Once in a GK community in Pangasinan, there was this little girl who all of a sudden cried while on the middle of the activity. I couldn’t make her calm and I was not even sure why she was crying at the first place. I was looking around if anyone was noticing the commotion. I was very afraid that her mother would come to me and do things a mother would do for her child. I looked for ways to bring down the chaos. Then I found a “Zest-o” orange juice, cupcake and lots of candies. Then I said to the little girl,

"Dahil magaling ka umiyak, may premyo kang Orange Juice, Cupcake na Pandan Flavor at tatlong candies".

I was not really sure it would work and she was still crying. Then the other kids also started crying, but obviously not something to take seriously. They were faking it making funny noises.

"Wala namang luha, wala, tingnan mo siya meron".

Then they started wetting their eyebrows with their saliva. The scene became livelier and I noticed the girl finally stopped weeping on the corner.

"Palakpakan naman natin siya kasi magaling siyang umiyak",

I handed her her prizes. Then they clapped as hard as they could, still making those funny noises.

"Pahingi din ako ng candy", the other kids insisted, but finally the other set of cupcakes came right on time to redeem me of this very challenging mission.

To end the activity with the kids, I showed them a magic trick, the "Look ma, my index finger is now pointing to the other hole of my nose" trick. Then I extended my tongue out and put my middle finger onto it. Some of the kids tried to imitate my trick but instead used both their index finger. Yummy

......

Years later (a couple weeks ago), I was alone with this pretty lady who was almost every weekdays with me. After they closed the door and turned off the brighter lights, she started to weep then scolded me not to look at her. We were always together talking and laughing with just about anything. We were always having early lunch so we could watch 1 episode for the lunch break. We were always going home after together. But it was very uncomfortable being with her right then as if i didn’t know her at all . She bent her head, leaned against her folded hands on the table in front of her. She covered her head with her jacket to hide her gloomy face, but I could tell from her deep breathing of air and mucus that she was crying. The same feeling of guilt came back to me after those years, because someone specially a lady was crying with only me by her side and I had no idea how to calm her down. I was thinking what could be the reason. Was it because of me? It could not be me. Did I say something to her that would make her cry?. No, it was not me. She doesn’t take my words seriously. Maybe a family problem reached her. Or maybe she already had a boyfriend to fight with after all. Or maybe because the mid-year bonus was not yet available. What if they come back seeing her crying? They will definitely blame it to me.

The pack of Tobleron chocolates on the table on other side got my attention. I took three small bars of them, each of different flavors. One was the original chocolate. The others were the milk chocolate and the chocolate/coffee flavor. I put them near her head and said that someone left us a Pasalubong straight from Singapore. I could no longer hear her deep breathing. She fell asleep. So I went back to my seat beside her and I continued playing StarCraft on my PC.

Then, the lights turned on and they came entering the room. They asked her, "Anong nangyari sa iyo?". "Nakatulog lang ako sir, napuyat kasi ako kagabi", she replied then made a very bright face.

Later, she turned to me then said, "Lex, salamat sa chocolate, you can have the white one, sabi mo kasi gusto mo yung milk chocolate". Then I grabbed it and ate it whole.