So I'm Back To Do My Favorite Pasttime...Jobhunting.

I find my life so monotonous recently. It just revolves around unanswered application emails and trying to forget those. Trying to forget tools can be divided into 2 areas: meeting new people, hanging with old friends. Hanging out with friends is subdivided into 3 areas under it. Entertainment (watching movies, or broadway play), reading (trying to get one book past my book list) or alcohol (the one that makes you feel elated. so not isopropyl). And, for the past weeks, it has been more on alcohol and less on the last two. Gosh.

I could not even find time to write and for that matter, my neurons are taking much longer time to conjure words for a written piece of fucked up blog entry.

Anyway, I've been reading medical blogs since this morning and most of them are rants about the present medical care in the Philippines. Honestly, I've heard a lot of bullshit in the medical industry, hated the bureaucracy in PGH and facing private practice in a society where there is no working health insurance and therefore, no guarantees of being paid. So, I acted on it and went here to New York, passed every exam and decided to apply for any job in the medical field just to escape the sordid truth in the Philippine society. I was an escapee just like 1/2 of our class who decided to go to the land of milk and honey. So here I am, ready to start a life and be picked by an invisible hand to serve people I don't even know, or even, cared for.

Honestly, I miss my Filipino patients. I miss saying "Magandang umaga po. Ano pong ikukunsulta nila?" I miss waking my classmates in the middle of the night for a referral "Hey. My patient needs an ORIF, please do it for me...okay, thanks." And I miss helping Filipinos in need. Haay.

I miss eating with the nurses late in the night. And buying balot or siopao from the nearby food stalls.
I miss delivering babies and assisting in cesarian section while gossiping showbiz news.
I miss waking up in Boracay and greeting my first patient fresh from the bed.
I miss the house calls in Boracay and the excitement that you have to be on your toes for whatever consult they have.
I miss yosi breaks with the manongs and clerks in the hellish world of OsMun, usually after a code in the NICU and after a successful normal delivery (which sometimes scares the shit out of me. One word sends chills to my bones: dystocia)
I miss patients calling me up in the morning asking if it's ok to have cornflakes for her fluctuating blood sugar.
I miss reducing anterior shoulder dislocations in pedia patients (I've done this 3x in Boracay) and their look on you as if you're a superhero.
I miss eating with the NICU nurses and sneaking from the nursing supervisor since its forbidden to eat in the ICU. (But, we have the NA as look out.)
I miss saying "Oo wag kayong mag-alala. Kami po bahala sa anak nyo..."

I miss those simple things in my old life, and I'm pretty sure I'll never have them again.

Thank You For Leonardo Dreams Of His Flying Machine

Eric Whitacre is one of my favorite choral composer mainly for giving us profound and ethereal pieces like Leonardo and Cloudburst. I haven't sung these master works but I've heard it from recordings and from his CD. I swear, after hearing it, you want to go up to heaven and kiss God on the cheek thanking Him for His gift of music. And for giving us Eric Whitacre.

Next month, his play Paradise Lost will hold its premiere in Los Angeles. I hope God will send a special plane ticket so I could go and watch. I bet it will be magical. Here's a clip of Leonardo Dreams Of His Flying Machine...



It's hard core choral stuff and I guess not everyone will appreciate it. I very much like it. Its a breather from the Palestrinas and Laudrisen which sounds very old. This one sounds young, hip and well, magical. I like it. I first fell in love with Cloudburst and then I got hooked.

I miss singing...

Here's a video clip from the play THE ROMANCE OF MAGNO RUBIO, which I love. Subconsiously, I feel like screaming to every pinoy here in NYC I can't believe you haven't watched this play!! It is freakingly amazing!!.

I Think I Want To Work As A Writer Now...

I submitted a short review about the play The Romance of Magno Rubio to a US-based Pinoy newspaper. It was a spur of a moment thing, composed the crap in 30 minutes and typed it for 10. It's short and the whole story about this writing assignment will be in my next blog.

ROMANCE IN THE US SOIL (WHERE FILIPINOS TOIL)
Richmond J. Ramirez, MD

Setting afoot in New York City three months ago, I
watched a television plug of the play The Romance of
Magno Rubio. Surprisingly, it was riddled with a lot
of praises from the cynical, perfectly snubbish,
critics of New York. I always eyed the Broadway
musicals as my kind of theater but I knew, I would
eventually see this play. Together with my friends
Robert, Russell and Luise, we bought tickets for it
hoping to catch a drift of the Filipino heritage on
stage that was sweeping the Big Apple. Never did we
thought that we were close to have missed such a
brilliant theater piece.

The Ma-Yi Theater reminds me of the Wilfredo Ma.
Guerrero theater back in UP where I frequently watch
the works of Tony Mabesa, Floy Quintos and other
theater personalities that I have grown to admire
during my stay in the University. Surprisingly, 80%
of the attendance last night were consist of
non-Filipinos. The play's playbill then contained
glossary for Filipino words which I doubted for a moment
if the audience would appreciate the use of the
Filipino language in the play, especially in the singsong
parts.

Based from the work of the late Carlos Bulosan, it
tells the story of a Filipino migrant worker, named
Magno Rubio and his enigmatic love for an unseen American
woman from Arkansas. Bulosan, who himself was a
"manong", narrates the lives of the first generation
of 100,000 migrant Filipino laborers whom American
laborers hired to work in U.S. plantations. Their
lives provided the backdrop in which the love of Magno
Rubio blossomed in all its innocence.

The plot may sound cliche, but the script, actors and
direction on stage gave it lividity. Each of the
characters had their own strengths and the actors
played their part in a very impressive way. The
dialogue was interspersed wittingly with Tagalog,
which I think is conscientious of the rest of the
American audience. Complete with the singing, arnis
moves and clever Filipino humor, it was worth any
musical on broadway and better yet, we can call it our
own.

After watching the play and the constant battery of
the words "Filipino ako!", I felt a twinge of
nationalistic pride and nostalgia of being 20,000
miles away from home. Too bad, we were only four among
the few brown faces within the predominantly white
crowd. The Romance of Magno Rubio should have been
our celebration of the Filipino pride: that we are a
people who toiled the soil of foreign lands until our
backs ache, but has too rich a culture capable of
producing honorable works of art and most of all,
capable of loving in an almost insane, Filipino way.

It's 4AM...But, I SWEAR, Our Stupid Luck Made Us Walk In Brooklyn At This Time Of the Night...Er...Morning

It started out to be a good plan: Bring a few dollars enough for dinner. Dinner with Joseph. Go to Beej House for DVD ripping spree. Home. Little did I thought, that Beej wanted to go out and have drinks. We promised ourselves not to spend too much. $10 max.

But things lead to another: we had a drinks of $4 total, had great conversations with NFF, exchange numbers and then, left. It was a nice evening until The Fucking Series of Unfortunate Events: (take note, we're not even drunk!!)
BOOBOO NUMBER 1: We missed the G train because we were on the wrong side of the track. We're languishing in poverty, remember? This could've been a great plan.
BOOBOO NUMBER 2: Beej decides to get into a cab. My usual alcoholic self wants another plan: go to the bar, order another round of beers and come back to the subway after an hour. My buzz was wearing off so I thought it was a great idea. The cab isn't much of a stupid idea and could've worked under our budget until the freaking bridge in Brooklyn had to stop traffic and let a friggin' garbage barge passs through!!

We were like WHAT THE FUCK!! And we sat on the cab watching the meter tick to our very last cash. BOOBOO NUMBER 3: We paid and went out of the cab. Walking in disgrace to the sidewalks, we were howling with laughter with our humbling experience. We waited until the bridge closes the gap.
I was so amazed by our dumb luck last night, that I had to take pictures, blog it and store it in history. OHMYGOD, WE"RE SO BROKE THAT WE"RE WALKING IN JACKSON AVE AT 4 IN THE MORNING!!! I CANT FUCKIN' BELIEVE IT!! But it was really fun. Who would have thought that a PhD graduate and a MD is walking on the streets of Brooklyn and totally broke? Haha.
And finally we had to prove the time in pictures so we have this one. We're laughing like crazy for our misfortune and surely, all these will go down to the books. God, I have a fuckin' headache from lack of sleep but it's all worth it...

Mon and Jeff: A Simple Pigout Life (A photoblog)

Sunday, June 3. Jeff is off the whole weekend. A perfect time to take pictures on the subway. Phew! What a touristy thing to do. Though, I don't care. Everyone is still asleep on this sunday morning to give us bullshit.
Woke up early. No coffee yet, snatching some sleep and trying to block sunlight in the subway. Big duh. Taken on the Q train to Brooklyn using Jeff's new camera.
A hemirib cage of a cow prepared by Harold. It was wonderful...tastes like Friday's ribs. They've been cooking "simple meals" like this since 8am in the morning. I think it's a med choir thing. I love going to Brooklyn.
There goes my diet! I've been living with Slim Fast Optima bars for the past week to slice the slab of fat off my waistline...well, not today. I guess I could party once in a while.
Sinful truffle cake for dessert. We spiced it up with strawberries for that Food Network touch. We could sit and watch Food Network all day.
The Ultimate Tag Team in Sleeping. Is there a World Federation of some kind for this sport? I'm sure we'll kick other contenders' butts.
Off to Brighton Beach for a change in scenery and immersion in Russia. Everyone here is Russian and old. But, a beach is a beach. Nothing beats the salty breeze.
Cheers!! Drinking tarragon and pear flavored soda in a Russian restaurant. The pear soda tastes like sago't gulaman, I swear. Perfect with the lamb kebabs.
I don't even want to count the calories we consumed that day. Going back in Manhattan means starving myself to disintegrate those fat cells. Although, I look forward to another weekend in Brooklyn. Or some other place next time.

The Wait Is Killing Me And I Better Hit The Books

I mean THE books (shown left). Not the Medical Books that I am detesting right now. I haven't read anything of THE books lately since I came here in New York. I was so amazed by my iPod's capability of storing movies, which, I could view anywhere, anytime. I saw a few good movies in that gadget for the past months. It saves me money from going to the movies here in the US and it really keeps me updated with the box office.

Let me run you through. The Patricia Cornwell books were scavenged from my friend in San Fo which she was ready to throw away. I never read any of these crime thrillers actually and I guess its cheaper to start on something free. Haha. I bought The Swimming Pool Library and The Farming of Bones yesterday from Strand. Martin and John was procured with a dollar from the local library. And then, the rest are Spanish learning books, which I have been trying to learn for the past 3 months. No progress. I'm a dumbass, can't you see? After all the espanol I've learned, I tried conversing with a guy from Argentina via Skype the other day. I ended up using freetranslation.com the whole time. I was cutting and pasting frantically during the whole conversation. Thank you technology. But, the purpose was defeated at will.

And the wait literally kills me. I've been emailing all the program directors in all the states, but, still no luck. I'm trying (like hell) to keep my hopes up. But then, I went through very rough times in my life and this is NOTHING compared to that one.

Well, I buy books when I'm sad. I still have a lot of backlog books at home--30-ish--so I guess, that speaks for the pits, abyss and nadirs I went into. Nevertheless, I really want to write when I get old. That's why I want to have copies of good books. I can go back to the good ones and pick the author's brains. The Patricia Cornwell books have to go, though. It's just not the kind of literature that I will be proud to have sitting on my bookcase. But, I don't know. I can give her a chance.