Pam Pastor - Planet Panic

Notes
from the
Queen of Procrastination

Pam
Pastor

Planet Panic: Notes from the Queen of Procrastination
by Pam Pastor

Copyright to this digital edition 2015 by Pam Pastor

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Cover design by Michelle Garcia
Cover calligraphy by Fozzy Castro-Dayrit
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ISBN 9789712732041 (e-book)

Version 1.0.1

For Powie,
the Chandler to my Joey.

For Jill, still.

And for Tyrion,
who will never read this.

My grandpa calls me Baby even though I am now thirty years old. I dont mind; I actually like it, and I know that no matter how old I get, I will always be a baby in my grandparents eyes.

This is a lesson I first learned in Hong Kong when my grandma decided to give me a bath when I was fifteen years old. Yes, fifteen.

We used to take big family vacations in Hong Kong with usually more than fifteen of us running around Tsim Sha Tsui, Central and Mongkok.

Wed squeeze into hotel rooms, head out to the malls and amusement parks and eat roast duck and roast pork before crashing in our rooms.

On one of these trips, I roomed with my grandparents, brother and cousin. Some time between a visit to Ocean Park and yet another Wellcome stop, I walked into the hotel bathroom for a shower and, to my surprise, my grandma followed me.

I was a high school junior. I was growing hair in places that never had hair before, my chest was somewhere between Cute, you need a training bra and YOWZA! but my grandma still wanted to give me a bath. And she did.

And when I say my grandma gave me a bath, I mean we soaped and rinsed, and we thanked God for all my body parts as we scrubbed.

Thank you Lord for my hair, my face. Thank you Lord for my healthy arms and my healthy breasts

I could have said no, youre probably thinking. I should have said no. That only means that you havent met my grandma.

Im willing to bet that if it had been you and my grandma in that hotel bathroom, it wouldnt have mattered if you were fifteen or fifty-one, growing hair in places that never had hair before and that your chest was somewhere between Cute, you need a training bra and YOWZA!you would have soaped and rinsed and scrubbed and thanked God for your healthy body parts.

January 2, 2011

My father works outside of Manila, and I rarely get to see him. In an attempt to connect with him more, I kept telling him to create a Facebook account.

It took months of badgering before he finally did.

When I clicked on his name, my jaw dropped. My father can construct houses and buildings but he has no idea how to use Facebook.

His status read: chat with pam pastor

And he replied to his own status with, hello, are you there?

Another status read: chat with patrick

And he replied to that with: hello? patrick?

It wasnt clear if he thought the status bar was a search bar or a genie that would grant his Internet wishes.

I scrolled down a little more to look at his older posts and was horrified to discover that I wasnt the first person my father looked for on Facebook.

Sorry, dear daughter, that honor goes to Anne Curtis. Let me be specific: that honor goes to a scantily clad, wardrobe-malfunctioning Anne Curtis.

But Facebook isnt a fairy godmother that would make your noontime show nip-slip dreams come true if you dont know how to work it.

I tried to explain to my father that his Facebook wall was to be used for posting his status and not for chatting and looking for celebrity scandals.

He said: Anong wall?

My father quit Facebook soon after. I cant say Im surprised.

August 14, 2010

Once upon a time, when we still had that house in Manila, my brother and I went to Quiapo.

We rode the jeep, got off in front of the church and hit building after building.

We emerged after a while and, while standing in front of a fishball vendor, we realized in horror that we only had about six pesos left in our collective pockets.

We had a tough choice to make.

Fishballs or the jeepney ride home?

Naturally, the fishballs won.

It was the right choiceafter all, if we picked the jeepney ride, one of us would ride and the other would have to walk home.

After stuffing our faces with street food, we cabbed it. We had a brilliant planwed just pay the driver when we got home.

On our way home, our broke asses spotted a rainbow. We got a huge kick out of that.

This story is just one of the many reasons I wouldnt sell my brother on eBay.

March 14, 2010

I dont know how it started but when I was in sixth grade, I developed a big obsession with trolls.

Russ trolls, if you were to be specific about it, the kind that you can buy from Gift Gate.

I saved up for them and, when asked what gifts I wanted during birthdays and other special occasions, they were always my answer: trolls. Okay, trolls and books. Soon I had amassed a pretty impressive collectionover thirty of them. I had trolls in different sizes, costumes and levels of nakedness, big plush dolls, rings, earrings, pencil toppers and pins.

I loved those trolls deeply.

And I wasnt the only one. In sixth grade, because I sucked at crochet, I paid a friend with trolls to finish my projects for me. If it was a small project, she got a small troll. If it was a big project, she got a big troll.

Yes, Russ trolls were a currency for my generation.

I loved those trolls so much that I made sure they surrounded me when I slept. It was like I was a murder victim, and they were my chalk outline. Every night, there was a circle of trolls on my bed, with me happily snoozing in the middle. My cozy sleeping arrangement with my trolls didnt sit well with my grandma, the same one who used to pray for my virginity back when she was sure it was still in my possession.

Trolls were evil, she believed, and must not be allowed in our house. She felt the same way about Beetle Juice.

One day, my grandma decided to take action. She grabbed all my trolls, dumped them into a metal drum and set them on fire while I bawled.