the show must go on

-
Seeing Man onstage as one of the hosts during IRRI's year-end party reminded me of Queen's song "The Show Must Go On". Man was aptly dressed as a classy Peter Pan, in my opinion, because he faced the audience with his jolly face on despite losing his father to cancer a few days before the party. 

Inside my heart is breaking
My make-up may be flaking
But my smile still stays on.

I don't know how he does this. During Lola Estay's necrological services, I had a very difficult time delivering my eulogy for her. I was choking up my words and was trying to keep the tears from falling. But in Man's case, he seemed happy as ever.

My soul is painted like the wings of butterflies
Fairytales of yesterday will grow but never die
I can fly, my friends

Maybe, part of the joy is because his father is finally at peace and is no longer battling the cancer. Perhaps, his heart has been filled with positivity and support provided by family and friends. After all, when the news broke out, his friends from Los Baños braved the horrible Manila traffic to visit him and his relatives at the wake. His Manila-based friends visited him as well. But somehow, I think that what Jim Hutton said of Freddie Mercury applied to Man too: "He [Freddie] never grumbled to anyone or sought sympathy of any kind. It was his battle and no one else's..."

I have to find the will to carry on
On with the show

Condolences, Man. Manuel, Sr is now watching you from up above, made whole again. 

Comments

Post a Comment

Thank you for dropping by!

Before moving on, please share your thoughts or comments about the post. :)

Thanks again!

Popular posts from this blog

Skyflakes

-
One of the more famous Philippine exports is Skyflakes , a wheat-based, salty cracker. It is one of my emergency food items: I typically have some stocked at home and in my handbag in case I become hungry (like in traffic jams). When there's no electricity and it's impractical to cook rice (because the leftover would spoil), I'd open a pack of Skyflakes and generously coat each cracker with Cheez Whiz... if I had a bottle of it within reach. Anyway, each time I spent more than two weeks outside the Philippines, I'd be elated to see boxes of Skyflakes inside Asian stores (particularly when in I was Australia and in the USA). Back then, I took it as a sign of homesickness. When I moved to California, I didn't miss Skyflakes because Mommy made sure that there's a steady supply in the house. Skyflakes is embedded in Filipino gastronomy as a snack, a panawid-gutom , that anyone who reacts positively upon seeing Skyflakes outside the Philippines must have spe...
Read more

10 things I learned while driving on Marcos Highway to Baguio City

-
I went on a day trip to the City of Pines, which was around a 700-km drive from my house. I drove  going up there and then from the city to Victoria, Tarlac. After that, my dad took over the driving duties. It was day trip with Tita Ising and Tito Sibing with us. Anyway, this trip was my first time to go to Baguio City with me behind the wheel. As everyone who drives up knows, there are three main routes to Baguio from the lowlands: Kennon Road, which ascends from Rosario, La Union. It was out of my options because it's too dangerous to use that road in the rainy season. The second route is via Naguilian Road, which makes my trip a lot longer because the beginning of the ascent is in Bauang, La Union (further north). The last route, and the one I took, was the Marcos Highway, now known as the Aspiras-Palispis Highway. This 47-km road starts from Agoo, La Union and is touted as the safest route among the three.  As I drove up and then down (on the same day; we were in...
Read more

Surat Mangyan

-
Image
In high school, part of the Filipino curriculum was learning about one of the country's ancient native scripts called Baybayin . I learned back then that this script was eventually abandoned because the Spanish, and eventually the Americans, encouraged the use of the Latin script for written communications. But that's in the lowlands; the rules were different up in the mountains. In the lush mountains of Mindoro, groups of indigenous people called Mangyans  live largely in isolation away from the Christianised Filipinos. This isolation has led to the continuous development of the Mangyans' old script, Surat Mangyan . As I walked inside the Ayala Museum , I saw this bamboo tube (I'm not sure if it's an instrument) with Mangyan script written all over it. I suppose that this was equivalent to a book or a song. But I haven't figured out what's written yet, despite the translation guide provided. What I can do, however, is write my name in Ma...
Read more