Tahooo!

I live in an apartment beside the street, so I am used to the deafeaning cacophony of discordant noises every morning : the coughing and honking of motor vehicles plying the route, and the annoying arias of vendors blaring, “putooo! bikooo! pichi-phichiii! binatooog!”

One morning I was disturbed by this vendor shouting for his tahooo. Actually he was not shouting. He was bawling.

Is it me (I have been perennially in distressing mood lately. Please don’t ask me why) or there is really something with the melancholic tone of his voice that evokes both pity and anguish? This morning I heard his voice again and he shouts tahooo in a gripping manner that you can feel his inner turmoil. Maybe he’s been through a lot of hardships that I can palpably feel an exquisitely tormented soul through his voice.

Maybe his wife is dying or one of his children. Maybe his little shanty he calls his home was mercilessly demolished. Maybe his family has not eaten for days. Maybe he is alone and lonely and needs to survive.

The last time I nearly cried as an adult was when I watched the movie Of Mice and Men. That morning upon hearing the voice of the magtataho I was on the verge of tears. Even our neighbor’s dog wailed and howled. Ok, that’s a bit OA.

It’s like this: Have you ever read verses from metaphysical poets? The kind that conjures images of visceral sadness and sorrow? The kind that chills your bone and makes you weep and wail but you don’t actually cry. Sort of like that.

I think it was Dostoyevsky who said that we are all connected and that we are responsible for each one. Maybe the feeling I felt was guilt…that somehow I was connected with this guy… that somehow I was responsible for his plight.

one twisted night, in the company of twisted friends

(Caution: may contain expletives; not for catholic schoolgirls)

Don’t go out, stay home. Tersely warned my horoscope.

I don’t give a rat’s ass really about my daily horoscope; I just pass through it for comic relief when I read the dailies. Oftentimes the predictions are hilarious. Plus I refuse to accept that my destiny is determined by the arrangement of the stars which may be dead by now, sucked in the blackhole in oblivion eons ago.

Maybe I should reckon sometimes.

Friday night. My high school friend Paris Hilltop, called for a night out. After assuring that I won’t spend a dime I said, I am in.

“Marami akong pera, daliii, gastusin natin! Kapapadala lang jowa ko”. She said as if she is on the watch list for money laundering that she’s anxious to spend all her money.

Her groveling American boyfriend whom he met loves to pamper her. He grants everything she wants, even her most whimsical, fanciful, arbitrary and capricious request (sorry for the thesaurus, I can’t help using the ‘whimsical’ word without mentioning the others. I don’t know, I think I am OC). Last time she asked for a video ipod and the next day it was delivered to her doorstep. I heard she is asking for and laptop and an air conditioner.

So I alerted every one. There are seven of us, but only 5 made it, Mario being in London probably wiping a Briton’s ass right now, and Marites is in Italy busy accumulating Euros assuming someone else’s identity. We’ve been friends since high school and he have developed a peculiar bond. Back then we call ourselves (gasp!) The Magnificent Seven. I remember after we sang our graduation song “If we hold on together” (double gasp!) we were so moved that we group hugged – yes, in the tradition of TGIS - and vowed to remain friends forever. We made it a point to go out together at least once a month.

Starbucks, Morato. I think I was the most excited because I was the earliest bird. Paris Hilltop came next together with Tom Cruz. You see, Tom Cruz is a balikbayan from Saudi and he loves to wear his thick gold blings so that I had to wear my shades or I get blinded with his shining shimmering splendid.

A few minutes passed, we heard a familiar loud tonsil bursting shriek: “Mareeee!” It was Rectum Padila, our happy and gay friend who just came out of his/her aparador after years of hiding his/her sexuality. He was a teacher turned call center agent. This guy has all the makings a Greek Adonis: nice body, tall, dark, handsome, square jaw, curly hair, but he/she prefer to blow air kisses while dangling his/her arms like useless gloves.

Tom who just knew that he/she is out coughed a mouthful of expresso he was swilling. He sprayed our table wet including the Dolce and Gabbana dress of a girl in the nearby table. We profusely apologized.

I was embarrassed, so I announced I was starving so we could get away from the girl’s homicidal look. However, we had wait for our two girls who are chronic late comers. Yes, they love attention. Lindsay Low Hands, our group fashionista came in shiny red lips as if she has just eaten escabeche but forgot to wipe her lips (the shade according to her is, get ready for this, titillating scarlet). She wore a tiny blouse that I wonder whether she could still breathe; she matched with those useless belts girls wear. But what I was worried about was her huge chandelier ear rings that might tear her earlobes.

Britney Sibat came later with her new accessory: her 21-year-old–Aruba-waiter-boylet. I moved her aside and asked where she left her virtue and morals or her sanity because the last time I checked she is married. She assured me that, her new boyfriend knew she’s married.

We zoomed to Gerry’s Grill. I was about to call the waiter for prime ribs, sisig and crispy pata when I was halted by Lindsay and gave me a look she reserved only to those wearing 80’s shoulder pads and boston high waisted acid washed jeans.

“Look I don’t care if by the mere sight of crispy pata, you will grow bilbil in your anorexic 22 waistline, but I am really starving here”. I sniggered

“Hello? It’s Friday today. Every faithful catholic is obliged to abstain”.

Although I have a problem with the word ‘obliged’, I knew it was pointless to argue. They ordered a plateful of what appears to be crustaceans instead – those expensive sea creatures the prize and the size its shell is inversely proportional to stuff that you can actually eat. We talked, exchanged updates of our lives and compared our checkbooks. When the girls started to argue about pedicures and shoes, I knew it was time to leave.

Comedy bar was our next stop. Paris is a good friend of KK, one of the performers in the bar and also happened to be an ABS CBN talent. They must be really good friends because we came in without paying an entrance fee and a table was already reserved for us.

I was worried because we occupied a front table and we might be dissed and maokray-ed with malevolently glee by the homosexual performers. My worry turned out to be unfounded because most of the performers were Paris’ friends. it was a riot.The homos were so good I laughed out so hard that my stomach hurt. It saved me from doing 100 crunches.

For some reason, while laughing, I was conscious about the manner I laughed. I was reminded of the Balitang K episode: Laughter according to a doctor can cure a number of diseases depending on the manner of laughing. For instance: a ha-ha laugh can cure heart disease and stress, Hi-hi laugh can cure stomach ache, ho-ho for head ache and hu-hu for constipation. While enjoying it, I took it as and opportunity to heal my self. So I shifted from one kind of laughter to another. My friend must have noticed it that she asked whether I was rehearsing for a Sisa audition.

After her performance, KK came to our table and Paris introduced her to us:

“Guys meet my friend KK, she is half human, half science”, referring to surgery she went through to enhance her breasts, butt, and nose.

She gamely laughed and played along: “Actually pinaulit ko nga dede ko kasi medyo tabingi. Hawakan mo maayos na”.

At that point, she held my hand and planted my palm on her breast. It came so fast that it was too late for me to protest (I swear this is true).

“Walang malisya, pare. Tomboy ako.”

It was almost creepy to touch a silicone breast… of a lesbian. I read somewhere that silicones do not burn. For some reason I kept on imagining her in the crematorium. I imagined, at the heap of her ashes are silicon lumps. I wonder how her family could fit those lumps in an urn or jar.

We left the comedy bar at 1am. We all felt groggy and bangenge including our designated driver. Tom suggested that we can still down some more bottles at Bay Walk.

“Tom, I know your feeling horny, pero bawal ang karne ngayon”. Britney slurred that it sounded sleazy.

We were traversing Roxas Boulevard when I heard a shouting match between Paris and Rectum. I did not how it started because I was seated beside Tom. The girls were on the back seat. They girls screamed when Paris and Rectum started to engage in a violent hair pulling. Tom screeched near manila Bay.

It must be the booze. The spirit of the beer must have opened the flood gate of Rectum’s subconscious that he/she unabashedly opened his/her id. He/she related all his sexual escapades with men as if it was his/her great achievement, including his trysts with Mario (our friend in London), who happened to be Paris’ ex boyfriend.

“Were you doing it with my boyfriend while we were still on?” Paris hissed.

“Minsan!” he/she raised his penciled eyebrow in the tradition confrontational scenes in Philippine movies. I half expect that they would slap each other until they were both exhausted.

“Where!” I saw smoke coming from her nostrils.

“Does it matter? You are no longer together. That was long time ago”

“Answer me you trump! I want to know!”

“In the apartment. One time when you were out. Are you satisfied now?”

These guys were really best friends and they shared apartments. Apparently they shared everything including their boyfriends (though unilaterally). So... Melrose Place.

I was worried that Paris would ask for all the details of the act a la Clive Owen and Julia Roberts in the movie Closer which involved the human anatomy and bodily fluids.

The shouting bouts went (reminiscent of a play I watched):

“Ahas ka!”

“Ikaw sawa!”

“Malandi ka!”

“Ikaw haliparot!”

“Pokpok!”

“Puta ka!”

“Mas puta ka!”

“Pinakaputaputahan!”

“Bakla!”

Enough said.

Pedro, 22 (1985-2007)

In the province, I live in a small community where we all knew each other. We are like big family and are closely knit because most of us are relatives. An outsider would suspect that we are a communist community because we share almost everything. We share our ulam and exchange gifts during occasions. Most of us are farmers and during good harvest, we share our produce. During bad times we tried to help each other and lift each others' spirit. We are involved in each others lives. We knew every birth, every wedding, and every death.

His name is Pedro and I knew him well. I remember him as a very shy boy who looks at you with his eyes on one side and then bows when he greets you. I particularly remember his thick eyebrows and his thick black hair that always parted in the middle. Every parent in the community was very fond of him because he was a very bright boy, always on top of his class. His proud mother would always pin his ribbons and put on his medals which he won on competitions. He is the bunso. I am very close to his siblings so I practically watched him grow. My mother and his nana are close friends too. The last time I saw him, the dark and emaciated boy had grown into handsome man with a buff body. I learned that he entered the Philippine Military Academy. Later however he left the military school because he could not stomach the pressure and the senseless extreme physical training. He transferred to another school and took up accountancy instead. They are poor like the rest of us; so he worked hard to be able to pay his tuition fee.

Last Sunday, March 11, he was killed (click here for the story).

A cop shot him twice in the chest with both of the bullets going out of his back. He did nothing wrong.

He is only 22, to graduate with honors this March. He is at the prime of his life. He had grand dreams for himself and his family.

Let's Get Physical

I think am the laziest person on earth. I can laze in perpetuam on the couch watching the entire season of Lost or 24 or CSI or lie in my bed all day even with the most disturbing existentialist book by any Russian author, enduring bedsores. Sure, I love to cook which I do not consider work, but no amount of nudging can convince me do a chore more strenuous than switching the television on and off without using a remote control.

Lately I did something radical, after dilly dallying, shilly-shallying, I went jogging. I figured its time I cultivate a healthy lifestyle (although smoking is entirely a different thing). So, I tagged along my cousin and engaged in cardio-vascular exercise. He complied thinking this is again one of those one- minute interests I venture in which would quickly die soon.

That night, I set the alarm clock to 6am.

I woke up 9am. The heat was starting to scorch outside but I pushed through nevertheless. To have a good and healthy start, I gulped a glass full of fresh milk although I am lactose intolerant. I still felt muzzy, so to jolt my sleeping nerves, I plugged my ipod into my eardrum a full volume hip-hop playlist and launch myself to trot.

So we jogged from V-Luna to the Quezon City circle through the Kalayaan Avenue. By the time we reached the Circle, I was dead beat already that my tongue could reach the ground like a worn-out dog. I was gasping for air and I could feel my lungs coming out from my mouth.

I struggled and dragged my carcass so I could at least cover one round. I tried to look around for inspiration, someone I could subtly chase and ogle while running, thinking that adrenalin rush is more potent and primal force that could push my limits. It did not help. It must be a senior citizens’ day because all I could see were flabby sagging and wrinkled bodies parading the oval. Everybody: eeewwe!

A few minute past, came an announcement. A priest at the Claret would administer a mass. I gathered that every Sunday a mass is being held here especially for joggers. Tired and worn-out already I decided to attend the mass instead. Indeed it was attended by joggers all sweating in their jogging attires: jogging pants, jogging shorts, jogging short shorts and jogging very short shorts. It was good the venue was in an open air or we would suffocate in our own stench.

My stomach started to grumble, probably rejecting the milk I swilled. Earlier I tried to get rid of it in the pay comfort room but it didn’t come out despite a stronger peristalsis. All through out the mass I was nursing a bad stomach that I had to repress a fart with great care and intensity or I could annihilate the people surrounding me with my biological weapon.

Probably thinking that these people are tired and would not care to listen, the priest delivered a bland, passionless and coma-inducing sermon. The priest is septuagenarian and speaks very slowly as if he was struggling to force out every word from his mouth that by the time he spoke the last word I have grown my nails to at least three inches already. The bright sun blurred my vision so that I could not guess his nationality. He speaks in a funny accent, a cross between French and Swahili. I guess he must have been assigned to different countries already before coming to the Philippines that he mixed up all their accents. For instance he said: “De horrry gorrrspel accorrrrding to rrruuke”. The “r” and “h” are pronounced harder as if it was an opportunity for him to scour a blob of phlegm that had been clogging his throat.

Maybe I was tired that I nearly fell asleep. I only got back to my senses when somebody nodded at me and spout at me the words: Piss be with you! To which I gladly answered back: PISS BE WITH YOU TOO!

Oh well, I think I need a cold shower.

Lobotomy

A friend of a friend of a friend came to me for help: a sort of legal advice. The school where she’s teaching charged her of gross misconduct and she is in danger of being dismissed. She was required to answer for the charges within 48 hours.

You see, when our whole neighborhood came to know that I was in law school everyone would come to me for my legal my opinion. For instance, I was asked about chacha, impeachment, about a fake president, and even the James Yap-Hope affair. An octogenarian relative once asked me about annulment. Yes, he is seriously considering annulling his marriage. My drinking buddies was delighted when I finished law school: “Kahit mangrape o pumatay na ko… may lawyer na akong kaibigan.” As if I entered law school in order to start a career on freeing all criminals.

I digress. Anyway, I told her she does not need any legal advice for as long as she is not yet dismissed. What they're asking her is only an explanation. I told her to write the details of what transpired according to her recollection and that there is nothing to worry about if she thinks she is innocent of any misconduct.

The truth will set you free, I added. I was leaning towards the idea that she is falsely charged because she came to me in copious tears as if she was auditioning for soap opera. I was in foul mood and I was a bit annoyed that I had to restrain my self from turning into Gladys Reyes or I might slap her and do a confrontational scene and then we might engage in hair pulling.

“Uhm… what if saying the truth might bring me to jail me and actually fire me.”

According to her, she collected a contribution from her students amounting to 20 thou plus for a field trip that never happened. She failed to surrender it to the registrar. She spent it thinking it was her own money.

Apparently, she commingled the fund with her own money so that she was so confused which was which. When she went shopping the money was so stupid enough not to tell her that it wasn’t her money.

“What am I going to do?”

I wanted to give her a gun so that she would shoot herself. In that way she would do a big favor to humanity, of not polluting the gene pool. I pity her offspring.

“Please, help me. I can’t afford to lose my job”.

I was thinking of a possible defense she could plead. An extreme emergency for example, like, say her baby was dying, or she went to patch the hole in the ozone layer or went to Africa to clamor against the practice of clitoridectomy (although the most plausible excuse would be a lobotomy. The doctor had to perform a lobotomy to cure her terminal condition. At least there was something that could explain her price-winning idiocy). Using an ad misercordiam argument would help after all these administrators are human too. At least the dismissal penalty could be downgraded to mere suspension, if they feel mercy and compassion. She could still retain her job.

I secretly wished she would be fired. This people should at least take responsibility for their actions and learn from it.

“Be careful”, Dostoyevsky said in The Idiot, “the world is full of wolves”

Pirate 2

Yesterday, I felt really cranky. No amount of caffeine or nicotine could fix me so I decided to get out and engaged myself in an unbridled pirated DVD buying.

Thank god for piracy. I can buy all the movies and TV series I failed to watch. Tonight I will have an OSCAR movies marathon. For days I will be a couch camote; I will grow roots.

How dare I for patronizing piracy? Well I tell you why:I was able to buy the entire first season of Rome, Six Feet Under, The Sopranos, Angels in America for a measly 50 pesos each. And get ready for this: I have found treasures there like Akira Kurusawa’s Rashomon, Stray Dog, his adaptation of Dostoyevsky’s the Idiot, Hitchcock’s Vertigo, Monty Python’s The Holy Grail and Peter Greenaway’s The Pillow Book for only 25 pesos each. Do you think only well- off cineastes can afford such collection of oeuvres?

I think piracy is a great equalizer. The poor like me can afford to watch movies in the confines of their own home. If only greedy movie producers would stop being greedy and cut down the prices of the originals, then piracy would be minimized. Hey, I don’t buy Filipino pirated DVDs. So that means I only rob Hollywood…

So I went home happy, my bag was filled with stacks of pirated DVD’s. When the guard at the MRT station checked my bag, I didn’t realize that my bag was full of contrabands. I told him what they were and he just smiled at my sack of loot. I bet he is a fan as well.

Pirate

My friend Jack Sparrow called me up. Excitedly he told me that he finally found the oeuvre he had been searching, finally completing his porn collection.

I empathized with his bliss because I know how he’d scoured every shelve and bangketa in Quiapo, Greenhils, Divisoria or every place that sells pirated DVD's in search for that copy.

"Really? Where did you find it” I asked.

“In found it in Quiapo, I went there yesterday after the mass. Destiny led me to it. I found the lone copy in a shelf along with rated R movies. I nearly cried when my eyes laid on it”

Like in the movies, with camera swirling from above in swelling background music and slowly fading, I pictured him in slow motion toward the shelf, grabbing the copy and then intensely hugging himself for such wonderful feat.

"Wait, you went to buy porn after attending a Holy Eucharist?”

Pause.

After we took the bar exam, we have been saving up for good karma points. We vowed to attend mass every Sunday and Wednesday, had pilgrimage to every miraculous saints, and help people at every opportunity. Yeah, yeah, it may sound selfish, but we vowed to continue doing these even after the bar exam results.

“Is that a sin? I should have bought it first before going to the mass.” He said it penitently as if buying it before the mass would make any difference.

“Of course not! We men watch these kind of flicks because we appreciate the woman form: God’s beautiful creation. Sure you watched it in the interest of science and research, right? Devoid of any covetousness and any prurient motives.”

“Hey, it was not my intention to buy porn. I was looking for the second season of the Prison Break. I just saw it there, lying in the shelf and my first instinct was to grab it.”

“Oh, you weak in the spirit!” I rebuked him as if I was his spiritual adviser.

“What else did you do?” I summoned him to confess.

“Oh, you sinful evil, bad, wretched fellow, you watched already eh! I can sense from your wet and lusty voice. Surrender to me your copy and run to the nearest confession booth to atone for your sins.”

The movie is the filmed EBN awards, sort of like Oscars for porn stars where trophies were given to porn stars with the best moan, best orgasm, hardest dick, etc. and the recipient receives it while stripping. The awards night would end in an orgy.

Of Love and Cancer

I watched Griffin and Phoenix last night at the UP Film Center.
It was supposed to be a post valentine date with my friend Kathy. She backed out the last minute. She was in the hospital visiting a relative who is dying of cancer. I sent her text message pointing out how insensitive she was with my feelings. I set the date years before just so she could clear all her appointments, only to be stood up on the very date itself. .

Our text exchanges went:

Kat: So sorry, I can’t make it. My uncle is dying. (smiling face)

Me: You chose your relative dying of cancer over your best friend?

Kat: The doctors said he has only a few days to live. We never thought his cancer cells spread faster than his doctors predicted (smiling face)

Me: The movie will run for just a day. Your uncle will still be alive tomorrow. Go run. You can still make it.

Kat: (smiling face)

Kat understands my irony. Although what bothered me was her constant use of smileys as if her spending time with his dying uncle was something normal or casual like say, playing billiards with him.

I already made a commitment. I promised my cousin to watch the movie sponsored by their organization for a fundraising. I bought two tickets, sayang din. I tried to invite my other cousin who is incidentally staying with us while waiting for his flight abroad (he will be working in Dubai as an Engineer) but he refused. He can’t stand romantic movies unless there are lots of nudity or he is with his girlfriend. I had to bribe him; I promised him lifetime supply of isaw and red horse. He agreed although I could sense later he regretted that decision.

Imagine two grown men watching a sentimental and extremely melodramatic love story of Griffin and Phoenix, surrounded by smooching couples in a theater.

Griffin And Phoenix is a love story about two people who face a seemingly insurmountable obstacle that may stand between them – their impending death. After being diagnosed with terminal cancer, Griffin decides to take his life by the reins and have some fun before he dies.

With time working against him, he meets and falls in love with Phoenix — but he soon discovers that she, too, is dying of cancer. They have a last chance at love so they decided to celebrate together life and luuuv. So they went out chasing speeding freight trains, sneaking into a theater from the backdoor, skydiving, splashing salt water with each other in a beach shore, climbing water reservoirs tower only to scribble their love with each other, and having sex on a clock tower. They also engaged in an unbridled passionate sex which lasted until morning with only 10 second coffee brakes.

Toward the end of the movie one of them is dying in a hospital. At this point be ready with those cheesy and bloodcurdling declarations of love. Or if you’re hopelessly romantic bring tranquilizers because you will be induced to intense lachrymal exhaustion. Although personally, I wished Phoenix would just turn herself into, well, Phoenix and burn Griffin into ashes so that we could all go home now.

So there.

Physical Examination

(Warning:may have explicit contents)

As a prerequisite for my employment, I have to go through the medical examination.

I badly needed a job. My financial support has been severed after the bar exam and I have squeezed all my resources to the last drop.

I passed all the tests required by the job. What if I fail this time?

The inner Marxist in me was suddenly awakened that I was tempted to shout: “Workers of the world unite!” These corporations knew how badly we need money to survive in this capitalist world they created. Healthy people equal great profits so they make sure that every worker is fit so that their abilities are maximized. I feel I’m a lowly proletariat seeking for a job and I am reduced to a machine – a mere instrument for profit.

Anyway, I filled up a form which asked for my medical history. Diseases and abnormalities known to man were listed where I had to check the Yes or No box depending on what is applicable to me. The diseases ranged from the simple (flu, colds, headache, etc.) to the morbid (cancer, insanity, HIV) and the utterly ridiculous such as extra-appendage in the body.

I was tempted to check the “yes box” under the extra appendage and let the doctor itch with curiosity to examine it. But I realized my appendage was not peculiar: All Homo Sapiens of the male species like myself have an appendage of varying sizes or forms (?).

So I tried to be as truthful as possible until the Physical Injuries part. Inspired by Dr. House’s motto that everybody lies, I checked the NO Box. If they would find something not normal in my system during their examination, then it’s their job to determine the cause and recommend the cure. A NO would invite interest. They would know that I was beaten into purple pulp in a hazing during my first year in law school, that my kidney was damaged, that I underwent a dialysis to clean out the toxins in my blood, and that I had to go through a medication to repair my kidneys. It’s not that I am sick and puny that I can’t perform stressful jobs. (The last time I had check up, my doctor assured me my kidneys where back to normal, and that they were functioning well again). I just do not want to give them doubt of by fitness to work. I said I badly need a job.

I was advised to undergo the examination in their company-accredited hospital. But before proceeding to the hospital I have to go through what they refer to as “vital signs test” in their clinic.

“A... what?” I chortled.

“The last time I checked, I had a pulse and I was breathing.”

“It’s the procedure sir. Everybody goes through it”

He said firmly and uncompromisingly as if I was a comatose patient who sneaked out from a hospital in order to apply in their company.

The following day I went to the hospital. The icky part of medical examination is the laboratory where I had to scoop my shit and put it in a container. Worst part was, that night before our kasambahay cooked buttered veggies (with sweet corn!), my favorite. And we all know what happens to the corns when it entered our digestive system. It also comes out whole unadulterated from our excretory orifice. Imagine I had to pick out the kernels in my poop with a chopstick before putting it my vial.

I kept my stool sample securely in the deepest chamber my bag since I had to take the MRT. If some nosey guard would insist to check on it, thinking that it is a substance for making bombs, I would gladly open it under his nose.

I do not have problem with the doctors cupping my balls while he lets me cough and him peering into my asshole, for as long as I am sure he is a He in the strictness sense of the word and for as long as he does not leave any instrument in there. The uncomfortable part was the drug test where I have to pee in full view a person. You see, I am not an exhibitionist, and I can’t take a leak in front of people checking out whether my urine sample really came out from my anatomy. I had to fill my bladder with tankers of water and iced tea just to break it loose.

I coughed up almost a thousand pesos for the entire tests. The results came out normal except the ECG. The doctor told me my heart beats faster that the normal 72 per minute in a lubb dub rhythm, whatever that means, although it’s nothing serious. He asked if I and chest pains or I was tired during the examination.

Is there something wrong with my heart? Or is it the hot nurse who took mg ECG that I suspect induced my palpitations?

how to get your NBI clearance without losing your sanity

Last month I applied in this government agency which was referred to me by a friend. Yesterday I was informed that they were considering me to fill a position in the legal department although what they need were lawyers.

Since I am still an under-bar (I am still waiting for the result to be realeased on the last week of March. Oh, GOd! Just the thought of it makes my heart beats faster. This waiting is killing me softly). I have to go through the usual process like any other applicant in the agency. I took a series of exams - IQ test, neurological exams, and the physical exam. They gave me a checklist of documents I have to submit: NBI clearance, Police clearance, MTC and RTC clearances, barangay clearance, TOR, etc.

So I rolled-up my sleeves and immediately proceeded to procure the papers. I never thought it would take me years and a fortune to obtain the requirements.

I went to the NBI office first. I lost my personal copy I obtained a year ago. Thanks to my prize-winning burara-ness, I have to secure again a new NBI clearance and go through a long torturous and tedious process. The renewal could have taken me a few minutes in Megamall.

I woke up early (meaning 10:00). Already at that time of the day, people who lined up to secure the NBI clearance stretched to infinity. Of course, I was at the furthest point that I needed a binocular to see what was going on in the front line. I knew it would take an eternity to reach the first window plus I had to endure the heat, hunger and the noise. I wanted to give up and come back the next day. But then I remembered my mother: Patience is a virtue.

You see in every challenging situation, I remember my mother vividly that I have to distract myself to get rid of the images in my mind- her big blabbering mouth, left hand on her waist and right hand raised with the forefinger pushing my forehead to instill her old age wisdom and virtue. Maybe that explains the permanent dent on my forehead.

Where am I? A huge billboard tells you what to do: Window 1, get the application form; Window 2, give the filled-up application form and get the order of payment; Window3, payment; Window 4 picture taking. Window 5, get the stub which tells you the day or time to claim the clearance; and Window 6 where to claim the NBI clearance (or something to that effect). With the rate we were going plus intense heat brought about by global warming and the noise, the windows translated to me as 6 circles of hell (Didn't Dante say it has 9?). Despite this, some moron will still come to you for instructions.


The office resembled a cluttered disorganized market. It discharged a cacophony of discordant noises- senseless conversations of women, takatak boys offering their yosi and candies and vendors shouting their goods depending on the time of the day and according to the needs of the people lining up. For instance, at 10:00, they sell breakfast and merienda like sandwiches, biko, pichi-pichi, chicharon. At 12:00, they offered lunch in plastics containing rice with dinuguan, bopis, kaldereta, pinakbet, fried tilapia... name it. At 1:00, they sell iced cold soft drinks, bottled mineral water or iced tap water in plastics and abanikos and other fancy fans. At 5:30, I half expected that they would offer papag, kulambo or kumot for those who failed to make it until the closing hours and wished to spend the night in time for the next working day.

I had grown nails and stubble when I reach the window I. Like a lazy overweight slug, the line slowly dragged itself. Thank goodness, I brought my ipod with me that I was able to break the boredom and drown the senseless chatter with my playlists. I must have been totally engrossed in Bob Marley and Sublime's Rasta Music that I didn’t notice I smoked my whole pack of Malboro lights.


It was already 3:00 when I reached the finger printing part. The old man must have been doing this for centuries that he mastered the skill. He does his job mechanically like a push-button robot.Using a paint brush, he painted black grease on the surface of what appeared to be glass on a table. Without even looking at me, he grabbed my hand darted each finger on the greased glass and stamped on the form. I just stood there like a moron who did not know what to do. Then he gave me wet tissue and asked for five pesos. I wasn’t even asked whether I wanted to buy; I was forced to buy it. Then and he called out the next in line.

The next stop in my long odyssey was the picture taking part. That means I was almost done but I had to wait for my turn again and there were over a hundred people before me. I noticed that the interval took days. I soon discovered the cause: one the there was only one camera, and two, the man in charged was doing something else, texting . Every 10 minutes his cellphone would beep and then he would leisurely reply. Every person had to wait before he realized that he was actually in an office and had job to perform. I was in UP-go-fight mood that I wanted to yell into his pockmarked face or as Miriam put it, fungus-faced but I composed myself lectured him in a more diplomatic tone.

I told the Moron: “Mister, we are paying for your services and we want it quick and efficient, so please keep your 3210 Nokia phone away. We have been here since crustaceous period. Most of us came from as far as Batanes and Sulu; we even skipped our lunch just so we could get what we needed today. And would you care to read what’s written on your dingy office wall? Oh, forget it I will read it you in case you don’t know how to read. It says, Mabilis na Serbisyo!"

The moron just rolled his eyes. I wished his eyes stuck in there in perpetuam.

During my turn, he just clicked the camera and captured my still angry and ngarag face. I was not even given the standard 1…2… 3… click so that I could have fixed my self and posed with my good angle which I have been practicing at home in the mirror. I was furious that I wanted to gouge his innards through his mouth and strangle him with his own intestines.

The following day I finally got my NBI Clearance. My image looked like somebody just shoved my face into the photocopy machine and ran it.

Now, I understand why most of the pictures in the NBI clearances are unflattering.

Mush Day

Poor me I do not have date today. Well, technically. Today I celebrated the mush day with someone... only vicariously. Call me whatever you want but I watch again my most romantic movies.

In the movie, “Bull Durnham” I am Kevin Costner. With a heart fraught with the throes of love I said the following dialogue to Susan Sarandon:

“I believe in the soul, the dawn, the evening, the small of a woman’s back, the sweet spot, soft-core pornography, opening your presents Christmas morning rather than Christmas Eve, and I believe in long slow soft wet kisses that last three days.”

I am Nicolas Cage in the movie "Moonstruck" when he said:

“Love doesn’t make things nice, it ruins everything. It breaks your heart, it makes things a mess! We aren’t here to make things perfect. The stars are perfect, not us. We are here to ruin ourselves and break our hearts and love the wrong people and die. Now, I want you to come upstairs with me and get in my bed.”

Finally, in the movie “The Fly” I am Jeff Goldblum when Geena Davis spouted:

“I just want to eat you up. That’s why old ladies pinch babies. It’s the flesh. It just makes you crazy.”

Happy Valentines day!

Make-over

I looked at myself at the mirror and my dejected reflection looked back at me. I noticed that my hairline has receded so that a plane could land on my forehead. Wrinkles started appearing on my forehead and crow’s feet has emerged beneathe my eyes. It dawned on me that I am getting older faster than I thought.

You see, I always have this delusion that I have this perpetually boyish charm. I remember when I was working as a personnel officer in a big company, nobody took me seriously because they thought I was too young. I was 25 then. They say I have boyish face and voice, and I do not exude credibility. I took that as a complement but I compensated it with my efficiency in my work. Maybe I dwelled in that delusion for quite a long time.

Or law school has a peculiar way of transforming a person physically.

“You know what? You need a make over.”

My friend Narcissus told me one time when we were planning to hunt for a job after the bar exam.

“You need a hair cut, a facial and shave.”

“What’s wrong with my look?” I asked.

I have always maintained a goatee. I wanted a scruffy-artsy look because law school reeked with the squeaky-clean formality. I loathe suits, wrinkle free lacks and sleek leather shoes.

“You look forty.”

I didn’t take it seriously until lately. Every girl I met or introduced to me called me kuya. Any romantic interest died instantly.

I never go to fancy parlors. Whenever I need a haircut I go to my ever reliable barber who only charges 50 bucks. I have only one hairstyle and he can cut my hair with his eyes closed. Neither do I use cosmetics and perfumes. I only use soaps, dash of powder to conceal the shine on my face, deodorants and cologne.

My friend on the other hand is a typical metrosexual. He regularly flexes his muscles in the gym, monitors his calories and protein intakes. He plans his ward robes, and use perfumes the name of which sounded like the sleazy tabloid (ah… yes I remember, Bulgari).He shops in Greenbelt or Glorietta and his shoes cost an entire month salary of an ordinary employee. He is not ashamed of applying a lip gloss publicly. No, he is not gay.


So I called him. I said I need a hair cut.

He took me to a parlor called Bench Fix in Greenhills and introduced me to his hair dresser Renee. I learned that hair cuts were on appointments. The parlor was surrounded by posters of Diether, Sam Milby and John Pratts in crazy hairstyles. The atmosphere was sharp and intimidating.

I was led to a chair. I was surrounded by Matronas in flaming orange hairs. When I took off my cap, Reneee touched my hair and assessed its condition. Then he alerted his assistants in a language that resembled the squeaks of dolphins and hiss of snakes. As if he is faced with a very challenging job and he needed backup.

My hair is wavy and thus naturally dry. It seemed to have a life of its own and it always appear in such a way that it always parted mid way like the Red Sea after Moses swung his staff. This, despite assiduous combing and application of hair gel.

The assistants came armed with different kinds of scissors as if i am a patient in the OR which badly needed an operation.

He asked me what kind of style I wanted. I told him I wanted a short, hip and one that could make me younger than my age.

In a heart beat he snipped and snapped my hair with great dexterity. For a moment, I'm was glued in my seat praying that my ears would not end up on the floor.

In a few minutes the assistant came with a blow dryer and powder. She dusted off the hairs on my face and shirt. Renee came back with something called petroleum wax. He dabbed a little sporadically on my hair, with his manicured fingers he raised the hairs at the back in such a way that they point upwards in one direction and he combed the front flat- style currently on the rounds which I abhor.Then he made some finishing touches.

"Look at you, you look 18!" He says it while cupping my face with his hands with great pizzazz that it looked fake.

I gave him a look I reserve only to those six legged creatures crawling in our bathroom before I squish them with my slippers.

I look like a gay boy under chemotherapy.

Now I am homicidal. I wanted to kill my friend. In the meantime I have to stay home, grow my hair back. When I go out, I have to wear a cap to hide the shame.

The Woman With a Missing Finger

I hibernated for a month in the province. That explains the quite long hiatus. For those who have been following this blog, kung meron, pasensiya.

I spent most of the time on a drinking spree with relatives and friends, cooking and experimenting with local spices, helping in our little family business, brainstorming for a theme in our cluttered receiving room, and story telling with my two little nephews.

The latter was a mistake. After I told the story of an old woman with a missing finger, I was bugged perpetually by these little devils, prodding me to tell the story again and again. I had to feign sleep or illness so they would not bother me, but to no avail. Sometimes they do sweet things to bribe me like giving me massage, helping me in the kitchen, running errand or giving a pack of Marlboro they stole from our sari- sari store. If all of these failed they would threaten to hit my eyeballs with their laser pellet guns.

I suspect that it is the gory part that delights them. I am alarmed because they seem to love violence: They are fanatics of Japanese cartoons; they love with passion John Cena and Batista. One time I was watching a Takeshi Kitano’ flick, they violently protested when I tried shoo them away or close their eyes during the slashing, gutting and the dismembering part of the movie.

I don’t know who came up with this story. I heard it first when I was only five years old and It was passed on like urban legend.

The story goes:

In a faraway village, there lived an old woman with her only child. One day, the old woman was sick and was dying. Convinced that she had few days to live she said to her daughter her last will

“My child, when I m dead do not remove my ring. I want to bring it in my grave”

“Yes my poor mother, whatever you say. But why leave me so soon? What will become of me? How can I live without you? Don’t die my poor mother…” she cried.

The mother died. The daughter turned out to be cruel and haughty. She thought that ring could cost a fortune so she tried to remove it from her mother’s finger. But the ring stuck and she could not remove. She got a bolo and hacked the finger.

Then she buried her mother.

One cold and rainy night, the daughter heard a knock from the door. When she opened the door there was an old woman.

“I am thirsty my child, please give me glass of water” the old woman said.

She took pity on the old woman who was shivering and drenched in the rain, she told her to come in. Then she gave her a glass of water.

When the old woman took the glass of water, the girl noticed the missing ring finger…..

“Oh god! You…. are…. My mother!” she cried.

The end.



I love how my nephews would freeze in fright during the climax.

The story is supposed to be suspense. To create a suspenseful and frightening effect there is a technique in telling the story. For instance, during the part where the girl heard a knock up to the part where she noticed the missing finger, you hold back, make sure that your audience is absorbed… in suspended animation and then throw the climax. The original story of course is in our dialect and the effect may be lost in translation.

I have told the story for the nth time. To maximize to fright effect I adorn it with some gothic detail a la Edgar Allan Poe like howling dogs, rolling empty casket… or add gory details a la Wes Craven slashers like the use of an axe to cut the finger instead of a bolo, or the finger would roll on the floor and blood would spurt.

But the fright effect was killed when my nephew later noticed the flaws in my story: How come the old woman is thirsty when she is shivering and wet? How can blood spurt from a dead person?

Merry Christmush

Today is not merry-sunshine-how-bright-you-are-now day. There are no puppies, doves and cotton candies in the sky. Instead it is dark and gloomy. I look outside; it is drizzling. The dour morning conjured a dingy indistinct landscape of the city slippery, wet and moist. I wish I am in Wuthering Heights. But I am not Heathcliff and I long for my Catherine Earnshaw.

I see silver bells glistening, poinsettias blooming. I hear Christmas songs playing on the airwaves.

Is it me or just the chemical reaction induced by the so called Pavlov’s Classical conditioning? It is Christmas and I feel nostalgic.

Ok, maybe I just miss someone. It is one of those days I feel a gush of creative expression. I want to create something. I could throw colors on a canvass but I am not a painter. I could play the violin and make dogs howl but…I came out with this lousy poem…


Once gain, here I am longing… wanting…
I know the universe will arrange itself
Circumstances will conspire
The gods will connive
To contract and distort time and distance
To unite two souls put asunder.

That is why here I am longing… wanting…
I feel you in every droplets of water in my shower
I feel you as I hold my teacup every morning.
I feel you as I put on my rubber slippers
I feel you behind my curtains rustling.
I am longing…wanting…
Painstakingly begging Waiting for every sign
from break of dawn
Till the vesper bell rings.
That one day you materialize even in my dreams
But each passing day, yearning is tormenting,
bitter sweet

I am longing...wanting
But I take refuge in my heart,
Where at its deepest core it has magical ability
To keep ethereal moments past.


I know… I know I am not a poet. Stop laughing now. Merry Christmas.

Wrath of Beelzebub

“Wake up, you idiot! Do you know what time is it?”

Mama screamed as if whole neighborhood has been razed by fire and I was the only cretin left behind. No, she is not miles away from me trying to get my attention. In fact she is just beside my bed thinking I was feigning sleep and just too lazy to get up. This is her normal way of expressing herself: shouting. Imagine if she is upset. I am used to her megaphone voice but I was jolted from a really deep sleep. I slept late that night because I vowed to finish the thick and dark The Brothers Karamazov; plus I had recurring nightmares of Grushenka. I was terribly annoyed that I could shove my pillow into her mouth for disturbing my slumber but I could not do it because well, she is my mother and we suppose to loooove and respect our dear mothers.

For as long as I can remember, my mother wakes up before sunrise regardless of the time she slept that night. To wake before the sun is up or we will be left behind was her constant reminder. This is one thing she always pound on us which we ignored with delight. We found it senseless to wake up so early on weekends. We attribute this obsession to her being raised during the famine where they had to work hard and pine for relief coming from the government in order to survive.


I have always been afraid of my mother more than my father. In the world of male chauvinism and women discrimination, she was never the submissive and the martyr type. Looking back, I could not imagine how she managed to raise seven little devils. She has balls the size of Jupiter. She is so much involved in us to the point of controlling our lives. In her own words: I know better. She hardly pinched or whipped but her mouth was her most potent weapon. If the invectives she spews could kill, maybe she should have been indicted for genocide together with Milosevic. My father, the seven of us her children, our neighbors, my fathers’ relatives, drivers, sales ladies are the unsuspecting objects of her daily wrath.

“Hey, get up, lazy boy. Get your ass off to the table, or you’ll be eating my goddamned fist for breakfast”.

I play dead. I did not move and I tried to doze off for a few more minutes.

“If I come up again and you didn’t fix your bed yet. We all know what will happen,” She warned.

She moved out of my room. I heard her going downstairs. It was followed by the incessant whistling of the kettle, the clangs of the utensils and our radio in full volume. I know she does this on purpose. She has a singular talent of annoying people and she does it with great panache. She never stops until you yield.

The arias of discordant noises were killing me softly. I dragged my carcass out of my magnet bed and crawled downstairs or ill be the object of Beelzebub’s wrath again. I gobble a pandesal then leisurely swill my coffee.

“Move you ass off. Go fetch water. Take a bath or well be late for the first mass,’ she growled.

Its Sunday and it its time for that a-family-that-prays-together-stays-together thing. I hate Sundays. I never liked mass. One, I could not handle the torture of boring sermon. Two, I want to slither away from my mother's long cherished religion.

“I won’t go to mass,” I drawled

“Say that again?”

She puffed a cloud of smoke. She crushed her half-finished cigarette into the ashtray with her long manicured fingernails. I saw smoke coming from her nostrils.

“You heard me.”

I cowered behind the table, anticipating 1000 lashes.

I know this is not the proper time to discuss but I figured I am no longer a young boy who should be told to do the do the proper thing. I thought its time I should stand up for my own convictions.

I was 18 then, young and intoxicated with a great dose of philosophy of Sartre, Camus, Nietzsche, Feuerback and I wanted to declare with sheer arrogance my personal angst, my profound understanding of life and the world. If they do not understand me, it does not matter. I was then a member of an underground organization who believes in an alternative view of life. We spent most of our time discussing Jacques Derrida and Bertrand Russell and humanistic philosophy. Often we shock people with our Weltanschauung. We look down upon those who do not share our views as the docile herd- unfeeling and unthinking. We loathe with passion the unfeeling… the unthinking.


“I do not have any religion. I am an atheist.”


“A… what?” her thin penciled eyebrows went to orbit.

She was probably thinking I was using metaphor. But the thought of that soft sweet fruit having numerous black seeds confused her.

“I do not believe in God any more!”

I wanted to quote Nietzsche: “The death of god is the birth of a superman; the new enlightened man who would trample upon the feeble Christian values.” Not believing in God will bring about a newer and higher phase of human history. The superman will be the highest form of human evolution.

Or Jean Paul Sartre: Man is the creator for his essence alone. Without god he will rely on his strengths, he will work his ass off. He will not depend on some divine intervention. Religion is the biggest impediment for man to achieve his own potential. It makes man docile and weak.

Or Ludwig Feuerback: Religion is an instrument of established power to perpetuate its influence by permanently incapacitating those who fight against it. It is a form of social control.

Long pause and then…

“Ayeeeeee!”

My mother shouted in a way that could wake up the dead. Then she fainted.

Dear Pareng Jomar

(An open letter to my childhood friend Pareng Jomar who is now an architect in Singapore)

I know this letter is long overdue. My apologies for not responding to your letter immediately. I had been perpetually caved in my mousehole since I enrolled in law school. It’s been a long time since I visited home; so I do not have news. I only decided to go home after constant cajoling and coaxing of Mama. I gathered it would be the perfect place to relax after the tedious and heart rending preparation for the bar exam. So there.

There isn’t really much change since you left seven years ago.

The roads leading to town is repaired and concretized. No longer you’ll be choked with the swirling dust or annoyed with the rattling stones and deep potholes when you get home. It's now the perfect time to buy a new car.

I am saddened though by the demolition of our make-shift hut near the road at Aling Loting where we usually jam together and discuss our dreams over a plate of fried grasshoppers and beetles. A waiting shed was built there named after the mayor in big and neon letters. In fact, every waiting shed on the street is named after him. Aling Adeng no longer sells there; she flew to Hongkong to become a maid. I really miss her betamax (coagulated chicken blood), helmet (chicken head) adidas (chicken feet) or IUD (chicken innards), our favorite pulutan.


Remember Aling Nita’s nipa where we used to play tong its? It was transformed into a ten-room palace. Her lesbian daughter, worked as a care giver in the States. She must have been earning a lot of dollars because she engaged herself in an unbridled house construction. All Her siblings wanted to live there. They did not get along well so they tried to kill each other.

Don Imo, the despicable land lord who tried to cheat us with our wage when we worked in their farm died of a terrible affliction. Obscure cancer cells grew from his crotch into a considerable amount until he could no longer get up. All his properties went to hospitalization bills. His lowly tenant whose son is a seaman bought his land. Talk about Karma. Rumor has it that it was Aling Sima, the Witch through a magical spell killed him because he refused to let her borrow a ganta of rice when she begged from him. The same Mangkukulam whom your mother thought was responsible for your uncle Turo’s death although the doctor said he had acute Tuberculosis.

Aling Dalena never retired from whoring despite several assaults on her person by the wives of the husband whom he stole including their income. In fact some of the women who envy her new lips tick, other cosmetics, necklace and cell phone became whores also and made it their career. Based on the description of my mother- orange-dyed hair, unusually fair face fairer than rest of her body- I think we have over ten whores here already. Maybe their guilt compelled them to clean themselves through assiduous application of astringent on their face, (or is it Chin chun zu?) to remove the grime and filth they feel. I hate to tell you but get ready for this: Nene you childhood sweetheart became a whore too.

Our sari-sari store still stands. We still supply the basic needs of the neighborhood from sardines to nails for coffin. Our best seller tuyo is no longer patronized because as one mother claimed: Napaparami kain mga bata ng kanin. Sa hirap ng buhay ngayon kailangan maghipit ng sinturon. The whole Soriano clan from the great grand mother to her great grand daughter has been our loyal costumers. They still buy armed with various sizes of bottles: the mayonnaise bottle was for two-peso Bagoong, the Tanduay Rhum bottle for five-peso lard, the gin bottle for one-peso soy sauce or vinegar. Mama who should sell a bulb of garlic for three pesos divides it into cloves for a peso to fit the buying capacity of our neighbors.

I could no longer find the large mango tree of Aling Iling where we used to climb- the mango tree was a mute witness to our rich childhood. I was told that it was uprooted by the bulldozer to make way for a road to reach the heart of the farmland courtesy of a congressman during the campaign period. After the election however, it was abandoned unfinished.

How could I forget? Under that mango we, little rascals organized by 12- year old Rey, a scheming gay boy, pledged allegiance together. It was where we hatched plans to attack the rival group from a nearby neighborhood. It is where we conspired crimes masterminded by Rey: to steal ripe mangoes of Aling Iling, coconuts of Mang Berting, the young corns of Don Imo. Once, we were caught stealing the large steel kettle of an old man thinking that it would cost much when weighed in the junkshop. Father whipped me to shreds and I was made to kneel over mongo seeds. Under that mango tree, Mang Kuset split our foreskins to make us men while we chew the guava buds.

Etched in that mango tree was your side kick Bong’s declaration of an unrequited love of a gal not of the same status: I heart Sharon (with a heart pierced with an arrow). Because of that heart break he never went back to school.He became a bonafide tambay. He spent the rest of his life swilling cheap wines. Only later I found out he was murdered, hacked with a bolo by a stranger in our neighborhood because of a petty altercation.

Under that mango tree, we played hide and seek under a full moon or role playing the TV soap Yagit. Nene was Joselyn, Ingga was Elisa tony was Tom Tom, Yolly was the villainess Dona Claudia. You, because you are manly and menacing are the tulisan Mang Damaso who would kidnap Jocelyn and the rest of the Batang Yagit. Our child play turned out to be the sexual awakening of the some of the girls. And the naughty you, lost your virginity at age of 12.


Our infamous multi-purpose building where we used to play basketball still stands. It’s still called multi-purpose because during week days, it serves as a school for kindergartens, during weekends it becomes a basket ball court. At night since it is not well lighted, strange things happen. People say that it was infested by spirits, moaning spirit that is. We both know that there are no ghosts in there but the Barangay chairman molesting young boys for 20 pesos. Occasionally, during holidays and fiestas it becomes a dancing hall for fundraising projects. You were always excited for you can dance a lady of your type for 5 pesos. Barrio ladies were then coy and modest -the abaniko fanning ladies who cover mouth with their hanky when they smile and who just flutter their eyelashes when you talk to them.

I am sure you miss swimming in the river. The Cagayan River was our playground. We swam, dived, built sand castles. We bathed our carabaos after grazing, wash our clothes, scrape charcoaled kettles and pots, rubbed our tar tared teeth with the sand. We peeked at young girls’ breasts and mounds.

The river’s imposing beauty was abandoned and forsaken by our barrio folks. Nobody swam and washed there except for few farmers. It has eroded hectares of land including ours. It has claimed many lives. I was told that beneath the river resides a beautiful but avenging mermaid Zirena who has claimed the lives or pretty girls and handsome boys. The former to be her slaves while the latter to become her husband. For five years in row, at least a life had been sacrificed.

They are very serious in their effort stop Zirena. They, mostly mothers even lobbied to the local legislators to enact ordinance outlawing swimming in the river. They organized a full-force team that would capture the Zirena and jail her. Although I just grumbled since every effort is futile to make them realize their prizewinning idiocy, I imagined it’s kind of amusing to put to jail a nude and scaled Dyesebel in a bath tub.

This year, the mermaid will be out again looking for the next victim, they warned. She’s waiting for the right timing. I never thought they were that frigging serious until Mama alerted the whole neighborhood armed with bolos and spears to fetch me upon learning that I went alone swimming in the river. My mother almost fainted. I assured her that the mermaid will never take because I am not handsome. Unless of course she likes scruffy looking guys… er, the likes of Brad Pitt.

I can go on and on like Pigafetta chronicling every change here but my fingers are getting numb… unless of course you buy me a laptop. I heard it’s a lot cheaper there.


Hasta la vista,
lante

Marooned in Recto Station*

It was 6:00 when I reached Recto station. The rain began to pour and the wind was portentous. Suddenly I found myself in a different world I never knew existed before: so cinematic reminiscent of Tim Burton gothic movies. I took my MP3 and Pearl Jam underscored:

“The ocean is full for everyone is crying. The sorrow gets bigger and the sorrow is denied. The full moon is looking for a friend in high tide.”

The cold dusk seeped through my spine. Neon lights barely perceptible in a night shrouded with a dark mantle. From my view, I could see the outline of the building like a giant monolith, mournful in the gloomy sky.

Lightning crashed.

I saw shadows darting across the opaque and rickety metals and walls darkened by soot and dirt. I shouted but no one paid attention. Nobody seemed to care I existed.

Yonder, I saw the spires of the San Sebastian church, the cross of the Quiapo church stabbed the sky. The protruding iron bars of under constructed flyover, and the dangling shards and barbed wire of dilapidated buildings violently slashed the rotten street.

Rain poured harder. The street bled. Clogged canals coughed and spurted gore. Manholes sputtered roaches and rodents hunting for the cadaver. And then, from the decaying Avenida came out Magdalenas like swarms of maggots. I smelled the stench of moist decaying flesh. Human cannibals lustily came like new terrorists.

The earth shook as thunder roared like furious beast. And then silence: I hear the beggar serenades in a song, doleful like vesper bells. I dropped a coin into his empty Mc Donald’s cup.

Just then the train came and I hurried home.

I was home finally. I returned to my mousehole were I sought comfort with my pillows, blanket and my own illusions and make believes.

I envy the unfeeling and the unthinking.

"The feeling we can’t leave behind. The meaning we can’t leave behind. Our innocence lost in one time. We are different behind the eyes. There is no need to hide."

_______
*written sometime ago

The Road to Tantalus

The jeep crawled itself like a lazy slug to the station.

Perennially haunted by the idea that whenever I miss first the train and the sliding door closes before me, one possibility of life which might be instrumental to my destiny would be lost forever - yes, the movie Sliding Doors- I squeezed into the already bulging train and disappeared from the sliding door.

Then, I found myself in a throng of corporate slaves. They were sleek in their wrinkle-free designer suits and shoes. They reeked of Ralph Lauren fragrances, shimmered in their designer watches and latest gadgets. I felt like I was Patrick Bateman in the movie American Psycho.

In a flash, I passed the same route again. The train like the scheming serpent in the Genesis passed through the road between Ortigas and Ayala. I gawked and I lustily reached through the billboards like giant trees virtually laden with all my dreams in life: shop-all-you-can Citibank credit card, Ferrari, house and lot in a posh village, signature wardrobes, savvy watches and mobiles, designer pharmaceuticals endorsed by flawless models, picture perfect family dining in Pancake House, “Live your dreams” promise of an insurance company, Vicky Belo's guarantee of perfect body.

Borgy Manotoc, KC Concepcion, Kris Aquino, Gretchen Barretto and Paris Hilton were inviting and enticing everyone in their gleaming paradiso.

But I was the helpless Tantalus. Their branches moved away from me. They eluded my every reach.

Past Taft Avenue, the serpent train shed its skin, metamorphosed into a giant maggot: the LRT train. Then it nipped through the rotten street of Manila. This time I found myself in a different class of people; I smelled the stench of the pawis of the proletariat worming their way to the factories.

I was one of them. I am one of those faceless thousands who plod through life with anonymity, resignation and retarded ambition.

Aaargh!

I thought it was one of those simple twists of faith but I figured I am being singled out for a terrible retribution for some previous misdeeds.

I became a teacher.

My friend Troy who is in the human resources in a company that runs those computers schools that abound in the streets of Metro Manila summoned me to fill a teaching vacancy. Apparently his boss had been heckling him to provide a teacher. He did not have a pool of applicants, so he called me up; his last desperate resort.

You see, I do not claim mastery of the English language. Sure, I have ample English units. Sure, I was an editor in our school paper during my high school days and tutored Korean students back in college. But I don’t think those will qualify me to teach English to college students.

What the heck. I have been bumming around for like months already and I needed bucks. I was lusting for an ipod, so I accepted the offer.

The following morning, I made a power point presentation on Subject- Verb Agreement before the school administration. As luck would have it, I was hired. I did not know it would be the start of my hellish life (insert horror soundtrack here). I was not forewarned.

Whoever said that teaching is a noble profession, I want to strangle him and ask him: What were you thinking! Were you even thinking!?

Teaching English is like- to borrow a line from one comedian- walking in a tight rope while eating a live chicken and doing Sisa’s mad scene at the same time (Parang tumutulay sa alambre habang kumakain ng buhay na manok at sumisigaw ng “Crispin! Basilio! Nasaan ang mga anak ko!”)

I did not know where to start. My students’ knowledge of the English language can be summed up in two words: What’s up! and cool. Ok, three words. Constructing sentence is a daunting task like finding a needle in a heap of hay. Students do not know the difference between is and are. One time a student gave a sentence, and he drawled: The dog is bark (sic). I thought it was hilarious but he was not even trying to be funny. For a moment, I wanted to get my two barreled gun and shoot him. But I composed my self and explained the proper form of the verb.

There are too much clutter and self-expression in the class room. Students can ask and the most stupid things ever imagined. They can even unabashedly bare their Id when prompted. A girl once shrieked until her tonsils burst just because, well, she just wanted to do it.

They come in school in their gothic outfits complete with make up and bling-blings like rejects from Adam’s Family Values or Tim Burton movies or in their tattered jeans and advocacy shirts in Swastika symbols, Hashish, Mao, Che Guevara, Bob Marley or (gasp!) porn star. Do they know what those icons mean? Senseless coolness.

Their crazy ringing tones annoy the hell out of me that I wanted to shove their cell phones into their mouth to relieve myself. They have extremely ambidextrous hands that they can text using both hands with their long manicured fingers. Their toes even. Still, others are oblivious of what is happening in the class room. They hang their bored heads in their seats with earphones plugged in their eardrums.

There are times that I would explode with seething rage and would run amuck or I am tempted to hurl myself into the speeding train at EDSA. There are times were I have to resist from slamming someonelse’s face into the concrete wall.

I wanted to give up. I am not Michelle Pfeiffer in the movie Dangerous Minds. I am more like Uma Thurman in the movie Kill bill, prone to gutting and dismembering.

I can see the headlines now:TEACHER ON A KILLING SPREE INSIDE THE CLASROOM.

Dura Lex..Pyrex

The law is harsh and sets its ways but it is the law—dura lex sed lex - and yet jurisprudence has wittingly proved it to be breakable to favor some powerful class- dura lex, pyrex (I stole that term somewhere).

A couple of months ago, I met my friend Dedalus, who I learned returned to law school, during an annual fair in my former school. I asked him how was he faring along this time in law school.

“I quit,” he croaked.

I nearly choked with the squid ball I was munching and before I could utter my line: “Again? For crying out loud?” He declaimed, “See those walls?” pointing to the Malcolm Hall where the College of Law is, “There is nothing in there.” I replied: “Duh. Like, have you been overdosed lately with those dark and disturbing books of Ivan Turgenev and Fyodor Dostoyevsky?" mimicking the cono twang which he loathe with passion. "How many orgasms have you reached today?", I spurted.

Intellectual orgasms, that is. That is his favorite past time. He's always in deep thought, always in trance.You ask simple question like, how are you? and he quotes from Schopenhauer or lines from Nietzche's Thus Spake Zarathustra. Dedalus shrugged, in deep and philosophical mood he launched: “The law is merely a legitimizing principle for the imposition of the wants of the ruling class over the rest of the subject citizens. For example, when capitalists, landlords and wealthy individuals are in power it is no surprise that laws both confirm and support their interests from those of others”.

“No wonder some of our laws are anti-labor and anti-land reform”, I drawled.

“You?” he asked.

Inspired by his social dialectics, I said: “Oh well, the study of law consists of four to five Sisyphean years. Consider: Everyday I was forced to memorize books of legislations and jurisprudence and regurgitated it in class before Ptolemy, Ad nauseum.”

“Perhaps law schools should welcome rigorous dialectical discussions on the basis of legality of laws rather than dismiss such inquiry as moot and academic.” He said.

The following morning, I read in the papers that the president issued proclamation 1017 placing the entire country under a state of emergency, all in an effort to gag media and curtail protests against her administration.

Dedalus just proved his point.

When I entered law school, I had grand dreams. I aspired to become Atticus Finch in Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird, or Jan Schlictmann in A Civil Action championing the cause of my clients. Today, I was reduced to the raving Schizophrenic Ally Mc Beal.