Bullet-proof

My officemate, AP, is in Manila this week on a 4day/3night vacation via Air-Asia. They were able to book the "zero-airfare" tickets last December so they were raring to go for the trip ---then came the attempted coup on Feb.24. To this he asked,

"Do you think it's safe for us to continue with our trip?"

AP is one of the cool guys in our office. Shaven-head, always wears black outfits, sporting a moustache a la Color Me Badd, he's a tall guy who's claim to fame was having survived a freak motorcycle accident and has lived to tell the tale. We'd always have these brief conversations on life and office-life. Throughout the day you could see a calmness radiating from him, uncaring about the stresses in life ---except for this trip that he will face.

“Yes I think it should be ok. Let me lend you my bullet-proof vest when I get back from lunch,” I said jokingly.

Since the Feb.24 incident most of the fellas here have been asking me how is the Philippines going, or to be more specific,

"How is Prisidint Arruyu?”

To which I would just sigh, “Oh it’s normal.”

“What is happening there exactly?”

Forgive me for my lack of knowledge of Philippine-politics, but this was how I answered them:

“In the Philippines, whoever controls the military controls the country. Seeing that the country is progressing (in terms of Peso-Dollar exchange rate), these sore losers during the last elections have decided to bribe some generals to lead their men in staging a coup against Arroyo. Well, of course, the head of the military didn’t like the coaxing of one lieutenant asking him to join their rebellion so the coup was thwarted. Arroyo had no other choice but to proclaim a state of emergency to calm things down.”

(Yes, my views are different from yours. Go build yourself a blog if you don’t like it.)

Anyway, AP arrived in Manila today and I asked him how things were. Here’s his sms:

“Hi bro. It’s a lovely country. The people are so warm n welcoming. What do you think of a visit to the [Taal] volcano? The taxi ride here is quite expensive.”

Well their guide is asking them for a “warm n welcoming” price of P7,000 for the trip to Taal volcano. Too expensive I said. Better go to the Tagaytay Picnic Grove and admire the volcano from there. Just in case it erupts, you’ll have enough lead-time to run.

Tomorrow evening he and his girlfriend are having dinner at the Boardwalk in Roxas Blvd. So if you happen to be there and see a tall, bald guy wearing black, tell him that I said not to forget to zip up the bullet-proof vests I handed him last week...

...and of course, don't forget my box of Goya Flat-Tops.