This Is How My Day Ended

I was filling my stomach with stuffs as we crossed the old Mactan bridge. We were laughing at my misfortune and at the possibility of me jumping off the bridge had it not been for the help of Josy and Irene. Sunstar's headline could read: "Vagabond jumps off Mactan bridge after losing wallet, mind." Terrible! Terrible! My 15 minutes of fame is way too late!

My mouth was full, my heart light and my hands were busy taking pictures.







I checked in two hours before my scheduled flight. Hurray! I was surprised to see the pre-departure area full of passengers. When I finally settled myself into a vacant chair, I immediately started reading "Night" by Elie Wiesel. I was half-way through reading the preface when a woman started shouting at the airline personnel. Another one stood up and joined the woman. And then another and another until they all looked like lawmakers debating on some legislation. Everyone spoke english sounding stupid with their local accent. I would have wanted to join them and slap them one by one with my book. The abundance of name-dropping was enough to make my stomach turn and sent me back to reading Elie Wiesel.

It turned out that their flight was scheduled at 11am and at 5pm they still don't have any idea whether or not they can fly home to Zamboanga within the day. If I were in their shoes I'm sure I'd be speaking not only English but French, Mandarin, Nippongo and God knows what that comes to me (I don't know any of those languages I enumerated, for the record).

Then, I think I got what I wished for. Soon enough talks started to circulate that our flight was rescheduled to 8:30pm. When a voice from the paging system confirmed the talks I immediately informed my friend who was to meet me at the airport in Manila. I would have wanted to start lambasting the airline personnel with my foreign tongue when free dinner was served to us. I shut up, sat down and ate. The meal was free and was on time. What can I do?

After more than an hour of talking with Elie Wiesel, a now familiar voice from the speaker spoke again: our flight was moved anew to 10:30pm. Great! No amount of food can make me shut up this time. I went to the supervisor and asked (diplomatically) that my trip be rescheduled the following day. In consideration of a friend who was to take the bar examinations the following day, I could not possibly make him meet me at the airport at 11:30 in the evening!

When my travel mate called to check on me, she was surprised to know that I was still in the beautiful island of Cebu. She was all smiles as she stopped by the airport to pick me up.

Back at the Mactan bridge, we were laughing at how my day went and wondered how it's going to end. Actually, it ended late at my travel mate's condo.