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I stand in front of my stove, pressed for time as usual, while cooking. There is nothing poetic about my cooking ...though finishing it quickly matters. While I'm at it, a remote acquaintance from the Pampanga calls me to talk about a niece who wants to go to America... she says, "Find her an American to marry." That reeaaalllly pisses me off. Is she thinking  I can just go in the US marketplace and sell a countryman for marriage?  My anger is worsened by a recent PDI news article about the big distorted job market in the Philippines: while there are lots of Pinoys who possess college degrees and are jobless,  technical jobs from computers to electronics are dismally filled up. Hey, ain't there something wrong with this picture?

The reason why I am mentioning this is because I recently enrolled in a night school to take an AS degree in Computer Programming. I am intending to follow my heart's desire, since, I spend so much time on my computer anyway. And I am intending to go back to the Philippines to work as a Technician in this area, or a businessman in this field...no, I don't care about a Master's degree or PhD in PT anymore, much younger men and women (like Miriam Quiambao) are more entitled to those, I'd be happy playing with my computer for the rest of my life, all the better if I'd be paid to do so. But it is difficult, I am slowly finding now, to work full eight hours during the day and go to school during the night. Though my married buddies say that's nothing compared to being married with kids.

slice onion and garlic, prepare and wash bean sprouts and spinach and green beans, cut tofu into cubes(fry tofu till brown)

Though I finished my PT degree in our beloved University, I am at heart, born and raised a technician. I remember Don Honorio Ventura, my highschool alma mater,( while I'm now slicing onion and garlic), the smell of these bulbs/roots brings me back to a time when my Filipino life was full of hope and skill and intelligence and patience. In my highschool, students spent half of the day learning industry and arts and trades. The other half was spent on academics. I was taught General Metals, Electronics, Drafting, Ceramics, WoodPattern Making, Foundry, and my favorite - Cooking. Oh I was also taught Building Construction. But my Cooking Industry topped them all.

We used to wear uniform, white shirt called polo during Academics and blue tee shirt during the Industrial Arts.  Matched with blue pants and skirts. I don't know why I always remember Don Honorio Ventura School of Arts and Trades under a sunny blue sky, while I walk on its wide and open lot and enter its beautiful buildings. It took miles to tour the whole campus and unlike other schools around the town Bacolor, only in DHVSAT would you hear the sounds of welding and pounding of metals and hissing of foundry and breaking of stones and  the voice of...well...Miss Korda in an ordinary day. Miss Korda insisted I was her most intelligent student because I always got a hundred percent in her history class. Well, who won't if she gave all her questions and answers a day before the exam? I was the best note taker in my class. The rest? They were probably too bored to take notes. Miss Korda made me popular in highschool ( before I took the plunge in our wonderful University and got drowned there.My recollection of my university life, of course is noted down in a novel, partially serialized, in another web site, I know you don't care about that - my purpose in commenting on this is to prove I am a good note taker. I take notes in novelistic proportions, and I don't give a s--- about grammar). So under this very quite Bacolor day, and tutelage of Miss Korda, I demonstrated my Cooking ability.

sautee garlic and onion, mix in the vegetables and tofu to boiling, add a little salt

It was a clear afternoon when my cooking exam was given, you see... in our school, we cooked the old way, meaning, I had to bring my own firewood, my own pot, (it was actually my Grandmother's clay pot, now broken, oh my God! but I'm okay, don't you worry, she's dead, bless her soul) my own ingredients, including  my own eggs (not that I hatched them or something). The examination direction was just one sentence, "Cook anything." And because I was so used to eating gizzards and pigs feet and anything chicken except the chicken itself (My mother over-fed me with chicken necks and feet I thought the chicken's body was poisonous), I thought of cooking something exotic called LECHE FLAN. As the name implies, it's nothing but full of LECHE!!!!

I brought lots and lots of firewood knowing it would take long to steam cook my leche flan. Seeing this, Miss Korda told me to leave my firewood outside because the pieces of wood were too bulky. I broke the eggs, scooped their yolk, poured the milk, the sugar, the... well, every ingredient mentioned in my recipe copied from Cooking with Nora Daza. Then, as if the Devil was in cohort with Nature, it rained. If we got a stove or an oven, that would be no problem. But due to my intense concentration on my recipe, I forgot my firewood outside!!! And my irresponsible classmates didn't remind me about my dried firewood.Ha! All they cared about was to save their own firewood.

Eat while hot.

I never blew so hard all my life. I poured kerosene on my firewood and it would bring out a big flame only to flicker and die in a few seconds. I don't know what made me think I could concoct a leche flan by steam cooking it with wet firewood...but being the way I was, I blew and fanned and wiggled and sweated and turned red from the flames and pale from hypoventilating from one till four in the afternoon. While my classmates who cooked as simple as boiled eggs and (you guess it right) tinolang gizzard and chicken feet were already exhibiting their concoctions and were being praised for their cooking, I was there bending over for the whole class to see my ass, blowing my wet firewood till I was dizzy and all wet with sweat. By four o clock, my leche flan was still as soggy as the wrinkled cheeks of Miss Korda. By five o clock, all my classmates left for home, I was still blowing my lache flan.

Miss Korda told me to pack the whole thing up as  it's not worth cooking my stupid leche flan anymore. She said, "You're much better in History class."

I took one look at her, packed my whole pot and carried my wet firewood outside the Cooking room, and on the yard in front, I assembled three bricks plucked from the garden and made an improvised stove.

I said, "I won't go home till I finish this leche flan." I was so pissed off.

"In that case," Miss Korda said, "I won't be responsible for you. Remember, the security guards close the gate at eight in the evening."

I stayed inside DHVSAT compound for the remaining three hours until I was sure my leche flan was well cooked, until the guards told me to leave the school premises, until Miss Korda came back in her pajamas, lighting me with her flashlight."...You're still here?" she asked  in total amazement.

I got 100% score  in my cooking exam. And was whipped with a belt  by my mother for coming home late. I wonder where Miss Korda is now, after Pinatubo...

don't forget the bottle of pinacolada.
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