Sun and shadows

I know I'm in Baguio when I'm reluctant to leave home, except in the mornings when I sun myself and go for walks with Kai, my grand-daughter. Somehow my spirit is restored inside the home than elsewhere. On those walks sometimes I bring along my camera, too, to record the fascinating shapes sun and shadows make on objects and plants. Does it have to do with the quality of summer light?

Papier-mache horse from Laguna

Self-portrait with rumpled hair

Back of a bench

Rolly's knick-knacks

Clinging vine Photos by Babeth Lolarga

Christmas through a child's eyes again

"A child’s world is fresh and new and beautiful, full of wonder and excitement. It is our misfortune that for most of us that clear-eyed vision, that true instinct for what is beautiful and awe-inspiring, is dimmed and even lost before we reach adulthood. If I had influence with the good fairy who is supposed to preside over the christening of all children I should ask that her gift to each child in the world be a sense of wonder so indestructible that it would last throughout life, as an unfailing antidote against the boredom and disenchantments of later years, the sterile preoccupation with things that are artificial, the alienation from the sources of our strength."- Rachel Carson, The Sense of Wonder

It's getting harder to get the wee one to stop and pose for a shot in her "secret garden." The Booboo has to be more creative, like asking her to look for the crocodile on Grumpa's shirt.

It's nice to catch her bathed in that morning light that gives Baguio miles and miles of cloudless blue skies on December mornings.

I think the trick is to keep the camera handy while at the same time not intruding into her space too much and remembering to also look around for other subjects.

One subject is this present from several Christmases ago. Our family calls it "Aurora's Angel" after Aurora Tamayo Bautista, the cheerful giver. It is to her that we send our thoughts this blessed season.

Photos by Babeth Lolarga

Ms. Butones of the tantalizing eyes

This space (this blog) is a good place to chillax while waiting for an interviewee to send in his replies to 14 questions, including follow-up ones. My eternal gratitude goes to the inventor of the World Wide Web and email for the convenience of interviewing subjects hundreds of miles away in geographical distance. This gap is easily bridged through email. Live interviews are always better because you can observe the facial reactions, even add small details like the get-up of the subject, follow-up questions can be asked immediately, but when one is out of town, this will have to do.

So while I am sitting and waiting and listening to my own YouTube shuffle, I've been looking and staring at some recent pics of The Apo (the grand-daughter Kai/Butones and my lakay, Grumpa/Tats Rolly). Butones is more aware when her picture is being taken and can choose to smile or not (her in-deep-thought pose). She's more confident about taking the stairs and uses it as a chance to practice counting.

Whether half-smile or full, hers can really mean a sunny day and lots of light inside of me despite the clouds outside. Have a good Sunday, Butones, and see you later after you come home from a school outing with your Mamay (not the lil one's school but the mother's).

Photos by Kimi Fernandez

Captcha from Yesterday

"A CAPTCHA ... is a type of challenge-response test used in computing as an attempt to ensure that the response is generated by a person."--Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia

yesterday i was about

to email a link to a friend,

the sharing of information

& possible insights

into life & the living of it

being part of my

morning prayers & rituals,

when the captcha that appeared

spelled "calctuc kai."

i copied it carefully

so my message can be

read by the computer

till it is assured

that i, the sender,

am no robot or spammer.

serendipity? coincidence?

the wit of the cosmos?

"calctuc kai"--

i again copied the

seemingly nonsensical

phrase, this time

on paper, with pencil.

i wanted to tell

the computer-generated captcha

that i know of a kai

& she's far from nonsense,

even if her mouth seems

to spout foreign

gibberish to a literate

adult's ears.

after all i've insisted

that she call me "booboo,"

a name equally without sense.

i figure it won't be long

when my fingers excitedly

fly over the keyboard

as i prepare another piece

of shared info in cyberspace

& the captcha for the moment

will be an alliterative

"babtuc booboo."

--Babeth Lolarga

Sept. 13, 2012

7:46 a.m.

Photo of a smiling Calctuc Kai, a.k.a. Butones, on her first airplane ride with Grumpa Rolly Fernandez by Booboo Babeth