From a fishbowlful of names

In his blog several weeks ago, Tim Challies has written about how he hasn’t won anything in his life. He asked whether his readers have it differently, and I was planning on giving him a reply that says something like, “Not really, Mr. Challies.” This is a fairly accurate statement, at least insofar as it concerns raffle draws, because while I could point to certain memories of going up the stage to receive this and that prize, I could only remember two of them.

During one fiesta celebration in our village, my name got picked by Ma’am Valme from a tambiolo. She is a slim, middle-aged lady with a disposition of a preschool teacher and a charm of a politician. Clad in my old and dirty pair of rubber slippers, ill-fitted shirt and worn-out pants, I went up the stage to receive my reward. Just as I was about to leave, she thrust the microphone to me, and declared that I should say a few words. My voice was shaky and my pauses frequent as I tried hard to conjure an impromptu, Oscars-like speech. My brother was savoring the scene, and was laughing so hard at my expense.

My name also got picked during our church’s Family day celebrations this December. I became a recipient of an alarm clock and two sets of pens that I need. A lot of gifts were given that day that it seemed all you had to do to win anything was to be present.

However, beginning this December 13, I would be able to remember three. Here’s an account of how I won the third time:

After Tax 2 class, my classmates and I decided to eat at a nearby canteen. To be able to go there, we passed through the main entrance of the college. Tables were set and several people were coming in for a Christmas party that we had not been invited to and that we had no intention of attending. But this lady stopped us, and directed us to occupy an empty table. We were delighted. Free meals are always something to be delighted about.

Then, we were handed tickets, one for each of us. We obediently filled it out with our names. Mine bore the number 185. We were told the tickets were for the raffle draw. They were giving out, among others, two 19-inches Phillips LCD televisions. My classmates all wanted to win. I was the most cavalier. I didn’t want to come in front lest I be made to conjure an impromptu, Oscars-like speech again.

Then the guy picking out the winners announced my name. I won the television. And there was no need for the speech.

I gave the television to my parents when I came to the province for the Christmas break. Our old one is very old, indeed. My parents bought it when I was 8. I’m 23 now. When I told them my name got picked in a raffle draw, my mother thought I was joking. When she realized I was not, she exclaimed, “An unexpected blessing from the Lord.”

I agree with her. It is an unexpected blessing, indeed. It is a blessing because it is undeserved. I didn’t do anything good to merit it—I didn’t do anything at all except, perhaps, write my name on the ticket. It is unexpected because I came to school only to attend classes. I was not told there was going to have a party downstairs. I was not told someone would hand us tickets to fill-out. I was not told my name would be called. And it was from the Lord. I believe that God is in control of everything, even in the picking of a name from a fishbowlful of names.

Counting the days, and the one time I remember being good with numbers

I’m bad at math, and I’m quick to admit this—quicker even than I would admit watching Zaido in GMA religiously when it was still running. I can’t remember dates very well, which gets me in hot water with friends because I forget whose birthday falls on which day. I can’t add and subtract with such speed the way Manila jeepney drivers do. When a cashier asks me if I have 75 centavos after handing her three pesos so she could give me 1.25, I simply smile and give a quick nod, resigning myself to believing she knows what she’s doing.

The only time I was good with numbers was way back in kindergarten. The teacher told the entire class to recite in chorus the multiples of two up to ten. While the rest obediently stopped when we reached ten, I went on rattling off the numbers up to twenty. This I did with a smirk on my face indicative of intellectual snobbery that a four-year old could muster. I could have gone up to a hundred had she not interrupted me with a, “Very Good, Ralph”—perhaps, a polite version of, “Stop it Ralph. Let’s move now to Jack and the Beanstalk.”

So, you see, I’m not a big fan of numbers. But lately, I have found myself numbering the days, counting and marking them off one-by-one with much gusto paralleled only by the excitement of Pierre de Fermat when he discovered an original method of finding the greatest and the smallest ordinates of curved lines (Okay, I have to thank Wikipedia for that sentence. I really don’t know who this guy is much less what “ordinates of curved lines” means. I must have heard his name from one of my mathematically-inclined friends).

Such fascination with counting and numbers can be attributed to a longing that I have of going back home to Koronadal, South Cotabato. It has been ten months since I last saw my parents and talked to them face to face. Ten months since my father last woke all his children up at 6 a.m. to join him for breakfast. Ten months since I last enjoyed a lungful of fresh, provincial air. Ten months since I last watched a movie with my then unmarried aunt for 40 pesos (how much does SM or Trinoma charge?). Ten months since I last ate a whole fruit of durian—smell and all. Ten months.

As of this moment, there are three more days before home.