Filed under: All That Jazz!
It was an almost rainy afternoon. I rushed out of our house, headed to the terminal, prayed to the Almighty that the bus’s every seat will be filled easily and the driver not to make every meter a loading area. I got off the bus, walked a number of stairs, bought a ticket, ran to get to the first cab of the train and finally reached Ortigas station. Walking under the thatched, wet walkway and having the feeling that I was filming indie with the strum of a blind man’s guitar as a musical score, I arrived at the Galleria, which I have never been to before, and headed immediately to Ministop, our rendezvous. Like a lost child, a good-looking stranger almost tried to help me, but I acted like a civilized woman and looked somewhere else near the area to find my friends. And they said they were near the statue, which I thought by myself was a really big one. Thinking my way where to find my friends in front of the statue, I uttered Mother Mary, help me. And Voila, my friends were there. We tried a taxi to get away from the busy street of Meralco Avenue, but the persistent Galleria traffic man kept on following us, even when we were near EDSA he kept on following us, and we wanted to sing, Let Us Be, Let Us Be. To add to our malady, all taxis there seemed to be on the peek of their business as they were all occupied. Great, now, the problem is, would we get there on time? Would we see Ann pass and shoot that ball? We gave up the taxi ride and tried to battle with the traffic at the Meralco Avenue. My friend, seemed like begging for alms to drivers where she went from jeepney to jeepney asking if they would pass Gate 2 of Meralco. Finally, we got a ride on a jeepney when its driver promised us that he would drop us off at Meralco, Gate 2. We’ve never been there before, so we were looking for the Home Depot like a skilled hunter, the only landmark that Ann gave us, and like a contortionist, we moved our heads and bodies just to see the outside world because the jeepney is like a a tepee with human bodies as walls. It is really crowded. Even the door was blocked. We thought the driver forgot his promise and Jendz kept on asking him, “Kuya, dito na po ba yung Gate 2?” We arrived there finally.
Inside the Meralco compound, we felt like we were in Subic Bay Freeport, and that time I remember, struggling inside the MRT, my eyes caught an ad promoting the new route going to Subic Bay and thought that maybe the jeepney took that route. It was like the Monolith empire is there with all their scaffoldings. Where is the port? I asked. We laughed at the idea and acted like we were in a bonfire asking each other, Who’s Afraid of the Dark? <Grin>
We walked a half mile till we reached the Fitness Center. We ran with excitement going inside. The game just started with the score of 4-5, Ann’s team leading. I was getting a picture of the game until the lens caught a terribly good-looking coach, my friend’s team’s coach.
Coach Charles in support of his team.
Coach, I tell you, just your mere presence and your players’ morale is up AS WELL as their lovely friends’. <Just like Mami, move your shoulders up and down while giggling.> 
All for One, One for All still in spite that they lost the game for five points.
The Team with their cute coach. 
Cheerers!! Pom-poms out.
Jandy was late. She reasoned that the driver was a liar and dropped her off at Gate 1 instead of Gate 2, and because of that, she walked a thousand miles. And we teased her if really she attended a Badminton practice earlier that day. We eyed her huge earrings, her party top, and asked her like Sherlock Holmes where did she go. She said that it was really in a badminton court that she had gone to while showing her rubber shoes, the badminton racket in her transparent bag. We laughed.
At the jeepney, Ann said, “Ang cute ng coach namin noh. Mabait pa yun.” And I immediately nod my head to agree with what she was saying. And she told us facts about him, that he is now engaged, that he soon will transfer to the HR department due to some issues with his boss in the account where he is a team leader, that he is a good coach, that he would let his team ride in his Picanto after a weekly practice, that he got a short stint in Ang TV when he was a kid, delivering jokes such as: Anung fish ang sumusulat? Ano? Eh di, la-fish. <Toinks> Nice meeting you, coach.
