September 28, 2006

The FINALE: 4th YEAR HIGH SCHOOL

I was trying to spread the posts so it would reach velada time, and here we are almost there, and I almost forgot to do a senior year post!

I remember the following teachers: Miss Barrera was English for half the year, Miss Marie Lim for the other half. We all got our share of a half year with Miss Barrera, the most terrifying yet thrilling English class ever. She somehow had the same tone and volume of voice, when one gave an excellent answer, or when one had none…or had the guts to actually utter a stupid one. Miss Barrera also taught us World History for a few months. The most important thing she taught me that year was to ask "WHY?" She gave us a quiz, once a week, I think. The quiz was on facts: dates, what, when, where. But that was just to prepare you to ask the big WHY question. Analysis, analysis, analysis. That class was simply brilliant.

Mrs. Mapa was religion, Mrs. Yorro for Pilipino, Mrs. Viloria for Trigonometry, Miss Paulate for Physics, Prof. Estrada for Philosophy, Mrs. Carlos for History, until she got pregnant and had to go on leave early, at which point we got Tina Zulueta, who was young and hip and just a few years ahead of us. P.E. was Mrs. Zafra! And Home Ec was Mrs. Pedrosa, just don’t remember what class it was anymore!

Pope John Paul II came to Manila sometime in January 1981. A bunch of us went to see him at U.S.T. Don’t remember who they were, just that I was not one of them, since there was no guaranteed seating, and I faint at such occasions. I went with my family to Luneta, where I got a seat. Saw the Pope again as he passed by my lola’s house on Shaw Blvd. He was riding a large tourist bus, and he was simply standing on the steps of the open bus door, as the bus moved slowly along, allowing him to be “close” to the crowd as he waved. No popemobile yet. The attempted assassination was yet to come, some 4 months later in Rome.

CMT or Citizens Military Training (or so I think?): Sorry to my many friends who were officers, or model platoon, but I HATED THIS! I was never so glad to be a "fainting" kind of person, such that after a few episodes, I got shuffled to the INDIA platoon, "I" for Invalid! Happy to be "invalid" for the rest of the year with wackly platoon leader Cindy "Travolta" Dominguez! I started out in Foxtrot, with Annette Lim as my platoon leader. One thing I learned: the alpha as in Alpha, Bravo, Charlie. Very handy now when I give the airline clerk my flight confirmation numbers! Hahaha!

GRADUATION PICTURES: We took them sometime in August. We had to go to the studios of Chat Peypoch, on a weekend. I remember being sick for my assigned day, yet I insisted on going. My mom said I would take a horrible picture and I should wait. I ended up liking my picture, it is still one of my favorite pictures of me in my youth! I still have my collection of grad pics that we traded with each other, complete with written notes at the back. I love to read through those notes, over and over again!

PROM: See post on prom. No sense in my typing up the trauma all over again.

GRADUATION: Okay, another confession coming. At one of our VP luncheon meetings (I think we met once a week?), Manila Cathedral came up, as the venue of our graduation. It started as a joke, like that was too ambitious to even dream up, but someone asked and found out it was possible. But there was a trade-off: Prom could not now be at a fancy hotel, if graduation was to be at Manila Cathedral. I thought it was a good deal: Manila Polo Club/Manila Cathedral vs. fancy hotel/Mother Rose Hall. No idea we would start a tradition. Many batches after us (up to today?) had their graduation at the Manila Cathedral. And it was a beautiful graduation, wasn't it?

PHYSICS AND TRIGONOMETRY: Will not bore you with my geekness to tell you how much I loved those subjects. But hey, I was in good company, Karina Galang, and Mia Unson loved them too. Miss Paulate, at the end of the year, made it a condition of our being exempted from Physics finals, that certain girls who were having trouble, had to pass, or else. I thought it unfair, but was too innocent to fight, and actually believed her (who knows, she might have been serious!) so we tutored those girls. Whoever you are: thank you, thank you, thank you. You passed and we got our exemptions!

BAGUIO RETREAT: Right of passage. Something we all looked forward to, from the time we were freshmen. Not sure if it was because this was the most significant and serious retreat by reputation, or because the venue was Baguio and Baguio = FUN. See Section 7 website, and see who some of us ran into at Wright Park. I wonder how many packs of Marlboro blue seals, and contraband food baon, among other contrabands, got consumed those few days and nights in Baguio?

At the retreat, the most awaited (or dreaded) part: Sex ed via Jesuit priest. Need I say more? We had no more explicit sex instructions, (actually DON’Ts, rather than DO’s) than from Fr. Reuter. Anyone here who actually got told by their mom or dad, or other teacher, explicitly, that one must not do this or that because it was a MORTAL SIN? I’m not complaining. I love Fr. Reuter.

Okay, now our “guy” lurkers, (yes, we know you are there, are you blushing yet?) will finally understand why you did not get what you asked for back in high school. Or maybe I should say, now you will realize how lucky you are that you got what you asked for back in high school! We got the book thrown at us, and promised the fires of hell, and eternal damnation if we did certain things. Certainly, not all of us complied. Enough said. Enough material there for another blog of another sort (insert naughty smile here) and I'm not the one writing it.

COLLEGE EXAMS: We all had to troop to Don Bosco, probably on a weekend, to take the NCEE. I think it was a whole day affair. And if you got a score less than 99, well, you were....err...having way to much fun in high school! For Ateneo exams, we had to go to Ateneo, also on a weekend. We had to use the high school classrooms. I remember some girls trying to figure out whose desk they were sitting on. For La Salle exams, well, we were special. La Salle came to us, and exams were administered right in our classroom. Why the special treatment? I believe that the Dean of Admissions of La Salle at that time was an Assumption girl herself. UP: We had to trek to U.P., on one of two or three “national” testing days, sometime in December. Those are all the tests I took, don’t know what other universities required, and sheepishly, don’t know what Assumption College required either!

The year went by quickly. We were busy, we had more difficult subjects, and serious life decisions to make: what college to apply to, what course to take. That’s on top of what party to attend this weekend, what to wear to the prom, who to take to the prom. It was fun, and it was sad. I knew that a major part of my life would be over, and I was to turn a new chapter the next year. I knew some of you I would not see again for a long long time, but of course, it had not hit yet during that year. I excitedly looked forward to college, nervous, apprehensive, not knowing where I would go really. All I knew is that for the first time in my life, I would go to a school that was not exclusively for girls. I could not wait to break out of Assumption, yet I was sad about leaving something that was my life for 12 years.

The day after graduation, we still had to go to school, to pick up our report cards and say goodbye to each other. I remember walking around San Lo that day, looking at everything. It was not as poignant as my goodbye to Herran 7 years before. I had not come to love San Lo the way I did Herran. I do remember running into Christine Carlos at the yard in front of our building. She gave me a hug, congratulated me, and I her. We did see each other again at college, but not everyday anymore, unlike the last 12 years. Now that I think about it, Christine was with me when I did a final "walk through" of Herran at the end of Grade 4.

Many of you, I never saw again after graduation. Shirley Robles and Regina Yulo, never will again, not in this life anyway. Adieu, old classmates.

Maybe I will see the rest of you again in San Lo, in the next two weeks. I hope so. If you are still sitting on the fence, c'mon, show up at Assumption on October 15, 2006, 10:00 a.m.

BE THERE. It's our time to COME HOME.

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