The Wily Filipino

Scenes from Los Banos, Part 1.

1. Izzy has survived jet lag, having finally slept from 6:30 to 5. We'll try to keep her up later. (It was brutal the day before -- she was up from 1 to 4 in the morning, with me crashed on the sofa while she watched a vintage Scooby-Doo episode, and was cranky all day.)

2. (We were, alas, dealt a bad blow yesterday during our 65-kilometer journey from Makati to Los Banos when a fuel truck fell off a bridge and onto a house below. We left around 5 and arrived at home after 9:30 with stop-and-go traffic all the way. Izzy, alas, only sleeps in her crib, or in her car seat when the traffic is smooth -- many tensions arose around that car seat, which people don't use in the Philippines -- and it was way past her bedtime.)

3. It's a little strange posting when I really have no time to surf and read anyone else's entries -- my folks have only one phone line and a 33.6 modem -- so I'm going through Eileen Tabios-withdrawal right now. =)

4. I've decided that Lyn Hejinian's My Life is just about the perfect thing to read, a poem at a time, before going to sleep. (I think dream work is necessary to process this kind of poetry anyhow; the half-remembered images slowly unfold like a flower that blooms only at night.) My wish: to take a class that walks me through a close reading of this book, one step at a time.

5. I've also started picking a fight with my 7-year old niece, Issa (she speaks flawless English, better than I ever could):

Me: Don't show any violent cartoons to Izzy; it's not good for her.

Issa: But these aren't violent.

Me [looking at the TV while Wolverine slashes some villain]: You don't call that violent?

Issa: But those were bad guys.

Me: So it's not violent if it's done to bad guys? What about the civilian population of Iraq, did you think that wasn't violent?

Issa: Huh?

6. My good friend Mike -- who I knew as "that kano who walked around Los Banos with a pick mattock on his shoulder" -- is asking me for updates on what LB looks like now.

a. Well, that store that sold fresh milk from DTRI at the corner of Lopez Avenue and Demarses Subdivision -- I'm sure the women there flirted mercilessly with Mike -- has been gone for well over a decade now. The main drag is now a long strip of internet cafes and restaurants, quite unimaginable in the '80s. A few years ago the Vega Arcade expanded across the street into a three-story building with McDonald's, Goldilocks, etc., and is still going strong.

b. There's also a Robinson's department store / supermarket / mall right before Crossing, just before you get to Jollibee. Huge, but it doesn't have the nice provincial feel that Olivares Mall does.

c. What this all means, of course, is a decline in sari-sari stores -- I certainly don't see very many anymore, especially since a South Supermarket also opened up between Maahas and Bay.

d. LB is more congested than ever, even without the students. Haven't driven around the campus yet, though -- Mike, did I tell you about the jeepney waiting shed that the Thai grad student alumni set up next to the Auditorium? I have to send you a photo, and you'll have to write about it sometime.

e. My folks took us out to lunch to this restaurant near Bay called Kainan sa Palaisdaan (Eatery at the Fishery, or something like that). About a dozen huts on bamboo rafts, circled around a pond with fish, the wind rustling the bamboo leaves. And the meal: grilled spareribs, sisig, pancit canton, kangkong, and other greasy Filipino fare. Excellent.

f. More on LB later. The heat and humidity is still the same; it's still raining every day, almost all day, since Typhoon Chedeng left.

7. No other fruit in the world can compare to a mango from the Philippines. Mmm.

[Up next: video piracy, more child-rearing tension, wedding preparations and more in "Scenes from Los Banos, Part 2." (I'm going to have to work tomorrow, so all you constant readers won't see it for another few days.)]

Posted by the wily filipino at May 31, 2003 05:45 PM