A Force of  Nature

All of you who think that all my posts from now on will be syrupy paeans as I have been reduced to the emotional equivalent of a love-sick, hormonal, and pimply fifteen year old girl , well, you have another thing coming.   I am an adult male.  I do not indulge in cheesy introspection with the objective of analyzing every single word said and every sentiment expressed to me by someone I'm attracted to.  I am not a fucking pussy.

Well, there's that.  And, um, there's this that happened today.

I was in my room doing stuff for school (okay, homework) this morning when I heard a knock on my door.  I immediately thought that it's the admin guy from the dorm asking for my payment for the Internet use.  I opened the door and, to my big surprise, it was Sakinah.  I let her in my room and noticed that she was holding a large notebook and cellphone.

From my most recent post, I have already brought out the fact of Sakinah's temper.   This compliments her personality which can be perfectly described by saying that she's a force of nature.   My god.  The woman is fearless.  She is not afraid at all to speak her mind and let everyone know what she thinks.   Very similar to a sandstorm or monsoon, she is a phenomenon which lays to waste anything that crosses her path.

I initially thought that she wanted me to help her with her Spanish lessons but as it turned out, she wanted me to talk to some people on her cellphone for her. Sakinah had put together a list of apartment and dorm rooms  for rent.   She had told me before that she doesn't like the dorm we're both staying in because it's far to and from the school, the food sucks, and she thinks the rent is way too high.    I counter that I need the exercise, the food's great, and the rent is a little high, yes, but I'll only be here up to December.   But of course, she doesn't agree with me.   So, Sakinah is looking to move to another accommodation which would address her three concerns.

"I want you to talk to the people on my list," she said.

"Why?" I replied as I formed a frown.

"Because I called one of them and I couldn't understand what she was saying.  I thought of you because your Spanish is better than mine."

"Okay," I said without even attempting anything resembling a counter argument.

I took her cellphone and sat down across my desk with my MacBook Pro on it.  I saw that I had Google Translate onscreen to help me with some of my readings in Spanish I couldn't understand and  then realized that, holy fucking shit, the wallpaper I had on was  a picture of Sakinah in all its fifteen inch glory.   The picture was her headshot when she was trying to take a picture of me and I beat her to it by taking my own picture of her.   Sure, the Google Translate page was enlarged enough to the size that it covered the wallpaper but not all of it.  And if I made the mistake of closing the goddamn browser window, Sakinah would see herself from two days ago staring back at her. 

Last night, I uploaded all the pictures that I took from spending Saturday and Sunday afternoons with her and my friend Lucy.   I'm really not the kind of person to setup pictures of girlfriends or family members as desktop wallpaper but when I saw Sakinah's picture, I just had a quick thought to see what it would look like as such.  I meant to change the damn thing but forgot to do it. (You believe me, right?)

So I dialed one number and the lady who answered said that the guy who owns the apartment will only be available to talk in one hour.

After I'm done with the call, I make the mistake of asking Sakinah where she got her list.

"From the Internet.  Here, enter this URL on your computer."

She stood behind me and focused her attention on the screen while I typed in the URL.

The whole time I'm thinking:  I am so fucking fucked. Sakinah will surely see the top bar and recognize the part of her hat which she was wearing in the picture.  Or she will see the bottom part of the screen less than an inch wide containing the image of her sweater.  

"Are you sure about the URL?" I asked and then hoped that she'd look away to check so I can make the  browser page a little bit bigger.

"Yes," she replied without looking away.

"Alrighty."

At that point, I was already thinking of an excuse to tell her if she does find out.  But what can I possibly tell her, right?   That I liked the background primarily and that she just forms an incidental part of what makes the picture so lovely to use as a desktop wallpaper?  I couldn't say that because it was a fucking headshot.   

Then I proposed to call the other numbers on her list and she thankfully gave me her cellphone back to do just that.  This time, nobody picked up the call.   

"Hey, wanna have lunch now?"  I asked hoping that she'd say yes.

"Okay, I guess we can eat now.  I'm a bit hungry."

"Well, I'm famished,"  I said  (a bit surprised that I actually said the word "famished"), "come on, hurry up."

We walked out together and when I turned around to close my door, I gave my MacBook Pro the finger.

See, There's This Girl...

Her name is, oh, let's say, Sakinah.  She's staying in the same dorm as I am and I met her one fine day during lunch at the cafeteria when she was at the same table as Bel -- one of the very few people I've gotten friendly with.  Bel's from England with a kickass Brit accent.  Well, you tosser, of course she would have an English accent because,  as it would be pointed out to me, she comes from the UK.   What I mean is, her accent's the same as Kate Winslett's or Keira Knightley's in those corsets and bodices BBC period pieces  and not of the Cockney "Sweep-Yorr-Chimnee-Guvnor-Huhlo-Huhlo" variety.   But I digress.

The very first thing that came to my mind when I met Sakinah was noting her passing resemblance to Eva Mendes.   Well, it's only a passing resemblance, yes, but I'd cut off one of my testicles if it were the price to pay to have someone think  when meeting me:  Hmmm, he has a passing resemblance to Brad Pitt.   I was a bit surprised to learn that Sakinah was not from Europe.  I thought that with her Latin looks, she might have been French or Italian but she's from a country in the Middle East which hates Israel (how's that for a clue to nail down which country this is?).   Oh, that explains the accent, I thought, and how rich she was for her family to send her to Spain to learn Spanish so she can go to graduate school here afterwards.

It's a mystery to me why, when we met,  she immediately asked if we could study together.  I couldn't say yes fast enough -- but her?  Why would she want to spend time with the Filipino guy?  Later on, she would tell me that there are a lot of Filipinos where she lives but they're mostly domestic helpers.  And she had an uncle who visited to the Philippines but had his wallet, laptop, cellphone, and camera on his first day in the country.   So I just thought that she only asked me because she was really desperate with the progress (or lack thereof) of learning the language or she'd forget forget who the hell I was the next time we see each other. 

So the next time I had lunch, I strategically came down to the cafeteria at the time Sakinah said she usually eats.   Bingo!  She was at a table with a Japanese girl and they didn't seem to be talking.   When she spotted me, she smiled and offered the seat next to hers.  So I tried to be not just charming but Carey Grant charming -- I did some research the night before by watching North by Northwest.   I think it worked because she asked if we could walk together to school after lunch.   

And so it's become a routine now with her.  Lunch and then the walk.   Yesterday was ass-freezing cold and she had on a thick parka which she wore with the hood on.   She was the cutest thing I've ever seen my whole life.  My heart literally skipped a beat.  Sakinah asked me if I was doing anything after school and I of course said I was free.   She said she had to go to the Western Union to get her allowance but we could do something after.

Time couldn't proceed fast enough waiting for my classes to end.  I meet up with her and we go to the Western Union she usually goes to.  The guy behind the counter says in English that he has bad news for her.  

"What did he say?" Sakinah asks me to translate for her eventhough the guy said it in accented English.

"Um, he says he has bad news for you."

She faces the guy again and goes, "What?"

The guy says in English that he's closing the shop at 8:00 pm (it was 7:15 pm then) but had to close his Internet connection at 7:00 pm.

"But you close at eight, right?"  Sakinah replied.  "I don't understand why you can't give me my money."

I went, "He said that his Internet connection is already closed and he can't check in the system for the money."

"Yes, but he closes at eight, right?  That's stupid.  Stupid."

Ah, that fierce Middle Eastern temper.  And the Spanish guy is just right there hearing every word

The guy was nice enough to disregard Sakinah's comment (doubtless because he thinks she's hot), gets an idea and takes out a map of Salamanca and gives us directions to the post office from where she can get her money too.

For the life of me, I couldn't figure out the directions scribbled on the map.  It was quite straightforward enough -- one line going from his shop to the post office which he marked with a dot the size of a cancerous mole.   But still, the side streets we took  lead to another street which we couldn't find on the fucking map.  I got desperate enough to ask an old Spanish lady walking toward us and she was kind enough to give explicit instructions in...Spanish.  Okay, she said the word "arriba" which means to go up.  For example you're at a bar,  and you ask for directions to the men's room and if it's in the upstairs level, you will be told arriba.   So I thought, she's telling me that there are steps we have to climb because she said arriba twice when I asked her if we just go straight on the street we're on.  

I said, "¿Todo recto?" (Straight ahead?)

The woman goes, "Arriba, arriba."

"¿Mas cerca de aqui?" (Very near here?)

"Si, si, arriba, arriba."

"What did she say?" Sakinah asked me.

"I think she said that we're supposed to go up somewhere."  (Much later on, I check in  my dictionary that arriba can also be used in the context of saying, "Go further up the street.")

So we walk further down without spotting anything resembling an inclined pathway.   I'm busy looking around us and didn't realize that Sakinah has stopped a man to ask for directions.  I see that the man has a dog on a leash.  And then, it dawns on me why the man is not looking at Sakinah and has his profile at her for him to hear her better:  the man is blind and that's his seeing-eye dog with him.  Basically, Sakinah was asking directions to the post office from a blind man.  I rush back to her to tell her of the insurmountable difficulty she faces asking for directions in English to a blind man who only understands Spanish.   I hear the guy asking her to repeat her question and I'm happy that he didn't take offense and not take the whole thing as a prank she was pulling.   

"Sakinah!  I think he's..."  I started to say but then an old Spanish gentleman happened to overhear Sakinah asking for the post office and takes over from the blind guy.  The old guy is incredibly kind.  As friendly and warm as I've never been treated here.  He actually wanted us to follow him to the post office eventhough it would mean that he'll be going in the opposite direction.    When I say thanks to him several times, he takes his arm around my shoulders and says that it's nothing and to relax because it was just nearby.   

Well, the kindest Spaniard I've ever known, came through and he proudly pointed out the post office after walking for less than a minute.  The only thing I could say was thank you again and he took my arm and shook it.  A really classy guy.  

Sakinah managed to get her allowance and as we were walking without having any particular destination in mind,  I bring up the episode with the blind guy again.  

"I can't believe you actually asked a blind guy for directions,"  I said.

"Well, I didn't know he was blind,"  she countered.  

"What?  The seeing-eye dog didn't give it away?"

"I thought he was just walking the dog."

"Well, how about the fact that he didn't have eyeballs?"  I reply.

"I hate you," she said with a smile.

And then my heart literally skipped a beat again.

Jappie

My last class for the day just ended and I'm still here at the school waiting for my friend Lucy to be finished with hers. We have to plan what to do this weekend because it's going to be a holiday here this Monday. We were planning to go to Lourdes, France but after doing some research online, I thought it would be a better idea to take a trip somewhere here in Spain because going over the border would need a much longer time than three days. So I'm thinking of suggesting to go to Santiago de Compostela in Galicia instead.

Anyway, let me tell you about what happened in my class today. The professor is a young lady who could easily be mistaken for a Revilla sister if she ever visits the Philippines. Her name's Isobel and she wears her hair short which only serves to highlight her soft features. There are only a few students in this class and as usual, America and Japan are ably represented. There are four Americans and three Japanese -- all of them are college students and are here because their chosen courses require them to study outside of their respective countries. The rest of the students comprise of three girls (I don't think they are qualified to be called women) who come from China, a Quebecois from Canada, and then, of course, me -- Filipino guy. The Quebecois obviously speaks French and his Spanish is quite good -- at least compared to mine. I wonder though about his fashion sense because he seems to have time-warped from the seventies: he wears those old school Carrera glasses which cover a quarter of his frog face and, I shit you not, a gold Casio digital watch with those tiny buttons for the built-in calculator.

I sit in the back row next to the Japanese girl with an American accent a whole lot thicker than mine. After her sit the Quebecois and then the Americans hold court sitting, as usual, together. There's Bill who I think is an asshole because he never talks to anyone else who doesn't come from his country. Next is Erica who sounds absolutely horrible when she speaks Spanish -- imagine a hybrid of the voices of Fran Dresher or that girl Chandler dated in Friends with the Jersey accent and Penelope Cruz. Ben's an okay guy -- he actually tries to talk to the Chinese girls in Spanish. The last of the Americans is Dorothy who's friends with Bill so that makes her an asshole by association.

Isobel was explaining something and she happened to mention the Spanish word "ejecutivo." She asked if anyone knew what this word meant. I did know that this meant an executive but I didn't want to answer because I wouldn't know fuck-all how to explain it in Spanish. Isobel felt a little desperate and the only thing she could do is to say what the word is in English and she said, "En ingles, comó 'Jappie'."

Everyone was looking at her with bewilderment at the sound of the word she just dropped.

"Oh," I said, after dawning on me what she meant, "You mean Yuppie."

"Si," Isobel goes, "That's right."

Dorothy looks at me at me and mouths in silence, "What?"

I said, "Yuppie. You know, it means Young Urban Professional."

Bill goes, "Oh, but nobody uses that word anymore."

"Yuppie? I've never heard of that word," says Benny.

Isobel clounters by saying that in Spain, an "ejecutivo" is a fucking "Jappie." Case closed.

Bill, being the asshole that he is tries to make the point that nobody knows the word anymore.

Isobel just insists that she knows what a goddamn "Jappie" is, and it's the same as a an "ejecutivo."

Me? I'm just depressed as hell that I know what a "Jappie" is.

The Salamanca Horror (Part One)

I'm currently living in an off campus dorm. It's a slice of heaven compared to where I was supposed to initially stay -- in a three bedroom apartment owned by a local couple. I wrote before that they didn't have kids and the two spare bedrooms they have were being rented to students of the university. It wasn't a bad looking place but I just had trouble with the couple's fanatical desire to conserve electricity and water. As soon I got to their apartment, the wife laid down the number one rule for me in terms of using the bathroom: the water heater is normally off and I should ask either her or the husband to have it turned on. The couple didn't speak any English at all and my Spanish was as good as their English and so when she did the universal gesture for brushing teeth, I took it to mean that it was only for the sink that the heat was off. It was midday when the wife was telling me this and it was a balmy 21 degrees celsius. So I thought, it should be okay. I probably wouldn't need the heat to be turned on anyway for toothbrushing water.

Still, I thought the whole place was a disappointment. Nevertheless, I thought that I should man-up because I've lived in far worse places when I was in college. It was kinda telling though that as soon as I was able to put my bags down in my room, I wanted to get away from the place as soon as possible. I could just not feel any familial warmth or a sense of something akin to being welcome. It's like the couple didn't see me at all as a human being but rather walking bills of euros.

When I got back to the apartment at around 10 pm (I didn't want to spend time there if I could help it), the wife kept me company while I was eating the supper which she prepared. She kept at it the whole time talking in her stacatto speed Spanish which all of them speak here. What's funny is, you ask a local to repeat a sentence or phrase he just uttered and he will say it exactly the same way -- never bothering to slow down or enunciate one or two key words contained just to help you understand.

With dinner over, I went back to my room and took out my MacBook Pro. I prayed that there might be a possibility of an unsecured Wi-Fi signal but I was shit out of luck. Of course -- in keeping with the total vibe in the apartment. So I thought then to take a shower and just watch the Frank Capra classic A Pocketful of Miracles using my laptop to help put me to sleep. I had in my mind though that Eli Roth piece of shit movie Hostel were foreigners visiting Europe were being kidnapped to be used as hapless victims of torture for rich pricks. I hoped (um, okay, and prayed) that the couple wasn't so hard-up that they've signed up to be suppliers of witless foreigners in the macabre merchandise. And you know that the token Asian gets killed in the first 30 minutes of any horror flick.

I got out my towel and bathroom stuff and proceeded to go to the bathroom outside of my room. Oh, shit. I had to turn back though because I left the lights on in my room. The wife told me in no uncertain terms to close the lights when I leave my room because electricity was expensive in Spain. As soon as I did this, I realized then why I had subconsciously left them on: because that 30-watt light bulb was the only light source in the whole fucking house. I am not kidding. All the lights in the apartment were off. Just the ambient light coming from outside the windows afforded any means to not, you know, randomly crash into walls.

Fuck it, I said. I can do this. The shower will do me a world of good. Let me say another thing. It was cold as a spinster's nipple. I couldn't believe that hours ago, I could walk around in a t-shirt and no jacket. So I turned on the faucet to brush my teeth and the water which came out was icy cold. I thought of asking either of the husband or wife to turn the heat on but I just thought I was being a pussy. The shower, I thought. It will take care of everything that ails me right now. So I quickly go without taking off my sweats as I needed some time to get a good mix of hot and cold water. I didn't want to be naked and freezing my balls off while standing up to manipulate the shower knobs for the optimal water temperature. There I was standing in anticipation for the hot water to come out. But, fucking shit, it never did.

To be continued...

I Couldn't Believe It Myself...

Starting with a title like that, I better deliver the goods, right? Well, I definitely will. Did you know that the voice you hear singing on the eighties classic More to Lose by the Brit band Seona Dancing belongs to none other than...Ricky Gervais? Yes, David Brent is David Bowie's evil twin. I doubt if Shakespeare himself could provide an hyperbole on how awesome that fact is.

Here's proof:

Salamangkero

If you'll allow me to wax philosophically a bit, please. You know how you have those quiet moments in life when you're in a strange, new place and you wonder how certain sequence of events had to happen for you to be there? Singular episodes which when they transpired you felt had you all confused as you wonder what were their existential points. You didn't get the you girl liked. The promotion at work you wanted and needed went to that asshole who always borrowed your stapler without returning it. The doctor tells you you have a lump on the back of your neck which shouldn't be there and shouldn't be in the shape of a flying ninja.

But now, in one of those quiet moments, you get a grasp of the big picture and you slap yourself on the head and say, "Ha! That had to happen for this to happen which lead to this thing happening." Events in your life aren't isolated incidents. You get a certain understanding that bad things also lead you to different directions which you wouldn't find yourself in if the opposite happened. So, what may have been a shitty incident could turn out to be not so bad after all.

In this light, I've been a bit more introspective than usual lately and thinking about such matters as the rich and beautiful train wreck which I call my life finds me typing these words in an off campus dorm room at the Universidad de Salamanca in Salamanca, Spain. I've signed up for a three month course and I'll be in school till December. The university here isn't just old, it's John McCain old. It was established in 1218 and it was once considered to be one of the greatest in Europe -- at par with Oxford and Cambridge and the Sorbonne. Through the years though, some of its academic lustre has dimmed a bit and it has lost its position in the short list of the elite schools in the country. However, it still attracts its fair share of scholars and students from all over the world.

As I expected, there are a lot of Americans studying here. What I didn't expect was the number of Japanese students. In one of my classes, half of the people come from Japan. It's amazing to walk around Salamanca and see how many Japanese there are. I've become friends with one of them, Jo, who will be here in Spain for one year. He said it's part of his university's program back in Japan that he has to spend that much time abroad. There's also Em who's from the same school as Jo. She's just a bundle of energy with an American accent to boot owing to the years she spent studying in an international school back home. Yes, that's right. I'm in school with coño kids. And being in school, the dynamic is pretty much the same you would expect in any school -- cliques are established from day one. The Americans keep to themselves and do not talk to anyone who's not from where they are. The Japanese are always together as a group too but are more open and friendly to talking to other races. Me? Well, I'm the lone Filipino in class and in the dorm so I'm probably the creepy old guy of indeterminate Asian heritage. Actually, I'm with a Filipina friend here named Lucy. She's in a different class though and is staying with a Spanish family and not in my dorm. I was supposed to stay with a family here too -- and I did. However, on my second day I told them I was moving to the dorm because, honestly, I didn't like the family (technically, they were just a couple and a fucking cat).

It was Lucy's brilliant plan to come here to Spain to study and when she told me about it, I thought that it wasn't such a bad idea too and I did have time to spare. More than anything, I also wanted to go back here to Europe and just get into all kinds of zany and krazy (that's with a "k", mind you) adventures. Besides, when I was back home, all my blog entries were as boring as watching an obese man get on a bus. I hope my stay here will provide more fodder for quality stuff in my writing. Oh yeah, just like that time I had to tell the Spanish couple that I was moving out of their house...but that's for another blog entry.

Just to give you a very small taste of what to see here, here's the view I get each night I walk home from having a few beers at the Plaza Mayor.



Oh, I'm also as cold as I've ever been here.