MRT Musings

Went to the press to deliver some Final Artwork for a raket I have. It’s located along JP Rizal, and subtly eases my homesickness, as it is situated corner Pateros street, and the street before that is Taguig street naman. While riding back on a Tulay Ibabaw jeep, I passed along a bunch of jeeps parked beside the road with the drivers resting, socializing with each other, but with the exception of one. This one driver dude was dancing a jig, which the nearest description would be the watusi crossed with the chicken dance and the dance the old ladies do on a prusisyon with a popular Virgin Mary incarnation. He was enjoying it as I saw a smile in his face.


While on the crowded MRT naman going toShang, a young dude had that radio sounding voice of “Enemy sighted” in Counterstrike as his text message sound alert. I was tempted to ask him: “Pre’, ano kaba, Counter o Terrorist?”

At the MRT ride before that naman papuntang Tulay, there was this South American, burly built, and mestiso looking Foreigner wearing a coffee colored polo barong. He was talking to a middle aged woman who looked like his missionary companion. He caught my attention when I heard this foreign sounding voice whose sentences were peppered with the word “dollars.” Yeah, for some reason the word “dollars” kept popping up, and it definitely made a lot of people turn their heads and see where it was coming from. I for one thought it was a PA advertisement of some pyramid scheme. I was even waiting for that “but wait! There’s more!” portion. He was unique since besides the attire I’ve earlier mentioned, he was wearing a baseball cap with a drag race fire motif along with this Flag of what probably was his country. Hindi siya familiar, pero it also had the same color scheme of the cap, black and red.

So the MRT was this guy’s stage, and the woman his attentive audience. Meron naman dalawang babae at isang lalake na nagkukumpitensiya sa kaniya sa kwentuhan. When we arrived at the EDSA-Shaw station, the woman was fixing her bag and was preparing to get off. He was telling her to take care and saying thanks for the company. She was busy putting something in her handbag, and I noticed that the foreigner’s hands were also trying to put something in it which she was trying to stop. An awkward scene of two pairs of hands struggling inside a handicraft hand bag. In the end he prevailed, dropping what seems to be a roll of money inside. He punctuated this act with a last thank you, and with that, she stood up. To my surprise, she bid farewell to this group seated across them.. It turns out they were all together, and the other group bid her farewell too. I was waiting for this other group to fill the void the woman left vacant with regards to conversation. But no. The foreigner just sat there, mum. Occasionally looking at the group who kept on talking, not inviting the foreigner to what they were talking about.

Jordan
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