Ober Khok

I JUST came from a weeklong vacation that caused my girth to increase by an inch. It’s time to duck into the gym.

Translation: “duck” here means to eat non-fatty food, like duck which may be dark meat but leaner than chicken if I am to believe my friend Illustracio.

Sun.Star accepts donations for victims of Typhoon Ondoy

Going to “the gym” means jogging around the neighborhood, doing some pushups while watching Katie Couric on CBS Evening News, and doing the barbells while watching television-superhero Darna do her amazing fight against evil.

Around the month of November, people start feeling festive “with Christmas in the air,” “Christmas time is here; happiness and cheer,” and “kay sigla ng gabi, ang lahat ay kay saya, nagluto ang Ate ng manok na tinola, sa bahay ng Kuya ay mayro’ng litsonan pa (nights are merry, everybody is cheery, Ate is cooking chicken soup, in Kuya’s house you can find lechon cooking).

It’s lechon that ruins whatever good we have done to our body.

Our logic is always the same: It’s not every day that we eat lechon or any food dripping with cholesterol.

There are people who can shun lechon and even give a lecture to those who gorge on this crackling delight.

If love is blind and lovers cannot see the pretty follies that themselves commit—so is the stomach when facing the lechon; it cannot stop itself from committing the pretty folly. Hey, let a man abuse poetic license.

Speaking of license, here is something I cooked up for you. As an opening salvo for Christmas, I thought of food personalities based on common Yuletide fare that Filipinos spread on the table. It’s just for fun.

Lechon. A lechon man is the type who can take the heat. No matter how hard the going, how many times you get in a heated situation you stick it out until everything is cool and clear.

You often give so much of yourself that you are left with almost nothing. However, it is your pride and joy to give until it hurts. You believe in this motto. It might be good to be kind to yourself also. Remember, you might give so much that you are left with nothing but bones.

Ham. Ham types like to preserve tradition. Everything has to revolve around tradition—whether it’s courtship, worship, entertainment, fashion, you can be sure tradition is there.

It doesn’t mean that you don’t like modern things. It’s just that you trust the old fashioned way. You carry this even to your choice of home appliances. You mistrust “air-con electric fans” and “micro-wave ovens with roasters.” You prefer the old “turn-around fans” and “simple ovens.”

The one thing no one can accuse you of is this: You are not a spoilsport. You know how to mix with the crowd even if you are an old cookie by heart and a nice one, too.

Fruit salad. The fruit salad person is so full ideas so that sometimes he doesn’t know what he likes or who he is.

He is like Chris Brown who said he has a problem with identity.

Nevertheless, this mix-up makes the fruit salad a fun person to be with. Just go slowly on too much fancy things in your life.

Well, I’d like to go on and on like that battery advertised on national television, but I am reaching my word count limit.

There could be a Part 2 next week, but don’t count on it.