“Just”

This morning, I hopped on an fx to run down to Ortigas for a work-date with R. I managed to grab one taking a U-turn on the road leading to our subd., so it was pretty much empty and we only picked up two other passengers before we got to Floodway. (Not the place in …

Mind the Gap

by Esther Elizabeth Suson Tinikling  music is one of the most danceable pieces ever written. It has that classic tan-TAN-TAN tan-TAN-TAN beat shared with the waltz, and any Filipino who's ever seen the tinikling danced knows just how compellingly catchy it is. As I was riding the BGC bus, they began to play the tinikling music over …

Luisita Starbucks Staff: Never Off-duty

During the Eidl Fitr long weekend, a cousin treated us, her generational-level relatives, to Starbucks at Luisita, Tarlac. We were there to just grab coffee and go, since the grown-ups had already gone on ahead to the house. When we were exiting the shop, our cousin turned and went back to get more paper napkins at …

Phantom Drumbeats

by Esther Elizabeth Suson As our fx passed over the bridge going to the Tramo stop (moving away from Antipolo), the world was bright with ten-in-the-morning full-glare sun. It threw every point of the outside into blazing clarity, like a picture springing into high definition. I was glancing out the left-hand window from the middle-seat, watching …

Brawler’s Knuckles and Hands that Know Their Place

by Esther Suson This turned out to be a sort-of sequel to one of my previous posts. As my readers know, the majority of my recent posts have turned out to be about commuting in Metro Manila, but few of them are connected. The fx I rode was exactly the same as the one in that …

Of Kindness, Generosity, and Wandering Pinkies

by Esther Suson As I mentioned in an earlier post, sitting in the front seat of an fx means you either get the best seat in the world, or something like the worst. If you're against the window, most of the time, it's comfortable and there's not much to worry about (plus, you get most …

Framed and Stuck in a Box: Smokers and Secret Agents

by Esther Suson [I have an earlier post, Framed and Stuck in a Box, which talks about how I save actual scenes that I see for possible story scenarios. Therefore instead of simply Snapshots, these are ideas that appeal to me for stories.] It's only one block from the fx stop to university, marked by …