8 Things

I have been tagged by my good friend mayette.

The Rules: “Each person links to the person who tagged them. Then each person posts the rules before their list. Then they list 8 things about themselves. At the end of the post, that person tags and links to 8 other people and then visits those people’s sites and comments and letting them know that they’ve been tagged, and to come read the post so they know what they have to do …”

So here are the 8 things, rather 8 twisted things about me.

1. I am a jolog. Yes, across-the- board jolog.

I was raised in the barrio in a third class municipality within a valley. I belong to a family of farmers so I spent practically most of my childhood in the farm. This explains my exotic dark tan. At a very young age I was exposed to hard work: I planted rice, sow corns and peanuts and tend our carabaos in the pasture. In retrospect I should have sued my parents for child labor.

When I came to manila for the first time for college, I cried copious tears (I was iskolar ng bayan). Not because I would miss my family but because my mother turned my baggage into a talipapa: I brought with me talong, kalabasa, sitaw, tinapa, a sack of rice and a manok in a bayong as a pasalubong for my aunt who offered free board and lodging. UP is a few kilometer away from my aunt's home so that I have to take three rides. It took me months to eventually learn to commute on my own. For some reason, I always could not find my way back home. One time I took a bus plying a different route and I ended up in Novaliches. My cousin had to pick me up in the middle of the night. Countless times, I have fallen prey to salisi gang, zesto gang, and boodoo-boodoo gang, pahingi-ng-pamasahe gang.

And I have a terrible fashion sense. Probably because I am used to hand-me-downs.

2. I once raised to life and dead sisiw (chick) by blowing air into it anus.

I confirmed my gift when I revived our dying new-born puppy by doing the same. When our turkey was ran over by a jeepney, I tried to revive it but did not respond. Perhaps my power is reserved only to the cute dead.

3. As a child, I was exposed to Komiks and German Moreno Spectacular Culture.

Did I say I had a damaged childhood? Our neighbor then had a steady supply of komiks and gossip magazines from his son who worked in a publishing company in Manila. No, not Marvel or the DC comics but those by Mars Ravelo, Carlo J Caparas and Nerissa Cabral. Even at a very young age I had developed a keen interest in reading. There was dearth of reading materials at home and I read all the milk, carton labels and newspaper used as pambalot ng tinapa, so I devoured it. I have followed with ardor Zuma, Captain Barbell, Darna, Agua Bendita Tuklaw and Mga Kuwento Ni Lola Basyang.

This was the era of black and white TV; the one with built-in cabinet. I remember there was only one TV in our entire neighborhood, so the whole barangay came to watch. We were not allowed to watch except on weekend so I was hypnotized by German Moreno’s colorful! spectacular! smorgasbord! production numbers in GMA Supershow and That’s Entertainment (yes, with kuya Germs everything should end in exclamation points).Yes, I still remember Michael Locsin, Ronnel Victor, Ana Margarita, Marilyn Villamayor.

4. I stole Gabriel Garcia-Marquez.

I learned about Gabriel Garcia Marquez and his magic realism during my first year in college. I searched for his One Hundred Years in Solitude in book sales. When I saw one, I stole it. Really. I was then intoxicated by the philosophy of Marx and I thought I deserved to read and own it even without paying it. Inspired by the success, I tried to do the same with Umberto Echo’s The Name of the Rose but I was almost caught when I tried to tuck the book under my waist.

5. I seriously thought of committing suicide.

Really. I was 18 then deeply troubled and confused teenager. My existential angst phase. Very in to my own alternative view of life, or as the French call it Weltanschauung. I thought there was no point in living. I thought it was romantic. Ok, please stop laughing now.

I was then intoxicated by the philosophy of Schopenhauer, Sartre, Nietzsche, and Camus. I devoured Russian existentialist books by Dostoevsky and Ivan Turgenev. From an extremely religious family who could recite the Litany flawlessly, I became an atheist, then became a humanist, then became a religious fundamentalist, became atheist again and then a believer eventually.

Add here the rebellious spirit of Grunge music by Nirvana and Pearl Jam. When Kurt Cobain scribbled “I don’t have the passion to live any more” and shot his head point blank, I said: “I thought of that first. That’s not original”

6. I read poetry aloud when I defecate.

I have hard-bound compilation of poems by TS Eliot, John Keats, Alfred Lord Tennyson and Milton. The pages were already yellowing and had been moist from constant leafing… while in the john. I call it inidoro poetry reading. I've been re-reading them countless times already

7. I have an irrational fear of numbers.

Make me add more than two digits numbers and I would tremble and pass out. I failed my Math I (basic!) in college. I got a 3 when I took it the second time only because I wrote a gripping and moving letter in my test booklet begging my teacher to pass me or I would lose my scholarship. He fell for it.

8. I regard my self as generally nice person.

Although I may not exude a pleasant personality, I am a nice person. People who do not know me would always think that I am obnoxious and snobbish. Probably because I have pouty upper lip. I wish it looked like the model-silicon-enhanced-look but mine is placed in such a way that I have a perpetual frown.

No, I am not in Friendster. I have few friends and I am perfectly happy with that. I don’t measure my happiness with the number of friends I could make. Although I was told there is an existing account under my name. That is not me. That’s an impostor.

So there.

____

Now, the problem. I have checked my friends in the blogosphere and found that they have been tagged. I have few friends in friendster, does that count?