papapel naman daw kasi they are, yeh...

Suddenly, he was reduced to being a stunned piece of breathing paper-pale flesh--formalinic, I observed, perhaps as his blood evacuated from their correct places--after getting a tongue-lashing from the fuming Mayor Rodrigo Duterte, who, by few inches, was taller than him.

He backed-off and it was the best thing to do while Duterte was still gathering the remaining sanity left of him. He cannot afford to put up a man-to-man show here, no matter how capable he is as he is an army Colonel after all.

But it was way too late for the man, later identified by one journalist as Col. Joel Ibañez, the commander of the 1003rd Infantry Brigade based in the town of Santo Tomas in Davao del Norte.

I was thinking--what could have been the man thinking? There had been arrangements that they must not be seen in the area or anywhere near for this event.

You see, the man was the uninvited. While I was witnessing the show, I pitied the man as I imagined him as being the main cast of a story that tells about someone who bought a new pair of swimsuits but was not part of the outing. So the gang went out to the beach while he was left home.

And yes, while writing this, I was kind of singing that Alanis song that says: "Like any uncharted territory, I must seem greatly intriguing...You speak of my love like you have experienced love like mine before...But this is not allowed, you're uninvited...
an unfortunate slight..."

Perhaps the scene outside was teasing him like those naked internet stars who last year had another official's time frozen while a national security official was behind a podium during a gathering that gave journalists a pass. Good that the media, when these things are happening, are always there.


So what I am really talking about? Read this.