Practical Guide to Urban Survival
Stories about my supahfriends – Jolas (Part II)
Like most folks from our part of the world, Jolas’92 family wasn’92t exactly well-to-do. Delay in the arrival of monthly allowances wasn’92t the exception, it was the norm.
I remember one time when his allowance didn’92t arrive for two months. It wasn’92t so much about delay, but on the capability of his parents to raise money for his monthly allowance. Two months’97that’92s 60 days, translated to 180 meals that he won’92t have the money to pay for. Being penniless for a week in the big bad city would have been unbearable for a kid (we were all just kids then). But for two months? That’92s preposterous!
A normal college student would have probably broken down and cried, or borrowed enough cash for transportation and go back to his island and, as we all love to say, plant camote. But our Jolas was made of sterner stuff. He had an indomitable will. And in those two months when he was practically a pauper? He gained weight! I shit you not. That is God’92s honest truth. He actually put on extra pounds! We were in awe. I believed then that were he to be included in the survivor reality show, he would win hands down.
Not only that, Jolas actually pulled a double-whammy during that time. Although he managed to solve the starvation part through socialized meals (meaning you join your comrade’92s lunch or dinner and let them foot the bill), there’92s still the question of the rents. And at that time, our boarding house had one tenacious bulldog-cum-landlady watching over us.
Jolas tackled that problem by employing evasive maneuvers’97the one popularized by the Vietcong during the Vietnam war ’96 the naw-yu-si-mi, naw-yu-don’92t technique. He would go home very late at night when everyone, including the bulldog, was sleeping, and then leave before the break of dawn. To the other people in the boarding house, he was the man who wasn’92t there, to us, his roommates, he was a folk hero escaping the clutches of the evil land lady and actually surviving to tell the tale, but to the bulldog, he was one big hemorrhoidal pain in the ass.
But as they say, even dogs will have their day. Jolas was eventually cornered by our bulldog of a land lady. Bouyed by his successes, he got cocky. He went home before 12 midnight one Friday evening. He thought the evil landlady wouldn’92t notice him as she was too engrossed with the other tenants of the boarding house drinking in front of her store. Big mistake.
Just as he was about to lie down on his bed and regale us with tales of his latest caper, there was a courtesy knock on the door before it was unceremoniously opened. It was one of the bulldog’92s stoogies. The nastiest of the bunch. The one who smiles lasciviously everytime a boarder is about to be humiliated by the evil landlady.
’93Madame wants to see you.’94
Up next – The Confrontation (Jolas Part III conclusion)
