Attack of the Killer Bee

SCORE one for humans. And zero for the bees.
Or whatever insect it was which bit me on my neck Monday morning while I was out for a drive in those tight, two-lane highways in Quezon City where tricycles rule the streets and pedestrians casually walk along areas especially reserved for roadkill.
But then again, it was a good thing that the bee bit me when it did. After all, this humble, patient, law-abiding motorist was at that time reduced to first gear, moving at the pace of a three-legged turtle. Because when I felt something sharp digging into the left part of my neck, I applied the brakes all of a sudden, putting the car at a full and immediate stop.
Had I been cruising along Commonwealth Avenue—by far, one of the most dangerous thoroughfares in northern Metro Manila—I would have created a vehicle pile-up from Tandang Sora to Fairview, elicited a special traffic alert on the radio, and incurred the perpetual scorn of irate motorists.
But since I was only negotiating a stretch of road filled with so much people it might as well be EDSA during any of the two peaceful revolutions, my sudden stop only caused the the tricycle driver behind me to grunt, curse, and spit (in that order).
Dismissing the thought that Count Dracula was in the back seat, I reached out for my neck, grabbed the creature with my fingers, squeezed it until it was sufficiently incapacitated.
In an unparalled stroke of genius, I threw the irritating insect on the floor, right by where my feet was, giving it another opportunity to have a go at my lower limbs if ever it decides to wake up from its coma.
Fortunately, the insect didn’t bother me any longer.
It either stayed dead, flew out of the window, or still trapped in all the gunk and caked dust collected by the car’s floor mat.
Meanwhile, the tricycle driver behind me revved up his engines, took a quick left, and sped on. As he overtook me, the driver gave me a look usually reserved for cheapskate passengers and irritating people in general.
Nervous insect in hand, I forced an apologetic smile while pointing to my neck, a gesture which I knew he understood to be the universal sign language for either a) “my neck hurts,” b) “I have sore throat,” c) “I have lost my voice,” d) “I am thirsty,” or finally, e) “I have swallowed an insect.”
Moral of the story: have the aircon fixed so that foreign objects—inanimate or otherwise—would be disallowed from entering the car through the open window. Either that or simply close the windows and endure the heat. Stupid bees.

Makati Madness

COMPARED to other urban areas within greater Metro Manila, Makati City—or at least its central business district—is clean, organized, and well-planned, making it the Philippines’ Little Singapore, without the ubiquitous cameras, the staid Singaporeans, and Lee Kuan Yew.
Despite the vigorous enthusiasm by which traffic laws are enforced in the country’s financial capital—a characteristic shared by the Asian city-state—many people still prefer to congregate in Makati City, with the hopelessly mistaken notion that working, shopping, dining, hanging out, and even living in the area is sophisticated. It’s not: it’s just plain expensive.
The outrageous amount of what it costs you to do anything in Makati—use the pay toilet facilities, for instance, to expel the solid and liquid remains of that third cup of latté—is the price of the illusion that allows you to give off an air of wealth and sophistication.
Fortunately, this kind of air doesn’t contribute to global warming.
If it did, politically-correct, holier-than-thou, backyard-composting environmental activists would be all over Greenbelt calling for its closure while stinking up the whole place since organic deodorant is not available at their local cooperative.
Unfortunately, thanks to this self-sustaining Makati illusion, the city has attracted tourists of all stripes and sizes, tastes and inclinations. In the process, it has also accomodated loud and tacky Filipinos, a category which cuts across economic classes and can be found in other countries, aping the locals and irritating the hell out of other people.
Products of stupid parents and the absence of a law legalizing abortion, these flashy individuals can also be found trolling Makati’s malls, exuding various degrees of pretension and self-importance, fiddling their expensive cellphones with thunderous ringing tones that can wake up the dead.
This, among others, explains why I avoid going to Makati City as much as possible.
But then again, it’s not as if that I have any choice in the matter.
Just like everyone else who needs to make a living—or at least until something better comes along—I put in the usual eight-hour routine in Makati, risking encounters with the usual set of drones, flacks, suits, and sell-outs found in every other financial capital.
And as soon as my work is done, I head for the door immediately, eager to resume my life which lies outside the Philippines’ business district.

Money for Nothing

THAT’S right: money for nothing.
Which is exactly what you get when you hit it big with poker, or any variation thereof.
In my case, it was a small stakes cash game of Texas Hold’em wherein I took home P600 without—and this I must fully emphasize—forking out a centavo since a fellow player agreed to lend me money for the buy-in.
Thanks to uncanny good luck, irresistably cold beer, and the saintly forebearance of my poker buddies, I was able to clean my rivals out, to a greater and lesser degree.
But don’t get me wrong.
My opponents—a meticulous magazine editor, two big-shot lawyers, and two semi-professional poker players—were sharp, intelligent individuals, sensitive to the game’s nuances, always on the lookout for sudden, irregular behavior which either betrayed a bluff, a winning hand, or in certain cases, a futile attempt to fart quietly.
Meanwhile, I had no such skills.
I was—and still am—a good-for-nothing, deadline-beating bum who had a nervous twitch whenever I held two cards of the same suit.
In short, I was a novice, a beginner; a neophyte whose only advantage over a poker virgin was that I knew the difference between a club and a spade.
As always, whenever I agreed to play, I was prepared to lose my shirt and whatever shred of diginity that I had left.
Fortunately or unfortunately, my inexperience never got in the way of my appreciation for a good round of poker—the thrill of calling and raising bets, the exchange of witty remarks among players, and of course, the sheer joy of winning a hand.
But then again, between drinking and playing poker, I’d take a cold bottle of beer over a straight flush anytime. After all, it is easier to look for alcoholic beverages than a set of five sequential cards of the same suit.
However, on that Friday night, cold beer was just as available to me as a straight or a nut flush.
A few minutes after I joined the table, I immediately won three straight games, all of them spectacular plays. Later on, I managed to win some more, allowing me to fully settle the debt I incurred to the chagrin of my friend who earlier agreed to cover me.
As expected, my victory and their defeat was not without name-calling (i. e., you bastard), sour-graping (i. e., “you placed your bet out of turn”), and hard feelings (i. e., “next time, bring your own beer”).
By the time the night was over, we went to my favorite watering hole and I treated them to a drink. It was their money after all.

Cheap Thrills

Cheap thrills

THANKS to the Internet, cheap technologies, and of course, the Chinese—who have apparently thought of everything (but that’s another story)—films and television shows have emerged as the most inexpensive forms of entertainment. Or at least in countries like the Philippines where piracy is rampant, copying licensed material is tolerated, and enforcement of intellectual property rights is, more or less, a joke. (And a bad one at that, primarily inflicted on the predominantly Muslim sellers of pirated DVDs.)
Although piracy has introduced many excellent foreign shows to local audiences (Battlestar Galactica, for one, which I highly recommend), there are still those who care enough about the written word to actually read, let alone, buy books, despite prohibitive prices.
Take the latest Harry Potter volume.
Only available in hardcover—at least as of this writing—the book costs a lot more than my weekly lunch allowance, beer money, and poker subsidy combined.
But this didn’t prevent many Filipinos from promptly purchasing their own copies. Which is a good thing I suppose.
However since I remain unwilling to risk ulcer, skip drinking, and auto-fold during Texas Hold ‘em night, I have deliberately foregone the experience of owning and reading the last of J. K. Rowling’s series. After all, by now, pretentious, irritating, and insufferable coño kids and their pretentious, irritating, and insufferable coño parents have told everyone that their favorite teenage magician is—warning: spoiler alert—alive.
So instead of spending more than a thousand pesos on a novel whose ending I already know about, I recently decided to indulge in an old habit: that of visiting stores which sell used books.
Financially-challenged Filipinos such as myself have always looked for finds in small establishments such as Book Sale and Limited Edition which put up shelves of books along malls’ empty spaces, hoping to get some business off visitors.
And just last week, while on the way to a meeting, I chanced upon Limited Edition’s two shelves on the third floor of SM Makati.
Located right by the entrance connecting the Metro Rail Transit and the mall, I scoured the bookstands thoroughly, primarily examining non-fiction titles and checking their publication dates to see whether the contents were outdated.
Not long after, I hit the jackpot and bought two books—Maria Bartiromo’s Use the News and an old but nevertheless serviceable issue of Granta’s issue 36 which dealt with Mario Vargas Llosa’s unsuccessful bid to become the president of Peru in the late eighties.
All in all, both books cost less than three hundred pesos and no one has yet told me how each would end.
Now that’s what I call a bargain.