Afternoon Christmas Delights
Its Christmas afternoon of 2004. I'm cozying up in my brother's room contemplating on the niceties of my life. The 3rd floor of this building makes it special enough for me to gaze the sky and appreciate the calmness of the season. Right at the heart of Manila near the business district of Makati, it's rare to experience such slowness in a normal day. A rowdy traffic and noisy street is already a part of my daily life. But not today, because it's a holiday. Six hours ago, I just came from my work in a call center. I've been working graveyard shifts for three years and holidays are no exception. For some reason, this Christmas is special in such a way that all my siblings are complete and together with my mom we celebrated it as a family after my dad passed away three years ago. This morning, on the eve of Christmas, we call it “Noche Buena” (dawn feast) it’s very unusual that my mom didn’t prepare the food. We had it ordered and catered. We just treated ourselve