TYPHOON IN-FA UPDATE, TRUMPET, SCRAPING SOLES, TELLING TIME

It appears that Typhoon In-Fa has turned to the right (as forecast) and is currently wandering the open waters of the Pacific Ocean, causing only sea faring vessels the experience of its turbulent winds and twenty-four foot swells.  I do recall the time of no radar or satellites to assist the meteorologists in their weather predictions, much less tracking weather systems such as this.  The only resource they had use of was reports from ships who had the misfortune of happening upon a meandering tempest.  
Even within the heartland of the United States, there was no system in place to accurately warn of impending tornadic activity much less those deadly winter blizzards which would roar like a raging steam engine out of the SW and across the country leaving death and destruction in their wakes.   Interestingly, as noted in an earlier blog entry, Filipinos believe if there are torrential rains with strong gusty winds, they say a Bagyo (typhoon) is passing.   Still, weather talk here on Negros Island seems to take on less of an importance in conversations than in the states….however the locals will say, and I mean always say, “init kaayo!” (very hot weather) as they sit in the shade and fan themselves.    

I had my trumpet sent here from the states over a year ago and Toy immediately latched onto it, determining he would learn how to play it.  Well, it hasn’t turned out quite the way I envisioned. 

Toy (Mark Anthony) Baguio and his trumpet

He has finally begun to get the hang of tooting through the mouth piece, but when making an attempt at belting out any meaningful tone on that brass instrument, it comes out like a bovine with mad cow disease.  The boy has the heart and desire, but just doesn’t have the lungs for it yet.  Still, I am hopeful that he will get the hang of it eventually…..and yes, I can still put out a nice sound after all those decades of not touching the instrument.  There are no school bands or orchestras, that I know of, on the island of Negros….at least I haven’t witnessed any yet. 

One thing I have noticed in the Philippines is the scraping of feet on the pavement as Filipinos walk.  I would like to stress that most people here wear only flip flops (or shower shoes) and even though the footwear is only made of rubber or plastic, they can make quite a noise especially if you have two or three or more passing at the same time.  In regard to my Filipino children, I have discovered that they would wear down the heels of their school shoes (a rarity among local children as most only wear flip flops (sandals) and thus required replacement every few months.  During my years as a youngster I do recall that the heels of my shoes would wear down prematurely and of my father taking me to the local shoe repair shop (they actually existed at one time in the states), having the heels replaced and then nailing semi oval metal heel cleats onto the back edge of the new heels.

boots with cleats on the heels

They made a cool clacking noise, but an irritating scraping sound.  I believe by the time I was in sixth grade, the metal plates had been banned from schools due to the damage they caused to the waxed floors.   Then I also remember on Sunday mornings, when walking home from church with my dad, he would invariably scold me to “pick up your feet!”   In the beginning of my walks with Toy during those predawn hours, I had to remind him several times to pick up his feet.  Over time the scraping of his sandals lessened, but every once in a while he would have a relapse.  During those moments, out of love and respect for him, I would softly utter the word, “Tiil” (pronounced  Tee – il) which means feet or legs in Cebuano and the scraping would stop.  Now, if I could just convince the other three kids to change their scraping ways.

One day I asked eight year old Charissa Mae to tell me the time on the wall clock.  Surprisingly she could not do it.  I was rather shocked and informed her that if she wanted to play with her iPad, she had to give me the exact time on the wall clock when asked.  If she was not correct, then she had to wait ten minutes before trying again.  A day or so after I initiated this new requirement, eleven year old Santiago was giving Mae Mae grief about her time reading handicap and thus I asked him the time. 

Charissa Mae Baguio telling me the time

To my dismay, as well as to his embarrassment, I discovered he couldn’t tell time any better than Charissa Mae!  I then took down the wall clock and gave all four a lesson on how to read time an “analog” time keeping device.  I did quiz the two oldest at several different times since then, but they were too wise for their papa.  As to the current accuracy of reading time with the two youngest?  Well, if they take their time they are accurate, but sometimes they get so excited about the prospect of playing games on their iPads that they don’t read the time correctly.  There are days when we have quite a few ten minute delays. 

Daryl A. Cleveland a.k.a. bounder

November 24, 2015