A horse with a name

Beamish Open Air Museum, UK

Meet Chester. He lives in Beamish. I don’t know how I knew his name. There are three probabilities: someone told me his name was Chester; his name was listed in that guidebook on my left hand or I just named him myself.

One thing defies my progressing senility – Chester is a heart stealer. Even without a capture, this heart-warming moment will breathe eternally fresh in my stock of beautiful emotions. I held out my palm. He came closer and checked out what’s in it for him. Mint candies. Chester didn’t hesitate. He licked them off as if thinking, “what took you so long to give me my treat?” I forgot the shrinking complaint of my south-east asian blood against the cold of North England.

I told Chester to leave some for me. He kept on eating til my palm was empty. I giggled and he understood I had more. It only took a second for him to realize where are the rest. He licked my purse too! The force of his tongue gave me a gentle push. His intelligence sealed my admiration for him. That’s when I patted his head. We exchanged the same unspoken message of thanks. His grateful eyes melted my dancing heart.

My little valentine

A snap gone happily awry: part of me, my date's camera-shy head and the view opposite Fuji in Central Bangna, Bangkok

Saint Valentine’s 2009 was a first for me.  In years past I have always been asked to be someone’s valentine.  This time I did the asking.  Fortunately I wasn’t turned down.  Perfect day!  My hairstylist did a great job.  I wore a semi-formal, dainty ecru dress. Light pink, two-inch slippers demurely displayed my sweet pink pedicure among butterfly wing straps that complimented my old biege purse. I went easy on the jewelry and make-up.

My date wore a greyish vest over a white, long-sleeved shirt.  His pants matched his vest, but his jacket disappeared.  It could have been hibernating in the closet.  His shirt matched the color of his shoes – an elegant pair of Mickey Mouse.  Unlike my previous valentines, this date didn’t bring me roses or chocolates.  A measuring stick reveals he is tall for his age yet I tower over him.  On our way to luncheon he sensed a camera about to click and ducked with the speed of a fish swishing off your fancy of catching it. What more – he had his own milk in a bottle with him and didn’t even share it with me.  But I didn’t mind.

We went to church first.  Before the divine service began, an amusing announcement was flashed – “If you do not have a date, join us at 6.30 in the auditorium for an evening of fun.  For more info contact Mrs. Lil.”  Mrs. Lil is a widow, perhaps a merry widow Man was I glad I didn’t have to contact her.  I had my date in a fond embrace while we stood singing “Jesus is all the world to me.”

BK Magazine featured Reader’s Choice Awards on their January 30th issue. Bangkokians cast their votes for their favorite hotel, pub, coffee shop, place to chill, venue for ladies’ night, live music, gentlemen’s club and so on.  The winner for all-time favorite restaurant category this year is Fuji.  That’s where I took my date.  I’m a regular weekend patron of Fuji.  So is my date. We are both lovers of Japanese cuisine.  My date examined the menu as soon as we were seated.  He wanted this and that.  He pointed at everything sending the waiter busy on the electronic order pad.  I checked my wallet for cards in case I would need financial back-up.  Indeed I got to pick up the bill.  And guess what – not only did my date not offer to provide the tip, he even pocketed the change.  Through all this I was bemused with thoughts of how fabulous he is to me and how I love him to bits that I didn’t bother about the apparent absence of a few dating etiquettes.  It must be true that when you are in love you don’t care what the world thinks of who you love and care about.

Cupid must have hit me hard.  While watching my date eat with gusto, I daydreamt: He will grow into a fine man.  I will mainly be responsible for that so help me, God.  His next date will be treated with the same affection he is showing me now.  In the meantime, as his date this year and in the next fifteen years at least, I am enjoying his affection and cheekiness all to myself.  The composure and soft-spokenness I am witnessing in him will be the same manners I want him to possess in the future even when I’m no longer his date. Please bring flowers or chocolates for your other future date, young man.  And you’re also settling the bill or whatever the trend is in 2024 or before that, or after that.

Over dessert I recalled what I already knew the first time I set eyes on my date the day he was born: Whenever necessary I would go through hell and back for him.

I dated my darling son!

A shot of epinephrine

In class yesterday students tracked a traveller’s flight from LA to New York to London to Paris, and drilled on UK and US travel lingo.  As I’m familiar with the topic, I did not bother turning on the computer and was barehanded while supervising the pace of everything that had to be covered in two and a half hours.  My phone rang.  A friend’s voice on the other end was frantic.  SOS.  I started moving away from the giant screen towards the computer - she needed someone who can speak Thai ASAP!  Her purse was slashed and all her ATM cards were gone.  I reckoned, ‘ok, finding a Thai speaker is not impossible around here silly… .’  She became incoherent with panic and I began to wonder why panic when ATM cards could be easily replaced.  I pressed the phone to my ear.  What I heard next made me bolt from the unturned on computer almost screaming, “excuse me class… emergency!”

I ran all the way from the 2nd floor of Bldg. 6, past Bldg. 5, past the engineering equipment building to our department office in less than a minute.  I rarely run, but besides the instinct to help the thought of bidding adieu to all that money made me run, in 3-inch heels!  Some of that money will finance our trip to Europe come April.  Damn it couldn’t be lost!

Two of my co-teachers were chatting in the office.  I was glad to see one laptop was on.  I told them my predicament and they immediately searched for and dialed the number of Bangkok Bank.  While waiting for the bank to pick up, I explained that Marix was transferring an amount to another account and wanted to avoid having her card swallowed up by the machine in case she made a mistake with the numbers.  The numbers on two of the three cards were identical and she finds them confusing so she deliberately wrote all PINs on a piece of paper and put it in her wallet.   

My co-teachers sprang off their swivel chairs and chorused, ”what?!” 

They realized the possibility that was raging in my head.  The clock was now registering 12.45.  I’ve never witnessed time as frighteningly swift as when we were working the phones and waiting to hear the bank say transactions for the stolen cards have been successfully disabled.  Finally at 1 pm on the dot Bangkok Bank declared the stolen cards invalidated.

I went back to class in a daze.  This time I was doing a funeral march.  ‘I am calm, I am calm, I am clamped!’  Phone rang again and my funeral march abruptly mutated into a foxtrot.  The lucky pickpocket had a field day.  Marix lost all maximum allowed daily withdrawals: two grand.  A print-out from the bank hours later showed withdrawals at 12.29, 12.31 and 12. 35 from an ATM inside a hospital near Victory Monument.  Cameras in the hospital lobby (no camera on the machine) showed a blurry, fat woman working the ATM at the times that coincided with times recorded by the bank computers.  Our effort to bar any activity on the cards were useless then.  Hoping that the wretched thief would be smitten by a bout of stupidity and try withdrawing the next day, we asked the bank and police to do whatever they can.   But we knew that chances of an arrest or even retrieving the cash were nil. 

Marix kept asking me what to say to her boyfriend who owns most of the money.  I wished there was a cup of strong coffee on the police officer’s desk where I reminded Marix that shit happens.  Nonetheless a mere apology is not enough.  She has to offer J a solution.  And the phone did ring.  Poor Marix braced herself and began explaining the accident to J who works on the other side of our crime-ridden planet.  I spoke to J too and judging by his voice and words, I knew he wasn’t mad and didn’t blame Marix.  How endearing.  As soon as we came out of the police station, Marix wept quietly on my shoulder.

It was almost midnight when I finally came home.  I grabbed the remote for J’s new commander-in-chief’s inaugural address, my appetite for fun analysis waning.  I observed rhymes in the reverend’s benediction, not in the poet’s poem, noticed how tall the new first lady is, listened to the elegance of the Star-Spangled Banner sung acapella, and exhaled when a military helicopter whisked Bush away.  I wanted to savor a historic moment of a nation whose global leadership affects my life whether I like it or not.  But the effects of epinephrine had gradually left my veins.  I decided which way to go: fridge to settle my forsaken dinner or bed to soothe my drooping eyelids.  I chose the latter.

God was I calm.

Mozart’s vacation

Flying Mozart home / cenchanting

“Where’s Mozart?” was Cj’s first question when I unlocked the door to our room. There was no Mozart there bouncing to meet us. Cj’s way of asking was more like ‘what have you done, Mom?’ We have just arrived from the Philippines where we spent christmas. I tried not to cry and for a minute ignored my son’s inquiry. He kept looking up at me, his eyes so like Mozart’s when expecting a surprise. My heart was as heavy as our luggage. I dragged it towards the bookcase then explained to Cj yet again why Mozart wasn’t back with us.

Cj and Mozart were a cheery duo at Suvarnabhumi. We three alighted from ex-husband’s car to an airport entrance that reminded me of a ship at night with its search light on in the open sea. My mouth went firing, “boys, behave!” They ignored me of course while ex hurried off to find a good parking spot. Some passengers we passed by on our way to the check-in counter ohhed and ahhed at Mozart. I overheard several “nah luks” (lovely doggie). Thailand is a dog-loving society so those were normal comments, but I still loved hearing them anyway.

With my left hand holding Cj, and my right carrying Mozart, my mind was on our travel documents, particularly Mozart’s. He’s the main reason for the trip. I was sorting out the final casualty of my divorce. Poor Mozart had to live with grandma for awhile because a pooch, no matter how adorable or how sweetly perfumed his velvety fur is is banned in most Bangkok apartments. The policy at Cj’s condominium is no different. Ex-hub offered to have Mozart stay with a family of a friend of his. I declined, “thanks but not in this lifetime.”

Sending Mozart to the Philippines was not just a tough decision but also one of the most heartbreaking moments in my entire life. Outwardly I was in complete control – no tears; I arranged Mozart’s flight as if he was just vacationing with us. And that’s exactly what I wrote as purpose on the application for a permit to fly a pet. I coordinated with corresponding departments of both governments: the Department of Livestock Development of Thailand and the Bureau of Animal Industry of the Department of Agriculture of the Philippines.

having a fabulous time / cenchanting

Mozart’s veterinarian reviewed his clinic record and looked me in the eye, “you’re taking Mozart to the Philippines?” A lump formed in my throat.  I knew he meant “what on earth are you doing?”  Next stop was the Animal Quarantine Station.  It wasn’t as bad as I thought. Mozart played round and round my leg happily while waiting for his turn at the examination table. I appreciated the Thai animal health officer’s unspoken understanding of my feelings.  He allowed me to hover needlessly over Mozart while he performed tests from head to toe (or paw?) to declare my boy fit to travel.

I have always enjoyed shopping for Mozart’s food, clothes and accessories. But shopping for his travel kennel felt like doomsday. When my ex and I took Mozart to a section at the airport that takes care of pet ’seats,’ Cj tugged at my jeans apprehensively, “Mommy, Mozart sit with me….” So it was explanation time again, “no Baby Pooh, Mozart has a special seat in the belly of the plane.”

The thought of a canine I treat like my firstborn travelling among bags was strange and awkward to me.  Even my ex stood watching and did not leave til Mozart was taken to the baggage compartment.  I always knew he loved him, I suspect more than he loved me particularly towards the time of our split.  Silly but I didn’t mind.  Around the time we signed the divorce papers, he whined, “you took everything! you took my son, you took Mozart, everything!” “Hang on,” I retorted, “I did not touch your real estate, your liquid assets or your golf clubs.  I did not take everything.”  When the cart on which Mozart was placed started moving, ex craned his neck as Mozart disappeared from view.  He looked ashen and I understood what he meant by “everything.”

beach with kuya calvin / cenchanting

Mozart’s luggage was filled with his toys, shirts, and a bulky supply of his favorite snacks and treats along with vitamins and new leashes for a niece’s dog. For everyday care I left my mother a visa card and strict instructions, “at least one cuddle a day, Ma.” She calmed my anxiety, “Relax, ija. There’s no need to plead. You know that a grandma’s favorite pastime is spoiling everyone in her household.”  Then sensing an opportunity she went on, “ surely you must also know that this is part of the brunt of doing away with the til-death-do-us-part tradition….”

“Great. I’m soooooo listening to this lecture, Mother.”

I hugged and kissed Mozart one more time and whispered in his ear, “It’s just a vacation, Mo. We will see each other on cam and I will call you once we arrive in Bangkok. Grandma has a yard for you to romp on, Mommy doesn’t. It should be lots of fun for you.” Cousins, nieces and nephews who sent us off at Davao airport for our flight back pretended not to notice our emotionally charged private moment.

online bonding / cenchanting

“Off you go then,” Mama prompted, and if ever you fancy having Cj stay with me again, (like I did when the divorce was at its height of nastiness) well, anytime, Anak.  Anytime.”

“Thanks, Ma. I will claim that support when Bangkok runs out of yayas.”

Party all night, invigilate all day

cenchanting

E-exams are going on at SIIBT.  They’re a hovering killjoy over christmas parties itching to start off.  Exam-takers in rooms 513 and 134 have a new nickname for me – Teacher Hawk and my co-invigilator – Teacher Duck.  Another co-teacher assigned to roam buildings 5 and 1 quacks students off in the corridor to tidy up or they are not allowed in the exam rooms.  “That should be Teacher Duck, not my companion here,” I thought while entering the numeric address on the toolbar of each computer. 

I pause at the screen and review morning subjects: Principles of Programming, Productivity Management, Business Communication, and Applied Math.”  These exams will digest their breakfast just fine,”  I mutter, my eyes following Wanna who is approaching the door to let students in.  Always well-mannered and well-dressed with face about a 3 out of 5 on the attraction scale, I nonchalantly wonder why she’s an old maid.  I scroll down the list of subjects for the afternoon.  “It must be choice,” my mind wander for a second to Wanna, “God, I hope students get themselves a good lunch,” I shot back to serious mode when I found what students were gonna wrestle when the clock strikes 1: Calculus.  At 2: E-circuit Analysis.  At 3: Labour Law, and at 4: Personal Finances.  Poor kids.  They’re gonna be slaughtered.

DBA / cenchanting

The Business Administration Department office happens to be right behind Bldg. 5.  I steal glances through the sliding glass windows and try to stifle my excitement at what’s going on there – maids hauling in food and drinks; office assistants decking the ceiling and walls with christmas decors.

Today I slip on padded heels.  I prefer to walk around as inaudibly as

siibtmidterms / cenchanting

possible while I invigilate.  It probably isn’t much help.  Students grumble how difficult exams are.  My eyebrows are meeting in the middle, “difficulty has more to do with classes unabsorbed by your iPod-playing heads than your cheat-proof seating,” I whisper sternly at a Marketing major whose result was coming up.  He almost didn’t pass.  I just hate it when students flop.  I move to the next computer used by Aukarawwat, a Thai-Chinese senior, “set yang?” (done yet?)  “Yang, Kap Ajarn.” (Not yet, Teacher)  I flashed him a smile that says ‘you’ll ace these exams again like usual, won’t you?’  Aukarawwat is top of his class.  Teaching him is a pleasure.  He is now making commands to find his score.  I hold my breath………and pop!  Merry christmas, young man!  I just love it when students click their way to an A almost effortlessly.

The faculty office was on a full blast party mood despite dull piles of work on desks.  Heck, they would have to wait til next year.  I shed my hawk persona and circled the somtam which was reddish with crushed prig kee nu.  I pictured Aukarawwat’s score and the rest who survived ruthless Calculus or implacable E-circuit Analysis and I was able to swallow the crispy strips of papaya, burning flavor and all.  Fruits and bits of Aanida’s 30-somethingth cake helped tranquilize the wrath of Thai chilli.  I scanned the party for her.  She’s lost among the food and chatter.  Aanida’s job was to know that I was  leaving the festivity early.  Near a huge bucket of ice, male co-teachers began a quiet discussion over the booze.  I found Aanida close by and wished her triple happiness – happy birthday, happy christmas and happy new year.  I almost hugged her but then remembered this was Thailand.  We exchanged nods.  

As I made my way out, the veteran ajarns were holding their glasses in manly calm.  They’re poised to deepen their discussion.  Ho-ho-ho! don’t get tipsy on the steering wheel, guys!

Spitting image slash behavior

Mozart waits for dinner watching CNN / cenchanting

Do you readily accept theoretical claims or simplify them as so-so?  Most of the time I can’t be bothered.  I admittedly just wait and see.  Leading claims metamorphose right before our accepting eyes everyday they have become too hackneyed for a CIA type investigation.   Whatever the experience let’s place it on the mad rush.  Or away from madding lives better ignored. 

In a Bangkok nook lives Raia, a young girl who’s got her mother, Female J’s dark skin and her father’s looks.  If you are not censorious you would say Raia’s looks are passable.  If you are used to say, a  JonBenet Ramsey  look and do not usually settle for average looks, nevertheless not heartless, maybe you would say Raia is plain but would be perfect playing the role of a sad, hungry orphan in third-world rags with her dirty aluminium bowl down Beggar Street in one of those school dramas.

But watch out.  Raia can express herself well (dad is as mentally slow as mom so it must be the genes of her paternal aunt who graduated magna cum laude), and with her mother’s uneducated attitude this little girl’s behavior is formidably impertinent.  At 8 her stinking precociousness slapped a 20 year-old, “I’m not supposed to talk with you because you are gay. My mom says ‘gays go to hell.’”

Besides Raia being her parents’ daughter, there has to be a sedative for such chutzpah before we all get a coronary.  I warded off  mine with Bandura’s social learning theory.  It posits that “people learn from one another, via observation, imitation and modelling.”   I know Raia’s parents very well.  Their gall at times can make the kindest soul wish they were co-existing with gorillas.  No further analysis, whether qualitative or quantitative is needed to detect that their little girl’s behaviour construes Bandura’s claims on a .01% margin of error.  However, Raia’s legal maturity is grounds for pardon.  No matter how murderous her attitude is we can’t force a one-way ticket to Azkaban on her.  Maybe a good whack on her parents’ heads is in order. 

Let’s leave the whacking to the elders of the church Raia’s parents attend.   Years Female J and her husband spent in school didn’t improve their mentality.  Maybe five Hail Marys will pluck them out from the days of people who forced Galileo to recant his heliocentrism. 

Sick audacity.  I thought I’d convalesce in a much less toxic and much more pleasant demonstration of social learning theory.  The sensationalization of Saddam’s falling statue did not stop me from watching CNN during rare times I cook because there’s no other English language news on my TV.  And so does my poodle.  Like mom, like son what else?  My eldest child may not be a spitting image of me, but his behavioral choice of TV news certainly is.  No drooling.  I digress from CC.  

Political ‘Maturity’

 

arrival area, suvarnabhumi, bangkok / cenchanting

It’s my 11th December in Thailand.  I made a quick trip down memory lane and  realized I have  had prior associations with Thai culture.  Once my mother dressed me up in a Thai costume during International Day at school.  In 3rd grade an aunt visited us with a bag of large, sweet santols that she introduced as ”Bangkok.”  When I heard the name I asked, “Did someone just arrive from Thailand?”  She was pleasantly surprised at my geographical association to her pasalubong, ”Very good.  You pay attention to Asian Social Studies, don’t you? But nobody went to Thailand, ija”   A juvenile insolence danced in my girly head, “Where else could a Bangkok santol come from?”

In my senior year in college I read news on the 1992 popular uprising in the Thai capital.  The story of Chulalongkorn students, my age, in the vanguard of bringing down authoritarian military dictators was riveting to me.  It held my interest long enough to remember it more than anything I read for pleasure on Good Housekeeping and Cosmopolitan.  Unknown to me then was that four years after graduation I would be working and living in a country I already had indirectly encountered a few times in the past.

Life in the city of angels has been roller-coastering though the years.  Work, although tiresomely routine, has been gratefully good.  Things have been moseying undisturbed until Deputy Spokesperson Golez and Senator Gordon opened their mouths to speak about anti-goverment protestors’ take-over of two major airports in Thailand.  

“Airport take-overs like those in Thailand will not happen in the Philippines because Filipinos have reached political maturity”?  Please.  Why does that remind me of a dormitory cleaner’s mousy rationale?  She barged intruder-style into a room during her round and was startled to find someone lying in bed, ”Ay! ‘kala ko may tao.”  The irate occupant lashed, “bakit ako, hindi tao!?”  Well, a maid’s mentality is venial, but when politicians who are supposed to be brilliant and sophisticated utter statements so cognate with a maid’s, you just can’t deny feeling a little disappointed.

The Thai ambassador to the Philippines cries foul over this “disrespectful and unfair statement.”  And rightfully so as it is obviously an implied insult.  He is reported to have added that “the statement made by these two persons does not positively contribute to good and long-lasting relations.” 

Now I work my ass off away from home because my own government can not give me the salary that I’m enjoying in Thailand.  Except in political communication analysis in gradschool where it was required, I normally stay out of politics.  But if statements such as the ones made by Golez and Gordon would trigger a rift between Thailand and the Philippines and threaten my comfortable job, then I’m taking the issue personally.

SIIBT Faculty/princesswake/cenchanting

Dear Golez and Gordon, what in the name of Jose Rizal were you two thinking?  I hope the scratch fades away because I don’t dream of croaking invectives at my own country’s “mature” politicians.

Meanwhile in the kingdom anti-government protesters agreed to halt protests while the late Princess Galyani lies in state.  It’s a given that employees, public and private, local and foreign, and everyone else wear black at some point during the mourning period.  People followed the dress code without fuss.  They showed up at the Grand Palace to pay their respects in orderly fashion.  The late royal’s chariots, pyre and crematorium took months to build.  Only when her funeral was done ten months after she died did protesters resume driving Thaksin’s brother-in-law out of office.  CNN’s Dan Rivers reported that protesters were generally peaceful, airport facilities were not trashed and the place remained clean.  

But what’s significant about political troubles in Thailand is that one word from the king and protests cease.  Yes, you heard me – one word.  What comes out of His Majesty’s mouth averts disaster, and I admire that. Approximately 65 million subjects of the world’s longest-reigning monarch are generally capable of obedience.  That’s the reality here.  At the end of the day when Thais go home after protesting at the airport,  they’re still the ones employing Filipinos, aren’t they?  Their currency value is still higher than ours, isn’t it?  That should humble our two good guys into seeing the folly of their careless logic.

Earthshine: Early Christmas Treat

earthshinebangkok / cenchanting

When I came out of Seacon Square on earthshine night, the overpass was  swarming with people; their cameras pointed heavenward.  My heart skipped with both excitement & annoyance.  While inside the superstore I was engrossed in buying Spiderman shirts for my son and nephews I almost forgot that something special outside was unfolding.  Seeing Venus and Jupiter in close proximity to the crescent moon was awesome.  The spectacle gave me an emphatic vibe that I rang my ex-husband eventhough I knew he wasn’t interested.  Five years with him solidified that knowledge, but as father of my son I was hoping he wouldn’t miss an astronomical treat.  “I have a lot of work,” he dismissed my enthusiasm.  “God, Hazel you haven’t given up on hopeless cases, have u?, ” I seethed my disappointment.  No wonder we are divorced.     

 

 

The mention of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and his use of this celestial sight as portent in his Rime of the Ancient Mariner took me back to Dr. Franco’s class.  It’s been more than fifteen years since college English Literature.  The details are slowly fading but my admiration for the subject has not ebbed.  Never did, never will.  I turn to Wikipedia to refresh my memory of the Rime.  It’s like meeting old friends.  The albatross is still there.  And of course the very familiar stanza:  

         “Water, water everywhere

         and all the boards did shrink

         Water, water everywhere

       Nor any drop to drink.”

There was water problem in MVC during our time.  No, it’s not the supply.  Water flowed out of the taps and shower nozzles as usual.  But there were days when it was brown with mud and ocassional weeds.  A horror tale circulated in the dormitories that carcass was left to rot where the water gushed from the reservoir to the pipes.  Hold your laundry.  Delay your shower.  And forget your thirst.   Did any of us in class think how these Rime lines would have made the perfect jingle for the issue?  I might have then.  But being young I was probably more focused on showering and finding crushes than reflecting on relevance of literature to daily life.   

Similarly, the Rime does have a reference of creatures swimming in the water.  The Mariner (at least before he suddenly saw their true beauty and blessed them), cursed them as “slimy things.”  Two centuries and a decade later, I squirm “ewww.”  No chance to either bless or curse anything as dissolving of animal tissues into our boarding school water was neither confirmed nor contradicted.  I better suck ice cubes scooped out of the real thing.  Darker than brown but safer Coke.  

As the epic moves towards its end, the Mariner was mistaken for the devil when he picked up the oars and started rowing after being thought of as dead.  In 1798 Coleridge, through the pilot’s boy narrated that the devil knows how to row .  In 2003 Weisberger proclaimed that the devil wears Prada. 

What could the devil be doing in 2009?  I say 2009 because 2008 is practically over.  Ok, not before giving and receiving gifts, decorating the tree, singing It Came Upon a Midnight Clear, hanging the wreath, or splurging on food.  I am proud to have viewed the December 1st sky.  I reckon there’s no glorious way to begin the christmas month.  Merry Christmas everyone! 

christmas2008@siamparagon/cenchanting

The smart and the brainless

One of my hypotheses sways like a drunk.  I dive into the e-database of Taylor & Francis to steady it.  There’s information overload there.  But I am not in a grouch about the overload.  When it comes to information I’d rather have more than less.  Hopping from one abstract to the next is a charming way to lose the hours.  And like I haven’t lost enough hours already I wander into google for anything dissectible and storable for back-up just in case my thesis committee would look for more to what I already deem enough.  Enough ass-kissing.

Alas! I stumble across a serendipity.  Monica Lewinsky’s thesis!  Now this is what I call academic entertainment.  The body of her work isn’t there of course, but its title is disclosed.  My reaction is not “she did not!”  It’s more like, “wow, how appropriate this time.”

Monica kept her blue dress but she moved on to explore pre-trial publicity (as for the third person effect, I recall wondering effect on what? Hint: she’s in search of the impartial juror).  In Clinton’s autobiography I do not think revisions of history regarding Monica are very necessary.  The analyzing public understand that it takes two to tango.

When the scandal was raging I read that Monica’s dad is an oncologist; mom an author. She must have gotten their intellectual genes.  The thong-flasher has a bachelor’s degree in psychology which just makes it less surprising that she earned a master’s degree in social psychology.  The deal is to present a feasible proposal and if you’re in you work to make it worthy of publication.  The truth could be a bit more complicated than that but I’m sure it’s something doable.  If Monica can work, albeit inappropriately, with one of the world’s most powerful men, surely writing a thesis and graduating from a prestigious London school is not an impossible feat.

It was suggested that Monica belongs to a subspecies called dumb-but-smart.  Celebrity names were dropped as examples.  Then there’s a species called just-plain-dumb and again famous names were cited.  I think of unknowns that I know and yes, I question my homegrown assumptions. 

Female J belongs to both species.  Failing or barely passing exams is characteristic of her.  Flunking the licensure exam after finishing her four-year course is as normal as falling in love.  But just when low expectations sink to undefied status she crawls her way up grad school.  Assumptions are jolted.  Nevertheless the moment is like sunshine thawing a Siberian winter.  Dumb-but-smart huh.  She asks me to ghostwrite her required essays.  Bingo! Told ya!  Had I agreed to write them that would have been just-plain-dumb of me.  It’s fun watching her drub her guts and cherish her non-existent brains.  She tells me later that she was coached by her adviser to say that her explanations are ”that’s it”  if the panel gave her a hard time during the defense.  That’s just-plain-dumb.  Someone from Female J’s school has her eyebrows turn purple trying to cushion the shock of discovering that Female J actually graduated and is now teaching in an international school in Bangkok.  

Assumptions questioned, no question.  Female J’s international school is staffed with gits.  Such FYI should comfort that someone’s purple eyebrows back to normal color.  If it’s any balm to one’s sadistic instincts, Female J is rumored to be ill.  Physical illness, not mental but cancer no less.  The whispers are she’s denying it.  Although she’s too poor to pay for treatment, her employer gives a large discount off medical expenses.  But so far there’s no report that she’s taking full advantage of discounts as she continues to pretend she’s ok.  That is just-plain-dumb at its finest. 

There’s a reverse of the dumb-but-smart.  It’s smart-but-dumb.  Male R holds two engineering degrees.  Smart.  Without a stable income he impregnates his wife every year.  Dumb.  Last time I heard he’s got at least five kids, one with a heart condition.  He joins the exodus of Pinoys to other countries to support his brood better.  Smart.  And to complete the smart-but-dumb combination, he boards a plane that lands in Thailand; not some place like the Middle East where engineering jobs abound.  If his debtors, I included, would even think of getting their money back, that would be just-plain-dumb.  Male R hasn’t sent a penny to his family for almost a year now.  But never mind that.  He hooks up with a girl who supports him while his family back home hang by a thread.  This girl is Female J’s antonym.  But by the looks of it she does not see that the future with Male R is blacker than my dearly departed janitor fish Shadow, may he rest in peace.  Smart-but-dumb girlfriend.  Heaven help us all!

Dumb-but-smart, just-plain-dumb, smart-but-dumb - I have been all and the ride hasn’t killed me yet.  Maybe because I did encounter the elites - the life-saving just-plain-smart species.  You waited to hear this, didn’t you? Sorry for the intervening rant.  Well, they don’t make us question our fundamental assumptions.  We know them to be smart and they go on doing smart things.  Their lives are a lovely picnic.  Often they breathe hope and inspiration into all of us.  I’m lucky to know a few.  I only wish they were not rare.      

Or with any luck I may just get to question my fundamental assumptions again.  And again.

Around the world in 8 minutes

cenchanting

Over the weekend I was on the phone and computer calling home, sending and receiving texts.  With the high cost of international calls, I am supposed to stick my nose to the pc and call only when it’s important i.e. I need to hear Mozart yap or be updated with his new haircut.  But this weekend was a bit different because a cousin succumbed to ear cancer and everyone trooped to Lanao del Norte for the wake.  The messages that keep coming up on my Chikka Messenger window describe which aunt is chatting with which grandma, how long have uncles been glued to the mahjong and chikicha tables and so on.  The army band played.  Before he died Edwin requested his band mates to play at his funeral; joked that if they played badly they would get a cold nudge from him.

I couldn’t resist.  I had to join in the fun.  Not that a cousin’s wake is fun but the slumber party going on at Lola’s haunted, world war II era house is.  I also worried that they’re not snapping away and videotaping enough and I would end up not seeing anything afterwards.  As it wasn’t an e-burial like a great aunt’s weeks earlier, I asked them to post snaps and clips on friendster and youtube.  Mama’s assignment was to read the obituary on Sunday morning.  I asked her to ring me secs before she does so I could dial back and listen.  I missed it because I overslept.  Agh! But I still got to hear the minister with all the background noise of a people-packed church.  In a hush-hush manner the phone was passed from relative to relative and I spoke with one I haven’t seen for almost twenty years.  I was elated with the catching up minimal though it was, sad that Edwin was going, and then … horrified.  My bill!!!

Too late.  Fast backward: on a Friday evening in 2007 a train accident took Vin’s life.  I didn’t know him personally but his wife’s family and some of mine are friends.  Friendster did the job of informing people smoothly.  In a single click the news of Vin’s death reached everyone around the world on sender Gab’s friends list.  While reading the news I remembered that at my father’s funeral in 2005 Vin sang Crossing the Bar, and he’s young, big and strong.  Wait a minute, he couldn’t be dead.  In disbelief I sent a text to my mother in South Cotabato to tell her.  She informed Ruby in Cebu who forwarded the news to Tess in Lahore, and they both simultaneously asked Vilma in Srinakarin if it was true or not.  My aunt in Seattle who is Gab’s friend, came online so I told her.  Since I didn’t know any details of the news she rang Gab in Ekamai and moments later she was back online typing the details away.  Gab and I live in the same city but I got the additional info not from him but from Seattle.  Human tendency to be unwilling to immediately believe something bad sets the purpose of ICT in wondrous motion and speed.  All this info spreading took only minutes and it was confirmed the poor guy’s not coming back.

A few days later I hurried to the temple after work to attend the cremation service.  The Bangkok sun blazed like crazy rendering the surroundings bone dry but not mourners’ eyes.  Vin’s widow’s six-year-old niece comforted her, “Don’t cry, auntie.  You’ll find another husband soon.”  Our Biernes Santo faces broke into amused smiles.  In my mind I said, ”with the efficient help of today’s ICT, that’s possible, sweetie; but unlikely happening in 8 minutes.