Online

Entertainment talk shows and variety shows are a staple in the Philippines. If you watch any of these shows, you would notice that they all share one distinct feature that is uniquely Filipino. I’m not talking about the high class circus acts where the performing animals belong to the highest level in the animal kingdom and who are uniformly inclined towards airing out their privies, eating habits, mating practices and prey decapitation techniques. I’m talking about the part where the hosts shove Kleenex to a bawling guest who just lost her husband to a plump Lolita as a way of discreetly telling her to get a life so they can move on to thank their sponsors.

I don’t have the figures to prove my point. I have no doubt though that many of my countrymen will agree that we Filipinos are notorious for being extremely proud of our racial heritage. The mere suggestion of an insult directed to anything Filipino would be enough to raise an uproar of such cataclysmic proportions that the poor hapless critic can soon expect to equate his life with standing naked under a hail storm.

This is why I now wonder what fellow Filipinos think of the country’s description in Uncyclopedia. For those who have no idea what the site is about, just imagine Wikipedia on a perpetual drinking spree with psychotropic drugs on the side. The result is an acidic, witty and impertinent view of everything under the sun and beyond it. You might even find it humorous if you’re not in it.

As expected a number of online Filipinos who do not appreciate satire have decided to miss the point altogether and react on the Philippine article. I am not qualified to have any kind of reaction because my own acidic tastes will not permit objectivity and will equally suggest impudence. It would be interesting to know though what other Filipinos within my circle think of the site and our article.

All right, maybe it does hurt my sense of national pride a bit but only because the article holds some grains of truth. Isn’t it partly true that a boxer is becoming more celebrated than the national hero, that more people are singing Boom Tarat-Tarat than the national anthem and that we are under the rule of a half Ewok?

Read and think about it.

My favorite Filipino cartoonist Pol Medina, Jr. mentioned something in his tenth anniversary book issue of Pugad Baboy that struck a chord. He said it took him ten years to learn to really love what he was doing as a cartoonist. I can honestly say that I know how he felt.

I never wanted to be a writer. It just so happened that every single job I got gave me a boss who required me to moonlight as a writer on top of my major work load. It was as if the art of writing was hounding me and would not give me peace until I had dipped my pen in an inkwell and drank my daily gallon of coffee. It’s not that I hate writing. It’s just that I don’t like it as a job as much as talking volumes in a seminar, hiring and firing people and draining my brains dry in labor disputes. So what am I doing here in a new job where I have to sit for most of the day writing numerous articles that are so long that War and Peace is considered comparatively short? Gee, I don’t know. It’s either I want to punish myself in reparation for my sins or writing is growing on me like fungi.

I don’t think I’ll ever be as good as any of those Carlos Palanca awardees who write so well that anyone who reads their works ends up thinking he’s stupid. I think though that I have finally accepted my lot in life. I will always be a writer and people will always expect me to write.

This is probably why I have decided to use my skills while waiting for a better opportunity to once more strike terror in the hearts of job applicants and employees. Seriously, a group has kindly offered to take me in so I can feed them literary fodder of my own concoction that even my own mother probably wouldn’t like to read.

Yes, I have yet again broken a personal rule. I have shoved my arms deep in the bowels of Friendster and decided to call a truce. If you know me, you would also know that I loathe Friendster and have waged a war against it since the irreverent virtual web gave birth to it. I am however solely in it for the group bolpen@kape and my handful of other friends that I can literally count in one hand. The members of this group are thankfully not literary titans who could eat me whole like a fetus. I take comfort in the fact that I at least have some borderline normal people I share something in common with. Just like me, they are also prey to the hounds of writing and the allure of coffee. We will not have any peace until we take up a pen (or laptop) and scribble (while drinking coffee).

That’s our table over there (although it does look a little too peaceful to be a writer’s table). If you want to own that table too, check out bolpen@kape.

It’s been five months since I first began as a home based web content writer. I must say that it has done me a whole lot of good. I have finally fulfilled my life long dream of becoming a hermit.

From my makeshift office that’s probably smaller than Paris Hilton’s closet, I have little to amuse me in between exercising my fingers sore. Everyday, I grow perilously close to attracting cobwebs in my stationary position and becoming a cellulite infested, halitosis prone social retard. It’s a great wonder that I haven’t been seeing my dead relatives outside my window yet.

Nonetheless, there are still advantages to being an online writer. At least now I know that a muscle car is not a cleaning agent brand; that diabetes can kill you with a heart attack; that dogs can’t eat chocolate; and that there are more screwed super stars than just Lohan, Spears and Hilton.

Yeah, I have just matured into an introverted walking encyclopedia who can practically rattle off to my imaginary friends about anything under the sun.

Blogging is modern exhibitionism. Having your thoughts flashed in a free for all system is just like walking naked in the midday sun. Lady Godiva had long locks, a horse and social activism to cover a similar act up. Bloggers only have supposed anonymity that is as virtual as the digital reality we all thrive in. The more daring among us don’t want to hide anything at all.

If we are exhibitionists, would that make modern peeping toms voyeurs? I suppose so, although there is absolutely nothing wrong with taking a look at specimens who willingly subject themselves to either social scrutiny or admiration.

To be honest there’s nothing more exhilirating than traipsing naked around the internet and watching others do the same thing. It probably beats skydiving all the time.