the folks at IHR just cannot do without me, and although i've left the office more than two years ago, they keep asking me to return, if only to inject some variety to the monotony of their lives. so they've decided to invite me to this symposium on the death penalty, meant to open the eyes of some newly elected congresspeople to the issues relating to the right to life and capital punishment. i was there just to moderate the interaction between the speakers and the participants, and so early monday morning, i stuffed a couple of barongs into my lowepro street & field rover light, and still found space for my travel iron and my laptop. i just had the bag plus my camera beltbag. this is what you might call packing light. i was at the airport early, and i didn't have any check-in baggage, so i found myself at the cellphone charging area of NAIA II, putting some power into my iPod. i had been deprived of sleep, not to mention that makiling had exhausted me, so i dozed off while i was there. i was facing the busy part of the airport, and there were a lot of people passing by, so all these strangers saw me while i was in that awkward sleeping position, my back slouched, my hands cupping my crotch, my head tilted back almost at a right angle, and my mouth slightly open. only later when i boarded did i realize that i was in business class! too bad i wasn't able to take advantage of the mabuhay lounge.
rhinitis) in room 6079 (which isn't even on the 6th floor, go figure). paloys is a huge person (his own words; imagine a life size teddy bear), with an equally huge sense of humor, and a lot of wit to match his unassuming intelligence. i suppose because of his size, he'd be more tolerant of alcohol. after the sympo on the first day, we took the second secretary of the royal dutch embassy to ratsky's in ayala center cebu, and paloys had around 8 bottles of san mig strong ice (2 bottles more than i). when we returned to the hotel, he went straight to the john and regurgitated the prawns we had for dinner. he doesn't chew his food that well. the sympo on the first day consisted of lectures from justice vitug and prof roque. justice vitug is an endearing old man, with an overpowering gentleness and humility, and whose small, physical stature finds no place in my towering regard for him. he carries the welcome burden of his erudition with restrained, but natural dignity. we sat together at lunch and he spoke to me with a relaxed, grandfatherly demeanor. prof roque, meanwhile, is a young, energetic academic, whose booming voice is almost as loud as his competence in the subject of international law. he spoke, though, with some consciousness of the composition of the audience, and had been perspiring heavily as he dealt with the inquisitorial cong lagman and the stubborn cong baterina.
we had dinner at the mactan pre-function ballroom. it was an immense hall which we had to share with the koreans (we were supposed to have it at the buko bar, but the rains washed out our venue). i was having more than my fair share of prawns when the cultural performers pulled me to the stage to dance the tinikling. i didn't need a lot of prodding, but i was still chewing a piece of huge prawn when we started jumping, and i felt the masticated food in my esophagus running up back to my mouth. i felt like throwing up at the dancer, and i quickly lost appetite after that.
the following day, i woke up with a really bad headache. paloys and i lingered in our large beds for a while longer before we actually stood up. the lectures for that morning were from prof hodgkinson of the univ of westminster and justice langa of the constitutional court of south africa. the articulate and funny british professor, whose name sounds like a new disease, is a giant of a man who directs the centre for capital punishment. justice langa (whose name i kept forgetting while i was up on the podium, so i referred to him as "our distinguished guest from south africa", "the good justice," etc.) is a humble and learned man, who had very black african sensibilities. by that i mean his speech had a musical and sonorous quality to it. he reminded me of an african yoda, because his face sort of spreads out horizontally, and as astutely observed by paloys and myself, his eyes were set so far apart across his face that i could place all of my five fingers between them and touch neither. he must have very good peripheral vision then.
after we had checked in, we barely managed to abuse the goodies at the mabuhay lounge since it was all of a sudden boarding time. i didn't have a window seat, which was sad because i could see that the sunset was painting the sky in a most interesting mix of colors. on the plane, i was possessed. when the stewardess-in-training was asking me what i wanted to have for dinner, i turned on my best british accent and harangued her about the menu. little did i know that while i did this, the other stewards and stewardesses were behind me, watching and listening with amusement. one of them even engaged me in conversation, and i think the entire business class of that flight was disturbed. i should remember to always take my medication.
