Looking for Jose for Dummies 2.0

Although still missing two million pesos in my bank account, I was able to snatch a copy of Zafra’s seventh. And I wish I bought a damn bath towel instead.

Always loved Jessica Zafra. Once, I saw her reading a book the size of the 1924 edition of the Catholic Encyclopedia I unearthed somewhere (if you have no clue what I am talking about, the book was profanely massive) at the Powerbooks store in Greenbelt, I panicked and ordered an entire army of the bookstore’s employees to dig me a copy of the Womenagerie book (the only Zafra I didn’t have back then). Two harassed ladies clad in the most despicable shade of yellow pounded on their computers to search for a copy and told me with the look of resignation that they have only two copies left but they did not have a clue where the books were.

Of course, I did not accept defeat. I insisted on having that book so I could have the coffee gulping diva downstairs anoint it for me. Finally, a copy was recovered behind a pretentious NCLEX review book and I had it punched right away.

Wait. I did not have a pen. How much does this one cost? A hundred twenty pesos?!?!?! You’re out of your freaking mind! I could see the woman smirking. I shelled out an extra 120 pesos for the pen with silly monkeys cavorting with huge elephants drawn all over it.

As I would approach Kali, I prepared to be eaten alive. Should I say, hello Jess, can I have an autograph? No, she hates being called Jess. Uhm…how about, hi…would you sign this for me? In a whisper. She stared at me and said, sure. What’s your name. I gave my name. Did not spell it. Just gave it. She spelled my name right. I was ecstatic.

If only Tw7sted could be as ecstasy-inducing. No surprises. The same good old drivel. But I won’t buy a 120 pesos pen for this one.

The bitch did not look so much as just another person who happened to have an access to an atm but when I punched my own card in, I was blown away by the figures she must have intentionally left for me to salivate on.

Two fucking million five hundred eighty-five fucking thousand three fucking hundred sixty damn pesos.

My knees felt weak and I quickly developed an insanely high fever while my heart did a terrible job at breaking free off my chest. Thoughts, as they would, raced through my mind, making me dizzy. Numbers usually do. Add to it the peso sign and I will be hyperventilating.

I have always suspected that some people, in fact, millions of people on earth have more than what I have in the bank and that a single automated teller machine could hold more than what i can probably earn in a lifetime. I have seen people on tv who woke up that day 8 million pesos poorer and went home on a kidnap list. And so I dreamed of hitting it big with quiz shows–a nice possibility except that I hate the kliegs melting me and so far, no quick show host is tolerable enough for me to endure a shoot with. I have answered several jackpot questions right including one in Dutch “Who Wants To Be A Millionaire” and Anne Robinson’s “The Weakest Link”. Yeah, I brag.

I don’t have an idea how that woman could have gotten such money stashed in her account. Maybe she has more. She did not look like she was born filthy rich (i.e. no visible evidence of recent exfoliation, pink shirt clearly from Divisoria, toenails screaming for a good wash, etc) and nor did she look like a quiz show winner so I thought that she must have acquired the money from keeping submarines perfectly dry while under the sea.

With two million bucks, I’d buy a nano and fill it with Coldplay and Bjork and Regina Spektor. I’d probably also drop by McDonald’s and get a Big Mac or get Jessica’s seventh.I would get myself a new bath towel cause the one I am using is threadbare. Then, buy a new tv so I could watch Conan without just hearing him. But then, I don’t have two million bucks. Yet.

I am missing a woman.

She did not have her left breast after a nasty bout with breast cancer. If you searched carefully, a carefully folded handkerchief became her pseudo-mammary gland. She was proud of the scar, though.

To save some of her children’s clothes, she braved a raging fire that turned the whole house into a huge pile of ashes. One day in our garden, she showed me the plant that cured the burns.

She told me stories. There was the guy from the mountains who kept counting the woods he chopped, always convinced that he’s missing some. I forgot how the story ended.

I am wearing a bonnet she skillfully knitted. The balls of yarn she used were scraps but still, she managed to make it look good for me to wear as I was about to do some mountain trekking.

She was one hell of a kitchen diva. She turned simple grubs into great dishes. She even made cow brain patties taste awesome, though it took some time for everybody to get acquainted to the fact that we were eating neurons and well, brain.

Her basket always dripped of barbecue juices when she comes home at night from her shop at the public market. She knew I loved barbecue and never forgot to bring me some every night.

She was beautiful. Even though she was old, nobody failed to notice her beautiful nose. She was small, but never frail.

She survived a turbulent marriage and was able to put six children through universities. And many more students who were nice enough to ask for help.

She told me she loved me while she was on her deathbed.

And I keep missing my mother’s mom.

Ever dreamt of rushing to the toilet in the middle of the night while your bowels are screaming to let go of shit you have been so preciously carrying inside you for years? I had lots of dreams like those when I was a kid and thankfully, they all ended up without the whole family waking up to drive out evil spirits in the shape of poo out of my room. Now, imagine all these happening without you having to hit the sack first.

You have been there before.

I was in the second grade and was thankfully acuqainted to a snotty kid who could keep secrets until high school. It happened a couple of times and on both occasions, my friend ended up running to their house, red in the face and probably cursing me. We were in the middle of our civics class, pointing out hazy pictures of people cleaning the streets, policemen pushing old ladies towards the running vehicles (well, it looked that way to me) and children perpetually being nice to people who looked like kidnappers. I stood up and went straight to our teacher, Miss D156 (she looked 156 to me) and told her I wanted to poo.

A flickering 10-watt bulb appeared beside her head and told me that I should go straight home and relieve myself. I was eight that time and never protested so I could use any of the functional 40 toilets we had in the whole school (each classroom had a toilet aside from the communal four). She also insisted that I bring with me Odie, the flamingly budding gay kid because we lived near each other and could therefore run to my mom should somehow I explode with shit all over the streets while we walked home.

Fully resigned to my teacher’s idea, Odie and I started our 15-minute trek back home. If you’re bursting with shit and given 15 minutes to run for cover, you would not think of anything else but getting there within the same second you were given the suggestion. So we walked home, while Odie was busy singing Manilyn Reynes and I, tightly clamping my butt to stop the inevitable.

At about twenty meters away from our house, came the explosion…or, the trickle, I should say.

Odie panicked and ran to my mom who was putting out the laundry in our backyard. She came running with my aunt who was there to visit us and saw me desperately looking for a weapon to kill myself from embarassment. The look on my mom’s face was quite unexpected. She desperately wanted to disown me, I thought. Then, she told me to run to our house and started laughing there in the middle of the street. Later she told me that I looked like a wee boy full of shit. I was.

And will always be.

Should somehow we get the chance to meet, say while on the way to a public shithole or at the mall where I usually get lost, ask me to flash you the middle finger of my right hand and I will show you an affliction I was led to believe was caused by dipping that finger in a bowl of turkey’s blood. Or a chicken’s. No, not pig.

And I will flash it the best way there is, but you’re not allowed to say anything to me lest you make me mad and I make a pie stuffing out of you. I was 7 or 8 when I first learned that flashing your middle finger and waving it high in the air is cool and that grown-ups loved to hate you for doing it. So I did it everyday. We did it everyday. On my way to school, I flashed it to my classmates on the other side of the road and they flash it back. I flashed it on my way to the community store to buy a bottle of cooking oil and the old woman at the store glared at me. I was definitely going to hell.

So, I prayed and promised not to do it again. But of course, it was fun to be a rebel sometimes. The following day, I flashed it to a dog staring at me while I was playing when after a couple of minutes later, I got the finger nastily cut by a tin can. My heart pounded and I knew I was being bad. So I prayed again. Comes the withdrawal. It was hard. So I did it again. This time, it was a knife that delivered the message. Either I was just too clumsy or that the heavens was too involved in my anatomy.

Later on, a wart, yes a wart grew at the top of the finger. A nasty little wart that has been stuck in there for years. tried to bite the hell out of it, clipped it, put medicines on it, still nothing. I have a wart. And so everytime I flash the sign these days, I remember, the dog that started it all.

Didn’t like it when people complain they have migraine because I have the sad fate of having just a pathetic headache which is not so fallutin’ as a mayhgreyn. And since mayhgren sounds better, people inflicted with the phenomenon tend to throw the royalties of Britain out of the loo by acting as the bitches of Nottinghill. Dunno what I am talking about, but, my doctor said I have migrain after I almost passed out from my sad headache. And now, I am entitled to act like a bitch. Go ahead, hand the crown over.

Went to work the other day with my new shirt, looking stiff in a coffin coz u dont wanna ruin a good clothe’s moment, would you? Halfway through, there was a twitch. Somewhere between my eyes. Some twitches are good. Not that twitch. I almost passed out. Started to sweat. Went downstairs for some pasta and quezadillas, thinking I was just hungry. The twitch again. Told myself I was going to be okay. Went to the clinic and smiled at the nurse. Damn. I hate to smile when I am dying. After assuring me that I was not hypertensive, she gave a tablet to take.

Told my manager that I was seeing doubles. She asked me how many of her was I seeing. I said four. I forced a smile. She laughed. She told me to take some rest if I couldn’t take it anymore. I went home.

Staggering, I got home, only to find out my key wasn’t working. I buzzed for an hour and nobody answered. Wanted to shout. Somebody came and opened the door. I ran to my bed. Plopped. And slept.

And the doctor said I can say I have migraines now. Haha.

Probably it was the heat that i started to imagine things again, but when i saw a pair of dogs humping just right beside the road, I thought…why the hell am I circumcised? Well, maybe it’s too late to have it all back, i mean the skin but yeah, why the hell am I circumcised? Now that I think about it, I feel abused, betrayed and badly missing a foreskin and I cannot even think of ways to justify the horrible act.

Cannot remember exactly when it happened, or maybe, i choose not to remember it because it was just so degrading to lie flat on a table, numbed in the middle, while two doctors in unwashed scrubs busily dissected me. While at it, they decided to strike a conversation as if we were strangers on an empty bus waiting for the driver to hit something on the road.

Got a girlfriend? No. Not really. But why? What do u mean? Why don’t you have a girlfriend?

His hand goes up, with a threaded jumbo needle in it. I did not feel anything.

I dunno. I never thought about it. Silence. How long will it take for the anesthesia to wear out? Two hours. Will it hurt bad? Not really. Just wear something roomy. Sigh. Scared? Yeah, a bit. I hate being here. It is important. I don’t think so. You won’t go to heaven if you don’t get circumcised. Well, my foreskin isn’t that big to fill the entire heaven, is it? No, it’s not that.

We’re done. That was quick. Just like having a haircut. Except that you don’t shower me with baby powder after the crime. Take this. What is it for? Antibiotics. And some pain reliever. Sigh. Grunt.

I stood up and took a look at the calendar. I remember the date but I’m not telling you. Call me a liar.

Just remember to wash it daily with lukewarm water. Here’s some iodine solution. Might as well drink it all down, I think. No. It can kill you. I don’t care. Will I go to heaven now? Dunno. Ask your pastor. Catholic? No. But my mom forced me to be here.

I cried. You can use it after a month. Wink. Wink. I hate what you did to me. How much? A thousand. Here.

I count the ways to get to heaven. Go to church. Get circumcised. I’m lost.

My room was probably made out of the same material they make ovens with. Sometimes, i find myself looking for brand names like, Hanabishi or GE hidden somewhere on its walls or maybe, it’s on the door, already covered by the ugly brown paint they chose to splash it with. Minus the first two sentences, it’s just too fucking hot inside the room. try to get inside in the middle of the day and you find yourself dripping water much faster than the La Mesa dam and no matter how many fans bombard you with stale air, you still end up sweating 98% of your body composition. That’s why nobody dares to bring a sex date in this room—in the middle of the day, at least.

Well, it’s a Sunday, not the Holy Friday, but yes, a Sunday. Chris Martin sings in my head, punched right in my ears by a pair of trusty white earphones while my body slowly battles dehydration. I am in my room, alone, almost 12 noon and seeking refuge from Sunday boredom. Tina Turner screams her way in, girls doo wooping behind her, it’s Fools in Love. Aarrgh. I remember the movie. Tina gets thrown out of a running car. She offers her watch to check in at a Ramada. She divorces Ike. Ike doesnt want her to keep the last name. She wins. A couple of days ago, she was on Oprah, still looking scary.

Now, it’s Dusty Springfield. Son of a preacher man. I like the song. Was at work yesterday singing the line over and over again. People stared at me. I kept singing. I slept singing it last night. Elton John. Never really liked him. Never really knew what his hits were except for the songs for Norma Jean and that princess. And that pigeon song. Now I have four Johns in my playlist. He bids goodbye to the yellow brick road. I like it.

They were supposed to watch a musical, I think. They were late and since it was not the Philippines, they were not allowed to get inside. They ran to the nearest pub. A man was playing the first few bars of Everlasting Love. The girl removes her gloves…joins the man at the piano. Everybody shuts up and listens to her. She finishes the song and gets applauded. Grolsch beer came on screen. I miss the Netherlands and the nice advertisements they have on TV. And that somebody I keep thinking about. I ended up downloading Jamie Cullum’s version last night.

Janis Joplin. Don’t know her. I kept reading about her a lot. Especially in those cheap romance novels i used to read a lot when i was in high school. Now, i just mark the parts where the characters fuck in the kitchen. Back to Janis. I dont know Bobby Mcgee. Who cares? Joni Mitchell. Thought she was a man. Joni. Johnny. John. Get it? Get it? I hate it that Sharon Cuneta dared to sing her song. I’ve looked at clouds from both sides…First heard Joni’s name on Love Actually (Emma Thompson’s and Professor Snape’s story). Watch the movie.

I wonder who Bette Davis was, but Kim Carnes made a nice ditty about her eyes—I mean, Bette Davis eyes. Kid Rock. Cats in the cradle. Temperature’s rising in my room. Like it. I got my music.

I can’t sleep so, go ahead and read what I have to say when I can’t sleep.

Just a couple of days ago, a highschool classmate started a yahoo group for our class which was graduated seven years ago. First thread of messages was all about when the reunion is going to be since, everybody thinks it’s high time we get together again because most of the people in our class have already tied the knot, had a nice shag and eventually became parents. Of course, the order of events can be changed, depending on how cynical you are.

Don’t get me wrong. I love my classmates. I had so many great moments with everybody, but every time the idea of getting together again with them makes me cringe in some weird fashion. Maybe because I embarassed myself a lot back then. Haha. Like when we played volleyball while still in our school uniforms, my pants literally tore off me when I ran to give the ball a nice setting. A classmate casually suggested we staple my pants because I did not have any other pair with me. We almost used the whole box of staple wires and I had to walk very carefully or else staple wires could have shot out of me.

And many others, of course, since I just have bad, fucked-up genes. The ones that make me perfectly capable of making an arse out of myself in public. I will be at the reunion, I say to myself. I miss everybody badly and I know we’re gonna laugh our behinds off with so many things from the past. I am curious how many guys in our class ended up being gay, or, have the most babies and maybe, have remebered how we stapled my pants back again.

I am playing Globe’s "Feel Like Dance" on my iTunes and I can’t help remebering the whole class dancing to it because UMD made it so fucking cool to show it off to everybody. Even if we were walking in the middle of a street we would do our best moves. Of course, looking back, it was sooo disgusting but we had fun. I am supposed to dance to the tune, but I’d rather sit down and think back to the days when somebody could staple your pants back up and told you taht you were going to be fine.

Teachers were not always my biggest role models. I just won’t have most of them as people I would want to associate myself with. That sounds pretty obnoxious of me, but yeah, i am glad i am obnoxious. In high school, second year, i think, when our class had this character as a teacher for biology. Don’t get me wrong but, had i fallen asleep in her class, it was because i chose to, not because i was sleepy. With all due respect to her profession, she was just not a pretty sight to look at. With that said, she also had the air of a scowling British headmistress and well, she loved passing around her pictures when she was still supposedly a beauty to look at. Oh well, i hated her because she kept misspelling things and told us that typhoon signal number 1 was the strongest. She died several months later but nobody could forget her as the teacher we chose not to believe.

Back in third grade, Maggi noodles came to our school to feed the whole campus with stale noodles and impress us with shiny cards with popular nursery rhymes printed on them. I got Miss Muffet, but she was eating chicken-flavored noodles instead of turd (curds, i know) and whey. A Maggi lady came to our room and gave each of us a small yellow cup filled with some noodle soup in it. Of course, there was also this fancy and yellow and plastic spoon with the Maggi logo on it. We were having the time of our lives when we saw the treat. I was looking forward to bringing the spoon and the cup home right after class. But strange enough, after eating, our teacher, a withering old crone told us that we couldn’t bring any of those things back home and the stuffs, especially the pretty spoons, should stay. I was crushed. I wanted to cry. I raised my hand and indignantly told her that I would bring my cup and pretty spoon home, no matter what she said.

She said she was going to have me killed by a local witch. I went home with the distorted nursery rhyme in my pocket sans cup and spoon. I felt so terrible.

And to think, this all happened. Oh, i went to public schools.