I recently had the chance to have oodles of time off that I literally had a go in touring the whole of downtown…
Hmm…I miss those days when I lived there and me and my friends would play/run at the sidewalks during the afternoons, notice the vendors that ply their trade, the guy who sells those "glue" stuff that you repair your plastic pails and stuff…
The oldie bakeshops, rice dealers, oh, and also the store where they only sell the most delicious chinese ham I’ve ever laid my mouth on…sigh…
That store that sells local tsinelas…ah…candy store…the local miswa/noodle dealer where they make their own noodles to your specs…the old shops where my grandparents used to get their "secret" weird (chinese or otherwise) ingredients that they use when cooking…until today my granpa’s cooking we (mom, tito, titas) can’t duplicate, only he can cook those things…
Went strolling around the mall, rob, thinking that how this place was just a piece of land on heaps of trash a few years back…
Oh, the "old" buildings near marymart, hmm, batchoy, Deco’s, mom said it opened, was for a long time…
Continuing along, met some of the people that have been on the streets walking for a long time, that old chinese couple (i forgot their names) , where was that old lady that sells sweepstakes tickets? Sarge (blank-blank) that always had his beat along Iznart st. Oh how I also miss the "ice srambles) that me and my buds buy for P1-2 after classes, walking distance from me store and school, my classmate walking across the other side of the street while me on the other side, since our stores are more or less near across each other…I wonder why for many years we done that, that we never got to talk/walk…
One never knows who to meet while strolling around, I was secretly wishing not to be confronted by some people I don’t want to, but somehow hoping to meet others that I have not seen for a long time, still, I’m enjoying my time amidst the hustle and bustle of that weekend day…
It feels good to be amidst the throng at downtown, though the airconditioned comfiness of the malls always pulls me back, the nostalgic and excitement that walking around and going into the most inner depths of this city and its alleyways always brings back fond memories of yesterdays:
Alleys…the place where we would run to after school to play the latest nintendo games, where in those times PC gaming was still not in vogue…
The bookshop where I would blow my money renting a stack of books and play the penalty after keeping it for a couple of weeks…
The hole at that bakery where they sell the best teren-teren/pancho (its still there)
The biggest siopao I ever had (still there)
My most fav banana Q at that alley (the children took over after the folks)
The waffledogs near socorro drug wherein my lola always brings home whenever she goes downtown…
A big mug of "tahu" or that soy drink my lolo buys and chills in the ref whenever the vendor passes by…
My friends/neighbors at Iznart, playing/running into each other’s stores everytime…
The old firehouse at Delgado, the free pacman and galaxian games, pool, riding the firetruck…firecalls, sirens…envy dad/titos as they chuck on their firesuits and off they go…(me, chuck on my blazer nowadays…haha)
My old alma mater…its peeling paint, the smell of burnt wood as they cook for the dorm, the endless pushing and shoving at the old canteen, the "bombs away" style of taking the trash from the 5th floor down to the ground…lol
The old cinemas, with their distinctive "ambience" and smells…
Peanut vendors, where you can get a BIG bag of peanuts for just P5 when I was small…
My sidewalk vendor friends, selling trinkets and stuff, firecrackers during new year, and dinagyang stuff on january…
MY barber, ever, still there and still
My dentist…still
My pedia, old office still there…
As I move/stroll on, I finally met some people I knew. My how have things changed. The stores where we used to tambay/visit no longer there, my friend’s stores not there or have changed their line of business. How that kid selling peanuts grown up and still sells the same kinda stuff…that photocopier near the side of school, their niche already taken up by that big atm machine…the open stinking sewer that lined the side that bakeshop…that old refreshment stand/store…glors I think, its still there? better have a look-see…
Nowadays, things are fast-paced, fastfood, fast everything, gone are the days of having the time to buy your own ingredients at the local grocer who knows you personally, the local textile dealer, the rice dealer who spends time with you to talk while they kilo your sacks on those scales with the 4 metal wheels…where only the "kargadors" with their sweaty backs carry the sacks to those trucks with long noses reading "cheverolet" or "ford" (imagine, gasoline-powered!) up long planks to flatbeds…
"willy’s" jeeps converted to hauling sacks and drums of cooking oil…fishball vendors and "manug ba-ids" with their oldstyle bikes with big wheels…water vendors with their 4 wheel carts with jerry-cans with water that they get from the barges at the pier…
If given the chance,I would like to live in the era circa 50’s-60’s, I can never miss the past, when everything was in its infancy and abundance…I miss the past, the people, the things, the places…
Time really moves on, but one thing for me that still has not changed…is the afternoon cup of coffee, although its now in its more "sosyal" technically higher-tech form (coffee machines), in the past, one can only choose to have a cup either from a freshly-ground from the dealer ’round the corner type, or from the expensive "imported" type from the can or them new-fangled "instant" coffees…haha, things still have not changed at all…