THAT BURNING QUESTION

Last Thursday I went to Sm to return the pants that didn’t fit me. First off I was lucky that it didn’t fit because now I have an excuse to exchange the pants into something that I really wanted in t he first place. TOYS! MARVEL TOYS!Unfortunately there wasn’t any GHOST RIDER OR THOR left and it’s just those sissy IRON man blue variants. YUCK! Ok! I’LL JUST GET ONE FOR THE SAKE OF COMPLETION. Then I got SELINA a CAPTAIN AMERICA.

Strangely shes always playing with my CAPTAIN AMERICA and kept banging up the blister pack. I assume she likes cap because she would often see me playing with it and singing

WHEN CAPTAIN AMERICA THROWS HIS MIGHTY SHIELD! DUNDUHN!
WHOEVER GETS HIT ON THE HEAD MUST SURELY YIELD!!!!! DUNDUN!
THE RED AND THE WHITE AND THE BLUE AND THE RED AND THE BLUE
COMES TRUE… WHEN CAPTAIN AMERICA THROWS HIS MIGHTY SHIELD!

She’d double up and laugh with glee and then smash the blister pack against the wall.

Sigh…

Now she can bang this up. Or we could even play with our two Captain Americas. She already dismembered my TETSUO DOLL. The one that cost 1,200. Cute tyke.

As I came into the compound. I saw smoke coming out from the bathroom window of our neighbor. A bunch of the other neighbors were looking and pointing on it.

Suddenly my heart leapt.

The other neighbors were just gawking and pointing at the smoke.

NEIGHBOR 1: “ You think I should knock and ask them what’s happening? “

FLIM: “ You better! “

He then walks up the door and knocks with the diminutive strength of a nerd who is picking up his date for the very first time.

FLIM: “THE FUCK! YOU KNOCK LIKE A GIRL! THEY WONT HEAR THAT!”

NEIGHBOR 2:” I DON’T WANT TO WAKE THEM UP OR ANYTHING…”

FLIM: “ MOVE ASIDE!LET A VETERAN DO THIS!”

I then slam three heavy ones!

FLIM: “Open up! There’s smoke in your bathroom!”

After a few seconds. I then pushed the windowsill opened and drew the curtains aside.

I saw the kettle pot engulfed with smoke. Its huge tail trailing upwards into the ceiling and into the second floor. Its head poking out from the bathroom window. The maid was sleeping on the couch with saliva trickling on her mouth.

FLIM: “WAKE UP YOU BITCH! YOU’RE BURNING THE HOUSE DOWN! “

She scratches her groin and continues to snore.

FLIM: “ GAGA! GUMISING KA! NASUSUNOG NA ANG BAHAY! “

She then flutters her eyelid like some ageing beauty queen and then looks around and starts screaming and yelling. She then runs to the pot and closes it. Moments later the other tenants come out coughing and sneezing. The maid looks at me balefully.

STUPID CUNT! Shed burn down everything because she was snoozing.Cecile comes out and then inquires as to what happened.

NEIGHBOR 2:” It was my kid who saw it first! If he didn’t see it then the fire would have spread.”

I just love people who suddenly spring forth to claim the victory laurel in a race they didn’t participate in.

FLIM: “ YEAH. YEAH YEAH! I’ll send you a coupon.”

I have been unlucky enough to witness 3 aborted would be fires. The second one was with my father’s own tenant block. He had a tenant who was cooking something and then left to go watch a movie.

FLASHBACK

Again there was black smoke coming from the doorway this time. When I saw it there was a couple of maids just looking at it and wondering what they should do.

MAID 1: “ Should we knock? “

FLIM: “ No time for that Just break the glass! “

MAID: “ But the tenants would get mad! “

FLIM: “ We own the building! JUST BREAK THE GLASS!”

MAID: “I don’t want to do that. Lets just wait for the owners to come.”

FLIM: “ Is that a real diamond? “

MAID looks at the ring on her finger.

MAID: “ Oh this…its

She offered her hand and I grabbed it and used both our hands to smash the glass thru.

MAID: “ HOY YOU TRICKED ME! “

I ran upstairs and found the rice pot. The rice contents burnt beyond recognition. But the room was already filled with smoke.

We closed the gas stove and let the bad air out.I sat down the street curb and waited for the tenants to arrive.

They came in an hour later.

FLIM: “ Where did you go? “

TENANT: “ we watched a movie. It was really funny.”

FLIM: “ THE REAL FUNNY THING IS THAT I DON’T LIGHT YOU UP AND POST YOU ON THE WALL! YOU STUPID CUNT! YOU NEARLY BURNT MY FATHER’S APARTMENTS! “

TENANT: “ Don’t talk to me like that…I…………wait….. I was cooking the rice right? “

She then ran up. She started screaming about the broken glass on the door. And who would pay for it. The maids looked at me and I just smiled and did funny circles on the head motions with my fingers.

The thing that really grabs me during instances like this is the inability of those present to think or even act fast. They gather around and then do small talk and wonder. They end up speculating as to what to do while precious minutes go by and the house eventually goes up in smoke.

And I wondered how humanity as a specie could survive this long with a mentality like that. Probably it’s a Filipino thing. You know bunching out into the streets to look and marvel, buying peanuts and drinks while out there.

The Americans would call up WILLIAM SHATNER.

THE JAPANESE would just run for their lives and scream, “ GOJIRA! “

The Indians would break down the door and sit inside while meditating.

My Uncle had an apartment building that went up in smoke a few years ago. It was a sad thing. He was raking it in with nine doors at 12,000 a pop. Then in just one night he lost everything. The culprit was again, A TENANT. But this time it wasn’t an overlooked rice pot or a water heater. THIS TIME IT WAS A KID.

This tenant was taking care of a kid that was his sisters from a MIDDLE EASTERN MAN. This kid was so naughty that he destroys everything that he gets his black skinned hands on. He destroyed my brother’s kid’s bicycle and our Christmas electric décor way back then.

He was a total pest.

So sometime in JUNE, I Guess. They locked him up in the house so that they can fetch their other kid.

This thing started playing with something electrical and then POOFF! Unfortunately I wasn’t there and so were any of us. Our entire clan went to Laguna to check the ancestral properties that were up for sale. They arrived when the apartments were already burning. I arrived when the smoke was being put out.

It’s a good thing we didn’t see the kid or we would have torn him to pieces.

In retrospect I don’t blame him. He was just fulfilling his genetic destiny. After all he is partly MIDDLE EASTERN. He might even be a sleeper agent. And MY UNCLES APARTMENT FIRE, An AL QUAIDA TEST RUN FOR BIGGER THINGS.

So my Tito Gie lost almost 80 percent of his apartments. And these were not just apartments. They were time capsules of the 60s.He made it in 62. He used some of the timbers that he got when he had to dismantle parts of the ancestral house where the apartments were erected. They were so well maintained that when visitors would come in they were wowed over the fact that it looked like a period piece studio.

DAMN THAT MIDDLE EASTERN BASTARD!

Two years later after the fire , Tito Gie erected three new apartments. He entrusted the construction to one of the relatives of his wife. He did a slip-shod job and instead of nice looking new ones he got tacky and badly designed shit holes. Nothing could replace the originals

DAMN DOUBLE DAMNED THAT LITTLE ARABIC SHITHEAD!

Now there’s this huge vacant lot of burned wood and broken down cement walls that we call THE DESOLATION OF PERSIA. Currently Im using it for filming. I guess one man’s misfortune is another man’s film set.