September 2013 Diaries Part I

October 19-25 Edition

Jonathan Aquino's Journals

September 1, 2013

Ayala Mall, Cebu City

The glass doors slid open as I walked out to the mall terrace at the third level. A gentle afternoon breeze caressed me as I gazed across the classy landscape and the people below. I leaned across the railing, absorbed in the present while in deep contemplation. I looked at the tree in front of me, admiring its elegance, communing with its soul.

I'm happy for the kind of person I've become, and I'm filled with gratitude about the way my life has turned out.

“And, when you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it,” says the King of Salem in Paulo Coehlo's The Alchemist, which I just finished reading in the bookstore.

I'm a traveler. I feel the same spirit that gave strength to the shepherd boy Santiago to cross the sea and the desert. I came on the verge of tears many times throughout his mystical adventures: the teachings of Melchizedek and the Alchemist are the very same lessons I learned in my own spiritual journey, long before the book found me.

"If you believe yourself worthy of the thing you fought so hard to get," writes Paulo, "then you become an instrument of God, you help the Soul of the World, and you understand why you are here."

I felt my mind open up to encompass everything. I can't turn lead into gold, but I know now that the true purpose is to purify the one who does. I can't transform into a wind, but I know there is life in all the elements of nature. I used to scoff at omens, but I now know I should listen to what the universe is telling me.

“The simple things are also the most extraordinary things, and only the wise can see them.”

I've been on the desert, in another time, in another life. I have climbed her mountains of sand and crossed her oceans of sand. I have endured the merciless heat of her days and the deathly iciness of her nights. Under the shrould of her terrifying silence, she has told me her secrets.

Paulo Coehlo's "The Alchemist"

Santiago: Huggybear

Melchizedek: Anthony Hopkins

The Alchemist: Robert Pickup

Fatima: Kristen Stewart

The Englishman: Orlando Bloom

Crystal Merchant: Morgan Freeman

Camel Driver: Michael Sheen

Sheik: Christopher Plummer

Seer: Ian McKellen

Gypsy: Brenda Fricker

Caravan Leader: Rey Stevenson

Wise King: Sean Connery

Boy: Hailey Joel Osment

Refugee: Viggo Mortensen

Monk: William Marquez

Baker: Tomas Milan

Baker's daughter: Selena Gomez

Father: Robert Redford

Angel: Elijah Wood

Santiago's Father: Spanky Manikan

September 2, 2013

Cebu City

Cute, I thought, looking at the puppies for sale under the footbridge across Robinson's Fuente mall. I walked past and stood at the corner of Mango Avenue. I saw an archive photo of it on the front page of the Cebu Daily News. Mango Avenue during the 1940s was an idyllic road lined with luscious mango trees on both sides. Now it's the center of the night life with bars and videoke joints. Everything changes. We often tend to forget how ephemeral the world is.

I spend my week days at the American-style public library on Jones Avenue. I would arrive before lunch, leaving when they close at five. The first book I finished today is The Time Traveler's Wife. I'm impressed by the originality. I love the story.

"Clare swings a leg over me so she's sitting exactly on top of my cock," says the time traveler. "It concentrates my attention wonderfully." That's one of my favorite passages.

The hero, Henry, can travel in time. He's 24 when he takes his 5-year old self to the museum. He's 27 when he teaches his 9-year old self how to pickpocket. When he's 15, he hangs around with his 15-year old self.

"I'm in my bedroom with my self," he narrates. "He's here from next March. We are doing what we often do when we have a little privacy, when it's cold out, when both of us are past puberty and haven't quiet gotten around to actual girls yet."

Audrey Niffeneger's "The Time Traveler's Wife"

Henry DeTamble: Huggybear

Clare Abshire: Winona Ryder

David Kendrick: Leonardo Di Caprio

Ben Matteson: James McAvoy

Gomez Gomolinsky: Owen Wilson

Richard DeTamble: Robert De Niro

Lucille: Glenn Close

Philip: Kevin Costner

Ingrid: Uma Thurman

Charisse Bonavant: Giselle Toengi

Helen: Britney Spears

Celia Attley: Rihanna

Sharon: Lindsey Lohan

Alice: Dakota Fanning

Mark: Mark Wahlberg

Jason Everleigh: Chris O'Donnell

Lizardface: Shia LaBeouf

Etta Milbauer: Rosemary Harris

Nell: Whoopi Goldberg

Roberto Calle: Al Pacino

Elizabeth Meagram: Maggie Smith

Aunt Dulcie: Judi Dench

Madame Simeon: Helen Mirren

I'm really back in time. I was still a kid when I first read The Greatest Miracle In The World. I was too young to understand the idea of dying while still living. I've known a lot about human nature since then. I have seen it, and it's not a pretty picture. But whatever happens, I'll never forget Simon Potter.

"You see Mister Og, most of us build prisons for ourselves," he says. "As soon as that belief takes hold of us, we abandon hope of ever doing more with our lives and of giving our dreams a chance to be fulfilled."

Og Mandino's "The Greatest Miracle In The World"

Og Mandino: Huggybear

Simon Potter: Sean Connery

Pat Smith: Helena Bonham Carter

Johnson: Queen Latifah

Janitor: Delroy Lindo

Sargeant: Colin Farell

I love Og Mandino. I'm one of the countless millions he has touched and uplifted. More than any other person, he has shown me that even writers can make the world a better place. Og Mandino is a part of my life.

"Today I begin a new life," goes The Scroll Marked I. "Today I shed my old skin, which hath, too long, suffered the bruises of failure and the words of mediocrity." That's from The Greatest Success In The World, which also contains The 10 Scrolls of Success from The Greatest Salesman In The World, the touching story of the camel boy Hafid and the message of the star over Bethlehem.

"How regretful it is that man becomes such a slave to his occupation or his career that he forgets he was created to enjoy this beautiful world and he quickly becomes blind to the miracles of nature that takes place before his eyes, everyday!" says Zaccheus Ben Joshua, the selfless merchant in The Greatest Success In The World, the third Og Mandino book I read today at the library.

There's a scene where he climbs a sycamore to see a young miracle worker from Galleli named Jesus. When Jesus saw him, He asked him to come down so they could stay at his house.

"I am now convinced," says Zaccheus towards the end of his life, "that life is just a game, here on earth, a game where no one need be a loser, no matter his plight or circumstances."

Og Mandino's "The Greatest Success In The World"

Joseph: Huggybear

Zaccheus: Warwick Davis

Pontius Pilate: Ralph Fiennes

Ben-Hadad: Ian McKellen

Marcus Crispus: Ryan Philippe

Jesus Christ: Kenny Loggins

Kenny Loggins as Jesus? Watch this:

Convictions of the Heart

Kenny Loggins

(See also Huggybear's Favorite Songs from Kenny Loggins)

"One with the earth, with the sky,

one with everything in life..."

September 3, 2013

Cebu City

The girl at the counter was there but she wasn't. I was at a bakeshop at the corner of Gorordo and Archbishop Reyes, morning, kinda a bit lost. Again. I asked where to get a ride to Fuente park. She seemed unsure. So I asked about Robinson's and for a fleeting moment she looked alive, then gestured vaguely at the passing jeeps. I bought a bottle of 7-Up, asking for a really cold one. She ignored me, getting a bottle like a zombie. I said forget about the straw but she mechanically put one. She gave me my change without any signs of life.

I sat in one of the outdoor tables, took away the straw and drank my 7-Up like a beer in a bar. I asked the guard at the pawnshop next door for directions. He said he didn't know. I walked in the opposite direction, passing a vacant lot full of trees, invigorated by the contact with nature. When I saw Harrold's Hotel in the distance, I got my bearings. I'm glad I didn't listen to the zombie.

In Escario in front of the big bikers' Balamban lechon restaurant, I got a ride to the library, where I finished two Og Mandinos and a half Hesse.

"I'm going to stop this silly rat race I've managed to get myself into, count the blessings I already have, and let the rest of you keep running in your non-stop marathon to the rainbow," declares Mark Christopher, the hero of the The Choice.

Mark has left his job to pursue his greatest passion, writing, and to be with the most important people in life: his family. He suffered financially but his pride is intact and his soul is at peace. After the numbing agony of so many rejections, his inspirational book becomes a publishing phenomenon. Mark has touched the lives of millions.

"I'm afraid that you have only touched most of your readers for perhaps a day or a week or a month," says Alexander Anthony, the reclusive literary legend. "They write to us at the elation while our powerfully written ideas are still fresh on their minds. Momentarily, you have convinced them that they can be better than they are. But their renewed hope rarely survives their next failure, and they soon come to realize that they are not equipped to become champion race horses but must spend their days, instead, straining at plowshares in order to survive."

People "give up on themselves," he continues. "They quit trying. And why should we expect more from the vast majority of mankind? After all, the greatest instruction book of all has been with us, in one form or another, for thousands of years, and we still act more like animals than angels."

Mark gets hundreds of fan mails. Somebody named A.B. Salom sent him a note, written with great elegance, that freaked him out:

"Drink freely from the cup of joy

No man is more deserving than you

But prepare yourself mentally

Your moment of choice approaches swiftly"

Og Mandino's "The Choice"

Mark Christopher: Kevin Costner

Louise: Michelle Pfeiffer

Alexander Anthony: Sean Connery

Todd: Macaulay Culkin

Glenn: Hailey Joel Osment

Croydon: Maggie Smith

David Coronet: Anthony Hopkins

Charles Bergen: Timothy Hutton

Bob Boynton: Dan Akroyd

Donna Templeton: Renee Zellwegger

John Christy: Paul Giamatti

Steve McPherson: Gary Sinise

J. Melton Hadley: Max Von Sydow

Roger Meyer: Huggybear

A stranger walked up to Og Mandino in a barbershop. He said he was a dentist and they were talking about Mark's book in The Choice, titled A Better Way To Live. The conversation gave Og a brilliant idea: that would be the title of his next book! He knew, and I fully agree, that his chat with a dentist in the barber's wasn't a coincidence.

  

I believe in a Higher Power that guides us, though we're often too dense to hear, much less understand. After too many "coincidences" in my life, all my doubts have vanished like the morning mists of summer.