Thursday, June 25, 2009
This is just a test.
This is just a test. This is just a test. This is just a test. This is just a test. This is just a test. This is just a test. This is just a test. This is just a test. This is just a test. This is just a test. This is just a test. This is just a test. This is just a test. This is just a test. This is just a test. This is just a test. This is just a test.This is a test.
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Sunday, August 29, 2004
So I finally started my own 'blog' (I just love how it's called, it's sounds so... abstract modernism). It's actually my third attempt to maintain one. My friends in Windsor have been encouraging me to document everything that's happened to me since I quasi-moved out to start a new life in Toronto. Just about a week ago, another older friend here in Manila re-introduced the joy - and necessity - of (shared) personal writing again."Ano yan?"
"Blogspot."
"Ay... parang livejournal ekk?" I notice the sleek and elegant blue hues of the template.
"Oo. Haaayy, may papabasa ako sa 'yo!!!"
It was God knows what time already in the morning that night when I tambay-ed at GP's airconditioned room again for the first time since I left three years ago. It was comforting, just sitting there looking around the whole mess of rare-find CDs, piled sheet music and other books, used and fresh clothes and other whathaveyous, as my good old friend props his head down with the same comfy pillow I'm sure I've salivated on in my many, unscheduled previous sleepovers. I comment on the polka dotted patterns on his wall.
"Ayaaaakaaaooo!!! Ibang shades of sky blue???"
We laugh hard. We started talking about choral music again, our first love. The spirit and force that bound me, him, Chris and later on, a ton of very interesting, very talented, extraordinary people. Our conversation segwayed so naturally, once again, to the people we know, to the latest trends and movements in choral music, the Madz, ACS, Estonian monster boys choirs and other esoteric stuff we always talk about. It was a warm and comforting feeling that only the polka dotted walls have changed afterall.
Now I'm still in the process of preparing myself for another change. GP's moved to Boston just yesterday to pursue his LONG DUE career-proper in Music. Ang bona ko, ni hindi ko maalala yung course na kukunin nya, but I remember him telling me it was something 'academic-focused' (oaaH!)... MUSIC BUSINESS!!! There.
So there we were, five kids packed in a Honda CRV, on the way to the magandang airport at around 7.30 pm. We took a late-late lunch just horus before, at Centro, where we stuffed (literally) about 10 million kilos of pork, tilapia, beef, makunat na butong-pakwan and arnibal with sago-gulaman in our mouths before finally relaxing. It reminded me of the last meal somebody would ask before a death sentence, which was actually befitting. Somebody was about to leave. (Heeeeeee!)
We laughed our way to the airport. I knew Chris, Katz, Louie, JD and I were masking the exact, same thing at the recesses of our minds. That's what's weird about friends dropping friends at airports, they can never express the total sadness of leaving (and being left) the way lovers and some families (save mine) do. So we naturally drowned our thoughts in laughter. GP brought out a book about the Marcoses and started quoting the author's statistical reports and political observations about the lavishness of the former first family.
"BLah blah blah enveigled chu chu chu. Katz, anong pronunciation non? Enveyled? o Enveygled?
"Anong spelling?"
"E-N-V-E-I-G-L-E-D."
Katz semi-whispers, "envgld."
Everybody takes turns experimenting different phonic executions to no avail. GP says it again, "Envgld."
I finally retorted, "Sabihin mo na lang ng mabilis."
The whole pack burst in raucous laughter, and for a moment there, I forgot that GP was even leaving in about 10 minutes. We finally arrived, unloaded and took last shots, hugged GP and hopped inside JD's CRV. I glanced back at GP, walking ever so Grimacey as he pushed his luggages inside, and remembered eating in McDonald's after our high school glee club rehearsal. GP just came in with Niel, asked if we ordered already and turned to go to the counter. I thought nobody else walked like a mascot.
I turned to the silence that befell everyone. We were to drive our way back in eerie solitude, only disrupted by bouts of forced laughter and Katingka's quiet sobs. Everybody had their own lives now. People had their own preoccupations and in a way, everyone had moved on to discover new things and conquer new grounds. GP was the last one of us who stayed, whom everyone depended on and relied on to relive that ever so blissful and musical past.
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