Sunday, November 14, 2004

i should really be writing about christmas

41 days before christmas and i still don't feel it. i don't know why, but it certainly couldn't be ME! i think christmas has not been manifesting itself well enough these days. and if it has, i think it's some pretty weird manifesting it's making.



for instance, my pop and i recently had our ceremonial "take out the christmas lights and fix the burnt out ones" tradition. we fell all over ourselves searching for damaged blinkers and exposed livewires only to lose heart in the end because of theft and robbery. yes, you read it right, theft and robbery. you see, we initially wanted to put the lights around the bush infront of the house to create the decor of a well-lit christmas garden. but neighborhood kids -- for some weird reason -- are in the habbit of plucking the little light bulbs away. the result is a christmas garden with only a couple of lights blinking merrily among themselves. from afar, they look like two stranded fireflies. the all-fixed up lights are now sitting idly in a cabinet.

then there was the case of the lost christmas tree. mama, who is usually the officer-in-charge of interior decorations, can't seem to find our old christmas tree -- the one we carefully disassembled and stashed away in some box last year. now, it's gone. whoever took it could be happily decorating it by now. or he could have sold it to some people who desperately needed a christmas tree. or he could have dismounted the little branches and made himself a halloween costume. we can only speculate.

and what's the deal with the weather, huh? it's even hotter than summer! gladys said it's because of the el niño. niño or no niño, we all deserve a cool christmas, or at least not an insanely hot one. this is the time to bring out the jackets, and the long-sleeved shirts and the dark-colored sweatshirts. and it doesn't mean you have to SWEAT on them!

and then there were the carollers last week. as i arrived home, i was greeted by some 5 to 6 kids shouting "May'ng Pasko! (Merry Christmas!)" to whoever they thought was inside the house. but nobody was inside, and as i was opening the gate to get in, they harangued me with their "greetings." knowing i (1) did not have any money, (2) did not hear their songs as i just arrived, and (3) did not like their conduct which was borderline rude, i said the customary reply, "Dugay pa ang Pasko, balik lang mo! (It's still a long time 'till Christmas, just come back soon!)."

"Kanus-a man? (When exactly?)" i was shocked to get a reply.

"Inig ka-Pasko (On Christmas day)," irked, i said.

"Dugaya pa ana oi! (That's too late!)".

exactly. whoever told you you were not too early to carol, kids?

Thursday, November 04, 2004

ancestors, we invoke thee


a couple of months ago, i was able to channel the spirit of the great Tamriel god of ancestry, Xarxes. during the brief encounter (which, strangely enough, arrived while i was eating burger steak in Jollibee), Xarxes revealed to me the ancestry of four of my close friends and myself. the revelation was staggering, their truth made known only in some of our physical attributes. with great care, i shall share with you this revelation from divinity.

ernie james is of Spanish descent. well, this is not that unpredictable, considering ernie's grandmother (Mamang Patiño) is an española who speaks fluent español. ernie looks unmistakably like a spaniard. when ernie james enters any generic filipino barrio, you half expect the inhabitants to run amock screaming, "ang mga guardia civil, paparating!" Xarxes also revealed that from now on, ernie james shall adopt the song "livin la vida loca" as his personal anthem. Xarxes did not reveal if he has a penchant for ricky martin.

vanessa hails from an Indian ancestry. Indian, as in those living in India. this too does not come as a surprise. bunga's indian features have always caught everyone's attention, thereby prompting the II-Palma students to bestow upon her the distubingly provocative role of "court dancer" in their production of Aladin. as bunga danced her belly out in her rendition of Arabian Nights almost five years ago, i knew she was Indian. but i did not tell Xarxes this, lest he smite me with a ricky martin cd album. he then revealed banne's theme song: the theme song of the ginebra "bilog ang mundo" ad. the title escaped me, as Xarxes was busy dancing himself to its dizzying rhythm.

chamar is Chinese. i did not see the significance of this mind-boggling disclosure at first but then Xarxes directed my attention to chamar's Confucius-like goatie. indeed, upon seeing chammy's shoulder-length goatie (which is unusually straight for a goatie), he immediately invoked the vision of a chinese horde in attack stance ready to fight the mongolians. i asked the Illustrious One if chammy's mutant powers of sweating profusely after consuming large amounts of spicy food had anything to do with chammy's being chinese, but then Xarxes only looked at me and said that he hated spicy food, too. (sometimes, Xarxes could be just as incoherent as he is unfathomable). Xarxes then launched into a song, "Make a Wish" by the taiwanese sensation Hua Xi Lei, indicating that it was to be Chammy's theme song.

i was Italian. Xarxes revealed that i am descended from a line of rich Italian blue bloods of the hoity toity sort. He revealed unto me a vision of a castle which he said were the home of my ancestors. i did not believe this, i told him, since i do not feel Italian nor do i feel any "lukso ng dugo" whenever i watch Molto Mario on tv. He threatened to pull each one of my beard hair if i do not believe him. Xarxes said that my beard itself was evidence enough of my ancestry. he, however, did not give me any song since he said he did not speak Italian. huh?

gladys, now this is a difficult case. i swear i thought Xarxes' revelation was that gladys was a true-blooded Filipino. however, now that i have told them, gladys claims i am wrong. to her credit, now that i try to remember, Xarxes was suddenly disturbed as he was giving his vision of gladys. the result was mumbling audio and blurry video. i tried to sort the words out and managed to make out "pandaca pygmea", "bahay kubo", and "aeta". i thought then that the deity was referring to Filipino. gladys, perhaps with a bout of jealousy over our foreign bloods, berated me with insults with a strength of a thousand amazon women. until now, she claims she is Brazillian.

Wednesday, November 03, 2004

the death of petunia

four days: that's how long Petunia stayed with me. in that four days, she swam, ate and frolicked in her little fishbowl like the little darling that she was. she gave everyone at home happiness, however brief, upon watching her do the things she did. now she is gone.

as far as i can think of, i did not do anything that might have contributed to her death. i fed her regularly, and took her outside the house whenever i would launch aggressive offensive assaults on mosquitoes with my trusty baygon insect repellent. i also talked to her whenever i can, to the dismay and consternation of my worried parents.

last tuesday, as i was steaming pork dumplings for lunch, i noticed that Petunia wasn't her usual self. she wasn't swimming fast enough and her dorsal fins were somehow not in unison with each other as they moved. i knew something was wrong. before you can say "here fishy fishy," she was floating helplessly on her side.

what happened next was a series of futile attempts at fish first aid too painful to recount.

she died at exactly 3pm of November 2. All Soul's Day.

i took her out of her bowl and wrapped her in newspaper. i could not take it to myself to dump her in the trashcan. so i flushed her down the toilet. crude, yes, but what is there to do. As she swirled around the flushing waters, i threw the remains of her hydrilla on the water. <*sniffs*>

now Petunia's empty fishbowl sits silently on the corner of my room: an empty tomb to her memory.

Tuesday, November 02, 2004

compsci jokes

My friend's 15-year-old son was chatting on the Internet, and, like many, began to exaggerate his accomplishments. He came running into the study and blurted to his father, "Dad, I'm talking to this girl in a chat room. I told her I'm a first-year university student and she asked me what my major is. What should I tell her?"

"How about journalism?" his father replied, smiling wryly.

Moments later, the boy returned and excitedly announced, "I can't believe it -- she's a swimsuit model!"

----

Powering up my office computer one morning, I saw a unique error message: "Keyboard undetected."

Then I saw how I was supposed to clear the error: "Press any key to continue."

---

A man walks into a Silicon Valley pet shop to buy a monkey. The store owner shows him three monkeys and begins, "The one on the left costs five hundred dollars."

"Why so much?" the customer wants to know.

"Because," the shopkeeper explains, "he can program a computer in 'C.'"

"What about that monkey?" the man asks indicating the next animal.

"He costs fifteen hundred dollars because he knows how to program in Visual C++ and Object-Relational technology."

The startled patron then inquires about the third monkey.

"He's worth three thousand dollars," the store owner replies.

"Three thousand dollars!" the man exclaims. "What can he do?"

"To be honest." the merchant confesses, "I've never seen him do a thing, buut he calls himself a consultant."

something fishy

I bought a fish. A goldfish. I have always wanted one. Her name is Petunia. I love her.

UPS was supposed to volunteer to this Feeding Program in Zapatera, but it was canceled on the last minute. So I had nothing to do for a whole morning. I decided to put into action my long overdue plan of buying a fish. I asked Jason and Ogdoc to come with me to SinHiaPing (I’m not sure with the spelling). They agreed and so off we went.

SinHiaPing is an old Chinese district in Colon renowned for its aquarium-type fishes. If you are planning on making an aquarium for a project, do not go to the malls to buy materials. The Cebuanos have long known the secret of cheaply priced fishes in SinHiaPing. Almost anyone I know with an aquarium got the fishes from there.

I bought a fishbowl for P80, fish food for P5, hydrilla for P2, and Petunia for P15. Neat, huh? Of course, these were all haggled prices, except for Petunia. The guy we bought her from was impervious to Ogdoc’s business talk. Oh well. I’d like to believe that you can never put a price tag on love. Well, maybe you can but the price is nonnegotiable.

Ogdoc and Jason urged me to buy a pair, but I wanted only one. I think that’s the point of an aquarium. If anything, it means solitude.

On our way home, we found a fish struggling for its life on the sidewalk. I grabbed it and looked for where to put it. A girl told me to just put it back in the bucket with the other fishes. Jason was confused why the fish jumped out of the water. I took a quick glance at Petunia inside the plastic bag.

I was really concerned if goldfishes can live on mineral water. I kept on asking the vendors if they do, all said yes. But I doubted them. After all, they were there for business. When I got home, Jason helped me put her in the bowl of mineral water. Petunia, God bless her heart, is still alive.

gamers unite

As one of the early settlers in our village, my family used to put up with the features of a new neighborhood, such as the lack of electricity and water. As a result, television was basically a luxury and you have to fetch water from the nearest artesian wells (there were two) if you want a hearty bath. This lasted for two to three years – that would be when I was 3 to 5 years old.

The lack of these necessities notwithstanding, I remember happy scenes of a bustling neighborhood. The absence of television and, hence, anything better to do, would inevitably result to communal activities. The manangs (old moms) would play mah-jong ever so often; the pops would, well, they would be too tired working their 8 to 5 jobs, so most just rested; and the kids would gather around and play games. Faced with the prospect of nothing to do, we turned to each other.

If you ask me what scenes I still remember of the olden times, I would say the many patintero, buwan-buwan (I don’t know the English counterparts), and other street tournaments held on our streets. Usually these were held during full moon when the streets were bathed with moonlight. Every kid played, no one was excluded. As long as you can run and tag people, your were in. Even weird introverted kids like me played. I remember, we would all be too noisy that our parents would give up trying to sleep and just go out and watch us. Most of them would then grab their bangko (stools) and gossip about whatnots.

All night long, smelly sweaty kids would shout, run, cry, laugh and tumble endlessly as parents watch on. Sometimes the parental units would even cajole and tease us. They were also asked to settle disputes on the technical aspect of the games – having mastered the games themselves in their childhood, they were the resident experts (of course, they wouldn’t always agree with each other).

Those were happy times. Fun times! They no longer exist nowadays in my neighborhood. You will no longer hear kids playing outside. The manangs no longer have their nightly sessions of board games. The streets no longer bear the markings of the familiar patintero grids.
In a way, I feel the new generation of kids have it badly. They missed what I would consider a big part of childhood. But then again, I may just be an old rut.

I asked Jason and Ogdoc where the kids are these days. We thought about it and we concluded that they are not in the streets because they are 1) watching television and 2) in the internet cafes, playing multi-player, networked RPG’s. The TV I can understand, I watch TV myself longer than what’s good for me. But computer games? Are you kidding me?

I guess this is what they call the generation gap. (Sheesh … when I say “generation gap” before, I used to belong to the younger side of the gap.) I guess that’s where kids play these days, not in moonlit streets but in darkened cafes lit by the eerie glow of monitors. They no longer evade their opponents persistent tags to score a “home”, they evade bullets and rocket launchers to win a terrorist virtual war.

I don’t envy them.

Then again, I may just be an old rut.