I woke up feeling like I was drowning. The place was misty, and with heavy eyes, I found myself kissing the pail lying on the floor, with my face catching the running water from the faucet. I was unsure what I was doing there. I was neither drunk nor having morning sickness, and there was no way I would collapse. But there I was in that cramped part of the bathroom, channeling Nastassja Kinski in her much-celebrated pinup.
I sat down to check my already wet body. There were no bumps or bruises, except for a minor scratch on my left leg. No red splotch on the floor. Nothing fatal. When I thought everything turned out fine, my stomach suddenly churned at an alarming rate, seemingly on the verge of eruption. Before I could react, a magma of something rushed unstoppably out of my mouth. Its sticky, colorful contents, which stained the white tiles I scrubbed laboriously last night, reminded me of the violations I committed against my dietary requirement.
That throwing up helped me regain my depleted energy. I lost some fuel, which paradoxically reignited me. Still trying to figure out what took place, I assuaged my curiosity with the thought that I had fainted for no clear reason. It is what it is. I cleaned up my mess to shoo away the reek that started to fill up the room and cleansed my body which began to smell like a rotten corpse, only stopping when the freshness of Irish Spring dominated the surroundings again.
I went up to get some clothes. I was rummaging through my closet when a spirit of some sort engulfed me, snuffing out the inner flame that supplied me the much-needed power to keep going. I attempted to stop it, but it was just too potent. It showed no mercy. It was not in the mood to give me any chance to preserve my remaining energy. At that time, I did not have the faintest idea of what was taking place; all I knew was that I needed to stand on my ground and subdue my invisible enemy. Soon, I sensed that it was sucking my soul out of my earthly body. I started to see dancing black dots, which caused me to lose my cool because it dawned on me that I was at the farthest part of the house, where windows were closed tightly for safety. If something happened to me, nobody would know. I crawled towards the other room facing the street, hoping that I would be able to grab some attention if push came to shove. Only at that point did I come to terms with the fact that having nosy neighbors has some advantages.
But my muscles were uncooperative. On their own, they decided to be in a state of atrophy. They just stopped functioning. I could not go any farther than the side of my closet, so I just sat there, praying that I would not end up being a useless fertilizer on a marble floor.
It took me some time to become fully aware that I had been sprawling on the floor for quite some time, embracing all the dust that piled up after days of neglect. For some unknown reason, that unsought nap gave me immense satisfaction. The coldness of the floor brought back the flames taken away by the mysterious entity a while back. At that time, I knew I was out of danger, but I was too debilitated to even lift my finger. So I just closed my eyes again and let my consciousness drift into nothingness.
When I felt that I had amassed all the vigor I needed, I hauled my entire heaviness towards the other room. I opened the window wide enough to catch some fresh air. It made me puke. For someone who hates vomiting, I was glad that happened because that meant my strength would be back in no time. I could scream for help should the uninvited, indomitable spirit decide to harass me again.
After wiping the scattered pieces of waste, I went downstairs. I opened all the windows and even the door in case of another wave of unfortunate events. I noticed that my phone was bursting with my friends’ messages, which I received at the exact moment when I was fighting for my consciousness. I recalled my friends got the strongest instincts, so they might have detected something was wrong.
My friends’ awareness of my situation helped me calm down. At the very least, I knew somebody would check on me. I lay down on the floor and tried to get that overwhelming experience out of my mind. Fainting for the first time, not only once but twice, was too much for a day. Just thinking about it drained me. I was unsure how I managed to survive. I closed my eyes, purposely did the Nastassja Kinski once again, and let the pitch-black take away my consciousness.
Roughly two hours after departing from the landmass, we finally reached our destination. The port, packed with a row of boats, was iridescent as the sun tried to show off its power. The waves hitting the shore served as the accompaniment to the upbeat music produced by a band that displayed its expertise in playing with batons. My friends and I joined the crowd assembling in the middle of the queue of multicolored flags with shell-filled festoons, which became more vibrant as they blended with the smiles of the locals.
The birds freely roamed above, with their ensembles of chirps and whirrs intermingling with the tumult of the excited people below. That scene alone was enough to ease minds so stressed by the hustle and bustle of the big city. With our bags getting heavier and our bodies wearier, we excused ourselves from attending the opening ceremony and headed to the hotel on foot, along the street that exhibits the town’s gymnasium curtained off by the posters of politicians, the churchyard tenanted by stores showcasing the town’s products, several kiosks offering chicken skins and other street food, and decade-old houses specifically designed to resist typhoons.
The Hardin Hotel was not fancy. It was a two-storey building with a minimal design; its decors only consisted of the bush and a palm tree in front and big vases obtainable in flea markets sprouting during the town’s fiesta. Its first floor was huge, occupied by a reception area, a dining area with five big intricately-carved wooden tables surrounded by six chairs, a kitchen, and a pair of restrooms. On the side, between the reception area and dining area, was a stair going to the second floor that had five rooms.
Its green room, just before the terrace, was no fuss. It was rather pragmatic. It had a queen-sized bed fully clad in what seemed to be an embroidered wedding gown, escorted by a single bed in white. An aisle between the beds led to an antique table and a polished mirror at the edge. Directly opposite the table, suddenly filled with my friends’ beauty regimen and sunblocks with all the levels of SPF, was the entrance of the restroom lurking on the other end of the room.
After dropping their life-size baggage on the beds of their choice, my friends mechanically put on some sunscreen and set off to conquer the island. I chose to stay to catch some sleep. The four-hour land travel and two-hour crossing of the not-so-pacific ocean left my body in a vegetative state and my mind in utter uselessness. At that time, nothing could give me immense pleasure other than some drops of White Flower and sound sleep. I proceeded to the world where I was the diamond of the first water.
Only to get interfered with by the sounds akin to shrieks of school girls upon catching a glimpse of their dream guys. My friends had already arrived. As soon as they noticed the tiny calculated moves I made to catch patience slowly slipping away from my system, they began describing what they had found with so much gusto, after a couple of hours of skirting around the island through their rented trike. I butted in with a suggestion of going downstairs as things like these better get discussed over some cups of coffee and some snacks.
The hotel had no menu. Guests would need to tell what they would want to gorge on or nibble, and the staff would personally pick up the ingredients directly from the fishermen or butchers and cook the requested dishes. The locals have retained this setup to guarantee that customers would only consume fresh food, something that would give these small-time inns the competitive edge over, and a clear differentiating factor from the other more imposing hotels in the metro.
But our bellies at that time were seething like the waves of the Pacific. We proceeded to the nearest restaurant past the street that, a while ago, witnessed an unplanned procession initiated by a group of youngsters orderly lining up behind one of my friends, paying veneration like true-blue devotees. They might have thought of my friend as the Black Nazarene or the Holy Child in the flesh, especially with her curly hair and her outercoat resembling a woven gown. They followed her and tried to touch her as a worshipper does before the statues of saints.
The restaurant was atypical. It was more ornamented than the rest of the business establishments in the area, trying to capture the vibe of the forest through the plastic bamboo and vines sprawling throughout the place. I ordered my go-to food, a cheeseburger, which I partnered with halo-halo. Polillo might have been so happy to have us because I got served with a plate-sized patty sandwiched by the biggest buns I had ever seen and a pitcher of mixed sweetened ingredients with crushed ice and coconut milk at less than PHP 100. My friends had a casserole of palabok each, a rice noodle dish with a rich pork and shrimp sauce, partnered with vehemently fizzing sub-zero sodas that sounded in tune with their collective burping. The sun was still blinding behind the opaque window. The weather was perfect for the dragon boat race.
The dragon boat race – our primary objective of going to the place, which we almost forgot because we were so engrossed in exploring the beauty of the place and the enormousness of the food it offers. Instantaneously, we freshened up the fastest we could, slathered on a gallon of sunscreen, made our way to the port, and mingled with the multitude already raucous as the steerspersons shouted simultaneously “Ready, ready!” before throwing the respective buoyant. The first race for the dragon boat competition kicked off. Four boats, sculpted with angry faces of dragons in front, striped the sea, metamorphosing into Michael Phelps with many pairs of arms that, at a bird’s eye view, formed a serried of multi-tentacled robots oddly appearing in a tamed, rustic seascape. Exhausting all the energy that came rushing through the paddlers, these groups were not just competing against each other. They were racing against time to qualify for the next round. They were in a contest against themselves, testing not only their power but also their efficiency through teamwork and effectiveness through their designed strategies.
After the intermission number from the town mayor and councilors, who rowed through the waters to the delight of the crowd, we finally saw our friend towering above the battle-ready paddlers. We could see the adrenaline popping out on their faces. We shared their tension as they split the sea. We shouted in synch with the drumbeat orchestrated by my friend and gasped in unison with each stroke her teammates made, showing the locals our prowess in cheering until their boat crossed the finish line. They came in second, behind the young team from Polillo, who looked like gladiators in steroids built to kick some ass.
As the heat raged on, meting out punishment to the paddlers maneuvering against the brewing tide and spectators reeking out the smell of dried fish, I learned from one of the locals that these young gladiators underwent years of rigorous dragon boat training through a program designed by the town council. This program has been in place to keep the youth solely focused on improving their overall fitness, behavior, and mental health, staying them away early on from having a crack at the intriguing sinister vices. The town has boasted zero drug addiction cases, and the leaders, parents, and elders have attributed the success to the program. They have been hell-bent on maintaining the statistics, come what may.
Our friend reappeared with a paddle and game face, sticking out like an apparition against the blazing backdrop. Her group always ended up as the bridesmaid of the dominating local team. We saw them regrouping under their assigned tent, seemingly unsatisfied with their finishes. My other friends and I, whose credentials involved watching an actual race twice and not having touched a single paddle even once, wasted no time sharing some unsolicited expert feedback, observations, and recommendations. When we learned that UPC qualified for the next round as they clocked second-best overall in the events they participated in, we silently celebrated by exploring the streets for snacks.
As we munched a dozen of milk bread in front of a kiosk beside the forest-themed restaurant to replenish our spirits drained by cheering, our competing friend informed us that we were among the invitees for dinner with the mayor and event organizers. We went back to the hotel to remove the smell that took a vacation on our bodies and scrub the sunburnt skins flaking off like dandruff on our faces. We did not join the entourage of UPC but instead opted to onboard the trike going to the venue.
It did not take us long to pass through the thick metal door towards the mayor’s residence. Several locals immediately ushered us to the garden, where another group was draping the tables and chairs in an obsessive-compulsive manner, ironing out the creases misshaping the hemline before putting the dirt-free banana leaves on top. Some feet away from the garden, dorms for the dragon boat race participants stood in full view of the ocean. The shore just beyond the garden provided the early birds with the perfect background for the obligatory selfies on Instagram and Facebook.
My friends and I decided to stay at the dock. We watched as the sun bid farewell, surrounded by clouds that seemed to pay respect. From afar, we saw the UPC Team in sepia, floating in the middle of the ocean that looked like in tranquilizer at that time. They came just in time, a few minutes before the dinner.
The boodle fight started with a thank you speech from the mayor, followed by the run-through of events for the following day. The crowd thanked her in return, for hosting the competition and for keeping her speech short and simple. A round of rumbling had been impregnating the thin air, and there was only one thing that could break it off.
Seafood rained on our laps. Shrimps, crabs, and different species of fish paraded before us. But in Polillo, where seafood in various forms and fashion dominate the kitchen, Sinantolan is the queen of viands. Sinantolan, a spicy Filipino dish made from minced cotton fruit simmered in creamy coconut milk with salted baby shrimps and aromatics, has been my favorite since childhood in Baler. I had high expectations that Polillo-made would satisfy my long-time craving. It did not rain on my parade.
While everyone was busy peeling the shrimps and pounding the crabs, I was devouring the mountain of Sinantolan in the middle of the table. It lured me to keep eating, which I did until my stomach could not take any amount any longer. I saw my friend unstringing her shorts, looking dead serious like a predator unstoppable in pulverizing her perceived enemy. After finishing half of the table, she was not yet done. She might have mistaken seafood for bubblegum because she carried on with chewing, only stopping upon noticing that the rest of the participants already surrendered.
The still silent water started to glint as the stars emerged en masse. My friends and I decided to stroll around the town center to relax our intestines from strenuously grinding a large amount of seafood we gobbled down. We dropped by the forest-themed restaurant for a quick dessert, pitchers of halo-halo paired with anti-histamines. With a plastic bag of chicken skins in our hands, we proceeded to the port, nodding to each kid who politely bowed after greeting us with “Magandang gabi po!” on the way.
Roughly fourteen hours after our arrival, the port was empty, except for a few fishermen setting up their boats. The multicolored flags with shell-filled festoons continued to swing to the tune of the waves hitting the shore. My friends and I tried to locate the Port of Real, but all we could see was a string of faint lights flickering against the dark horizon. Around, there was no pub, restaurants with exaggerated signages, or opulent coffee shops along the shoreline, only the stretch of sand being kissed by glistening waves. Polillo, at night, remains pure and pristine.
The supposedly heavy-duty Cricket was no match with the wind fanned away by Manila Bay. It took three pairs of hands from my friends to shield the flames that had been trying to sear the already contorted Marlboro stick between my fingers. The sky above was ablaze even at that ungodly hour, lighting up the empty parking lot facing the Cultural Center of the Philippines, exposing the maniacal grins of friends deep in thought with the mixing and matching of their outfits for our vacation.
Dust blanketed the area that got awakened by the roar of swaggering engines. I watched it hover fleetingly over the crowd not long ago dispersed like stranded passengers with bulky bags and paddles in a terminal. Now forming phalanx before the vans, they were members of the United Paddlers Club (UPC) that would compete in a dragon boat race foregrounding the town’s fiesta.
At the command of our friend, whom my other two friends and I would cheer for during the event, we joined the organized queue. We went into the van assigned to us and flumped our bodies in dire need of a well-deserved break. We braced ourselves for the four-hour journey. At around 11 pm, we entered the South Luzon Expressway en route to where we could childishly play in the waters and wildly bask in the sunlight.
The radio in full blast mixed dissonantly with the heavy snores of my friends comfortably slumped in their most unappealing positions. The tinted window I leaned on from time to time cast the houses along the highway into grayed and obscurely sinister lights. I tried to catch some sleep, but my mind was already frolicking along the coastlines of our destination. Raised in a town that is always the receiving end of the strong slaps of the waves of the Pacific, I was as thrilled as my friends to finally visit Polillo, an island floating somewhere in the Pacific underneath my hometown.
The road to Polillo follows a seemingly never-ending pattern of crisscrosses and twists and turns. Locals describe it as chicken innards precisely because of the resemblance. It often triggers motion sickness that challenges the sensitive gag reflexes of many passersby, including my friends, who chose to busy themselves with munching chips and any food they could grab. Alternately, they made the sign of the cross to drive away the spirit of Michael Schumacher that seemed to possess our driver. Speeding at 120-150 kilometers per hour, we reached the Port of Real approximately 30 minutes before the expected time of arrival.
The Port of Real was already in action. It was busy and noisy. People, drenched by the sudden pouring of rain, were scampering to get onboard ferries going to islets farther than our destination. Tourist guides were shouting at the scampering people to assist them with their assigned ferries and boats. Vendors were trying to stop scampering people to sell whatever products they had. My friends, whom I left for a quick smoke break, were playing hide and seek with the leaking raindrops inside the port. After more than 30 minutes of what seemed to be a scene in a mall sale, a paddler from UPC ushered us to our ferry.
The ferry was medium-sized, made of steel, woods, and rubbers, and meticulously designed to withstand the ferocity of the Pacific Ocean. Painted in already peeling navy blue and green, it had two decks that could hold around 100 passengers. Beside each window on both sides of the ferry, there were laminated notices outlining safety measures tacked just above the rows of five welded chairs, which resembled the seats common in fast-food restaurants in the early 90s. Separating these rows was the passageway leading to the stairs beside the captain’s cabin and a kiosk. At the tail of the boat behind the cabin, there were flashy orange jackets that reflected the streaks of the peeking sun.
My friends and I planted our already malfunctioning bodies in the middle, parallel to the kiosk offering instant coffee, instant noodles, and assorted chips. It was strategic because, at that time, our bellies were hungry predators ready to devour anything crossing their paths. I decided to indulge in the salty chips that sounded like my bones whenever I crunched. I had been sleepless for more than 24 hours, and I felt that my pelvis decided to have a life of its own as it started to detach itself from my entire skeletal system.
As mandated, my friends and I put on the flashy orange lifejackets. We heard a prolonged blast filling the entire port, interrupting the erstwhile still summer breeze. It was loud enough to shoo away the birds trying to fit in with the crowd. But it never bothered my friends, who were busy finding their best resting positions.
One could never be complacent when crossing the Pacific Ocean. During our trip, it was a beast that had terrible mood swings. I watched its beauty and vastness, and it was not pacific at all. Its waves changed from sparkling blue to green to brown depending on the position of the vessel and the sun. From time to time, it teased us with its gentle pats on our faces, which, I recognized, became savage and strong slaps eventually. I felt our ferry flailed in different directions, struggling to be in shape, holding its ground, and I realized how brave but helpless it was in the middle of the seething sea.
Sometimes, I have a strong feeling that Joni Mitchell is punishing me.
I am inspecting the turfs peeking out from the narrow crevice beneath the fence when I hear her voice breaking the fragile afternoon air. It is so pure, so divine, yet intruding and somehow imposing. I am in no mood to entertain any uninvited thoughts. But in all its subtlety, Joni’s timbre throws a powerful punch at my still yawning spirit, commanding my mind to make a U-turn to the place intimate to me, to the time when clouds were ice cream castles in the air. In an instant, I find myself in a garden at a bend in the river, examining the sprouting Bermuda grass while having a conversation with my grandmother.
Have you been kind? That was my grandmother, her croaky voice harmonizing with the burble of the water below. For a five-year-old kid, it was a kind of no-brainer question, a question seemingly tossed out of compliance, a question I had routinely answered whenever she was around. I surveyed her face raw with sunburn, which to my mind resembled the field she just checked across the garden, and responded with an instant nod and a reverential hush afterward. I was half-expecting follow-up questions, some proof or receipts she naturally demanded, but instead received a peck on the forehead. I heard her throat-clearing that hinted the rush of litany on the significance of being kind and its consequences – narratives based on her experience, anecdotes of her friends, or stories she could relate to the necessity of possessing a fountain of virtue. Before she got to utter her preface, I deluged her with an account of all the kind things I did, the good deeds that would secure glasses of coconut juice as hard-earned rewards.
Have you been kind? That was my grandmother, popping the query again more than thirty years after my last glass; her voice never changed, except for the buzz of excitement kindled from seeing me again. To some degree, I should not have any difficulties responding considering the barrels of coconut juice I consumed in my youth. But I just stood before her, with a freezing brain and a head that was too stunned to budge even the slightest nod. That time, all I could see was the empty glass that once held the juice. And all I could do was reply with a pregnant pause at the heavily loaded inquiry.
To be the receiver of that question these days is to be in an interrogation room, where each word matters. As one matures, it has become a question that requires some time to think things through, whether its motive is sincere or not, because it puts the integrity of the responder to the test. It has become a question that forces one to be honest because it does not fall for half-truths or white lies, only the truth solely accepted by one’s moral compass. It has become a question that returns unannounced at the devil’s hour, disturbing peace, guilt-tripping, whether one answered truthfully or not. And in some ways, it has become a question that stirs the still small voice.
It is giving in to Joni’s voice so persistent in breaking through the thick wall of consciousness.
Over the years, I have seldom run into that quick moral fiber check. Perhaps, that question is specific only to the children, whose brains have become the glass overfilled with righteousness or attributes or anything adults have decided to pour into them. Perhaps, that question is no longer applicable to adults, who are still figuring out if their glass is half-full or half-empty. Maybe, the teachings about kindness have become vague as one grows up. Or maybe, people just get tired of practicing kindness in a society that has become weirder and weirder each day. There could be a long list of other reasons but one thing I can recall is that being kind is like what is stipulated in the equal opportunity statements of the companies – it knows no age, race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, marital status, disability, national or ethnic origin, and citizenship.
In the corporate world where I have spent most of my adult life, I have never been asked if I have been kind. It is probably because the response will not merit any points in the measures of success in a customer service business. Agents get rigorous training on soft skills with the primary reason of improving the customer satisfaction rating, a business key performance indicator. Leaders undergo training on interpersonal skills with the primary reason of enhancing their competencies to drive people on the ground to hit the customer satisfaction target. The management team supports these trainings with the primary focus on the returns of investment. Yet, being too soft is a hard no, a potential risk because the management team equates it to complacency, to leniency that might impede the company from amassing a substantial fortune.
I remember the time I got summoned to the principal’s office, the interrogation room of the corporate world. My case? I was accused of being too kind, of having a cotton candy personality. I did not get a glass of coconut juice, but an earful of what seemed to be a stern warning. The resolution? I was required to undergo on-the-job training under my boss on becoming a tougher leader.
Kind people, which I am not, always get the burden of explaining, adjusting, straightening their lives out, and never the other way around. It seems that some see it as a liability. The way I see it, the problem lies not in the attitude but in how one perceives the importance of being kind. Jacinda Ardern, New Zealand’s prime minister, has shown the world how to combat the seemingly-unconquerable Covid-19 with leadership that puts kindness at the core. Suho has proven that he is not just the prettiest in the sea of the pretty faces of KPop when he has led his equally talented EXO members in bringing in waves of songs and performances to new heights that have revolutionized the music industry. He has done it not with a tough but with tender love.
I understand why some people don’t give themselves away because, in our society, being kind sometimes comes at a price. Such is the case of Patreng Non, who got vilified by none other than people in power after sparkling kindness through the community pantry, of Dr. Naty Castro, whose kind heart drove her to serve the poor in the outskirts only to find herself languishing in jail sans a single complaint, and of Zara Alvarez, who was gunned down in the dead of the night for seeking justice for the oppressed. Being kind is never wrong. The people who try to stop it are.
Kindness, people should realize, is not a ribbon that one can just tie up in one’s pandora’s box. It is not a tagline or a sound bite or a role to play. It is an act.
Joni Mitchell’s voice might occur to be punitive sometimes. But it is a necessary disciplinary action to remind us that there was a time when our innocent selves exactly knew what kindness meant.
Clark is obsessive-compulsive. It is neither tolerant of people lacking willpower nor people with a loose grasp of discipline. It is not for the deviants because it commands standards, demands conformance, and puts everyone under its spell.
I am one of those who have fallen for its enchantment, which grew on me after several brief business trips to our satellite office in the neighborhood of Clark. Each time, these sojourns prompted me to picture myself lazing around like Tom Sawyer on the cover of the books, under the stooping tree perched on by itinerant birds. They piqued my curiosity about how it would be to wake up again to the clear blue sky that spews gentle breeze, rather than the gray, sinister haze that greets and threatens the metro every morning. These images lingered in my mind. One Sunday afternoon, while everyone was having a siesta, I just found myself entering the South Gate of Clark with nothing but a new job, a few clothes, and a pair of smitten eyes.
Not a single blade of grass jutted out from the tuft inside Clark. The manicured lawn ushered me as I passed through the bump-less MA Roxas Highway split into two by flowers that were organized like a well-thought-of centerpiece. These flowers were never unkempt, even when swaying to the wild wind generated by the speeding cars on the left side of the road. Like them, I noticed vehicles followed a certain order, an unspoken or invisible rule; drivers practiced give-and-take relationship and along the bike lanes on side roads, cyclists pedaled rhythmically with no one stepping out of line.
As I turned left to the Friendship Gate exit, I observed the same level of tidiness. Outside, toward where I was about to settle, was a totally different story.
I have been living on the outskirts of Clark for over two years now. My place is just a seven-minute tricycle ride from the gate that separates two disparate worlds: the world where orderliness is the order and the world worn and torn by the actors just abiding the disorganized orders. Every time I cross that borderline, or poverty line to my friends, there is this whisper that reminds me I need to behave.
To live in Clark entails discipline, tons of it. The expectation for anyone who enters any of its gates is to surrender oneself to its rules and regulations. To be obedient and to be respectful. To follow the commands already in effect since the GI Joes kicked the natives out of their lands. Because it is in the belief that following the set rules is just a matter of black and white – one either obeys or not. Whatever one chooses has a proportionate consequence – either one is welcomed with arms wide open or one pays the price. I have always opted to cooperate.
Obedience is what would allow one to enjoy Clark in all its glory. From frequent visits, I have gathered that to be able to laze around under the stooping tree, one needs to seek approval from the guard. To pass through the gates with no hassle, a truck driver has to present the required proof of delivery or purchase or complete documentation of business. To spare oneself from the attention-grabbing, humiliating whistles from a stern guard, one should only saunter down the designated path. A driver should limit the car’s speed to 60 mph on a fast lane to avoid the exorbitant P2,800 fine, and a cyclist, to be allowed to pedal along the accident-proof bike lane, has to have a complete set of safety gears. No one may pick a single flower or just lay down on the vast manicured lawn. The list goes on, and I have found out that not a single person is spared. For each instance of insubordination from the long list, there is a corresponding disciplinary action: a three-hour seminar to instill the importance of recognizing Clark’s rules and regulations, a whopping fine to teach the violator a lesson, or a lifetime ban from entering the vicinity. Clark, in all its glory, enjoys its full autonomy.
It appears to me that Clark is a disciplinarian obsessed with putting everything in order. It is a control freak, in a way. What it does not control, though, is the flowering of the food businesses now in a sort of luxurious sprawl in what used to be a dense thicket.
Clark is a huge smorgasbord that caters to people conscious of budget. It is a fine treat to eatsplorers in constant search of the best food experience, a watering hole for workers in dire need of a quick mental break, and a safe haven for anyone wanting a sweet escape from the daily torments of living. It is an affordable luxury and so far, I haven’t heard of someone getting a heart attack upon seeing the bill or someone feeling held up after the meal. A steakhouse near Friendship Gate offers a tenderloin steak for P350, same slab and succulence with, but half the price of the steak being offered in a famed restaurant in Tomas Morato. It also serves scrummy homemade apple pie and apple walnut cake that unfailingly slake one’s sweet tooth for less than P160. Not far is the Chinese bistro with a table d’hôte lunch for P80 right beside the burger joint offering a protein burger for less than P150. All of these are just an appetizer because Clark’s main course is hiding in its alleyways.
There seem to have been some magical concoctions happening in the kitchens of the makeshift eateries along the backstreets of the business center. I have always suspected that a drop of potion and a murmur of conjuration serve as toppings on food being dished out in a garage transformed into what can be qualified as a bistro, or in a house that has replaced couches with serried rows of wooden tables and benches, or in a garden with rusty chairs in full view of Clark Parade Grounds. What these hash houses lack visually, they compensate gastronomically. For less than the price of a tall cup of Café Americano in Starbucks, a diner can already have unlimited rice with a bowl of vegetable stew half-filled with crunchy pork, or a plate full of mixed vegetables steamed in shrimp sauce, or the combination of different dishes, or any typical dish that becomes zestier at the meticulous hands of the Kapampangans. These cooks only serve a plate of nirvana and transcendence is the only standard they conform to.
In Clark, there’s no such thing as too much food. There are neither rules for consumption nor disciplinary actions. It is unkind to the people on a diet.
I have been living on the outskirts of Clark for over two years now and I have always been smitten. Its obsessive-compulsive personality has helped me become tolerant of life decisions built from the lack of willpower and discipline.
Rafa Nadal, then the world no. 2, was sitting upright on one of the two most fought-over benches in Melbourne Park. It was a relaxing shot after the fervent, if not ferocious, exchanges of pounds and grunts between him and the equally determined warrior on the other side of the court.
His movements were in a precise calculation: his eyes were laser-focused, his jaw was clenched and his lips were tightly sealed, depriving the wishful of his inviting and impregnating smile. He rolled up his dripping shirt that earlier veiled one of God’s most beautiful creations and wiped the drops of exhaustion off his knitted brows. He acknowledged the need to work on his unforced errors and receiving points, which caused him two sets of loss to the top seed Nole Djokovic.
He stood up, unclenched his jaw, unsealed his lips, and shook his still drenching body tightly hugged by an ensemble of neon green shirt, blue headband and wristband, and white shorts. He walked towards the court, evidently drained of energy but not spirit. He surveyed the other side of the court with an aura of an unforgiving lion.
But he was up against the widely considered the greatest returner in the history of tennis, the human wall whose scrawny physique could counterpunch any fired shots – fast or slow, drop or deep, cross-court or down-the-line. Rafa knew this, especially with his less-than-impressive 2-6 score in the third set. He was trailing behind at the first half of the fourth set and just following the tempo of the game his opponent furtively and slyly dictated until the score reached 4-3.
He seemed to realize that the Norman Brooks trophy was slipping away from his hands. He flexed his world-renowned biceps, toughened up his left wrist, and whacked the ball as deep as he could to generate more insane spins that would force his challenger to commit unforced errors. The ball twirled like a drunken cannonball; its swoosh shushed the rowdy audience eagerly awaiting the counterstrike. It returned with a slower, more manageable spin, touching down at the exact spot Rafa had hoped for – outside the court. With the Rod Laver Arena in pandemonium, he fully regained his composure, stole the momentum, and never looked back, ending the set at 7-5 in his favor and forcing a decider. He took in some air, the smell of victory.
The fifth set kicked off with tense serving as the backdrop of the arena that became combustible with the heated back-and-forth of shots. Rafa became more aggressive. He was reasserting his dominance as he continuously machine-gunned Nole with his “crisper,” borrowing Pat McEnroe’s description, oddly spinning bullets and cannonballs. Already enjoying a 2-game lead and was just 2 games shy from lifting the trophy, he somehow forgot a crucial detail–he was playing against a passive-aggressive and a silent killer, a heavily built bulwark with hidden bombs powered by mental toughness. He was all over the court, chasing the drop shots and deep shots, the cross-courts and down-the-lines, unmindful that his oddly spinning bullets and cannonballs were already being melted by a fully charged two-handed backhand. He lost 4 winners. Still ahead at 4-3, he received a giveaway, a floater in the mid-court, and pounded the ball using the backhand. The ball landed at the exact spot he had not hoped for–outside the court. Rafa never recovered.
On the bench, Rafa was sitting sluggishly, with bullets and cannonballs of sweats still swarming all over his rugged face and bulging muscles. He watched his opponent let go of a roar while ripping shirt, a fitting drama to wrap up the never-before-seen shots and play-making abilities brought to the world by the Australian Open 2012. He finally flaunted his smile shining as bright as his shirt and joined the cheering of the crowd that just witnessed the longest Grand Slam final match in history and what the pundits declared as the greatest match ever.
This is just a part of the story that I wanted to share with you, the story that would bridge what you watched and what you had not. The decade-old images that are still vivid, the rawest moments I captured while I tried to catch the chips sliding off my mouth. The images that have shown the world again and again what masterpiece means – from start to finish, characterized by the dramatic instances we usually tabled in our tennis-first conversations over the cups of coffee and packs of ciggies.
Because what is a tennis conversation without these defining moments? Aside from tennis itself, I realize we had these dramatic instances as our common denominator, even if we were usually divided by the side of the court we chose to support. In one of our conversations, we almost forgot the greatness of Steffi Graf in the 1993 Wimbledon women’s tennis final because we were so engrossed in talking about the choking of Jana Novotna and her meltdown in front of Duchess of Kent, who gave her a shoulder to cry on in the most literal sense. This was the scene that I was waiting for Rafa to replicate, to counter and even upstage Nole’s roaring and ripping, to add more spectacle to the already action-packed game. But he must have been so tired to even shed a single tear. And he is, well, the ever-polite and polished Rafa.
Already, I could hear your string of justifications and analyses, the sound of the pain of losing, of groans of heartbreak upon learning that the love of your life, Rafa, got his ass kicked again by none other than his greatest rival. I could imagine your heavy puffing as if absorbing all the pieces of the incomplete puzzle of why and the quaffing of your dark brew that had never tasted so bitter. I could hear your night-long sighs and laments on the other line as you tried to accept the result of what Rafa has considered as the greatest loss of his career.
Only, there would be no calls or chats from you, no night-long laments, no puffing, and quaffing. It has been ten years, and the images are still vivid.
Happy 10 years in heaven, Ate Cris! I hope you’re able to watch the 2022 Australian Open, with Rafa, in his usual flamboyant fashion, standing upright in Melbourne Park, hoisting the trophy after beating the current world no. 2. But then again, you might have been at the courtside shouting “Vamos, Rafa!”
The gate shrieks as I step outside. It is freakish, reminiscent of the wail of despair that lingers in the air and haunts the hearers.
If not for that sound, I would not be able to see the rusts and peels that have splotched its black paint. I would not be able to realize that in 15 years since my transfer, I had never bothered to check it, not even once, with its facade now resembling the other gates in the street that have known no care, gates that have been forgotten and have gotten embroidered only by the thickening rusts and moss.
Beside the gate, under the thick metro smog that levitates like the possessed, three kids are slumped on the pavement, without masks, unfazed by the unceasing awful stories about the ravages of the pandemic. I watch them laugh their asses off as they parrot the corny lines from an ad of a loser hell-bent on staging a political come-back. They have opted to just surrender their fates to the saints and those with superpowers, I suppose, just like their recently laid-off mothers, who walk miles and miles every day searching for a job while reciting the sorrowful mystery.
A few meters away from the young daredevils, I already sense the larger-than-life presence of Kuya Nonoy, from the smoke he emits that clouds the half-empty store of junk food and sanitary napkins behind him, and the crescendo of shrieks he produces that shake the neighbors on siesta. I can hear his laments, the curses he profusely showers to Duterte and Duque, his promise to throw rotten eggs at them as simple payback for the negligence and further misery the two have inflicted on the poor like him.
As I walk past the swelling crowd that gets engrossed in Kuya Nonoy’s perfervid monologue, I notice him looking straight at me, bearing the eyes of a child asking for a candy for a job well done. I give him a sweet, approving smile.
The crowd is still raucous with a cacophony of cheers, jeers, and sneers when I reach the corner of the street. I stand facing what was once the melting pot of all that had been ignored, abused, and rejected – the broken vases, unupholstered sofas, stale sodas, spoiled food – often swarmed by flies, cockroaches, and other weird-looking insects. It now houses the well-maintained, fully-embroidered grotto that has become the convergence point of people who feel unloved, unappreciated, and neglected, consistently abuzz with lamentations, intercessions, petitions, and grievances from its frequent visitors – Kuya Nonoy and his gang, the desperate job-seeking mothers and the kids they leave behind, at the hands of those who give a damn.
Across the street, I glimpse at the sign tacked at the window of the water refilling station that reads “permanently closed,” at arm’s length from the wall lamp striped with blue and red beside the ajar door of the barbershop that has seen better days. There is nothing in there other than the unswept strands of hair from its last customer.
After a brief pause, I continue to make my way towards the next crossroads with heavy steps, crushing the fallen leaves from the lonely, imposing tree and stones chipped off the cracks in the pavement. I chance upon the 90s matinee idol flashing his killer smile in front of the onetime flower shop that no longer sells flowers and bouquets but promises fully ornamented with colorful words. As I get closer, I find out that I am smiling back at a standee of a virgin trying to penetrate the tempting yet filthy world of politics.
I haul my body that suddenly becomes exhausted, not from the short walk but from the feel-good platitudes that I just read, the over-the-top recycled promises that are as treacherous as the pervasive virus. At last, I can now see my destination, standing proud before the spot-less, rust-less cars that have probably never experienced any forms of neglect.
I flump into my favorite spot in my old haunt and breathe in the smoke from my cafe americano. I gulp down as much liquid as I can to immediately wash away the shrieking, haunting, and lingering images of neglect and misfortunes from the world that has promised its people the opposite. I then close my eyes for their much-needed break.
My eyes have traveled a lot just from a 5-minute walk.
Letting go, planned or unplanned, becomes inescapable when one hits forty. It’s not that one suddenly turns into an unloving, disengaged beast without rhyme or reason; it is more of realizing that one’s fangs are better to be used in cutting off things that are no longer pragmatic and sensible to keep.
It is not an easy affair, though. Some things are hard to cut off, even with the sharpest fangs. They are stubborn and seductive, often in the guise of the “I deserve it” or “I worked hard for it” justifications. I had almost fallen into that trap, hesitant to end my dalliance with fancy bags until I saw them lining up like unclaimed cadavers in my closet, cobwebbed and dusty.
Self-discipline is what whets the fangs. And so far, I have had hard-fought triumphs of letting go. Not until I come face to face with perfume, because whenever that happens, I become a toothless prey.
Perfume can effortlessly put my ready-to-kill fangs into a state of total worthlessness. It’s able to find my Achilles heel, and there is a huge possibility that it’s because I have always been a willing target. So even before the battle starts, I have already lost.
My apathy to escape from the spell of perfume has resulted in more than a hundred bottles of fused notes from different brands or houses, as cognoscenti call them. Occupying the mid-part of my closet, they look like babies in the nursery screaming out for my attention.
For someone who grew up with a great-grandmother fully bathed in floral scent every second of the day, I have always been under the impression that my hoarding is justifiable; it is deeply entrenched. And however edged the fangs are, they would always be blunt in cutting the habit off.
The truth is, I have a special relationship with each of my perfumes. They are vivid, scented memories encapsulated in bottles, reminders of the beauty of life in a world that has become a brutal beast. They are a staple of my soul. They make me feel I am human.
Or a fairy freely frolicking in woods flecked by budding blooms. Or a princess as delicate as well-kept china, her well-kempt hair flows like a sparkling river in her crease-free lavender gown.
And that’s another thing about perfume. It is a magic carpet ride that can transport any wishful to dazzling, unconquered places. It is a mystical elixir that one can spritz or sniff to transform oneself into a princess with a boyish charm, a brunette and voluptuous celebrity, or a kick-ass lady boss revered by all. It is the perfect vehicle to get away from the torments of the gagging inanities and insanities.
Perfume lets one remember and lets one forget.
And so, I have made peace with the thought that perfume is something I cannot utterly slash from my system, even in my fifties or sixties or even in my grave. Letting fragrance go has never been an option, for how can I detach myself from something that makes me human, and a blonde bombshell?
I turned forty when even a simple celebration was taboo. The world was mourning then, with the dead in phalanx across the once noisy streets and the alive, even the most rapacious ones, in dead silence in the corner most part, begging only for one thing – to wake up the following day, nothing more, nothing less.
In our place, paranoia was as haunting as the howls of the neighbors’ dogs at night. It was palpable; it damped down the spirit that the Christmas lights at every window tried to jazz up. But that did not stop me from having a decent party. Not with my life-of-the-party soul sister Mitch, the only person I knew of exempted from the strict imposition of curfew and other spurious policies made out of iffy grounds, gracing my about-to-get-boring event with his Christmassy presence.
When all were at wit’s end, being with someone you immensely enjoyed chatting with was in itself a present. It was a comforting hug after months of mourning, filling up the longing of somebody like me who had nobody to talk to for more than eight months but coffee and ciggies.
And so, the show went on, backdropped by the curtain of smoke from the coffee, ciggies, and recently-delivered food. The rest of the team I handled joined the event virtually, doing what they do best – trading banter, generating a euphony of laughter that supplanted the hiss of homesickness hovering over my place. In times like this, laughter was not only the best medicine; it was one essential key to survival.
I had my most unusual birthday, and it was not bad. At the very least, I had a good laugh that was so elusive the past days. That virtual space, in its expanse, provided the venue for a get-together to laugh our asses off. To be human again. True, some elements were missing, and I would still prefer face-to-face, but if only for laughter, which I live for to keep a tab on the dwindling mental health, it served its purpose.
The world was weeping, but it did not forbid its children from celebrating life. Laugh to survive, embrace change to pull through, persist in these trying times.
Live for the moment. I turned forty with a decent party.
I live to tell – that’s how I always think of myself. My mantra and my mission, that thinking has become my way of life, personal or professional.
And so I write. I have always been in awe of words. Words have the unseen immensity and depth that capture the shade and hue of the beauty and madness of this world. Words can amp up and tone down the picture they paint, and just like a face, they can launch a thousand ships.
I love exploring the pulchritude of words. I write because I live, and I write because I tell.
I write because I exist in the most interesting of times when unprecedented changes in all facets of life happen, revealing more and more the craziness of this planet. But however stark raving mad things have become, they need to be written. They require telling, the Didion way or not.
And so I’m writing again, attempting to journal the world in the eye of forty-something. In these interesting times, to write is a must.
