Last Night

It's my last night at 'home'. To tell the truth, I'm really freaking out. For the past three months (and possibly my entire life), I've been directionless. I guess it's time to get my act together. I know what I want to do. I know what I want. But I just don't know how to do it. To tell the truth, I'm sick of my university. It feels like a drone factory, where the mold students into become vital resources for the economy, instead of good people. I don't want to work for something like that. I don't want to be a drone. I don't want to support our corrupt, bloodsucking economy. But I guess, to get what I want, I have to play by the rules for just a little but until I can break them. I just don't know. I think I need a mentor. That's what sucks about public schools, you're pretty much on your own. But I guess that's how the real life is.

I got over dreading my roommates. I'm now freaking out over school, wondering if grades are really important to me. If being top 10% of my class is something I really value. I've actually contemplated dropping out of the drone factory.

My mom had a conversation with me. She rarely tells me what hopes and dreams she has for me, only that I'm her last hope. She's completely lost faith in my younger brother, and she's expecting that the family pride and honor is going to come from me. So basically, I shouldn't get pregnant.

"Okay, fine." Like I really would get pregnant within the next decade. "But is it okay if I become a teacher?" At the rate I'm going, I'm going to end up as an underpaid, stressed out teacher. But I don't think I'll mind. I like kids.

"What!?" My mom says in slight mock-hopelessly. "I spend thousands of dollars on you, and you're just going to become a teacher? You should have just went to nursing school. Nurses make a lot of money, you know." Maybe it's not family honor she's after, but social security, money. It's really disappointing. I really don't need a lot of money, I think. I don't need to be rich. I just need to be able live, you know? I don't need luxury. I just don't know what I'm doing.

One step at a time. One step at a time. Sometimes I just want everything to be done and over with and I miss steps of opportunity, just waiting for the future to happen. I just don't know what to do. I need guidance. I need to learn how to use my voice. I got cut in line in blockbuster. I should have used my voice. I always tell myself that I'm going to use it, next time, next time. But I never do. I don't know what to do.

9/20/2002 01:32:33 AM

Chicken Adobo

Xab and I tried to cook chicken adobo today, which I thought would be rather simple. Even for me, and I can't cook. But Xab insisted that there wasn't enough sauce so he added more vinegar. Thus, chicken adobo because plain vinegar, with some chicken. "Would you like some chicken with your vinegar?" It was pretty bad. And I can't remember exactly what chicken adobo tastes like. My mom came home and asked why the house smelled like vinegar. She tasted our experimented and made a face and started hacking and hissing.

Xab then says "You know, I don't think we should have put so much vinegar. We should have put more soy sauce."

"What do you mean we?" I demanded.

So that's the story of the day. Actually a more interesting story. My room is right by the front door and I had my window open. No one was home but me and Xab and we just laying on the bed, just laying there. Not really talking. Just there, next to each other. I hear footsteps coming up to our front door and then a doorbell and then the voices of my little neighbor kid and his mom. Can't pretend that we're not home because both our cars are in the driveway. For a few long, stalling moments, we still just lay there and then we stir, the bed making horrid noises that would get the mind thinking if you had a dirty imagination.

I answer the door and my neighbor is standing there.

"Oh, were, you two in bed, taking a nap?" She asks, basically spelling out a whole story that I only have to nod yes or no to.

"Yeah," I smile sheepishly, but everyone knows that I sleep in late during the summers. Real late. Maybe she believes me. I couldn't think of anything else to say. "We were just laying there."? "We were playing playstation"? "He was trying to fix my computer."? I don't think any of those would have been believable since there was no noise coming from the room. Argh.

She strikes up a conversation about something different. All the while I'm wondering if I should tell her not to mention that Xab was over while no one else was home which is basically one of my mom's top rules about having a boyfriend. Or maybe I should say how nice my nap was. Maybe she understands? She was my age once. She went to college. She ran off to boy's houses, at least that's what she told me when she was sharing her college stories with me.

All the while, she has this look like she came at a bad time. She looks at me differently. Suspiciously, dirtily, adjectives added probably from my imagination rather than my memory. I just want to tell her that I was fine. Nothing happened. You didn't come at a bad time because I didn't do anything. Damn.

Hopefully she won't mention anything to my parents. I have little doubt that she won't. She understands, at least I think she does. She always puts in a good word for Xab to my parents. Maybe she won't think she's been saying otherwise. There's nothing I can do now.

Getting caught, it's the story of my life. Even though I do nothing that I should have to get caught for. It's really strange and ironic.

Learn Your Culture Project

My brother had an essay to write about his culture. Somehow I was asked to help him.

"What do you mean culture?" I asked him. "Like being Filipino American? Or being Filipino?" I wonder if there is a difference, and yes there is. Then I wonder if we should really point out the difference.

"I don't know. My teacher's an idiot," he replies. I look over the essay guidelines, and yes, it means another culture. "Learn about your culture!" it says happily. I see this as an opportunity to put my brother's constant trash-talking into use. If there was a section on history I would have him write the whole essay on it.. particularly on the much ignored Philippine-American relations. But no, it's all generic stuff - art, language, religion.

Sure, he's only in the eighth grade. He's not exactly a global thinker, but he isn't in kindergarden. The whole essay pissed me off. It was designed to only report happy things about 'our culture'. My brother was no big help either. We're on opposite wavelengths when it comes to Filipino culture/history. I mean, I'm not hopping over bamboo sticks in Tinikling dances but I'm learning, willingly, about the history (and history was never my forte). All he does is talk about how shameful it is to be Filipino, or Asian. He likes being 'colored', but he doesn't like his 'color'. He's rather be Black or Mexican. It's quite funny, because he doesn't know how much he seems to have walked out of a modern immigration novel.

He gave me his rough draft so that I could help him edit it and type it. He basically gave me trash. Words. All spelled wrong. No grammar. Really. Not wrong grammar, no grammar. He can't even spell Philippines or Filipino right. "Phillippenes" "phillippino" I yelled at him for a second but I decided to help him out. I typed exactly what he wrote. For a little bit, I was helping him cheat, fixing his sentences, actually writing sentences. But I got sick of thinking for him. It wasn't my style. I never did anyone's homework before. So I typed the essay with the missing grammar and the misspelled word. I was even thinking about writing a message in the essay: "This is ----'s sister. I'm actually writing his essay. He doesn't care if fails the 8th grade. Thanks for the great motivation. Bye!" But that would be too mean. I blame the system though. I think my brother should have failed the fifth grade. I have no idea how he got to the 8th grade without being able to spell his own ethnicity. It's overpopulated. They need to hurry about boot students into the street. But it's not just the system. It's my parents. I get so angry at how they raised him. Sometimes I feel it's my fault, though I could have done nothing about it. It's probably egotistical, but I believe that they didn't do much in raising me. They weren't bad parents. And I wasn't one of those perfect, independent kids. I just sorta figured things out on myself. They didn't need to warn me about drugs, sex or strange. I just knew. I just looked after myself, because they were too busy looking after my brother. And I looked after him. Maybe they thought that he would turn out the same way. That he could 'raise' himself. That he would figure out the best thing to do. But he needed more. More that they didn't give or they couldn't give. Maybe they thought I would always be there. It's one of the burdens I left when I moved away. The third parent is gone.

My mom asked if I could just transfer to a closer school. I declined. I'm determined to finish at my current school although most of the time I hate it there. It annoyed me. Why do I have to be held back because of him? I am trying, and he is not. Why should I stay back for someone who will actually fight going forward?

I wonder if I am selfish. If my college money could go to my brother, he could probably go to a private school, or he could be enrolled in some extracurricular activities. But, again, he doesn't care. His one love and god, is that infernal playstation 2. He doesn't care. So should I have stayed back? I don't think so.

I complained to Xab again. The tears of regret, guilt and disappointment don't fall from my eyes anymore. Just annoyance. He says he'll take care of it. But whatever. He's the only one that says that, but he has his own problem.