Twenty fucking twenty.

That is how this year is best described by many. Contrary to how people hoped this year to be, 2020 caused a number of challenge to all of us. This year made me realize how old I indeed am because I experienced how to live in a time of struggle and fear. The emergence of the COVID19 pandemic tested both my resilience and existence. The things I planned to do for this year either had to be set aside or worst, have to be scrapped for good. 

While I hoped to stay employed for two more years, the plan was cut short after the lockdown caused my employment to be terminated last April-- an effect of the current situation. For a moment, the news of becoming unemployed all of a sudden after being in the same job for more than eight years left me both in worry and fear. Sudden unemployment meant worrying about my own finances among other things. I always had this question of what will happen tomorrow and how I will start again kept running in my head every single day for nine months now. Despite wanting to get back to the groove again, such plan does not seem to work out.

But in a way, I try to look at the abrupt pause as a welcome respite. For someone like me who has always been used to busy and often stressful routines familiar to every employed person, to be part of the locked at home population enabled me to realize a number of things that I failed to recognize in the last eight years. For one, the pandemic allowed my body to recuperate from years of working in different jobs and working hours. A thing that I admit to have neglected just because my body was not sending me much warning that it’s needed. Eversince the lockdown (and its easing happened), my body has enjoyed the luxury of getting enough hours of sleep and being able to rewire and recharge.

I just try to look at a brighter side that a chapter of my life has concluded after eight long years and that something better will eventually arrive to replace what I have unexpectedly lost.

To me, 2020 was also a year of discovery and exploration. It was this year that I ventured in some endeavors that for years I never tried thinking I don’t have any skill or talent for it. And just when I thought I won’t be exposed to the Kdrama syndrome like some of my friends, I decided to give in and join the bandwagon of being “eaten” by a craze of interesting story plots, dreamy places to add to my lakwatsa list, never-before heard but sensible life lessons, unexplored life and kitchen hacks and not to forget dashing Kdrama oppas.   

And speaking of discovery, it was on this year I discovered a lot about people. It's nice to have asked a number of questions to some which made me get to know them more -- even if it meant asking the questions I should have asked some 18 years ago.

But the best thing this year and the situation associated with it had showed me was how God was ever present despite the tough situation. Sure the unemployment thing caused me to be afraid and worried, in the nine months of being in that situation, He never failed to make His presence felt by providing for our needs and keeping us afloat in this challenging time --to the point that I sometimes end up saying we don’t feel like we are struggling despite the pandemic. Having someone powerful up there looking after us and keeping us safe at a time of fear and worry was something to be thankful for and in some ways, be calm about. 

In a few hours, 2020 will soon be over. And as this old year leaves and gets over and done with, I hope that the unfortunate events do too. No more of a shit-filled year that was twenty fucking twenty. I hope and pray that as we welcome 2021, may this new year bring in some positive vibes, better things, hope and a wonderful chance for me to rise from the ashes and begin again. 

My unexpected fondness for Korean dramas was one of the effects that the COVID19 pandemic brought me. Since February of this year, I have seen a number of Kdramas of different genres which were from the advice of peers from my former office; some of which became personal favorites while there are also a number of titles I can recommend to friends who just started joining the Kdrama hype. Incidentally, I am closing this year with a heartwarming rom-com, Shopping King Louie.

In Shopping King Louie, Seo In-guk plays Kang Ji-Sung, who also goes by the nickname Louie, the heir of a chaebol chairman who resorts to online shopping as a means to divert his emotions from loneliness. After a plot to kill him causes him to develop temporary amnesia, he ends up in the care of Ko Bok-shil (portrayed by Nam Ji-hyun), a poor but kindhearted bumpkin who, despite growing up in the countryside and acquiring limited education, adapts well to challenges and situations associated with city life.

Prior to watching the show, I have read a few reactions online saying that Shopping King Louie is fun to watch. Well, I must admit that the comments of strangers did not disappoint. Next to teaching me a thing or two about the wonders of eCommerce and how online shopping influenced our lives, watching this drama at some point made me think about what it means to be truly happy. It made me recall a part of the lecture from an online course of Yale University called The Science of Well Being which I took at the height of the COVID19 lockdown. The course lecturer, Professor Laurie Santos stated a fact: “we live in a culture whose economy relies on us wanting awesome stuff (in order to be happy)”. She even raised an advice that rather than investing in material things, we should focus more on investing in experiences because it is less susceptible to social comparison. 

Christmas will be over in a few hours. Honestly, it felt a bit weird and different this year. I spent Christmas Eve reading through the December issue of Reader’s Digest and the article about the Kpop group BTS, drafting a scheduled post about Melting Me Softly, spending time in the kitchen helping Mama with the cooking, and spent the night binge watching and laughing to my heart’s content to another Kdrama, Shopping King Louie. I spent the wee hours of Christmas Day sending Christmas GIF greeting cards to friends over Messenger. 

I woke up to Christmas morning as if that day was ordinary. The usual sight of kids strolling clad in their Pamasko outfits was an elusive sight this year. Christmas became a “normal ordinary day” this year. I spent the morning watching Go Back Couple on TV while having my morning coffee, updating my planner on the last few days of the year, watching the bullet journal tutorials on Youtube, took a 20-minute nap in the afternoon and prepared to attend the 4 pm Mass. I had a quick trip to the supermarket with Mama and snacks at Bonchon after.

First time this year na naging weird ang tanawin sa mismong araw ng Pasko. If in the recent years, it's the ninongs and ninangs who are elusive, this year, it's both as kids aren't allowed to go out this year.

If there’s one thing I am thankful this Christmas, it’s that I am blessed with another year celebrating with Mama and despite financial woes, God continues to keep us afloat. Compared to the recent years when Christmas used to be festive and somewhat exhausting, this year felt strangely different. And the pandemic still is to blame for that. But like what I captioned in my Instagram post, Christmas will always be constant regardless of the situation we are in. 

Here’s to hoping that Christmas 2021 will be different -- a happy, festive one that is. 

Whenever I watch TV programs, science fiction is always the genre that is the least of my liking. But after watching the movie The Passengers on cable TV recently, I remembered that I have one sci-fi Kdrama that has been sitting in my external hard drive for months. That Kdrama was Melting Me Softly.

Melting Me Softly is the story of variety show producer Ma Dong-chan and TV show part-timer Go Mi-ran. Two ordinary people who will try to make amends in catching up with the time they lost after a supposed 24-hour science experiment where they were both part of fails. Both people wake up 20 years later, leaving them confused, in a daze and racing against time to adjust and cope with the changes they encounter in the present time. 

My author-friend Elizabeth told me that this Kdrama is another show that can give one a lot of feels -- and indeed it is. There was actually a moment while watching this drama that I felt it hard to process what I was feeling towards Dong-chan and his girlfriend Na Ha-young’s situation. Ha-young was left powerless when Dong-chan went missing; and despite being in a situation where there was no clear resolution as to what happened, she still waited for him to return -- even if it meant she will have to wait for two decades. But what made it all the more painful was when Dong-chan confessed that his feelings no longer aligned with hers. It made me realize that time indeed can change everything, and it’s not just limited to one’s physical features but even to the emotional aspect of their being as well.

Aside from the humor and a bit of the romantic side, this drama showed a good representation on the importance of family. I particularly found the episode where Dong-chan had this heart-to-heart conversation with his youngest sister where he assured her that he will always be his older brother and that she is still precious to him. But honestly, if there was one thing that really pushed me to watch the show aside from wanting to observe the genre, it’s only because of its lead actor, Ji chang-wook. Melting Me Softly would have been better if only the main characters were given a much-deserved conclusion to their story. I mean come on, Dong-chan and Mi-ran went through a lot of complications from that botched science experiment and a stabbing incident caused Mi-ran to be a cryonic human again for another three years so the ending that they both travelled together to the United States and did a travel vlog does not give justice to both the storyline and the characters. I guess viewers would have enjoyed it more if the story and the characters had a more interesting ending. 

In the months of being confined at home due to this present health crisis, I’ve seen a number of Kdrama of different genres and themes. From medical, legal to action but not suspense and dark-fantasy. Not until I got to pick the series Hotel del Luna.

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Next to the drama’s light, colorful and funny representation of the inevitable, what made it interesting is that even the “supernatural guests” have their own backstory. Like the events that happened before they reached Hotel del Luna and what each will do before they leave the mysterious place. Some of those made me cry. Particularly the scene about Yoo-na's short-lived romance with the hotel's receptionist Hyun-joong, the father and son who despite being killed in an accident, decided to forgive the driver responsible for their deaths through the hotel’s dream call service to communicate to someone who is still living. The other one was the scene when Chan-sung brought his best friend, Sanchez to the hotel’s sky lounge during a lunar eclipse to break the sad news that the latter’s girlfriend, Veronica has died and to give him the opportunity to see her ghost and bid her goodbye for the last time.    

If there’s one thing that the drama imparted, it’s the reality that we will all really cease to exist one day. Much like what happened to all the characters in the story: the hotel staff left after having settled the unresolved issues that hindered them to leave the land of the living, Koo Chan-sung sent Jang Man-wol off as the hotel's last guest so she can proceed to her long-awaited journey to the afterlife, the Moon Tree died, and Hotel del Luna itself vanished at the emergence of the full moon. And while the conclusion to Man-wol and Chan-sung’s love story was an open-ended one, I just want to believe that they were reincarnated and met again in a different place, perhaps in New York as that was the last conversation between Sanchez and Chan-sung suggests. 

In my opinion, despite 90-minute run for each episode, this series is worth the time. And after seeing My Love from the Star’s Kim Soo-hyun making a cameo in Episode 16, I now understand why Kdrama fans want a second season (if not a sequel). I would love to see Man-wol and Chan-sung as human guests of another mystic hotel should that happen.