Diary 10

I figured it was too early to return to my boarding house. I didn't wanna wake up my landlady. I imagined her sitting like a harlot at the door, her face masked with messy cream, her morning breath, hair net, and seventy year old body greeting me -

"And where were you the whole night young man? Hand me your rent."

Finding me empty-handed she would spring from her rattan chair and would shout obscenities enough to scandalize the neighborhood.

"What? Don't tell me you're out of money again! Animal! What's this place to you ? Home for the Homeless? Damn you, don't you even dare get into my house! Get money even if it takes you to sell your blood to the Red Cross! I am no Charity!"

She would then kick the door leading to her apartment and get dressed - for Sunday mass.

I boarded an old SARAO jeepney. To those who don't know yet, a jeepney is an American World War Two-original jeep with two long leathered seats inside. Each seat accommodates eight passengers tightly packed alongside each other.

The one I rode was overloaded. Extra passengers clung to its back, forming a peacock-tail configuration matched only by the Ring Ling brothers. In Manila, what people develop as ordinary skills are worthy of a carnival show in other countries. This jeepney -- It cried like a baby, whimpered like an iguana, and belched smoke like a chimney. It bounced on so many potholes that one lady passenger whispered to her woman companion - "If this stupid jeepney keeps running like this, it will break the hymen of an unsuspecting virgin."

We passed through Taft, turned right across Freedom Park, slowing down in every passenger pick-up stop.

Its driver, instead of looking at the road, called out. "Hey - Quiapo, Quiapo, Quiapo - anyone going to Quiapo hop in."

My God, it is already full, where would the others go to--- the roof?

Another jeepney stopped behind it. It had the same destination, but this one had better accessories - a stereo beaming local music full blast -...If I were a bachelor, and I were to marry, I would marry a sorbetero, ice-cream-man's daughter ...She licks me and I lick her, we will lick each other, until midnight... All passengers except me jumped off and boarded the second jeepney, attracted to its lurid music. The driver of the jeepney where I'm left all by myself beseeched the outgoing passengers -"Come back, Come back!"

One passenger threw a match box to him. "This is for you, burn your slow jeepney. Ungas. Sakim. The way you load your jeepney you will never go anywhere. Move over. Get that old piece of junk out of the way."

We crept forward, the old jeepney and I being its lone passenger. We crossed Quezon Bridge overlooking the polluted Pasig River. I turned my eyes to the other, brand new jeepney before me. It was obviously new, a miniature horse statue was atop its hood, it was covered with multicolored paint peppered with signs such as Juice from Saudi Arabia - in reference to the hard labor it took in Saudi Arabia to come up with the money to buy it. On its sides were naked women drawings with captions such as "God knows Hudas not pay" (Hudas or Who Does meant Judas, the disciple who betrayed Jesus).

I jumped off in Quiapo and meandered through its streets. At five o'clock, Quiapo, the heart of Manila, provides a good starter for people from all walks of life. I passed through its underpass being mildly confused by its many exits. I eased my pace while observing those I met, all neatly dressed, on their way to the Quiapo Church. On the underpass pavements, waifs embraced each others in total tranquility, it was a type of embrace more out of dire need and necessity. They had no blankets to warm each others. They used their body heats instead. They slept as if having no cares in the world, salivating, snoring, unaware of the soot from the jeepneys and the dirt that whirled around them. Smelly garbage bins stood beside them.

I felt losing grip of my life. I was supposed to work on my Undergrad thesis. Why was I wandering aimlessly in Quiapo?

Newsboys displayed the early tabloids that carried the usual headlines: Man Found Floating In Pasig; An Adulteress Hacked To Pieces By Jealous Husband; Husband Cut To Pieces By A Jealous Mistress; Transvestite Strangled By A Tourist. Enough! The mainline newspapers didn't help either: Imelda In Hawaii; Aquino In Malacanang; Ninoy Aquino's Ghost Spotted in Tarlac. Man oh man! What else is new in this country? I emerged through the exit opposite the church. Chinese restaurants, hard ware stores, shoe outlets, department stores lined the street . In front of these shops were tiny food stalls that released the aroma of siopao and coffee teasing my appetite. Breakfast?

What breakfast?

I hate the thought of breakfast. It had been out of my vocabulary since I arrived in Manila. I bit my lips. I damn well knew I had no money. So get used to it. I took only two meals a day. Lunch and supper. Supper happened to be my main meal, compensating for all the nutrients I've lost during the day. Who cares about what I eat? Thank God, I never got sick. I hear there is a virus affecting homosexuals in the West. So what? I would retire before these foreigners start spreading it here. How many foreigners did I serve? Oh countless. But they were too old to catch any virus.

I climbed an overpass. Quiapo was all about roads- either cross its main road, or go down thousands of underpasses or millions of overpasses. On both sides of this particular overpass, small tables hang obscene magazines along with the major dailies. Naked centerfolds right in front of my face. Time had changed. During Marcos years, there was too much censorship in magazines, thanks to Imelda. But now after the revolution and reestablishment of the so called freedom of the press, people did nothing but sell obscenities. Freedom of the Press my ass. What is free in it? I still pay for these stupid black and white pictures which couldn't even tell where the tit or the dick is located. I lose taste for them especially when they greet me in the early mornings. I need food, not a fucking centerfold!

Anyway, I leafed through one of the magazines and its leprotic owner warned me to browse not read. What would I browse in a naked picture? Tell me.

I climbed the overpass. Beside its yellowed walls, beggars met me, "Toss me a coin sir, will you?"

"My goodness, it's five a.m. get some sleep."

Stopping midway the overpass, I breathed deeply, hesitating at first because of the smoke emanating from the diesel run jeepneys. In the process, I nearly stepped on a child sprawled on the floor; the child was snoring. He appeared like a corpse beside an empty can of sardines. The sardines can... perhaps hoping that someone would drop a coin in there. The child was motionless except for the heaving of his chest. Skipping over his tiny body, I took a look at the view below the overpass up to the end of Quezon Bridge. Muslim Kiosk stood side by side with the Catholic Church, both painted dirty white. My eyes, blurred by the morning pollution, could barely see. The sun is rising, the people moving, it is still a beautiful day. My ass!

Roberto Policarpio slipped into my mind again. I couldn't get over him. I was stupid to spend the last two nights with him when I could have left him right from the beginning and went on my hustling. At the least I could have earned money from some client. Ah one day, I would drop the Manila Bay scene, but then, I may not. I don't know, no reason whatsoever may drive me away from the bay. Like heroin, it is addicting.

I looked at my watch. It was seven a.m.

I needed to be in the Public Library for my thesis research by eight. After the library I am supposed to go to Artemio's house, my thesis partner to discuss the hypothesis and methodologies we agreed to implement for our stupid thesis. Disgusting! This is all I can say about this college thesis requirement. It is all vanity - reading and analyzing a literature book makes no sense to me at all. Why can't these stupid professors just give me a grade and say bye-bye. If there is one thing I need to learn is about ME ME ME; who can show me the way to get away from places like Manila Bay and avoid meeting sick people like Robert Policarpio? I should have taken Psychology. Well, that is too far-fetched by now. Goddamn too late.

It was seven thirty in the morning. My landlady by now would be kneeling inside Quiapo Church, wearing a white embroidered jusi dress matched with a black veil clipped neatly on her hair, sorting at least fifty different rosaries inside her purse, picking out the black beaded one given to her by an Italian Franciscan claiming it is the holiest rosary because it came from Rome. I could see her mouth salivating solemnly in saying Our Fathers and Hail Marys and Glory Be To Gods. After the rosary, she would lie prostrate on the aisle for a moment then walk on her knees towards the altar then ask for the forgiveness of her sins and implore the Black Nazarene to punish me for not paying my rent.

I went to the jeepney station plying the route Quiapo to Balic-Balic. When I was about to climb into one of the waiting jeepneys when a tabloid headline caught my attention.

MAN FOUND DEAD IN MANILA BAY.

Of all places! I got curious, I was there last night and didn't notice anything different... I stepped off the jeepney to read the article. Too bad all I had were a few coins, just enough for my fare and could not buy the paper. I noticed the picture under the heading - a dead man wearing denim jeans, with one foot still in a mocassin, his shirt stripped off revealing a muscular body. His face, was very familiar.

Roberto Policarpio is dead?

When you work as a hustler, you never want to be the person last seen with someone who just died.

I got scared. I was the last person seen with this man. I am a dead meat. My heart began to palpitate. I looked to my right and my left. Is someone trailing me? I walked a few steps, turned towards the church, no one was following. I walked down the underpass, no one. I climbed the overpass, no one. My body began to sweat and my hands trembled. My God, what kind of trouble have I gone into?

In shock and fear, I hurriedly hopped into the jeepney back to the boarding house. Upon returning, I found a note posted on my door. Want your stuff? Pay rent. Damn her. I checked my room, half of my clothes were gone and my carton box of mementos, the only pictures of my destroyed family was taken by my landlady. I needed to have that back. It was all I had in my so called life.



Alex Maskara