The Cafe of Memories

Dumaguete, Philippines

Against my will, I was assigned to Dumaguete in 2002 as a medical representative or territory manager, which ever term suits my eternally broken ego.  I joined the pharmaceutical industry hoping to enjoy the benefits of a new Toyota Corolla company car, corporate attire and serving the high falluting hospitals in Manila.  Instead, they sent me to the sleepy community of Dumaguete where national hero Dr. Jose Rizal himself was deported for subversion.  Well, that’s what I thought.  Dumaguete was a quiet community but its Siliman University gave it an interesting environment.  The students were pretty and fabulous in their own ways.  They came from different interesting cities like Cebu, Bacolod, Cagayan de Oro, Davao, Zamboanga and Cavite.  In fact, Miss Siliman was the most charming girl I’ve every seen.  Only that everybody thought she was a bitch.

Among my favorite places was the Cafe Memento, where I took the name of my Multiply website.  It was very rustic, a hole in a wall even, but intrinsically decorated with Spanish-Filipino art.  The owner was a Kastilaloy himself.  His father I would have combat drinking on certain nights together with his Kastilaloy buddies who looked like Bin Laden and someone else respectively.  Cafe Memento was located in a quiet street fronting the magnificent Siliman University and the ocean.  You could hear the splash of waves from there.

Cafe Memento is the cafe of memories.  Someday I will go back there and reminiscence the beauty of what once was a life I didn’t expect.

Saluda Dumaguete!

 

Originally written on Casa de Mementos (http://joshavinante.multiply.com)

February 10, 2009

 

Surrounded by Fallen Leaves

I always thought that women who flirted with part-time message handlers were fugly. Well, this one wasn’t. There she was clad in her white Pre-Med student uniform and standing between two ladies – a rose amongst thorns. Too good to be true.

It was an ordinary day when I set the eyeball date. The campus was a romantic place with all its Romanesque architecture and gardens. One attraction was the statue of the Querubin which was said to be the patron saint of homosexuals. The thought was rather disturbing but there was just the two of us surrounded by fallen leaves, scintillating silence and mystique of the lone statue. I could still remember the feeling.

Act 1:

Oh, did I mention that she had a boyfriend? Yes, she did. She said that she misses him. I could still remember the cheerless expression on her face. The thought of it was sad but not tragic. It was too early to fall head over heels. At this point, the excitement of courtship was all that mattered. In a few more days of dating, I forgot that the car I was driving her with was color coded, that is the vehicle was against curfew for the day until 7pm due to the last digit of my plate number . Far ahead were the figures of four sloppy looking clowns (a.k.a. MMDA Traffic Enforcers). They haven’t seen us so I had time to turn right and pretend to be parked in some corner of Kalayaan Street. A flyover made the area poorly illuminated. There was hardly anyone. She bit my right arm in a flirtatious way. I didn’t do anything about it. We just talked. One night, in the middle of one of our nightly telebabad (telephone conversation until the wee hours of the morning), she said it was over between her and the boyfriend. I didn’t take that as a sign either.

Act 2:

My memory is fuzzy but I think it was a break from the career dumps that ended our story. The new direction introduced me to new friends and routines. I spent less on phone conversations and ice cream dates and more on clubbing and staying out late. We simply lost the connection, just like that. Poof! Some months later, I remembered to call her up and say hello. Actually, I kind of missed her. Her answer was an evil laugh and said she had gotten back together with the boyfriend. For some reason, that laugh failed to inspire myself to rekindle an old friendship.

Act 3:

Some years passed and reached my late 20s without even noticing. I was emotionally more mature, email had become available to everyone and Friendster (before Facebook) had just been born. Consequently, she was among old friends I wanted to dig up. I could still remember that first email conversation.

Josh: Well, well, well! Look who we have here. =) You don’t seem to have changed, still charming as usual. How are you?

Cons: Well, some things do change. I’m getting married in a few days.

Originally written on 8.14.2008