ERIC’S SONGBOOK

Turning thirty is not as bad as I have thought. When I was about to turn twenty, I asked myself what are the things that I have done with my life and why do I feel old? There are some questions in life where the answers unravel themselves in the right place at the right time. I always believed that life is a mystery to be lived and not to be solved. As I bid my twenties adieu in less than 48 hours, I would like to express my sincerest gratitude to the Lord for guiding me all through these years–through thick and thin and most especially in those trying times which I thought will never end. I would also like to thank my Dad for raising me in the best possible way he could think of. It is only now that I realize the wisdom in all his preachings. Thank you Mama for bringing me into this world. Thank you Don for being my kid brother. I would also like to thank my friends and relatives who are taking some precious time to read this.

Aaliyah album cover circa 1994

Aaliyah said it best that age ain’t nothing but a number. Who would have ever thought I would make it this far. When I was younger, I didn’t even bother thinking of what the future may have in store for me. Hopefully, as I forge ahead into the next 30 years (or even more) of my productive life, I ask the Lord for the gift of wisdom, a higher sense of awareness and consciousness. I am no longer the kid I was but at times, it is indeed nostalgic to look back and reminisce those simple days and to also recall how impishly innocent my desires were. No matter how hard I try to be a man of unworldly things, I have to face the fact that society dictates and judges those who join the rat race of life. As long as I hold steadfast to my principles, I guess everything will be alright at the end of the day.

1999: Age 20

• Had my first taste of what it is to be in the corporate setting as a management trainee in a local pharmaceutical firm near Bicutan, Paranaque. I realized how different theories could be from actual practice. Life is much more complex that what I have thought.
• Made a solemn vow of making the most of any opportunity that will come along my way as I joined school contests and became actively involved in school
• Went to Baguio for the first time since 1982 (The Lasallian Summer Workshop) and fell in love with the place
• Moved out of the house for one week to stay in Mama’s business apartment in Makati and realized that living by myself is harder than what I have suspected
• Tried part-time modeling and realized that it is not as lucrative as what people try to project it to be

Age 21: 2000

• Realized that life is one big popularity contest as I won the post of Batch Representative in the DLSU Student Council under the banner of Santugon, I honestly don’t see myself as a politician despite my leadership qualities
• Went to Antipolo City for a Management Effectiveness seminar
• Resuscitated part-time modeling for extra income. Appeared in MTV and the now-defunct Channel V (Watch U Want) as a model in between programs. Pati Hanggang Saan Ka Man Naroroon starring Janice De Belen and Rico Yan, as a set extra pinatulan ko na rin. Major realization: People go great strides to make a living.
• Senior Year in College: Had a difficult time juggling studies, modeling and SC work. Another realization is that people are extra nicer when you are popular. The once wallflower is now invited to parties left and right. Had a real difficult time with ECONTRI and BUCOTAX I was very thankful that I passed with a 3.0 and 1.5 respectively. Ang hirap mag Dean’s List with so many commitments.
• Last OJT as an ACM student: Merck Chemicals, realized that the operations of a multinational corporation is different from that of a local corporation
• I started toying with the idea of teaching as a career, I realized that i was in the wrong course at too late a time.

Age 22: 2001

• I almost killed myself by studying to hell just to get a GPA of 3.500 prior to graduation.
• I was the only person who graduated with two medals in our block: one for Loyalty and one for Honorable Mention.
• Spent my 22nd birthday a tad lonely because mom had to assist someone who runs Goldilocks and I promised myself to work my @$$ to hell to get a good paying job so that my mom wouldn’t have to
  work hard and away from home.
• I got a teaching job in De La Salle Santiago Zobel as a high school faculty member. First monthly salary: P15868. I got into part-time teaching as an Assistant Lecturer in De La Salle University Mathematics Department even though I am a Business Management graduate. The latter said I was too young and I needed some experience. So, I went and got the experience someplace else as I taught COMATH1 and MATH111. Rate: P159/unit. Major realization: Everyone has to start at the bottom of the ladder and the climb is not at all easy.
  
• It feels good that I am now able to buy stuff I have always wanted and I was watching movies and buying CDs all the time. Later did I realize the value of savings for future use.
• Dad was persuading me to go to graduate school while he was still employed. Dad, at that time, was already 61. I took the entrance exam to the Master in Applied Economics (M-AE) program in November 2001 and got accepted. My STUFAP scholarship was also approved.

Age 23: 2002

• Resigned from De La Salle Zobel because my bosses (my former Christian Living and former Physics teachers) did not approve of my graduate studies. Moral lesson: Never work for your former teachers. I was forced to return the salary I received from them for Summer 2002. Realization: It is back to square one. Make wise and informed decisions and learn how to save. In the workplace, no one really gives a damn. The stress of being broke caused me to spend the first week of school nursing a bad cold.
  
• I continued my stint in the Math Department as I taught ALGE101, ALTRIG1, COMATH1 and COMATH2 term in and out. Rate: P170/hour. So much for my bread and butter, adjusting my lifestyle from able to unable was very straining.
• I started graduate studies (with partial scholarship) and I was having a difficult time shifting my mindset from my management background to being an economist. The approach to the latter discipline is very different and extremely mathematical. My stint with the Math Department helped me cope.
• I learned how to tutor kids and teenagers ranging from grade school to high school to earn extra money.
• Being underemployed was hard for me. Christmas 2002 was almost penniless in my case. I was mad at myself for having such very supportive bosses in my former employer and what’s even worse, alma mater. If my memory serves me right, this was the time when my dad was telling me that there is not enough money in the academe. I was disobedient, I still carried through with my idealism.

Age 24: 2003

• The slightest iota of teaching started seeping slowly. I
  

  Norah Jones

  was tired most of the time and my back ached at the end of each day.

• I found recluse in jazz music. Thanks to Norah Jones’ Come Away With Me, one album that remain a favorite to this day.
• My kid brother started going to College of St. Benilde (CSB) to pursue Multimedia Arts. I was very happy for him.
• I psyched myself up that I am a social worker every Wednesdays as I make enough money just to pay my income taxes since I get paid for only two hours of lecture. My teaching load fluctuated badly and I can not make decisions that concern my future so I got myself a pension plan with Prudential Life with very low quarterly premium payments. I started instilling the discipline of saving.
• I was promoted from Assistant Lecturer to Lecturer 1 by Dr. Blessilda Raposa, the former Chairperson of the Mathematics Department. She is one of those rare bosses who sees potential in her faculty members. I taught BUSORGA for the first time as a shared faculty with the Business Management Department.
• Spent a lazy summer day taking a dip in the Hidden Valley Springs with the Mathematics Department faculty. It was my first time to have fun with colleagues in a long time.
• It was first time to teach in Summer. I handled ALGE101 and made a decent sum of money.
• 2003 was a relatively peaceful year: intellectually and spiritually. At age 24, I was still finding my center and my place in this world…I still am. Strangely, it was the calm before the storm.

Age 25: 2004

• Dad already showed signs of failing health as January. It was first time to have a monthly salary of P2000 since I was only given 3 units of teaching.
• While teaching ALGE101, I took the comprehensive exams for the MAE program in Summer 2004 and passed all four exams. I graduated in June 2004.
• I applied for reclassification of rank but was denied because a Masters degree in Economics in not recognized for promotion in the department I worked for. I asked myself why the hell did I hurry my Masters degree for?!? I finished all requirements of the degree in 6 terms and 1 summer.
• I realized that I am getting older and I am still not in a stable position in life. It was hard for me to see my dad ill and dying and I couldn’t even help because I cannot even help myself a bit even though he has enough finances to pay for his own medicines and hospital bills.
• Business Management finally took me in as a part-time faculty in September 2004. However, I was still stuck as Lecturer 1. I began feeling that I was stuck in a rut and I am not even progressing.
• I applied with China Bank as a Management Trainee and I almost got the job but the offer was still insufficient to get me decent lifestyle despite the long hours of service I will render.
• I ventured into tutoring students once more to make extra money.
• From July till the end of the year, my Dad became weaker and weaker.
• This was a period when I was in denial, I refused to see the truth that my life, both personal and professional, is not at all going well and it was because of my choice to stay in the profession I felt was right for me and I am slowly paying the price.

Age 26: 2005

• I taught COMCALC and QUATECH for the first time and later did I know that these will be my fields of expertise and will generate a publication and a slew of outstanding evaluations from students.
• Dad passed away March 4, 2005…a month and 3 days short of my 26th birthday. A part of me thought he will survive, a part of me thought that this was coming. I was a wreck but I tried to smile and be strong as I went back to work and carried on.
• I visited my relatives in Naga City in Bicol to help me find my center and for emotional support in the Holy Week.
• I finally filled the shoes as provider and breadwinner of the family despite my measly salary.
• That summer, I was able to handle 6 units as I taught BEHAORG for the first time. It helped me get through the household expenses.
• An opportunity came as my former Strategic Management professor took me in as a professor in St. Scholastica’s College June of that year. I taught Marketing Management under the Entrepreneurship and Franchise management Department. I was given a rank of Lecturer 4 and a higher rate. I was glad that there are plans for me to be groomed as the next Department Chairperson.
• DLSU reclassified my rank and hired me full-time in September after St. Scholastica’s College hired me part-time so I had to let go of the latter. The Economics Department of the former even asked me to teach with them. I taught PRODMAN and ECONONE for the first time. My career trajectory that year in a span of few months: Lecturer 1 -> Lecturer 4 (in SSC) -> Assistant Professorial Lecturer 1 -> Instructor 7 -> Assistant Professor 1. It was too good to be true and it felt fishy but well-deserved due to the long and agonizing wait for a better career. I realized that there goes an opportunity where I could have grown roots someplace else. Later did I found out, that this was the beginning of the end since it is a brand new count for 3 more years for tenure to be granted but I still rolled with the punches. Some people weren’t that happy that I joined the roster of full-time faculty.

Age 27: 2006

• Teaching took a brand new toll. I was sick most of the time. I started the year with chicken pox and a sprained knee. I even think I got the mononucleosis.
• I was nominated for the Students Search for Outstanding Teachers Award that year.
• I had my first disciplinary action with students whom I caught cheating in a final exam. The lawyer was even mad at me for giving her work. This was my first brush off with a lawyer.
• I presented my paper on Foreign Direct Investments in China in a Lounge Lecture Series.
• My life generally felt like it was on track despite my fragile health. Life was on the fast lane while I was working for DLSU.
• Started working on my Ph.D. in Business Studies.
• I handled 6 units of Summer classes again and then I received a call, it was the beginning of the end as…
• …I got appointed as Director of the Interdisciplinary Business Studies (IBS) and helped produce its first batch of graduates. No one even lasted more than a year in that job except me. Let’s face it, at that time, I didn’t know how to read people’s intentions and all I wanted to do was help. I guess you really get your hands dirty while doing administrative work. Sooner or later, you will find yourself opening Pandora’s Box. Saan ka pa makakakita na ang thesis adviser, sya na rin ang panelist??? No one really wanted to help me running that place…I was a rubber stopper placed to plug a leak. Later did I find out that it will asphyxiate me till near death and no one would even bother giving me CPR. The problems I faced were also interdisciplinary in nature and I was left alone to paddle my canoe through turbulent waters. Trabaho ng anim na faculty members, ginawa ko. I had to be the blunt of insults and jokes while running that office.
• I reported to work in between contracts with no pay just to run that office.
  
• I was sent to Cebu City for a major research project courtesy of PEARL2/CIDA.
• Major realization: Is this the price I have to pay to earn a living?!? Is it all worth it?!?!?

Age 28: 2007

• I made a vow to myself that I will sharpen my priority management skills. Things can wait and I have to work on my own rhythm and pacing. Circumstances found me doing otherwise. I would spend three days a week working from 10 am to 9 pm nonstop, with a few minutes to spare for eating and peeing. Money was good but it was spiritually and emotionally draining. I was juggling research, mentoring, administrative work and graduate studies all at the same time. Life was indeed in the fast lane and I wondered if I will make it in one piece, alive and breathing.
• I handled summer classes again, all 6 units of them.
• My boss at that time told me that I was supposed to be in some other position but my boss decided to keep me in that office for one more year since I was doing ‘a great job cleaning it‘. It was a clear sign that I will rot there. The person who got the job spent the year poking fun at me, laughing at me in meeting and embarrassing me in front of my two full-time faculty members. I needed an escape hatch badly so I tried resigning last September so I can teach in St. Scholastica’s College, where life was more peaceful. But my boss wouldn’t let me. So I stayed. I began feeling the extreme exhaustion and toll. They wanted my services but they couldn’t give me the tenure I felt I deserved so they offered a consolation prize - a scholarship to Spain for a Masters Degree despite the fact that I have a Masters degree already. I really needed an assurance that my job is stable, if they want me to commit to that. From the words of my boss, she even wanted to dissolve my office. Taking that Trojan horse will be a step backward so I declined. The workload increased, the insults were there, and I had to take it all in at the expense of my self-esteem. The tactless and rude remarks were omnipresent and I abhorred going to meetings.
• October 1, 2007 a near-tragedy struck my kid brother. I found him stabbed and bleeding in the middle of Posadas Avenue. He was coming home from work. I almost lost him. If I haven’t passed by at that minute, I could have lost him and I will never forgive myself if I did. I lost my balance. I lost trust in people. I almost lost my faith and godliness. Despite all the hardships in school, here comes another blow. I never felt so low in all my life until this moment came. My life savings was so close to fully drained.
  
• The school started forcing me to sign my Ph.D. study contract. Sensing that I wouldn’t last in that kind of environment, I started financing my Ph.D. studies with my own pocket and savings. Moral lesson used: Fend for yourself. Nothings comes for free. If they want your sanity in exchange, it is not worth it.
• My self-esteem was in such a bad shape that I needed an escape hatch and I started considering applying to other companies and schools to start anew. Never did I feel so short-changed, used and abused in my whole life that I get anxiety attacks up to now.
• To ease the finances, I was able to get a consultancy project with the Philippine Health Insurance Corporation with Mr. Francis De La Cruz.
• Come December 2007, I received a call from a training company which offered twice my salary as a professor. Regretfully, I declined since I will leave DLSU at such too short a notice. At times, I still ask myself how different my life could have been had I accepted the offer. It could have been my trip to salvation. Major realization: There is a world of opportunities out there.

Age 29: 2008

• I started mapping out my action plan for the year. If I stay in DLSU, they will make me run IBS with no faculty 9since they are due to retire that year) and no staff and it was explicitly stated by my boss in a January meeting (as she asked me “Kaya mo ba?”) OR venture into the outside world. Actually, kaya but it is just so goddamn unfair. So, I started applying to different schools: CSB, St. Scholastica’s College, Asian Institute of Management, etc.
• In February, I presented my paper on “Piracy and the General State of the Modern Music Industry” in a conference held in the Asian Institute of Management. Dr. Ricardo Lim was the panel chair. Two months later, I got a call from one of the Deans of AIM for an interview. It boosted my morale when I realized that they saw my potential as an AIM professor.
• My journal article entitled
  

  Teaching Business Calculus: Methodologies, Techniques, Issues & Prospects

  “Teaching Business Calculus: Methodologies, Techniques, Issues & Prospects” was finally published in January and released February in the DLSU B&E Review Journal.  It was a culmination of my seven years of teaching quantitative courses in DLSU, a fitting adieu and final requirement for my tenure that was never offered at all.  I can proudly say that I gave them ALL what they wanted from me to the very last letter and to the very last day.

• Spent one February evening in Fully Booked at the Fort. I saw a good old friend of mine, Didu Lopez and his family. His Dad is a Dean in AIM and his mom is a Dean in Assumption College and we all had coffee in Starbucks. It was a night where my soul was saved and redeemed.
• Work in DLSU never got any easier. I had another brushoff with a different lawyer who was extremely mean and insulting. In a meeting, he laughed at me for doing my best in running that office. In a closed door conversation, my boss even justified his bad behavior in several occasions. I just couldn’t see myself working in that kind of environment anymore where insults and manipulations are tolerated considering that the office I ran is under that mean lawyer who doesn’t want anything to do with that. IBS was then lodged with the BM department. So there goes my two years of hardwork, people can just pull the rug under me. Never has a sign been much clearer that I really have to go.
• I finally accepted the offer of Assumption College. I have finally found a new lease in life…a brand new place where I can start anew as I gained new friends and experiences.
• I was given the rank of Assistant Professor 5.5 and I was teaching subjects like Financial Management, Econometrics, Managerial Economics, Mathematical Economics, Current Issues & Updates in a place where my heart, mind and soul can be at peace with people I work with. I finally experienced how it is to be like preparing for a PAASCU accreditation. Civilization is just a stone’s throw away in the presence of Ayala Center and I can work and still finish my graduate studies with God’s grace. I have seen the light. Thank you Lord for saving my life and I made it out in one piece. Work is important but it is not the end all and be all of one’s existence.

As I enter my 30s, I learned so many things in life that was never made known to me in the classroom. Everyday is a learning experience. Hopefully, in the next decade, after I finish my Ph.D., I will be finally able to start a family of my own, and finally settle down. If God willing, maybe I can finally get my own car and home and finally work on some long term plans with my life. My 20s was never a walk in the park as most people projected theirs. I just charge everything to experience. Life was never meant to be easy but I am glad that I have learned the art to take it a day at a time now. What is a realization anyway? It is nothing but a snippet of wisdom we accumulate over the years.