Losing my notebook

As a young reporter in Cebu city, I did not cover City Hall. That beat used to belong to Sol, who always landed in the banner headline almost everyday. I did not cover Capitol, either. That beat belonged to Michelle, who also used to grab the headlines with Sol. I did not, could not cover the police beat, supposed to be the training ground for young reporters. Instead, I was made to cover the business and economic beat, not because I was a smart ass but because no one my age and fresh from school would dare cover such a beat. In fact, the one covering it was Pops, an octogenarian so aloof I was afraid of him. I treated him like a sage. He always had sums of money, running in the millions, on his head. I knew it because that was always what came out of his mouth when he stood talking with presidents of the Chamber, another scary thing I had to contend with. Pops used to wear a gray beret that covered his balding head. It gave him an air of style and prominence.

Reporters my age used to describe the business beat as difficult, boring, full of economic jargons one can't understand, numbers, figures, charts. How can you make a story out of mere charts and numbers, no narrative, from BIR, from SEC, or from Neda? But my editor taught me how to make the numbers talk. 

Even during those times, I already had the ability to sit straight quietly and listen as somebody explained to me the workings of the Norwegian ship.   Maybe, it was a result of some neglect I might have suffered in childhood because I could sit there for hours listening to a farfetched subject without complaining. Towards the end of the day, I would hurry back to the newsroom to write the story. My business editor would be waiting for it, as if it were a matter of life and death. She would ask as soon as I opened the door, "So, what's your story?" and I would stare at her, mouth open.

So, I'd never open the door again if I was not sure of the story. 

Our newsroom was on the second floor, so even before I could take the stairs, I would be composing the lead  and two supporting paragraphs in my head to give her a ready answer. Sometimes, I would go to the toilet before opening the newsroom door. The toilet was just near the newsroom door. You can write your lead and two supporting paragraphs in the toilet. 

I was still a dreamy-eyed and clumsy young reporter then. I never actually fully understood what was going on with my life. 

One afternoon, after spending long hours with Norwegian engineers piloting a shipping project in the city, I was already three steps to the newsroom door when I realised I no longer had my notes with me. I panicked. Where could have I left my notebook? Did I drop it in the jeepney? I was about to go back to chase the jeepney when I realised--how could I do that?! There were lots of jeepneys plying the city. How would I know which was the one I was riding? 

So, right then and there, I tried to recall the story. I loved those Norwegians so much. Just like me, they'd be easily dismissed as boring and they never spoke English that fast. They spoke English slowly, as unsure as I was. I could ask them over and over again about the basic concept of their machine and they'd never tire explaining it to me. So, more or less, I already had the story in my head. I can even approximate a quotation, knowing their Norwegian English well. Yes, it was really, really painful to retrieve jottings from a lost notebook in your own mind. It was hell. The story made it to the business page's banner headline the following day. But from then on, I really made sure not to lose my notebook again. 

 

Working high up in the air [Flash Back Series 1]

 Have you ever tried working while you were high up on air? There was a beautiful sunset at your window but you can't even look out and down because you had to catch the deadline? 

It was crazy but that really happened to me. It was just like an experience of being there and not being there at the same time. 

On my way back to Davao, I was still in the airport in Cebu when some breaking news happened somewhere in the town of Datu Hoffer, Maguindanao del Sur. Four soldiers were ambushed on their way to the public market--or was it on their way home? The desk needed the story asap and I had to file it, by hook or by crook. It was lucky that the reporter was already in the area sending the story.  I needed to process it before deadline time. It happened that my flight would arrive at the next airport precisely at deadline time, so that meant I should be doing the actual editing right on the plane. So, there I was, boarding the flight, editing the story while the plane traversed the ocean at 150,000 feet altitude. I could not describe what I felt. It was like I was holding some fragile thing that I had no control of and anything wrong could happen any time--.

I thought about it now and I realised that the fragile thing I was thinking about was actually my life.

Survivor's Manual

In the old days, fear figured in our survival as a species, the psychologist told us. That's why, in extreme circumstances, fear flashes before us like a warning. We could never rest until we locate the source of that fear, the warning, because it's key to our survival, she said. 

Today, we no longer face those kind of dangers that our ancestors used to face; yet, the amount of stress we had to deal with everyday has grown to unprecedented proportions. Key to surviving the stress of our everyday life is our capacity to savor moments of joy, to locate in our body no longer the source of fear, but the source of pleasure. 

I kept thinking about this as I went back to my room.

Feeling like Rip Van Winkle

As soon as the air cooled, I went out of the hotel and walked towards Osmeña Boulevard, where I took the jeepney that had Santo Niño on its signboard. I asked the driver what route would take me to San Jose and he said, this one, pointing to his manibela. So, after winding down through--was it Sanciangko or P. del Rosario Streets?--the jeepney finally went to my old street and dropped me near the gate. I immediately followed the walk that led to the chapel because that's what had always been on my mind--to find that chapel and see what it looks like now.

They call the walkway leading to it the Paseo Recoletos now, although I could not remember if we ever used that name before. To us, this was simply the way towards the chapel, you would meet so many people here, usually carrying things, baggages, sometimes sacks from the nearby Carbon market. Today, I met this woman hurrying towards somewhere, carrying at least three bags and dragging a child. Another man followed, this time, carrying a--what was that--a sewing machine?! Why do they have to manually carry a sewing machine? A beggar,  covered with soot, lie sleeping on the paseo's floor.  An obnoxious smell of dried urine assailed ones nose.

I was surprised to find the chapel's entry on the ground floor sealed but I could hear church music upstairs. Two opposite stairways led to the second floor. I chose one and heard someone--a priest?!--leading the novena. It's a novena, we're starting the novena, a woman told me. I did not know why she had to explain that to me.  I went down and asked the security guard how long had he been working there because I wanted to know when did they move the chapel to the second floor. But he said he was only working there for four years and it had been that way since he arrived.

I fell silent. I was gone thirty-three years!

Crystal Memories

In one of my forays to the Legazpi Sunday Market, I once met the Crystal Woman.  She was tall and her rather blonde hair was loosely tied in a bun, some unruly strands falling on her face. She was wearing a faded blue cotton shirt; or, this might just be the way I remember her, I'm not really sure now.
Then, she talked about what she had in her hands in a loving, animated way, that everything around her seemed to dissolve and fade away.  I've been to other crystal shops before--including that one at the Makati Square or another more expensive one somewhere in Binondo--but because I really did not know much about crystals, their rugged edges and abnormal shapes, their shimmering colors and most of all, their staggering prices almost always intimidated me. How could I know the stones they purport to sell are real ones and not synthetically made? I stayed away because I can't keep my eyes off the price tags and I can't trust the voices that I hear.

But here I was, one Sunday morning in the mid of a leisurely crowd of condo dwellers, drawn to this towering Crystal Woman whose explanations were so down-to-earth, I can't help but gasp.  She had asked me if some of those crystals communicated to me, if I can feel their particular pull, I said I was drawn by the ones that were so clear and long but more expensive.  In a moment, I could sense her wanting to give those particular crystals to me. This perception lasted a minute and then, I could feel her going over me, trying to fathom if I was telling the truth about what I felt about her crystals. 
Then, she started talking about the Herkimer and it didn't take long for me to get convinced. "It's so small and yet, so powerful!" she said, putting such a tiny sparkling piece on her palm. "Don't ever underestimate the power of this small crystal!" 

When she handed it to me, she took a bell to cleanse it.  A bell to cleanse a crystal! This really blew me off.  She placed the crystal in the middle of my palm and sounded a bell to cleanse it. Really, it had that cleansing sound.  I could swear it cleansed my soul as well.
[Curiously now, I can't remember ever seeing the the shape of the bell. All I can remember was its sound--and what a cleansing sound!] 

The crystal had stayed with me through thick and thin inside the newsroom.  When I used to get close to an obnoxious energy, I would place the crystal on my palm or in my pocket and the obnoxious energy became bearable.  The crystal worked in a very subtle way.  It worked in the in-between of things so that you could not really claim without a doubt that what you perceived was its work was actually its work. But it worked the way it did with the obnoxious thing (or person) and you begin to wonder why. 

I can't forget my first encounter with the Crystal Woman. Somehow, it changed me somewhere. She made me perceive things in a different light.  She made me think of the energy I encounter and to make good use of energy. She still stayed in my mind somehow.  Sometimes, when I think of Legazpi, I would think of her.  I also think of bumping into her one of these days and when the comes, to talk to her, soul-to-soul.
That day I talked to her, I saw the worried glance on her staff's face when she began explaining things to me.  The staff tried to interpret her sentences, thinking I wouldn't understand her language. But her language transcended human speech and so, when the staff saw that I was entering her world, she slowly retreated away, leaving me and the Crystal Woman alone.
Now, I'm saying this as if there was only me and the Crystal Woman in the whole Legazpi market that Sunday.  Of course, there were lots of other people. One of the listeners, a man with a strong, commanding voice, flaunted his knowledge about crystals, trying to impress her.  This somehow turned her off.
She said she was giving yoga lessons somewhere in Batangas but she said she was getting too busy taking care of her daughter to continue those lessons.  She said she was calling off those lessons soon. I wouldn't be able to attend those lessons, anyway.  I had a hard time going out of Makati on weekdays.  

But her crystal had stayed with me until it got lost one day in our foray with Ja to Samal Island.  The date that it got lost seemed to be a reminder to me about the things that I've forgotten.  [O, crystal, can you just speak to me in a more straightforward manner, please?]
When it got lost, I was so upset that I kept sending it a distressed message. Then, somehow, it shot back its crystal clear message to me: rest now, everything would be okay. 
Thank you, crystal, wherever you are, rescue me when things get so murky here! 

Things that fascinate me

NOTES FROM MY JOURNAL
September 13, 2012 

What did photographer Nick Onken say in his book “photo trekking?” 

Choose the subjects that interest you. 

Don’t only photograph subjects just because you are paid to do it  but explore also those that naturally fascinate you and attract you for some reasons.

This is how you develop your style, he wrote. 

Just a bit like writing, I think. But what are the things that really fascinate me? 

Alleyways. Skies (although I just found  how their colors change at different hours of day, as Ja used to point out to me). Mirrors. Doors. Windows. Labyrinth. Churches. Buildings. People. Roads. Shapes. Sillhouettes. Books. Shadows. Ceramics. Jugs and Jars.  Signs and writings on the walls. Cats.

Roads. Especially roads.

Rivers.

I discover this journal because I was looking for traces of Pa among the things I wrote before.

Old passion re-asserting itself

When I was six, Ma came home with an exciting news about an artist/teacher, a dignified and illustrious Mr. I forgot-his-name, accepting six or seven year-old children to train under him at home. The students--whom Ma imagined could be all boys--would stay with the Master on weekdays and may go home on weekends, an arrangement similar to a boarding school for young artists.  Even in a remote place like B'la, it promised something special; it even sounded different: a training in Art. I felt loved, happy.  Even at that point, I thought, Ma must have felt something about me, must have thought I had some of what people called "potential."  I was filled with excitement. Day after day I waited for it to happen: to learn Art, to watch the Maestro render reality on paper. But the month ended without a word from Ma. I waited and waited until the waiting became so unbearable.  When I finally asked her about it,  she told me she decided against it because she was worried about me. For her, it was unimaginable: a six-year-old girl living with boys under the tutelage of a man.   That officially ended my career in Art and Ma quickly forgot all about it.  I didn't. 
Well, maybe, I forgot all about it while I was growing up but that's what I remember now.  I remember how I was quickly forgotten, my dreams set aside. 
Ma taught us to put ourselves last always.  All the drawings that mattered in school were those being done by boys.  The bold strokes, the tri-dimensional realistic renditions, the portraits that copied reality even if they were only done with a ballpoint pen. Girl drawings were merely beautiful, trivial. Together, we--girls--thrived in the shadows, learning from each other and enjoying every moment of it; and that's how we persisted. It's only now, when old passions try to re-assert themselves, overwhelming us in their intensity, that we come to realize we could have been bolder.  
Then, we want to start all over again.