Wednesday, March 14, 2007

8:30 AM | A Long Dinner

Mark and I had a wonderful dinner with Jackie Veloso-Antonio and Annabelle Lee-Adriano last night at Boston Market. We had, among other things, roasted chicken, vegetable kebab, and garlic and cheese pizza, topped with a Brazilian drink the name of which I cannot seem to recall now (it begins with a "c"...), but it was something I wanted to have because I first had a taste of it in Antulang (Annabelle's wonderful resort down south in Siaton town), and loved it. Quddus's version though lacks the subtlety and sweetness (and the lychee) of Annabelle's, but it has more kick because it has more white rhum. Later, we had a nightcap (the three of them had San Mig Lite and I had iced coffee -- and all of us shared two slices of apple pie a la mode) over at Chicco's. We had dinner at 6:30, and everything ended at precisely midnight. Sometimes it amazes me how people could gather and talk, and talk, and time just slowly slides by, mostly unnoticed.

It was great conversation, covering all sorts of news and gossip, including tales of local murderers, party boys, jealous wives, old classmates, old boyfriends, gay men, nymphomaniacs, writers, strange artists, crazed mothers, and beauty queens.

You had to be there to understand what a night that was.

Still, it amazes me that I am friends with these two beautiful women whose friendship with us both amuses and surprises me because ... well, they're from another generation of Dumaguete kids (Ernst, Jackie's younger brother, was my high school classmate, and I was more or less a contemporary of Ian Lee, Annabelle's younger brother -- who used to be my high school crush, hehehe), a generation which mine emulated and, in a sense, worshipped because they seemed so adult, so sophisticated. Jacky, for one, was once Miss Negros Oriental, probably the most beautiful in the long line of Negrense beauty queens. When she was crowned, she was only in her early teens, and I was a grade school kid who dragged mother to the spot nearest the old stage in Freedom Park because it was something I had to watch. And Annabelle. Well, she was (and, of course, still is) a Lee, from a very prominent Negrense family.

And now, we're all eating pizza and roasted chicken together. Strange how time can annihilate the false borders of generations, and gather people together because, well, they can have interesting conversations.

Labels: friends, life

[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich

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