half and then at Podium for the second half. At Westin, it was more of a French confederation while at Podium, it was Italian (or so).

The game was really great except for those first few minutes where there were a lot of fouls and sort of "injuries" incurred by some players. It was really frustating to watch that. But the best was when Zidane gave the first goal of the game on the 7th minute by penalty kick. Everybody on Westin were really having a great time except for this single Italian watching the game behind us. He was always muttering to himself and probably cursing everybody else there! Hehe

At Podium, it was a really different matter. Though the company was great, the screen was not. It was too small. For such small people like me and my friend, we had to stand on our toes just to get a good view. And there was this guy behind us, who keeps pestering us with "wash the time, wash the time?," as if he couldn't see it on the screen! We found out later that that guy was one famous actor that got drunk during the game!

Back to the game, my friend and I were really feeling that France will win until Zidane gave his now famous (or should I say 'infamous'?) head-butt! My friend was just saying a few seconds ago what a nice, clean player Zidane was and just suddenly, there it was on the screen, Zidane and the head-butt. It was really a bad end to a great career! I just hope he can defend himself when FIFA makes the investigation official.

In the end, Italy won by penalty kicks 5-3. But nonetheless, the game was great, the company even better. We went home at 5 AM amidst the cries of the French fans: Vive le France!

Well, I will see you in 2010, then. This time, Germany and Portugal will even be better!

By the way, the Adidas' Jose commercial is really great!