The Man I Am Missing

I am missing someone. It’s been a long time since I’ve been with this guy. I remember years ago, he was thin, pale, quiet, unadorned and very conservative. Looking back to the old days, he had simple aspirations in life, that is, to be of help to his family by finishing college and landing a job probably as an architect or a nurse. He had no friends except me and he had brought all his focus in honing the talents that God has given him (damned!, this guy got a basket of natural gifts). He used to speak less though I knew his heart was full of stories to tell.

We had no earlier pictures together, he’s very camera shy, he thinks he’s hideous.

After college, we parted ways. I left him actually, not because I needed to but because I wanted to. He’s too boring for a mate. He didn’t know anything beyond the most complex algebraic expressions or the elements that most commonly present in the atmosphere. He lived his life with books and the imaginary characters he found therein. He didn’t play any sports. He didn’t wear jeans. He had never been to a mall until I invited him one time during our second year in college. My god! He’s a hermit living in a cave of closed identity. He had lived a simple life but I had never once heard him complain or protest why others have to be more blessed.

Yeah, he maybe so probinsiano, but he’s way better than anyone you could ever find in the metro.

That’s what I had liked about him. Yes, he’s too corny but he’s true. He never lied, he never doubted anything that people told him, he’s very smart yet humble, he’s mysterious, he’s very different. When I came to Manila to work, I did change. I have liked all the new found things that I have not seen in the province and when I was still with him, the huge malls, branded clothes, gadgets, new friends and too many others to mention. I forgot about him just as my Friendster friends keep on growing. Then for a long time, I have not seen him. I don’t know if he’s dead already. There was no news of it.

He disappeared to anonymity, never took his college dreams and then..a news blackout.

So many years passed, I had not heard about him. How I wished I could have given him some complimentary gifts when I was still with San Miguel or invited him to the many occasions that I have spearheaded in our house. How I wished I could have talked to him and just simply take a trip down memory lane. But where is he? Now I am here in Dubai and friends are too hard to find, after so many things that have transpired, after dropping him from my priority list, after denying him a chance to go with the flow, after letting him alone, after leaving him lonely, his thoughts and character suddenly graced my imagination.

He was forgotten, but his character lingered somewhere at the back of my mind.

Could I be missing him? well, I must admit I am. But why? Maybe I got tired of the lights and the modern times and I am looking for some peace and truthfulness . I know he is not that hard to find, only if I will look closer and deeper within myself. I miss him, yeah, i miss the man. I am missing the man I used to be.

Regular na Ako!

Yahoo! Regular na Ako!......

Regular na ako sa work, so dapat wala na ang chismis na may STD daw ako! Kasi dito sa Dubai, pag nalaman kang may ganung sakit after nun pre employment medical test, DEPORT ang bagsak mo!

Regular na ako sa work, so ibig sabihin, namit ko yung mga expectations ng mga amo ko kaya napaaga ang pagiging opisyal na pagiging empleyado ko. In short,magaling talaga ako.Yabang!

Regular na ako sa work, so malamang, regular na rin yung makakarinig ako galing sa amo ko nang : " you did a great job, Sherwin!". Hahaha, yabang pa rin!

Regular na ako sa work, so regular na rin ang overtime na walang bayad.

Regular na ako sa work, pero hindi ibig sabihin non eh manlilibre na ako ng regular yum sa Jollibee.

Regular na ko sa work, so regular na rin sa mga susunod na taon (unless mag resign ako kaagad!? Ang pagsusuot ko ng pormal clothes. Hindi pa rin ako ganung sanay kasi sa Pinas, civilian ang palagi kong suot pagpasok sa opisina.

Regular na ako sa work, so regular na rin ang paglalakad ko pagpasok sa umaga at pag uwi sa gabi. Tamang ehersisyo lang para iwas taba, iwas high blood at iwas gastos sa pamasahe.

Regular na ko sa work, so regular na rin ang pagsahod at siyempre pagpapadala ng pera buwan buwan sa mga mahal sa buhay sa Pinas.

Regular na ako sa work, so regular na rin ang pag gising nang maaga kahit pa puyat para maghanda ng almusal, baon sa tanghalian at mamlantsa ng damit na susuotin.

Regular na ko sa work, regular na rin ang pagluluto ko sa gabi ng pagkaing makakain. Mas masarap kaya ang lutong bahay kaysa sa regular flavor ng KFC, kasawa fried chicken!

Regular na ko sa work, so regular ko na rin makakasalamuha sa opisina yung mga ibat ibang lahi na minsan eh nakaka init ng dugo lalo na yung kanilang amoy.

Regular na ko sa work, ganun pa man, hindi dapat pabayaan ang regular na ritwal na pagblobloging.

Regular na ko sa work, at sa bawat araw na daraan, tiyak na dadami pa ang mga Pinoy na aking makikilala at makakausap, at masasabi kong parang hindi rin ako lumisan ng Pinas!

Regular na ko sa work, sa kasamaang palad, meron iba jan ang lalong maiinis sa akin kasi may regular na trabaho na ko. Mamatay kayo sa inggit, pag nagkagayun, ipapalibing ko naman kayo sa regular na casket!

Regular na ko sa work, so ilang buwan pa bago ako makauwi ng Pinas para magbakasyon. Regular pa rin ang pagkamiss ko sa pamilya ko, sa mga kaibigan ko. Hayyyy.

Regular na ako sa work, ayos na. Sana next time, love life ko naman ang dumating...

Regular na ko work, maraming salamat sa Diyos! At sana patuloy Niya pa akong biyayaan ng kalusugan at kaayusan maging lahat na mga Pilipinong nagtratrabaho sa ibang parte pa ng mundo.

Attack of the Clogged: The Evil Strikes Back

How long can a man holds grudge against an innocent another? How long can a man harbors bitterness over an unintentional snub? How long can a man gets over something that should otherwise been a simple case of lapse in judgment? Two months? A year? A lifetime? Or til he realizes at least some of the objects of his frustrations? Two months after the horrible dedication to avenge what's for him "was the greatest sin you could ever commit", the man in black is getting more furious and relentless in his evil endeavor to destroy the fruitful chico.

The saga continues. He is so upset to read the messages my friends and some anonymous people left in the blog I wrote about him. He finds it difficult to accept that despite all his efforts to exaggerate things , his pathetic and inventive lies are getting eclipsed by the true circumstances about his motivations. He is so disgusted that no one seemed to believe his story telling. He is jealous to know that I am more loved and trusted despite his labors to make me look unlovable and trashed. He is hating me more than ever as he grips more tightly to the angst and anguish of his desperate soul. He is so mad to see me happy and living life to the fullest after all that he has done.

His latest threat? Hacking onto my friendster account and messaging all my friends (250+ of them) and telling them lies and vulgar stories about me. Then using the same account for the nth time, he is joining gay forums and starting threads telling things he expertly does on my behalf. Finally this, he has found his way to our company email address directory and now he started sending my officemates vulgar stories about me with matching obscene photos and malicious representations. I would not be surprised if tomorrow the same email would find its way to the mailboxes of our senators and the office of the President! How gross!

He even takes pride to say that he is my mortal enemy. Well, he is wrong. I never consider him as enemy. Though he may have done damage to me, I view it as his way to appease how I have made him felt during the snubbing incident. In as much as I want to hate him and get even, my conscience dictates me that doing so is unchristian and unbecoming of an educated person. So instead of blaspheming him accordingly, I choose to fill a big heart for a troubled soul and I maybe right.

Someone left me a message on the blog and he shared me something about this guy that should make me understand him more. This guy, who has hated me for the longest time has actually been through a lot in life. He was a product of a broken family and since childhood, has been house hoping just to live each day and survive. At early age, he's been exposed to the "dirty jobs" and through this and some ambition to improve his life, he was able to finish an education degree and fact of matter is, he even graduated magna cum laude in some school in Cebu. Sadly, he had never been given the opportunity to become a teacher as he was more inclined to do things beyond the boring classrooms of ABC. He has tried some modeling stint and been joining male beauty contest here and there. Just the same, no light had shone on him. So he was forced to go back to his old self and doing his "dirty jobs" so he could survived. He's been involved in a lots of runaway robberies in Manila and Cebu before he decided to go to Dubai. But his sad luck continues, the company that sent him to Kish (where we have met) and where he has worked for some months, didn’t pay his salary so he was forced to resign and do what he does best, this time in Dubai, so he could survive another day.

With what he's doing, I feel little afraid. No, not for my self for facing all those humiliations and embarrassment but to him for the way he is evolving. He's troubled and as days pass, he's showing signs of mental deteriorations. It seems difficult for him to move on. He's still clogged in that one moment in time that he's trying to shake my hands and shook the air instead. I feel sorry for him. Now I realized, there could really be more to that hands shaking. It could have been another Kimi Dorish moment where he's trying to tell me…" I am just little gay, standing in front of a boy, asking him to love me…." Hehehe. Again, sorry for that. I have no plans.

So how long will he be going to do this? Well, I have no idea. I just wish he could find a better and decent paying job so he could be busy with something else productive. At least now, I understand where it's all coming. He has his reasons and I just wish him to realize that there's still more to life after all the aggravations and frustrations. It's not too late to move on and start over.

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“It is a simple but sometimes forgotten truth that the greatest enemy to present joy and high hopes is the cultivation of retrospective bitterness.”
- Robert G. Menzies

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Casted 10 Months Ago

Tired of writing?? Well, I do, so here's what I've got, a personal Podcast made in October of 2008. I am sharing it for the very first time, wala lang. For a change. Hear it, it's me, Chico.

Much of Less

Last night's sighting of the new moon has marked the beginning of the most holy month in the Muslim calendar – the Ramadan. And as the season begins, life will change for most of Dubai residents, not just for Muslims. People of other faith, including Filipinos, will see their usual routines altered, whether they like it or not. Beyond the fasting of our Muslim brothers, everyone else is goaled in finding more good with the "less" during the observance.

For Muslims, Ramadan is a time to come back home, to get closer to God as individuals, as family and as community. Fasting or less focus on food and earthly things teaches them self control and discipline while purifying the body, mind and soul. Abstaining from food seems to be the way God teaches how to gain control over other aspects of our lives, which in turn helps us focus on spiritual matters. During this month, Muslims must control their passions and desires, and perform extra prayers and good deeds with complete devotion to God.

It is a tough call for Muslims, but for us people of other beliefs, living in a country where the brand of faith is different from ours, we could only slow down on the way we usually do things as a sign of courtesy and respect. After all, not obliging with the guidelines is punishable and that leaves us not a single choice to act on our own less one wants to spend some time in jail or worst get deported. Since it's a time of piety and religious consciousness, one must dress up moderately and avoid animated behavior that could cause offense. I must say that discipline and accord is at their highest adherence at this times regardless of our identity and preferences.

The annoyances during Ramadan are aimed not to punish or discourage people at any level. Truth is, treasures could be found in the elected bareness and simplicity. During Ramadan, shpping malls and restaurants veil their windows and open only after sunset. So you'll get to learn how to cook. Eating, drinking and smoking during the day is strictly prohibited and it's a great way to diet and stay healthy. Nightclubs and discos are in hiatus for a month and that means less spending. Road is less congested during the usual rush hours and your patience while traveling home is somehow momentarily laid to rest.

Working environment during Ramadan is more relaxed while people find more reasons to postpone work or go home early. Working hours is reduced and in theory could be bad for the economy. Professional commitment is not maximized and office works tend to pile up unfinished in one's desk. But for the good part, having to go home early means more time to sleep, to blog, to read your favorite books, to movie marathon, to chat with family back home, to meet up with friends and just simply rest and plan ahead for your family's future. Bet no one's gonna argue with that.

Despite the many things reduced, curtailed and minimized during this Holy month, Ramadan works in a way far important than just losing some pounds due to eating prohibitions or saving money due to closed bars and entertainment options. It gives us the opportunity to learn a lot from other people's tradition especially the essence of fasting, to share more time with our beloved back homes even through that small webcam, to show respect for our Muslim friends and be one living proof that people, despite differences in color, race or religion can unite and live harmoniously as one big happy family.

Bringing a Good Man Down

I really don’t know which way to feel. Being so preoccupied with my current job, I have almost lost all the time in the world to update my blogs, check on my emails and see what's the latest in friendster and facebook. Thought I could just leave the world unattended and focus on what's essential – my job. Well, evil really works its way when no one's watching. With the latest assassination that surprised the unsuspecting character in me, I really don’t know which way to feel . Should I be proud that someone is so negatively OBSESSED with me or should I be bothered that someone is weaving up trouble out of his OBSESSION.

What started out casually is raging on bloodily. Plagues of malicious emails, disturbing forum subjects, snatching control of my humble life's sanctuary, deleting the comments of my friends and even my own Friendster account, as if an apology would be not be enough to appease the bitterness and frustrations that is totally consuming this obsessed soul. Such another triumph for the evil monarch as another lost soul has taken the dark path and is blinded miserably by his congenital hatred and resentment of other people's successes.

While I work hard to earn a decent living, inevitably someone will just come along and speak evil without any just cause. But no matter how unsettling his words and his actions, I have always reserved in my heart a piece of understanding and console for people who are less loved. Sadly, people who are less loved most often are being used by the devil to spread their havoc in this world where we all try to live peacefully. And the battle just goes on. Damage will be inappropriately caused but God sees the truth and waits. He allows evil people to live longer, not because He wants them to spread more of their wrong doings but to give enough time to contemplate and repent for their transgressions.

I have always been a good man and a good friend to many. I am not a perfect human being. I have also flaws and vulnerable to mistakes and pains but I always know how to ask for apology for something that I have done knowingly and unintentionally. We live in an imperfect world, sometimes, what we want we won't get, who we love wont love us back the way we want it to be, we can never wish to be just successful, we have to work hard for it. At times when things don’t fall into place, there's no reason to blame others or feel bitter.

I have no enemies in life, aside from the loneliness that sometimes I feel from being far away from home. As an OFW, in time and in this place, that's the least that I would care about. But for some, there must be pleasure in evil speaking of others and spreading demeaning thoughts. I really don’t know which way to feel. How could some people be just so obsessed with someone so as to devote so much time trying to destroy him? Good luck. But they can never put a good man down. I have been through a lot in this life. I know as long as I am with God, this evil can try but they can't take that faith away from me.

"A man can never be too careful in the choice of his enemies” - Oscar Wilde

Never Say No

My sister texted me yesterday. How sweet noh?! But wait, she didn’t text to say hi or how I am, or to thank me for my last padala. Text from the Philippines is quite expensive so she cut it off, she needed three thousand pesos for a project she's doing in school. "Fine" I said, I'd send right away. So I did. After, I called her to give the reference number and she thanked me. I smiled and I said to myself, I don’t need to be thanked. As an OFW, I am believed to have lots of money, though the inside of my wallet, the place where I live, the roads that I walk, the food that I eat and the way I spend my weekend would say something else.

Never say no. that’s probably the motto OFWs like me have come to breathe and live in as far as family back home is concerned. Whatever they need, whenever they ask, however they want, we try hard to provide and fulfill every promises and every hope in as much as we can. When sometimes it requires going beyond our capacities, we still make up ways not to frustrate and upset our beloved. Though it means we need to swipe that card, borrow from friends, avail of company loans, sell personal properties or engage in extra sidelines, we are more willing to do that so we could be that ever dependable anak, kuya, tito, kaibigan at kapitbahay.

It hurts sometimes when we are too misconceived. They think that when someone left the country to work abroad, success is a guarantee. It may or may not be, but whatever happens, we cling on to our missions and sanguine that the next time will be better. Yeah, we are heroes, but not super ones. Hence, we have limitations and inabilities that oftentimes we conceal beneath our tears and under the pillows when we sleep at night.

I counted the change in my wallet when I arrived home, it's enough to last till the next payday, only I just have to take meals twice a day and spend nothing else for other things, not even for a piece of toblerone that I terribly love to grind. But I am not saying these to make someone feel guilty or to solicit any form of pity. I love to be of help to my family, and that’s basically the reason why I am here working far from them, away from friends and bare of a comfortable life that I want my loved ones to have.

Actually I can say no. But I have chosen never to say it. More than a motto, I have come to love and live with it, like a destiny, a bitter sweet destiny.

mtv featured was Jim Paredes "Sa Aking Padala" for Western Union.

Home is Where the Toilet Is

I was sitting on the toilet bowl for almost thirty minutes. Had it been a weekday, in the same span of time, I wouldn’t have only emptied my tummy from last night's full meal, but have also taken a shower, dressed up and gelled my hair. But since it's a weekend, I was spared of that obligation to enslave myself to another day of never ending early morning wake up calls and pressuring office works. So for thirty minutes, I have afforded myself to sit on the toilet bowl, releasing my thoughts of boredom and homesickness yet again. Been here in Dubai for more than a year now, it's kind of odd that after many battles and consecration to fulfilling my dreams in this land of sands and the guinesses, I was actually feeling sad and missing home.

The toilet was as bare as me. Aside from the bowl, the water hose and the tissue holder, there was nothing else to see inside. The walls and floor was made of white shiny marble tiles whimsically resembling a huge folded unpainted canvass whose master's artistry has lost ever since he left his silent sanctuary back home. The toilet and the bowl was nothing similar to the one we had back home. This one was so closed out and unforgiving, while ours in the province was meters away from our house, a place without out a roof and where the sky and heaven freely falls and where the birds and the tress fly and sway abandonly from above without even care at what you are doing.

Such a great pleasure from simple things. I missed that and I missed home. Sometimes I wish if only toilet bowls could be like time machine that could transport someone back to the past or bring someone closer to the future, then I'd probably spend frequent times to happily do both. I wanted to go back to the days when our toilet bowl was stll that ground level type, much like me, so young, so trivial, so jologs, funny and innocent. Yet all the more that I wanted to go forward to the future. I missed home, family and friends. If I could travel to skip many pages in the calendar and many months of sacrifices alone here outside of my own familiar confinement, my thoughts of home and all the feelings of boredom would be flushed away with all my hesitations and unsaid feelings for my loved ones.

There was peace and solace in the toilet room, the deafening silence is a treat away from the seemingly inescapable lack of privacy that is Dubai. Yet the noiselessness was just suffocating in a sense that when you have nothing else to see, what you saw was a picture of yourself back in time in the same moments and mersmerized how things have changed since the time that you'd enjoyed some private yet public moments in that roofless toilet nestled below the leafy towering calumpit trees. There were no flush, tissue paper or exhaust whatsoever, but there was joy in seeing the birds and airplanes flew from above, there was pleasure hearing the birds' noises from the trees, there was sweetness in the scent of the fields and farms. There was hapiness, simply in being at home.

The House That Loneliness Built

Sunday, I was happily trading online messages with a former housemate in Quezon City when out of our scattered conversation I learned a very disturbing and saddening old news: the boarding house where we used to live had been burned down to ashes last year due to faulty electrical wiring. Shock restrained me from typing a word when I heard what happened. The boarding house where I have lived for more than two years back when I was still working in Manila has surrendered its walls and floors to a tragic and unwanted demise. I couldn’t believe that such misfortune had happened and I didn’t even know. Suddenly I was silenced by shame and denunciation. I was clothed with immeasurable guilt and disconcern for an old house that I have come to call home.

Our boarding house was a unit of a typical up and down apartment building that was located along Bansalangin Street in Veterans Village, approximately a hundred meters away from Edsa. It was an old apartment building and our boarding house unit, I'd say, looked older as it wasn’t well maintained. For its dark interiors, busted lights, clogged drains, waterless faucets, swaying staircase, cracked walls, rusted windows grills, crawling insects and all other stuff reminiscent of those haunted houses featured in creepy Korean horror movies, it was definitely a miserable place, good enough as shelter, you might think, for miserable people.

But not so long ago, I was there in that same building. I have lived there since our office was transferred to Valenzuela. If it weren’t for its proximity and convenience, I wouldn’t have lived there. There was nothing special in that house, except for an old woman who had been keeping that boarding house operational and inhabited, so that she too could survive, she was our landlady. In two years that I have lived in that house, I have witnessed boarders come and go. I was there when the house was fully occupied with bedspacers and I had to act like a caretaker overseeing the others. I have witnessed how at one time the house was almost empty of any occupants, just me and Nanay Mimi, yet still we survived. I was there when someone have tried to sneak into the house and rob but didn’t succeed. I was there in many occasions that though all might not necessarily be happy, for all the lessons learned and trust earned, I'd say that it's all worth it.

I could still remember when I've found that boarding house, it was advertised in BuynSell. That was in 2004. When I came into the house, It was full of male boarders, it was more like a jail, only the prisoners were free. Time passed and everyone had to go but not me. I have chosen to stay in that house despite prolonged waterless day, despite the cockroaches, despite the creepy settings. I didn’t know. Maybe I was a miserable guy destined to live in a miserable place. Maybe because the rent was cheap and the location was very accessible. Maybe because I have already developed a sense of family inside the house. Maybe because I didn’t want to leave her alone. Maybe I was afraid to see her in tears. Maybe I was afraid to just see the house stand in its solitary and desolate state.

When I came to Dubai in 2007, I had to say goodbye to my landlady and to the house for good. It was after spending my nights there for more than two years. It was a sad moment indeed as I emptied my improvised dusty wooden cupboard, it was like leaving a huge vacuum in the house and heading forth with a hollow space in my heart. It wasn’t that easy. Working abroad was a tall order but leaving something that has come to be part of your life was rather heavy. The so many nights where she shared her unforgettable and sometimes incredible life story were incomparable. The many mornings where she'd cooked breakfast for me were genuinely appreciated. I knew when I left, she'd also felt sad. She has no family. Well, actually she has, but she's living on her own, with her pride, her silence, her solitude. This old boarding house was what kept her surviving all these years and it pained me to see her left behind and not see her at time when she simply needed someone to talk to.

The last time that I've seen her was the time when I left the house with all my belongings. I have never heard anything from her since then, not until this shocking old news that sent my thoughts to nostalgia and melancholy. I am still gald to know that no life was wasted in the accident. I felt sorry for her. I wonder where she is right now; it's been almost a year since the boarding house caught fire. The house was gone, so I hope her loneliness. Pray that she's fine and doing good, wherever she maybe.