We were supposed to be eight, but the other guy was in the province and chose country life over futuristic experience. photo (c) Minky Manalo

On June 1st, my friends and I went to Market! Market! for a mission — to play laser tag. At about four in the afternoon, we were taken inside a Star Trek-like room with sliding doors and neon lights. While we fascinate our imagination, the monitor in front of us began to talk. I thought we were going to be transported into another dimension in warp speed but the purpose of the talking monitor was to explain the mechanics and rules of the game. Besides our group, there were two little twin Japanese boys with their daddy and two other guys which the other one, who was wearing round glasses, looked like my high school batchmate.

When the monitor finished explaining, another sliding door opened and behold, in front of us was a hall where vests and guns were hanged at the walls. My friends and I were divided into two teams — the pink team and the blue team. Another sliding door opened and we marched ourselves into the battle arena.

A few seconds later, the battle began. Our vests began to light up and our guns were activated. Suddenly, out of astonishment, my vest was deactivated. I was shot, probably at the back. I looked around and saw foreign kids scurrying around us. The arena was dark and was only illuminated with neon lights. I decided to get into position, duck behind a wall and shoot an opponent.

A guy began marching towards me and I sensed he was shooting me, but my vest and my artillery weren’t deactivated. I suddenly recognized him and the lights on his vest. “Stop killing me, we’re team mates!” I told my friend.

I moved around, went up the terrace, hid on a surface and began shooting random opponents. The whole arena was filled with laser lights and futuristic explosions. Halfway through, I started to hyperventilate. I was sweating so hard and I faced my greatest enemy that made me defenseless for so many times during the battle — my shoelaces.

In the end, our bodies were wet of sweat, but I imagined it was blood since I was shot eighty-four times and to uplift the experience to the maximum degree of futuristic intensity. The scores were published just as we left the hall of the engines of laser war. I scored 4000, ranked 13 out of 21 players, and my team placed third.

It was a great time to end my summer vacation and I think I can hear an encore. And while there’s a sinkhole in Guatemala, my friends and I are planning to execute another laser war.

——
Visit LazerXtreme’s website at http://www.lazerxtreme.com.ph

I was so ecstatic to have some full rest, when summer started, away from the worries and hard works of my course. And I thought by May, like what I usually feel every May, I will get bored and miss school, miss studying, miss being mind fucked by mathematical problems and scientific concepts. But May is ending and school will be starting some weeks from now and I don’t feel the usual excitement to go back to school, but I feel bored and tired of resting and of self-isolation in my room all day. I also stopped reading. I am halfway through Henry James’s novella The Turn Of The Screw and I can’t finish it albeit it’s really interesting theme and plot and to think that it’s thinner than an elementary school notebook.

I think I have lost it, the spirit or the energy or whatever you call it.

What I feel right now is the feeling of breaking away. I wanna go away with some people — my friends — to some place where there is great landscape, or to the beach perhaps. And we’ll just talk all the time, eat a lot, take pictures, laugh hard and forget about life and the future — just having fun. I wanna forget about the future, about my career when I get old. I wanna float in the air, as though there’s no gravity. But it’s just really impossible. The future rides on my back like a shell on a turtle and it makes my pace so slow.

I know I sound like I wanna get high on drugs. Please don’t get me wrong, I’m just venting an I have no intentions of snorting coke nor inhaling weed. I just feel so different. Maybe it’s mood swings or maybe I’m bipolar or maybe it’s college.

—

Writing is an important part of me and I’m kind of losing it. My writing is getting worse, as I have observed with my previous posts. I lack inspiration and motivation and of things to write about. For sure, I can write about anything but the words to say are on shortage and I can’t catch up with my rapid thoughts. Somebody said that writing is easy, that you just stare at a blank sheet of paper and wait for drops of blood to flow out your head. But bleeding is pretty hard, I guess. Specially if you don’t wanna get hurt.

—

On a lighter note, a friend told me I should pursue photography as my career and take it seriously. But I think it’s considered as a hobby for now since I’ll be needing a kick-ass DSLR to be a serious photographer.

Anyway, I have established a photo blog.
http://jmaratienza.tumblr.com
If you’re on Tumblr, follow it if you want. Kthnks.

Pity me for my Eyebags!

My first year in college was a roller coaster ride. It was so hard. Architecture is so damn hard, I was deprived of so much sleep I almost forgot my name. And we have this math, one of our two maths last semester, it’s called Math215 aka Solid Mensuration. It was so motherfreaking difficult, I shat bricks.

It’s actually about looking for measurements of certain shapes. It sounds easy at first but when you get to actually solve for a problem, all you will be given is the radius and you have to find everything, like, the chord length, arc length, the central angle, the area of this shaded region, etc. It looks impossible but when the professor solves it in the board, all you will get is a confused face and a white board in front full of complex solutions. But thank goodness, I passed that freaking subject. I was considering to commit suicide during “the great depression” phase in my life which occurred  for a few days, thinking about my Math215 grade. And then I saw my Math215 grade this morning and I nearly cried because I did not really expect that it’s going to be that high. I mean, I’m not saying that it’s high like high-high. Based on my performance, one would not actually think of me receiving that grade.

The other math is Trigonometry. It was so easy like yeah. I just didn’t know what happened to me in high school, I almost failed it.

——

I do not usually plan things. I’m the type of person who likes surprises. But since I want my summer to be, at least, productive, I will force myself to follow this plan:

• Read books.
• Watch shitloads of movies.
• Review at least one movie.
• Keep this blog updated.

Sounds fun? Pshaw. I don’t really consider going to the beach and travelling, but I’d love to. They just seem so impossible to happen since I’m so broke and all. My friends are actually planning to go to Pangasinan cos one of my friends owns a beach there. I just don’t know if my parents will allow me to go and swim and enjoy my summer and give me money.

But I know this will be a happy summer because I’m so positive that I’ll pass my course’s cut-off.

The car travels in a constant speed creating a cumulus cloud of smoke behind. From inside the speedy vehicle, you can see nothing outside but distorted lights painted on a black canvass. I do not mind it at all, until it starts to accelerate and speed up into an amount that is almost like the speed of light. I am traveling very fast and I cannot help but to feel very scared. So I take my hands off the steering wheel and grasp my seatbelt very tightly. But my legs are shaking and sweating so I lift them up from the pedals and take my knees up on my face. I sit in that position for a few minutes until I realize that no one’s controlling the car anymore and it is no longer driving very fast. I open my eyes and saw that everything is still distorted outside except for the bright moon that is clearly seen from the windshield. It is growing bigger and bigger. No, I am going closer to it. I am being pulled by the moon like the tide. And then I realize that life is full of stupid metaphors and I should stop over-analyzing things.

A few weeks before summer vacation. I do not know where my life is going to lead me.