Allergyboy

The best town in O-H-I-O, Ohio USA!

Remember that song? It was from the critically acclaimed cinematic masterpiece entitled “Babes in Toyland” starring Keanu Reeves and Drew Barrymore. Anyway…

After six days in California, I was off to Cincinnati to visit my dearest friend, Diane, who has been residing in the land of the cicadas (gross-looking winged insects that emerge from the ground in large numbers during certain parts of the year for the sole purpose of attacking famous actress Cameron Diaz) for about two years now. I hadn’t seen her in ages so I was pretty excited to finally see her and to meet the people in Cincinnati she calls her friends. I wanted to find out if they were just as kooky as we are. They were.
The flight from LAX to Cincinnati took about 4 hours. I hated my seatmates at the plane - two old, unattractive, white folks who kept blabbing about nonsense. I was so glad when the plane finally landed in Cincinnati. Their airport was rather large and vast. It took me about 3 1/2 days to get from the gate to the baggage terminal where Diane was waiting. Yey! And then we had dinner at this Asian restaurant called Teak which had really good sushi. And then we walked around a bit.

Here, you see us posing beside a fountain-slash-statue of what appears to be a fat friar.


I forgot what the name of this area was, but it was a pretty nice place to walk around. We also went to this nice little cafe to get some hot coco.

There were a few days when it got pretty cold in Cincinnati. As in cold enough to get frosty breath. You know? When you talk and you could actually SEE your breath coming out of your mouth. What I loved about the cold weather is that it allowed me to wear nice cold weather clothes which I could never wear in Manila unless I wanted to look like a sweaty idiot.

Naka-scarf pako. Say mo? Geoffrey Been yan. 100% pure wool pa. Sosyal.

I came prepared for the cold. I even bought a beanie and thick gloves that kinda looked like potholders. They were all black so I kinda looked like a burglar when I wore them.

Enter magnanakaw…

This is me rifling through what I regretfully discovered to be Diane’s underwear drawer.

Now if only I could fit this TV in my carry-on luggage.

Huli ka!

Yes, we were that bored. But you have to understand, there isn’t much to do in Cincinnati.

I got Diane a small gift during my stopover at the Narita airport in Japan. It was one of those dangling thingies that you could attach to small items like a cell phone or a mini coin purse. What dangled from the string was a miniature statue of what, to me, appeared to be the prevailing Japanes archetype of the all suffering female.

Here she is standing beside the miniature cow on Diane’s countertop.

We named her RJ. After our good friend RJ Paculan, who has noticably pouty lips.

So aside from playing dress up and naming inanimate objects, I also got to meet and hang out with Diane’s lovah, Aaron, as well as some of Diane’s friends. We stayed at Aaron’s for a couple of days. He lives in the suburbs. His neighborhood is very Wysteri Lane-like.

Aaron’s a musician and he’s got a lot of musical instruments in his house. From pianos to piccolos and trombones to timpanis. His home was a veritable orchestra.

This is Diane’s friend, Noname (pronounced no-neym). The story goes something like how her mom, not being able to decide what name to give her, just gave her no name at all - Noname. Here you see her playing one of Aaron’s bongos.

And here I am playing the bongos with Diane’s scientist friend, Julissa. Notice Julissa’s shirt. She doesn’t work in Hooters but she’s most certainly qualified. She is, after all, a scientist.

Here we are in our grand finale.

We were magnificent. Diane gave us a standing ovation.

The funny thing was that Aaron wasn’t even home that time. And yet there we were playing with all his stuff. We looked through one of his closets and found numerous head ornaments and wigs. What he uses them for, I do not know.

The guy on the left is Roman. He’s a total boyscout. He has this “emergency” bag that he carries all the time. It has tons of stuff in it like two-way radios, flashlights and a defibrillator. You know? In case someone gets a heart attack.

At this point, I would like to reiterate that there isn’t much to do in Cincinnati. But I still had a lot of fun with all the people I hung out with. See you soon, Diane! And thanks for letting me stay in your nice high-ceilinged apartment with easy to use washer and dryer.

My first stop was sunny Californa-yey! My mom’s friend, Tita Ichu, picked me up at the airport and we had lunch at this cajun restaurant at this pier somewhere in Long Beach. The area kinda reminded me of the OC. And our waiter looked like a sad version of Robin Williams. Like when he played that crazy one hour photo guy in the movie “One Hour Photo”. Anyway, here I am at the pier, which you actually don’t see much of in this photo. But it had yachts and stuff.

Here I am with Tita Ichu. She’s super nice.

This is the fat cat that would sit in front of her apartment. She’s terrified of cats so she has to go in the back door everytime it’s there.

I stayed with her mostly when I was in California. She lives in Long Beach. It’s a nice place. In some parts, you’ll see a lot of buildings that were built way back in the 70s.

I also stayed with my Aunt Baby (who I mentioned in a previous post) and my Uncle Clark for a few days. They live in Chino Hills. I’m not sure which part of California that’s in. They live in the suburbs. Here’s a photo of us in their home. My Uncle Boy (who I also mentioned in a previous post) is in it, too.

And here I am being all touristy. This is me at the Kodak Theatre in Hollywood.

And here I am at the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

I actually saw asses that were way bigger than the one in this photo. I was at the mall once, and there was this lady with a gigantic ass. It looked liked she was shoplifting an entire store’s merchandise and put everything behind her butt. Seriously. It was ridiculously and impossibly huge. It should have been a tourist attraction.

Anyway… I had a lot of fun in California. And I loved the weather, too. It was just right. I’d definitely love to visit again. And I barely felt like I left the country, too. Everywhere I went I would hear Filipinos talking. May Jollibee at Goldilocks pa.

I’m back! I was back since friday actually. I arrived at around 11pm I think. I hate flying. My plane left Newark at around 9am for a 2 hour flight to Detroit where I sat for about 3 hours until I boarded for my plane to Nagoya. TWELVE HOURS on that flight. 12. TWELVE!!! And then another hour waiting in Japan. Then another 4 hours of flying which finally brought me back to Manila. Home-sweet-polluted-home. It’s great to be home actually. I really missed my room. I have this thing about my room. And my bathroom. I just have this thing… nevermind… I have no idea where I’m going here…

I met this nice, albeit strange, middle-aged woman on my way home. She started talking to me during the stopover in Detroit. She’s a balikbayan on her way home to visit her relatives. We were having a pretty normal conversation at first and then she started opening up to me about her life. Like I was Joe D’ Mango or something. Her husband apparently is a controlling, stubborn womanizer. And her stepson’s emotionally unstable, which she believes is caused by the father’s (her husband’s) behavior. I told her she should leave her husband. I may have actually convinced her to think about it. And then we had lunch at this Japanese restaurant which was just a few steps away from the gate where we were waiting at. She talked some more about her life, her religious beliefs, her family back in the Philippines, etc… Close kame. As in. She’s nice. Her name’s Mrs. Panis.

So anyway… after my super duper kaduper long flight, my mom picked me up at the airport and I chatted with her for a bit when we got home and went straight to bed. I barely slept during my 22+ hours of travelling so I was pretty much knocked out the moment my pretty, little head came into contact with my hypoallergenic pillow. Which was good because I actually had to work the next day. My goodness. 22+ hours of airports and airplanes and I have to go to work the next day. It’s funny how vacations always end in stress. Well, it’s not funny actually. Anyway… so I went to work the next day in fear that I might actually collapse in the middle of a lecture. But thank goodness I didn’t.

So it’s back to reality for me. I had such a great time during my 3 1/2 week stay in the US. Saw good friends and family. Hung out in sunny California. Went hiking in Kentucky. Immersed myself in the awesomeness of New York. Went shopping!!! It wuz gureyt. Ah luvd it. That’s me doing my southern accent.

Mabuhay!