A Room Of One's Own

I'm not a brooding Virginia Woolf but I have heeded her quote,

"Women, then, have not had a dog's chance of writing poetry. That is why I have laid so much stress on money and a room of one's own."

So I commissioned some carpenters and masons to build me one!

Tis me. Holding a cupful of Tofu with sugar syrup.

 What started as a solid wall of pure cement, hollowblocks and long strip of metal has now transformed...

Viola!!! In under a month, I have a little room now!

BGM: Angelic trumpets of victory!

It's the smallest room in the world. But no matter how small, if it's your own little space, you will always have your heart set on it, right? I love my little sky blue room. I've named it "Bonus Stage"! Give me a bit more time to save for decors I will certainly give that name some credit.

For now, I am living on Minimalist style, with very little to no decors on the walls or around the room (which I surprisingly like, it's a dream for neat freaks like me, I admit) and just a few furniture like a closet, a small shelf, my wooden bed and a computer table!

Here's a picture tour of my room! With no extra cost! He he he!

They match well...

I hauled my old closet from my old room that I used to share with a niece... Then I got this little table at a whopping sale. From P1,060.00 to P500.00! More than 50% discount so I can't ask for anything more. Yeah! But I do wish I bought two but I was afraid the extra one wouldn't fit in my room anymore.

And on my shelves I have:

Kawaii! > u <

A plastic organizer shelf to house my skincare items, my small documents, and my jewelries, but I don't have real jewelry, only fancy ones, but I still keep them and care for them because they are all I have! And we have a cute Rilakkuma mirror that Mike gave me > u < it's really cute, so I put a ribbon on his ear, too...

On top of my organizer I have:

Some toy stuff that I love, almost all of them were given my Mike. Yojimbo from Final Fantasy Creatures Series (My dog's name is also Yojimbo!), a little nendoroid, and another Rilakkuma soft toy. The little tan cinnamoroll, which my friend Deena gave last year is also there. And that red thing behind it is a cherry tomato. I put it there for good luck. I don't know if tomatoes give luck, but I feel like they can!

Then on another shelf level I have my unread/to be re-read books!

And finally... Here is my little bed and table and my desktop PC!

When I wake up I just roll around and turn the PC on...

Pretty quaint...

I feel so settled and so at ease when I come home. I've often thought how precious privacy is... Now I get to have it FOR ALL ETERNITY! *Insert evil laugh*

But honestly, even after dishing out my entire "TRAVEL FUND" to fund this project, I can really say that this is definitely lasting, and gives me something to look forward to, something to clean (!) and something to take care of.

I love my room.

Financing My 2012: New Year, New Decisions

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

First and foremost I would like to greet everyone who passed by here a very happy and prosperous 2012! This year is very exciting, just like every start of the year, there's so much in store for ALL of us and I hope we do our best and meet any challenge with a wiseass grin on our faces! :DD

Well on to the New Year update:
I've been long harping about having built a fund by budgeting and saving over the last year that was in preparation for my travel to Japan. You can see from the link above that I put away about 22% of whatever take home pay I get.

I've always been so adamant, so excited, so driven to save because I love to travel. Not just travel, but TRAVEL TO JAPAN. There is something magical for me about that country. Did you know that I studied the writing language since Sixth Grade just to be able to read Japanese comics? Haha!

I also studied formally at Mindanao Kokusai Daigaku for 5 months and took the JLPT N5 last December! You see, there has been so much preparation for me NOT to go there.

But the New Year left me thinking for myself. I grew pensive while I was alone in my nieces' room that I shared with them reading a book. I looked at the walls, ceiling and felt the hard foam at my back. I thought to myself that this year I would be 26 years old come September.

It struck me that I'm not THAT young anymore. And that at this age, I would at least stop sleeping on floors and stop sharing a room with my nieces, right? :( If not have a place of my own, at the very least I would have an area, no matter how small, to call my own...

In any house I lived in, except that short stint at I've always shared an area or a bed. I didn't have privacy. If I needed privacy, I go to the bathroom to be alone. But you can't sit in the bathroom for long until someone raps on the door for their turn to use it. Reading books is hard when kids are talking and fighting and trying to one up each other left and right. Getting stuff done on my computer is hard, especially when my nieces ask what time do they get to play. Sigh. My stuff is also haywire. I have my wardrobe cabinet in the other room, I sleep in the room fronting it, my personal stuff is in the other room all the way from the kitchen and my bookshelf is in my nephew's room :( You can't imagine how difficult that is doing my daily things going to and from rooms just for me to get things done.

That's why I want this!

All I want is a small, 7 wide room that's enough to stash a small bed, two tables, a computer, and a wardrobe cabinet :( It will be pretty tight, but for me that's already paradise.

I have talked with my sister about building it just adjacent to one of the outer rooms and she agreed! She asked me if I wanted to pursue this and I was adamant. She told me I could use the money for a house downpayment and I said I do not have the right amount of resources in the next few years to fund that much. I told her it would also help with the appraisal of our house if ever it would come to that point, and that maybe someday if I get married and have a place of my own I won't be living there anymore, one of my nieces can always take over my little room for herself.

But I think I'm going to be single for a long time :( so I guess this is the best option for me.

This is why right now, I am very sorry for having to let go of my dreams for travel. I think that a room is more lasting physically, and it will provide me the emotional comfort of finally having something all to myself. :D I've already talked with some home renovation guys and they can build my room in a short amount of time hopefully.

It's bittersweet for me to write "My Room" instead of "My Travel Fund" in my budget. I have to let go of that dream of seeing Sakura trees and eating oden and ramen on a cold Hiroshima fall night; but maybe I can dream about that in the room I'm about to start building.

WISH ME LUCK! :)

Thanks for reading.