On the Dark Side of Charity

Driving along the familiar roads of Makati, I find that it is almost impossible for one to never see a homeless person begging, literally, on the street; their gray, unwashed hands knocking on windows of cars, their faces pleading for some of your change, and for food that they may eat. It can be heartbreaking sometimes, especially when the beggar is a child.

But in the Philippines, these people are a familiar sight. Poverty is the rule, not the exception. And when I say poverty, I mean knee-deep in the muck kind of poverty, and I can almost mean that literally. Forget about quality of life or even dignity; in a lot of cases, these people just want to survive. And you can see it in some of these homeless people’s faces, their eyes conveying nothing but desperation.

There are con artists to be sure, who simply go out on the streets to beg, acting like they were handicapped or insane, just so they wouldn’t have to do an honest day’s work. But in a country where the poor outnumber the wealthy and the not-so-wealthy in mind-boggling numbers, it is difficult, if not impossible, to distinguish between the two.

Willie Revillame, an extremely popular celebrity in the Philippines especially among the poor, was once under fire for allowing a child named Jan-jan to simulate the dance of a male stripper on his game show. There are several clips all over the internet, and the first thing you would notice is that the child was crying while it was all happening, and that the audience, in a cruel display of heartlessness, was laughing. Revillame, obviously possessing very little empathy, even went so far as to say that he admired the child for doing what he did just so he could help his family. He then gave Jan-jan Php10,000 as a prize for his performance.

When you watch the whole thing, it literally makes you want to throw up. Have our countrymen been ground so low that they would allow their children to do something so obviously horrible just so they can get by? Are TV shows so blinded by the bottom-line that they are willing to subject a child to pointless psychological abuse just so its audiences are entertained? When will we realize that these people who act like champions for the poor are nothing but greedy hypocritical sharks who really do nothing but profit from our less fortunate brethren? When will we realize that instead of helping, these shows cultivate a culture of mendicancy, where instead of being taught to stand on our own two feet, we are made to depend, our arms outstretched, on the alms given by false kings?

In an obvious display of self-righteousness, one that shows his ignorance and malice and worthlessness, Revillame claims that he shouldn’t be criticized for what he did, and that he was only trying to help the poor and that he only wanted to make people happy.

What hypocrisy. As Conrado de Quiros so aptly put it, it is so “odious that he should treat his guests exactly the opposite of the way Degeneres does. It’s utterly distasteful. The beneficiaries in particular are bled dry for every tearful detail of their miserable lives and made to look as though they are the luckiest people in the world to have been the object of the show’s beneficence. The gratefulness is way too sticky, the beneficiaries virtually kissing the hand of Revillame, which isn’t always metaphorical. The cameras do not flinch at this lavish display of emotion but catalogue every moment of it, with no small encouragement from the host. Revillame himself does not bother to distinguish between the show’s beneficence and his own. In fact he makes it a point to encourage the belief—which has been the secret of his success—that he is doing all this out of the goodness of his heart, and out of the depths of his pockets.”

Revillame lives off the myth that he is one of the poor, that he wants nothing but to help them. The irony is that he is a multi-billionaire who generated his wealth at the expense of countless Filipinos’ dignity.

This Way, Not That

I remember when we were in the car, and you were talking about your son, and how you wanted him to be this way and not that. What “this way” or “that” was, you never fully explained, but I remember you emphasizing your point with a flimsy flip of your right hand. And that flip spoke volumes to me, because in that one small gesture, you summarized what it meant to be gay.

And I remember thinking how difficult it must have been for you to even begin to talk to me about this, considering how awfully hard it was for you to even say the word. Instead you flipped your hand again and again, knowing that I would know what you meant, because I knew where you were coming from, and because I knew your son.

Maybe you felt that speaking the words out loud would make them true. And you wanted so much for them not to be.

And I didn’t know what to say, or whether I should lie.

And so I said nothing. I wanted to hold your hand to say that your son would be more than fine, he is a decent, loving, caring human being who would no doubt grow up to become a fine adult, and this, this word you couldn’t even say, it doesn’t matter precisely because it doesn’t matter. In the general scheme of things, it is the least important of the attributes your son has been so blessed to be with.

And I wanted to say that I know that you are only worried about him, because he lives in a world that would no doubt think of him as abnormal, for a small trait that differentiates him from everyone else. And that your worry only underscores your love, but that it doesn’t change the fact that your son would rather have your support because, at the end of day, it is only when he accepts himself, and especially when the people he loves accepts him for who he is, will he be truly happy.

And I wanted to comfort you and tell you that you did not bring your son up wrong, he is a beautiful person, and that he is simply who he was meant to be. You could not have loved him more. 

Instead I remained silent, because, still, I didn’t know what to say, or whether I should lie.

And so we continued traveling, my thoughts a blur, imagining you in your corner, worried about your son in the inadequate and sometimes terrifying world he has to live in.

Photo taken here.

Snapshots: on HIV

The first time I heard of the increase of HIV cases in the Philippines, it was from my friend Manuel. He worked as a researcher for various international organizations as well as the Department of Health. We were in a coffee shop, just hanging out, talking about unimportant things, when he brought it up.

"I don't think I should be telling you this," he said. "It's all still confidential. Well sort of. Actually I don't know. Anyway, I want to tell this to you as a friend because I want to warn you."

"What?"

"Well, there is substantial data coming in that shows an alarming increase in HIV cases this past year."

"How alarming?"

"Very. Before, HIV cases were limited substantially to female sex workers and to heterosexual men who had sex with them. The new cases are coming from men who sleep with men. The most vulnerable people, well, according to the limited information that I know, are those who work in call centers."

"Why?"

"We don't know yet."

"That's scary."

"I know."

***

I was having dinner with my friend Ron when I learned that the Philippine Daily Inquirer ran an article about the increase in HIV cases, where they underscored the fact that most of the new cases came from gay men who worked in call centers. I asked him how he felt, as a gay man who actually worked in the same industry.

"I don't really know how I feel about it," he said. "Well, first, because it's not like I'm having a lot of sex right now. Second, I've always been careful. STDs scare me."

"Does it make you more wary of having sex with people from the same industry?" I asked.

"Not really. Well, maybe. I don't know, I've always been careful," he insisted.

***

We were in photographer Niccolo Cosme's exhibit commemorating World AIDS Day when Wanggo Gallaga came out as a gay man afflicted with HIV. The room was expectedly tense. His voice was clear, though there were moments that I thought it would break. His speech was short, and purposeful. When it ended, there was a moment of silence. The type that seemed so deafening.

Then applause. I looked at my friend Ioanis, who asked me to come with him. There were tears in his eyes. I realized there were some in mine too.

I made it a point to walk up to Wanggo right after to commend him for his bravery.

***

"I think this epidemic, if you can call it that, is almost inevitable really," a friend said to me one day.

"What do you mean?"

"It's like this, we all know that HIV is real, but at the same time, we also felt that HIV wasn't really a problem within the Philippine gay community. At least until now. The number of people who actually practiced safe sex is woefully low. Barebacking is a given. We should have expected this."

"I agree. I think we looked at World AIDS Day as one big party. The literature was there, and the warning signs. We didn't listen I think."

“Here's my theory. I think that before, we've always thought of HIV as a problem foreigners have. Some disease that people in America or Africa get, but never for us here. We were isolated. We felt safe in our cocoon. So we got lazy, and we forgot the danger. Now we're paying the price for our failure and our apathy."

"Well, let's hope the price doesn't get too high."

"Well, yes , but even one case is one case too high."

***

"My roommate's ex just got diagnosed with HIV."

“How did you know?”

“He told me. Besides, word gets around. We’re not exactly a large community.”

“I must admit, this is really starting to scare me.”

“Me too.”

“What can we do?”

“I’m not really sure. All of this just seems so new. It shouldn’t be, but that is how it feels to me. It’s scary.”

Photo taken here.

Coming Out (A Tribute)

When we were children, my younger brother and I never got along. “Like cats and dogs,” everyone said, and it was true. It was mostly my fault, although I blame evolution. Older brothers, it seems, just like tormenting their younger siblings, and I was particularly talented at it.

One summer, our parents enrolled us at tennis lessons. Before going to the courts I told him that he’s not allowed to speak with me, or be within two meters of my immediate vicinity. When he walked up to me sometime later, I told him to go away. He didn’t talk to me for a week.

There are times when I can be particularly nasty. We were having dinner, and he said something I didn’t like. I retorted, “at least I’m not gay,” looked at him, then snickered. His face grew red. He stood up and walked out.

Even as a child everyone knew my younger brother was gay. What talent I had in hiding the little things that betray my desire for the same sex, he seems to have missed out on. Our tutor was particularly cruel, telling me one time that I needed to look out for my brother, because he shouldn’t be allowed to grow up like that. She stressed the last word in the same pinched tone she reserved for rats or cockroaches. You didn’t need to be brilliant to know what she meant.

One night, I was perhaps 15, and my brother was 13, when he walked up to me, eyes teary and red. He told me he wanted to tell me something.

Even then, I knew what it was. And I waited for the expected confession.

“I am gay,” he said. And just like that, he was out. He told me he wanted to tell our parents, and I answered, in that nonchalant way I find so necessary (because I assumed indifference meant strength), that I didn’t care what he decided. It was all up to him.

But that was a lie. Because I did care, in that fundamental way people can care. “I wish I was him,” I thought, but I shot the idea down as soon as it came. “I’m not gay, I’m just confused,” I remind myself.

But I knew in my heart that I was envious of him. Because he was brave in that particular way I couldn’t be at the time. He asked himself the hard questions, and found himself strong enough to answer with the truth. I admired him in a way he has never known.

I love my little brother, though I have never told him that. It is just not said in our family. We love, but we do not speak of it.

So these words I write are a tribute, and a gift. To you, whom I admire, I wish you the best in life.

This is not my story, but sometimes I wish it was.

Initially written for theorg-y. Featured photo taken here.

I Like Dogs But Sometimes I Want to Kill Dog Owners

There was a day, not so long ago, when I found myself walking beside the row of commercial outlets next to my apartment building. I just had dinner, chicken fajitas with a side of salsa, and was pretty content with the world. This cute little boy with a gorgeous father (whose shirt said that he was a jiujitsu master) was distracting me. He was making weird faces, so I made weird faces back.

Then it happened. A soft, squishy sound.

I just stepped on dog poop.

And good lord, not even the hard, normal kind. It was watery and gross and well, just plain yucky. There was so much of it that my flip flops were rendered incapable of shielding my foot. I got crap on some toes.

I wanted to shoot the goddamn bastard who was walking his goddamn dog with an obviously upset goddamn stomach and who wasn’t civilized enough to bring a goddamn bag to pick up his own goddamn dog’s crap.

So I walked back up to my apartment and stopped by the parking area to wash some of the stuff off, fantasizing about ways I could get back at my obviously irresponsible neighbors.

There ought to be a law.

One fantasy involved me picking up the dogshit, heading to the perpetrator’s apartment, knocking on the door, and then saying, as soon as he (or she) opens the door, “Hey neighbor, I just realized you dropped something. Here’s your shit back.” Then I’ll throw it at him.

(I can set it on fire first for a more dramatic, theatrical experience).

Something similar happened again a few weeks ago, when JP and I stepped into our building elevator to head to work. This time a woman with a jittery, nervous smile was wrangling with a small, restless and frustratingly excitable dog, which was running all over the small space.

We didn’t mind them at first, and actually thought the whole thing was adorable, up until the small dog decided he wanted to make the elevator his own personal toilet, and started peeing all over the place. Perhaps it was naïve of me to believe that the woman would take responsibility for her dog’s, well, pee, but she instead just gave a quiet nervous laugh, offered us a small smile, and stepped out of the elevator as soon as she reached her floor. I wanted to throttle her.

We ended up going to work slightly smelling of dog piss.

I didn’t know someone had to actually publicly say this, but guys and girls, here’s the cardinal rule of pet-ownership: pick up after your pets. If you think that’s gross, or you can’t handle the responsibility, then don’t get a pet in the first place. You’re just giving all pet owners a bad name. And you’re making us non-pet owners want to strangle you.

The Pitfalls of Dating the Perfect Guy

Jt is not the easiest person to date, especially if you're the jealous or insecure type (just so we're clear, I'm not). He's good-looking, (very) intelligent, and successful. Seriously, everything I've been looking for in a man, I found in him. And he loves me. What more do I want?

At the risk of sounding ungrateful, there are a few pitfalls to dating the perfect guy:

1. It magnifies all of your own insecurities.

I once told my friend that I just realized Jt is everything I ever dreamed of becoming. First, he's a lawyer (and a very successful one). Second, he's an opinion writer for a popular newspaper. Third, he does freelance writing for art magazines, where he interviews up and coming artists, as well as a few established ones.

Now look at me. First, I'm a law student working my butt off to pass the bar. Second, I have a blog. Third, I do freelance writing for random magazines which would take me.

I'm like Jt redux. The diluted Jt. His sidekick.

I'm not an insecure person in general, but there are moments.

2. Eating out can be a hassle, especially if he stopped telling you he knows people in the restaurant who used to court him.

Here's a typical conversation.

"That was a nice dinner," I would say.

"Yes it was," he'd reply.

"The guy next to us was pretty cute."

Pause.

"What?"

"We dated maybe once or twice."

Repeat.

Then he said, a couple of nights ago, that he didn't tell me there was this guy in this restaurant in Greenbelt that he used to date because I might get jealous. Of course not, I said. Then wondered which one it was, and if he was cuter than me.

3. You don't want him to talk about his exes. Then you do. Then you don't. Then you imagine random guys he probably dated and why he ended up with you.

I was at his apartment when I saw a picture of this very good-lucking guy on his bookshelf.

"Wow. Hot guy," I said.

"Oh that's nothing," he replied.

"Who's he?"

"Someone I dated before."

Eyebrow raised, I swallowed a little bit of my own spit. "And?"

"He moved back to Malaysia."

"What does he do?"

"He's a model."

"Kill me now and stab me in the gut," I thought. I looked at the picture, imagined the guy without his shirt off, and I started to hate myself.

"Oh, that's not a real job," I mentioned offhandedly, if defensively.

He smiled.

Then I thought, "Please, please, please, let him be an idiot. Or else I may have to tell Jt myself he could do better."

I wouldn't exchange Jt for anyone in the world, and I do love him, but we have our moments.

In all fairness, another friend did point out that Jt is 16 years older than me. "That's a pretty decent headstart," he said, and I agreed, but that's probably something I should tell in a different story.

Photo taken here.

Death and High School

The first time I met Allan, we were sophomores. It was also the first time I met Ron, who would eventually become one of my closest friends. That year was a year of many firsts for me, but high school being high school, it wasn’t easy.

Allan was an interesting guy, funny but insecure. Our relationship settled on that gray area between acquaintances and friends; we joked around each other, but we were never close. Ron knew him better, and they shared many intimate details about their lives and dreams.

One memory stands out among the collage of images that form in my head whenever I think of Allan. It was free period, and we were joking in class. We didn’t have a lot of homework, so we were rowdier than usual. Allan walked up to me. I expected the usual banter, so his bullying came as a complete surprise.

“Bading ka ‘no? (You’re gay aren’t you?),” he said, giving my shoulders a little push. I’ve just gone through a growth spurt, so the bullying surprised me on two levels: first, because I thought we were friends; second, because he was a head shorter than me. If it wasn’t so out of the blue, I could’ve kicked his ass.

Instead, I kept my mouth shut. This was a new experience for me, and I had absolutely no idea how to react. How do other people deal with it? I remember Ron once hit a guy because the guy said something Ron didn’t like, and Ron is around two-thirds my size. I wanted to hit Allan, but I felt paralyzed and unsure.

I’ve been hiding in the closet for so many years that the idea that someone may uncover my secret terrified me. And here he was, declaring the truth for all to hear. I wanted to deny it, but I knew it was true, and that I’d only sound insincere. I sucked it up and kept quiet.

The bell rang. I spoke with Ron about the incident, and together we developed several ways to exact revenge. Ron’s more of the physical type, he said he probably would have hit Allan if the latter did that to him. I said I’d rather be subtle, let’s destroy his reputation.

We were only fantasizing really. I don’t doubt Ron would have hit him, but I probably wouldn’t be able to go through destroying Allan’s reputation. It would weigh on my conscience too much. Besides, I had the sinking feeling he was bullying me to impress his friends.

Lunchtime, the same day, Allan went up to me and apologized. I was still with Ron, still cooking up ways to destroy Allan, and here he comes offering an apology. I was angry of course, but I also understood. High school can be hard on those who refuse to go with the tide.

***

We were seniors, and Allan had to repeat a year because he got sick. It was Ron who told me.

“Allan’s dead. He killed himself last night. The last person he spoke to was his sister. He tied a belt around a beam in his room, and hanged himself.”

I didn’t know how to react. More than a year had passed since I last spoke with Allan, so I forgot about him. The lukewarm friendship we shared had easily dissolved into a fading memory. I knew he had a new set of friends now, but I didn’t know anything else. No one was sure why he committed suicide.

Ron asked if he can hitch a ride to the wake. I said yes.

***

The story spread through school as fast as one would expect with news this big. Rumors sprung like mushrooms. “It was because he got caught with X-rated magazines and alcohol during a school retreat,” someone said. “His father beats him up regularly,” a sophomore insisted. “He’s secretly gay,” said another.

The last one struck me, not because it was true, but because I understood why a closeted high school student would want to kill himself. I knew, because I thought about it myself. I know that that part of my life made me who I am today, but actually living that part was a nightmare. Being misunderstood is only fun in hindsight, not when you’re being alienated at that specific point in time when your peers’ approval is as necessary as air, or water.

Someone once said that adolescence is the worst because that’s when you are at your ugliest, in that period where it was the most important thing for you to be your prettiest (or handsomest). It was a joke, but it was also true. My friend Ioanis (who studied in the same high school) told me once that he never understood why I considered myself an outsider.

That’s because I was, I told him. Ioanis had already gone through the process of coming out, and though he lived in the fringes of the high school hierarchy, he had friends there, who knew him and accepted him. My secret forced me in a place similar to the relationship I had with Allan: a gray middle ground that offered few opportunities for real friendship. I was still lucky. I found two.

I wondered what secrets Alan kept. What drove him to that final, desperate act? I remember the boy, always funny, his words always tinged with an unsure quality, and I realized I knew nothing about him at all.

***

We’re at the wake, Ron and I, sitting a few rows away from the coffin. Ron pointed out the father; a short, stocky man in a black Lacoste shirt, eyes red and glistening with unwept tears. We sat for a few moments, unsure what to do. We decided to approach Allan’s dad to offer our condolences.

He was exceedingly gracious, with a voice that was much more composed than what his face belied. He asked if we were Allan’s classmates. I said yes, but didn’t elaborate further. I didn’t think it was appropriate to bring up the fact that his son had to repeat a year.

He reached for this piece of cardboard that stood on the coffin, and showed it to us. Proudly he said it was a poem written by his son, for an English class. It spoke of love, and friendship, and understanding. In that context, a father obviously holding back grief for a dead son, I wanted to weep. Ron was unnaturally quiet. We said it was a nice poem, and sat back down.

Ron was fidgety, and because I couldn’t stand it any longer, I asked him what the matter was.

“You know that poem?” he asked. “I wrote that. I showed it to Allan one time and I never thought about it until now. I can’t believe he passed it off as his own.”

I was stunned by the complete absurdity of the situation. “Well, keep quiet about it. I don’t think now’s the best time to accuse someone’s dead son of plagiarism.” Moments later, I started to find the whole thing funny. “You know what? Think of it as a parting gift. He was our friend after all.”

Photo taken here.

Real Men are Illusions. Macho is the New Gay.

I remember a story my friend Chuck told me that happened in Facebook. He saw a former classmate from high school, and like any decent person who wanted to catch up, decided to add the guy as a friend. A few days later, Chuck received a message.

The message said that the classmate couldn’t add Chuck because the former had developed a“slight homophobia”. Chuck was first shocked, then angry, then mortified. He couldn’t believe that he went out on a limb to give this guy an opportunity to be Facebook “friends” and the guy gave him the electronic equivalent of a slap in the face. So, like any other person addicted to Facebook in the Philippines, he decided to update his status.

“I just added this guy from high school and he said that he can’t add me back because he developed a slight homophobia. I’m regretting the fact that I added him in the first place.”

A wave of sympathetic comments flew in from the “let’s get this guy and destroy him” to the “it’s good you’re being a class act by not going down to his level” type. I even threw in an insult or two. Besides, what is a “slight” homophobia?

(It reminded me of this piece a spoken word poet once performed, lamenting this generation’s lack of conviction when speaking. He said that every idea we posit is really an invitation towards a shared disbelief, and that every sentence we speak is really a question. I thought if the classmate was going to “develop” homophobia, he might as well have the balls to admit that it is definitely more than a “slight” one considering that he just insulted a decent gay man who tried to be polite.)

The number of sympathetic comments wasn’t a surprise, but it got me to thinking (as Carrie Bradshaw would have said): Is our generation moving away from and is in fact consciously rejecting traditional macho culture?

This reminded me of another conversation with my friend Mike. Now, Mike is a gay man, but outside of the fact that he likes Mariah Carey and having sex with his boyfriend, no one can tell he’s gay. That’s because he is a complete slob. (In case he’s reading this, he’s also very very intelligent. Love you Mike! We’re still friends right?) He confessed that he doesn’t take a bath everyday because he thinks it’s a waste of time. His longest run was two weeks, and he was only forced to take one because his roommates could no longer stand how he smelled. In fairness to him, he was suffering from depression then, but the not-taking-a-bath-regularly-thing kind of stuck.

I remember telling him that I used to think he had a gray pallor every time we went out. At first I thought it was a skin condition. I didn’t realize it was a thin coating of dust. I received a rather painful punch on the shoulder for my mouth.

I also told him that we’re already being marginalized for wanting to sleep with men. Why would you want to be gay, and then keep that aspect of traditional macho culture that makes straight men, well, icky? In case people haven’t realized it yet, straight men have been trying to look gay for the past several years (under the guise of the politically-correct term “metrosexuality”). Why be marginalized on both fronts: one, for wanting to sleep with men, and two, for looking like a dirty straight man?

I asked if he was insane. I got another punch in the shoulder.

There was this guy (whose name escapes me at the moment) who decided to jumpstart a movement that was a response to the feminist philosophy. He wanted men to re-take their manhood because he believed that the current cultural and social landscape has emasculated them.

Emasculated them. What a joke. (The first time I read about it, I thought the writer was being satirical.) The whole movement was an ironic WTF blip in the whole of human history. No one could take it seriously. The very concept of a real macho man is isolated, silent, unmoving: a lone wolf. How can they possibly do that as a group? By sharing their feelings of emasculation? Isn’t that what they were trying to stop in the first place; all this touchy-feely stuff? How does that work?

In the (admittedly upscale) school I used to go to, a guy can get teased by his other guy friends because he keeps on wearing pleated slacks. My older brother (who, it may be argued, is too straight, considering the number of girlfriends he had) is even more brand-conscious than I am. I know another guy, not gay, who will kill you if you touch his hair. These all used to be very “gay” characteristics. (In fact, you would have gotten beaten up and bullied for exhibiting them not too long ago.) The former macho men are now encroaching on what used to be regarded as “faggot (bakla)” territory; so much so, that it has actually become unfashionable to look like, well, what we used to call a guy’s guy, a macho man. Acting tough is now a liability: in all probability, people will laugh at you rather than applaud you.

And this general encroachment has had a ripple effect, and is starting to impact other aspects of our culture, particularly where the heteronormative and homosexual perspectives collide/intersect. There are examples now, like that of Chuck’s classmate, where straight men are publicly skewered for declaring homophobic beliefs. It’s still okay to be homophobic, our society says, you just can’t admit it.

(I mean, just look at My Husband’s Lover and how Filipinos have embraced the ideas it espoused and the themes it has embraced. That’s one huge effing leap for mankind.)

This made me realize that the homophobes, ironically, are now in the closet gay men used to occupy. And the idea is the very soul of karmic retribution. The world is moving towards a new direction, and if more gay men bravely step out of the closet, then we’ll have more space to stuff the homophobes in.

Featured photo taken here.

Cowardice

I was 15 in an all boys' school, and really involved in theater. We were going to stage a play that celebrated the 50th year of our school's founding. It was a musical about the life of Saint Marcellin, our patron saint, where at one point the young Marcellin had to rap. It was definitely not striving for realism. As soon as I read the script, I realized it was written by condescending old men who thought they knew what young people wanted. Dump in a few verses of that newfangled rap music, one of them probably said. They love that stuff said the other.

I pitied the poor guy who would be lead. This was going to be embarrassing.

They gave me the part of the father mainly because I was tall and looked the oldest. I also looked straight. It wasn't that big of a leap that I knocked someone up. That the boy turned out to be a saint, yes well, there's the rub.

As preparation, we were subjected to a three day acting, dancing and singing workshop. It was so physically grueling, there were times I wanted to stick a pen in the choreographer's eye. Pleeck your pinggers, he says. Pak you my mind shouts back.

From the get-go, we knew how our group was going to be arranged. We were given two classrooms where we can set up our sleeping bags and clothes. Like sheep, heterosexuals went in one room, homos in the other. The dividing line between the straight and the gay boys couldn't have been any clearer. If you had a lisp, or a limp wrist, you go here; normal kids thattaway. I went with the gays, but not without a warning look from a friend that went in the straight room.

We spent the first night bonding. At some point, someone in our room invited some of the boys in the other room to join us. We spent the night talking about life in general through that particularly unique point of view adolescents have. The straight boys still huddled together, but at least there was a certain openness to the exchange. It felt like a soiree.

The second day was much the same; this time we were making fun of the scarf the choreographer had around his neck. Apparently they decided to make Marcellin Filipino. Good job. Now we were going to be farmers planting in the fields. Farmers who will, at some point, have to rap. Palm, meet forehead.

When night came, I crawled back to our room to sleep, sore and bruised from the countless rehearsals we had to endure. My friend Jimmy told me that a small group was going to the track and field oval to look for ghosts. I begged off, I was too tired.

The last day of the workshop felt like any other day. As usual, I was the last person in the room, everybody was already getting breakfast. Jimmy came up to me and told me that Ms. Bunny, our adviser, wanted everyone to go to another room for a meeting. I brushed my teeth quickly and washed my face, then went after Jimmy who motioned for me to hurry up. Apparently, Ms. Bunny was angry.

I never liked Ms. Bunny. A fresh graduate from a top university, I found her both condescending and falsely modest. She also enjoys having tantrums. I lost track of the number of times she's kicked a chair and walked out on us when she didn't get her way. I told Jimmy I think she's a drama queen.

I went in the classroom and the atmosphere was strangely heavy. My roommates' faces were a shade paler than usual, and they spoke in hushed tones. When I asked Jimmy what happened, he told me he doesn't really know. I knew he was lying.

Ms. Bunny walked in, and in a high-pitched, strangulated voice announced that all the straight boys can leave. I looked at her, then looked at Jimmy. Jimmy refused to look at me. I looked at the others. They still huddled together, but kept quiet. The other group stood up and left. Heart pounding, I joined them.

It was a full half-hour before the meeting in the room ended. All of us who left were waiting in the covered court. I sat quietly in a corner. No one was in any mood to talk. I saw Jimmy and approached him but he motioned for me to remain seated. Ian, who was part of the group inside the room, looked visibly upset and angry. I asked Jimmy what happened.

Apparently the ghost hunting activity segued into something more adolescent (or adult, if you think about it). A few sexual jokes that became dares. Nothing happened, but something almost did. Another guy from that group went to Ms. Bunny the next morning and told her what happened. Ms. Bunny immediately zeroed in on the lisped, limp-wristed ones.

Ian came over. He could barely keep his temper in check. I wasn't even part of the group that went to the oval, he said. How dare she. How dare she.

I listened to him rant. I felt something squeeze my chest, which I first couldn't understand. Then I realized I wasn't angry, I was guilty. I knew, and instead of standing with my own, I left. I was sure Hell reserved a special place for traitors.

And so I let him rant. In my cowardice, or precisely because of my cowardice, I shared in his outrage.

Photo taken here.