Why can't we just shut the door and only allow our dearest ones to enter?

The funeral did not really allow me enough room to mourn and grieve for my Pa.  There were so many people around; most of them someone I knew from childhood, but not all of them were offering a word of comfort. Some were there only to measure you and be critical of who you are. Some were really so tactless and mean that instead of consoling us in  times of grief, they only succeeded in upsetting me, and taking me away from thoughts of my Pa. For instance, there was this guy, who was so rude, he said I must have been so old by now because I was already far ahead in school when he and Eve were still in Grade One. Of course, he was Eve's barcada. "Day, ikaw ba, tiguwang na jud ka kaayo karun, Day, no, kay Inday na man ka daan atong naa mi sa Grade One ni Eve?" he asked. Of course, I told him, Hoy, I was far ahead of you because I was very young when I entered school! I was a visitor at age 5 but I was good enough to pass Grade One. (I should have told the guy this: I bet, you were still struggling to read your first alphabets at a very late age, while I only breezed through it at 5! But I was not quick enough to say that!)
Recalling it now, I realized, I was not quick enough to shoot back my killer one-liner (the way I used to) because I kept telling myself I was in my father's funeral and I had to be very careful not to make a scene with tactless and unwelcome visitors!  There was another guy, who was already drunk and started making some statements about the eldest daughter, because he mistook me for the youngest.  But our youngest sister said,  "Ah, she's always mistaken as the youngest," which immediately alerted the guy. I was curious what that drunkard was about to say about me before he was stopped by his companions.  Was he going to blurt out something about my political beliefs? Or why I hadn't married?! 
Then, the wake was really a wake, because it forced you to stay awake, even if your body was already crumbling for lack of sleep.  I had to get along with some people, including the driver who told me pointblank in between gulps of Fundador, I should be ashamed of myself because at my age, I still don't have a house and a car, I should strive to have one! As if those were all that mattered in the world. [But maybe, he was right?!] I told the foolish fellow those were not the things that I treasure most. What I treasure most are things that people like him could not see. But the guy was so stupid to even understand a word of what I was saying. 
Except for some kindred souls--like the two women friends from the Seventh Day Adventist, who offered me some beautiful verses to light up the dark moments of grief (and surprisingly, they belong to another religious sect and only came to pay their respect), most of the people at the funeral really upset me.  I was wondering why can't we just make the funeral a private affair?  Why not shut the door and only allow those closed to us to enter?

Moments

Things really happen so fast these days, but not really that fast, because I'm sure, I've been given sufficient signs and sufficient warnings of what lays ahead. On May 1, I was asked to go to Taiwan in a spur of the moment and while walking along Chino Roces with Pam before my trip, I had told Pam over and over again I had wanted to go to Butuan to visit my Pa but how can I do it? It's so difficult for me to do it because of something. Did I tell Pam I was not on speaking terms with my sister? Do it, she said. You have to do it. But I can't. I still can't. Why? she asked. Because. Pam said, Do it. I said, maybe, I should talk with my Pa in other ways, through the mind, perhaps, or through dreams because it's very difficult for me to go there, Pa, you know.  So, on the eve of June 1 when Eve called, she said I would no longer make it. I booked a ticket to Butuan to catch up with my Pa, who had been bedridden there for about eight months and people said he was waiting for me.  When I saw him, I could not almost recognize him. His face had assumed the face of my grandmother, who was so fair and pretty, and his hair has gone long and white. Pa, nia na si Ate, Pa, said Eve from the door. Did I see a flicker of recognition on his closed eyelids? 
Oh, if you only knew the weight of those final moments.

View from my window on Zhongshan Street

I'm still sick so that excuses me from writing.

Break the ice, will you?!

I just finished all the four articles from Taipei and sent everything online except the pictures (which I fear I don't have) and so, I am posting this as an ice-breaker.  This picture reminds me that I never got to meet some ordinary folks in Taiwan when I went there the past six days.  Of course, I met some of them at the train station when we were heading to Hsinchu, a city about an hour south of Taipei; or, maybe, even our  Mofa friend Jack Li, who accompanied us throughout the tour; that is, if he considered himself just like another Taiwanese. But all I can think of were those folks at the train station. They were seated at the waiting area, some of them might have been pissed off with me for taking lots of pictures, but when I looked at this photograph in my photo file and saw these motorcycle-riding men, I realized that I never really got to meet some people in Taiwan.  We were shuttled around from one place to another to meet and interview the Ministers, and on the fifth day, we met the President at the Presidential Palace. Which was not really a good experience for me because I was the only one not wearing a suit. I left it in the Philippines in a hurry to leave Makati. I know that the office will kill me if they learn about this--which they might, when they see our picture with the President. Depending on how you look at it, it might be regarded as a breach of protocol, which it is. So, I cringe. I don't want to remember my trip to Taipei because I was the only one not wearing a suit when we met the President, and everyone was wearing their best, but I merely treated it as another day in the office, where I frequently told Lyca, no, it's not important what you wear there as long as your English grammar is perfect.  Now, I learned my lesson. What you wear is important, damnit! Maybe, I should not let anyone read this.  I should make the font so tiny so that no one could read. This is embarrassing!

Selfie

Lyca, April and I went to the Century Mall to watch Emma Watson's performance in the Beauty and the Beast but were flustered when we found out the movie house  already ran out of tickets.   Deeply let down, we ambled about the building, taking as much selfies as we can.

Setting sight on something

How the sky looked like the last time I went home

Happy Easter!

I've been holed inside my room for the entire duration of the Lenten break, so, I missed all the observance of the Passion here, which, based on the telltale signs I kept seeing on the streets on the days leading up to it, has been passionately marked by the community where I live. Still, I sat here deeply engrossed in my reading through out the Holy Week until this morning, when I happened to wake up late to find it's a Happy Easter, and I'd like to greet everyone out there, sending this image of the old the old belfry of the church of the Lady of the Abandoned, and its amazing stained glass windows, which have fascinated me since the first time I entered the church's dark cavernous hall alone.

Hunt for vegan food

I discovered this vegetarian outlet at the heart of Makati but I will only tell you about it later.

Postpartum reflection

I feel so devastated after that long-distance chat with my boy. It had started well, actually, but towards the end, he had been passing judgment on me quite unfairly about the choices I made in my life, without asking me how and why I made those choices. It hurt terribly. But in retrospect, I realized, who were the people who had been judging me that way and it was not my boy. So, I suspected, he just caught that narrative from someone else, just a whiff of an idea, which germinated and came out of his mouth as his own. That's the trouble with long-distance conversations, you only have such a next-to-nothing chance of getting heard, or having some points clarified, you could not even trace how and why he had said such things. I can glean from his lines that he had some issues with me, which had never been there before, well, it must have been the fertile ground for that wicked idea from wicked people to germinate. It puzzled me for a while until I realized where he had been to recently. He accused me of so many things, including perhaps, [because this was not said outwardly, but in between lines] blaming me for his difficult childhood. (Sigh). Life, of course, had not really been that easy for both of us and I had really tried to make it easier for him, though, my best was not really that good enough. But I still think I was not to blame. You know who was to blame. How could I ever make people understand when people can't even open their eyes? They're deaf and blind! 
So, well-what do you expect? He just came back from a visit to his father, so, are you still surprised? They always blame the women for all the effing wrong that happened to their lives, don't they?  Even if it was the women who did all the dirty work for them.
Yet, to hear those things from your own son. I was so disturbed, I did not write anything the whole day.  I was just staring in space and closing my eyes to feel which part of my body hurt the most. 

Open Air Altar

Just after the Jones Bridge, as you head toward Binondo's Santa Cruz church, tucked somewhere in between the highway's chaotic traffic flow, lies a miraculously tiny piece of land that holds this oasis of faith.

Prayers by the roadside

It's Maundy Thursday, the start of the long Lenten break, which for someone working the kind of work that we do, would be the only long holiday open for us for the rest of the year.  That's why, everyone was so excited as we rushed out to help put to bed the newspaper copy last night. Everyone trying his best to keep his cool, to keep his/her mind in focus because the spirit was already rushing out the door, getting inside the elevator in a hurry to get out of the building fast to the life of untrammeled joy and freedom outside.
I merely stayed in my place. I was thinking if I had only bought that ticket, maybe, I would also be rushing home, too. Rushing to the airport to catch the plane to where the heart belongs. But I did not have such a ticket.  So, all I have is the long hours of reading and writing open for me for the long weekend.
When I reached our street, it was already 9 pm, and the vehicle I was riding could no longer get inside because the neighbors had already set up tents outside their homes--yes, tents along the roadsides, and I thought,  is this another vigil for another funeral?  But no. The tent was only for the gathering of people for the prayers to the Jesus of Nazarene,  the cross-carrying image of Christ. I was amazed by the people's observance of the Passion here. It also reminds me how, a year ago, back home in B'la, while Pa was struggling with his ailment, and I still languished in bed to recover from the previous night's late sleep, Ja tried to shake me awake because the procession was already passing by the house. He said the procession was an amazing sight, I should see it, I should at least photograph it. "I thought you wanted to be a real, hardnosed photographer? What kind of a photographer are you? You lie there sleeping while a beautiful event passes you by!" I got the mouthful from Ja while I flitted in and out of dreamland.
When I managed to get up, I only caught the tail of the procession at the end of the road, and I saw an open air altar by the roadside.  Ja shrugged.  But the sight of an open air altar amazed me because it reminded me of the pagan ways. It reminded me of some faraway Greek altars when the world was young. It also reminded me of
the Bagobo altar tambara. I loved that concept of an altar because it lays itself bare and open to the elements. Most of all, it opens itself up to the skies.