A Garden by the Sea

Imagine yourself sipping lemonade on a warm summer day, while overlooking the beautiful Italian seaside, breathing in the crisp, sea-salt air. Take a few seconds on that. Now let me tell you that it wouldn’t take you more than a few simple ingredients to recreate that moment. Light, refreshing, healthy, and absolutely delicious, it’s a complete surprise how simple this is to make.

Insalata de Mare simply translates to seafood salad. There is no traditional or specific set of requirements on how to make Insalata de Mare, as there are many kinds–some are made with literally only seafood. This one is inspired by Cibo’s Insalata de Mare, and comes in directly as a food hack. Though Cibo’s chefs are geniuses and deserve every peso they earn, I can’t dish out 400 bucks for every time my body says “Salad! Salad!”

Ingredients

• Shrimp or Prawns, peeled, washed, deveined/butterflied
• Romaine Lettuce
• Other seafood–Squid, Lobster, Mussels, Oyster, Clams
• Recommended additional greens–alfalfa sprouts, arugula, Lola Rossa, shredded zucchini

• Fresh basil leaves, picked and washed
• Parmagiano-Reggiano
• Olive Oil (or hydrogenated coconut/vegetable oil is alright)
• Garlic
• Balsamic Vinegar (or substitute with equal parts red wine and cane/white vinegar and two teaspoons/more brown sugar)
• Filleted Tuna
• Rosemary
• Lemon
• Salt & Pepper

For the Pesto:

Chop up a couple cloves of garlic and tear some fresh basil leaves. Put them into a blender or food processor with some oil and parmesan and pulse for a couple of seconds. You can include some rosemary, salt and pepper to taste. If you’re making a large batch of pesto for future use, make sure to keep a sterilized, air-tight jar.

To make the vinaigrette, just mix the pesto and balsamic vinegar/red wine, white or cane vinegar, brown sugar together in a small bowl. The pesto-to-vinegar ratio should be roughly 1:3.

Insalata de Mare

Heat some oil on a pan, and lightly sautee all the seafood together. Toss in with the greens: romaine, lola rosa, alfalfa sprouts, arugula. Have the vinaigrette in a separate saucer. When you’re ready to eat, just pour over the salad and toss lightly.

Lemon Seared Tuna

Have your tuna cleaned and filleted. Make sure you trust where you buy your tuna from. If it’s fresh tuna, leave the skin on. If you’re buying the ready-filleted frozen tuna from your grocery store, try to find the ones that are certified sashimi-quality, with the packaging vacuumed and air-tight. The fish won’t be sliced into steaks until after cooking. So, with a knife, make incisions every two inches across the fish. Also make sure that your sources for lemon do not use pesticides or coloring. And if you aren’t sure about it, just wash the lemon before you begin cooking.

Thinly slice four cloves of garlic and put it into a large bowl with a few splashes of olive oil/vegetable oil for the marinade. Take your lemon and use a micro-grater to zest the lemon. Roll the lemon on your counter-top to get the juices flowing, and cut off the top half. Slice off the rinds and mince them and include them to your marinade. Set the lemon aside. Take a sprig of rosemary and pick off the leaves. Crush them in your palm and throw them into the marinade. Toss together.

Make sure your hands are clean for this one. Sprinkle salt and freshly grate some pepper on your tuna, and rub lightly. Toss it into the marinade and massage lightly. Let it sit on some of the lemon and garlic, and sprinkle some of the lemon and garlic on top.

While the fish is settling with the flavors, heat up a pan. You can choose to not oil the pan anymore since the marinade has enough of it. If you are oiling the pan, use vegetable oil or peanut oil, not olive since it burns faster than the others. Heat the oil but don’t let it smoke. Regardless of oil, check if the pan is at its hottest. When it is, use a pair of tongs to take your fillet and cook skin-side down. Only wait until the skin crisps up and spreads the heat a bit towards the center before you change sides.

Don’t overcook. The entire point of a good pan-seared fish is that you get the best flavor of the fish by cooking up the skin quickly, but without drying out the center of the fish. Tuna is reddish when raw. A light pink with about a centimeter of white around the margin  is a good texture for pan-seared tuna. You know it’s cooked, because it flakes easily, but it isn’t dried out. Don’t worry, though. If you really do prefer your steaks and fish well-done, or if you don’t trust your fish supplier 100%, feel free to cook the fish all the way through, or cut the fillet into individual steaks from the beginning.

Plate your fish with your greens, but take a minute or two before you carve the fish, just to let the juices settle in. Before you serve, have a final sprinkle of salt and pepper to taste, and squeeze the lemon over. Garnish with slices of lemon and a sprig of rosemary.

And there you have it–a simple, refreshing, and flavorful meal.

Sisters’ Night Out at Bulgogi Brothers

What is the best way to spend Payday?

Is it, (a) sit down and budget the cash you have until the next payday? (b) Pay all debts and bills? Or is it (c) donate everything to charity?

If your answer was (d) treat your younger sister to dinner, then, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding! You must be my sister! Because that is exactly what happened last week.

Bulgogi Brothers is a highly rated Korean BBQ restaurant among the more well-known foodies of the online circuit. Ever since BB hit the Islands about two years ago, we have heard from so many about how great the dining experience was. Curious about all the great reviews, and as fans of the Korean cuisine–my sister being a fan of Korean anything–this just seemed like the perfect night to finally try it out. And so we found ourselves at the third floor of Greenbelt 5.

The dining experience starts out with your classic banchan. These are side dishes or appetizers traditionally served first alongside complementary tea. We have here some kimchi, something that seems to be soysauce cured kangkong in oil, and sweet sundried anchovies or dilis. On a large platter are some that would better pair with an order of meat: some corn, hardboiled quail, and sweet potatoes. The tea of the day was Bari or Barley Wheat Tea, which had a mild, rounded, sweet-soft flavor.

Bulgogi Night doesn’t truly begin unless you’ve been served Kimchi, and some hot, spicy broth. So why not have both in the same pot? We ordered a large bowl of Kimchi Jjigae, which can give you about six full servings. The broth was made with boiled Kimchi and some additional peppers and onions. The soup also had small cubes of soy, small cuts of delicious, sweet cured beef, and ddeokbokki (read: /TOHk-bo’-kii/), a rice cake shaped like penne traditionally included in spicy dishes.

It is served to the table still bubbling in heat. A sip of the soup gave a sour kick mixed in with a bit of spice. To my taste, the broth was not as spicy as I had hoped, but was most likely adjusted so for the common Filipino taste. I found the bits of meat adding an odd sweetness to each spoonful, but I suppose it contributes a fair amount of flavor to the bowl.

Next came the Bulgogi Brothers Special, a platter of two kinds of beautifully marbled meat: thick and juicy heart-shaped patties, and cuts of thin, yet fatty beef marinated with sweet soy. As the pan pre-heated on the heating pad incorporated into the table, we were served with this lovely bottle of Bokbunja, or Black Raspberry Wine.

Grape based wines have a thick bitterness to it hiding deceptively behind its sweet aroma, and a glass of it will rest heavily in the stomach. Whereas, rice wine is the soul of an aggressive, wise, old hermit, forever intertwined with the spirit of a fierce, mischievous youth. It is bitter, full, open, light, truthful, and warming to the senses. Black Raspberry Wine is light in spirit, but packs a full-bodied flavor, and travels lightly through the chest, leaving behind a trail of blue flames. Its fruity aroma brings about a liveliness to the drink, but does not even attempt to mask the alcohol. In the glass, the sweet juice of life and its darker spirit are bonded friends that do not deny each other. It is a quiet virgin whose only means of conversation is through a song of dark seduction.

It seems like Bokbunja and a platter of fatty, rich, heart-shaped beef would make a great pairing and could pass for a romantic Valentine’s dinner. But the heavy, earthy flavor of meat breaks the balance and angers the virgin–and when she’s not in the mood, she’s not in the mood.

Non alcoholic drinks are also on the menu, and fair well with the dishes just as nicely. Raspberry Mint Tea can pair perfectly with the meat, if Black Raspberry Wine just isn’t your thing.

The onions and sweet potatoes are the first few sorry criminals sent to their smoky-flavored deaths. As they settle in and caramelize, the heart patties are grilled in the hot pan, and within seconds, the fat melts away. Soon enough, the beef cooks in its own gorgeous fat.

When the patties leave the pan, the fat continues to cook in with the onions and sweet potatoes as the sprouts are added in, and there is just an aromatic exchange of beautiful flavor that takes place in the air.

 

And in comes the thin strips of heaven.

Every bite of this sweet, stirfry bulgogi reminds you of just how important quality ingredients are to a good meal. There is nothing particularly unique about grilling meat in a pan–and definitely not this, as this might taste something more like gyuniku teriyaki. But it is with every bite that you understand that the real flavor you taste is in the meat, not in the marinade.

 

 

Let me just say this straight out:

As a rule, truly good Korean food should not be expensive.

Korean cuisine showcases dishes that warm the soul, and soothe the numbed fingers that have suffered the harsh winters of every day living. Here, food is a warm blanket that lovingly embraces you on a cold night. Warmth, in Korean Cuisine, is not only a description of temperature, but a flavor on its own. It is the mixed taste of calming comfort, and daring fierceness.

It is this flavorful experience that I had been looking for in Bulgogi Brothers, which I did not find.

Which is not to say that BB doesn’t offer great food–just don’t let your hopes up if you were looking for the best Korean dining experience your money can afford. Because trust me, your money can afford a whole lot of great Korean food; it just isn’t here. Maybe it’s mostly because I live in the Southern Metro, and Aguirre is just one among many places where the best, Seoul-ful restaurants are lining up. Cham-Maru and Shabuyaki are among my favorites. These two in particular are home-based businesses of Korean families. Eating there is quite literally eating a homemade Korean dinner, and simply nothing compares.

Dinner at Bulgogi Brothers is delicious, and perhaps even exciting for those who have not eaten, or have no intention of eating authentic Korean cuisine. But for those who have, BB will come out as a bad knock-off, a Teriyaki Boy of the Korean scene. In all honesty, the kimchi we buy in jars was better. If not for the great quality of the ingredients they use, this review wouldn’t have been edited, and would simply been harsh from start to finish.

Take my advice: Eat at Bulgogi Brothers when you have a great craving for meat, and all else will be forgiven.

2/5.

Four Weeks.

Twenty-eight days.

Six hundred and seventy-two hours.

Forty thousand, three hundred and twenty minutes.

Two million, four hundred and nineteen thousand, and two hundred seconds.

I haven’t been in her car for almost a month. She always kept a bag of sweet-corn flavored snacks and a box of other cookies and biscuits. She had a pink bear in the back seat to accompany her often heavy luggage. In the morning, the car smelled like freshly poured coffee.

Before, we’d be together in the morning ride to campus, during lunch, after class, in meetings in the evening, and in the car ride back home. And this was on every day, even on Fridays and Saturdays when we both didn’t have scheduled classes. We went to campus to study together, from morning ‘til evening. There was even a time when she stayed over for two nights. We became unaccustomed to being away for a day apart, even missing a car ride would feel kind of iffy.

What troubles me now isn’t how long I haven’t seen Abigail. What troubles me is that I’ve stopped counting the days.

It isn’t that big of a deal, really. Abie’s not off in a different country, fighting in a war. She’s not lost or kidnapped. She’s at home, only five minutes away from mine, and she’s been enjoying her Christmas break. So it doesn’t make sense for me to have a need to think about a friend who’s safe and sound in the comfort of her own home.

But that’s just it, I haven’t.

I haven’t talked to her in a while, or tweeted, or even slightly cared about how her vacation is going. And now that I realized just how easy it is for me to be alone, how easy it is for me to let go of friends when they’re not around, it’s a discomforting thought.

It’s discomforting to think that I can live my life without these people. It’s discomforting to think that I’m okay. It’s discomforting to think that I’ve done this before, to so many other friends. Should I even be called a friend? Or am I just a passing phase? Or are they just a passing phase in my life?

How many people have I let go of? And how many friends did I forget?

What is a friend?

Is a friend a person who makes an effort to see you on a regular basis, or at least try to arrange a reunion despite the difficulty? Or is a friend a person that is just effortlessly there in your life, that, without trying, has found a place with you?

After all, if I have to work for it, then it wasn’t meant for me, right?

But what about all the people who tried so hard to hold on to me, those who tried to find a way, and those who did make an effort to give me a spot in their lives—did I lose them because they left, or did they leave because I pushed them away?

I was afraid.

I was afraid of being loved, or to even be thought of by such good people, and to be given so much of their time and effort for our friendship to survive. And I was afraid of being loved this way, not because I was afraid of getting hurt, but because I honestly believed that there was nothing of me to be loved, and nothing that I have which I could give back to them.

Or perhaps I just didn’t want to. Or just that I didn’t want to learn how.

“The greatest thing you’ll ever learn is to love, and be loved in return.”

(from Moulin Rouge, 2001.)

 

Struck with Awe: Chris Colfer’s Struck By Lightning Movie Review

What do you call a twenty-two year old actor, singer, New York Times Bestselling Author, one of Time Magazine’s 100 Most Influential in 2011, and the writer and producer of his very own film for the 2012 Tribeca Film Festival?

A genius, that’s what.

A creative genius.

Overview

Carson practically hates his life: his mother is a defeatist bum who lives off her inheritance, his favorite grandmother can’t remember him anymore, his dad left them, his high school is filled with thick-headed pricks, and nobody just gets him. His only way of escaping his life is through writing, and hopes to one day become a famous journalist for the New Yorker and other publications. He carefully builds his college résumé to get into his dream college, Northwestern University, and the only way to do that is to blackmail Clover High’s royalty into contributing to a literary magazine he hopes to publish.

And the catch? Carson dies at the beginning of the film, and this entire story is a flashback, narrated by Carson himself from the grave.

Once upon a time, there was a boy.

Struck By Lightning holds a simple plot, but is so filled with incredibly witty dialogue and such inspired messages that Carson’s entire account makes for a beautiful story in itself. Carson hates his high school, and everyone in it, that SBL is the anthem of every out-of-place teen who just wants to get out, break free, and do something more with their lives. SBL is the story of every dreamer, who knows he shouldn’t settle for less than the highest.

Struck By Lightning is everything we’ve always wanted to tell people in high school, but couldn’t.

High school: society’s bright idea to put all their aggressive, self-righteous, pubescent, naïve youth to torment and emotionally scar each other–for life.

Struck By Lightning is about Carson Phillips, and his immense amount of back-sass.

Casting, Characters and Yearbook-style Superlatives

Best Death: Chris Colfer as Carson Phillips

We’ve already been through this one, but to add to the commentary, Chris Colfer is perfect when it comes to playing a smart-ass. Maybe it’s because he actually is?

“The minute you walked into this school, you were labeled as high school royalty. And you would rather maintain that label than–heaven forbid–stand up for yourselves. But high school ends. And for your sakes, I hope you guys aren’t the walking clichés everyone thinks you are, because life is going to walk all over you, and it’s gonna bite you in the ass!”

I think what makes Struck By Lightning such a compelling story and a believable film is that Chris Colfer has a lot of similarities with the character he created and portrayed. Chris was from Clovis, California. Carson was from Clover. Colfer was also in speech, debate, drama, and was the president of the Writers’ Club, and the editor of the school’s literary magazine, just like Carson Phillips. He was also a victim of bullying, and was often told that he was never going to make it big anywhere. In a way, Colfer shares his life’s story through Carson, and uses this film to send the message to his young viewers–a message of hope, to always keep reaching for the dream, and never let anyone or anything stop you.

Best at Table Tennis: Rebel Wilson as Malerie Baggs

Conservative at the front, party at the back.

We know Rebel from films like Bridesmaids or Pitch Perfect as an annoying and self-righteous loser. For once, here, Rebel plays Carson’s most loyal companion, Malerie Baggs, who might be the only person in the entirety of Clover High that actually wants to be in The Chronicle.

Malerie likes to carry a camera around and videotape everything. She has flawless complexion and great talent in table tennis, like,  Asian good. Also, like the BAMF that she is, she is fluent in Spanish, Celtic and Elvish.

“What isn’t worth remembering? With good memories comes bad memories, and I’ve got a lot of both. At least, this way, I can fast forward through all the bad stuff. The counselor once told me that it doesn’t matter if you’re stuck in the past, or trying to forget the past. What matters is what you do in the present. So that’s why I just try to soak it up as much as possible.”

Worst Posture: Sarah Hyland as cheer captain-slash-queen Claire Matthews

“But I didn’t laugh at you. In what grade do we stop believing in ourselves? In what grade do we stop believing, period? Someone has the be the Nobel Peace Prize Winner. Someone has to be the ballerina. Why not us?”

Someone should cast her as Vanessa Hudgens’ younger sister in some movie or something. We know her as Dylan from Disney’s Geek Charming. And now you will know her as the whiny head cheer bitch who has in-campus sex with the coach.

“The worst thing of being on top of the pyramid is that you can get really hurt if you fall.”

Best Hair, I mean look at that thing: Carter Jenkins as Nicholas Forbes

Nicholas Forbes is the school rich boy, and gets around by paying people to do his bidding. He seems to have very strict and unaccepting parents, so when Carson finds out–spoiler alert–that he’s gay and frequently has bathroom stall sex with his boyfriend, Drama Club President Scott Thomas (Graham Rogers), he’s more than happy to pay Carson to get him to shut up. But it doesn’t work.

As for Carter Jenkins, that boy has fine hair. I’m pretty iffy on his acting, though. The only other place I’ve seen him in is Aliens in the Attic as Tom Pearson.

Most Gay, more-than-Colfer: Graham Rogers as Scott Thomas

I don’t think Graham Rogers is actually gay IRL, but his voice, his glittery-painted toe nails, and his dance moves could give him a pass. So plus two points if he really isn’t gay, because he still made a pretty believable character.

This is him, right? The blonde guy? Because I originally thought it was  Grant Gustin, who plays Sebastian Smythe from Glee‘s Warblers. But alas.

And that, over there in the background, is the athlete who is deserving of the next superlative:

Most Conceited: Allie Grant as Remy Baker

We all might remember Allie Grant growing up, as Agnes from Disney’s The Suite Life of Zack and Cody. She was the creepy one. I don’t know how she got cast as the president of the Yearbook Committee, but if the goal was to make her the most annoying character in the film, then it works. Seeing her, of all people, seated atop a table, rejecting photos and judging people by their appearance, only makes me think that the casting director is a genius.

I think the way Colfer wrote her and intended for her

Most Poetic: Matt Prokop as school stoner boy Dwayne Michaels

“Why do people live 2D lives in a 3D world, when they can live 4D lives all the time?”

Once again from Disney’s Geek Charming, and also Jimmie from HSM3, Matt Prokop plays the perpetually high student Dwayne Michaels. I feel like Matt is actually the most versatile actor in this cast, for some reason. But I think that’s just me.

Most Make-Up: Ashley Rickards as Vicki Jordan

Familiar face? Or do we need to put her arm in a cast? Jenna Hamilton from MTV’s Awkward. brings her sassy remarks to the big screen with Vicki Jordan. What amazes me with Ashley Rickard’s performance is that she’s given the goth character, the person who likes talking about the dead/undead, and has a pretty dead outlook on life. But that doesn’t make Rickard’s performance dead at all. She moves her lips and angles her head slightly to make a reaction, all while keeping her voice in a deep, I don’t really care if you die, semi-monotone, and her eyes filled with nothing but apathetic joy.

Most Emilio: Roberto Aguire, as Emilio

There are only three things you need to remember about Emilio: (1) Emilio has gorgeous rooster hair, (2) Emilio smells like puppies, and (3) Emilio is the bean in your pupusa, and he’s damn proud of it.

I hate her:

Nuff said.

Also, I hate Carson’s mom.

Sheryl Phillips loves her son, even when she casually tells him he was unwanted, or she hates her. We all know she just did things because she loved her son, and she’s the first to worry about him.  Doesn’t make her any less stupid, though. So I still hate her. But I love Allison Janney–she’s the woman who will end up making you cry in this film.

And his dad. His dad is the worst. Dermot Mulroney perfectly portrays Neal Phillips, the man who recycles his apologies, and taste in wives.

Christina Hendricks playing April only breaks your heart worse than it already has, because you start to think that she’ll end up with that pretentious douchebag. What kind of monster turns bright, loving ladies into emotionally wrecked, drugged up bums?

This isn’t the life you want. I gave him my life, and I was tossed aside when he decided I wasn’t enough. This was never part of my picket fence fantasy. You and I aren’t so different. I had a kid to save a marriage, and you’re having one to ensure one. So you shouldn’t be so quick to judge. Especially you. Because I was you. And now I’m this.

And he’s back: Adam Kolkin

Once upon a time, there was a boy who wanted to fly.

If you can remember that little boy over there, then you must have seen him from Glee, as a young Kurt Hummel. I think he’ll forever be cast as a younger Chris Colfer in everything, because the resemblance really is uncanny. It’s too bad he only appeared a few shots, but this kid is perfect.

In Essence

Once upon a time, there was a boy who flew.

What The Carson Phillips Journal really tells a story of was how Carson wasted his life, by working so hard, trying to be a good grandson, a good son, a worthy writer, but end up not having what he wanted–and how he’s okay with that. It’s a story about how Carson learns that it was in whatever he “wasted” his life on that made it worth living in the first place. It was in Carson’s acceptance and self-appreciation for the things that he had and were able to do, despite all the disappointments, that he found his peace.

And so, he died.

“Don’t try to find the ideas. Let the ideas find you. It’s one of hte most amazing experiences, you know, finding something to write about–realizing something for the first time. It comes out of nowhere, and it just hits you, and it’s all you can think about, and it goes through your body, and it tries to escape, and be expressed in any way possible. I mean, it’s ah, it’s a lot like, uhm–”

“Lightning.”

Struck by Lightning gets 9 out of 10.

Let’s Be Friends

Break-ups can be painful and scarring, but no one can deny that they’re part of life. They shape us just as much as relationships do. We’re built up, not only by the things we take in, but also by the things we let go of.

I’ve received a series of similar questions from anonymous askers via Ask.FM, and these answers pretty much sum up how I feel about ex-boyfriends.

What does it mean if your ex wants to be friends with you?

In general, I’d suppose it would depend on the manner and reason for the breakup. For the most part, an ex trying to be your friend would just mean that he perhaps wishes that the relationship didn’t happen, that you would’ve been good as friends before. Or he feels guilty for doing something, and hopes you could find a peace with each other. It would only mean that he wants to get back together, if the reason for breaking up wasn’t really worth losing you over. Other than that, an ex wants to be friends, because he wants to be friends.

Either that, or he wants to seem like friends, because he wants to keep his reputation clean and want to look good and innocent to other people.

Would you want to be friends with your ex after the break-up?

Like, right after the break up? No. I’d like to be left alone. When I’m fine, we can be friends again.

The only person who asks to be friends right after the breakup is the person who cares more about his reputation and just doesn’t want to look like an ass in front of people.

“Friends to lovers, possible. Lovers to friends, never.” Agree? By lovers, I mean those who are in a relationship.

Disagree.

Why do you disagree?

This is about the lovers to friends thing, right? Well, because not all breakups are painful and horrible. In some of them, you both just realize that you didn’t want to be in a relationship. Just because you guys were super close before didn’t mean you should have been together. And upon realizing that, it’s not such a bad breakup. It could hurt, because then you’d realize how much time you wasted trying to build or fix a relationship that wasn’t really meant for you both in the first place. Other than that, you’ll get back just fine. The small details about your life that you let only him know would still be there, and even though you’re not together, you at least make a good friend you could even end up trusting more than others.

How long does it usually take someone to move on?    

The rule is usually half the relationship period. But if you ask me, it kind of takes five to eight months.

How do you make your ex regret leaving you?

Well the first step is to not think about making your ex regret leaving you. If you do think like that, everything you do will be done for that ex. The trick is to do everything for yourself. Get back on your own two feet, live your life, learn to not be dependent on another’s love to survive.

What if I’m the one who broke up with him and right after the break up, he keeps on INSISTING to be friends with me? EVen though the break up’s been a month already   

Maybe he didn’t like the way things ended for the both of you. Why, do you think he’s trying to find a way to get back?

No. I was actually thinking that maybe he wasn’t as hurt as I am cause he can stand being friends with me and he even insists it. 

If that is true, that doesn’t give him an excuse to force his terms on you. Ask him to give you your time and space. Tell him that what he’s doing is insensitive towards you, and that if he really is your friend and cares about your well-being, then he has to learn to leave you alone. If he doesn’t really care about you as a friend, and is insisting on this friendship just so that being together in the same room/group of friends won’t feel “awkward” anymore, or so it wouldn’t make him look like a jerk to have a new relationship, then he can learn to fuck off.

Do you think it’s possible to move on from a broken relationship within a month, if you’ve been with that person for almost a year?

If the past few months of that relationship was all about falling apart and breaking away, then it’s possible. Are you the person who has an ex that insists on being a friend? If you are, your ex might have seen this breakup coming from a while back, and managed to prepare himself for the fall. Whereas you tried to work hard to keep things together. So at this point, you might feel that it’s unfair. Why is he not so hurt, and why does he want to be friends? Why do I feel so alone? Why does it feel like I was the only one doing everything? I feel exhausted, used, hurt. Why do you not feel this way? Why are you okay with everything when I’m a total wreck? Those kinds of things. What you should know is that the other person must have felt like this too, but gave up long ago.

Why do you think badly of ex’s that want to be friends right away?

When I say that they want to be friends right away, to protect a reputation or to have a ‘go’ signal that they can date other people again, it comes from experience. I’ve been that person, sort of. I’ve been the person to pretend that we’re friends, or ask to be friends, even though I know that “you” aren’t okay yet. I’ve been the one to somewhat force “you” into a situation to act like you feel better about everything, when “you” were still hurting. Because, you know, I didn’t want to have to walk the same hallway and not say hi to you. I didn’t want to leave the same set of friends. You should know that as much as I forced you to be okay, I was forcing myself to learn to be okay with it too.

But I’ve also been the person on the receiving end of it. “We’re still friends though, right?” ended up as a way to make sure “he” didn’t look bad in front of other people, especially when he was trying to court another girl. It also gave him an excuse to say “she’s totally fine with us dating; we’re friends” to this new girl.

And I realized, it’s not just me. With the friends I’ve listened to, maybe like you, dear Anon, if you’re the same one asking the questions, it happens all the time.

I guess I’m not really angry at these ex’s. I can understand. They’re just as confused as we all are, and to the best of their judgment, being friends is something they think they should do. If there’s one thing I learned in this world, there are no villains, only victims. People who hurt us do hurtful things, because they believe it’s the best way to protect themselves. Still, learn to protect yourself too. Be angry if angry; express pain if you’re hurt. You can’t begin to forgive someone before you’ve let them know that they’ve done you a great deal wrong.

So now that you now what ive been going through, would u give me some advice on what i should do now?    

Well, for starters, tell that person the reason why you aren’t ready to be friends just yet, if you’re ever to be friends at all. Also, if you have common friends who may be affected by this separation, let them know. Take your time to grow and heal, and learn to take care of yourself without depending on someone else. You can go on dates, if you like. But remember that not all dates have to become relationships. Only enter a new relationship when you feel like you aren’t going to look at this new person, and hope that he fills up whatever gaping hole the previous one left behind. Whether or not you become friends with your ex at the end of it all is totally unrelated. By friends, I mean close friends who regularly meet and hang. But you /should/ be on good terms with him.

Do you know about the Three Month Rule? Do you believe in it?

I don’t know anyone who’s ever dated and never knew about the three month rule, haha. So yes, I know it. I don’t believe in it, but it’s a damn good rule to establish. A lot of people just go and wreck themselves over the notion of love and eternity without even thinking about what happened to them in the past, so they date new people and repeat the cycle of what hurt them in the first place. But I don’t believe in the three month rule in a sense that there are mature people who know what they’re getting in to, and there are also people who are only casual daters, so it doesn’t really matter if they date someone new a day after the breakup.

What can you say about couples who get their names tattooed on each other, but break up only in a matter of months?

They’re impulsive romanticists. I don’t want to judge them. It’s not that they’re doing anything wrong, really. So they fell in love and fell out of it, what now? I’m sure they feel pretty stupid themselves, so I don’t want to add to their humiliation. I’m kind of proud of them, actually, to learn to let go of their fears that they’ll end up broken apart soon, and just fall recklessly and freely in love with each other regardless of that fear.I don’t know. I think society’s dumb for calling people like these dumb, or too idealistic, like having dreams is ever a wrong thing. You know what renders people incapable of getting back up after a break-up? All the scornful people who told them to wake up to reality, because happy endings are only in fairytales, that’s what. Why can’t we all just congratulate them on trying to find love in an otherwise hopeless world, right?

Taxi Cabs, Condoms, and Catholicism

Why is it that, in the Philippines, Taxi Cab drivers are picky when it comes to their customers? And on a side note, why do beggars complain when they get small donations?

Because the traffic regulation system in the country is totally shit, so some trips are less profitable than others. Taxi drivers should retain some right to choose the trips, I think. Like a lot of the taxis we see in central Manila park at Valenzuela, and that’s fucking far. If you ask the driver to take you to Las Pinas via service road during rush hour, then that makes them waste gas because of the bad traffic, it’s going to be one hellafa long ride home for them, and worst of all, they wouldn’t get that many customers there. So it sometimes gets irritating, but I sometimes want to take the side of the cab driver. If only I were rich enough to pay a fixed rate of five hundred bucks whenever I have to take a long cab ride. So if you aren’t rich, the solution is don’t take a cab, take a fucking bus, a train, a jeep and an FX.

 As for the beggars, wellllll, the world hasn’t treated them fairly, and in fact, they’re suffering. We’re going to do a small favor for them, and we’ll do it half-baked? They’re just people who are tired of the injustice of the world, and tired of the fact that they were born helpless and without the opportunity or capability to get out of their situation. Sometimes, it isn’t really their fault.

I’m a firm believer in the underdog, hahahahaha.

What if giving donations to beggars isn’t the answer to injustice?

And so if it isn’t? Because it really isn’t, you know. I know what I said about how they have every reason to react badly to a donation of a peso or something. But I didn’t say that they even had the right to beg in the first place. Begging is illegal anyway, and why inconvenience the upper classes with the burden of having to provide for those incapable of contributing to society?

But the thing is, as much as we shouldn’t give to them, they can’t provide for themselves. (Because if they could, why the hell would they beg, right?) So what I’m getting at is, that it isn’t their fault. They beg because they’re poor, because their parents couldn’t provide for them, because they don’t have proper jobs, because they weren’t provided with good education, because their own parents were total shitfaces back in their day.

So we can’t solve these kids’ problems today, and right away, but we can contribute to making sure that it doesn’t happen to the millions of kids to come in the future. What we can do now is build the foundation for better quality and more affordable education programs, and more employment opportunities.

So do you think the Reproductive Health Bill is the answer to poverty?

One of the steps, yes. Not exactly the answer to poverty. It takes a lot of different things to prevent and alleviate poverty.What I think is important to remember about the RH Bill is that it isn’t meant to be a direct answer to poverty. The principle behind it is that we who have money can buy our own contraceptives if we wanted to, can go see doctors to consult, and avail of health services when we need them. We, who have money, have a choice. It’s as if saying that if you have money, you have freedom. And if you’re poor, you don’t have freedom. What the RH Bill ensures, more than anything, is the closing of that gap. You’re free to choose what to do with your body, whether you’re rich or poor.So what the RH Bill ultimately becomes is not limited to giving contraceptives to the poor so they’ll have less children. It becomes a way of granting the poor access to the rights and resources the rich have, at least in terms of reproductive health services. And isn’t that the first step you take to eradicate poverty?

It took me like six years of my life to see it this way.

What are your views on being Catholic but doing a lot of non-Catholic things (being pro-RH, swearing, all the like)?    

 There’s a specific reason to certain issues, like the ones you pointed out, why I think they’re okay, and sometimes even, possibly in line with what I believe in as a member of the Catholic Church. Being pro-RH, for example, is just me believing in equality and the value of freedom (if you’ve read my previous explanation).

Swearing, on the other hand, is what I think to be a contextual thing. The words ‘fuck’ and ‘shit’ still are bad words to use, mind you. But in the context of our language, and how English is growing in this day and age, a lot of it is used more of an adjective/adverb than to actually mean fornication and fecal matter. Using ‘fucking’ to mean ‘very extremely’, is easier to understand for most. I like learning about words as much as the next bookworm, but in this day and age, I think people would find me weird to say “superlatively” or something else. At the end of the day, it isn’t the word that’s wrong, but how you use it. If you aren’t talking to your elders or children, it’s fine. I think the only reason why elders and children would find those words offensive would be because in the context of their age, it should be. If you think about it, telling someone that you wished they were thrown into a pit of ravenous beasts for them to die an extremely painful death is still a worse thing to say than “Dude, I think this pie you baked is fucking delicious! This shit’s amazing!”

As for the other things that may seem un-Catholic, the only other thing I have left to say is that Jesus is kind of a radical. He believed that man is naturally good, and people should not adhere to the laws of man, but to the laws of God, and that we shouldn’t trouble ourselves with keeping the technicalities of these laws, but only to love God and neighbor. Jesus didn’t bother with following the rules when it came to, like, following the certain way of washing hands. And even when he met a whore about to be stoned to death, Christ was the first to tell us that it’s not in our hands to say what is right and wrong for that person. What matters is we don’t hurt each other, and we promote a culture of love around us. I mean, he took the most ungodly people to be his disciples, and he came from a long line of sinners. He’s here to make us believe that whoever we are, wherever we come from, and whatever we do, He’s going to be here to love us, and His only request is that we love others too.

If you think about that, what right have you, or anyone, as part of this Church, to tell me that I’m going to hell for the things I stand for? If I promote the RH Bill, or Homosexual Marriage, if I’m anti-dress code? Isn’t it less Christ-like to promote hate and prejudice? An important thing to think about.

I’m a huge sucker for prompts. If you want to leave me questions, you can do so at Tumblr or Ask.FM.

Jingling All the Way to Bono Tei

I don’t know what it is about my family and Japanese cuisine that we decide to have Japanese food for Christmas dinner, just like we did last year. Last year’s Christmas feast was at Okiniiri, along Aguirre, BF Homes. This time, we decided to check out Bono Tei Japanese Restaurant, found around El Grande Ave.

There are three things to love about this place: great food, great service, and most of all, great atmosphere.

Great Food

The sad thing about Japanese cuisine in the Philippine food scene today is that it’s slowly being drained of excitement, flare, and that bit of class for the sake of economical reasons. Your classic examples would be Teriyaki Boy, Rai Rai Ken and Tokyo Tokyo.

Gladly, Bono Tei reminds you that everything spent for each delectable bite is worth it.

Go ahead, sample the sushi.

Futomaki

Your classic Futomaki, which I think is tamago, pickled daikon, kani stick and rice wrapped in seaweed. It is one of the simplest kinds of makis out there, but with good quality ingredients, Bono Tei makes them a humble delight to behold.

California Maki

The roll that captured (almost) every Filipino’s taste is the California Maki. Virtually everyone’s had one, may it be from some dump sushi place. Drizzled with Japanese mayo, it seems that Bono Tei likes to keep things fresh but traditional.

But don’t be fooled, because they have a mountain up their sleeves.

Mt. Fuji:

deep fried salmon maki, drizzled with cheese.

I don’t know how it is possible, but even the rice tastes better.

One rule of restaurant hunt is to order things that are familiar to you, things that are common to every one you’ve tried before, for the sake of comparison. When it comes to Japanese, you have to test the Chicken Teriyaki.

Chicken Teriyaki

Bono Tei serves up a mildly sweet, savory, succulent and tender dish. Comparison? It doesn’t swim in sauce. It lets the chicken be the star of the show, which is a quality of good food. You don’t kill the flavor of the meat with overpowering sauces; you pick good quality ingredients, and the sauce is there to highlight that taste. Which for chicken teriyaki, it happens only once or twice, and at least one of those times would be here at Bono Tei.

Gyuniku Teriyaki

Which is much to say about their Gyuniku (beef) Teriyaki. Unlike most other restaurants that serve them up in slices, or even thin strips of sirloin, Bono Tei gives you that uncut chunk of meat for a really good bite of beef. Served with it is a stir fry salad of mung bean sprouts and other vegetables and corn on the side. It is served well-done, and as you take a bite, you will notice that the sauce goes through the inside of the meat, telling us that this has been well marinated.

Ebi Asupara Bacon

I was expecting prawns with asparagus, wrapped in bacon. But it was a stir fry dish of shrimp, asparagus, bacon and some corn. Still good, though. Asparagus is not at all overcooked, and the bacon is not too salty.

Now about what I told you when it comes to the experience of taking a bite of beef:

Wagyu.

Yes, Wagyu Beef. Hello there, you just made my Christmas.

Bono Tei serves up Wagyu Beef in two ways: a plate of the beef with a plate of sauce, or the beef barbecued with the sauce. I chose the first one.

It isn’t a plate of steak or anything, but eight humble cubes of beef, with a plate of sauce that seems to be made of shoyu, teriyaki sauce, honey and sesame oil. It’s a wild guess, but hey. The beef itself is cooked well-done, which is how my family prefers it, but not how I do things with meat. Still, it isn’t dry or hard to chew at all (but that’s just a property of Wagyu beef). This isn’t something you just eat through, but something you take careful bites of, to savor that taste of exquisite beef, and the sauce just perfectly compliments that.

If you don’t know what Wagyu Beef is, it comes from a Japanese breed of cattle, where the meat contains more Omega-3 & 6 fatty acids. So it is a lot less unsaturated fat. I know it sounds like there shouldn’t be any difference in taste, but there is. There really, really is.

And the last dish to come to our table was the one most awaited. If you love hotpot dinners, you might want to trade in your Sukiyaki for this.

Yosenabe

Prawns, crab, I think there’s fish, I don’t know, rice noodles, shitake mushrooms, golden string mushrooms, tofu, and plenty of lovely vegetables in what seems to be a miso-based broth makes up this lovely Seafood hotpot.

Their menu also features countless other dishes, classic and otherwise. And the drinks do include alcoholic beverages and some Japanese rice wines, just in case you wanted to know.

Great Service

If you’re into the foreign cuisine restaurants where the staff dresses the native costume, and act like they’re native, then you’re in for a surprise.

Because the Bono Tei staff is nothing like that.

There are no kimono-wearing waitresses, kneeling down to your small floor table to pour you tea. They do not act all formal and treat you like the guest of the imperial majesty, or whatever. Instead, they go with something they actually have: Filipino charm. With all their casual graces, they smile and even giggle along with the customers. I love a good cosplay as much as the next otaku, but I’d have to admit, this is refreshing.

If you do take a long meal, you’re going to hear a couple dozen mispronounced irasshaimase’s, spoken as if they’re ready to throw it out the window.

But they do serve green tea, complimentary, before the meal.

They have a lovely set of plates, and they prepare the hotpot set far before the meal is even ready.

Great Atmosphere

Now the great difference of buying food, and actually looking for a restaurant, is the ambience. Dining isn’t just about eating, but the experience of eating, taking in not only taste and smell of the dish, but also the sight of the meal and its surroundings. Bono Tei completes this dining experience by paying attention to the detail in design. Here’s a shot of the inside dining space:

Which of course, I cannot take any more of, because I couldn’t go around the restaurant like a crazy person, disturbing people having dinner to take their pictures.

The entryway to the inner dining area is a sliding door made of bamboo, with a white cloth curtain. Right outside is a sort of patio dining area.

Bono Tei seems like a great place for parties especially with their outdoor event space.

 

With a koi pond and a bridge.

 

Other than the tent, there is a roofed dining space right next to the koi pond.

And a perfect view from the event tent is a row of lanterns.

Let’s light this baby up, shall we?

My family and I couldn’t resist; we just had to have a photo-adventure out here.

Great, basically everything

Bono Tei is definitely a brilliant new find, and this dinner totally made my holiday a feast to remember.

For a casual lunch out, a budget of 400-500 per head should do. But if you intend on tasting all that Bono Tei has to offer, 600-900 per head should do the trick.

Bono Tei scores an 8.5 out of 10 for me.

Happy Christmas and a cheerful start of the year to everyone.

The 2013 Watch List

Seems like the world decided to celebrate its survival from various doomsday prophecies by providing us with the best films. Twenty-thirteen definitely gives us plenty to look forward to, with all of the most highly anticipated sequels, the best animated films, the most intense horror stories and the most unique stories. Here are my picks for this year’s watch list.

We aren’t including write-ups for the expected sequels of film franchises, and the already heavily-advertised films throughout the previous year. The films are listed by chronological order of known USA release dates, and all posters and art belong to their respective production/distribution companies unless otherwise stated.

January 11: Struck By Lightning

Genre/Themes: Coming-of-age

    

Struck by Lightning comes from the creative genius Chris Colfer, who wrote, co-produced and starred in the film. Directed by Brian Dannelly, the film premiered April 2012 at the Tribeca Film Festival, and will show in cinemas January 2013.

It is a coming-of-age story, of a young Carson Phillips (played by Colfer), who dies from lightning strike. He narrates the entire story of how he blackmailed his classmates into contributing to his literary magazine, all from the grave.

January 25: Hansel and Gretel Witch Hunters

Genre/Themes: Fantasy, Action

Fifteen years after the Gingerbread House story, siblings Hansel and Gretel grow to become bounty hunters, ridding the land of witches, and are commissioned by the mayor of Aubsburg, Germany to defeat an evil sorceress who intends to sacrifice children in a ritual within two days. Hansel is played by The Avengers’ Hawkeye, Jeremy Renner, and co-starred by Gemma Arterton as Gretel.

January 25: Movie 43: Truth or Dare

Genre: Comedy

Directed and produced by Peter Farrelly, Movie 43 is a twelve-way comedy film. What’s interesting about it? The cast is nothing short of amazing. Names like Chloe Moretz, Emma Watson, Justin Long, Halle Berry, Anna Faris, Gerard Butler, Kate Winslet, Uma Thurman, Richard Gere, Hugh Jackman and so many others already make the film worth seeing.

February 8: Side Effects

Genre: Thriller

Director Steven Soderbergh and star Channing Tatum make a well-known formula for brilliant cinema. Add in Jude Law and Catherine Zeta Jones, and the Girl with a Dragon Tattoo’s Rooney Mara, casting alone makes the film a fullproof hit. We’ll be witnessing the life of a young woman, left alone by her husband thrown into jail. As she waits for his release, she messes with prescription drugs. A thriller story, set in pharmacology—something to look out for.

February 28: Stoker

Genre: Horror, Thriller, Drama

If this isn’t one of the most interesting films we’ll encounter this year, then I wouldn’t know what is. Stoker is three things: a horror film, a family drama, and a psychological thriller. The Stoker family loses the father, leaving the mother Evelyn Stoker (played by Nicole Kidman) an emotional wreck. Uncle Charlie Stoker (Matthe Goode) moves in with them, and though the young lady India Stoker (played by Burton’s Alice, Mia Wasikowska) finds him suspicious, she is oddly drawn to him. The screenplay was written by Wentworth Miller, and Stoker was voted into the 2010 Black List of the 10 best unproduced screenplays in Hollywood. Directed by Park Chan-wook, this film is his first English-language film. He takes with him cinematographer Chung Chung-hoon.

March 1: Jack the Giant Slayer

Genre: Fantasy, Adventure

Jack the Giant Slayer is a fantasy adventure film, of Jack (Nicholas Hoult), who opens the gateway between the world of giants and our own, and he must defend the Earth in a territorial war. The film is based on the Cornish fairytale Jack the Giant Killer set during the Arthurian legends. From I Am Number Four director D.J. Caruso, the cast also includes Eleanor Tomlinson, Stanley Tucci, Ian McShane, Bill Nighy and Ewan McGregor.

 March 8: Oz The Great and Powerful

Genre: Fantasy, Adventure

Disney takes one of its own classics to create its prequel, directed by Sam Raimi, director of the Spider-man Trilogy. Oz the Great and Powerful is set before the events of L. Frank Baum’s 1900 novel The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, where circus magician Oscar Diggs arrives at the Land of Oz. Three witches Theodora of the West, Evanora of the East and Glinda of the South doubt that Oscar is the powerful wizard. As he is called upon to solve the problems of the inhabitants of the Land of Oz, he grows into a better man. Oscar Diggs is played by James Franco, who worked with director Sam Raimi in Spider-man before. Mila Kunis, Rachel Weisz and Michelle Williams play Theodora, Evanora and Glinda respectively.

March 14: Carrie

Genre: Horror, Supernatural

A supernatural horror film directed by Kimberly Pierce, a remake of Brian de Palma’s Carrie in 1976, and a more faithful adaptation of Stephen King’s 1974 novel, Carrie is a film about Margaret White’s sheltered daughter, Carrie White. Margaret protects her daughter from a group of high school mean girls dubbed “The Ultras”, of which, Sue Snell feels guilt and asks her boyfriend, school heartthrob Tommy Ross, to take Carrie to prom. Anger? Hatred? Pressure? All these trigger an inner, uncontrollable power within Carrie, which drives her to unleash what can only be worded as telekinetic havoc. Starring Chloe Moretz as Carrie White, and Juliana Moore as Margaret White.

March 22: The Croods

Genre: Family, Adventure, Comedy, Animation

A 3D animated family adventure comedy film from DreamWorks, about the world’s first prehistoric family, co-directed by Chris Sanders, who was a big name in How To Train Your Dragon and Lilo & Stitch. The adventure begins when Grug and his family are forced to leave their home due to a powerful earthquake. The voice cast is amazingly put together, with Nicolas Cage as the voice of the overprotective father Grug. Ryan Reynolds’ character, Guy, threatens Grug’s manliness and position as father, as he prefers to use brain over brawn, on coming up with revolutionary ideas. Emma Stone plays Eep, the daughter of the family, and sister to Thunk voiced by Clark Duke (who you may remember as Marty from Kick-Ass, and Jacob from Hot Tub Time Machine). Mother of the family Ugga is played by Catherine Keener (you may remember her to be Percy Jackson’s mother Sally—always the mother role.) And lastly, Grug’s mother-in-law Gran is played by living legend Cloris Leachman, eight-time Primetime Emmy Award winner, familiar to the younger generation as the voice of Farmworld Marceline from Adventure Time, Noriko from Ponyo, and Hydia from My Little Pony: The Movie. With such credentials, starting from directors down to the cast, one can only expect the best from this film.

May 3: Iron Man 3

May 10: The Great Gatsby

May 17: Star Trek Into the Darkness

May 24: Epic

An adaptation of the children’s book The Leaf Men and the Brave Good Bugs by William Joyce, Epic is a 3D Animation film that cannot be missed. Directed by Chris Wedge of Ice Age and Carlos Saldanha of Rio, in a story that is reminiscent of Hayao Miyazaki’s work, and with a voice cast starring Amanda Seyfried, Josh Hutcherson, Beyonce Knowles, Colin Farrell, there’s nothing better you can ask for.

May 24: The Hangover III

June 28: Kick-Ass 2

Lionsgate thought that Kick-Ass didn’t need a sequel, so it’s now in the hands of Universal to prove them wrong. Although they didn’t seem to invest as much in this film, as I’ve heard Kick-Ass 2‘s writer/director is “cheaper”. I’m watching this film because I’m worried about it. I loved, loved, loved Kick-Ass.

June 21: Monsters University

The decade-late revivals of Disney-Pixar classics have been good to us, so the prequel to Monsters, Inc. where Mike and Sulley are in college should make for a good film. Plenty of skeptics were nervous about this, since we all know that they’ll be friends in the end. But it seems like a good call for Pixar, because Boo! growing up just destroys the enchantment of childhood.

June 14: Man of Steel (Superman)

July 26: The Wolverine

July 3: Despicable Me 2

Potatoes, bananas, minions, and fluffy unicorns. We’ve been waiting for so long, that putting this on the list needs no explanation.

August 16: Percy Jackson: Sea of Monsters

August 30: Insidious Chapter 2

From what I gather, Dolton’s father is both him and not him. It doesn’t make sense, yet. And we’ll just have to watch the movie to find out.

September 13: I, Frankenstein

There’s still very little news about I, Frankenstein, but this horror-thriller written and directed by Stuart Beattie stars Aaron Eckhart as Adam Frankenstein, the monster created by Dr. Victor Frankenstein played by Aden Young. I have no idea what Bill Nighy is doing here, but I’m certainly excited.

September 20: Rush

An interesting biography of a Formula 1 champion racer who almost died in a crash in 1976, but later on tries to challenges an enemy in another race. That enemy will be played by our favorite Thor, Chris Hemsworth.

October 25: The World’s End

Remember The Adventures of TinTin? Voice actors for Thomson and Thompson, Simon Pegg and Nick Frost, are coming in as Gary King and Andy Knight in a British science-fiction comedy.

Upside for the BBC fandom, Martin Freeman is in this one. Written and directed by Edgar Wright, writer and director of Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz.

November 1: Mr. Peabody and Sherman

Mr. Peabody & Sherman is a 3D animated comedy adventure film by DreamWorks, directed by Robb Minkoff, director of Lion King and Stuart Little films.

The characters are based on Peabody’s Improbably History, from The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show, famous 1960s animated television series.

November 8: Thor: The Dark World

November 22, 2013: The Hunger Games: Catching Fire

November 27, 2013: Frozen

Frozen is an animated film, and a loose adaptation of Hans Christian Andersen’s longest and most critically acclaimed story The Snow Queen, of a young girl Anna voiced by Kristen Bell (Forgetting Sarah Marshall) who must find Elsa, the Evil Snow Queen, voiced by none other than the most magical voice alive, Idina Menzel.

Joining the cast is Jonathan Groff, popularly known as Jesse St. James from the Television series Glee and Melchior from the musical Spring Awakening, who plays Kristoff, a mountain man who accompanies Anna in her journey. Anna will be the twelfth in the official lineup of Disney Princesses, as Frozen is set to be the 53^rd in the Walt Disney Animated Classics series.

The following are some truly breathtaking concept art from the blog of Scotty Jo.

December 13: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

December 27: 47 Ronin

Keanu Reeves as a Samurai? Need I say more?

WordPress on Windows 8

If you see this article, don’t mind me. I’m just checking out the new WordPress.com app for Windows 8. Having recently joined the Microsoft Student Partners program in our university as a Junior Partner, I was able to avail of a free copy of Windows 8 Pro even before the official release date, since we’re developing apps for the Store. And I’m telling you right now that this thing is absolutely beautiful. If you could buy a copy of Windows 8, do so, because Microsoft definitely intends on changing the way everything works. We’ll all be working on touch screen everything. By the time the Surface is out, people will no longer have separate tablets for playing and laptops for work. It’ll be just one: compact, light, but fully functional.

Now, about WordPress.com as an app

I put that in bold because I couldn’t select the type settings like how it is normally available on the website, neither was the option to view the HTML of the post. There are lacking features, but I think the app was designed for basic functions. Reblogging posts and writing on the go is the objective, and it’s not even the primary one. The app is centered on content, but limited to the Freshly Pressed page. Don’t get me wrong, I’m pretty happy about that. I didn’t like how they changed the front page of the website to one that advertises the benefits of WordPress.com. I wanted my daily dose of Freshly Pressed once I go on the site, and that was taken away from me. Plus, it was a bonus for the writers who get featured. People join WordPress because they want to write and be read, and Freshly Pressed captured that. But since I don’t have that on the website, I’m glad I have it here: one click on the Start menu and I’m good to go.

Beautiful, as Always

One of the main perks of WordPress.com is how beautiful it’s always been. All the themes in the showcase are the best you can find, whether it’s free or paid for. I bet that the people at WordPress.com are the first to know the true importance of a good theme or layout. The layout of a website and how content is presented to you affects so much of how you read it. Fortunately, the reader for the Freshly Pressed section makes everything look like a beautiful webzine. It’s a familiar layout, though. If you’ve used Google Currents on an Android Tablet, then you know how it looks like.

But wait, there’s more!

No, no. There isn’t. That’s all that there is. With a download size of 144KB, what I got for the app was pretty damn amazing already. I know apps that download for how many MB but have horrible functionality. But as a dedicated member of the WordPress community, here I am wishing that this app was complete, that all my writing tools are available to me. I wish that I could view my stats on the site, see the pending comments and receive notifications. Basically, I wish my entire dash was here. I wish I could edit my post after it was published. I wish I could access my media library, or choose a featured photo, or insert them into the post with ease. I wish I could choose the categories and add tags to them when I write, instead of having to go back to my dash via a web browser just to fix it. I wish I could edit my site, and view others’. I wish I could see the blogs I follow, instead of just Freshly Pressed. There is so much awesomeness offered on the website itself, and what a wonder it would be to have WordPress.com available at the click of a mouse or the tap of a screen. To be able to flip open a Surface, or dock a tablet on a keyboard and just type away.

The Circus of Dreams, Destiny and Defiance

Magic, Mystery, Love and Clockwork—The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern is a verbal scrapbook that brings to life a fantastical story of love and destiny so unlike every other romance novel out there.

It is a book that I would easily rate with an 8.5/10.

Overview

The circus arrives without warning.

No announcements precede it, no paper notices on downtown posts and billboards, no mentions or advertisements in local newspapers. It is simply there, when yesterday it was not

Prospero the Enchanter puts his long-lost daughter Celia Bowen into a game against Mr. Alexander H’s student, an orphan named Marco Alisdair. With no known reasons and no known rules, the game is set in a circus that comes unannounced and appears only at night, owned by a rich young man, Monsieur Chandresh Lafavré. Le Cirque des Rêves is the chessboard and everyone is just another piece.

What started out as a humble NaNoWriMo submission ended up as a bestselling debut novel for Erin Morgenstern, jumpstarting her career.

Up, up, and away–Erin Morgenstern’s writing career soars into new heights with the success of her debut novel, The Night Circus

I dislike how often The Night Circus is compared to Harry Potter for the simple reason that it isn’t similar to it in any way. The Night Circus is a Shakespearean tragedy set in a small dome of fantasy travelling in the real world in the dark. It is a story of the Hunger Games, with Love is Our Resistance playing in the background. It is not a story, but a poem in paragraph form.

Wine is bottled poetry.

He wonders if the poem of the circus could ever be bottled.

The usual downside that most reviewers have pointed out about The Night Circus is that it was too slowly paced, or All-Word-No-Plot, or that it was “the most boring circus ever.” They’ve even compared it to Twilight. The difference, of course, that most people did not see was that it was the entire bottle of poetry, of every piece of imagery that was necessary, not only to make it magical, but to actively portray and paint a picture of the love shared by Celia and Marco. When one reads about the circus, about the design of the clock, or how the statues move at such a glacial pace, one could barely notice, every carefully laced detail should be read to interpret Celia and Marco’s love story. They are the circus. They were destined to be together in this way, in a way so magical and so eternal and so artistically bizarre. Every one of their tents was a love letter: The Ice Garden, the Carousel, The Labyrinth, and the Wishing Tree where each wish gets lit up by someone else’s. Compared to real circuses, yes, they do seem slow and boring. But it’s poetry, and you’re never supposed to take words for what they seem to mean at first.

The Delicious Reads Book Club meeting for their February choice The Night Circus

Writing Style

Even the sex scene was so quietly, artfully, poetically portrayed.

Trapped in silence, Marco traces apologies and adorations across Celia’s body with his tongue.

Though I have to admit, it’s not your usual popular romance story, with the witty comebacks from the charismatic young lover who tries to charm his way through a million rejections, just to get her to smile and probably rethink that offer. It barely even touches on the romance, and takes half a dozen forevers before Celia and Marco even meet. And when they do, it’s all the I Love You’s and the I Can’t Live Without You’s stock dialogues, like the badly written Legend of Korra season finale. Even though I think TNC is trying to be poetic and symbolic, but it could try to be a bit more natural and creative. In this way, what TNC really lacks isn’t plot, but character development. We look too deeply into the circus, all the tents and the cinnamon things and the spiced chocolate, but we see the characters too subdued, too quiet, that after some 400 pages in a journey with these characters, you’ll feel as if you’ve barely known them at all.

But Erin Morgenstern knows how to keep you flipping through those pages, regardless. It didn’t need to be fast-paced, witty and action packed to be interesting. Every single issue was shrouded in mystery, and our main characters don’t even know what they’re in until somewhere towards the end. And it will mostly be what gets you to continue reading: to try to uncover the mystery, when in fact, every flip of the page just adds another layer of it.

Another creative bit about the writing, after all the colorfully interwoven imagery, is the description of the attractions in the circus, used to separate chapters. Using second voice, it seems as if the reader himself steps into the scene. And, like good poetry, the ending was written to resonate with the beginning. Everything just seemed so polished and well-structured, that you can feel the amount of time and effort Morgenstern poured into the creation of this piece.

Book Covers

The artistry of the book covers is no exception. The covers come in black, gray and white with a hint of red.

Before The Night Circus even hit the market, the lucky critics who received advanced copies (like Reveurs getting free admission or something) had this stack of beautiful silver things to enjoy.

The US version showed a view of the tents of the circus with the clock above it, being held in what seems to be Tsukiko’s hand. The hardbound version is lovely, but having this transferred to paperback doesn’t seem as nice at all. Printed by Anchor Books, an imprint of RandomHouse.

The US Release Cover designed by Pei Loi Koay

Walter Sickert himself designed this poster for The Night Circus Paperback Release Party, where he performed with his band, Walter Sickert and the Broken Toys

The UK print from Vintage Books, another imprint of RH, looks much more elegant, especially in hardbound. The dust jacket is in black, with white silhouettes of Marco and Celia, which was also used for the online game.

The UK Release Cover

The book itself is in red, with a golden clock face painted on the inside.

Herr Thiessen’s Clock Face

Look at the red ribbon bookmark and the black edged pages! Book publishing as an art form–it’s definitely a good reason to buy this version as a sort of collector’s item.

The inside cover has a pattern of top hats and bowler hats.

Marco Alisdair on the inside-back flap of the dust jacket for the UK Release

I found a Spanish Release cover, but I’m uncertain on whether or not it is the official one. Most of the other translations are the same cover as the UK release but change the title.

The Spanish Release Cover?

Rejected cover by Jessica Hische, perhaps because it was in black and gold–and there was no gold in Le Cirque des Reves.

A black-and-gold cover that wasn’t able to make it out to the market, a beautiful design by Jessica Hische

A cover that didn’t make it out, by Jessica Hische

Fan Art

The Night Circus is so visually indulgent that an artist just can’t help but make something inspired by it. Here are some notable works I’ve found.

Laura Walter has a fan-made cover in a deep shade of teal.

Laura Walter redesigns Erin Morgenstern’s The Night Circus with deep shades of evening blue

Upcoming Film Adaptation

Summit has already claimed the rights to the movie production of this book, and I hope they won’t mess it up the same way they did Twilight. Although, there seems to be a good thing about having David Heyman as the producer, since he also produced the Harry Potter films. Writer for the screen adaptation is Moira Buffini who previously wrote for films like Jane Eyre and Byzantium. There has no official date as of yet, and no cast either, so the film can be predicted to be out by mid-2013 or early 2014.

The book is just so visual despite the fact that the circus comes in Black and White, and I think it would be perfect as a movie. Costume designs, props and set would be perfect if we could get the team of people from the 2004 Phantom of the Opera, ala Masquerade, or Moulin Rouge on board.

What I want to hear: Music

It would be incredible to have Erin Morgenstern’s personal writing playlist as an inspiration for the film’s OST, just as Summit was able to do for Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight Saga. It would be perfect to have at least one Florence + The Machine track in there, hopefully a new one, or perhaps Spectrum. And then Andrew Bird as well as Smashing Pumpkins. Other than the music from her personal soundtrack, a bit of Muse would do some good, especially something similar to Starlight or The Resistance. (Starlight because of the sound, Resistance because of the message resonating with the film.) And Birdy. And Coldplay. And Fun. And Panic! At The Disco. These last two choices seem out of balance with the rest of the track, but when I ask myself, “what music sounds like an old French circus?” then nothing would match it better than some PATD.

Who I want to see: Cast

I have no one in mind for the cast, to be honest, except maybe Lucy Liu for Tsukiko, but that was still a no for me. I definitely want to see Chloe Moretz in red hair for Poppet. Mila Kunis would make a great Isobel. But other than that, my thoughts on casting are really useless. I’d love to know who you guys think should play it though. I do think that it’d be great to have Cirque du Soleil be in the movie.

Spoilables

Here is a comprehensive list of the characters and themes of the novel. Do not read them until you’ve finished the entire book. Also to note, a good number of the themes or the personalities of the characters are my own thoughts and observations. They’re not necessarily what Erin herself intended.

Characters

Celia Bowen

Celia is the daughter of the world-renowned magician. After her mother died, she is given to her father who uses her as a representative in the game because of her “natural talent”, inherited from her father. During her childhood, she was thought to be strange, or a child of the devil, as she would tend to break things around her without touching them whenever she was upset. She was taught to heal herself, remake things she broke, and do illusions and magic tricks. She worked as an illusionist at the Circus, and wrote letters to the Revéur Herr Thiessen. She collaborated with the engineer Mr. Barris in creating the enchanted Carousel.  She also made a vertical labyrinth of clouds, and took it upon herself to train the Murray twins. She acts very mature and motherly towards them.

Celia dislikes being treated like a child, or having to follow orders and rules that she don’t understand. She continues to struggle to gain independence, to break free from every bond she’s had, represented by the ring that was embedded into her skin. At some point, she mutters to herself, “I’m already married,” declaring her unwanted engagement with a seemingly pointless game. She compared herself to Shakespeare’s Hamlet once, saying that she was haunted by her father’s ghost. And she has plenty of Shakespeare in her stack of books in the tent.

Her style of magic makes use of illusions and redirecting energy from places, something that seems natural and inherited. Her usual acts in the circus as the illusionist include the usual dove tricks, changing the colors of her dress, destroying watches and re-making them, etc.

Celia’s Gown, by the Delicious Reads Book Club

Her character ends up as a very self-protective one, often finding herself not allowing Marco to love her. She tries to be in control of things, and tries to push away the people—especially Marco—who take away that control.

Marco Alisdair

Marco starts off as an orphan, taken by Mr. Alexander H. to represent him in the game. Marco Alisdair is not his real name, but one he used growing up, revealed only once he met Isobel. His magic is part of his studies for years, unlike Celia who was born a natural talent. His style of magic makes use of a lot of alchemic symbols and formulas which he keeps in notebooks with drawings of trees. He does not perform in the circus itself, but works for Chandresh Lefèvre, the main proprietor. Marco keeps the accounts and records, etc., and makes certain that the dinners and parties and events are organized. His contribution to the circus is the bonfire, which actually acts as a protector, shielding the people in the circus, so they won’t be overpowered by the magic and would eventually go insane. Likewise, the protector also seems to prohibit the main people in the circus from aging. He also created the Ice Garden, Celia’s favorite tent.

Personally, Marco’s favorite tent was the wishing tree.

His romantic pursuits are often without Alexander’s permission. His decisions on love seem impulsive and rushed. His usual way of courtship is by creating fantastical illusions and recreating the surroundings, which is what he did the first time he kissed Isobel in the rain, and what he continued to do for Celia. He never told Isobel that he loved her, but he never held back on telling Celia.

The Night Circus Character Designs by deirling via deviantART (click the image to visit her page)

Hector Bowen (Prospero the Enchanter)

Prospero the Enchanter was a well-known magician, a student of Mr. Alexander. He challenged him in the belief that magic cannot be learned but a special talent accessible only be a rare few. This challenge between them two was what started the centuries of games. At some point, people believed that Hector Bowen had died, but in truth, he was suspended in a state of life with no physical body in a failed attempt at gaining immortality.

Esse Quam Videri is the Bowen family motto, which means, “To be, rather than to seem.” According to Celia, Hector was “very fond of engraving it on things.”

Mr. Alexander H.

Mr. A.H—as he is often referred to in the book is the teacher of Hector Bowen, Marco Alisdair and Tsukiko. He always wears grey clothes and does not have a shadow, which was noticed only by Celia in the first chapter, and by Widget in the last. Celia also notes that it’s as if Alexander isn’t his real name, as if “it doesn’t fit.” Mr. AH—believes that magic can be learned, that it is all around and for everyone, but only very few people make an effort to notice it. He warns Marco during the game to stay away from Celia, knowing the objective of the game and that the end result would only hurt Marco, as it did Tsukiko.  Also unlike Hector, Alexander openly appreciates the value of death, a sentiment he only expresses with Widget in the last chapter.  Although he is very old, he admits that he will eventually die and does not intend on seeking immortality.

[Immortality] is a terrible thing to seek. It is not seeking anything, but avoiding the unavoidable.

Alexander also believes in the power of stories, and makes a deal with Widget that the game will end and the Circus will be passed over to the hands of Bailey Clarke.

Circus Performers

Winston Aidan Murray (Widget)

Widget was born October 13, 1886, six minutes before midnight. He has striking red hair, always wears a black suit, and carries a white kitten with him. Other than his kitten act with his sister, Widget also has his own tent called Bedtime Stories which houses various bottles that release stories when uncorked.

He has a natural psychic talent of knowing people’s past, and is tutored by Celia to develop his magical powers. His talent is attributed to the fact that he was born on the same night as the opening of the circus, and perhaps was affected by the enchanted bonfire lit by Marco. His favorite treat at the circus are the cinnamon things.

The Cinnamon Things that Widget loved so much; from the Night Circus meet-up by the Delicious Reads Book Club

Widget, as revealed later on, is apparently the narrator of the entire novel.

Fan Art: Poppet and Widget – The Night Circus by jucylucyinspired via deviantART (click the image to the original)

Penelope Aislin Murray (Poppet)

Poppet was born October 14, 1886, seven minutes after midnight (thirteen minutes apart from her twin brother). Like Widget, she has striking red hair. She wears white dresses made of scraps of different fabric, and has a black kitten. The Murray’s parents run the Big Cats attraction. Poppet ends up as Bailey Clarke’s love interest, as well as the reason he comes to join the circus. Opposite her brother, Poppet has the power of foresight, and sees blurry images of the future. She also has the ability to read the stars.

Isobel Martin

Isobel is a reader of Cartomancy, Tarot Cards. She first appears as an unnamed wanderer, and ends up kissing Marco in the rain. Through the years, she tries to aid Marco to win the game, but ends up finding out that there is nothing she could do to hold things together. Her relationship with Marco ends up as a very one-sided love story. No matter how you put it, the only way to really describe it is that Marco cheated on her. Other than Tarot Cards, Isobel also makes use of charms.

Tsukiko

The Night Circus Contortionist by Fluffball264 via deviantART

Tsukiko is a Japanese contortionist who performs at the Circus. She first appeared at the Midnight Dinners. Tsukiko becomes the main inspiration of the circus. She reveals herself later on to be one of Mr. Alexander’s student, and the one who previously won the game, or, in her words, “survived” it. She was in love with her competitor Hinata who lit a pillar of flame and stepped into it, to burn herself and let Tsukiko win. (This also means that Tsukiko is a lesbian.) On October 31, 1902, she claims to have won the game that ended “eighty-three years, six months, and twenty-one days ago. It was a cherry-blossom day.” Approximately, that would be April 20, 1819.

Original Conspirators

Chandresh Christophe Lefèvre

Owner of Le Cirque des Rêves, Chandresh is a wealthy man of great ambition. His life spanned from August 3, 1847 to February 15, 1932, dying finally at the age of 85. He was 39 when the circus first opened. His character has this keen sense of beauty and a burning love for the arts. He has a lingering restlessness whenever he does not have work to do, which, other than the burden of the magical circus, caused his emotional and psychological unrest less than a decade after the opening of the circus. In that said moment of instability, he attempts to kill Alexander with a silver knife, but misses. Instead, Herr Thiessen gets stabbed. After he hands the circus over to Bailey, he creates a museum with Poppet.

Ana Padva

Often referred to as Tante Padva or Mme. Padva, she is a retired Russian prima ballerina. She acts almost like a mother to Chandresh and the Burgess sisters. She loves fashion most of all, and appoints Lainie Burgess as the heiress to her business.

Lainie & Tara Burgess

The Burgess Sisters Lainie and Tara are socialites who love secrets and stories. They feel uncomfortable being apart from each other, one of them acting as the eyes, the other the ears during social events, making them a complete set. Tara ends up committing suicide by jumping in front of a train, after being heavily affected by the overpowering magical influences of the circus, just as she realizes the grand scheme. Lainie, however, ends up inheriting Ana Padva’s business, as Padva claims her to be reliable and responsible. Also, Lainie is the love interest of Ethan Barris, but initially refuses his proposal. Her argument was based on the fear that she was only chosen because Tara was already dead, making the choice not completely Mr. Barris’s, but just a matter of consequence.

Ethan Barris

Mr. Barris is the engineer and architect that built the circus. Aside from Isobel, he was the first among the original conspirators to know about the game, and how the circus was being used as a stage. He seems to be always busy, but he has a reserved and secretive character. He does not take sides.

Revéurs

Bailey Alden Clarke

Bailey is just a son of a humble apple farmer who ends up as the main proprietor of Le Cirques des Reves. When the circus visits Concord, Massachusetts in September of 1897 but is closed due to inclement weather, Bailey gets dared by his sister Caroline and her friends Millie and the Mackenzie brothers to check it out. There he meets Poppet, who lets him keep her glove as a souvenir. He keeps it in the hollow part of his favorite tree, for years until he sees the circus again in 1902. He finds himself in a dilemma between choosing Harvard, by recommendation of his grandmother, or staying to take over the family farm, by the strict decision of his parents. When Poppet returns for him, she asks him to join the circus as if though his presence were essential for the preservation of it. Later on, Celia and Marco are trapped in the half-matter state of the circus and can no longer keep it operating under their own power, so they ask Bailey to take over.

Assuming that the internet became available in 1990′s or 2000′s, then the ending would hint that Bailey and the rest of the circus continued to live past a hundred years.

Bailey’s Favorite Treat: Chocolate Mice

Friedrick Stefan Thiessen

Herr Thiessen (September 9, 1846-November 1, 1901) is a German clockmaker from Munich who creates the iconic timepiece that is displayed at the circus. After his first visit to the circus at Dresden, he develops overwhelming feelings about the magical performances and starts to write about them. Patrons of the circus see his articles on the news, and start writing to him. They begin to create a network of fans of the circus called the Reveurs(daydreamers). He had a great fondness for Celia and was often assumed to have a romantic relationship with her. He died by getting stabbed with a silver knife by Chandresh who was in a time of mental instability, trying to kill Alexander who dodged the attack. His and Chandresh’s names are engraved on a metal plate installed on the great clock in their memory.

Designed by Stephanya from BookPeople

Victor

Victor meets Bailey on his way to New York and is the first to introduce him to the Reveurs. He offers Bailey to stay at one of the rooms at the Parker House, and even gives him a book of clippings and circus memorabilia. He is stubborn and does not accept rejections for his offers of kindness.

Lorena

Victor’s sister who chooses out Bailey’s deep grey suit and puts a rose in his lapel. She seems very supportive of Victor and often finishes his sentence.

Elizabeth

Elizabeth seems to have a hidden romantic relationship with Victor. She makes red scarves all the time for the Reveurs and gives on to Bailey as a gift.

We lead strange lives and chase our dreams from place to place. –Elizabeth, on being a Reveur.

Analysis of Themes & Ideas

What’s in a Name?

In the first part, when Celia meets Mr. Alexander H., she asks her father if it was his real name, saying that it’s as if it doesn’t fit. Likewise, when Hector first meets his daughter, he says that it was a shame she wasn’t named Miranda. And after various attempts at calling Celia as “Miranda” it never catches on. Later on, calling the Murray twins as Poppet and Widget, the narration includes that “the nicknames stick as all nicknames do.”

So what is in a name? Does not a rose called by any other name smell just as sweet? Well it would, but if you called it a daisy, it wouldn’t feel like a daisy. It would still be a rose. The thing is, names have their own definitions—not the type like those in baby name books. Words mean what they are meant to represent, and names mean the person they are meant to identify. To use a name for a person that isn’t their name would be defying their own sense of identity, in some way.

“Why did you call that man Alexander?” Celia asks.

“That’s a silly question.”

“It’s not his name.”

“Now, how might you know that?” Hector asks his daughter, lifting her chin to face him and weighing the look in her dark eyes with his own.

Celia stares back at him, unsure how to explain. She plays over in her mind the impression of the man in his grey suit with his pale eyes and harsh features, trying to figure out why the name does not fit on him properly.

“It’s not a real name,” she says. “Not one that he’s carried with him always. It’s one he wears like his hat. So he can take it off if he wants. Like Prospero is for you.”

Destiny, Dreams, Defiance

Tarot Cards, premonition and foresight, the rings, the game, the circus, the umbrella, the bottle, the glove, the fire, the silver knife, the blood, Harvard and Apple Farms—there are so many things in The Night Circus that none of the characters could be in control of. In fact, the game wasn’t one that you play, but one you survive. Marco and Celia aren’t even players in this game, just two kings on the opposite sides of a chess board, while Hector and Alexander move them around, knocking other pieces over like worthless pawns.

She has gathered that the man in the grey suit whom her father called Alexander also has a student, and there will be some sort of game.

“Like chess?” she asks once.

“No,” her father says. “Not like chess.”

And maybe, even, that’s why the entire circus is in black and white—because it’s a chessboard. No matter how they try to end the game, they couldn’t. They could try to win or to lose for the sake of the other, but there was no way to end it. Their love for each other was the resistance that they put up, their last act of defiance. It’s the same way that Romeo and Juliet died for each other, or even how Peeta and Katniss took those berries at the end of the games.

But then, there’s Bailey. He was supposed to either go to Harvard or take over the family farm. One of those was his predefined destiny. It’s a nice thing to think that Bailey tried to go against destiny by running off with the Circus. But then, Poppet saw it happen first, that Bailey should come over to the circus so that it would continue to survive. If so, then wouldn’t joining the circus be part of Bailey’s destiny? Is there really ever an escape for it?

In the same way, Celia tried to not get Bailey involved—but he still did. And she also tried to not fall for Marco, but she still did. It was something out of her control, like her emotions and her powers. And at the end of the day, if you really think about it, nobody escaped their destiny. It’s as if defiance and rebellion are just heroic illusions, when in fact, nobody ever really gets away.

Perhaps, even, love is just another way of giving up your freedom, like when Marco and Celia bind themselves forever into the soul of the circus, or when Bailey takes the contract and stays. It’s as if the only way to truly rebel from life is to dream. Art is the purest form of defiance, it’s the escapement, the maximization of the true sense of freedom.

A dreamer is one who can only find his way by moonlight, and his punishment is that he sees the dawn before the rest of the world. – Oscar Wilde, 1888.

Time

The book narrates back and forth from the beginning of Celia and Marco’s game in 1873, jumping to Bailey in 1897, and takes them together until both parts of the story meet at 1902. This, and the fact that the narration was in past tense, only meant that there was already a defined past and future, and there was no way of changing it. Peculiarly enough, Widget started telling the story in 1902 to Mr. AH–, but was able to write at the end of a time with internet, even though he wouldn’t have known about that in 1902.

“I am saying that you had a chance,” Isobel says. “A chance to be with her. A chance for everything to resolve itself in a favorable manner. I almost wanted that for you, truly, in spite of everything. I still want you to be happy. And the possibility was there.” She gives him a small, sad smile as she slides her hand into her pocket. “But the timing isn’t right.”

But likewise, it showed that destiny could be—or could have been—quite flimsy, flexible. An outcome of some event could be changed by the smallest factors, or in Isobel’s terms, the timing.

Kiko, please,” Celia says. “I need more time.”Tsukiko shakes her head.“I told you before,” she says, “time is not something I can control.

Immortality

The concept of immortality and how Hector tried to obtain it is briefly discussed directly, but in all truth, I think it’s what the entire thing was about. Celia and Marco being forever part of the circus, with their souls intertwined with its existence is their piece of immortality. And Widget’s account of the circus is the preservation of everything—Herr Thiessen lives, and so does Chandresh, and likewise every person in that circus.

Oddly enough, as the years progress, the people in the circus never seem to age. By 1902, Marco and Celia would have been at age 34 or so. And Bailey, who was born around 1886, same with the twins, lived long enough to reach the time of internet, as shown when “you” receive Bailey’s business card with the website name and his email. That would mean they all lived past a hundred years. This might mean that the circus continues to pro-long and preserve their lives, making Celia and Marco, and everyone in the circus, in their own way, immortal.

Circles

The whole of Les Cirque des Reves is formed by a series of circles. Perhaps it is tribute to the origin of the word  “circus,” deriving from the Greek kirkos meaning circle. (…) They are set within circular paths, contained within a circular fence. Looping and continuous. – Herr Friedrick Thiessen, 1892.

So is the narration, and Marco and Celia’s rings. Everything is like an orobouros and everything continues in circular motion, on and on, again and again, looping into forever, like a clock that never stops ticking.