The Dread
Mood:  caffeinated
Topic: Stories

 

            Several days ago, several bombings just blasted several places. And in this morning I am supposed to commute. I found myself inside those floating trains the crisscross cities and towns. Inside, I tried to surrender to the feeling that my train will reach its destination. That nothing will happen. Or if something should happen, that something whatever that was would not affect my existence. Well even a part of it. Who wants to live without a big toe or a middle finger? Because of these thoughts I have forgotten about the thing I have inside my portfolio.

 

            Going back to the thought I swung my eyes around. Who will be the culprit? Could it be the lady sitting there in the chair with her rosy face? My father has always taught me a distrust for beauty, its like everything has a catch. Could it be the old man dozing off, maybe he is contemplating with eyes closed of the coming death? Everybody is a suspect in a Hercules Poirot novel even a paper pusher. That guy with a laptop inside his briefcase could be the mad bomber for this train. The student sending messages in his mobilephone could be signaling his comrades to blow us up.

 

            I count the stops. Each stop is like a heartbeat. A beating heart could be beating life or death. I remember those movies which the slow dreadful sound of the heart. The main organ that is giving us life- moaning death. Its morbid but the newspaper always has in among its pages an obituary. Death of natural causes is like a bingo game you’ll never know if your number is up. But in this dance of death the feeling is similar to a duck in a shooting gallery. You can open your eyes or close it but death smiles on your face.

 

            The threat of death is like having pre-marital sex without the use of prophylactics. The thought of pregnancy is always there. After the act, the couple thinks whether they are prepared to bring forth to this world another person. Must be the reason why some people smoke after sex.

 

            Finally I see the end of this dread. I reach my stop. I stretched my body and felt complete. I swipe my card at those machines and look at the endless lines of humanity. A lot of them are naïve. They remind me of the pigs being brought to the slaughterhouse or chickens on the way to the market. Am I really that morbid? 

 

            Below and far away from station- I thought of the thing that I have in my portfolio. It was a sanitary napkin for my girlfriend.

UP DILIMAN
Topic: My Youth

I cherished every moment I was there- I was literally born in UP and lived in campus for almost 20 years. My mother was a prof there- well don't ask me what she was teaching. Later she became a Vice-President in the UP Administration. My elementary, high school and college were all in UP save my first year in college when I tried Ateneo for a year. It was in UP where I really learned about French history without going to France, learned Spanish without going to Spain and read European literature in my past time (Henrik Ibsen, Marquis de Sade, Luigi Pirandello, Guy Maupassant, Jean Cocteau, Henry Miller, Andre Gide...etc...). Every college during my stay has its own library- so the library never appeared cramped. It was not airconditioned and the books were old but heck this was the place where future Senators and Presidents sat.

Even while in high school- I was already a witness to student demonstrations. We had our own walk out and protest during CAT and conducted our own noise barrages. The issues then was that the government has diverted much of the budget to militarization and not to education- later it was debt payment instead of education and students demanded a moratorium. It was there that I learned to think analytically- not to act on biases- to criticize ideas not my fellowmen. I joined the debating team which was my passport later in law school to the debating guild.

The faculty of the University were overworked and underpaid but they worked with zeal. They taught you to think, how to think, how to discuss and of course they shared their own biases and beliefs. Most of my profs had Phds and MAs some had their MAs in the States and others in exotic lands one had an MA in Nicaragua before it fell to the Sandinistas. Students there were a mixture of life, I met Michael Defensor, as well as future Congressmen, future councilors- and future millionaires. I also met dissidents, those who have either gone to the hills or joined the left. The University has no color. It has all sides. It was in the university where I met then General Biazon whom we interviewed in our class, the topic? Low Intensity Conflict.

It was the place where I learned about love- the place where I met the first love in my life. A petite lady who looked like Alice Dixon-
Prior to her I courted an Ifugao who gave me a headache. (Would write about that later...)

A dedicated faculty, a great facility or shall we say facilities, and a conscientious and militant studentry- those are the qualities which I like. Not just topping the board, or the bar- the UP has so many topnotchers already. When other schools top these exams to them- its a big thing. Its flashed in the school gate. Here we don't make it a big thing. The school where I came from did not teach us to make money- it taught us how the world works, how to deal with the world and our fellowmen. One of my classmates became a multi-millionaire without going to business school. Others are now cabinet members- still others are dedicated men and women working in government again overworked and underpaid. Celebrities were there too if you want- my classmates were a relative of Jaworski, Benjie Paras, Estrella "Star" Querubin, Ito of Neocolors and so forth.

The naked guy on campus is very much well clothe- with his arms stretched to the sky.

Noypi!
Mood:  happy
Topic: Filipino Culture

 

 

Makapagsulat rin nga sa wikang Filipino- Well medyo mahirap magsulat sa ating wika dahil pulang pula ang pahina nang aking Microsoft Word. Sinisigaw naming ang salitang “Hoy! Pinoy ako!” sa kanta ng Bamboo. At bakit? Dapat kilalanin na tayo nang buong mundo…

 

Matagal nang nagsusulat ang mga Filipino sa wikang Inggles- kaso mayroon bang manunulat na Pinoy na nanalo na nang Nobel Peace Prize  o di kaya Pulitzer Prize? Kung mayroon man ito malamang yung mga pinoy na base sa Tate.

 

Matagal nang nagtutugtog nang Rock N’ Roll ang mga pinoy- kaso may Pinoy na ba sa mga Rock and Roll Hall of Fame? Bakit mas magaling ba talaga ang mga rockistang mga banyaga keysa sa atin? Ang alam ko mas matangkad lang sila! Buti pa nga ang mundo nang sining nang Classical Music- kinilala si Cecille Licad at si Rowena Arrieta- sa rock matagal na tayong iniisnub! Sa pagsulat nang Inggles ganun rin. Si Ibsen ay Norwegian, si Camus, tiga Frances, si Nietzsche, Aleman pati si Thomas Mann- bakit sa mundo nila tila si Rizal lang ata ang kilala nila?

 

Nung pangalawang digmaang pandaigdig (haba ano- dapat WWII na lang linagay ko)- lumaban ang Pinoy- namatay sa Corregidor at Bataan. Kung di tayo lumaban- aba baka pati Australia nasakop na nang mga Hapon. At buti pa mga Hapon kinilala nang mga kano- eh tayo? Mga guerrilla natin? Nakilala ba? Yung isa nakilala kasi nalulok sa Malacanang- kaya lang ayon kina Burgos (hindi Fr. Burgos ah)- eh peke daw ang medalya.

 

 Hanggang ngayon nagkukumahog habang namamatay ang ating mga beterano- na lumaban, nakipagdigma, nagbuhos nang dugo. Kaso kinilala ba?

 

Sa  Olympics eh bakit di gawing sport duon ang Bowling at Bilyar? Di hamak na uulan nang gintong medalya para sa atin. Kaso may mga laban nang mga boxing at tae kwan do akong napansin na sa halip na puntusan sana tayo- di tayo binigyan nang kahit anong puntos… Hoy pinoy ako…wag mo ako dayain!

 

 

Ano ba tingin nila sa atin mga DH nang Hong Kong, mga Japayuki…ganun lang? Ganun kababa? Aandar ba mga barko nila pagwala mga seaman natin, bubuhos ba ang langis kung wala mga Pinoy sa Saudi, may mag-aasikaso ba nang mga pasyente nila kung wala mga nars natin at doktor sa abroad?

 

Hindi kami atsay, hindi kami prosti, hindi kami tiga-timpla nang kape, hindi kami tiga tulak nang kariton- alalahanin niyo- PINOY KAMI!