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BUFFET WORLD
by Yayie A. del Carmen
My eyes open in coordinated fashion. Yawn, stretch, yawn. I must have slept that tight. Tightly, that my eyes hardly open due to these mass of you-know-what abundantly collected on the medial tapered ends. Goes one yucky equation: length of sleep is directly proportional to the mass collected.
I remember counting 354 sheeps trying to jump over the fence last night. No, its just the same dimwit sheep trying to cross over 354 times but its feet kept hitting the fence. Then I wondered what makes sheeps insomniac-genic. Is it the regard for soft and immaculate fur, one wishes to be stuffed into the pillow under his head? Why dont we consider kangaroos instead? They are the ones more associated with hopping and jumping. Thinking about
this stilled more the impulse to sleep. Stupid me. I forgot my sleeping pills. My advocacy for kangaroos as sleep-inducer brought me to self-experimenting. Voila! The 14th kangaroo ushered me to a good nights sleep, smack in the right upper quadrant of the king-size bed. And I woke up with no irritating alarm clock that invites conking. Ah, what a holiday! Cold and with vacuous stare ceiling-wards, I suddenly feel a strong affinity for lizards. A lizard in supine, for that matter. I used to be that
upside-down, four-footed reptile. But something in the way a fellow-lizard told a joke that sent me bursting into belly laughs, compelling me to clap my hands in amusement. And you know what happened next. Harharhar. Finally, I sit on the edge of
the bed. Somethings wrong somewhere. It took awhile before everything sank in. God, I miss that thingamajig. That ever-trusted nocturnal bedroom fixture. Nothing can shake my allegiance to it. Not a proximate banyo (But hey, this is A-mee-ri-cuh, new set of principles, please!). My parents had it as a
wedding present. I kid you not. For prosperity, they say. My father prospered in womanizing. So it has some sentimental streaks in it. A regular bladder can maximally hold 300-400 ml of urine. Mine holds twice the value. I tell you, its Pagsanjan Falls gushing down everytime.
The meandering mind of a bored mortal in transitory semi-holiday. I see nothing that could goad me. Ho-hum. So, this is Michigan. We were barely out of the shoulder-straining Physical Therapy oath-taking when a friend whispered, Theres this
American agent fishing out for fifty PTs to work in Michigan. First, theyll sponsor you for the licensure exam using a tourist visa. Stay there for three weeks. Back in Manila afterwhich and wait for the results. We agreed to meet the next Monday for the qualifying exam. The following Monday was déjà vu. Everyone else in the oath-taking was there, taking a newer oath that
we all wanted to leave this helluvah nation, hobnob with the freckled, strain our jaws in speaking English the way Americans do it (the Filipino art of mimicry).
Six weeks later, I found myself with forty-nine colleagues lining up for an interview at the US embassy. The question thrown on me to establish my PT identity was, How many bones are
there in a foot?. My luck held. I know my foot very well. In my cadaver-tinkering college life, I marveled at how 26 little bones fit into each other and constitute a foot. Their irregular shapes and rough surfaces, once joined by tendons and ligaments, make a
perfect contour for weight-bearing. Lesson in life: Problems, collectively, should never frighten us all the more. Instead, we should utilize them in making a better and victoriously standing us.
So there, the knowledge of my foot set my feet into this very room of Holiday Inn, room 323, Lansing, Michigan. Still, I see nothing that could goad me. No earthquake, no flash flood, no
coup, no volcanic eruption. No phone calls, at least. Callsughcalls. Excuse me, nature is calling. With 5 seconds leeway I know I can make it to the toilet. A case of miscalculation could spell disaster. Inside the toilet, I wiggle out of my pyjamas. Excuse me, may I close this door? Thank you. I dont intend this to be a doorless affair of sort.
Ten minutes. Door opens. Sigh. What have I done to deserve this woooooebegone condition? Do I see some imps nod in approbation, telling, You want action? There, race to the toilet ad infinitum. Or is it the grace before meals that I got somewhere? Good food, good meat, good God, lets eat. Thou shall not have any short-cuts to grace before meals.
Suddenly, it dawn on me that No man is an island, errra volcano in my case. For am I not a spewing source of volcanic (gastric) tephra? Filipino ethos admonishes that I run to my fellow when in dire and not-so-dire straits. I dialed the number
of a Nonits, a colleague. Yayie? Wala siya. Hey, nalimutan mo na ba? Everyone else is in Detroit for an interview. Dalawa lang tayo ngayon dito sa hotel. The last statement sounds like a small-scale flirtation to me but Ive no time to analyze. All I
want is a goddam broken-or-chewed-before-being-swallowed pink tablet for theeeez! But I manage to feign coolness. Sorry, I
forgot. Sakit kasi ng ulo ko, e! Saan niya kaya nailagay ang medicine pouch niya?. Ok, Ill bringthe whole thing when I meet you at the lobby in aboutan hour for lunch. My, getting a date in my sullen state. The guy, Nonits roommate, was
also a classmate in college. A heartthrob. good-looking, yes. A Greek-god incarnate. Cerebral.Well-off. Drives flashy cars. Been to the US countless times. But he has this irritating habit of throwing his weight around which makes him less of an
object-of-passion. I want someone who doesnt have to
talk too much to shine. And I dont think hell likeme either. Dont ask me. I just know. So, this aint going to be a preconceived sentimental affair of sortplaying on your mind. Sorry.
Kurugkroogkruuuug.excuse me, I am called again. Give me ten minutes. I think Ill gostraight to taking a bath. So this is what dying in a gas chamber feels like. I emerge from our room dressed for the chilly day. Ten minutes after the alloted time
lest he say that Ive been waiting for this date with bated breath. The first few days in this hotel wasagony. Everything looks practically the same. In total, I usually take 28 lefts, 12 rights and 11 u-turns just to get to our room on the 3rd floor. Inside the elevator, facing the door, I also have to position myself ala John Travolta. My right hand diagonally upwards, my left hand diagonally downwards. Meaning, going up, to our room, will be eastwards and going down, to the hotel lobby, will be westwards.
After sometime, I left it all alone to my engram lest an American complain that theres a looney Asian in the house. At the lobby, he hands me my salvation, the medicine pouch. My eyes must already be pleading with the peroration, Give me liberty, or
give death. He asks about my headache. I absentmindedly put a hand on my stomach, sensing some gastric dynamics. Good thing I have another to put on my head. Talk about being off-guard. I immediately prowl for that broken-or-chewed-before-being-swallowed pink tablet. My salvation, in pieces, now gushes down
my throat sub rosa. Ever wonder why Polymagma (plugging) was called such? Poly, as in many and magma, as in molten rocks inside the earths crust. Come on, youre not a reader for nothing.
My date brought me to this oriental resto along Lansing Avenue. He knows the place pretty well. Ive been here coooountless
times, goes his first leg of bragging. Kurrugkroog.and my third leg of racing to the toilet. I ask an obsequious waiter for directions. A good six tables away. And a helpless android that is me wedge between the tables. Once more, magma turns into lava.
Stepping outside, I see my date drumming his fingers on the table, knees upturned and craning his neck. Spotting me, he motions that I head straight to the buffet table. Curse of Noah! The
superfluity of food is giving me some dizzy spells. My upset stomach cannot accommodate a single morsel. You never really know when looms another gastric tragedy. All I could do is to caress allllllll the coveted food with my eyes, embedded in an ashen face. God, I promise never to utter the same short-cut. Bless us O Lord, for these thy gifts which were about to receive
from thy bounty through Christ our Lord. Amen. As if now guided by some mystical beings, I load my plate with what seems like a wetter version of pancit, a dollop of mashed potatoes topped by generous amount of gravy and a bowl of lobster bisque. Beside me are generic Americans in their porcine mode. Everything served on the table has its proportion on their plates. And yet, they go back for more. Their temporomandibular joints getting arthritic due to over-gnawing.
My date transitorily commented on how little I have on my plate, then blasts to a higher level of boasting: his aristocratic bloodline,
geographical distribution of some relatives from Florida to Pangasinan. I doubt if he is audibly perceptive enough when I say that I am from a nearby province, Zambales, for hes continuously going, in an expanded notation, what each relative owns, how much each is worth. Ho-hum. This time, the vestiges of my reptilehood crept again. Ceiling-bound, it is now my
turn to amuse a fellow-reptile.
I belted out a Zambal humorous folksong:
Balangingi, anyay tambal/ Tambal nin mailab a tiyan/ Manghua kan malihang balang/ Itapal mo ha tatakan/ No angkalayam moy nan mamot/ Tatakan moy mangimut-kimot/ Punahan moy nan lalok/ Pigaw lumayop-layop. ( Balangingi, whats the cure?/
The cure for upset stomach?
(Get a red hot chili /Spread it on your ass/ And when you feel that its getting warm/ Your ass will go berseck/ This time,
spread some oil/ To let it cool).
That sent my lizard-friend into belly laughs, compelling him to clap his hands. And he went straight to my dates corn soup. Harharhar.
Reality-check:
No trace of a reptile on my dates soup. I am just plain bored. And with boredom, I can quickly take on the aspect of anything. I can be a chair, a mat, a door, a bed, a whatever. But with boredom and LBM, I see myself as, okay, Kate Moss. I, the walking stick of vanity striding on the catwalk (yeh, on the catwalk) , diarrhea-stricken.
Finally, my date finishes his sumptuous repast, consumed in between senseless gabbing. He invites me to walk to a nearby mall. Outside is winter wonderland. The rime on the trees give them the magical beauty. I guess, the winningest part visiting America, by a Filipino standards, is the feel of snow falling on your head. He asks me now if there is any tagalog word for snow. Niyebe, I replied. Now hes hearing me. And I dont care. My head is more set on textualizing the pulchritude laid
before me. Words start forming in my mind. An anecdote in the making. The topic: snow? dating? men? Or LBM? Thanks God, no signs of imminent gastric eruption. The broken-or-chewed-before-being-swallowed pink tablet must be working by now.
The title:
Michigan Interlude? Rules in Dating? or the name of
the resto weve just been, Buffet World. My, is
buffet the word!
The Sound of One Hand Clapping
by Gloria A. del Carmen
I love biking. To the hilt, that is. Nothing parallels the feeling of wedging yourself into the vastness of a much greater whole. Much much greater than your perceived self. Until your perceived self enters into the dimensions of that greater whole and you become one with the universe. My one with the universe here is my personal euphemism for nirvana brought about by biking. It was otherwise utilized by M. Scott Peck in the book, The Road Less Travelled. Entirely different stuff. To discuss how it was used is to commit the sin of digression. Thou shall stick to the subject: biking. I am a generic poet. I love to textualize the dynamics that goes behind every fear, joy, frustration and anger that I experience. I see pulchritude in the littlest of things. Serendipity, in the most horrendouscircumstance. My way of surviving. As a kid, not long after Ive mastered the righty tighty, lefty loosey principle of manipulating our faucet, I was already into transforming our house into a jungle, using strange decaying leaves. And there would be two impish Neanderthals biking around inside the house. You see, I was of yore the younger version of Jane and Tarzan lived next door. Sometimes, he would join me in riding this piece of metal that would be regarded by future civilizations as bike.
Let me dig deeper. Biking gives me the virtue of appreciating Gods basic gifts: nature and myself. These virtue connects so much with the word wanting. Want what you have and you will have what you want.
But this doesnt mean that I dont WANT to WANT bigger WANTS. I do. I still do. In fact, I still want to WANT to see Yosemite National Park; to want to WANT a trendier bike, to want to WANT a study in Creative Writing. The list actually goes ad infinitum.
But the grandest WANT that I have is to yield to the WANTER that God plans me to be.
KALSADA By
Aldrien Soriano
Masinloc, Zambales
Umuugong na naman ang gitara ni Mang Pedring
Halos sa buong maghapon ginawa ng Diyos
Puro kanta ng Beatles,Beegees, Elvis
Nakakasawa na ang musikong tinutugtog ng matandang nagpupumilit na ibalik ang ang kanyang panahon, mga kantang kahapon gusto ko ng kalimutan na. Mga paulit ulit na tonong utak koy rinding rindi na, sa maghapong pakikinig, lyrics at tono ay saulo ko na.
Sa kabilang dako naman,Etong si Aling Pacing ay sumasayaw pa, Matandang bugaw, frustrated na pukpok na nilangaw,
Naglalako ng babae sa gabi, sa araw naman ay yosi at kendi,
Sideline daw nya, pandagdag ng kita sa binubuhay na pamilya at batang batang asawa na di alam e pineperahan lamang sya.
Katabi ni mang Pedring si Nenang bulag,
Nagtitinda ng sampaguita, gusto raw makaipon para makakita,
Minsan ng ibinugaw ni Aling Pacing,Pero minalas yata at hindi kumita, Saying na bata, maganda sana, minsan ko ng pinaginterasan ngunit akoy natakot at nakonsensya.
Si Badong naman, patambay tambay dito sa kalsada,
Nagaantay ng syanong tatanga tanga sa kahayupan ng siyudad,
Mandudukot, manghoholdap o kaya maglalapongan,
Dito sa kalsada sya daw ang hari at siga.
Tigasing maton na datiy may syotang bakla.
Katabi ko naman si Hapon ,Dating manyakis sa aming lugar
Exhibitionist, rapist, pedophile, bosero, tsansingero.lahat ng katangian nya.Natigil ang kamundohan ng mali ang tinabla,
Dalagang anak ng sigang si Totoy Bato,
Siyay pinutulan castrated kumbaga, ngayun nagdurusa, nabubuhay, nagmamaktol at nagpapantasya sa putol na alaala.
Eto naman ako, reklamo ng reklamo sa lugar na eto,
Naghihinagpis sa lupit ng tadhana. Nagmamalinis, nagmamataas, nagmamatigas nagmamagaling at nangangarap na yumaman pambili ng rebolusyong kontra kapitalismo marka ng kalsunsilyo, Nagpupumilit na sumali sa sosyodad na akoy pilayas na, nagpupumiglas para makaalpas sa mga kadena ng kalsadang eto. Nagsusumamong, nagpupumilit na magmukhang kawawa, naghihintay ng limos mula sa mga hipokritong mapagkawang gawa.
SAKBIBET: The infamous Ice Cream Man of Masinloc. One Second Delay
By
Fernan Elacio Kalaw
Vallejo, CA
He is late again! Maybe he did not understand what I told him last time. He should be here now.
Id been trying to communicate effectively to you as best as possible. Its difficult for me to talk to you about how I feel, and of what I wanted to tell you. I guess you really need to listen to what I am not saying to you. The dilemna of speaking to you on your level is really a work of art for me. I have to always impress you and pretend that I understand you to make sure that you will think that you have been understood.
Explaining my opinions and expressions has always been a struggle. I have to pause, think it over before I could open my mumbling mouth because I am afraid that you might get hurt or get confused. I sometimes wonder whether if I am just insensitive or lack some tackiness or that maybe that you are not really listening to what I am not saying to you. Most of the times, I can make you laugh especially when I start talking and sounds like out of this world. It hurts me though, because I am literally not a stand up comedian. I am being serious all the time and yet I dont feel that you are taking me seriously. Are you?
I am one-second delay, Please understand that. The moment that you speak to me, my mouth opens slower than my mind. Absorbing the words that you are throwing on me and understanding it to my level takes a very good scientific process. It is like I am answering the final question to win the crown of a prestigious beauty pageant that needs an interpreter. What a shame, yet I still need to answer the question.
This might sound funny, but the next time you set an appointment with me, please be prepared to wait for me, I might be late, but I dont mean it. I m only one-second delay!
Gods Francis
by Gloria A. del Carmen I thought that he was mine. Mine by motherhood. My womb, describing his earliest space. My genes,predicting how he, most likely, will have sinusitis come adulthood. But he belonged to the figure that was long-been cradling him.
Funny how that moment feigned reality. And the many other ephemeral moments I found myself into, with other kids. Deep within me, I am always hankering after being a mother. But no Adam in sight. My kind of Adam. Most of those I knew believed that compatibility lies solely in trekking one single road. The one that leads to Eiffel Tower. Eiffel Tower, being that thing about seven inches south of
their navel. Sick.
The child, Francis, was the 8th patient for that day. Poliomyelitis, the mother asserted. Previous to him
was a patient with a rare case of Neurofibroma. Colleagues back in internship days always mistaken the case for Leprosy. I, having seen both, could tell the difference in physical manifestation and the indifference in how devastation displayed its dimensions on their faces.
You see, medical cases in the countryside appear with sufficient infrequency to be interesting and sufficient regularity to be predictable. But the problem was, a child with atrophied lower limbs (no larger than the standard railings you get to hold while taking the stairs in Megamall) will almost always be attributed to poliomyelitis. Quack doctors, contributing so much to its devaluation. Mothers, hailing their diagnosis as impeccable. The child, living his lifetime believing that polio was caused by either a bite from a rare insect or a curse incurred on his mother while pregnant. How did it happen? Refer to the quack doctor for more details.
I was forewarned by colleagues in Manila. I took it from the taps on my shoulder and the right and left oscillations of heads. At a certain point did come a very little margin for backing out. But the hymn of a countryside experience came more enticing. More promising for lessons richer than those culled in my Physiology book. My time to seek out metaphors from contemporary sidestreet realities.
I asked Francis to lift his right hand and touch his left ear. Poor kid. It didnt even go beyond the horizontal plane. At close range, his face was even more adorable. The nose, giving me a reason to envy. I tested the strength of the grip. The thin and elongated phalanges arised my suspicion of a case other than the mother asserted (quack doctors, indirectly). The grim on the face commanded that I
stop for painful threshold had been invaded.
And I did stop. For several reasons that, in my mind, came out in torrents. The elongated phalanges, barrel-shaped thorax, pronated feet and slender limbs. These things pointed me to a vast array of possible diagnosis. Differential Diagnosis. It is a time-honed art in the medical field. Polished as you get to meet a lot of sick people. Until you become sick yourself in an attempt to compartmentalize signs and symptoms. A can only be A, B can only be B. AB denotes another thing.
I tried to rule out Francis case from what was physically given. From it, I gleaned a case close to Arachnodactyly. But before me was a creature nothing more akin to a spider than the elongated fingers and the hump at the back. If looks were to be taken as indications of character, then Id like to think of Francis as the arachnoid painstakingly weaving a web of dreams despite the affliction.
The mother said that he was very serious with his studies and was always topping the Grade 3 class.
In my mind, I made a desultory rundown for other stones left unturned. The eyes, yes, the eyes. I remembered an orthopaedic book telling that majority of people afflicted with it has dislocation of the lens. But I was seeing a medical arena beyond mine. I was just a Physical Therapist working for this precarious NGO in my mothers hometown. My medical facility limited me to the boundaries that were
only common to me.
So I banked on to the dead end definition of me by my college diploma. General muscle strengthening; stretching of tight muscles and tendons; breathing enhancement; and laughter, in good healthy doses. The last one, being the most important tool.
Francis turned out to be a very shy and quiet kid. To have his replies within earshot was to bend my head closer to his face. Replies, which were usually prefixed with Ate, kasi po. Rarely did he look smack in my face. But I remembered him laughing at accounts of a colleague attaching a note (without my knowledge) at the back of my shirt saying Ampakataka ako (I feel like going to the toilet). Or for absentmindedly dipping a finger on a pail of water with the heater on, giving me minute electric
shocks. The father even told me how he had described his therapist to his siblings left at home: maliit, medyo mataba, puro ugat ang mukha tsaka mabait (small, chubby, with tiny veins all over the face. and shes nice). And how this therapist of his administered contraptions all over his body, sending tiny twitches to his muscles which he found funny. Laughter, indeed, has been a very important tool in every trade.
Months after the regular PT sessions, pulmonary
complications set in. The condition made Francis scarce both in school and at the PT sessions. Leaving him irredeemably depressed. I had visited him several times at home and taught his mother what exercises to maintain. Several times did I see him silently crying. Something in the way those tears fell that broke my heart. But I felt that I have to still mine from falling.
He was hospitalized two days before his 10th birthday and died the day after it. I wept with his family. I wept for the child who, at one time, I thought my womb gave description on his earliest space. Francis was never really mine nor his mothers. He is God's forever.
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