2.21.2003
February 21, 2003 || 12:25 amTaxi drivers make for interesting though sometimes awkward conversations. It's either they bitch about the government and the traffic, talk about other passengers (famous or infamous, usually famous), reveal their sad lives, or ask about yours. Sometimes it's good therapy. Or just a way to not fall asleep until you arrive home.
A sample conversation.
Me asking if he'd go to Sto. Domingo (I'm always polite. If he doesn't want to go where I go, why bother arguing? They win anyways and you'll just end up upset.) Driver saying get in. Then he starts about how do I think cellphones with a camera cost. Then asks how much he could have sold one for. Then reveals a passenger left his phone. A high tech phone with a cam. He's asking me if he did the right thing returning it. The cellphone owner gave him 2,000 bucks. Smugly, I smile and nod. Then he tells how he got robbed at QA for 3,000 bucks. Then rants about slow trucks. Then back to where do I think he could have sold the phone. Then me asking maybe next time he should just keept the phone and use it. Then driver says something about karma. That he probably did the right thing. Then remembering that those phones probably fetch, at the lowest, P20,000. Then me asking him to pull over my house. Then driver tells me next time someone forgets their phone on his taxi, he won't return it and keep it for himself. As I was going down, he adds, "puwera lang kung telepono mo." Maybe there are no slow trucks in hell and maybe he'd have a grand time there.
Just realized I'm getting jaded. Used to be that I get excited easily. Now, I don't. Went to Powerbooks and saw all those books and bought The English Patient by Oondatje and Choke by Palahniuk but no enthusiasm. I know I want the books. Especially, Saint-Ex's. But no rush. It has been a long time my fingers trembled holding a book or a CD. Not even with music. Used to be I'd starve to buy a book. And now it has been so long since I bought a book and gush over it.
At least the movies still excite me. I guess, I'm still spared. Thinking about The Hours again. It makes me high again.
I want to be like a kid again. Grinning whenever I'm at the bookstore. Now it's more like, ho hum, wala pa ako ng libro na 'yan. I have to buy it and read it sometime.
Weird. I suddenly miss Wind, Sand, Stars.
Ernan at 12:14 AM