HIGH SCHOOL LIFE - The Vignettes

It took too long in coming, but here it is -

With so many things that happened in high school, I thought that the best way to reminisce is by sharing vignettes.

I became a student of the Science-Oriented High School (SOHS) quite by accident. While a graduating elementary student in 1975 of the Bicol University Pilot Elementary School (BUPES), my class advisor then (Mr. Matocinos), spurred the class to take the entrance tests to the Philippine Science High School which was then, as now, billed as the premier secondary school for bright, young students. I never did qualify but Mr. Matocinos never lost hope. He urged us to check this new Science high school in Legazpi. So take the tests we did. If I remember right, I ended up fourth in the list of successful examinees.

MY FIRST DAY IN SCHOOL AND I WAS IN SHORTS!
I distinctly remember going to school for the first day, in shorts! Que horror! I looked around and I was the only one in shorts. I wore shorts since I wore them during my elementary school days and poor, naive me never did realize that becoming a high school student was some sort of a rite of passage. But thank heavens for small mercies! It appears that it did not bother anyone else, and no one even seems to remember. Well, except me.

I MADE CHERRIE PIE CRY
Cherry Pie Salandanan, she of alabaster skin Nicole Kidman is known for, and she of the really curled and frizzy hair, cried in one of our classes with the venerable Ms. Aida E. Bongon (our freshman class advisor and Communications Arts English teacher for four eyars) and I got blamed for making her cry. I don't even remember now what it was that made her cry but that I made her cry or that I was blamed for it, has been with me all these years.

Cherry Pie and I eventually became good friends mainly because she and I love to read. I would swap my older brother's Penthouse with her Harold Robbins.

DENNIS RAPOSA CALLED ME HIS BEST FRIEND
Dennis Raposa is the kind of person whose reputation precedes him. He came from St. Agnes' Academy, one of the most prestigious in our province, and maybe even in the whole Bicol region. He looked good then as now though a bit on the frail side. I think he topped the entrance exams too. (I think Gerardo Estevez was second, with Virgilio Perdigon coming before me in the list.) Dennis was the type of person who comes on strong, personality-wise. He was the kind who would stand out and eventually be the so-called campus personality. And he told me early on, he classified me as a best friend!

Early on in our freshman year, our weird PE (Physical Education) teacher (who wore truly striking color-coordinated ensembles to class, sometimes even in monochromatic colors), once subjected the whole high school population (our school population then was so small, all of us, from freshmen to seniors, would share the same PE hour) to a quick quiz. So out did our one-fourth size papers come and listened intently to the ridiculous (on hindsight) questions we were asked to answer. True-or-False questions like Niagara, which you are supposed to answer with False, just as if you wanted to say Falls. Or which pant leg do you get into first when you are about to wear your pants? (Right leg or left leg - it doesn't matter really.) And of course, one of the questions was, list down the names of 3 co-students, and rank them first, second, and third as far as the level of your best friendship with them are. After the test, Dennis told me, he ranked me first - making me his best friend of the highest order! We somehow drifted apart during high school, prompting Miss Bongon to refer to us as "ertswhile friends."

DENNIS INJURES HIMSELF
At a jamboree for Boy Scouts, Dennis injured himself at the campsite. It was such a big deal in school. We were asked to write Dennis get-well soon cards and letters. Dennis himself wrote an account of his experiences at the OR. Dennis has indeed become a campus figure.

OUR SMALL CLASS/ES
The freshman batch started with three classes with sections known as B, A and C - in that order. We never really got to know how these section names were arrived at but all the brightest students were in the B-section, including me! Go figure! We ended up graduating in high school just with one class and there were no more than 50 of us in the class. I ended up fourth (again) in the Class of 1979!

MOPPET BUENVIAJE'S HALAYANG UBE
One of our classes was the equivalent of Home Economics. Based on long-standing scholastic tradition, HE has always been for the girls. But our school let us join the girls in cooking class. It was taught by the owner of one of the cafeterias on campus. One of the earliest recipes we cooked was for the traditional Filipino dessert, halayang ube (sweetened purple yam that was almost like a thick jelly in consistency). Somehow, Moppet Buenviaje managed to convert the recipe to taste like it was ice cream. Moppet may have forgotten this episode but I haven't.

From our cooking class, I remember learning that it is best to use day-old bread for sandwiches. It appears that day-old bread are firmer than fresher ones. But I like freshly-baked bread so this lesson was never really imbibed.

LUNCH AT THE CAFETERIA'S ROOFTOP
When we were freshmen, campus food was served at a place called Automat where we got served food on aluminum trays. Later, the building where the Automat was, was expanded and converted into classrooms. We were not growing that much in population but we were simply "squatters" at one of the three major buildings in campus (labeled Science building, with the two others referred to as the Administration and Library buildings - gee, I hope I still got them right) and we had to vacate the classrooms we used to occupy to give way to college students.

Two new cafeterias sprouted at either side of the middle of the three major buildings - the Library building, so called because, you guessed it, it housed the university's library). The cafeterias were kind of open although they had roofing. And we somehow found a way to go up the roof of the cafeteria nearest our building and eat our lunch of sandwiches and fruit juices there.

As an incoming freshman, I used to pack lunch from home but I eventually found myself buying from the cafeteria like my other classmates. It seemed like it was the cooler thing to do.

From this cafeteria, I learned that sandwiches can come in many tastes and flavors. When I used to think that sandwiches meant spreading Lady's Choice sandwich spread on each side of two slices of bread and putting them together and wrapping them in paper napkins, the cafeteria opened my eyes to more varieties such as corned beef mixed with Lady's Choice sandwhich spread, tuna with mayonnaise, cheese with crushed pineapple (my favorite), boiled eggs with Lady's Choice sandwich spread, on top of the more familiar and popular ham-and-eggs and hamburgers.

CECILE'S HAWAIIAN COSTUME AND DANCE AND ALAN'S CLOWN
We were all pleasantly surprised that during one of our interactive, role-playing classroom activities, Cecile Bobadilla came out onstage (we used to have presentations in class, as well as in other venues such as the Daragang Magayon Hall which was the topmost floor of the Library building), wearing a genuine Hawaiian costume of skirt and bikini top. I remember hearing that Cecile was so anxious about appearing almost naked from the waist up but being the real trouper that she was, she went ahead with the role-playing.

I'm not sure if it was the same activity but Alan Crisol ame out onstage wearing a clown's costume and interpreted the song "Send in the Clowns" so effectively that we were all so touched by his performance.

OUR TRIBUTE
Our artistic inclinations and creative pursuits never were limited to the classrooms. I remember our class putting up a program we entitled "Our Tribute". It was supposed to be a fund-generating activity cum tribute to parents and teachers by way of showing our talents. I remember being part of a dance group that performed with funny results. I think Gerry Estevez played on his violin. Then there was this girl (a junior at that time), who had a monologue that ran on and on and on. Seemingly unscripted. She was so full of angst, she cried herself hoarse. It was rumored she was indeed a deeply-troubled girl who slashed her wrists in attempted suicides for a number of times already. She wasn't acting onstage, on hidsight. Never knew what happened to her though.

THE SENIORS
Just as there were freshmen campus figures, so were there senior campus figures. At one of the school-wide activities (methinks it was some sort of a retreat) where the whole school population was present, Dennis and I were playing with paper airplanes. One of them struck a senior campus figure who, despite the fact that we felt we were in her good graces, haughtily turned to us with the diva-esque dialog of "Next time, choose your victim!"

ART AND HIS TABLE TENNIS
Art Lorete stood out at first because he appeared eccentric (but it was just our stupid labels because he turned out be something else). He spent so much time playing table tennis, he sometimes came to class late. In hindsight, Art was just so absorbed and focused.

MRS. PACARDO
Our Social Studies classes were such a hoot and a riot because of Mrs. Pacardo. I must say that she was a teacher ahead of the times. She was the one who introduced us to more meaningful and more lively methods of learning. She was the one who urged us to tackle role-playing in class, as well as other methods such as brainstorming, panel discussions, research and interviews. She would let us formulate the issues/problems, draw up our own hypotheses and come up with our own conclusions/generalizations after making our presentations. And no one can hold a candle (well, maybe Ms. Lana) to her fashion sense. She once came to class wearing a jumpsuit in canary yellow. The material was quite see through and she was wearing string bikin under! I thought she was stylish but a lot of my male classmates had other things to say about her get up. In hindsight, nobody seemed scandalized.

OUR SPEECH CLASSES
We were one of the few schools who could afford to send students to speech laboratories, complete with air-conditioned rooms and headphones. Our speech teacher was also excellent. I don't recall his name now but I learned a lot from him, specially how not to be intimidated in expressing yourself. He encouraged us through his speech lessons how to think about the words and phrases (including sayings) that come our way. One I remember distinctly was how he urged us to speak about what it meant by "Clothes don't make a man, but they tell you what he is." From him I learned how to pronounce the silent sounds in chassis. Later, when the university went on an accreditation program, he was one of the evaluators who mingled deliberately with students to get their pulse on issues. But I didn't know it then that he was an evaluator. But he asked me and a group of students which of the universities in the province (of Albay) we believe is the best. We naively then told him that of course, the best is our school. He followed up with the question: Where are going after high school? All of us chose a university in Manila. (What is with us probinsyano (guy from the province)? All of us want to study in the city - which means, the city of Manila?). Our speech teacher simply asked again, rhetorically this time: "I thought your school is the best?"

More to come in succeeding blog entries...