TOTE THOUGHTS

Everytime colleagues offer to carry my bag for me, they are amazed at how I can maintain walking straight despite the load that is my entire bag. I have to admit to them that I indeed carry a lot of stuff. It may be weird but I just subscribe to the belief that a woman should always be prepared for any eventuality. The other night, Gretchen Barretto was featured on TV showing off her separate pouches for sundries. My husband said that perhaps Gretchen is also a girlscout wannabe.

In the spirit of La Greta's revelations, here's mine:

Two mobile phones
Why do I need two? One bears a number that is known to officemates, my boss, as well as my family and is easy to navigate as its a basic phone with no frills. The other is a bit fancy and holds pictures of my son and recordings of his laugh.

Maroon folding umbrella bought in Aachen, Germany
The length of the umbrella is actually a standard for a perfectly-sized bag for me. It's a basic need in a country that goes through only two seasons: rainy season and scorching summer time.

Little Blue Ideas Book
It's a much-loved companion in times when something just goes "ting" in my brain and I have to jot down stuff like concepts for a business or for a project at work, wonderful places that I must go to, interesting finds in a store, tips read from a magazine or heard over the radio, wish list for life, etc.

Make-Up Pouch
For quick touch-ups and for medical emergencies, my pouch holds my basic make-up and quick remedies such as antihistamine tablets, menthol stick for headaches, Ilog Maria ointment for insect bites, and holy oil from Fatima.

Shades
Remember...I have to be ready for the scorching summer season which can occur anytime within the day in this country. Yes, even if it was raining in the morning.

The Wallet
It doesn't hold coins but I must have it beside me even as I sleep. Other people hold on to pillows or blankets, me I clutch The Wallet especially when I have to sleep by myself.

Tattered Prayerbook
You get the idea, my purse is a shopful of things for emergencies. Wherever I go, I have this tattered Cursillo prayerbook I got from my father which has been a source of solace in trying times. Pages on prayers before studying, before travelling, for the family, for work, and for illness are well-used and are witness to how I entrust my life to the One.

Green wallet
This holds the money and IDs, of course.

WANDA I SHALL BE

I'll be Wanda, a twist to being named "Wanderer." Indeed, I wander - going places even as I sit here infront of the pc. I've loafed in highschool without leaving my seat, reading travel mags in my Chemistry class. But now that I'm older and earning my own upkeep, I wander in the truest sense of the word.

It is a passion reflected in the magazines I buy, what sections attract me when checking out the Sunday paper, what TV channels I surf, what I Google about, what I read, and what my life's wishes are mostly made of.

I have this book "Places to See Before You Die" and I look forward to every opportunity to cover each nook and cranny featured in its fabulous pages. There's Macchu Picchu in Peru, Monet's Garden in France, the Bund in Shanghai, Angkor Wat in Cambodia. When I get the chance to travel I return home with a suitcase filled with a substantial collection of flyers, brochures, magazines on sites that I collect from shops, the airport, inside the plane, even in hotels.

Fridays find me browsing the Net for places that may be good weekend roadtrips for the family. Good thing I have a hubby who shares this passion, complete with historical perspectives and a son who seems to have gotten the hand of traveling as early as when he was seven months and we drove to the province -- he was excited the entire trip.

Give me time to be in malls and I wander to travel stores and ethnic shops that tell of a people or a culture entirely different from mine.

That's what I am and I love this kind of me -- WANDA.

Give and Thank You

I recall it was Flor who told me that if you pray over your loved ones while they are asleep, murmuring your deepest desires, God listens. I do that and I believe He does.

Tobi is coming up with words lately and is following some instructions at home. The latest “to do” that he learned was “to give.” While he’d usually throw his toys all over the house, last weekend I asked him to give me his basketball and behold he did, with a bonus sweet smile for me. That undeniably brought tears to mine and Agom’s eyes because among our wishes is for our son to be a giving person. We’d like him to be so because there is this stereotype that an only child can be selfish, thinking only to satisfy him. We pray that he grows to become a cheerful giver in the same way that his parents are trying to be one today.

Giving as a family is something we are working on now, in our own humble ways. I pray that Tobi follows that same track because that would be our family’s way of saying Thank You to a God that provides.

My answer to Tobi’s giving: “thank you, anak!” In my heart it meant thanks for a hundredfold of blessings that comes our way, Tobi the most precious of them.

My tribute to Francis M.

TODAY, I DEDICATE THIS LITTLE KALEIDOSCOPE CORNER TO THE MAN FROM MANILA

So many faces, so many races
Different voices, different choices
Some are mad, while others laugh
Some live alone with no better half
Others grieve while others curse
And others mourn behind a big black hearse
Some are pure and some half-bred
Some are sober and some are wasted
Some are rich because of fate and
Some are poor with no food on their plate
Some stand out while others blend
Some are fat and stout while some are thin
Some are friends and some are foes
Some have some while some have most

Every color and every hue
Is represented by me and you
Take a slide in the slope
Take a look in the kaleidoscope
Spinnin' round, make it twirl
In this kaleidoscope world

Some are great and some are few
Others lie while some tell the truth
Some say poems and some do sing
Others sing through their guitar strings
Some know it all while some act dumb
Let the bassline strum to the bang of the drum
Some can swim while some will sink
And some will find their minds and think
Others walk while others run
You can't talk peace and have a gun
Some are hurt and start to cry
Don't ask me how don't ask me why
Some are friends and some are foes
Some have some while some have most

Every color and every hue
Is represented by me and you
Take a slide in the slope
Take a look in the kaleidoscope
Spinnin' round, make it twirl
In this kaleidoscope world

My So -Called FX Life

Agom has been traveling overseas and outside the city more frequently these days. This relegates me to two home-office commute options and vice-versa. Option A: subdivision to city hall tricycle-fx to megamall-another fx to Quaipo-taxi to Intramuros. Option B: subdivision to city hall tricycle-fx to Megamall-MRT to EDSA station-LRT to Kalaw Station – jeepney to Intramuros. Both options would take from one and a half hour under normal Metro Manila traffic conditions to two terrible hours when there is just one too many traffic officers mixed with disoriented traffic lights at work. These past two weeks, I’ve been taking Option A for no reason. Agom tells me taking the MRT-LRT routes would be less stressful but I just can’t bear being compressed like sardines in a can inside those train cabs specially when it picks up passengers in the Makati stops. So FX it is for me all the way to Quaipo then vice-versa in the evening.

But I think I have to reconsider the acceptability of Option A. My reason is that I may be sitting a bit comfortably inside the vehicle but I am so deprived of much-needed quiet while commuting. I’m a promdi working in the city for almost 15 years and I value some quiet time wherever or whenever I can get it, including sitting back and trusting the FX driver to bring me to the terminal safely.

These past days, I can’t do that. The other night I had to suffer listening to three passengers speak, no, shout, in their dialect while the FX radio was blaring pop music. I had to stop myself from asking either the driver to shut the radio off or my three seatmates to postpone their presscon until they get home. I was beginning to think they were angry at me because the woman beside me kept looking at me while she told the whole FX-world about something she might be angry about. I could only guess from their tones and their faces for I speak a different dialect. This morning, I did not suffer through shouting bouts in an alien language but I was a silent witness to the plans, financial woes, airport concerns of a girl saying goodbye to her boyfriend a zillion times as they cuddled themselves inside an oven-hot FX! I was beginning to think I took an FX bound for the international airport not Quiapo! While others might savor being voyeurs to their “lambingan,” me I don’t.

Call me overly decent, call me a hypocrite, call me anything but be careful if you’ll tell me to just take a cab and have peace in exchange for a few bucks.