love has a thousand faces
february 14, 2007
- Oscar Wilde
Just a few days after Valentine’s Day last year, Markie woke me up at around 1 am, to tell me that on TV was news that a landslide had occured in Guinsaugon, Southern Leyte, barely 2 kilometers from where my parents live. Horrified, I immediately called my parents, who confirmed that they were alright. However, my mom, sounding very shaken by the news, started telling me the names of several people we know (some of them distant relatives) who were still missing under the rubble.
Days passed and the details of story continued to come…how the rescuers were having difficulty looking for survivors under 30 feet of unstable rocks and mud…how aid was starting to pour in…and finally, how the search and rescue effort was called off with still almost a thousand people unaccounted for. As the rescue operations came to a stop, relief efforts for the survivors began. We heard news that such-and-such country was sending in millions of pesos in aid, that so-and-so celebrity or businessman was pledging millions more to help the displaced residents of Guinsaugon. They were being relocated, re-housed, revived, relieved.
This news that a huge amount of help was on the way gave us hope and a sense of relief. However, we were realists: after all, after the Super Typhoon Ruping devastation on Cebu in 1990, help was promised, but very little seemed to trickle down to us, the residents who were affected by the disaster. So we decided to do whatever we could to help this time.
I started setting aside items we could send, and collected clothes, blankets and towels from my friends and co-workers, who were more than willing to help. In Southern Leyte, my mom tried to figure out what the problems were with the distribution process, so we wouldn’t do the same. She discovered that, for the most part, the survivors were well provided for.
However, some of the clothes donated through the big organizations were simply packed in plastic bags and handed out to whomever was in handing distance. In this manner, a little 80-pound lola might get a pair of jeans for a 6-foot man in her plastic bag, and a muscled farmer might get a ladies’ blouse. Still, help was help, and no one was complaining. Because they are a resourceful people with a strong sense of community, they went around exchanging stuff so that most people ended up getting just the thing they needed.
My mom, however, wanted to make things a little easier for the survivors. As soon as a balikbayan box with donations arrived from us, she patiently separated the clothes and other items, went through the list of survivors, and tried to match the clothes and other items with the appropriate people. She would place these items in plastic bags and write that person’s name on the bag. Then, accompanied by one of my brothers or cousins, she would visit the survivors in the shelters and personally give them the donated items.
Some of them were so happy, she said, that they wore the clothes right there and then. In this way we were able to distribute about two hundred pieces of clothing and other items. A small drop in the stream of relief operations, we know, but we were glad to do our little part.
Today, a year after the disaster, most of the survivors have regained some semblance of normal life. They have been relocated to houses built especially for them – tiny huts, for sure, but homes all the same. Most are back to work, and some entrepreneural souls have even opened teeny sari-sari stores. They go about their daily lives, oftentimes with a smile on their lips as most Filipinos do, but in their eyes you could still see that hint of sadness.
Since that time last year, more disasters have descended on other areas of the Philippines, challenging the resiliency of our people. The survivors of Guinsaugon have shown us however, as others have before, that Filipinos are able to bounce back from disaster. And even if they do still need whatever help we can send them, they do pull themselves up, and help themselves and each other carry on.
*****
happy birthday, markie!
september 29, 2006
there’s always you, holding my hand
Thank you for being the funny, sweet, kind man that you are.
Thank you for sharing your stories, secrets, and dreams with me.
Thank you for sharing the day to day adventures of life and marriage with humor, courage, and strength.
Thank you for being you.
Happy birthday, sweetie! 
*****
strength
march 14, 2005
It was a warm, balmy afternoon. We had parked a couple of meters away from the bank’s entrance, in a spot shaded by a leafy tree. I had opted to wait in the car while Mark transacted some business inside, as I was sleepy and the thought of dozing off in the bank’s lobby didn’t appeal to either my sense of decorum or comfort. So there I was instead, in the car’s passenger seat with my seatbelt still on, nodding off as an Alanis song played softly on the stereo.
I sensed more than saw a movement to my left. I opened my half-closed eyes a little wider, and looked on with mild interest as a little old lady got out of her car. She was stooped at the shoulders, and had wispy grey hair that blew away from her face in the slight breeze. She had on a yellow jacket, a pair of thick stockings that couldn’t hide her varicose veins, and black leather shoes with thick soles. She toddled up the path to the bank with a very unsteady gait, with two yellow bags slung on her left arm.
Having been raised by a loving grandma, I was overcome with a strong urge to jump out of the car, run towards the little old lady, and open the bank’s door for her.
But before I could even unfasten my seatbelt, she had already resolutely made her way to the door. With one strong, sure movement, she pushed one side of the heavy glass swinging door open, and was swallowed up into the tinted coolness of the lobby, away from sight, away from my slow-legged good intentions.
*****
everyday is valentine’s day
february 16, 2005
a cup of brew, a pile of books, and thou…
*****
ruminations over a plate of sushi
june 3, 2004
I was quite hungry this morning, owing to the fact that I stayed up half the night cleaning the apartment. While trying to decide whether I should cook or eat out, I came across Minnette’s latest entry in Lafang List, so I decided to go to one of the few eating places in our area that I actually like to dine out in – a restaurant that serves a buffet of American, Chinese, and Japanese dishes.
I’ve been to this place several times in the past year, often with friends and at times on my own, so I know the menu pretty well. Their sushi is pretty good, and I was looking forward to sampling them today.
On the way to my table, I came across one of the waitresses, and smiled in recognition. Jill (not her real name) is, I assume, a member of the family who owns the restaurant. Or perhaps a close relative. I came to this assumption because a) she closely resembles the cashier, who I take to be one of the owners simply because she never wears a uniform and b) she is always here whenever I/we come over to eat.
My drink was already waiting when I got back to my table after visiting the buffet spread. Noting that one type of sushi was especially good, I went to the bar for more. When I came back to the table, the used plate I had left behind was already cleared, and my drink had been topped up. This Jill is very efficient, I thought to myself, noticing that she moved between tables and did her job with the same speed I use when crossing the Taft Ave. MRT station in my rubber shoes, which is to say, very fast.
As I watched her balance a loadful of half-empty plates, this thought suddenly came to me: Is this her American dream? Did she, like so many of us, leave her home for the promise of ‘greener pastures’ in this foreign land? Does she have dreams and secret hopes that she nurtures while she waits tables, day after day, in this buffet restaurant? Or was this it, was this the only thing that she came for?
I must admit, I’m a hopeless romantic when it comes to dreams and goals. I’m the eternal optimist, albeit a pragmatic one. I believe in dreaming, and in going after dreams, even when we sometimes have to take the long and circuitous route to get to where we want to go.
So there I tarried over the plate of savory sushi, my thoughts now jumping from Jill the waitress to my own self, to my family, to my friends. And to the people I’ve met along the way to my goals, who helped me get a second wind by giving me an encouraging word, a comforting hug, some well-timed advice.
And suddenly, sushi half-forgotten, I felt a wave of gratitude for everyone who helped me get to where I am now. It is not yet the destination I had originally set out for, but I believe that I’m nearer to where I want to go in part because of the people who helped me and blessed me and cheered me on.
And so, as I left the coolness of the restaurant for the 97-degree Florida heat, I whispered a silent prayer. For Jill the waitress, that she might get a second wind to last her through her busy day, and hopefully keep alive whatever dreams she might have. And for myself, my family and my friends, that we would always find the strength and the faith to keep on going. And that, even when our goals seem very far off or when we start to feel like nothing much is happening at the moment, we never stop dreaming.
*****
the books of my life
july 10, 2004
The first book I remember holding was:
A Reading textbook, featuring ‘Bantay’ the dog.
I think I was about 4 years old at that time, too young to be in school, at least by that era’s standards. I was tagging along my older cousins, who were in Grade 1 at the local public school in Southern Leyte.
The teacher gave me my own scratchy wooden desk to sit on, and lent me a worn-out copy of the book. The 7-year-olds in the class were reading aloud from the text in a singsong manner:
I didn’t understand the letters and words, but I enjoyed looking at the pictures and hearing the chant-like chorus. It was wonderful. It was the first day of my lifetime love affair with books.
***
The books I almost broke a leg for were:
My cousin’s classic Disney books
My cousin’s parents were both English teachers and owned this huge collection of what to me were beautifully-illustrated Disney books featuring endless stories about Mickey Mouse, Pluto, Donald Duck, and company. My cousin lived 2 houses away at that time, and on long summer days she and her sisters would come over to our house to watch TV, and afterwards I would go over to their house to read the books.
Those big, heavy books were placed in a high shelf over their living room sofa. I suspect it was because my cousins hardly read them and they were just there mostly for decorative purposes. One day when I came over the adults were too busy too help me, so I decided to climb up the window to get to the shelf on my own. As I was holding on to the volume on Mickey the Magician, I lost my footing and slipped. Thankfully I did not fall too hard on the bamboo-slat floor. My aunt and uncle were mortified, but I didn’t even cry, and proceeded to read as if nothing happened.
***
The book that ushered me into ‘adult’ book reading was:
“Master of the Game” by Sidney Sheldon
I was 12. The standard reading fare for my age, I was made to understand by friends, was ‘Sweet Dreams’ and ‘Sweet Valley High’. That summer I was back vacationing in Leyte when I saw my aunt with a book whose cover photo was a diamond dripping with blood. My mom saw me eyeing it and expressely forbade me to read it. I am somewhat embarrassed to admit that exactly because of that admonition, I snuck out of our house every day between noon and dinner that summer, hid in my aunt’s 2nd floor living room, and relished each forbidden page.
That year I read four other Sidney Sheldon books and not one ‘Sweet Dreams’ (although I would ‘discover’ these later, at 15).
***
The book I was politely but firmly asked to stop carrying around in College was:
The Holy Bible
I was a young, passionate Christian, and added a weighty full-sized Bible to the load I carried in my bag, already heavy with huge Nursing books. Some of my friends and I would chat after lunch, and would at times get to opening our Bibles to one page or another. Sometimes, other friends and classmates would come over, and we would have friendly, and often spirited, impromptu discussions about Christianity and other matters.
I didn’t know this had reached our Dean’s ears, until I was summoned to her office and very politely but very firmly asked to stop ‘carrying a huge Bible and proselytizing’. To honor my dean’s request, I bought a palm-sized Bible that same week. But the discussions continued, I guess because people didn’t want stop discussing Christianity just because I carried a smaller Bible.
***
The book that changed the way I looked at comic books was:
“The Sandman” by Neil Gaiman
A few months after I arrived in Manila to work, one of my officemates, JB, found out that I was ‘into’ comic books…that is, I used to read X-Men and could tell who was Cyclops and who was Wolverine at a glance, and didn’t have to have the premise explained to me at length (this was before X-Men the movie came out). (I’ve also read a number of classic literature in comic book format, but this is another story).
JB then raved about ‘Sandman’, and over the next few weeks brought me his copies of this epic story. I am eternally grateful to him for this because a) I think Sandman is one of the best stories ever written in graphic or any other format, and has some of the most memorable, well-developed, and complex characters in any story I could think of, and b) it was one of the topics I could talk about with Markie when I first met him, because, well, Markie is ‘into’ comic books and graphic novels too. 
***
The book I’ve read more than 3 times (and could read over and over again) is:
“Foucault’s Pendulum” by Umberto Eco
My next-cubicle neighbor at Summit, Kat, lent me her copy of Foucault’s Pendulum, and I fell in love with Eco’s words and worlds. The couple of weeks I spent reading this book was the only time I ever holed up for a long time in my then-apartment in Pioneer, not caring that I had neither TV set nor phone (landline).
There is something about Umberto Eco’s writing, and especially about Foucault’s Pendulum, that I find immensely enjoyable. Whenever I start to read this book I find myself totally immersed in it. The words that Eco uses are not easy words. The allusions he uses are numerous and varied, and could be obscure at times. I’m not sure if “fun” is a word that other people use to describe Eco’s books, but that is exactly what I experience when when I read Foucault’s Pendulum.
***
The books currently on my night-stand are:
1. Quicksilver and The Confusion by Neal Stephenson
2. Endless Nights by Neil Gaiman
3. The Girls’ Guide to Hunting and Fishing by Melissa Bank
4. Dancer by Colum McCann
*****
insomniac’s haiku
february 29, 2004
night’s cold and bed’s warm
i wrestle with rampant thoughts…
sleep, sleep, come to me
*****
made everywhere but here
august 2, 2003
My occassional trips to the local malls and my one-time visit to the area’s outlet store complex has made me aware of a strange phenomenon. This was new to me, but apparrently not to my new friends here.
“Check the labels of the stuff you’re going to buy�?, they said.
At first, this statement barely registered through the clearance-price-shopping-induced euphoria that clouded my judgement. And then, slowly but surely and clearly, I began to see…
Brand-name sneakers: Made in China
Popular line of leather bags: Made in Hong Kong
US-brand tank tops: Made in Russia
World-renown jeans: Made in Indonesia
High-end sandals: Made in Mexico
But it was the lingerie from a well-known women’s line that made me stop in my tracks. “Made in Israel�?, the tag said.
I paused for a long time in that store, surrounded as I was by exquisitely-designed sleepwear in satin, cotton and lace, and wondered what the Israel-based makers thought of these hip-hugging, t-backed sexy underwear that women in far-off U.S. of A would be wearing.
Did perhaps one or two workers in a crowded factory in that war-torn country also pause in their work to wonder at the sheer luxury and extravagance of lace-trimmed boy-leg panties? Did they, at that moment, begin to form their own American Dream? Or did they snort in disgust at a society so pampered and frivolous? Or were they perhaps too numbed by work and worry to even think any of these thoughts?
Ah, my own thoughts were to deep to ponder for too long inside a lingerie shop. That day, I simply moved on and continued browsing somewhere else.
But on another, perhaps more fateful day, I came across a t-shirt in the clearance section of another big-name store. It was, in many ways, just your average crewneck, except that the cloth’s material was softer and a bit heavier. It was priced at $1.97, down from $12.50. That in itself would’ve been good enough reason to buy it. Then I saw the tag. “Made in Lesotho�?, it said.
Lesotho? Where on earth is Lesotho? I jogged my brain for any geopolitical memory of Lesotho, but to my utter shame came up with nothing.
Without a second’s hesitation, I went to the cash register and bought the shirt.
*****
birthday blog
october 25, 2001
As of today I have walked this earth for 28 years.
I’d like to think that by this time I have learned a lot of life’s more important lessons, and paid most of my dues. There will be others to come, I know, but the hardest ones are past. At least, I hope they are.
Over the years I have distilled the things that have most value to me – family, friends, love, laughter, respect, trust. Of these, not one is something I possess by right but each is something shared by another person – a rare privilege.
I have been taught, even before I turned the magic age of 18, to know the difference between a love that burns like a raging bush fire, and love that slowly burns in the hearth.
While the first consumes, the other nourishes. The first dies soon after its heated peak, the other stays constant and even its embers still give off warmth.
It is a quiet kind of love, this other one. There are no cymbals crashing in the background while it burns, and more often than not, no trumpets either.
I have known the first kind of love, and at times its devouring fire ignites me. But I treasure, perhaps more deeply, the second kind of love that is always there – like the ever-present tide that always ebbs and flows beneath the ocean’s surface, like air that seeps into my lungs even when I don’t make a conscious effort to breath.
I am thankful for the first kind, for its excitement and exhilaration. But I am more thankful for the second kind, for its sweet sustaining strength.
To my family and friends, thank you for making the last 28 years (or 15, or 10, or 5 or 2, depending on when I met you ), wonderful years of learning, love and laughter.
And to my dearest, dearest Markie, Ga, thank you.
*****
Posted under Navel-Gazing
