Passenger Tales

I don’t know what got into me while I was in the city of my birth but i committed more than a couple of booboos (aside from the airport incident).

First off, I had dinner with my friends Melai and Kate at Casa Verde on my first night there. Whenever I’m in Cebu or one of them comes to Manila, we almost always meet up. Anyway, the food was great and a real value for money. It helped me forget that we had to wait to be seated and we learned patience while waiting for the food to be served. It was my first time to eat there so I tried their specialty, baked pork ribs.

After dinner we decided to go for a massage. On our way out of the parking lot, I told Melai, who was driving, that I wanted to take a picture of the name of the restaurant. So when we reached the gate, she paused so that I can take a shot. I was bewildered because all I can see was the address so I asked them why there was only an address and no resto name. They exclaimed, “Ha?!?” It was then I realized that the name of the resto was above the address. Unfortunately, a line of departing vehicles was already forming at our back so we had to go without me getting a good shot.

The misadventure did not end there. On our way to a massage place, I requested that we drop by a pharmacy because I had to buy my turbohaler. We left Emily to wait for a parking space while Kate and I went inside the pharmacy. I approached the counter and the sales lady asked me, “Naa kay SM card?” (Do you have SM card?) I replied, “SM advantage card?” She said no. What can I say, I’m an SM advantage card fan It turned out what she was really saying was, “Naay KSM card?” (KSM card?) I’m not sure what a KSM card is but I think it’s the pharmacy’s discount card. Suffice to say that I was able to buy my inhaler without getting a discount.

The next one was more of a booboo thought than an action. After a lot of cancellations and missed opportunities, I was finally on my way to Tops, courtesy of Melai and Carlo. It almost didn’t push through because Melai suffered from a stomach bug earlier but she was very insistent that I would finally see Tops during that visit. By sheer will, rest and some medication, she felt good enough to go to Tops. On our way to Busay, we passed by a resto/internet shop to buy pizza to take to Tops. It was another old house turned restaurant. Cebu is full these kinds of restos.

From the name Tops, you can already guess that we were going to a place overlooking the city. So up we went. It seemed an endless uphill climb. When we were nearing the top I noticed that dust was floating in front of our vehicle. I was wondering why the dust would have been disturbed when there were no vehicles in front of us. Then Emily commented something like, “Naay fog.” Of course! It was fog not dust. How slow can I get?

We stayed there for more than an hour but we were not able to see the city lights very clearly because of the fog.

The last booboo happened in the plane going home to Manila. I arrived early at the airport so while waiting for my flight to board, I worked on my laptop. My laptop’s battery life is just an hour (low tech) so when it was near boarding time, I decided to switch to the adaptor to conserve the battery. A short time later, an older businessman sat down near me and charged his cellphone. We got into a conversation. Suddenly, our flight was called so I hurriedly packed my laptop. The man asked me what my seat number was, I said 16 while his was 7. I took my leave and hurried away leaving him still charging his cellphone. When I got to the plane I hurried to my seat, I chose a window seat and when I got there a man was already occupying the aisle seat. He had to stand to let me in since he was a big man. Just as I was starting to feel comfortable, I realized that I got the wrong seat. It was 7H and not 16H. I hurriedly stood up and had to ask the man on the aisle seat to stand again so that I can pass. I was full of apologies and he was very obliging. Good thing I realized my mistake quickly before the rightful owner of the seat arrived to boot me out. Hahaha. Sometimes my mind can really wander. Hehehe.

It was during the flight that I realized that the airlines seat women passengers together with other women and men with other men. So my fantasy of sitting beside a handsome stranger is not bound to happen. Too bad Another fantasy wasted. Hahaha