Hot days and cheap food

If there’s one thing my ACP (Alternative Class Program) class taught me, it’s this: after today, I shall never take air-conditioned transpo for granted ever again.

I’ll spare you from all the horrid details of why I ended up with the ACP class I took today, which is a tour of Fort Bonifacio. It wasn’t supposed to be like that–at first we were supposed to go to Batangas and experience the military training of the soldiers or something like that. But the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) changed their mind and made us go around freaking Fort Bonifacio in a rusted old army truck instead. At first I thought it would be cool to ride an army truck, but do you know how high those fuckers are? The floor of the truck is four feet from the ground, and the only thing that will assist you in climbing up is this piece of twisted up metal wire three feet from the ground. This is how you climb up: you put one foot on the metal wire thingie, grab hold of the (dirty) rope or the (rusted) chain next to you, hoist yourself up, and if you’re lucky, a cute guy from the class will take your hand and pull you up. In order to jump off without injuring yourself, you have to balance yourself by putting your hand on the rusted, dirty floor. Thank God I thought of bringing my hand sanitizer with me, but to my horror, my hands were covered with dirt after I rubbing them together vigorously with Alcogel. Ewww.

But the dirt and the grime wasn’t the worst part. I assumed that we’d ride an air-conditioned bus, or at least a van or something all day. But nooooo. We had to take an oven of a jeepney to and from Fort Boni, and the army truck we rode on was roofless and its exhaust pipe was located just above our heads. By the end of the class, my hair was a messy swamp of sweat, car exhaust, and dust.

It seemed to take an eternity, but eventually the torture was over and we finally arrived at Ateneo. I met up with Tina once I got off the jeepney and since we were kind of having bad days, I decided to treat us both to isaw at UP. Gawd, UP food rocks so much. They’re probably all loaded with calories and many other substances that will kill me one day, but who cares. They’re cheap and delicious. Eating UP food gives crappy days a good ending. While we were devouring our isaw, fishballs, and softdrinks in front of the isaw place, Tina was like, “Lauren, you have white stuff all over your shirt and your hair,” and proceeded to brush off these little white flecks off my shirt. I shrugged. “It’s probably just ash from whatever they burn when they barbecue isaw. Leave it alone, no one we know is around.” Tina frowned and started brushing the stuff off my hair anyway. “Still, it doesn’t look nice. It looks like you have dandruff or something.”

And that little incident made me realize that I’m a lot more careless about my looks these days. I still like to dress well and I get a pedicure twice a week because I can be very OC about my toenails. But there are days when I go to school for a half day without combing my (long) hair even once. And I couldn’t really care less if there’s a smudge of dirt on my jeans or if my hair is flying off in all directions. When I come to think of it, who or what exactly do I have to look pretty for? Myself? But I’m my worst critic. To me, I am never ever pretty no matter what I do. I don’t have a boyfriend to look good for and none of the cute boys at school notice me when I look my best. So I’m sure they won’t so much as bat a pretty eyelash when they see me developing a case of dandruff (that isn’t really dandruff but ash from whatever it is they burn when they barbecue isaw). Why waste time and energy making myself look marketable? I have more important things to do.