Sunday, December 10, 2006

Homeward bound

Things I am looking forward to when I get back:

1) The food. As much as my culinary skills have improved ever since living alone (I actually use the oven to roast assorted animals- lamb being my favorite), I am kind of weary of my own cooking and look forward to devouring inasal, Tapa King, Magoos, Dencio's, and anything that's inappropriately fried and involves vinegar.

2) Being able to curse as loudly as I want on the field. Australian Ultimate tends to be too polite sometimes. I miss good old Tagalog cussing, or good-naturedly trash talking with opponents after I've just scored on them (I need to savor those moments, as I am getting old and they don't happen very often anymore). Can't wait to hit Cuenca and see everyone again. Let the "C'mon, keep up old man" comments begin. Bring it on.

3) Being techy with my family. As of this writing, both my sisters have acquired their own Mac laptops. Gabbi has even gone so far as to getting our whole house WIFI'd. For some reason I can imagine the four of us sitting together in our sala, our Macs switched on, exchanging tips and sharing files and doing other similar crazy fun ass things. Dorky! But in a bonding way!

4) Swimming with the dolphins. Kai is now working at the marine park in Subic and I look forward to a free tour wherein I can hopefully share a swim with a Flipper or two. I stress the word free.

5) Writing more. I'm 100% positive that going back home for 3 weeks and not being faced with the perils of my 9 to 5 job will allow me to get cracking on the final draft for my new short film. It's just been so crazy at work lately that when I get home I usually pass out on the couch, too tired to flip open my laptop, let alone string a bunch of coherent words together.

6) Watching NBA every morning. Lack of basketball coverage in this part of the world has been a constant source of frustration for me ever since I moved here two years ago. I had to go to some obscure cafe a few months ago just to watch the Heat-Mavs finals and even then I had to beg the owner not to change the channel (he wanted to watch cricket).

I really don't get cricket. First of all, a match lasts five months (or seems like it), all the players wear white, making the two competing teams completely indistinguishable from one another, and the scoring system is as easy to pick up as say, oh I don't know, calculus. Now how can a game that boring possibly take up more newspaper space than a Cavs-Suns game? The only time I found cricket riveting was when I watched the brilliant Bollywood film Lagaan, and even then, I'm convinced it was probably because the cricket players in that film broke into song every half hour or so. Now see, if that happened in real life, then maybe cricket would be slightly more enjoyable.

7) Catching up on local films. I've been hearing so much about the digital revolution that's taken Manila by storm and I am excited to see what Pinoy filmmakers have been up to.

8) Watching my first moonset.

Tuesday, December 05, 2006

Basket 'O Beer


What a nice way to head towards the new year. The Haircut won Best Original Score at the Bondi Short Film Festival. My film's composer, Sebastian, wasn't around so I had to go up and mumble a speech in his behalf.


"Mumble mumble..."

Before the event all the filmmakers had to arrive early to pose for some photos in front of the banner of the festival's main sponsor, Stella Artois, which in my opinion is the world's coolest beer only because it's obvious that the company's head honchos are film buffs. God bless you fellas.



And the award for Best Bowlegged Filmmaker goes to...



My prize for the evening was a lovely plaque (which technically belongs to Seb) and a huge basket of wine, beer, DVDs, and swag. Not being able to find a cab at Bondi Beach at midnight, I had to resort to carrying said basket on a bus, then a train, then on a walk along King's Cross, having to endure requests from drunken teens to throw some beer their way. Winning awards is fun only if you have a car to carry your prizes home.

Can't wait to finish this year strong. Can't wait to go home and face what I consider to be my actual reality. Should be interesting.