Pulao Fiesta
20th February 2006
Pulao, the barangay where I teach, had it's annual fiesta
recently. Let's get the formal stuff out the way first.
It had a Queen. She was pretty.
It had Princesses. They were
jealous.
It had speeches. They were long.
It was very similar to the Tabucan
Fiesta.
Things that I found interesting include:
The Dances
Pulao Elementary School played a big part in the Fiesta. Mam
Thercy was one of the Master of Ceremonies, and the
kids performed all the formal dances.
They were taught the dances by a guy called Pong.
Pong is as gay as the day is long and I'm sure he could put a lisp in
the word "wheelbarrow". He has more cleavage than
most supermodels. I'm unsure how he actually got his
cleavage. It may have been via hormones or via some tissues
stuffed down his bra. I was too embarrassed to ask and wasn't
sneaky enough to take a peek.
Pong spent many hours with the kids teaching
them the dances. I thanked him afterwards, which was more
difficult than it sounds. I was unsure whether to say
"He" or "She", or call him Amiga (friend who is a
girl), or Amigo (friend who is a guy). A good guy/girl
nevertheless.
The practices were done during class time, which was very annoying as
I often had half the class get up and leave so that they could practice.
At one point I had six students left in a class of 33. The most
annoying point was when half my class left to practice the Big
Brother dance. Everybody here knows the Big Brother
dance. It is done to death. It is a very important that I
teach the kids at the moment as their final exams are about two weeks
away. The order of importance seems to be:
Dance the Big Brother Dance > Pass Math Exam
This is what I think of the Big Brother
Dance.
The Junior Basketball Tournament
Most of the guys in my Grade 4, 5 and 6 have been involved in a
basketball tournament for a number of weeks. They kept asking me
to come watch a game, but for some reason-a-rather, I've never been able to
attend one. I did manage to watch the semi-finals and the finals
over the weekend though which was great, and I know the kids just loved
me being there.
The final was contested between Bugnay and The Green Team*.
Bugnay were the heavy favorites to win. While they were obviously
not "rich", they still appeared to be the better funded
team. Their uniforms all matched and they
all wore sports shoes. The Green Team on the other hand had many missed
matched uniforms.
Bugnay was also a lot bigger, which is a big advantage in
basketball. John Paul is a very big
twelve year old. His sheer size, strength and skill allowed him to
dominate large portions of the game. The Green Team had the better
team work though, and this allowed them to keep in touch.
The Green Team eventually won by two points. The winning goal
was scored by a little guy just before the final buzzer went. He'd
done nothing for practically the whole game, but managed to steal the
game for his team.
I really enjoyed watching the game. It was a good example of
the little guys winning and a Champion Team beating a Team of Champions.
A special mention has to go to Leo Cabrera
though, who played exceptionally well for the Green Team. He
wasn't nearly as big as John Paul, but his
skill level was exceptional. He made plays that he shouldn't of
been able to, and shot hoops that a much older kid would of been proud
of. A real team player too. I really love this photo.
It shows Leo being surrounded by the entire other team, and still making
his way out. Leo won the MVP award for the tournament, which I was
just stoked about. Leo is also one of the cleverest kids in Grade
5 and a really nice kid too.
Being a Karaoke Superstar
I underestimated how popular Karaoke is here in the
Philippines. I had this stereotype in my mind of sad lonely Asian
businessman belting out Celine Dion tunes at the top of their lungs.
This is only a small part of the story. Just about everybody sings
Karaoke here. Unemployed laborers, housewives, hardened street
thugs, mayors, captains. Everybody.
Most of the houses in my "middle-class" suburb have
Video CD players that play Karaoke songs. Another volunteer swears
that they saw a karaoke player in the slums of Manila.
Most of the other volunteers are quite shy about singing some
karaoke, but I'm the complete opposite. I lurv singing
karaoke. I play to crowds quite well, which helps a lot.
Most people sit down to sing in the Philippines, but I get up and
groove.
There was a small karaoke bar set up at the Pulao Fiesta. The
kids that I was wandering with asked me to sing some songs, so I paid my
five pesos and belted out versions of:
I danced and pranced around and hit the big
notes, much to the amusement of the drunk guys who were
watching. There was lots of high fives and clapping after each of
my songs. The Karaoke machine only gave me a 96 out of 100, which
is a pretty average score. Boo!
I usually tell people that I can't sing (which is true), but I really
like singing Karaoke.
Gay Roulette
The fiesta also featured lotsa Easter Show style games.
All of them involved betting of some sort. They were all even odd
games, so they weren't illegal.
For some reason they were all run by gay people.
My favorite was the bingo, with its "Modern" Electric Bingo
Board, which was a grid of lights that were turned on my throwing
balls into a grid of switches. Very cool.
The bingo cost one peso a pop, and the winner got everyone else's
pesos. I paid for the flock of school kids that was following me
around as well. We all had a lot of fun.
Mam Thercy (a teacher of Pulao), seemed to
clean up big time at the block game.
Hanging With The Kids
The fiesta was very formal. Lotsa speeches and that sort of
thing. As we arrived we were shown to our official seats from
which we could watch proceedings. After a while though, I got a
bit bored and found myself hanging out backstage with the kids from
Pulao. This was a lot more enjoyable than the formal stuff.
* I can't remember their name, so Green Team will
have to to.
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2005 and 2006 Malcolm Trevena.
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