mallrat
March 25, 2001 4:54 am

My brother and I were planning (I'll explain that bit about were in the words to come) to go to Virra Mall to get the computer fixed, so he phoned me at 8 in the morning to get the system ready, which was a stupid move on his part because any hour before 10am is never when my best side shows up.

So I stumble out of bed crawl over to the computer and strip every single COM port and connector, male or female of stringie appendages and promptly go back to sleep. I eventually got up at about 12, just in time for my "morning" lunch. All this early preparation was for naught, since we left at 2 p.m. anyway.

The brilliant plan my brother laid out was this: Since he has to play violin for the graduation ceremonies at De La Salle Zobel (which we were both students of) and he drops me off at Town Center to bum around and amuse myself while waiting for him. I was initially suspect, because I've never heard of a graduation ceremony that lasted two hours. But he promised to keep me posted... which he didn't, the fricking bastard.

So what did I do? Well, other than getting fumed for keeping me waiting for about four hours and contemplating the ability of his bodily orifices to hold gaming controllers, I basically ached my legs out wandering around doing nothing but talking to clerks, mall security and sanitation engineers.

On the other hand, I did run into plenty of people.

For starters, I ran into some La Salle chums, Jusuf Arribas and Benjamin "Dino" Bernardo. It was amusing to hear myself talk in a manner more whitewashed than imaginable five years ago, as well as noticing the disparity of how much change that's taken place in me and how little change has taken place in them.

Jusuf is a Muslim rocker who i used to hang out with during my nomad years, and he's still confused and aimless. Not that I'm significanty certain of my destiny, but that's not the point. 

Dino on the other hand, was a professional geek who also happens to be my cousin by virtue of being the son of my mom's cousin. I'm not sure what he is now, since conversation didn't drop me anything on what he does now. What sufficed for them was to let me know that they've enshrined themselves in the culture of doing nothing. "I'm in Ateneo and I just hang around in Ateneo," remarked Dino. As for what Jusuf does, "Wala."

I was tempted to watch a really stupid movie with them, but I passed because I wasn't terribly thrilled with the prospect of catching a Jamie Foxx flick, and because my mind told me that I shouldn't be occupied with anything cause "your brother might pick you up any second now.". Right. Well, that, and I didn't want to spend a hundred quid on the newly scaled up cinemas.

I also ran into Cris Tanpinco, a semi-regular groupie of a circle of friends of mine that is heavily populated by Southridgean Aquarians. 'Cept she has a life beyond them. She's really more the friend of Hannah, the girlfriend of another friend, Ben, who is a pseudo-protege of Pao's. Hannah is also the sister of the girlfriend of Goey, my former best friend who played in the same band as Ben. Oooh, we're all so connected. It's like we're a family, only some of the kids are having sex with each other. Now why am I thinking about V.C. Andrews' Flowers in the Attic?

The last time i talked to her was at a gig at Laguna, and I'm glad to have run into her today because she's better conversation than I thought she was at that gig. Which was terribly unaccomodating for conversation, I should add, so it's no fault of hers at all. She ran into me at Powerbooks as I was making a beeline for the magazine rack. Partly to say hi to that weird emaciated hair colored freak, and partly because she forgot her money at home and needed some for a pack of cigarettes.

So we spent a significant amount of time walking to the supermart to get said cigarettes (and a soda for me) and return to the courtyard to wait for her car. The small talk was interesting and although there was nothing to write home about, I'm glad to have had her company for that small frame of time.

I also ran into some acquaintances from the university. Robbie Joseph, a recurring thespian of sorts who is an animation student and obssessive gamer. He's met both my siblings through Fame, where my sister played Coco Diaz. I initially didn't like him very much, but we get along better now. I think this has happened because his perception of me may have improved by association with my siblings.

CORNER OF CULTURE CONSUMPTION
WRITTEN: Doom: Endgame by Dafydd ab Hugh and Brad Linaweaver
ANIMATED: Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (dir. by Walt Disney)
CODED: Squaresoft's Chrono Cross and Bushido Blade 2 for the Sony Playstation. I also clocked in a cathartic hour of Quake III: Team Arena. I was third place in kills. That nightmare bot was a pain in the rectum.