TNLDRDOLSL #4 09.17.06
My oath taking for the physician licensure. I was brought to the venue by my Tito and cousin Pong (who is basketball star and iron chef rolled into one lanky giant), where I had to wait for my mother and my brother, who would be escorting me. My dad would be coming in late, kasi na-late ang flight nya as he was just coming back from a sortie with medical colleagues in Cagayan De Oro. Anyway, so I sat there, pretty early huh, watching friends such as Ferdie, Tonette, Coe, Ma’am Che Nazareth, Reg my kinakapatid (MD, MD, MD, MD, MD!), etc (MD) sashay past me down the red carpet… and kept on sitting there for sooo long. I waited for close to 2 hours! (okay, yes, that’s rich coming from me the perennial latecomer, pero hello naman, to my defense since I finished internship I’m almost never late for things! :-)) Nakakawala ng poise much, as I had to wait alone texting furiously sa gilid in my Neiman Marcus clothing, Kenneth Cole shoes and Nicole Richie shades (my Kris Aquino syndrome… and im like her, so bear with me, hehehe… banggitin ko na rin ang combination Shu Uemura-Clinique-Lancome makeup? Hehe. Asif sponsored eh! If I had a son called Joshua I’ll be namedropping him too. But I thank my Tita Syl, other Titas, Manang Rochelle probably, coz without their generosity I prolly wouldn’t own such beautiful and expensive things, hehehe). Waiting and watching on the sides of the red carpet. when I’m supposed to be walking it. Haynaku .
SO anyway, the oath-taking itself wasn’t really that noteworthy. Aside from the usual speeches from dignitaries all around, we had the pagbibigay pugay for the top 10 placers, the minutes of silence for the late Joram, MD (may he RIP!), and the wakeupper-kahet-papano from the spitfire speechmaker Patricia “Heart” Evangelista (im kidding about the heart of course). Weird nga lang that she’s very young and an undergrad at that, speaking to, uh, slightly less young postgraduate graduates (hoy bata pa ko! Twenty something lang! – thanks again, Kris Aquino)… imagine na lang getting admonitions from your younger sister or something. Anyway, at least she made a lot of sense.
OH wait, what’s noteworthy for me, is that I suffered from an asthma attack, wheezing and coughing (mostly trying to suppress the coughing, but we all know coughing’s one of the three things that rise above the surface the more you try to hide it, eh eh? ) for three-quarters of the whole ceremony. And I so happened to have left my inhaler. And my phone was with my brother who was up in the rafters or something. I managed to calm myself (thanks to my friend and seatmate Mommy G) though sheer willpower. And through sheer willpower, too, I was able to scan the seats and the crowd around me for my fellow asthmatic friend, groupmate and former choirmate and ka-back, Brian D, who was located several rows from us. … all for nothing though, kasi hindi nya naman dala that day ang kanyang supply of medications, even if Bry has saved me, Mix G and Donna C, our other choirmates nung mga bata pa kame, from sure asthmatic exacerbations. Kainis. Hi Bry, and Mommy, Mix, Donna!:-)
My father then texted us that he wasn’t feeling very well, and will no longer catch up with us, as he’s decided to stay at the infirmary. Don’t get me wrong, I didn’t make tampo, and I didn’t hold it against him. My father was feeling ill, and he needed to rest. We were all supposed to proceed at a Japanese restaurant at the Mall Of Asia.
Prior to that however, was the waste of a lot of precious time courtesy of the ineptitude (plain stupidity) of the (dis)organizers of this event, who saw it fit to hold a mad scramble/mosh pit session, the unbearable cockfight for the physician’s license. Goodlooking people, nay, doctors, in sexy gowns and dapper suits and all, boxing each other out and sharing each other’s sweat (and the whiffs! Don’t forget the whiffs!)… you’d end up all so sweaty and half of the gunk isn’t even yours! All of these could have been prevented, had one organizer summoned enough common sense for the rest of his committee.
Note to the PRC people: First of all, wala kayong ka-siste-sistema. I’m not surprised that there’s a scandal going on. Bulok nyo. License distribution lang yun, my goodness, there are tons of ways to make this simpler, and organized, and less of a headache for everybody concerned. Mag-isep isep please. For my friends in February. And second, super mahal naman ng binayad namin, we expect at the very least a decent, truly formal ceremony. And maybe someone a bit more distinguished – hell, older! – than Patricia Evangelista (whom I have nothing against, I promise. She was good, really good. I just really thought it was kind of odd to have her address us). Thanks.
So we ate Japanese food as scheduled, my cousins, my sibs, my mom, my tito and tita. No traipsing around the Mall Of Asia (so I technically still have to go there) kasi lumulubog daw ang reclamation area and we had to leave fast! Joke. No, we had to leave not cause of some silly architectural rumor but because my tito has a dentist’s appointment and my Dad had to be fetched from the infirmary.
And at this point the story begins…
