Reasons Why I Hate Receiving Flowers

I am not like most girls. I don’t enjoy being wooed to death and receiving gifts at home. I am a direct person and I won’t waste your time. I’ll tell you right away if I like you or if I don’t. It’s all very simple with me.

Please, oh please, don’t ever bother giving me flowers. Otherwise, you’d find it stored in the trash can in front of our house as soon as I shove you out my door. Or worst, stuck inside your mouth.

May nagbigay sakin ng bulaklak dati, nalungkot ako. Akala ko due date ko na kay San Pedro. I also feel cheap whenever I receive flowers; I feel like I could have received something better, kahit slice of cake, or if you must give flowers talaga, Flowers by Kenzo na lang (perfume).



Here are valid reasons why I hate them:

1. Flowers remind me of Undas.

Undas is the time of the year when Filipinos flock in memorial parks and columbaria to pay their respects to their dead loved ones. Flowers of different sizes, shapes, colours, AND prices are scattered around, waiting to be picked up by families visiting the dead. Ibibigay nila yan kay pumanaw na Angkong Toto or Amah Susan na nalagutan ng hininga several years or decades ago.

You might find it sweet if your soon-to-be-boyfriend (or boyfriend na talaga dahil hindi ka na nakatiis sagutin siya) asks you to tag along with his family to visit his late Uncle Dodong on All Souls Day. Tapos he’d buy two bouquets of flowers from stalls outside Loyola, one for Uncle Dodong and you. Awww. How sweet para sa iyo. Well, sakin hindi. Matagal pa ang deadline ko kay San Pedro noh!

P.S. Amuyin mo yung flowers na bigay sa iyo, di ba kasing amoy nung pinagburulan na kwarto ng namatay na lolo ng lola ng mama mo?



2. Flowers are generic.

As far as I can remember, the Philippine government was only pushing for generic and cheap medicines, not generic gifts. Sa pagkakaalala ko, hindi kasali sa listahan ng approved generic medicines by the Bureau of Food and Drugs at ng Department of Trade and Industry ang chrysanthemum at everlasting.

Parang kapag Valentine’s day, halos lahat na lang ng babae nakakatanggap ng flowers, pare-pareho pa halos na roses. Lahat naman pwedeng tumanggap niyan eh. Kahit saan pwede mo ring hanapin. Parang kung mag-ddate kayo ni girlfriend, bigla mong naalalang nakalimutan mong bumili ng gift, magka-cartwheel ka lang papunta sa Dangwa solve solve ka na. Hindi mo man lang napag-isipan ng mabuti kung anong ibibigay mo. Makakatipid ka pa kapag bagong bagsak sa tindahan yung mga bulaklak. Hay diyos ko, so cheapskate. Paano naging sweet iyon, aber?

If you really want to give flowers, try to be just a little bit unique at least. Why don’t you give your girl a rafflesia flower? It’s rare and it’s the biggest flower in the world according to the Guinness Book of World Records. Warning: amoy bulok na karne lang yan and instead of bees, flies flock around it. At least unique ka. Ngee.





3. A bouquet of flowers is a trash collector’s best friend.

Whatever happened to zero waste management? Right now, those flowers from your beau may seem like the sweetest thing ever, but the next thing you know, nasa basurahan na sila. No matter how much sugar you mix along with water inside the flower vase to preserve your flowers, sooner or later hahagkan na rin niyan ang basurahan. Mas maganda ata yung regalo na kahit simple lang, pwede mong itago ng kahit 50 to 100 years hindi ba?

You might say that you’d still get to keep the flower wrapper and the ribbon. Yeah right, and cheesy. Another addition to the clan of dust collectors inside your room. Kaya andaming ipis at daga sa mga kwarto ng babae eh, andaming abubot.



4. Have you ever heard of the saying: “Don’t pick flowers” ?

One girl’s sweet gift is another girl’s poison. Kung patuloy na pipitasin ang mga bulaklak sa kapaligiran, how can we reduce pollution in our country? Imagine kung patuloy na mababawasan ang mga bulaklak na may kasama pang dahon, ilang halaman kaya ang nakalbo at nangamatay? Kung ngayon, maraming babae ang natutuwa, next time, marami na ang mamatay dahil sa hindi mapigilang polusyon.

Nakakatulong ang mga halamang mabawasan ang polusyon. Maganda pa siguro magbigay ka nalang ng halamang may ugat, pwede pang itanim ulit at alagaan.

And that is all because of the growing population of guys who hate to think hard about what gifts to give their girls. My goodness, please be sensible.

The Same Old Brand New

I was sitting outside a while ago with my cup of coffee (thank heavens for the trusty old coffee) and a thought occurred to me: Whatever happened to the old Joan Valerie Escoto???

Backtrack and background check:

Approximately two and a half years ago, Joan had a life. Truth be told, she was the life of the party. While her weekday schedule was always filled with academic deadlines and exams, her weekend schedule was almost always jam-packed with outings, dates, family gatherings, and gimmicks with her friends.

The old Joan had plenty of time for her family. I remember that before, after her school day was finished, she always met up with her mother (who is a super health buff, by the way) and sister (who is a vegetarian and also a health buff) at Slimmers’ World Pasig and worked all those sweat machines that scare away lazy couch potatoes. After gym time, Jo and her family would go to coffee shops nearby and enjoy cups of coffee after a hard day’s work at the gym. At home, she would sit in front of the TV with her mom and sister and watched Tagalog TV series. By 9:00 p.m. on a normal day, they would wait for her Father’s phone call and would take turns talking to him; exchanging day stories and i-love-yous. On Sundays, they would normally go to Tagaytay and visit Sonya’s Garden for their regular organic meal. Unlike other teenagers, she didn’t enter that awkward stage wherein a person in his or her teens would normally drift apart from the family. She enjoyed her family and vice versa.

Before, she had plenty of time for her friends. She enjoyed having lunch, coffee, and dinner with them. When a friend calls for an emergency, she’s the first one who would arrive to offer her sympathies and comfort. Saturdays were normally reserved for friends. During the daytime they would find themselves having lunch somewhere in Greenhills, Katipunan, or just in the neighbourhood, eating hearty meals and laughing their hearts out. She was often mistaken as a wild party girl because of her outrageous stints during nights outside, but the truth is, she just enjoyed being with her friends that much. She never forgot to call or text them about even the littlest joys and details about her life or to congratulate them about wonderful happenings. She was very generous of her time to her friends; they came in first place along with her family.

While Jo is a social person, she also enjoyed being with herself. God, she loved herself. She took care of her appearance very well. Because she was pounds lighter three years ago, she even went modelling gigs and posed for magazines. She wore miniskirts and halter tops because she looked great in them; and because she knows she looked good, she always had a ready smile to give. She enjoyed going on out-of-town trips before, enjoyed lunches and coffee alone. And because she looked great and felt great, guys flocked around her and almost always, she found herself going on dates. She enjoyed time alone, driving around the metro and visiting bookstores where she would sit all day with her nose hidden behind pages. After a tiring drive she would buy herself a cup of coffee and stare at the scenery thinking about life and love. She looked great, she felt great, and she was happy.
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Looking back, I realized that much has changed in those years that my “magic” was carried away. I need my old life back. I need family life, I need social life, and I need my much-loved nightlife. I don’t want to end up like a sad and lonely old lady.

It's time for some color and party! Friends, rescue me!!!

New Year: Hello to the Future!

Recently, a friend and I shared a bunch of laughs about HelloFromEarth.net, a website project by the Australian Government's Department of Innovation, Science, Industry and Research, which supposedly enables people from Earth to send messages to terrestrial beings in the outer space (are you kidding?). It is assumed that messages from Earth are to be received by alien beings after 20 years. It also follows that if they reply to the Earthlings' messages, it would take another 20 years.

The hell with fast communication. Hahaha! Well, at least they tried. Who knows, we might even get back replies after 20 years, inviting us to pay them a visit and enjoy the beautiful shores of some place like Kurikaktong. Ho ho.

If sending messages to beings in the outerspace might be possible, I really wish that sending messages to people that we would be able to meet in the future would ALSO be possible. If that would be the case, I wish I could send a message to a future love, or even to a future friend that I would be able to meet along the way. I would tell them that I am hoping that the speed of us meeting together would hasten, so as I could share to them who I really am, as well as my joys and pains.

Letter to a future love:

Dear Guy From The Future,

As I am writing this letter, I am thinking about how thankful I am for having experienced all of the hardships in love in the past year (2009). I must admit that some of those hardships are self-inflicted, but I also do not deny that my heart was badly broken by blinded idea of a person to love. It wasn't beautiful; by grace, it was even ugly, but the thing is, I learned a lot. Separation taught me what real love is. I also learned that for us to be able to devote ourselves to another, we must love and accept ourselves FIRST completely.

I do no deny that right now, I am still trying to fix a broken heart. By a broken heart, I do not mean to say that I am mad, angry, or sad to the point of committing suicide. My heart is broken because I was disappointed that my hopes were not fulfilled. I am trying very hard to think that this opportunity to mend my heart is God's way to make me stronger and more matured than before, so that when I can finally meet you, I am ready than ever and would be able to handle all responsibilities that are entangled with love.

If the time comes that we would finally meet each other, I promise you that I will love you with all my heart, with no hesitations and confusions. I'll share everything there is about me, my hopes, my dreams, my good and bad sides. I will take you to places that I love, including the neighborhood bookstore where I love sneaking into a corner and finishing a book from morning until night time. We'll enjoy cups of coffee along with laughter.

If ever you'd break my heart, that's okay. My past experiences have helped shape me into the stronger person that I am now. I'd think of our future breakup as another phase where I can tune in to myself and learn from the situation. The important thing is that once, we have shared ourselves to one another and made each other happy. I'm sure that God has a purpose for everything that we would meet along the way. But as much as we can, I really wish that we won't break each other's hearts. I really am hoping that you, the guy I'm meeting next, is the one I'm spending forever with.

Excited to meet you,
Jo