Alex Maskara
Thoughts, Stories, Imagination of Filipino American Alex Maskara
~
Darkness in Manila was always my safety. I had so many things to hide during my youth. My poverty-ridden clothes and sunken face due to irregular meals, my constant failures in exams because I could not learn anything on an empty stomach and a parade of distractions in the sardine-can like the boarding house where I stayed because I could not afford a decent dorm. I still can’t believe I graduated from the top university of Manila despite all that. I can only attribute whatever I gained in life through the full blessings of God because my life is nothing short of miraculous.
The only difference between today and nearly 40 years ago was that I am much older and the old spot I used to occupy is now barricaded by fences installed by construction companies reclaiming parts of the bay to build casinos and hotels and theme parks. This saddens me because in due time, the landscape of Manila Bay will totally be transformed and any reminder of the old version will be thrown to oblivion with no one recalling how it was.
The Bay is similar to my life. Blessed but cursed at the same time. Manila Bay had been coveted by many superpowers in the world - it had been ‘discovered’ by Spain, nearly occupied by Britain, taken over by the US, flattened by the Japanese-American war, and now, China is rearing its dragon head, setting its sights upon this beautiful city. The bay remained isolated, waiting for another catastrophe to happen. Now it is being transformed into something that it is not.
I am similarly designed like Manila Bay. I was born, raised, fought my way to a better life but to succeed I had to be single-minded, solitary, because everything else in the world is a distraction that I can’t afford to give in to. When I was young I was so scared of failure because to fail would spell disaster for the people I promised to help. I didn’t venture much outside of work for fear I might get sick or meet with an accident. I did not form close relationships. I was basically transformed by the dictates of my time’s economy. I lived and worked to serve and I always hoped for the day when all the responsibilities will finally be over. Or at least I was financially secure. I am blessed to have both outcomes in my life.
Just like Manila Bay, I served a purpose when I was needed, and the way I see it now, Manila Bay’s purpose in history was to serve as a backdrop for superpowers to project their might - whether through the Spanish-American War or the Japanese Occupation, the city and its bay was the perfect stage to announce to the world their victory or ascendency. And China is probably dying to show its own power. It started claiming islands that belonged to the Philippines geographically and historically.
I found a tiny opening in the fence and furtively eased my body through it so I could sit on the seawall. It was dark and nobody would see me here. I raised my head to stare at the moon which luckily was full tonight. This solitude allowed me to invoke my past and as I said, without the stories I have written beside this bay when I was young, I would have nothing to talk about. That is the good thing about writing, it provides that important tool to resurrect what has long been dead in one’s memory. Regrettably, I hardly see anyone like me who enjoys the beauty of solitude here nowadays. Solitude is not always romantic or melodramatic or a vessel to float in nostalgia. Sometimes solitude is the best way to access the clarity of one’s brain. Sitting alone here, I am able to recall the many sights and sounds and images I saw and conjured a long time ago.
I carry with me the Filipino narrative, it is a narrative that is exclusively mine and every Filipino’s. It is embedded in the fibers and axons of my brain. I started as a Filipino when I was not even known as Filipino. I could have been a maharlika or aliping saguiguilid or namamahay. I could have been a warrior or babaylan. I could have been an Aeta. I was also known as Indio, a term imposed on me by the Spanish as opposed to the original Filipinos who were Spanish natives living in this Asian country or as opposed to the Peninsulares and the mestizos or as opposed to Sangleys or the Chinos.
Eventually I claimed the name Filipino, a consolidation of everyone (Indio and otherwise) under one description. Everyone is Filipino now, no matter what their blood mixture or social class or state of mind is. So long as they have been a part of the soil and culture. It makes everybody equal and nobody is surprised by that. There are still a few who maintain their separateness - some tribes of remote islands, some Muslims and other regional ethnic groups. But they are mostly a fraction of the whole.
That is the reason I came back here to this part of Manila. I have switched my nationality to American keeping my one foot on the birth country while planting the other on the adopted. That makes me incomplete. I am nourished through many umbilical cords. One is attached to Spain, the other to America. I dream of visiting Latin countries in search of the culture that once thrived in my native land, before it got canceled by the US. Some local Filipinos also try to drink from their umbilical cords attached to America.
It is hard to erase in one’s cultural memory the relationship I had with Spain and America, especially when that memory has been as long as 350 years. Even now, I always dream of traveling in Mexico, celebrating the celebrations I shared with them. From the Day of the Dead to Christmas to Spanish cenaculo, to the Catholic traditions. The best part is our familiarity with each other, the Latinos and I. I live in an enclave surrounded by Latino immigrants and for some reason, I feel at home just by listening to their music, the way they gather and laugh at the end of the day. They are the closest I can find to my home outside of home. The saddest thing is my alienation with my Asian neighbors Japan and China. There are still remnants of old stories embedded in my brain about Japanese atrocities in World War 2 despite their total change and my distant love for their culture of which I can never be at home to. And now the Chinese, instead of building their friendship around Asia, are relying heavily on bullying tactics to subjugate and claim what is not theirs. They seem to look at their neighbors with disdain, and when I see how they water-cannon Filipino fishermen on the fishermen’s fishing turf for centuries, only because they can, it makes my blood boil. For a Christian, that is the last thing you want to do to your neighbor. They can do whatever they want, but love and neighborliness, they cannot have from me. It is probably their Confucian teachings that make them do that.
I look at the images of Spain and I see their wide poblaciones and plazas which reminds me constantly of the towns and Manila I grew up in. In the same manner I encounter old buildings in the US that have uncanny resemblance to the old buildings of Manila. Of course they were designed by the sane people. And then there were the Filipino oral traditions of Spanish times and the Commonwealth era. The colonization of the Philippines created both positive and negative impacts. And I would be lying, mainly to myself, if I would deny the feeling of superiority by ex-colonizer against my inferiority as a colony. I wouldn't be surprised if I meet discrimination in the land of the master now and then. The Filipinos themselves are full of discrimination against each other albeit using different criteria.
But the sadness of my being Filipino stems from my inability to mentally consider that I am equal to them who colonized me. Even now, I seem to appeal to their acceptance, their generosity, that I can never match their intelligence and accomplishments. I still feel the joy of having them around because it triggers that old Filipino feeling of having a superior being making all things good for me. I sing and dance and parade in beauty pageants to entertain them. I have this curse that I cannot outsmart them, or beat them in sports, I am their perennial consumer to what they create thinking I cannot create like they do. I am the top user of social media and Internet and before that I was the top texter. I create every digital content possible and feel smart being the user, not the provider of their platforms. I am their zombie.
Zombies Of Heroics and Histrionics(undated)
Sometimes I get so dramatic with my articles only because (I'd like to think) only a few read me. That's why I prefer not to 'link' or join any grouping of bloggers on the internet (not that I belong to any particular mindset, mind you)- my isolation frees me from censoring my writing. I also base my writing on the countries that read me. And I always draw from my life as a Pinoy in composing my sentences here and there. I am still surprised at the number of hits on my site but then, I don't know, I'd like to think no one reads me except myself. Which means, why shouldn't I just confine my writing in notebooks inside my drawers? But then, at the same time, I'd like to imagine people reading me, because we as humans are actors on a stage, always imagining an audience. Oh well, as long as nobody writes me back and tells me I'm breaking the law by writing what I write I'd continue. Besides, blogging is self-publishing without censorship and editing. I find it very pure and liberating. So Beatnik. And I love that.
I've been writing lately about the recent crisis in the Philippines.
Ramon and I had lunch today and he said, "The country is so surreal it becomes a zombie movie." He said this as he raised his eyes from reading Morikami's Wind Up Bird Chronicle. He's now half-way through the novel, reading it steadfastly and fast while sucking the straw from his chilled chocolate mocha. He continued:
There was a time when a barrio existed in the Pacific populated by people who used to be so alive until one day, multitudes of fish swarmed the coast to their delight. The fish themselves jumped into their fishing nets and bit their hooks even without the baits. The people concluded the fish were a gift of God and they feasted right there and then, eating fish left and right, day and night, and many many more days after that. And then, they all turned into zombies. Well, not all of them really.
Many from foreign lands have focused their eyes on these barrio people whose peculiarity was so puzzling. How can people so easily be turned brain-dead when they were so alive and so intelligent before?
It turned out it was not the fish that turned them into zombies, it was themselves. The fish were just a decoy. Later on, the foreign observers discovered how they turned into zombies: The first ruler of the land removed their freedoms and they were forced to learn only things the ruler wanted them to learn. No one could question the ruler's decisions lest he wanted to die. For twenty years the people moved according to prescribed and programmed movements, like robots. They were fed with lies and grand ideals emanating from the ruler. These people became blind followers, marching wherever they were told to go. They had to always be quiet and not bad-mouth the ruling class. Until one day, a zombie accidentally woke up and started to question the ruler. The ruler hastily shot him. But it was a wrong shot, it was the flick that unzombied the zombies. In one particular year their hypnotist ruler vanished and they were back into being alive and intelligent again.
But it was short-lived because it was their misfortune not to know how to act with independent, functioning minds. For twenty years their minds were locked-up. For the past twenty years they looked up to one ruler.
For the next twenty years they kept on searching for a single ruler.
The poor zombies claimed independence but deep inside they were looking for someone to tell them what to do, how to act, what to think, what not to think. This unfortunately, is a trait of zombies that was easily manipulated. They lost perspective. They did not know how to distinguish heroism from heroics, they could not tell the difference between real sense and histrionics. So that, when the zombies heard a screaming sound: Fight! Let's all gather together! Lets kill the Devil, they all gathered thinking that by reliving their first release from zombie-ness they could be unzombied again. True they were unzombied but they had to go through it again and again, like some form of therapy (everytime there is a new ruler) to unzombie themselves. And so many zombies of heroics and histrionics took advantage of this: Even the college drop-outs who could not pass Trigonometry became philosophers in newspapers so long as they re-kindled the fire of the "First Unzombie-ness". So they went on and on, thinking because they were ready they must truly be heroes in Zombieland. The other zombies gathered together in the name of different things, like Zombies of Morality (You fuck you're a sinner- I fuck I'm a Saint); Zombies of the Prayer (I pray for you asshole because You cannot pray for yourself); Zombies of the Senate and Congress (You don't give us what we want, we investigate you); Zombies of Business ( You protect my ass I give you money); Zombies of Jueteng (You protect my ass, I give you Balato); Zombies of Literature(You give me Award, I give you Award); Zombies of Mutual Admiration Society (You do good...and so do you...oh no you do good really...but you do good too...really...etcetera for eternity); Zombies of Entertainment Industry(Ha?); Zombies OFW (How much is the dollar rate now? When I go home, I'll show 'em...); Zombies of Youth (When I grow up I want to be an American Idol, otherwise, I want to be a member of the Zombies of -----); and so on and so forth.
But on the 20th anniversary of "The First Unzombie”, the most powerful of the Zombies gathered together to plot a coup. They invited all the Zombies of whatever persuasion they could gather and discussed how to topple the new ruler. All of them need to be unzombied again, they said, they just can feel it. Their power as The Heroes of Zombie-ness is wavering, fracturing, and all the Zombies no longer see 'the light'. These powerful Zombies are no longer capable of appointing the new ruler and the ruler they got now doesn't want to give them what they want. They gathered as a prelude to Unzombie-ness. And this time, they'd do it with such force.
But, the ruler they want to topple is a Zombie who is smarter than them. And the other Zombies in this Zombie-land are now awakening. And the other Zombies who went abroad to work saw the true light. And the many Zombies of lowland and hinterlands are just becoming humans again, alive and thinking. It took them twenty years but by golly - how smart they became. How intelligent.
On the day the Zombies of Power and Ruling Class called on all the Zombies to protect the Spirit of Unzombie-ness, some zombies shrugged them off, others went on playing sports, others went on business as usual, others made fun of them, others looked at them and found them unattractive, others played mah-jong, others went shopping, others went blogging, others watched the world wrestling championship match.
The Zombies are about to write volumes and volumes of explanation for this, volumes and volumes of threats and counter-threats, volumes and volumes of analysis of what happened to the Zombieland ....
But they too, are slowly waking up.
-- the zombie does what everybody's doing. In a stampede, everybody kicks and shoves at the same time to the deaths of the weak --
2024-05-11 07:54:23
shortstories
Boy Luneta
I stepped out of my Manila hotel in the dark and crossed Roxas Boulevard to take a walk alongside the bay, repeating a habit I formed some 40 years ago when I was young and green, full of dare and curiosity. I remember how I took a jeepney ride or walked miles so I could visit the Bay as often as I could then. It was like home to me. It was a pleasant home - I recall standing on the seawall, with nothing in front of me but the breeze and occasional moisture splashing from the waves of the Pacific. The habit disappeared with time, the way time took away my libido and youth and beauty. I stayed abroad for more than 3 decades, killing that habit. But today I returned to see if there was still the sparkle, if Manila Bay could trigger the old memories. I miss the coconut trees, the big rocks lining the wall. In the old days, the bay welcomed everyone through the night: lovers and schemers and the homeless and young dreamers, rich and poor, old men. We fortified the vulnerable Manila as we stood guard in the dark watching and waiting. From afar a ship with bright lights rolled by.
When the moon was full, forty years ago, I conjured up events and scenarios and stories, oh I was fond of stories that I witnessed and heard and read about. I wrote them all piece by piece, on notepads that have now collected dust in my storage. Good thing I converted them to digital decades back and now I can summon them as I approach the twilight of my years. I carry no illusions about my writing as I have no formal training. My language is definitely lacking in impeccable grammar and extensive vocabulary. I won’t worry much about this, I don’t think my intended readers prefer to read English anyway, if they even want to read anything at all. How can writing like this compete with the allure of digital content creations? Nowadays one would rather spend time checking out Facebook, Tik tok, reels, you tube for their quick and simple formats of sharing everything from ideas to philosophy to experiences to stories to entertainment in just a few seconds. Visually in an increasingly visual society! Compare that to this long-winding verbiage, really, it is a no brainer.
Yet I keep posting my long ago stories for whatever reason that I can’t fathom. I always wanted to be a writer as a young man but life’s demands required me to take a different route. There was no money in writing during my youth, especially in the Philippines where people could be limited in their scope of interest. Even today, what takes most attention are politics and scandals. The venerable gods come from show business. I even observed the openness of the society on things kept closeted during my time. It is both progressive and regressive I think. Now we have the LGBTs in the limelight, they command hefty prices for their talents, collect millions of followers on social networks and admirers to the chagrin of the close-minded and religious zealots. Relationships become a part of the daily menu, people stepping over the boundaries of what used to be private and polite to open and aggressive. Think of Trump and other conspiracy-theory driven personalities. I am glad I took the route of healthcare as my profession. It paid well and consistently as opposed to a possible writer’s job. That was the trend in my college years. Working in healthcare, especially abroad, was the main gateway to one’s family’s survival.
---
Boy Luneta
Boy Luneta 3
So we drank another round of San Migs. By this time, Boy Luneta's face was turning red and I was getting hot and horny. He beamed savagely,
- Why do you lookin' at me that way?
-Well I...
-I know, I know, I can read it all over your face. You lookin' at me like I'm pancit and adobo which you prob'ly never tasted for the past ten years.
-I hate you.
-Lemme tell you something' Ramon de Goiti. I may be eating shit like a goddamn native chicken but that has just made me more delicious and tasty.
-Stop!
Drunk, Boy Luneta and I walked out of the bar, the hang-out of Manila low life. I nearly tripped on the sidewalk of Roxas Boulevard, he had to support my balance. I was saddened by the old and tired city of Manila but excited by the prospect of having sex again with a fellow Filipino. I was ashamed of my feelings - two days ago, I was living a pretentious clean life in my citadel of false tranquility in the city of Miami, and today, I was wandering along with a hustler in Manila. I felt the presence of both God and Lucifer within me.
Come to think of it, I thought, what have I achieved so far in America? I did good, as far as making it in America is concerned. But what is meant by achieving good in America? Earn enough dollars to have a walk-in closet, a brand new car, a little respect for my service to sick people. Other than that...it’s empty. I did not find a single true love, oh I had faked a lot of love, fooled myself into believing I had found love worth dying for. And I died. I must have faked my death tens of times, because I'm still alive and feeling nothing. In America, I felt like a pancit and adobo, they would always love to taste me, but to consider me as a staple food, forget it. It is so easy to find someone in my bed, someone who in the heat of passion would whisper he loves me dearly, but after that, my bed would be empty again, waiting for another curious lover. Perhaps I could blame my morose empty feeling to my culture. And Americans hate me for saying this all the time. I grew up in the company of my family, my parents and all the parents I knew in my town who have managed to live together forever. Divorce is against the law. So I lived with this expectation that even in my gay world, I will find someone who would stick out with me for better or worse for the rest of my life. One whom I will take care of when he gets sick. One who'd be with me when I get sick. Isn't that the Philippine way? I hoped for someone who would wake up with me in the mornings, retire with me at nights. That's oh so romantic but unreal in my gay world, especially in my American gay world.
So I developed this compensation in relationships. I became the prissy senorita who would stand in a party or a bar in a backoffish manner. Snubbish. Moralistic. Yet shallow because beneath all these, I was extremely sexual. Always leaving me in eternal conflict.
This extreme sexuality became clearer when I found my old fling Boy Luneta. I simply stripped myself of all my inhibitions. Am I crazy or what?
"Where are we now, Boy Luneta?" I asked.
"Oh please...stop these stupid pretensions and hypocrisy Ramon de Goiti. If there is anybody who knows every nook and crook in Luneta, it is you my friend. It's not as if Luneta has changed since you last came here."
I gave out a hearty laugh as we continued walking on the Luneta strip. He was right. It was the same old strip all the way from T. Kalaw to CCP. Except for extra coconut trees and smashed seawall for repair or replacement, nothing was really changed. And to be honest, I was anticipating we would end by one hidden coconut trunk in my secret nook close to the Film Center and make love. Standing. We did that before. By the time we reached my secret coconut tree, I became a one hundred percent slut. I grabbed him by the collar and started kissing his beer tasting mouth. He was caught by surprise and had to push me away.
"What's wrong with you?" he asked.
"Sky's the limit," I reminded him.
"If this is what you learned in America, I pity you." he quipped.
I pulled him back again towards me and began unbuttoning his shirt. Being drunk, he started to give in. Until... "Did you hear that?" he asked. In the heat of passion, all my senses except my lust were oblivious. "No I didn't," I said. I started unbuckling his belt. By the time I was about to unzip his pants, he pushed my hands away. "There it goes again, can you hear it?" he persisted. I raised my sex-starved voice. "No!" obviously pissed.
He raised his voice, "Because you're not listening dammit!"
I stopped momentarily, releasing a deep sigh. Okay, I listened. The sound came as a suppressed cry. It was obviously that of a man's. It came in spurts, sometimes prolonged, but it was meant not to be heard. It sounded creepy. Boy Luneta did not waste time in following the sound. Under the moonless night, beside the dark Film Center, he combed through the overgrown wild weeds and searched through shrubbery. He tapped the corrugated iron fence separating the Center from the Manila Bay shore.
"Hello, is anyone there?" he called.
The voice stopped. And then...not far from the coconut tree where I intended to make love, I saw a silhouette, a sitting figure whose back was leaning against the iron fence. The figure was tall, muscular, I saw its arms move, large hands.
God, this can't be true, I thought. I've been in America too long to know that this broken crying man was Caucasian. Walking closer, my suspicion was verified. There he sat, a man with a crew cut, light hair, probably blond. He was holding his cap in his hands, there was a streak of blood running down his face. This is exactly what I hated to see, another incident that will run across the newspapers in the world, claiming how another foreigner was violated in Manila. Another incident that will add to the so-called notoriety of the Filipino which everyone the world over wants to feast about. Another incident that would scare tourists and investors, another to make Filipinos ashamed, or to the likes of me, become guarded and defensive. My friends would often assure me this happens everywhere in the world. Yeah, tell that to the peace loving Swiss. Tell that to Miami which lost a lot of revenues after a few crimes were committed to its tourists. Tourism is simple hospitality. You don't commit crimes to your guests. Incidences like these don't land you in tourism brochures.
But...was the man a tourist? We approached the leaning figure.
Boy Luneta had other thoughts. He was like any typical Luneta resident who believes every Caucasian is American. To him, this American was not a tourist. American tourists like the Japanese come by bus loads taking pictures, or hopping from bar to bar. A solitary American like this sitting in a dark corner of Film Center is either a service man who refused to leave after the closure of the bases or a Peace Corp volunteer who got lost on his way to the American Embassy or a Mormon Missionary. The Protestants are better prepared and less adventurous, Boy Luneta once claimed. But the Mormons? They think the Philippines is Paradise. But surprisingly though, he continued to claim, he hasn't heard of any violated Mormon in the Philippines. I guess it's something to do with their looks - they suffer enough wearing neckties and long sleeves under the Philippine heat. Actually Filipinos worry more about the Mormons than themselves because these missionaries are barely out of their teens, they don't have cars much less money and they give out Bibles containing the Gospel according to Joseph Smith. No, you don't violate the Mormons, Boy Luneta claimed. They are so dedicated to God that God will kill you if you violate them.
"Hey you, what's wrong man?" Boy Luneta asked the poor leaning Caucasian. I preferred to stand behind to watch the events and conversation about to unfold. The Caucasian did not even budge to raise his head. "Enough," he said faintly. "Beat it."
"Say that again?"
This time, the man stared at us with ferocious eyes. "Don't you understand English? What the fuck am I doing here?" I saw it all right there and then, the poor guy was robbed. And beaten too. I could smell liquor from his breath, he wryly waved us to go away.
Boy Luneta was deeply hurt by this gesture. And no one hurts Boy Luneta. He said once, I may be a hustler, but I've got pride.
I had to intervene."I'm sorry..." I stared at the bruised man and all I saw in his face was anger. An anger that didn't care what happened next. And for a person like me who never encountered any problem in a foreign soil, I just felt this immense obligation to ease the pain of this man. If there was one thing I wanted to do is to give back to foreigners in my soil whatever kindness they offered to me in theirs.
"Son of a bitch. Yes, what the fuck are you doing here?" Boy Luneta hissed. Before he got out of hand, I pushed him away from the Caucasian man.
"Sir," I addressed the man in my best Florida accent, "We just wanna know if you're alright. Do you want us to get you some help?"
The man just stared at me blankly.
"Do you want us to call the police?" Still no response.
"We will leave if you want us to." I was answered by silence.
I immediately grabbed the hand of Boy Luneta, who continued to mumble all the Filipino cuss words he knew, there's a lot of them actually. When we were a few yards away, the man spoke. "Wait."
Boy Luneta stopped cursing. We turned back to look at the man who began crying. This time it was a loud cry. I never saw an American cry this loud except those who were about to die in the hospital where I worked.
He wailed, "Tesang, forgive me. I forgot myself!"
What did he mean by that? He was obviously calling the name of a woman. But then, he was as drunk as I and Boy Luneta. Drunk people are capable of many unrestrained acts and can cry out anything.
"Who did this to you?" Boy Luneta asked. His words came out in a false pretense of concern, unfortunately. The Caucasian whose English and accent obviously were American stared at us with a pained face, first at Boy Luneta, then at me. He kept his eyes at me afterwards. He probably thought I was the lesser of two evils. In between his sniffs and sobs, he said to me, "Your accent is different."
I said, "I just arrived from Florida two days ago. I work there."
In saying this, a ray of hope landed on his face.
Not wanting to be ignored and outdone, with or without accent, Boy Luneta kept his inquiry, which progressively sounded more sincere as he rattled along. "Are you a serviceman?"
"No."
"A Peace Corp volunteer?"
"No."
"A...Mormon?"
"No."
At this point, doubt had cast a dark shadow upon all his American-visiting-the-Philippines stereotypes.
"Are you a...you know...a tourist?"
"You can say that again...Fuck, it's all gone...Shit, I'm bleeding...They kicked me in the face..." the American kept mumbling as he felt his body.
Boy Luneta shouted "Why?" As in "Why are you not in your hotel sleeping the night off with fellow tourists? You should know better than to be alone in this dangerous side of the city at this time of the night." In other words, "Why are you different from all the other tourists I know?"
I tapped Boy Luneta's shoulder. I whispered to him, "Shut up." I looked again at the American. I asked, "Who are you and what happened?"
"My name is Keith Devlon. I used to serve in Clark Air Base. I came back to Manila to look for Tesang, a bar hostess I met a couple of years back. I was promised by her friend Leila some leads to her whereabouts. And then...we ended up in a hotel in Manila...and then...oh fuck...fuck...I remember now... I was duped and beaten and stolen of everything I have. My bag of clothes and my wallet."
A series of slurs came out from the lips of Boy Luneta. "So here you are! Another one of them superior Americans coming here to save the world while enjoying a Filipina! And you thought everyone here would call you a hero? This is your own doing man."
Keith Devlon just stared at him with an open mouth. I knew that Boy Luneta was playing nationalistic, really, but to an American, this American at least, his outbursts made him appear like a specimen of wonder. I tapped Boy Luneta once more and gave him the shut-the-fuck-up look.
"Who is this Tesang you're looking for?" I asked Keith. Keith Devlon shook his head, this time, tears rolled down his face, it took him minutes before he could answer.
"She is the woman I love."
Now, my dear readers, I want you to sit down and rest. Because what I have is another long story to share. This is another one of many long stories that Boy Luneta led me to. A story that happened in four weeks, mere four weeks that I intended to spend as a homecoming visit from America. Against your expectations, this is about a love between a foreign boy and a local girl, as opposed to the love between Boy Luneta and me which more likely will always be between a native chicken and a chicken with no wings.
Volume 1
Ramon de Goiti
---
2024-05-05 01:16:43
masquerade
Manila in the Dark
Darkness in Manila was always my safety. I had so many things to hide during my youth. My poverty-ridden clothes and sunken face due to irregular meals, my constant failures in exams because I could not learn anything on an empty stomach and a parade of distractions in the sardine-can like the boarding house where I stayed because I could not afford a decent dorm. I still can’t believe I graduated from the top university of Manila despite all that. I can only attribute whatever I gained in life through the full blessings of God because my life is nothing short of miraculous.
The only difference between today and nearly 40 years ago was that I am much older and the old spot I used to occupy is now barricaded by fences installed by construction companies reclaiming parts of the bay to build casinos and hotels and theme parks. This saddens me because in due time, the landscape of Manila Bay will totally be transformed and any reminder of the old version will be thrown to oblivion with no one recalling how it was.
The Bay is similar to my life. Blessed but cursed at the same time. Manila Bay had been coveted by many superpowers in the world - it had been ‘discovered’ by Spain, nearly occupied by Britain, taken over by the US, flattened by the Japanese-American war, and now, China is rearing its dragon head, setting its sights upon this beautiful city. The bay remained isolated, waiting for another catastrophe to happen. Now it is being transformed into something that it is not.
I am similarly designed like Manila Bay. I was born, raised, fought my way to a better life but to succeed I had to be single-minded, solitary, because everything else in the world is a distraction that I can’t afford to give in to. When I was young I was so scared of failure because to fail would spell disaster for the people I promised to help. I didn’t venture much outside of work for fear I might get sick or meet with an accident. I did not form close relationships. I was basically transformed by the dictates of my time’s economy. I lived and worked to serve and I always hoped for the day when all the responsibilities will finally be over. Or at least I was financially secure. I am blessed to have both outcomes in my life.
Just like Manila Bay, I served a purpose when I was needed, and the way I see it now, Manila Bay’s purpose in history was to serve as a backdrop for superpowers to project their might - whether through the Spanish-American War or the Japanese Occupation, the city and its bay was the perfect stage to announce to the world their victory or ascendency. And China is probably dying to show its own power. It started claiming islands that belonged to the Philippines geographically and historically.
I found a tiny opening in the fence and furtively eased my body through it so I could sit on the seawall. It was dark and nobody would see me here. I raised my head to stare at the moon which luckily was full tonight. This solitude allowed me to invoke my past and as I said, without the stories I have written beside this bay when I was young, I would have nothing to talk about. That is the good thing about writing, it provides that important tool to resurrect what has long been dead in one’s memory. Regrettably, I hardly see anyone like me who enjoys the beauty of solitude here nowadays. Solitude is not always romantic or melodramatic or a vessel to float in nostalgia. Sometimes solitude is the best way to access the clarity of one’s brain. Sitting alone here, I am able to recall the many sights and sounds and images I saw and conjured a long time ago.
I carry with me the Filipino narrative, it is a narrative that is exclusively mine and every Filipino’s. It is embedded in the fibers and axons of my brain. I started as a Filipino when I was not even known as Filipino. I could have been a maharlika or aliping saguiguilid or namamahay. I could have been a warrior or babaylan. I could have been an Aeta. I was also known as Indio, a term imposed on me by the Spanish as opposed to the original Filipinos who were Spanish natives living in this Asian country or as opposed to the Peninsulares and the mestizos or as opposed to Sangleys or the Chinos.
Eventually I claimed the name Filipino, a consolidation of everyone (Indio and otherwise) under one description. Everyone is Filipino now, no matter what their blood mixture or social class or state of mind is. So long as they have been a part of the soil and culture. It makes everybody equal and nobody is surprised by that. There are still a few who maintain their separateness - some tribes of remote islands, some Muslims and other regional ethnic groups. But they are mostly a fraction of the whole.
That is the reason I came back here to this part of Manila. I have switched my nationality to American keeping my one foot on the birth country while planting the other on the adopted. That makes me incomplete. I am nourished through many umbilical cords. One is attached to Spain, the other to America. I dream of visiting Latin countries in search of the culture that once thrived in my native land, before it got canceled by the US. Some local Filipinos also try to drink from their umbilical cords attached to America.
It is hard to erase in one’s cultural memory the relationship I had with Spain and America, especially when that memory has been as long as 350 years. Even now, I always dream of traveling in Mexico, celebrating the celebrations I shared with them. From the Day of the Dead to Christmas to Spanish cenaculo, to the Catholic traditions. The best part is our familiarity with each other, the Latinos and I. I live in an enclave surrounded by Latino immigrants and for some reason, I feel at home just by listening to their music, the way they gather and laugh at the end of the day. They are the closest I can find to my home outside of home. The saddest thing is my alienation with my Asian neighbors Japan and China. There are still remnants of old stories embedded in my brain about Japanese atrocities in World War 2 despite their total change and my distant love for their culture of which I can never be at home to. And now the Chinese, instead of building their friendship around Asia, are relying heavily on bullying tactics to subjugate and claim what is not theirs. They seem to look at their neighbors with disdain, and when I see how they water-cannon Filipino fishermen on the fishermen’s fishing turf for centuries, only because they can, it makes my blood boil. For a Christian, that is the last thing you want to do to your neighbor. They can do whatever they want, but love and neighborliness, they cannot have from me. It is probably their Confucian teachings that make them do that.
I look at the images of Spain and I see their wide poblaciones and plazas which reminds me constantly of the towns and Manila I grew up in. In the same manner I encounter old buildings in the US that have uncanny resemblance to the old buildings of Manila. Of course they were designed by the sane people. And then there were the Filipino oral traditions of Spanish times and the Commonwealth era. The colonization of the Philippines created both positive and negative impacts. And I would be lying, mainly to myself, if I would deny the feeling of superiority by ex-colonizer against my inferiority as a colony. I wouldn't be surprised if I meet discrimination in the land of the master now and then. The Filipinos themselves are full of discrimination against each other albeit using different criteria.
But the sadness of my being Filipino stems from my inability to mentally consider that I am equal to them who colonized me. Even now, I seem to appeal to their acceptance, their generosity, that I can never match their intelligence and accomplishments. I still feel the joy of having them around because it triggers that old Filipino feeling of having a superior being making all things good for me. I sing and dance and parade in beauty pageants to entertain them. I have this curse that I cannot outsmart them, or beat them in sports, I am their perennial consumer to what they create thinking I cannot create like they do. I am the top user of social media and Internet and before that I was the top texter. I create every digital content possible and feel smart being the user, not the provider of their platforms. I am their zombie.
Zombies Of Heroics and Histrionics(undated)
Sometimes I get so dramatic with my articles only because (I'd like to think) only a few read me. That's why I prefer not to 'link' or join any grouping of bloggers on the internet (not that I belong to any particular mindset, mind you)- my isolation frees me from censoring my writing. I also base my writing on the countries that read me. And I always draw from my life as a Pinoy in composing my sentences here and there. I am still surprised at the number of hits on my site but then, I don't know, I'd like to think no one reads me except myself. Which means, why shouldn't I just confine my writing in notebooks inside my drawers? But then, at the same time, I'd like to imagine people reading me, because we as humans are actors on a stage, always imagining an audience. Oh well, as long as nobody writes me back and tells me I'm breaking the law by writing what I write I'd continue. Besides, blogging is self-publishing without censorship and editing. I find it very pure and liberating. So Beatnik. And I love that.
I've been writing lately about the recent crisis in the Philippines.
Ramon and I had lunch today and he said, "The country is so surreal it becomes a zombie movie." He said this as he raised his eyes from reading Morikami's Wind Up Bird Chronicle. He's now half-way through the novel, reading it steadfastly and fast while sucking the straw from his chilled chocolate mocha. He continued:
There was a time when a barrio existed in the Pacific populated by people who used to be so alive until one day, multitudes of fish swarmed the coast to their delight. The fish themselves jumped into their fishing nets and bit their hooks even without the baits. The people concluded the fish were a gift of God and they feasted right there and then, eating fish left and right, day and night, and many many more days after that. And then, they all turned into zombies. Well, not all of them really.
Many from foreign lands have focused their eyes on these barrio people whose peculiarity was so puzzling. How can people so easily be turned brain-dead when they were so alive and so intelligent before?
It turned out it was not the fish that turned them into zombies, it was themselves. The fish were just a decoy. Later on, the foreign observers discovered how they turned into zombies: The first ruler of the land removed their freedoms and they were forced to learn only things the ruler wanted them to learn. No one could question the ruler's decisions lest he wanted to die. For twenty years the people moved according to prescribed and programmed movements, like robots. They were fed with lies and grand ideals emanating from the ruler. These people became blind followers, marching wherever they were told to go. They had to always be quiet and not bad-mouth the ruling class. Until one day, a zombie accidentally woke up and started to question the ruler. The ruler hastily shot him. But it was a wrong shot, it was the flick that unzombied the zombies. In one particular year their hypnotist ruler vanished and they were back into being alive and intelligent again.
But it was short-lived because it was their misfortune not to know how to act with independent, functioning minds. For twenty years their minds were locked-up. For the past twenty years they looked up to one ruler.
For the next twenty years they kept on searching for a single ruler.
The poor zombies claimed independence but deep inside they were looking for someone to tell them what to do, how to act, what to think, what not to think. This unfortunately, is a trait of zombies that was easily manipulated. They lost perspective. They did not know how to distinguish heroism from heroics, they could not tell the difference between real sense and histrionics. So that, when the zombies heard a screaming sound: Fight! Let's all gather together! Lets kill the Devil, they all gathered thinking that by reliving their first release from zombie-ness they could be unzombied again. True they were unzombied but they had to go through it again and again, like some form of therapy (everytime there is a new ruler) to unzombie themselves. And so many zombies of heroics and histrionics took advantage of this: Even the college drop-outs who could not pass Trigonometry became philosophers in newspapers so long as they re-kindled the fire of the "First Unzombie-ness". So they went on and on, thinking because they were ready they must truly be heroes in Zombieland. The other zombies gathered together in the name of different things, like Zombies of Morality (You fuck you're a sinner- I fuck I'm a Saint); Zombies of the Prayer (I pray for you asshole because You cannot pray for yourself); Zombies of the Senate and Congress (You don't give us what we want, we investigate you); Zombies of Business ( You protect my ass I give you money); Zombies of Jueteng (You protect my ass, I give you Balato); Zombies of Literature(You give me Award, I give you Award); Zombies of Mutual Admiration Society (You do good...and so do you...oh no you do good really...but you do good too...really...etcetera for eternity); Zombies of Entertainment Industry(Ha?); Zombies OFW (How much is the dollar rate now? When I go home, I'll show 'em...); Zombies of Youth (When I grow up I want to be an American Idol, otherwise, I want to be a member of the Zombies of -----); and so on and so forth.
But on the 20th anniversary of "The First Unzombie”, the most powerful of the Zombies gathered together to plot a coup. They invited all the Zombies of whatever persuasion they could gather and discussed how to topple the new ruler. All of them need to be unzombied again, they said, they just can feel it. Their power as The Heroes of Zombie-ness is wavering, fracturing, and all the Zombies no longer see 'the light'. These powerful Zombies are no longer capable of appointing the new ruler and the ruler they got now doesn't want to give them what they want. They gathered as a prelude to Unzombie-ness. And this time, they'd do it with such force.
But, the ruler they want to topple is a Zombie who is smarter than them. And the other Zombies in this Zombie-land are now awakening. And the other Zombies who went abroad to work saw the true light. And the many Zombies of lowland and hinterlands are just becoming humans again, alive and thinking. It took them twenty years but by golly - how smart they became. How intelligent.
On the day the Zombies of Power and Ruling Class called on all the Zombies to protect the Spirit of Unzombie-ness, some zombies shrugged them off, others went on playing sports, others went on business as usual, others made fun of them, others looked at them and found them unattractive, others played mah-jong, others went shopping, others went blogging, others watched the world wrestling championship match.
The Zombies are about to write volumes and volumes of explanation for this, volumes and volumes of threats and counter-threats, volumes and volumes of analysis of what happened to the Zombieland ....
But they too, are slowly waking up.
-- the zombie does what everybody's doing. In a stampede, everybody kicks and shoves at the same time to the deaths of the weak --
2024-05-11 07:54:23
shortstories
Boy Luneta
Boy Luneta
I stepped out of my Manila hotel in the dark and crossed Roxas Boulevard to take a walk alongside the bay, repeating a habit I formed some 40 years ago when I was young and green, full of dare and curiosity. I remember how I took a jeepney ride or walked miles so I could visit the Bay as often as I could then. It was like home to me. It was a pleasant home - I recall standing on the seawall, with nothing in front of me but the breeze and occasional moisture splashing from the waves of the Pacific. The habit disappeared with time, the way time took away my libido and youth and beauty. I stayed abroad for more than 3 decades, killing that habit. But today I returned to see if there was still the sparkle, if Manila Bay could trigger the old memories. I miss the coconut trees, the big rocks lining the wall. In the old days, the bay welcomed everyone through the night: lovers and schemers and the homeless and young dreamers, rich and poor, old men. We fortified the vulnerable Manila as we stood guard in the dark watching and waiting. From afar a ship with bright lights rolled by.
When the moon was full, forty years ago, I conjured up events and scenarios and stories, oh I was fond of stories that I witnessed and heard and read about. I wrote them all piece by piece, on notepads that have now collected dust in my storage. Good thing I converted them to digital decades back and now I can summon them as I approach the twilight of my years. I carry no illusions about my writing as I have no formal training. My language is definitely lacking in impeccable grammar and extensive vocabulary. I won’t worry much about this, I don’t think my intended readers prefer to read English anyway, if they even want to read anything at all. How can writing like this compete with the allure of digital content creations? Nowadays one would rather spend time checking out Facebook, Tik tok, reels, you tube for their quick and simple formats of sharing everything from ideas to philosophy to experiences to stories to entertainment in just a few seconds. Visually in an increasingly visual society! Compare that to this long-winding verbiage, really, it is a no brainer.
Yet I keep posting my long ago stories for whatever reason that I can’t fathom. I always wanted to be a writer as a young man but life’s demands required me to take a different route. There was no money in writing during my youth, especially in the Philippines where people could be limited in their scope of interest. Even today, what takes most attention are politics and scandals. The venerable gods come from show business. I even observed the openness of the society on things kept closeted during my time. It is both progressive and regressive I think. Now we have the LGBTs in the limelight, they command hefty prices for their talents, collect millions of followers on social networks and admirers to the chagrin of the close-minded and religious zealots. Relationships become a part of the daily menu, people stepping over the boundaries of what used to be private and polite to open and aggressive. Think of Trump and other conspiracy-theory driven personalities. I am glad I took the route of healthcare as my profession. It paid well and consistently as opposed to a possible writer’s job. That was the trend in my college years. Working in healthcare, especially abroad, was the main gateway to one’s family’s survival.
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Boy Luneta
Boy Luneta 3
So we drank another round of San Migs. By this time, Boy Luneta's face was turning red and I was getting hot and horny. He beamed savagely,
- Why do you lookin' at me that way?
-Well I...
-I know, I know, I can read it all over your face. You lookin' at me like I'm pancit and adobo which you prob'ly never tasted for the past ten years.
-I hate you.
-Lemme tell you something' Ramon de Goiti. I may be eating shit like a goddamn native chicken but that has just made me more delicious and tasty.
-Stop!
Drunk, Boy Luneta and I walked out of the bar, the hang-out of Manila low life. I nearly tripped on the sidewalk of Roxas Boulevard, he had to support my balance. I was saddened by the old and tired city of Manila but excited by the prospect of having sex again with a fellow Filipino. I was ashamed of my feelings - two days ago, I was living a pretentious clean life in my citadel of false tranquility in the city of Miami, and today, I was wandering along with a hustler in Manila. I felt the presence of both God and Lucifer within me.
Come to think of it, I thought, what have I achieved so far in America? I did good, as far as making it in America is concerned. But what is meant by achieving good in America? Earn enough dollars to have a walk-in closet, a brand new car, a little respect for my service to sick people. Other than that...it’s empty. I did not find a single true love, oh I had faked a lot of love, fooled myself into believing I had found love worth dying for. And I died. I must have faked my death tens of times, because I'm still alive and feeling nothing. In America, I felt like a pancit and adobo, they would always love to taste me, but to consider me as a staple food, forget it. It is so easy to find someone in my bed, someone who in the heat of passion would whisper he loves me dearly, but after that, my bed would be empty again, waiting for another curious lover. Perhaps I could blame my morose empty feeling to my culture. And Americans hate me for saying this all the time. I grew up in the company of my family, my parents and all the parents I knew in my town who have managed to live together forever. Divorce is against the law. So I lived with this expectation that even in my gay world, I will find someone who would stick out with me for better or worse for the rest of my life. One whom I will take care of when he gets sick. One who'd be with me when I get sick. Isn't that the Philippine way? I hoped for someone who would wake up with me in the mornings, retire with me at nights. That's oh so romantic but unreal in my gay world, especially in my American gay world.
So I developed this compensation in relationships. I became the prissy senorita who would stand in a party or a bar in a backoffish manner. Snubbish. Moralistic. Yet shallow because beneath all these, I was extremely sexual. Always leaving me in eternal conflict.
This extreme sexuality became clearer when I found my old fling Boy Luneta. I simply stripped myself of all my inhibitions. Am I crazy or what?
"Where are we now, Boy Luneta?" I asked.
"Oh please...stop these stupid pretensions and hypocrisy Ramon de Goiti. If there is anybody who knows every nook and crook in Luneta, it is you my friend. It's not as if Luneta has changed since you last came here."
I gave out a hearty laugh as we continued walking on the Luneta strip. He was right. It was the same old strip all the way from T. Kalaw to CCP. Except for extra coconut trees and smashed seawall for repair or replacement, nothing was really changed. And to be honest, I was anticipating we would end by one hidden coconut trunk in my secret nook close to the Film Center and make love. Standing. We did that before. By the time we reached my secret coconut tree, I became a one hundred percent slut. I grabbed him by the collar and started kissing his beer tasting mouth. He was caught by surprise and had to push me away.
"What's wrong with you?" he asked.
"Sky's the limit," I reminded him.
"If this is what you learned in America, I pity you." he quipped.
I pulled him back again towards me and began unbuttoning his shirt. Being drunk, he started to give in. Until... "Did you hear that?" he asked. In the heat of passion, all my senses except my lust were oblivious. "No I didn't," I said. I started unbuckling his belt. By the time I was about to unzip his pants, he pushed my hands away. "There it goes again, can you hear it?" he persisted. I raised my sex-starved voice. "No!" obviously pissed.
He raised his voice, "Because you're not listening dammit!"
I stopped momentarily, releasing a deep sigh. Okay, I listened. The sound came as a suppressed cry. It was obviously that of a man's. It came in spurts, sometimes prolonged, but it was meant not to be heard. It sounded creepy. Boy Luneta did not waste time in following the sound. Under the moonless night, beside the dark Film Center, he combed through the overgrown wild weeds and searched through shrubbery. He tapped the corrugated iron fence separating the Center from the Manila Bay shore.
"Hello, is anyone there?" he called.
The voice stopped. And then...not far from the coconut tree where I intended to make love, I saw a silhouette, a sitting figure whose back was leaning against the iron fence. The figure was tall, muscular, I saw its arms move, large hands.
God, this can't be true, I thought. I've been in America too long to know that this broken crying man was Caucasian. Walking closer, my suspicion was verified. There he sat, a man with a crew cut, light hair, probably blond. He was holding his cap in his hands, there was a streak of blood running down his face. This is exactly what I hated to see, another incident that will run across the newspapers in the world, claiming how another foreigner was violated in Manila. Another incident that will add to the so-called notoriety of the Filipino which everyone the world over wants to feast about. Another incident that would scare tourists and investors, another to make Filipinos ashamed, or to the likes of me, become guarded and defensive. My friends would often assure me this happens everywhere in the world. Yeah, tell that to the peace loving Swiss. Tell that to Miami which lost a lot of revenues after a few crimes were committed to its tourists. Tourism is simple hospitality. You don't commit crimes to your guests. Incidences like these don't land you in tourism brochures.
But...was the man a tourist? We approached the leaning figure.
Boy Luneta had other thoughts. He was like any typical Luneta resident who believes every Caucasian is American. To him, this American was not a tourist. American tourists like the Japanese come by bus loads taking pictures, or hopping from bar to bar. A solitary American like this sitting in a dark corner of Film Center is either a service man who refused to leave after the closure of the bases or a Peace Corp volunteer who got lost on his way to the American Embassy or a Mormon Missionary. The Protestants are better prepared and less adventurous, Boy Luneta once claimed. But the Mormons? They think the Philippines is Paradise. But surprisingly though, he continued to claim, he hasn't heard of any violated Mormon in the Philippines. I guess it's something to do with their looks - they suffer enough wearing neckties and long sleeves under the Philippine heat. Actually Filipinos worry more about the Mormons than themselves because these missionaries are barely out of their teens, they don't have cars much less money and they give out Bibles containing the Gospel according to Joseph Smith. No, you don't violate the Mormons, Boy Luneta claimed. They are so dedicated to God that God will kill you if you violate them.
"Hey you, what's wrong man?" Boy Luneta asked the poor leaning Caucasian. I preferred to stand behind to watch the events and conversation about to unfold. The Caucasian did not even budge to raise his head. "Enough," he said faintly. "Beat it."
"Say that again?"
This time, the man stared at us with ferocious eyes. "Don't you understand English? What the fuck am I doing here?" I saw it all right there and then, the poor guy was robbed. And beaten too. I could smell liquor from his breath, he wryly waved us to go away.
Boy Luneta was deeply hurt by this gesture. And no one hurts Boy Luneta. He said once, I may be a hustler, but I've got pride.
I had to intervene."I'm sorry..." I stared at the bruised man and all I saw in his face was anger. An anger that didn't care what happened next. And for a person like me who never encountered any problem in a foreign soil, I just felt this immense obligation to ease the pain of this man. If there was one thing I wanted to do is to give back to foreigners in my soil whatever kindness they offered to me in theirs.
"Son of a bitch. Yes, what the fuck are you doing here?" Boy Luneta hissed. Before he got out of hand, I pushed him away from the Caucasian man.
"Sir," I addressed the man in my best Florida accent, "We just wanna know if you're alright. Do you want us to get you some help?"
The man just stared at me blankly.
"Do you want us to call the police?" Still no response.
"We will leave if you want us to." I was answered by silence.
I immediately grabbed the hand of Boy Luneta, who continued to mumble all the Filipino cuss words he knew, there's a lot of them actually. When we were a few yards away, the man spoke. "Wait."
Boy Luneta stopped cursing. We turned back to look at the man who began crying. This time it was a loud cry. I never saw an American cry this loud except those who were about to die in the hospital where I worked.
He wailed, "Tesang, forgive me. I forgot myself!"
What did he mean by that? He was obviously calling the name of a woman. But then, he was as drunk as I and Boy Luneta. Drunk people are capable of many unrestrained acts and can cry out anything.
"Who did this to you?" Boy Luneta asked. His words came out in a false pretense of concern, unfortunately. The Caucasian whose English and accent obviously were American stared at us with a pained face, first at Boy Luneta, then at me. He kept his eyes at me afterwards. He probably thought I was the lesser of two evils. In between his sniffs and sobs, he said to me, "Your accent is different."
I said, "I just arrived from Florida two days ago. I work there."
In saying this, a ray of hope landed on his face.
Not wanting to be ignored and outdone, with or without accent, Boy Luneta kept his inquiry, which progressively sounded more sincere as he rattled along. "Are you a serviceman?"
"No."
"A Peace Corp volunteer?"
"No."
"A...Mormon?"
"No."
At this point, doubt had cast a dark shadow upon all his American-visiting-the-Philippines stereotypes.
"Are you a...you know...a tourist?"
"You can say that again...Fuck, it's all gone...Shit, I'm bleeding...They kicked me in the face..." the American kept mumbling as he felt his body.
Boy Luneta shouted "Why?" As in "Why are you not in your hotel sleeping the night off with fellow tourists? You should know better than to be alone in this dangerous side of the city at this time of the night." In other words, "Why are you different from all the other tourists I know?"
I tapped Boy Luneta's shoulder. I whispered to him, "Shut up." I looked again at the American. I asked, "Who are you and what happened?"
"My name is Keith Devlon. I used to serve in Clark Air Base. I came back to Manila to look for Tesang, a bar hostess I met a couple of years back. I was promised by her friend Leila some leads to her whereabouts. And then...we ended up in a hotel in Manila...and then...oh fuck...fuck...I remember now... I was duped and beaten and stolen of everything I have. My bag of clothes and my wallet."
A series of slurs came out from the lips of Boy Luneta. "So here you are! Another one of them superior Americans coming here to save the world while enjoying a Filipina! And you thought everyone here would call you a hero? This is your own doing man."
Keith Devlon just stared at him with an open mouth. I knew that Boy Luneta was playing nationalistic, really, but to an American, this American at least, his outbursts made him appear like a specimen of wonder. I tapped Boy Luneta once more and gave him the shut-the-fuck-up look.
"Who is this Tesang you're looking for?" I asked Keith. Keith Devlon shook his head, this time, tears rolled down his face, it took him minutes before he could answer.
"She is the woman I love."
Now, my dear readers, I want you to sit down and rest. Because what I have is another long story to share. This is another one of many long stories that Boy Luneta led me to. A story that happened in four weeks, mere four weeks that I intended to spend as a homecoming visit from America. Against your expectations, this is about a love between a foreign boy and a local girl, as opposed to the love between Boy Luneta and me which more likely will always be between a native chicken and a chicken with no wings.
Volume 1
Ramon de Goiti
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2024-05-05 01:16:43
masquerade