I love the Christmas Season. It really is my most favorite time of the year. I love Christmas carols except I think I am getting old because the commercialized ones now grate my teeth.
We always had great Christmases when I was growing up. Everyone would be home and my father, my sister and my brothers and I would be in the kitchen cooking our noche buena dinner while my mother sits in the dining room, smoking a cigarette and talks to us through the door and changes the cd for us.
We have a twelve- (I think or fourteen) foot tree which is decorated with ornaments that we have collected through the years. We have some ornaments that are older than I am! Some are beautiful, some are kitschy and others plain ugly but they all go up (some in the back) and I personally think our tree is the most beautiful Christmas tree period (Oh Christmas Tree, Oh Christmas Tree! How beautiful your branch is!). I have a strong proprietary feeling for our tree, ever since the time my sister splurged some of her hard-earned money and bought a plethora of christmas lights and it took me three days to wind it up the tree. It took me four more days to get all the ornaments up. Ever since that time, I sort of became the person "in charge" of the tree. I don't care if I move into an apartment the size of a shoebox but I'm bringing that tree (and my twelve dining room chairs, but that's a story for another time) with me and putting it up every Christmas, even if it means I'll have to sleep at my brother's place because I can't get in my apartment for the tree.
We also have the belen which we take turns every year to design. To this day, I never remember to ask where we get the sand we use (yes we use sand, after all, they were in the desert, right?). I remember we grabbed little hand mirrors and buried them in the sand to make ponds and nicked my sister's glass animals to add more "color" to the landscape, never mind if the animals weren't indiginous to Israel (and that the rest of the figurines weren't made of glass).
Christmas became even more fun (for us kids, anyway) when we had pets that were allowed inside the house. Bijou, my sister's daschund, would knock down the low-hanging tree ornaments, and if it happened to be a ball, would chase it around the living room. So much so that we had to plan the tree very carefully. Sissypuss, our cat, was also notorious for swiping tree ornaments. However, the most memorable chrismas-decor-and-pet-incident was with the belen. We woke up one day to find the belen figurines knocked down. We correctly figured it was Sissy who did it. We also saw she did more than just knock down the figurines, she seemed to have moved the sand a bit. Well she was a cat, she probably thought it was nice of us to decorate her litterbox.
There are a handful of Christmases that stand out: When my dad suffered his heart attack he spent Christmas in the hospital. To get our minds off it, I don't know who suggested it (I was 8 at the time), we (the kids) were instructed to each cook a sauce for the beef fondue that we were going to have for our Christmas Eve dinner, which we were having at the hospital. I think our tradition of cooking Christmas dinner started there.
When my cousin Jayjay joined us one time and we (my parents and all five siblings with Jayjay as the Dungeon Master) played Dungeons & Dragons for days.
I remember the two consecutive Christmases we spent in Baguio with my other cousins, their parents and my grandmother. We stayed at the house of a family friend. One of my three cousins was paired off with one of my two brothers or myself and each pair was put in charge of either "the house" (taking charge of the keys, making sure there was enough firewood, etc), "the cars" (they were in good condition, stayed gassed up, would drive us around as needed, etc) or "the kitchen" (oversee the menu, make sure the food got served on time, would do the grocery, etc). I had a ball. Those were good Christmases. Wish we could do it again.
Another was the first time I didn't spend Christmas with my family. It was just my brother and I here in Bacolod. We couldn't afford the airfare back to Manila. Still it wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be. I remember that we were asked to bring eggnogg to the Christmas lunch at my Abuelita's. I got the recipe from my younger brother in Manila who told me to just use half since the recipe was for 40. So I did...that is, I did except for the cream. That eggnogg was so thick, you had to eat it with a spoon! It was good though.
And lastly, there was the Christmas we had here in Bacolod right after the "Eggnogg Christmas." It was the first Christmas our family spent here since we moved to Manila in '81. However, what made this one memorable was I pretty much took over the Christmas dinner that year. I cooked a mean bouillabaisse, which I ended up serving at 9pm because I didn't realize it would take so long to cook!
I remember as a kid finding it harder and harder to sleep as Christmas Day got closer. I also remember lying underneath the tree and looking up through the branches and marveling at all the christmas lights. I remember playing this really silly game with my brother Wanggo about Snow White the Zombie ("ooh a shiny red apple!" -- don't ask) for about two or even three Christmases.
I think it's grand that we've kept our traditions and even added some new ones. The olds ones: opening our presents at midnight, always having a Christmas ham, each family member takes a turn every year to be the one who calls out the presents, "adopting" someone who can't be with their family for Christmas; and the new ones: we now play Kris Kringle (and this year it now includes my cousins, my aunts and uncles and even my grandmother) and making paté for our family and friends.
I'm looking forward to this Christmas. Those who can be here will be here. The names for Kris Kringle have been picked. The paté list has been drawn up. The menu for both the dinner on Christmas Eve and the lunch on Christmas Day has been prepared. I've burned a new cd of Christmas carols. Oh wait...I haven't done my shopping yet!
Sunday, December 11, 2005
Timing
My dad texts me these quotes almost everyday. I don't know where he gets them (quite possibly from the people who text him) but his supply seems limitless. I keep them, almost every one of them. I type them up and save them on a file I have in my computer. The sappy ones, the witty ones, the profound ones, I kept them all.
I'm in the middle of typing another batch when I came across this one: "Sometimes, all it takes is knowing when."
Timing is key, isn't it? Knowing when to to act, when not to act. Knowing when to advance and when to retreat. As I sit here, I'm thinking back on all the times when I acted at the right moment, when I hesitated and when I blundered. The last two has happened a lot more than the first.
There's a thought that it's better to act and fail than not to act at all. I don't know if this is right anymore. I used to think so. However, looking back, I only thought so when I had already acted and then blundered. I'd say it to myself as justification of my actions. Now that I'm older, I tend to think that discretion really is the better part of valor.
I'm in the middle of typing another batch when I came across this one: "Sometimes, all it takes is knowing when."
Timing is key, isn't it? Knowing when to to act, when not to act. Knowing when to advance and when to retreat. As I sit here, I'm thinking back on all the times when I acted at the right moment, when I hesitated and when I blundered. The last two has happened a lot more than the first.
There's a thought that it's better to act and fail than not to act at all. I don't know if this is right anymore. I used to think so. However, looking back, I only thought so when I had already acted and then blundered. I'd say it to myself as justification of my actions. Now that I'm older, I tend to think that discretion really is the better part of valor.
Friday, December 02, 2005
Conversing with God and Traumatizing My Mother, an Autobiography
Here's the second creative writing result.
I’ve always felt that writing an autobiography is a two-edged sword. You have to tell your story and be truthful but not too truthful. We all have skeletons in our closet that we’d rather stay in there. It’s a balancing act, you don’t want to brag about your accomplishments but you don’t want to cover yourself with false modesty either. One thing about autobiographies though, at least the writer can’t say he’s unfamiliar with the subject.
Where to begin? I could say that I was born in Bacolod and while that is factual it doesn’t exactly make for an exciting read. Don’t you just hate those biographies that just list facts down? It’s like a bio-data written in prose. There are only two significant things anyone ought to know about my early life. This is the first: my mother blames me for ending her ballet career. She finally got the lead in a ballet recital at the age of thirty-three, pretty late if you know ballet. This has been a dream of hers for a long time. She was working hard in preparation for it when she got pregnant. This has always puzzled me, how was it my fault? It was my father and her who did the dirty deed! She says that she could’ve continued with the recital except I was such a big baby that she soon got too unwieldy to continue. Again, the blame, if any, should be placed either at my father’s feet for his genes or possibly my mother for her appetite. However, this has been cruelly shot down with the parents’ prerogative of “I’m right, now get me a glass of water.”
The second significant thing is similar in theme to the first. A couple of weeks before I was due my mother felt contractions. She quickly rushed to Our Lady of Mercy Hospital, where to her chagrin; the doctor told her it was a false alarm. False alarms are common to first-time mothers; however, I’m child number four. The day of tribulation wasn’t over yet. The hospital’s elevators weren’t working so my mother had to go down the stairs. Her doctor, however, didn’t want her to walk all those steps in her gravid condition. I was born nine pounds and two ounces; you can only imagine the weight she was carrying (actually you don’t need to: the weight was nine pounds and two ounces). So the doctor had her put in a litter to be carried down the steps. The litter was carried on the shoulders of two men: one was elderly and the other was scrawny. My mother held on for dear life, she was so heavy that she was afraid the two gentlemen were going to drop her. To top it all off, my mother has a fear of heights. Just imagine being carried down three flights of stairs on the shoulders of two men who look like they’ll snap in a good breeze while being nine months pregnant and suffering from vertigo; I think he should’ve just let her walk, it couldn’t have been any worse. Needless to say, she puts the blame on me as well. She has to blame me for something; I heard that the actual labor was really short. Anticlimactic, isn’t it?
There’s an Eastern belief that states that you choose who you’re born to, where you’re born and what kind of person you’ll be. You simply forget all this when you’re actually born. So if you were born with buckteeth, you have no one to blame but yourself. I bet you parents, those sneaky little bastards, came up with this one to avoid responsibility when their children come up to whine, “Why wasn’t I born pretty?” “It’s your fault I don’t have long legs!” I actually believe this though (both the Eastern belief and that parents are sneaky little bastards) and I’ve given this a lot of thought.
God: (coming up to my soul) So Jubal, you’re going in tomorrow. Had any thought about the life you’re going to lead? (God, being omniscient, already knows I’m going to be called “Jubal.”)
Jubal: They’re going to call me “Jubal?” I’m going to be Jewish?
God: No, no, no… I’m sorry; I keep forgetting not to do that. (But we know he never forgets; I also believe God has a twisted sense of humor) Let’s see, you believe in reincarnation…hmm (God is checking his PDA) okay, I’ve assessed your karma. Let’s see possible birthing sites…
Jubal: (looking over God’s shoulder and looks at the PDA) The Philippines?! Who was I? Hitler?!
God: Relax. That’s just one of the options. Let’s start from the beginning, male or female?
Jubal: Definitely male. I don’t think I can go through PMS again.
God: Okay, (makes a note in his PDA) now what advantages would you like? However, based on your karmic debt you have to take some large disadvantages.
Jubal: I want to be beautiful, rich, brilliant and born to an aristocratic family, preferably the British Royal Family.
God: (sighs) We have this conversation every time. No no no and no. The whole point of living is to learn the value of things. How can you learn if you get everything?
Jubal: (sulking and mumbles) but I wanna be rich and beautiful and smart and belong to royalty and have everyone love me and be successful and rich and have a nice car and famous and date celebrities but find true love and live happily ever after.
God: No.
Jubal: Well, can’t blame a guy for trying. Okay disadvantages (looks over list at God’s PDA), can I be colorblind? That looks interesting. Let’s see what else – nearsighted! That’s always good. I want to be nearsighted again; it’s something I can live with… Hmmm… enough physical disadvantages let’s go to character
flaws… laziness! That ought to take a big chunk out of the karmic debt.
God: It has to be the major kind of laziness though. You also have to get procrastination, low self-discipline, 11th hour shenanigans, king of the last minute and escapism.
Jubal: Wow, all that?
God: Look at it this way, you pay off some of your bad karma and you might manage to work some of this out and never have to deal with it again.
Jubal: Okay and throw in some wrong-headed pride, but just a minor one. The kind of pride where I’ll do something just because I’m told not to; but I don’t want to be too proud.
God: Okay. Major disadvantages noted. Shall we continue to advantages?
Jubal: I want to be born to a good family this time. Not necessarily perfect, but I want one where I can actually talk to my parents and I have an actual relationship with my siblings.
God: I can arrange that but I’m afraid with your karmic debt you can’t afford to live in a first world country.
Jubal: But I was looking forward to going back to Europe! Come on, what I did wasn’t that bad… (God gives Jubal a look) Okay okay Third World country it is then. But I don’t want to deal with winter if I’m broke so let’s go tropical.
God: Southeast Asia is popular this year. Lots of growth.
Jubal: (looks suspiciously at God) Why do I have the feeling you want me in the Philippines?
God: (looking innocent – he’s very good at this) Now why would I do that? Okay, you got me. It’s part of the Plan. You know, the Ineffable Plan? The one I have for all Humanity? Just trust me on this. Besides the Philippines isn’t that bad. It has great beaches; warm, friendly people and you can have a Western upbringing coupled with the Eastern concern for family. It’s suited to you.
Jubal: Fine, fine I’ll take it if it makes you happy.
God: Good, good. (Tabulating scores on the PDA) Hmm, looks like you still aren’t balanced. You need to take at least two more disadvantages.
Jubal: What? Are you serious? (Looks at the PDA) Goddamn it! (looks at God guiltily) I beg your pardon. Hmm, okay throw in overweight. At least that’ll fall in line with the laziness. I’ve been fat before I can deal with that. And hmm, let’s see… (reads through PDA) okay I got it, make me gay as well.
God: Gay? I said choose a disadvantage.
Jubal: I’ll be overweight, lazy and born in a country where 90% of the population is Christian. I’m colorblind meaning no career in fashion and I’ll be too proud to go through the trouble of dating.
God: You have a point. Okay, log homosexuality as a disadvantage… hey, you actually got some points back. You can spend it on an advantage.
Jubal: Yeah, make me an agnostic.
Well you get the idea. While I’ll agree that maybe this isn’t quite how it happens (but then how do we know for sure), this is one of my strongest beliefs. It feels like a Truth (with a capital “T”) to me. I believe that we are put on Earth to learn a lesson in life and when we learned everything we can (and since we’re human, we don’t always get it right at one go, so we keep coming back until we do), we go to another place to do God-knows-what, literally. This other place may be another world like Earth with another set of lessons, or this place could be what people believe to be Heaven.
Having conversations with God and traumatizing my mother were tough acts to follow; consequently the rest of my childhood was unremarkable. We moved to Manila when I was four and I lived there until I graduated from high school. I did things other children did. I played with my toys, fought my brothers, got thrown out (in one memorable case, literally) of my older brother’s room for being obnoxious, visited my dad in his office – it’s just that my father’s office was a movie set.
People always ask me what it’s like growing up to be the son of Peque Gallaga. My life was different and even as a child I knew it. The awareness started early with me, how can I not know? When forty-year old teachers ask their seven-year old student for movie passes, it clues a person in that his dad is special. It’s not my father being a director that made my life different though. My father, being who he is, would’ve made life different for us anyway. If he had stayed in Bacolod to teach instead of going back to Manila all those years ago, I don’t think I’d have lived a different life. My father would’ve been around more but it wouldn’t have made much of an impact; I never really noticed my father was out a lot. It was simply a matter of fact. Things were definitely more exciting when he was around but one can only have so much excitement.
The reason things would always be different is simply because my father is a reader, he is someone who pursues knowledge. He is constantly getting involved with new things and dragging the rest of us with him.
I have a personal library that I’m not ashamed of. My library is larger than some family’s whole collections (I know, I’ve visited some of my high school classmates’ homes). My father has lost, given away and been robbed of more books than I currently own. He’s always willing to learn. I know people associate food with him because of his size but his appetite for ideas defines him far more than what he eats. With him as a father, I would never have had a “normal” childhood (normal being relative – I know some real weird families out there, most of whom I’m related to).
The other thing I’m always asked growing up is if I was going to be a director like my father or an actor. I used to get irritated by that question. It’s as if I have no individuality; that I have no dreams or aspirations separate from my father. I’m not simply an extension of his DNA! Things changed though when I hit twenty but I’m getting ahead of myself. I still have puberty to breeze through.
Puberty was a breeze. Okay that’s done; now on to my twenties.
I’m not kidding.
Okay I am. Puberty was a breeze though. I have to thank the Christians for that. I used to watch this show that came on before my Saturday cartoons. It was a news program that wore its Christian heart on its sleeve. I didn’t care, I was eleven. Saturday, however, was the only day of the week that I would wake up before seven on my own to catch the cartoons and since it came right before I’d give it a go. I don’t remember anything about it except that it gave away a free magazine subscription to anyone who wrote in. So I did.
I got, aside from the magazine, another magazine by the same people but written for teenagers. I was excited. Not for anything but because I got something for free! And it wasn’t a plastic army figurine in one color that was the consolation prize for not being able to pin the tail on the donkey! The magazine I originally subscribed to bored me to tears (I was eleven) but the teen magazine intrigued me. I read one issue that detailed what happened to children when they hit puberty. It was written in a way that didn’t insult my intelligence, engaged my interest and gave me all the details. It warned me about physical changes and loss of emotional control, etc. Almost literally the next day I hit puberty. I couldn’t have been better prepared.
In high school I was a geek and a nerd. However I was a tall and hefty one. My older brother was also one of the popular kids in school, who the gangs around our school actually respected and feared, so I was left alone. My best friend then (and now) was one of the most beautiful girls in my school; everyone assumed that we were going steady so they thought I couldn’t be a sissy (evidence to the contrary) if I was dating her (we didn’t know that at the time, though, and she’s blamed me ever since for not getting dates in high school – I seem to have gone through life being blamed for something I couldn’t help). Since I had these things in my favor I was saved from being harassed by bullies. I wasn’t in the cool crowd but I was definitely not one of the “losers.” I was also a Junior Police (like a hall monitor but with more responsibilities and powers) and the right-hand man of the Head Teacher, who was in charge of discipline. I was a Nazi in school and the lower years loathed me. They couldn’t complain, though, because I always followed the rules myself and made no exceptions: not for myself, my friends, or even for my younger brother.
I didn’t go out. I would go to school and go home. If I went to the mall, it was because I was buying something. I never “hung out.” I loved being at home. My parents made it very comfortable. I actually was forced to go out and socialize because I would spend most of the time in my room reading in bed.
It was a small school so I knew everybody and everyone knew me. My personal circle of friends, though, was small and stayed pretty constant. My three best friends in grade school are still my friends now although we don’t see each other very often.
I went to university in Cebu after I graduated. This is when I really started to grow up. You can’t grow up when you are safe and comfortable. Growing up is testing your limits and seeing how strong you are and you can’t do that when you get breakfast in bed and have a car at your beck and call. I was by myself and I thought I could handle it. For the most part I did but it also served me one of the most painful and humiliating lessons about life I ever received. It would not be the last. This is one of those skeletons in the closet I’d rather not air so I’ll just gloss over that bit and get to the one I’m willing to air.
In Cebu I also made a lasting friendship. It was here, a couple of months shy of my twentieth birthday, that I realized just how popular my father was. My friend is a huge fan of my father and he actually went out of his way to meet me. He was a super senior (someone who’s been in university for longer than four years) and he actually hunted me down to talk to me, a freshman.
I started to get an inkling about how big my dad was. You must understand that I grew up in Manila. The conceit of the Manileño is that Manila is the Philippines. If it’s happening in Manila it’s happening throughout the whole country. When I arrived in Cebu I realized that there’s a whole other country out there that isn’t in tune with Manila. There are things happening out here that Manila isn’t even aware of. And they knew who my father was. That’s when it hit me. It hasn’t failed yet. I’ve been to a lot of places and I’ve yet to meet a Filipino who hasn’t heard of my father. It’s mind-boggling. I’ve always felt lucky and proud to have my dad be my dad; but it was in Cebu when I felt privileged to have him as my father. I don’t feel privileged because he’s famous, I feel privileged because everyone who I met is proud of my father, of his accomplishments.
The rest is boring recent history. I dropped out (honorable dismissal!) of UP Cebu, bummed for a semester and then went to La Salle Bacolod. I expanded my circle of friends, fell in love with theater, and, only after graduating from college, discovered what it was I wanted to do with my life.
Since graduating I’ve been arranging my life so I can teach. I joined the LCC graduate school so I could get the credentials I need to become a working teacher. It is a goal that I’ve managed to keep for five years now. That’s a record for me. Perhaps I’m beating that laziness after all.
I’ve always felt that writing an autobiography is a two-edged sword. You have to tell your story and be truthful but not too truthful. We all have skeletons in our closet that we’d rather stay in there. It’s a balancing act, you don’t want to brag about your accomplishments but you don’t want to cover yourself with false modesty either. One thing about autobiographies though, at least the writer can’t say he’s unfamiliar with the subject.
Where to begin? I could say that I was born in Bacolod and while that is factual it doesn’t exactly make for an exciting read. Don’t you just hate those biographies that just list facts down? It’s like a bio-data written in prose. There are only two significant things anyone ought to know about my early life. This is the first: my mother blames me for ending her ballet career. She finally got the lead in a ballet recital at the age of thirty-three, pretty late if you know ballet. This has been a dream of hers for a long time. She was working hard in preparation for it when she got pregnant. This has always puzzled me, how was it my fault? It was my father and her who did the dirty deed! She says that she could’ve continued with the recital except I was such a big baby that she soon got too unwieldy to continue. Again, the blame, if any, should be placed either at my father’s feet for his genes or possibly my mother for her appetite. However, this has been cruelly shot down with the parents’ prerogative of “I’m right, now get me a glass of water.”
The second significant thing is similar in theme to the first. A couple of weeks before I was due my mother felt contractions. She quickly rushed to Our Lady of Mercy Hospital, where to her chagrin; the doctor told her it was a false alarm. False alarms are common to first-time mothers; however, I’m child number four. The day of tribulation wasn’t over yet. The hospital’s elevators weren’t working so my mother had to go down the stairs. Her doctor, however, didn’t want her to walk all those steps in her gravid condition. I was born nine pounds and two ounces; you can only imagine the weight she was carrying (actually you don’t need to: the weight was nine pounds and two ounces). So the doctor had her put in a litter to be carried down the steps. The litter was carried on the shoulders of two men: one was elderly and the other was scrawny. My mother held on for dear life, she was so heavy that she was afraid the two gentlemen were going to drop her. To top it all off, my mother has a fear of heights. Just imagine being carried down three flights of stairs on the shoulders of two men who look like they’ll snap in a good breeze while being nine months pregnant and suffering from vertigo; I think he should’ve just let her walk, it couldn’t have been any worse. Needless to say, she puts the blame on me as well. She has to blame me for something; I heard that the actual labor was really short. Anticlimactic, isn’t it?
There’s an Eastern belief that states that you choose who you’re born to, where you’re born and what kind of person you’ll be. You simply forget all this when you’re actually born. So if you were born with buckteeth, you have no one to blame but yourself. I bet you parents, those sneaky little bastards, came up with this one to avoid responsibility when their children come up to whine, “Why wasn’t I born pretty?” “It’s your fault I don’t have long legs!” I actually believe this though (both the Eastern belief and that parents are sneaky little bastards) and I’ve given this a lot of thought.
God: (coming up to my soul) So Jubal, you’re going in tomorrow. Had any thought about the life you’re going to lead? (God, being omniscient, already knows I’m going to be called “Jubal.”)
Jubal: They’re going to call me “Jubal?” I’m going to be Jewish?
God: No, no, no… I’m sorry; I keep forgetting not to do that. (But we know he never forgets; I also believe God has a twisted sense of humor) Let’s see, you believe in reincarnation…hmm (God is checking his PDA) okay, I’ve assessed your karma. Let’s see possible birthing sites…
Jubal: (looking over God’s shoulder and looks at the PDA) The Philippines?! Who was I? Hitler?!
God: Relax. That’s just one of the options. Let’s start from the beginning, male or female?
Jubal: Definitely male. I don’t think I can go through PMS again.
God: Okay, (makes a note in his PDA) now what advantages would you like? However, based on your karmic debt you have to take some large disadvantages.
Jubal: I want to be beautiful, rich, brilliant and born to an aristocratic family, preferably the British Royal Family.
God: (sighs) We have this conversation every time. No no no and no. The whole point of living is to learn the value of things. How can you learn if you get everything?
Jubal: (sulking and mumbles) but I wanna be rich and beautiful and smart and belong to royalty and have everyone love me and be successful and rich and have a nice car and famous and date celebrities but find true love and live happily ever after.
God: No.
Jubal: Well, can’t blame a guy for trying. Okay disadvantages (looks over list at God’s PDA), can I be colorblind? That looks interesting. Let’s see what else – nearsighted! That’s always good. I want to be nearsighted again; it’s something I can live with… Hmmm… enough physical disadvantages let’s go to character
flaws… laziness! That ought to take a big chunk out of the karmic debt.
God: It has to be the major kind of laziness though. You also have to get procrastination, low self-discipline, 11th hour shenanigans, king of the last minute and escapism.
Jubal: Wow, all that?
God: Look at it this way, you pay off some of your bad karma and you might manage to work some of this out and never have to deal with it again.
Jubal: Okay and throw in some wrong-headed pride, but just a minor one. The kind of pride where I’ll do something just because I’m told not to; but I don’t want to be too proud.
God: Okay. Major disadvantages noted. Shall we continue to advantages?
Jubal: I want to be born to a good family this time. Not necessarily perfect, but I want one where I can actually talk to my parents and I have an actual relationship with my siblings.
God: I can arrange that but I’m afraid with your karmic debt you can’t afford to live in a first world country.
Jubal: But I was looking forward to going back to Europe! Come on, what I did wasn’t that bad… (God gives Jubal a look) Okay okay Third World country it is then. But I don’t want to deal with winter if I’m broke so let’s go tropical.
God: Southeast Asia is popular this year. Lots of growth.
Jubal: (looks suspiciously at God) Why do I have the feeling you want me in the Philippines?
God: (looking innocent – he’s very good at this) Now why would I do that? Okay, you got me. It’s part of the Plan. You know, the Ineffable Plan? The one I have for all Humanity? Just trust me on this. Besides the Philippines isn’t that bad. It has great beaches; warm, friendly people and you can have a Western upbringing coupled with the Eastern concern for family. It’s suited to you.
Jubal: Fine, fine I’ll take it if it makes you happy.
God: Good, good. (Tabulating scores on the PDA) Hmm, looks like you still aren’t balanced. You need to take at least two more disadvantages.
Jubal: What? Are you serious? (Looks at the PDA) Goddamn it! (looks at God guiltily) I beg your pardon. Hmm, okay throw in overweight. At least that’ll fall in line with the laziness. I’ve been fat before I can deal with that. And hmm, let’s see… (reads through PDA) okay I got it, make me gay as well.
God: Gay? I said choose a disadvantage.
Jubal: I’ll be overweight, lazy and born in a country where 90% of the population is Christian. I’m colorblind meaning no career in fashion and I’ll be too proud to go through the trouble of dating.
God: You have a point. Okay, log homosexuality as a disadvantage… hey, you actually got some points back. You can spend it on an advantage.
Jubal: Yeah, make me an agnostic.
Well you get the idea. While I’ll agree that maybe this isn’t quite how it happens (but then how do we know for sure), this is one of my strongest beliefs. It feels like a Truth (with a capital “T”) to me. I believe that we are put on Earth to learn a lesson in life and when we learned everything we can (and since we’re human, we don’t always get it right at one go, so we keep coming back until we do), we go to another place to do God-knows-what, literally. This other place may be another world like Earth with another set of lessons, or this place could be what people believe to be Heaven.
Having conversations with God and traumatizing my mother were tough acts to follow; consequently the rest of my childhood was unremarkable. We moved to Manila when I was four and I lived there until I graduated from high school. I did things other children did. I played with my toys, fought my brothers, got thrown out (in one memorable case, literally) of my older brother’s room for being obnoxious, visited my dad in his office – it’s just that my father’s office was a movie set.
People always ask me what it’s like growing up to be the son of Peque Gallaga. My life was different and even as a child I knew it. The awareness started early with me, how can I not know? When forty-year old teachers ask their seven-year old student for movie passes, it clues a person in that his dad is special. It’s not my father being a director that made my life different though. My father, being who he is, would’ve made life different for us anyway. If he had stayed in Bacolod to teach instead of going back to Manila all those years ago, I don’t think I’d have lived a different life. My father would’ve been around more but it wouldn’t have made much of an impact; I never really noticed my father was out a lot. It was simply a matter of fact. Things were definitely more exciting when he was around but one can only have so much excitement.
The reason things would always be different is simply because my father is a reader, he is someone who pursues knowledge. He is constantly getting involved with new things and dragging the rest of us with him.
I have a personal library that I’m not ashamed of. My library is larger than some family’s whole collections (I know, I’ve visited some of my high school classmates’ homes). My father has lost, given away and been robbed of more books than I currently own. He’s always willing to learn. I know people associate food with him because of his size but his appetite for ideas defines him far more than what he eats. With him as a father, I would never have had a “normal” childhood (normal being relative – I know some real weird families out there, most of whom I’m related to).
The other thing I’m always asked growing up is if I was going to be a director like my father or an actor. I used to get irritated by that question. It’s as if I have no individuality; that I have no dreams or aspirations separate from my father. I’m not simply an extension of his DNA! Things changed though when I hit twenty but I’m getting ahead of myself. I still have puberty to breeze through.
Puberty was a breeze. Okay that’s done; now on to my twenties.
I’m not kidding.
Okay I am. Puberty was a breeze though. I have to thank the Christians for that. I used to watch this show that came on before my Saturday cartoons. It was a news program that wore its Christian heart on its sleeve. I didn’t care, I was eleven. Saturday, however, was the only day of the week that I would wake up before seven on my own to catch the cartoons and since it came right before I’d give it a go. I don’t remember anything about it except that it gave away a free magazine subscription to anyone who wrote in. So I did.
I got, aside from the magazine, another magazine by the same people but written for teenagers. I was excited. Not for anything but because I got something for free! And it wasn’t a plastic army figurine in one color that was the consolation prize for not being able to pin the tail on the donkey! The magazine I originally subscribed to bored me to tears (I was eleven) but the teen magazine intrigued me. I read one issue that detailed what happened to children when they hit puberty. It was written in a way that didn’t insult my intelligence, engaged my interest and gave me all the details. It warned me about physical changes and loss of emotional control, etc. Almost literally the next day I hit puberty. I couldn’t have been better prepared.
In high school I was a geek and a nerd. However I was a tall and hefty one. My older brother was also one of the popular kids in school, who the gangs around our school actually respected and feared, so I was left alone. My best friend then (and now) was one of the most beautiful girls in my school; everyone assumed that we were going steady so they thought I couldn’t be a sissy (evidence to the contrary) if I was dating her (we didn’t know that at the time, though, and she’s blamed me ever since for not getting dates in high school – I seem to have gone through life being blamed for something I couldn’t help). Since I had these things in my favor I was saved from being harassed by bullies. I wasn’t in the cool crowd but I was definitely not one of the “losers.” I was also a Junior Police (like a hall monitor but with more responsibilities and powers) and the right-hand man of the Head Teacher, who was in charge of discipline. I was a Nazi in school and the lower years loathed me. They couldn’t complain, though, because I always followed the rules myself and made no exceptions: not for myself, my friends, or even for my younger brother.
I didn’t go out. I would go to school and go home. If I went to the mall, it was because I was buying something. I never “hung out.” I loved being at home. My parents made it very comfortable. I actually was forced to go out and socialize because I would spend most of the time in my room reading in bed.
It was a small school so I knew everybody and everyone knew me. My personal circle of friends, though, was small and stayed pretty constant. My three best friends in grade school are still my friends now although we don’t see each other very often.
I went to university in Cebu after I graduated. This is when I really started to grow up. You can’t grow up when you are safe and comfortable. Growing up is testing your limits and seeing how strong you are and you can’t do that when you get breakfast in bed and have a car at your beck and call. I was by myself and I thought I could handle it. For the most part I did but it also served me one of the most painful and humiliating lessons about life I ever received. It would not be the last. This is one of those skeletons in the closet I’d rather not air so I’ll just gloss over that bit and get to the one I’m willing to air.
In Cebu I also made a lasting friendship. It was here, a couple of months shy of my twentieth birthday, that I realized just how popular my father was. My friend is a huge fan of my father and he actually went out of his way to meet me. He was a super senior (someone who’s been in university for longer than four years) and he actually hunted me down to talk to me, a freshman.
I started to get an inkling about how big my dad was. You must understand that I grew up in Manila. The conceit of the Manileño is that Manila is the Philippines. If it’s happening in Manila it’s happening throughout the whole country. When I arrived in Cebu I realized that there’s a whole other country out there that isn’t in tune with Manila. There are things happening out here that Manila isn’t even aware of. And they knew who my father was. That’s when it hit me. It hasn’t failed yet. I’ve been to a lot of places and I’ve yet to meet a Filipino who hasn’t heard of my father. It’s mind-boggling. I’ve always felt lucky and proud to have my dad be my dad; but it was in Cebu when I felt privileged to have him as my father. I don’t feel privileged because he’s famous, I feel privileged because everyone who I met is proud of my father, of his accomplishments.
The rest is boring recent history. I dropped out (honorable dismissal!) of UP Cebu, bummed for a semester and then went to La Salle Bacolod. I expanded my circle of friends, fell in love with theater, and, only after graduating from college, discovered what it was I wanted to do with my life.
Since graduating I’ve been arranging my life so I can teach. I joined the LCC graduate school so I could get the credentials I need to become a working teacher. It is a goal that I’ve managed to keep for five years now. That’s a record for me. Perhaps I’m beating that laziness after all.
Thursday, December 01, 2005
An Epiphany
When it rains... I'm attaching two things I wrote for my Creative Writing class last summer. This is the first.
I had an epiphany... well sort of.
A friend of mine, let's call him Jan (because that's his name), and myself have been exchanging slightly ludicrous emails about godhood – mainly my godhood or rather what I would do if I were God (or at least, a god).
It got me thinking – no I haven't seen Bruce Almighty but everyone has thought about this at least once and if you haven't you don't have a shred of creativity or imagination – what would I do if I were god?
At first all the "me" stuff came in: the requisite riches, wealth, palaces, talk show dates, and open auditions for my angels. One must have a heavenly host to sing one’s praises after all. Now Jan, poor naïve Jan, thought that what I had in mind would not fit the idea of the "purity" and "holiness" of angels. Poor, poor Jan. Angels are not little cupids. I mean these guys razed cities, rebelled against the Lord and overpopulated the Earth so much with their illegitimate children that God had to send a deluge (which is like a flood but more dramatic) to get rid of the vermin. Does this sound like "pure" and "holy" to you?
Angels aren't those renaissance cherubs that grace the paintings of the masters; they're more like incandescently-beautiful rock stars. Think Jude Law, Colin Farrell, Brad Pitt (I know they're all movie stars, I'm a film buff not a rocker), piss-eyed drunk, stumbling out of the bar, eyes all bloodshot, clothes all over the place, wings gray and dirty, with an underage girl in one arm and a boytoy in another, singing "kyrie eleison" off key and to the tune of "Bullets and Butterfly Wings" and you're getting close to what I have in mind.
Fun as this train of thought is, I decided to seriously think about it – or at the very least go beyond my usual ego-trips. If I had the power of god, what would I do?
Would I do anything for the environment? Contrary to what you might think, I don't think the planet's going to hell in a hand-basket. I think the planet's doing fine. It's the capacity for the planet to support human life that's going to Hades. I mean cockroaches and mosquitoes would probably survive (wouldn’t they just?). Tubeworms will not give a hoot if we burn out all our oxygen and the only thing left to breathe up here is methane. Heck the common cold will probably kick back at the end of the day, downing a cold beer at a pub somewhere and talk about us humans like a cool vacation spot that went potty.
What I think is terrible is that we're bringing so many critters with us to extinction. Life will probably go on, just not how we know it. So would I do anything? If I could wave my hands and make the air breathable, let the trees grow back, bring the endangered animals out of risk, clean the oceans, make all that garbage go away, take out the toxins and radiations in our water and our soil, would I do it? If it were me, Jubal, yes I would, in an instant. But if I could do that then I'm not just Jubal, I'm god. I'm the parent, not the child. So I have to think like a parent.
Changing things drastically overnight won't help because people would just go on as they did before. They probably won't even notice. The way we're built, we don't realize the importance of something until it's gone. What would be the point of doing all of that if it doesn't fix the problem in the first place? The problem isn't that we have too much garbage; it's that we don't know how to handle our waste. We just throw it away and hope someone else will take care of it. The problem is not that there isn't space in this world for humans and animals to live together; the problem is humans want more for themselves. If I were god, I can't make this decision for everyone else. I'd sooner just remove humans altogether (and where would be the fun in that?).
One thing I know (head-knowledge, I don't know this in the gut, haven't really experienced it personally – but sometimes head-knowledge is better than gut-knowledge. I don't need to be shot in the foot to know that isn't a good idea) about power is that once you use it, you have to keep on using it, all the time. You see, by using your power you elicit a response. The kind of power you use and the magnitude, how much you use of it, will bring about a similar response with equal kind and measure (don't believe me? Ask Newton. Still don't believe me? Try this experiment: go outside of your house and push the first person you see as hard as you can. Keep doing this until either he/she can't get up or you can't (either because she beat the crap out of you or you are now presently in jail awaiting trial for assault and battery) that’s how you exercise power and how the use of power elicits a response).
So it is important that you carefully choose what kind of power you exercise. That's why power through force never works in the long-term because the choice of using force breeds more force. You push people, they push back. They might not always be successful but they can be a damn nuisance (or get someone else to push you back harder, like your mother – sometimes force is not always a physical manifestation). You can cut down trees to create farms and furniture and buildings and stuff, but you also open yourself up to landslides and mudslides and the full fury of hurricanes.
This is the reason why I don't like guns (and in the bigger picture, nukes). I've fired a gun and I got this huge buzz from doing it. It scares me that someone like me, who hates guns, can feel that way (and if you're wondering why I fired one if I hate them so much, well it's like giving a movie a bad review. You can't, with integrity, diss a movie you haven't seen) about firing a gun. Don't get me wrong, I watch action movies, read books where people blow each other away in a grand scale but I think guns, and their ilk, is the easy way out. By using guns, i.e. force, to solve our problems we only invite other people to use their guns to solve their problems, i.e. us.
So what kind of power should we exercise then? There are lots of choices: persuasion, bribery, deceit, love, compassion, passive-aggressiveness, and so on; but my favorite is Enlightenment. You can show people the way but you can't force them to take the path. Like the USA and the Kyoto Protocols. You can show them that the best way for all of us to survive is to sign up, but it would wrong to force them to sign because they wouldn't be enlightened, just resentful. Ever had a resentful employee? They can make your life a living hell, particularly if they're smart about it so you can't really fire them.
If I was god, truly a god, I would – though I hate to admit it – probably do the same thing the current deity is doing now. God could make your life easier, but when was the last time we appreciated anything that came easy?
Despite what I've said, I believe in the human race as a whole – maybe not my fellow Filipinos, we are all so focused on the short-term it's surprising we haven't imploded this week – and that we'll come to a realization, an epiphany if you will, and come out all right. We’ll be bruised, battered and scarred but, on the whole, all right; with a deeper appreciation of the worth of things around us. The world will be a whole lot shittier by then, but by gum, we’ll appreciate it!
I had an epiphany... well sort of.
A friend of mine, let's call him Jan (because that's his name), and myself have been exchanging slightly ludicrous emails about godhood – mainly my godhood or rather what I would do if I were God (or at least, a god).
It got me thinking – no I haven't seen Bruce Almighty but everyone has thought about this at least once and if you haven't you don't have a shred of creativity or imagination – what would I do if I were god?
At first all the "me" stuff came in: the requisite riches, wealth, palaces, talk show dates, and open auditions for my angels. One must have a heavenly host to sing one’s praises after all. Now Jan, poor naïve Jan, thought that what I had in mind would not fit the idea of the "purity" and "holiness" of angels. Poor, poor Jan. Angels are not little cupids. I mean these guys razed cities, rebelled against the Lord and overpopulated the Earth so much with their illegitimate children that God had to send a deluge (which is like a flood but more dramatic) to get rid of the vermin. Does this sound like "pure" and "holy" to you?
Angels aren't those renaissance cherubs that grace the paintings of the masters; they're more like incandescently-beautiful rock stars. Think Jude Law, Colin Farrell, Brad Pitt (I know they're all movie stars, I'm a film buff not a rocker), piss-eyed drunk, stumbling out of the bar, eyes all bloodshot, clothes all over the place, wings gray and dirty, with an underage girl in one arm and a boytoy in another, singing "kyrie eleison" off key and to the tune of "Bullets and Butterfly Wings" and you're getting close to what I have in mind.
Fun as this train of thought is, I decided to seriously think about it – or at the very least go beyond my usual ego-trips. If I had the power of god, what would I do?
Would I do anything for the environment? Contrary to what you might think, I don't think the planet's going to hell in a hand-basket. I think the planet's doing fine. It's the capacity for the planet to support human life that's going to Hades. I mean cockroaches and mosquitoes would probably survive (wouldn’t they just?). Tubeworms will not give a hoot if we burn out all our oxygen and the only thing left to breathe up here is methane. Heck the common cold will probably kick back at the end of the day, downing a cold beer at a pub somewhere and talk about us humans like a cool vacation spot that went potty.
What I think is terrible is that we're bringing so many critters with us to extinction. Life will probably go on, just not how we know it. So would I do anything? If I could wave my hands and make the air breathable, let the trees grow back, bring the endangered animals out of risk, clean the oceans, make all that garbage go away, take out the toxins and radiations in our water and our soil, would I do it? If it were me, Jubal, yes I would, in an instant. But if I could do that then I'm not just Jubal, I'm god. I'm the parent, not the child. So I have to think like a parent.
Changing things drastically overnight won't help because people would just go on as they did before. They probably won't even notice. The way we're built, we don't realize the importance of something until it's gone. What would be the point of doing all of that if it doesn't fix the problem in the first place? The problem isn't that we have too much garbage; it's that we don't know how to handle our waste. We just throw it away and hope someone else will take care of it. The problem is not that there isn't space in this world for humans and animals to live together; the problem is humans want more for themselves. If I were god, I can't make this decision for everyone else. I'd sooner just remove humans altogether (and where would be the fun in that?).
One thing I know (head-knowledge, I don't know this in the gut, haven't really experienced it personally – but sometimes head-knowledge is better than gut-knowledge. I don't need to be shot in the foot to know that isn't a good idea) about power is that once you use it, you have to keep on using it, all the time. You see, by using your power you elicit a response. The kind of power you use and the magnitude, how much you use of it, will bring about a similar response with equal kind and measure (don't believe me? Ask Newton. Still don't believe me? Try this experiment: go outside of your house and push the first person you see as hard as you can. Keep doing this until either he/she can't get up or you can't (either because she beat the crap out of you or you are now presently in jail awaiting trial for assault and battery) that’s how you exercise power and how the use of power elicits a response).
So it is important that you carefully choose what kind of power you exercise. That's why power through force never works in the long-term because the choice of using force breeds more force. You push people, they push back. They might not always be successful but they can be a damn nuisance (or get someone else to push you back harder, like your mother – sometimes force is not always a physical manifestation). You can cut down trees to create farms and furniture and buildings and stuff, but you also open yourself up to landslides and mudslides and the full fury of hurricanes.
This is the reason why I don't like guns (and in the bigger picture, nukes). I've fired a gun and I got this huge buzz from doing it. It scares me that someone like me, who hates guns, can feel that way (and if you're wondering why I fired one if I hate them so much, well it's like giving a movie a bad review. You can't, with integrity, diss a movie you haven't seen) about firing a gun. Don't get me wrong, I watch action movies, read books where people blow each other away in a grand scale but I think guns, and their ilk, is the easy way out. By using guns, i.e. force, to solve our problems we only invite other people to use their guns to solve their problems, i.e. us.
So what kind of power should we exercise then? There are lots of choices: persuasion, bribery, deceit, love, compassion, passive-aggressiveness, and so on; but my favorite is Enlightenment. You can show people the way but you can't force them to take the path. Like the USA and the Kyoto Protocols. You can show them that the best way for all of us to survive is to sign up, but it would wrong to force them to sign because they wouldn't be enlightened, just resentful. Ever had a resentful employee? They can make your life a living hell, particularly if they're smart about it so you can't really fire them.
If I was god, truly a god, I would – though I hate to admit it – probably do the same thing the current deity is doing now. God could make your life easier, but when was the last time we appreciated anything that came easy?
Despite what I've said, I believe in the human race as a whole – maybe not my fellow Filipinos, we are all so focused on the short-term it's surprising we haven't imploded this week – and that we'll come to a realization, an epiphany if you will, and come out all right. We’ll be bruised, battered and scarred but, on the whole, all right; with a deeper appreciation of the worth of things around us. The world will be a whole lot shittier by then, but by gum, we’ll appreciate it!
The Vatican Decision
I don't know what the fuss is about. Why is everyone so surprised by this? The Catholic Church let itself be known clearly its stand on homosexuality for the past two thousand years. I have no problem with that. It's not like they're dragging us into their dungeons and torturing us to "repent our evil ways".
What I don't get is why people insist on changing what they are. That's like telling the British to stop using English and speak Spanish instead because a minority of citizens in the United Kingdom speak Spanish. This isn't a corporation who should judge people on their merits and capabilities not on their beliefs and culture. This is a cultural institution which defines a set of beliefs and, well, a culture.
If they don't want us there, then why force ourselves down their throats? It's not like they have a monopoly on God, you know. We can't have everything in life, so why focus on the things we can't have? Don't get me wrong, if the Catholic Church, by some (heh) miracle, realize the stupidity of their position and lifts their idiotic and archaic views on homosexuality, then great! Besides, I've always wanted to see pigs fly.
Which is a shame, I always thought that gays and the Catholic Church would make a great fit. Think about it: who else would be happy completely surrounded by other men, have to engage in strange and beautiful rituals, wear black (trés chic! and so slimming!), tell people what to do and how to live their lives, and get to listen to everyone's dirt. Celibacy will be an issue but imagine if the half the clergy were gay it would soon be a moot point.
What I don't get is why people insist on changing what they are. That's like telling the British to stop using English and speak Spanish instead because a minority of citizens in the United Kingdom speak Spanish. This isn't a corporation who should judge people on their merits and capabilities not on their beliefs and culture. This is a cultural institution which defines a set of beliefs and, well, a culture.
If they don't want us there, then why force ourselves down their throats? It's not like they have a monopoly on God, you know. We can't have everything in life, so why focus on the things we can't have? Don't get me wrong, if the Catholic Church, by some (heh) miracle, realize the stupidity of their position and lifts their idiotic and archaic views on homosexuality, then great! Besides, I've always wanted to see pigs fly.
Which is a shame, I always thought that gays and the Catholic Church would make a great fit. Think about it: who else would be happy completely surrounded by other men, have to engage in strange and beautiful rituals, wear black (trés chic! and so slimming!), tell people what to do and how to live their lives, and get to listen to everyone's dirt. Celibacy will be an issue but imagine if the half the clergy were gay it would soon be a moot point.
Baby Steps
I finally started teaching last month. It's a little bizarre that I'm finally doing what I've set out to do. All the people who know me know I'm a procrastinator who thinks instant gratification takes too long. This is incredible that I have set out a long-term goal and actually met it.
I'm not surprised that I like teaching. I've always known that I like it. I enjoyed doing reports in front of the class back in the day. I have fun every summer when I teach either Basic Acting or the Improvs class. When I was teaching Koreans and professionals "practical" English, it was a job I didn't mind waking up early for and going everyday to do. Even as a student I used to daydream how I would run a class or how to teach a subject. So yes, teaching is something I see myself doing for the long term (knock on wood).
I didn't realize how (corny as it may sound) fulfilling it is.
I'm a believer of things that cannot be explained (a nice way of saying "superstitious", isn't it?) so I pay attention to my horoscopes (not the newspaper/magazine variety -- the personal ones), knock on wood and send eggs to the Carmelite nuns when something important needs the Hand of God. However I'm never around when a "oh my God, I went to this manghuhula and he was, like, so brilliant! We should go"-type reader is around or whenever a meeting with "this person is the real thing, she's not flaky and really knows her astrology" is scheduled. Finally I hit the jackpot and this "omigod this brilliant numerologist came over from Iloilo and, gawd, he's, like, super good. He, like, totally got it! He knows his shit" came over and I was available.
My point is, he read me and he told me that the best work suited to me is teaching. I felt really good about that. I felt validated in my choice, like I did the smart move. I know my family has supported me in this decision but it's something else when it comes from someone who has no vested interest in your well-being.
One step at a time. That's what I'm learning. Take it one step at a time. It took me a hell of a lot longer than I expected but at last I'm doing something I set out to do.
I'm not surprised that I like teaching. I've always known that I like it. I enjoyed doing reports in front of the class back in the day. I have fun every summer when I teach either Basic Acting or the Improvs class. When I was teaching Koreans and professionals "practical" English, it was a job I didn't mind waking up early for and going everyday to do. Even as a student I used to daydream how I would run a class or how to teach a subject. So yes, teaching is something I see myself doing for the long term (knock on wood).
I didn't realize how (corny as it may sound) fulfilling it is.
I'm a believer of things that cannot be explained (a nice way of saying "superstitious", isn't it?) so I pay attention to my horoscopes (not the newspaper/magazine variety -- the personal ones), knock on wood and send eggs to the Carmelite nuns when something important needs the Hand of God. However I'm never around when a "oh my God, I went to this manghuhula and he was, like, so brilliant! We should go"-type reader is around or whenever a meeting with "this person is the real thing, she's not flaky and really knows her astrology" is scheduled. Finally I hit the jackpot and this "omigod this brilliant numerologist came over from Iloilo and, gawd, he's, like, super good. He, like, totally got it! He knows his shit" came over and I was available.
My point is, he read me and he told me that the best work suited to me is teaching. I felt really good about that. I felt validated in my choice, like I did the smart move. I know my family has supported me in this decision but it's something else when it comes from someone who has no vested interest in your well-being.
One step at a time. That's what I'm learning. Take it one step at a time. It took me a hell of a lot longer than I expected but at last I'm doing something I set out to do.
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