The Sound of a Broken Dish

Unmindful of her dishwashing, Faye my daughter, slipped a bowl from her hand, it crashed on the floor. The shattered sound thundered in my brain. It woke up my childhood memories.

 

It’s Faye’s first time to break a dish. Her face pale. She spun around poised herself in front of her Mom. Mur, not distracted.

 

“Don’t worry. Careful.  Picking up the shards,”.

 

Faye expunged a sigh.

 

The props I saw, the dialog, the impression I kept, flash backed. The scene exposed the cruelties of the old times. It anchored on the broken dish.

 

The scene between Faye and Mur occurred in our century old kitchen when we lived at Victor Street. The same scene took place in our dysfunctional hut between my mother and sister when we lived in the Philippines.

 

My mother dubbed our house as the Dove’s house. Often, she spoke of it in spite.

 

Mur pitched to Faye caring and unblaming words. While my mother then, ranted off indignant barbs.

 

“It’s not shard-money we buy those dishes,”.  Her favorite.

 

“You want me to necklace you with that broken pieces?”. Her second favorite. My mother shivered in anger. She pinched my sister’s groin. My sister cried in pain.

 

My sister did not intend to break that dish. Neither my mother wanted to get high strung or hurt my sister. I blamed it on time. The creator of spirit to go awry.

 

My mother, to help with my father’s scrimpy income, she slaved up with our relatives whom she thought are rich. Little did she know, she’s being exploited.

 

In my mother’s absence, she designated my sister as the mother in charge. At age nine, she skipped her childhood, and jumped to motherhood. And being a mother, she usurped her power dividing our breakfast, myself getting the little ration, yet I am the eldest. I couldn’t dare question her authority.

 

When my mother got home, if she found things not to her liking, she lectured my sister. My sister couldn’t just let it passed. She answered back. She challenged my mother’s verbal assault. And she got my mother’s palm on her mouth.

 

Such a big job my mother laid on my sister’s shoulder. At her tender age she knew why our mother had been that way.

 

My mother wanted a decent home stripped of the indignities of a cave dweller. She aimed to live beyond food.

 

She wanted other things; toothpaste, soaps, towels, pillow cases, furniture and other civilized things. Whenever she scrimps  money, she bought these things beyond food. And if those civilized things got wasted or broken, it devastated her. Blinded by rage, she ignored how my sister make up a home out of a Dove’s house.

 

My sister worked as a kitchen-helper in a small kitchenette near the Baliwag Academy School. Her purpose: for us, to live beyond food. She got paid one peso per day for ten hours work. The kitchenette had a leaking sink. As she wet her feet most of the time, she developed a swelling legs.

 

When my sister handed in her thirty pesos earning to my mother, she looked up to our Nipa ceilings, to cover her eyes. But her tears fell.

 

She bought my sister a Wintergreen, a twelve pesos ointment to appease my sister’s swelling legs.

 

Then asked my mother to buy herself a curtain, a new sleeping mat for us and another pillow, so that my third sister not share with my fourth sister. Mother never let my sister worked on the kitchenette again.

 

I hated recalling these scenes.  But it always comes back whenever a dish crashed.

 

A “Tule” Tale

Mur talked about Rico, my one week old grandson should have his circumcision early. So, it shouldn’t be as painful when it gets done.

I chuckled as I remembered when I had mine.

I considered myself as a slow bloomer. Kids my age at Riles grew taller and faster. I envied their mischief. I drooled over their truancy and escapades. If I get circumcised, I passed the rites of passage. That’s one step to adulthood.

The boys in our neighborhood circumcised at Grade 4. I had mine in 6. So eager to have it done. I feared not of the pain: slicing off that sheath cover of my penis head.

I asked Gara, a Jueteng bet collector who conducted circumcision in our barrio, if mine is ready. He looked at it.

“Not ready yet. Exercise it.” He said.

“How?” I asked.

“Keep pushing inward the sheath covering of your penis.

“What?”

“The ‘burat’ make it show!”

Every day I exercise my pecker.

During my summer break, I showed my prick to Gara.

“Hmm Okay, prepare my Kingscup.” That’s his smoke – his fee.

“Do dressing.” a square of cloth with a hole in the middle.

“I’ll see you at the Irrigation Canal together with the other kids.”

At the Irrigation Canal with three younger kids, Gara told us to get naked and soaked ourselves to the water. I wondered… Why do we do that?

An hour later, under the shade of a Guava tree, Gara told us to chew the shoots of the Guava leaves. What’s that for?

Circumcision is one of the great spectacles in the barrio. It draws a big crowd and make fun of the kids who cry harder and who pass out because of the pain.

Gara drew out his instrument. A glistening barber’s knife and a twig of a tree shaped small letter “r”. called “batakan,” used to snug in the foreskin covering the head of the penis.

I cringed at the sight of the barber’s knife. Two of the spectators took hold of my arm. Meanwhile, I chewed that shoots of the Guava leaves. Gara snugged my pecker to the “batakan”.

My eyes closed tight.

“Ready?”

I quit. Tempted to say. But I had been waiting for this. The knife touched my skin. It went deep slicing my foreskin.

“OUCH!” I tore apart the heaven above. I spat the chewed Guava leaves on my prick. The crowd jubilant.

Then Gara dressed it up.

“You shouldn’t look at girls”, Gara told me. “it will make your penis swollen.

I had four sisters in our household. How can I do that? And besides, how mere looking cause my pecker to swell…?

I am puzzled. Apart from bathing in the Irrigation Canal and the spitting off the chewed leaves.

My pecker swelled as big as a ripe tomato!

Two weeks bathing my penis with boiled Guava leaves and dress changing, it started to heal.

When I get older, it reminded me of the traditional circumcision method. I found an answer to my juvenile questions. The dipping of the body in the Irrigation Canal is a substitute for Anesthesia. It didn’t do any good. The chewing of shoots of the Guava leaves and spitting it to the pecker after the cut is infectious. The advice is a myth. A cover up for infection.

Today circumcision is painless and easy. How lucky Rico be, depending if her mom followed the Filipino Tradition.

A well-thought out Scam Modus

 

A friend request popped out on one of my FB accounts. Picky granting friends requests, I have to check the person’s profile. Do we have mutual friends? Who are they? Does this person’s post interesting?

 

Her profile is bare.  Her photos, appeared to be she’s in a military office with her supposed superior accepting military awards. She’s a middle-aged military woman who said she works in the US Army, stationed in Aleppo Syria.  Hmmm… She’s a wealth of information of US army’s life amid war.

 

After a week of short, rapid, spurts, of chats, she tried to scam me.

 

On a pretext, she and her troops going on a mission in parts of Syria, apart from the Syria’s American Military Camp. insinuating this could mean her demise. She wanted me to help her establish a business. If she survives, she will retire. She intended to send me 750,000 thousand US dollars. She suggested we chat on WhatsApp to secure our conversation.

 

Too good to be true. But I played along. I tested her. I asked her to send me the 1000 dollars and put the rest on a separate account with documentation – as the bank could investigate. This is money laundering.

 

Banks in Syria are closed? I will send the money through the diplomatic way.

 

Meanwhile, we exchange Postal home and email address.

 

Our security will handle this, she said.

 

I wanted to act vulnerable.  I repeated what she said.

 

“By diplomatic you mean, the U.S. Government allows you to send the whole $750,000?”

 

“I know how to do it. That’s how Government send money abroad.  So leave that to me.  I Am the law. I know what to do. Okay,”

 

The address and email she sent, I googled it.  Google says it’s a Mall in Texas. And she got a paid email address I had never heard of, featured with an encryption with self destruct option, disappearing at an appointed time. Her text, too, accented. It sounded East Indians. She always ended her sentences with a “You” word  and capitalized it.

 

These clues didn’t disturb me yet.

 

Then the supposed Courier Company emailed her, that the box,  passed at Damascus, Syria. Half a day passed, the email, disappeared.

 

She sent me the photos of the Courier Company from Las Vegas…? It alerted me.  It came from Syria. which contains the suppose 750,000 US dollars to make me salivate.  But declared its contents as documents,  medals, and treasures for her family.

 

She followed it up with photos of her troops airborne, a suitcase with US dollars,  plaque, and documents.

 

She sent a message, they arrived at their mission. One of her soldiers wounded, but survived.

 

Further, she informed that before I get the box, I had to pay 1,300 US dollars for Insurance.

 

This is a different story now. It’s a scam. I said. I don’t have that kind of money. When the box arrived, I’ll open it and fish 13 pieces of 100 dollar bills to pay for its insurance.

 

You made me worried. She said.

 

I am too. I said.

 

What will I do?

 

Return the box to the sender. I said.

 

One day after, her FB account disappeared.

 

 

 

Little Voices

In my mind’s eye, I saw a man slithered like a snake on the gritty surface.

A James Bond music competes with insects’ noises. Clicked!  A latch flipped.

Pepit who sat on my side fidgeted.

The man in my mind’s eye opened a window flaked with rust. The window squeaked. and later yielded. Shards of broken glass crashed down.

“Little voices can make you a doctor,”.

“What!” I yelled. I didn’t know which made me mad first: his silly message or bad breath.

All the surrounding kids listening to Tata Menggoy’s radio growled in anger.

Bang… Bang

Gunshot echoed from Tata Menggoy’s radio

A body fell with a big thud!

Silence… The victim of the fatal shot, pleaded…

“Si… sino ka?”

“Ako ang batas. Tawagin mo na lamang akong …Lagalag” the hero’s voice said.

The James Bond music faded. Entered the Tide commercial.

Pepit is an incurable killjoy. He’s happy when you’re miserable. And when you enjoy life he’s detestable.

I  listened to “Lagalag,” and he intoned this “little voices” crap.

“Imagine! Little voices can make one a doctor. You said your father didn’t have the money for your schooling. Solved! Little  voices is all you need.”

“That’s brilliant! I bopped him. Tata Menggoy threw us. We violated one cardinal rule for listening to his radio.  No talking!

“You better make that ‘little voices’ of yours good, because if not, I’ll get your share of that banana bunch we’re ripening in Mang Dehino’s old hut”. I said, when we get to Pritil, our hangout.”

“It was Inong Isabela who told me the little voices”.

I bopped him again.

“Inong Isabela! The  town idiot?!”

Inong Isabela is a Rillis historian, but only in his sane mood.

“Listen first,” Pepit insisted.

“He told me Ising Ihip who heard little voices became a Rilis doctor. He was a tricycle driver blinded by a streak of light and little voices told him to heal people. The “little voices” says he has to heal people by blowing, kissing, that part of the body with the ailment. When Ising Ihip opened his eyes, a strong urge befall on him. He must follow the  “little voices,”

The “little voices” get tested.  A mother and son came.The women complained his bewitched son wanted to murder her because she forced him to shower.

“Ising Ihip told the mother that the only way to drive away the evil spirit is to punish the devil dwelling inside him. He warned that her son might put up a fight, so he needed two men to clamp his son’s hands. Ising asked for water, blessed it, gulped, gurgled, and then spat in the son’s face. The son yelped. Muddy residue dripped. The son struggled,

“Mother. Stopped him please. I could die. He  bathed me with sewage!”

“It’s the evil spirit, tricking us. Don’t worry.”

“Who are you?” Asked Ising to identify who bewitched him.

The son didn’t answer.

Ising gulped his blessed water again; spat to the son’s face. He  looked dead. Ising went on gulping and spatting. The son’s face cleaned. Stopped resisting. The evil spirit left. Ising, since then, became a famous doctor”.

It’s believable the way Pepit tell his story. My only problem is why didn’t I know that? We live in the same neighborhood… It’s a made up story. Inong Isabela invented it for Pepit.

Yet, Pepit continued his incredible tale.

“One day Ising Ihip and his 12 disciples got busy blowing and kissing to heal people, when a young woman came accompanied by her mother. The mother complained that her daughter had a lump on her breast.  The 12 men left the patients they are doing and crowded the two women. Each of the twelve disciples wanted to do her daughter. Ising Ihip being the boss, did the blowing and kissing.

“At another time, Ising Ihip, rejected a patient and passed her to  his apostles. His apostles refused the wrinkled woman troubled with peeing.

“People sensed of Ising Ihip’s discrimination. He lost his credibility. The “little voices” left him. The next day, people seen him walking the street in his birthday suit.”

“That’s it. Pepit! You just lost your share of those bananas.”

The Half-coconut Nut Cut

 

My father sampled my head as a billboard of a hairstyle, he trumpeted as the “half-Coconut’s Nut Cut”. (gupit bao).

 

Tabog and Pepit on seeing I flaunted my new hairdo, contracted me to use my head as bait  to catch rats. Naive, I agreed. I am so proud I impressed them.

 

But not my teacher Mr. Eugenio. He tousled my hair, as if to untangle a bunch of earthworms. He kneeled and whispered:

 

“Where on earth you’ve got your stupid haircut?”

 

“From my father.” I said.

 

“Take me to your father. I’ll kill him,”.

 

Thinking I’ll be an orphan, I went home sobbing.

 

“Who bullied you this time?”

 

I told him. His eyes bulged, looked for his bolo. My mother restrained him.

 

To perfect my father’s style of a haircut, he needed heads to practise on. He offered his services for free. The sweet word “FREE” became a fisher of heads. Soon, my father’s haircut style became a fad among the youngster. Tabog and Pepit didn’t want to miss the fad.

 

Parents became fearless. The youngster courageous. They trusted my father untrained hand wielding his delinquent shears and scissors.

 

To earn the parent’s trust, my father mastered the penetrating concentration of Vincent Van Gogh, the painter, in copying his model to the canvas. My father dangled a half-coconut nut from a guava tree and tried to copy every minute detail of the nut to every head he works on. With clumsy hands working with uncooperative scissors, cuts fell from either ears or nape. Not on hair. Blood flowed. My father stamped his affinity to Vincent Van Gogh who cut his own ears.

 

When Pepit turns came, he got minor cuts on his nape. Wiping it with ‘katsa,’  (a flour sack) that draped over his shoulder, the blood disappeared.

 

Tabog turns came, I whispered to my father: He was the one who told me to make my head as bait to catch rats.

 

“Hmmm. Here’s 65 cents. Buy me a bottle of ketsup,”.

 

My father draped over the ‘katsa’ over Tabog’s shoulder to work on his head as I got back.

 

“You know what a ketsup boy?” My father asked Tabog.

 

“Yeah. That’s our dinner, sometimes.

 

“I can give you ketsup.”

 

“Is that for free?”

 

“Oh yes. But I have to pour it over to your nape and ears. You don’t tell that to your mother. That’s our secret.

 

Tabog agreed.

 

The haircut done, my father holding a mirror, he showed to Tabog the ketsup poured over his ears: His wounds concealed. Lots more ketsup over to his nape.

 

“Can I taste it?”.

 

“No. Dried the ketsup first,”.

 

Secrets of Rego’s Riches

In 1979, as a graduate of Bachelor of Science in Agricultural Economics, at the Gregorio Araneta University Foundation, the Australian Agricultural Trade Show invited me to their show at the Manila Peninsula Hotel.

 

As I hang out at the hotel’s lobby, I surveyed the portraits exhibition of mature women. While confused of the purpose of the display, a tap on my shoulder disturbed my musing, and caused me to turn around.

 

A nice gentleman in his expensive, business suit smiled at me. He mistook me for somebody else.

 

“Buslog!”

 

I couldn’t place him right off,  but he knew my nickname.

 

“Rego,” He shook my hand.

 

“… Is he an Account Executive of the Lego Company…?

 

“Regoberto Tenorio. Where’s Tabog and Pepit?”

 

“Oh my God, Regoberto Tenorio… Are you now a Millionaire?”

 

“Well. I am there,”.

 

“What brought you here?

 

“I am a distributor of Agricultural Machineries from  Australia. Our machines in display at the Trade Shows.”

 

I am going, there.  But it’s yet too early,”

 

“Look at you.  What are your secrets?”

 

 

“Well, I owe my success to the three of you. You, Tabog and Pepit  The Three Musketeers of Disaster. I learned lessons  from you guys. I am using them now in business,”.

 

 

“Whoa!”     Shocked, My lips rounded in an “O” shape. I knew Rego to be smart in Math and Science, That’s the reasons for his success. Not because of us.

 

 

So amused of my reaction, he said.  “Okay. Let’s go to the 2nd Floor and lunch. My treat. Then, we can go together at the Trade Shows.”

 

The waiter gave us the menu with curlicue design. The prices in the menu made me dizzy.  I asked Rego to just order for me, whatever he’s taking.

 

“Two of your luncheon special–hors d’oeuvre’ and two Margaritas please,”

 

 

“Wow!” We can order women, too?

 

  “So, you owe your success to us, huh,”.

 

Rego smiled.

 

“Do you remember when you tag us along at the Irrigation Canal. You said, we do the characters of Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn of Mark Twain? We made a raft of banana trunks to cruise around Baliwag?”

 

I exploded a laugh.

 

Now, I remembered. That banana raft we couldn’t maneuver, because the Irrigation Canal had swelled. And the rampaging water drifted our raft so fast. We’re worried the stitch that hold together the banana trunks snapped before reaching the Tarcan Headgate. Passing that Headgate, the water can swirl us to the deep and turned us to corpse when the water surface us to the other side.

 

When our raft got near the Tarcan Headgate,

Tabog pushed Rego out of the raft. Rego tried to save himself. He held tight onto the raft. Tabog dipped Rego’s head. His feet propelled our raft. Every time Rego’s head gets off the water, Tabog will press it. Tabog, made Rego’s head the car’s wheel, his feet works as an engine. Our raft reached shore before we get to Tarcan’s head gate.

 

“Your Margarita Sirs,” the waitress put our orders. Margarita is a wine, not a woman.  The ‘hors d’oeuvre,’ a slice of liver big as the one peso coin decorated with seven pieces of peas.

 

 

“That’s maneuvering and manipulating people,”     Rego said, while wiping his lips with a napkin, “Those were necessary skills to conduct business, Sacrifice the weaknesses of your comrades to save someone’s asses.

 

“Remember the Ilang-Ilang tree?”

 

 

I wondered why climbing up tall trees, one of our hobbies during those days had taught Rego a lesson. Most trees in our barrio had the horseshoe branches because of our  “climbing and jumping off”.  One tree remained a virgin. That of Ilang-Ilang tree of Aling Itang.

 

Tabog showed-off. He climbed up. When he reached the top, the tree bent, 40 feet away from the ground. Too dangerous to jump off. Swung in the air, Tabog offered his bravest spider to Pepit. Pepit joined Tabog.

 

The tree bent, but not enough. So, the two negotiated  with me. Pepit will give me tops. And Tabog offered me a marble. I asked for marbles because you buy those. I climbed up. Our joint weight left a good 15 feet distance from the ground. Still, not enough. The three of us lured Rego. I offered myself as his errand boy for three days, just for him to go up. Rego climbed up.

 

With four of us on top, the Ilang-Ilang tree bent enough for us to jumped off.  Tabog proposed that we jumped on three. So, Tabog counted: “One,”. We distrust him.  At Tabog’s count of “two,” the three of us jumped off – leaving Rego counting “Threeee”, while the tree spewed him up in the air.

 

“So, Rego, what lesson you learned in the Ilang-Ilang tree?”

 

 

“Timing,”. In business, Nothing can beat timing. Don’t mess with timing.”

 

“You didn’t tell me where are the two rascals now, Tabog and Pepit?”

 

 

“Oh! Tabog is a Marine Biologist…”

 

 

“The fool… and he finished school?”

 

“Yeah. He got his diploma from the ‘Recto University,’ he’s a bus conductor now.

 

“Hmm. Good for him,”

“Pepit is an announcer,”

“On radio?”

 

“No. At a rat carnival stands during  fiesta,”

 

“Good”

 

“And me. Took ten years to finish my studies, always runs out of money. Here I am, struggling.”

 

I sensed him saying, “Hmmmm. good for you”. But he restrained himself.

 

At the Trade Show,  before we parted, I invited him to join the Three Musketeers of Disaster again. This time, fishing at the Pritil, our juvenile hangs out.

 

“No. Thank you,”

 

“Well, Rego’s reunion with us, could have been worth another Million,”.

 

The Quicksand Marriage (Let the “Butt” Coming)

 

My mother abhorred the family tradition of buffet-style-one-day-feast, then starved the next day.  She humiliated herself after eating the unripe Guava fruits still on the tree. That’s not right!  If they rationed the food up to a period. It could have been better. As what her Ilocano father used to do. That gave her a hunch of a looming reality.

My mother relayed that message to my father.

The way my mother said it that was the first mature statement my father heard from my mother. My father didn’t know how to discuss that. My mother had grown up. But undoing that customary feast-a-day-routine of his family was beyond him.

“You need to find a job. We can’t stay here long.” My mother said.

Now, my father was in a dilemma. Hitched on my mother’s appeal was a burden.

“Yeah. Okay.” my father said, just to appease my mother’s worry.

But nothing happened. Meanwhile, my mother continues to spend her month’s pension for their food. My father always gone out on the pretext, he was looking for a job. And only come home during supper.

Now, it occurred to my mother she shouldn’t tarry anymore to get her siblings pulled out from Ate Nance’s house, as she promised.

My Lolo Valentin sympathized with my mother’s predicament. She asked for my Lolo’s help to push his son finding a house for them to buy. Lolo Valentin did that. My father couldn’t refuse to follow my Lolo. Because his naked butt is on the line. His butt suffered whips-whacking from my Lolo.  And this feared my father to the max.

My father was a social animal. He has lots of friends, and they helped him to find a Nipa Hut and moved it to a relative’s compound in Concepcion.  My mother paid the hut for 800 pesos.

Now, my mother and her sisters lived together in one roof. She was ecstatic. She got only one problem: my father.

My father and Filo’s friendship renewed when the latter went back to Baliwag. Filo get sacked from his job. They hung out together serenading women. Filo played a guitar and cymbals. And sang. The cymbals, Filo played it with the band during hearse parade on a funeral procession. He earned extra money for doing that.

“I understand you need a job,” Filo said. “Here’s your chance.  Learn how to play cymbals under ‘Maestrong Anong,’ (known, as Maestro Lucino Buenaventura, a pioneer Band Instructor in Baliwag.) and earn money.

My father said, “Thanks, but no thanks.”  And he laughed it off.

Nana Turing, my mother’s twin sister, detested my father’s being an idler. My mother received a mouthful of invectives from her.

“Where is that you said, a male figure that can protect us? I can’t find that from a freeloader husband of yours. He only gets home to eat, change clothes and sleep. We don’t need him here. We can live by ourselves.”

Hurt by the truth, my mother had no recourse, but to rat my father out to my Lolo Valentin.

Lolo Valentin called them together at their mansion.

“Tinay, watch how I will castigate my son.”

The vitriolic litany of my father’s sins in front of my mother cringed my father. He looked down.

My mother as she watched my father had a mixed sentiment. On one hand, she hoped my Lolo Valentin’s lectures penetrate in my father’s skull, but on the other hand that weird punishment, which highlighted my father’s disfigured face looked funny.

“Now you know the drill. Ready your butt” Lolo Valentin ordered my father.

A simple butt-whacking was easy. My father had been used to it. But it’s an ego downer in front of my mother.

“Itay. Please don’t shame me,” beg my father.

“Now you know what shame is. Removed you’re clothing. Everything!

Reluctantly, my father followed. Had it been in other circumstances, it’s nice being naked in front of a woman, but not at this instant. It’s nerve-wracking shameful.

My father got a good whacking from my Lolo Valentin. Yet, he restrained himself not to cry despite his disfigured face.

“Now listen to this, if you don’t straighten your act, I’ll whip you in public. Let’s see. I’ll be excited to see that.” My Lolo Valentin said.

Young Love

 

My father found me weird when I was 17 years old. I stayed home and do nothing but read Charles Dickens’ book. He wondered why I don’t hang out with boys my age.  A neighbor teased my father: “How come, Jessie locked up himself. Is he an “in-between”?

My father got worried. He had four daughters. He didn’t want me to be his fifth.

One night, he said, “Get a break from your books and join me to watch Fistorama, a boxing TV show at Mang Apiong Acuna’s house.

Mang Apiong was the first to have the black-and-white TV set in Riles. As expected, even the boring amateur boxing show has shown late at night, people with odorous breath and day-old fart, stay glued.

Noticeable among the crowd was this one cute girl. She got a well-sculptured neck, smooth and fair with coiled locks on her nape.

When the final images of Lupang Hinirang ended and the TV’s screen swarmed with moths, people bolted out.

I rushed out and waited outside for my father. Then, I saw him talking to this cute girl. From the distance, the girl gave me furtive glances, with a restrained giggle.

“So, what do you think of Elvie?” my father asked while walking back home.

“Who’s Elvie?” I said.

“The girl I am talking.”

“Oh. We’re a TV junkie, but she’s worse. She’s a TV freak. Imagine, she stayed late for that men’s show.” I said.

“Isn’t she cute?” My father asked. I didn’t answer.

Elvie became our neighbor. She and my sister Elsie had a bond. They loved exchanging movie gossips. I hated hearing them talking trash. Elvie rooted for the Love Team of Vi & Bot: Vilma Santos and Edgar Mortiz; while my sister went gaga with Guy & Pip: Nora Aunor and Tirso Cruz III tandem.

Visiting our house turned out to be Elvie’s routine. I got conscious. It forced me to get hygienic. Since then my father wore a mischievous glint in his eyes.

The “Young Love,” the movie which starred the Guy & Pip and Vi & Bot tandem had its Christmas opening at the Life Theater in Manila with personal appearances. Dying to go, Elvie and my sister conspired to convince our parents. My father agreed with a condition that I chaperoned them.

Just in time, my cousin who lived in Manila visited us. She tucked us with her the night before the movie opening on Christmas day.

My cousin gave us a room to rest. My sister went out to wash panties. Elvie and I left alone.

She sat on the sofa opposite me. My heart thudded. She read Kislap Magazine it banners the headline – “Nora Aunor Hindi Tunay na Anak ni Mamay Belen”. Then, on the bottom half, it screamed: “Vi and Bot Love Team, Subok na Matatag”.

I quivered. I stood up, brought the chair beside her, pretended to read the corny article. Her hair smelled Camay soap. The musky fragrance of her skin wafted through my nostril. The Eagle has landed! I planted a kiss on her left cheek. The magazine flew out.  She’s expecting it, but she had to react. She slapped me. Not hard enough. It felt sweet.

Along Quezon Boulevard, at Paterno Street, where the Life Theatre is, we thronged ourselves to a sea of people covering the entire street. At 10:00 am, we were able to buy our tickets. The show supposed to start at 12:00 noon.

Hiding from my sister, I dared to hold Elvie’s hand, which she didn’t object.

Loud screaming announced the arrival of Vi and Bot. My sister got disappointed. Guy and Pip didn’t show up.

The theatre’s iron gate plunged down. The crowd shoved us to the gate. We saw Vi and Bot being escorted. The star smiled, waved, and blew kisses. When Elvie saw them, she tap-danced to a record running at crazy speeds. She screamed Vi and Bot’s name without letting up.

Suddenly, she stopped. She asked me where my hands are. Puzzled why she asked that when at the time I clammed the iron gate.

“Someone is taking my panties off”. Elvie complained.

“What!” I swung my head around. All I saw were a sea of heads. Elvie must have been hallucinating with excitement. Considering people were tightly packed, how one could get her panties passed through her feet…

When we got home, my father sensed magic transpired between Elvie and myself. I assumed it erased his doubts about me.

Road Rage: Insidious Inducer of Traffic

 

Every motorist experienced unleashing pent up emotions while stuck in a traffic jam. As bottled up emotions exploded into road rage, the motorist expressed aggressive or violent behavior.

It’s easy to get into a road rage trap. The sweltering heat. Traffic stood still for hours. Undisciplined drivers with a sense of entitlements. Absentee traffic enforcer. These contributes and provokes aggressive behavior.

When a motorist abused his horn, that’s a sign. Say, a driver stops, and barks expletives to the driver behind him that sideswiped him, the altercation burst out into physical injuries or death.

In a civilized society, road rage is a no no. But it seeps in any way. A well-behaved motorist, studies showed, lured into road violence at least once a year.

Can cool heads prevail amid hellish traffic?

The oppressive heat, the silent inducer is a given. Traffic congestion? For Metro Manila, —nobody knows. Only if the government build more roads and regulate the numbers of vehicles, the roads can handle. That’s tough. This is where the government found wanting: either it lacks resources or political will.

There are options to decrease incidences of road aggressive behavior. And this requires two participants; the motorist, and the transportation department (LTO, LTFRB, MMDA).

The undisciplined motorist, those with an air of self-entitlement, the (pasaways) of the road, if they committed traffic violations, play deaf ear to their argument. Get their license and vehicle registrations. If they don’t give them, warn them of heavier penalties and cancellation of their license. The traffic enforcer will go by the vehicle’s License Plate No.

If the transportation agencies can set up a shared robust database of vehicles, and carry out the road safety education to get a license, violence between drivers is decrease.

Sandra Cam: Gorging on the “Dipping Sauce”

Could committing bum steer while gorging on the “dipping sauce” of everything leery and scandalous be a new criterion now to get a cabinet post? This could be true of Sandra Cam.

Showing tantrums that she was not accorded the same privilege as that of a Cabinet Secretary while at the VIP Lounge of the NAIA, she boasted that she will be appointed as one in three months, even dropping the name of Bong Go, Duterte’s Executive Assistant, as per reports.

Sandra Cam catapulted into the limelight when she confessed in the Senate Investigation in 2005, that she was a bag-woman of the “Jueteng Lords”, delivering money to the then Pampanga Rep. Juan Miguel “Mikey” Arroyo, and his uncle Ignacio Arroyo. She implicated, too, the First Gentleman Arroyo. The Arroyos denied the accusation.

That began Sandra Cam notoriety.

Sandra Cam busy bodying engagement into “dipping sauce” get real tractions during Pinoy’s time. She cultivated, nourished, and waged indefatigable war against Leila de Lima, the then Secretary of Justice, up until she became a Senator to her incarcerations.

It seemed Sandra Cam was obsessed pinning down de Lima. She fiddled and peddled purported affair of Cezar Mancao to de Lima.

As head of the Whistleblower Association of the Philippines, she tried to block de Lima’s nomination as Secretary of Justice.

And now, on Duterte’s time, she dipped her hand on Ronnie Dayan. She even built up a rapport to high valued prison inmates who testified against de Lima. And for some reason, her hand reached up to Kerwin Espinosa. How in the world she’s always on the scene…in the “dipping sauce!”

It was with Kerwin Espinosa that Sandra Cam committed her gravest bum steer from all of that she was guilty of. She intuited Kerwin told her, two Senators are involved in getting payola from him for his drug protection. De Lima, her nemesis, obviously, was one, and the other, she still has to mention but never did.

Duterte said, if Sandra Cam asks for a government job, she can get one because of Duterte’s debt of gratitude to her for helping in his presidential campaign, but that depends on how people judge her for her conduct at the airport, and if there is a job available for her.

Sandra Cam’s haughty attitude at the airport is probably her way of telling Duterte, she needed a job, as her prize for making de Lima her “dipping sauce” to advance her career from the head of the Whistleblower Association of the Philippines, as she didn’t win a Senate seat.