Finally sent blanket text messages to everyone in my cell phone directory, informing them that they will be unable to reach me next week except by my personal e-mail address and my Google+ account.

Received all sorts of responses. Among them were a message from Mark, who said that he'd been dreaming about me and had just awakened; a "textula" from Frank that he composed; a lot of Christmas greetings; and good wishes from a lot of people whom I hadn't seen or heard from in a while.

Four more signatures to complete my 21-signature checkout list!

The Shower

The Dream:

I am visiting the house of a young man, a student at De La Salle University. It is an old, 1940s house updated to the 50s, and has quite a dark interior. I've been invited to check out the death of another young man, a suicide.

Sometime after I arrive I decide to take a shower in the ground-floor bathroom. There is a huge plastic tub, and I note that it is green. I lift the lid--it contains not collected water but small, white towels tied in bundles.

The young man comes into the bathroom and insists on taking a shower with me. His father and brothers look in through the window that opens onto the garage and garden. I am embarrassed. The young man and I are unable to even commence showering. He leaves, saying we should shower another time. Now alone, I decide to go ahead and shower.

Back in the living room, the young man's relatives gather round me. I predict that a second young man will commit suicide. Much later, indeed, I am told that a second young man, though not related to any of the characters in the dream, has done so.

People trickle in to hold a prayer session for the first young man who committed suicide.


My Commentary:

On the morning of that day I learned that Richmond resigned from his position; we are both exiting the office December 19. Someone remarked that so many people are resigning from the office--as opposed to retiring. Over my 36 years in this office I have seen this happen all too often, and I view resignation as a form of suicide. The towels inside the green tub are the healing possibilities I could have used on these people--alas, I give that only when people come and ask me.

In this dream, I am both myself and the young man. I am the employee who is retiring, and the young man is what I am or was during the entire time that I was employed. Showering is an act of cleansing; the young man's father and his brothers are our spirit guides.

The last part of the dream is precognitive: another young man will resign from his job.

Blessed Thursday!

Countdown: Six work days before my official retirement!

Yesterday morning a female janitor from a building across the office compound came up to me and asked whether it was true that I am retiring very soon.

It's amazing how news travels fast in a huge office.

I was happy during all my 36 years working in this office. But I have often sat in the Octagon and observed the cleaners and gardeners and construction workers at their tasks and, though they often gather in small groups and exchange jokes and banter, I have also often wondered how happy they really are.

Sometimes it is the friend who dares not say "I love you" who really loves you, yet it is that friend who must suffer unrequited love.

Your e-mail message: 

"Hi Sir Tony,

"I apologize for bothering you but I’ve been trying to reach you... the group Spirit Questors. I’ve been reading about your group Spirit Questors for quite some time. I understand how your team operates and what you do but I want to make it clear that I’m not a practitioner just a voracious reader. That is how I came to know about you. Now, I wrote this letter in the hope that you can help me with my dilemma. We just transferred to this new house for about 7 months now and everything was perfectly fine till me and my wife started noticing some very odd and particular things. My daughter who is __ years old keeps on telling us that she dreams about this dark small guy who keeps on egging her to hurt, kick, punch, or do some nasty things to her mother. We didn’t give it any thought dismissing it to be some silly dreams any __ yr. old child would normally have. We told her to pray everytime most especially before she gets to bed and fortunately the bad dreams stopped.

"Things started getting odd this ____________ 2014 till now. Money of various denominations and keys started disappearing for no apparent reason. At first we thought that we had just misplaced it but since me and my wife started having doubts we developed a system and placed organizers on strategic points in the house so as not to lose anything but still it did. The last straw happened just yesterday __/__/2014 were my wife left her grocery money in the cabinet put it in a small jar and sealed it and locked the cabinet. She was about to give me some spare change for my fare going to work and voila all the money in the jar was gone. This is something we can’t understand and fathom hence this email for help. Honestly I feel a presence in the house but I don’t know what it is and I dismiss it all the time but this has gone too far now. I don’t know how this thing works and I don’t want to mess with something which I don’t understand. I’ve been raised as a Christian and was told and warned not to deal with these things i.e. talking with spirits, vanishing them, etc. I was thought to rebuke evil which I do all the time but this thing that is happening in our house is something I need help and assistance. I can’t conclude and I don’t know how to resolve this. I hope this letter reaches you, and reaches you in good spirits. I know you are a very busy group but I hope you will find the time to extend help to me and my family. In case you were wondering, we don’t have anybody in the house it’s just the 3 of us. Me, my wife, and my daughter, so we wouldn’t prank each other just for the fun of it. It’s really happening and I believe there is an entity involved here."

"Here’s my contact: _____ - ___________

"Email: __________________

"Address: __________________________________

"Thanks

"______________

"_____________________________

"___

My answer: 

Hello _________,

The old Spirit Questors group no longer exists. I as an individual am now the Spirit Questors. I visit places either alone or with only one or two trusted companions. I am able to resolve situations via e-mail, however. Most of the time having to meet physically is a ridiculous game.

Please try the following:

1. _________________________________________________________________________________________.

2. _____________________________________________.

3.____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________.

4. _____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________.

This should work.

If I do not hear from you again, it means that everything is all right.

Unable to understand account statistics. This has happened several times before: page views go up to 2,000,000 and then suddenly go down to 600,000 again.

My office desk is a stark contrast to my Filipino Dumbledore desk at home.

My office module isn't as nearly-vacant as I want it to be, because it is the only space where we can store the 70th-Year-of-the-Liberation-of-the-Philippines T-shirts for a project I am passing on to a colleague.

My office module. I brought most of my stuff home already.

The rings I wore today, because I dreamt of them last night.

Left to right: royal blue sapphire, my aunt's ring; dragon with black onyx from Italy; silver seal ring with my initials; jade, Philippine magic, MephanaiJPhaton ring surrounded with brilliants designed for left forefinger.

Left to right: ruby, Philippine magic, MephanaiJPhaton ring surrounded with brilliants designed for right forefinger; my antique, signature ring, black star sapphire set in silver with vampire bat design; antelope intaglio ring from Afghanistan; and one of my four, claw, silver rings.  

Doing my checkout sheet. I need 21 signatures for my clearance from 21 sections of this huge office!

A person who lives in a matchbox will have stunted growth, and his creativity will not have the necessary space to expand to its fullest.

Last night I dreamt I was wearing eight rings, one of them the royal blue sapphire ring bequeathed to me by the aunt who had the greatest impact on my life.

I am wearing eight rings through Friday, including the royal blue sapphire ring.

Blessed Wednesday!

Countdown to my official retirement: Seven working days!

Good night, Cubao!

Reset my alarm. Back to work in the office tomorrow.

I will always remember 2013 and 2014 as very special years in the Philippines. Within that period of time, citizens and civic-minded institutions made the entire country and the world aware of massive corruption and of an entire range of crimes--and, most importantly, action was and is being taken.

The perpetrators think that they will have a chance to continue practicing their anomalies once a new President is elected.

The perpetrators are wrong.

2013 - 2014 was a point of no return for the Philippines.

Everyone is now observant, vigilant, alert, critical, analytic, interpretive, and willing to act against all odds.

My two scholar's fetishes: the little boy monk is from Shouzan (famous for semi-precious stones that cannot be found elsewhere), the old man with ru-i, Xian-jin (on the border between China and Mongolia). I am told that the Chinese literati collect such stones and that they are highly treasured. The friend of a friend has hundreds and keeps a photo catalogue of them; the little boy monk was part of that collection and was purchased from him by a very close friend for me. Such stones are meant to be touched frequently or held in one's left hand, presumably while writing with the other hand.

It is said that each stone will crystallize with age. I can believe that; note that portions of the little boy monk have crystal quartz.

These stones are jade, not agate. The old man figure is an example of three-color jade, which is quite expensive.

Jade comes in many colors, but, once I got started with red, I decided to stick to it.

I am next scheduled to do workshops for underprivileged high school students and, I think, female residents of a home for the aged. All of this, however, is still tentative.

A company schedules frequent staff meetings whenever it is constantly in fear of being unproductive.

While waiting for our workshop sessions to begin, Sarah wrote messages in Christmas cards to send her family and friends in Canada. Sarah is always on travel status. She is the only person I know of today who sends handwritten letters and postcards via snail mail.

I tried purchasing a box of Christmas cards many years ago but found the cost unreasonably high. Sarah agrees that sending a Christmas card is as expensive as buying a small gift for someone.

As long as they have good housing, clean water, electricity, reliable facilities, excellent transportation systems, safe roads, and no traffic, employees will not mind working 12 hours a day.

That is when progress begins.

A chilly day in Cubao. I am glad I have an iron-tracery firebox that can accommodate six bottled candles to warm my feet while I am writing. It is such a practical and portable substitute for a hearth.

I can't seem to get to retirement soon enough, because I so look forward to doing things for myself on a full-time basis at last.

The two cleaners who alternately worked on my hotel room are from mainland China. The young man intends to go back to China eventually; the young woman intends to get married and settle down in Singapore.

It was somewhat comforting to see the same staff members at the hotel from my last visit. Same faces, same uniforms, same conversations. I suddenly realized, though, that I am never like that to other people--I keep changing, and I wonder if the new personality they encounter ever makes them feel unsure both of me and of themselves. Regular people do make the world feel secure, and irregular people make it feel insecure.

Whenever people meet me again, their typical question is, "What are you up to these days?"

In the Departure Area of Changi Airport, I did my usual ritual, which was peeking into Madame Butterfly. I didn't purchase anything because my red set is complete. The only interesting items were porcelain statuettes of the Three Stars of Happiness and the three men in the peach garden (cf. Romance of the Three Kingdoms). I was actually looking for a cloisssone cigarette case; there weren't any, and the toothpick cases were too short!

The Filipina saleslady was no longer there--either she'd moved on or was on her day off. There was another Filipina saleslady, though, at Cards, where I was so tempted to buy a statuette after Klimt's The Kiss, but it was so pricey and cost the equivalent of P18,000!

Good news from Omar. God bless him!

Good morning, Cubao!

It was a wet night, it is a wet day.

The gods and goddesses speak within the silence.

The goddess of the storm is my mother. SQ-916 was a smooth flight. I was able to watch two movies: Ninja Turtles and Lucy.

Arrived home in Cubao 7:00 PM.

Many of the migrant workers who came from Bangladesh to Singapore have dreams of being writers, actors, and singers. They organized a theater group that performs every once in a while in Bangla; I had the rare opportunity to watch one of their rehearsals. One of the workshop participants took a course in Electrical Engineering just so that he could qualify as a worker and get sent to Singapore. His dream, however, is to become a successful visual media practitioner here. I pray that all of them achieve their dreams.

These men are very religious Muslims. They are construction and shipyard workers.

As I was sitting there conducting an exercise, I wondered about Filipino carpenters, plumbers, and such in my own country. Am I failing to see anything in them? Do some of them secretly want to be writers and painters too?

I never say goodbye to anyone or anything. When I leave, I take them away with me in my heart.

Every photograph is a memory of a relationship between the photographer and his subject matter.

Often, when a person apologizes or shows remorse, there remains a subpersonality within him that sits there smirking and has the potential to do the same offensive act, or worse, all over again.

Gave away six office T-shirts to ease my luggage: mango yellow, egg yellow, celadon, powder blue, and steel gray. I gave them away as souvenirs of the Philippines. Besides, I have only seven more work days before I retire, and I don't foresee myself keeping anything of the office in my house or in my wardrobe.

The problem with adaptation and deconstruction as, for example, in Walt Disney movies, is that the clueless mistake them for originals, and, sadly, there are many clueless people in this world.

I loved the Bangladeshi migrant workers, and they loved me! I'll post all the photos I took on my "Writing from The Heart" blog when I get home.

A few nights ago, when I was trudging into the hotel after a workshop at the theater, I passed by the open door of the bar. A female crooner was singing "Dahil Sa Iyo".

A workshop is not a formal tea party. As such it is the proper venue where participants can make mistakes, fail, even be unpolitically correct.

Addendum to my notes on exercising one's body to get rid of nocturnal leg cramps:

Contrary to what your gym instructor will tell you, when doing sit-ups focus on your legs rather than your stomach. You do this by keeping your legs flat, not arched, on the floor. Feel the way the muscles in the back of your thighs are stretched--it is actually quite a pleasant feeling.

Sometimes I Am the Lamb Being Led to the Slaughter

The workshop this evening will be for low-wage, migrant workers at Dibashram. It is in Little India.

I suddenly realized that, on December 8, 2013, "the" big, bloody, riot occurred there, the first such riot in 40 years in Singapore, and that my workshop might be part of its commemoration.

Every evening I watch the shadows of buildings lengthen as the sun begins to set. Then, like a vampire risen from his coffin, I get dressed and walk to the theater for the 7:00 - 10:00 PM workshop.

Full moon and empty arms

It is mating season for myna birds. Their two-note mating calls are haunting, especially before the sun sets.

The male myna hides at the very top of a tree and intones its call. The females perched on the ledges of buildings respond by trilling and nodding their heads continuously.

I have never looked at my own city from the point of view of someone living in a hotel.

Diego has been reminding me to pray for him every night.

Been sleeping 1:00 AM through 8:30 AM. I need to change that when I get back home and adjust to my office working schedule.

Typhoon Hagupit has a two-page coverage in The Straits Times.

Carefully preparing a revised syllabus for this evening's workshop at The Ashram (dib ashram, merged to be known to all as Dibashram).

Dramaturgy in the flesh with Samantha

It would have been too tedious to do this in the theater, and so we did this at the hotel.

I went over the works of two playwrights over the past few days in the cafe smoking area on the ground floor of the hotel.

Workshop done!

Tomorrow is another challenge altogether: another workshop, this time for low-wage, Bangladeshi, migrant workers at Dibashram.

The participants are rehearsing their five-minute, outdoor plays on-site. The actual vignettes will be held in sequence afterward, and passersby will be encouraged to stop and watch.

A series of emotional truth exercises--then all of us had a late lunch.

Full work day and work night

Discovered only today that carrot cake is actually made of white radish, which the Chinese refer to as carrot.

My latest Singapore Albums are on my Google+ Profile Page, but are visible only to my Followers.

There are actually three routes leading from the hotel to the theater: the first going straight through Saiboo Street; the second crossing the Saiboo bridge and then turning right down a staircase to the restaurant areas; and the meandering third through the park and turning left on Alkaff Bridge, Pacita Abad's bridge.

I frequently take the third route.

Lunch in a mall, and then visited a Taoist temple on Mohamed Sultan Street. The priest was very accommodating. We discussed the different Chinese gods inside the temple--I recognized only Shien Tien, Kwan Yin, Pao Kung, Noh Tzah, To Tee Kung and Kwan Kung.

I asked whether there was an image of Chuoko Liong (a.k.a. Chuoko Kung Ming in Manila); there was none. Apparently CL a.k.a CKM is not venerated in this particular temple.

Taoist priests are usually psychic, but I thought it would have been impolite to ask for a reading.

Jerwin called at 11:00 PM last night but I was too tired and sleepy to go out with him for coffee.

On a social media application, mainly your friends look at what you have to say.

On a blog, the whole world can look at everything you have to say.

--The single word "Can" means, "yes, it's possible," or "You are allowed to do that."

--In normal conversations, when someone is telling me something, the phrase "so-called" always crops up. I suppose it is the equivalent of the Tagalog "kuwan". It wasn't easy for me to catch up because it is usually pronounced "sukot", and, at first, I thought it was a Bahasa Malay word.

As in my trip last May, I encountered a lot of myna birds.

Some terms about workshop supplies that led to a little confusion:

--When I asked for a whiteboard eraser, I should have said "duster".
--When I asked for drawing paper, I should have said "drawing block".
--Double adhesive is commonly referred to here as "Blue Tack".

In terms of men's dressing, there are two things I see here that are not en vogue in Manila:

--It is perfectly all right here to wear rubber slippers as a substitute for casual shoes.
--I note a lot of men wearing "three-quarters" (pants that come down to mid-calf), which they often wear with sandals. Not to be confused with baggy, long shorts, though. In 1950s parlance, these are tight "pedal pushers", the kind you see in old Betty & Veronica comic books.

2:00 3:00 PM, dramaturgy in the flesh with Mayura

Dramaturgy in the flesh with Gabriel 11:00 AM - 12:48 NN. Afterward Gabriel, De Jun, and I had lunch in a "coffee shop".

I assigned the workshop participants a penultimate exercise that I call "Walking Theater", in which they are to write a sketch to be performed by their co-participants in different locations on the park outside the theater, by the river. (If it rains we simply move into the theater.) This will commence at 10:00 AM on Saturday and is free of charge, of course.

Should you happen to be in the vicinity, do come and be with us.

Jezreel wanted to cast me as a one-line grandfather in her sketch, but I can't afford to not see all of the sketches rather than appear in even one of them.

This morning I read in The Straits Times that a typhoon is foreseen to hit southern Philippines on Saturday.

Your Hangout message: "Hi Sir.  I hope your enjoying your stay in Singapore.  I am just wondering if you will be posting your forecast for the month of December?  Thank you sir and take care and enjoy Singapore Sir."

My answer: Hi _______!

I don't do that anymore, because it seems to me that only a few people read them and appreciate them.

Gabriel at 11:00 AM, Mayura at 2:00 PM for dramaturgy in the flesh. In the meantime I left my camera jack at the hotel and can't upload anything!

In Chinatown, I visited the Indian tailor from whom I'd bought a silk Chinese dragon jacket last May. I was hoping he'd have Chinese men's suits in cotton that I could wear through my very old age. He had none; neither did any of the stores in the market area. They are all probably in Hong Kong rather than in Singapore, and are the ones being used as costumes in Jacky Chan movies.

A rainy morning in Singapore, and I mean, rainy as in Manila rainy. De Jun had to pick me up from the hotel with two umbrellas.

Teow Li looks on with amusement whenever shopkeepers try to persuade me to make an expensive purchase.

I eat in carinderias called "coffee shops". The food there is quite good and "inexpensive", but, converted to pesos, I spend P300 - P500 per meal. (The real Filipino carinderia food, therefore, is still a lot cheaper.)

Back from Chinatown and lunch on River Valley Road.

There was only one thing that I came back for on Temple Street--a three-color-jade fetish carved as an old man with a beard and holding a ru-i sceptre.

Some years back, Teow Li sent me a jasper-and-crystal quartz Shouzan stone carved as a little boy monk.
According to Teow Li, Shouzan stones are coveted and collected by the scholarly and the literary-minded. They are supposed to crystallize with time.

The old-man stone is from Xingjian, on the border between China and Mongolia.

Both stones are meant to be touched and placed in one's pocket.

The literati of Singapore have made an effort to strike out the expletive "lah" from their conversations. They really shouldn't have--I always thought that it was quite piquant.

I am delighted to have begun gathering my works and posting them in cyberspace. In the far future, when every Filipino has a computer that is up and running, my countrymen will re-discover me and find a slew of my works out there, and I will continue to speak to them--though I may no longer be alive in this lifetime when that happens.

Going jalan-jalan (walkabout) with Teow Li in Chinatown in a few minutes.

Good morning, Singapore!

I have many interesting dreams every night. This is, after all, on one of its planes of existence, the kingdom of Chuoko Kung Ming.

My Album "In Singapore (Tuesday, December 2, 2014)" is now on my Google+ Profile Page, but is visible only to my Followers.

Teow Li was on a bus on her way home from buying a few things for me when she saw De Jun and me sitting in the hotel cafe. She alit and brought me apples and the one way to my heart--a box of Almond Roca!

I still haven't seen Teow Li and Jerwin.

The good news is, it seems that I have enough cigarettes to last the rest of my trip.

Sleeping at 1:00 AM every night, or should I say every early morning, and working the day through 10:30 PM.

Time flies by so quickly whenever I'm having fun.

"Writing from The Heart" began yesterday evening. I thought it went on very well, although some participants and staff members felt that it was "too intense."

Frankly, I do not know what "too intense" means at all.

What is so surreal to me here is that the water from taps is safe for drinking.

The interior of SQ-919 was bedecked with artificial poinsettias, holly, pine leaves, and red-and-green ribbon.

On the airplane, was again tempted to buy a Montblanc Princess Grace at S$875 and/or a Montblanc Starwalker Midnight Black at S$420, but I already have too many pens.

It's only Monday but it feels like Tuesday already, because all of yesterday, Sunday, was a stressful travel day.

Jerwin called me in my hotel room last night--once while I was still at Changi Airport and at 11:00 PM when I was in bed.

Traveling without a cell phone as a rehearsal for life without a cell phone after retirement, and it's heavenly.

Sometimes you must assume that people are not ignorant. But, then again, sometimes you must assume that they are, especially if you see that they are incapable of figuring things out for themselves.

I have always envied Singapore for its high-rise condominiums. The units are spacious and have high ceilings, unlike those we have in the Philippines, which are like matchboxes.

No human being deserves to live in a matchbox.

The biggest mistake of every teacher is assuming that he or she must have the last word, and that he or she is in complete control of his or her students.

In a school, you are told to write anything you want, and then the school authorities censor everything that displeases them.

I meet interesting people in airport smoking rooms. Two Americans admired my signature ring, which is from Khabul. One of them said that, when he was in Afghanistan, he bought a piece of kunzite and had it set as a ring for his girlfriend. He paid $650 for it. Unfortunately, his girlfriend eventually lost the ring.

I remember my faceted alexandrite stone, which Sarah Peck sent me when she herself was stationed in Khabul. I had it set in gold and is now one of my finest pieces of jewelry.

Yesterday I explored the entire departure area of NAIA Terminal 3. Saw two fabulous things I wanted to buy on the spot in two shops but refrained from doing so.

My Album "In Singapore (December 1, 2014) is now on my Google+ Profile Page, but is visible only to my Followers.

My Album "Manila - Singapore (November 30, 2014) is now on my Google+ Profile Page, but is visible only to my Followers.

Arrived Singapore 10:45 PM last night.