For my Ladies: Tea and Geography (instead of sympathy)

Baang! Chef and Brewer. Old Spaghetti House. Heaven N Eggs. JTs chicken inasal. CPK. Grilla. Burgoo. Chili's. Dimarck's. And Baang again!
These are the places where in one point in time (or more), I had my dose of TEA (not coffee) with the girls...
or where we shared desserts of all kinds and flavors...
where we had our endless discussions about relationships, careers, revelations, or plain updates on each other's lives...
where we learned to hold our weekly get-togethers which eventually turned into bi-monthly then recently into monthly! (this calls for red alert, girls!!! but monthly updates are still good as compared to pre-Canadiagirls times, when we rarely had get-togethers except during birthdays!)

Going back to our favorite spots...

People would look at us and sometimes see:
A long table filled with hyperactivity -- 1,000,000 words per minute, baby!
Or six girls giggling HARD until Coco would have tears welled-up in her eyes (and still laughing her distinct khkhkhkh laugh).
Or three ladies and a gentleman conversing deeply about more serious matters.
Or just two confidantes. Or three. Whispering. Gasping. (sorry, we all swore to keep our secrets.)
As long as there were stories to tell and tea to drink or crepe to share, we were there.


Last night's session in Baang was short noticed. Aenid called for it the afternoon before (It was a spur of the moment kind of thing... "miss nkta, let's have tea!" then there we were). And whoever was game & free could just drop by.

In the end, it was just me and Aenid. Like the one in Chef before. And the one in Heaven N eggs (but Mayen followed that time, yay! :-) sorry partner, we had to go home early last night :t we missed you! And all the girls too!) I'm kinda famous for dating my girlfriends on weekends, haha. (while my official date is still in cebu :p)

And like in all the other get-togethers, there was always one striking event or news to be told.

Aenid's leaving for San Francisco on May 29.
She would be the third in our barkada to move out from the Philippines.
First, Cami.
Then, Jo.
And now it's Aenid's turn.

These girls have been my friends since our grade school years, back when we played patintero or told ghost stories under the acacia trees in school... up until highschool when we learned to include boys in our discussions, preparing and attending soirees, and then college when we eventually swore the guys off our lives (just kiddin'! we love the special ones)

When Cami was about to leave back in 3rd year college, we had the longest preparation for it -- trip to Zambales (where she told us that she was leaving for good), attending all her org's events, sudden visits to U.P. & gaining new friends from EcoSoc, her suprise party, our sleep-over or sleepless-sleep-over, rather... We all cried so hard that time. Yet, we managed to capture all those puffy-eyed moments with our indispensable camera.

After that first despedida, we realized that ALL OF US could have had spent more time together. And we swore to do just that. That was the birth of the CanadiaGirls -- comprised of 14 girls (sometimes ladies, sometimes women, but oftentimes still girls) plus Glenn, our honorary member. And the beginning of our regular get-togethers and our rare but much awaited sleep-overs. Eventually, Jo left for Canada too. Aww.

We've all gone through heartaches & break-ups (the clean & not-so-clean ones), shifting courses, hunting for the perfect job, night outs, vacation trips & updating each other about our adventures (skiing for cami, beach at night for Jo, beach trips for us back here, Mayen in Ausy, me climbing the Great Wall, Aenid in NY, the list goes on), welcoming new persons to the barkada and to our lives (whenever someone had a boyfriend to introduce), and all the ups & downs of people nearing the quarter of a century.

Now that we're in this age, we have learned to accept that we would all eventually live our own lives. Each of us would have that certain corner in the world. But like all the other corners found in any geometrical figure, our corners are only created by connecting lines. In distant places then, those connecting lines for us had been and would always be the lines of open communication.

At this point, I choose to stay here in the Philippines. This is my corner. Among us, I think Sarah, Coco, Julie, Michelle, Mayen, Jill, Kate and Alych opt to do the same. Cami and Jo have left while Aenid, Cheree, and Glenn are planning to leave. These are the choices and the plans at present.

But we have to keep in mind that all our plans have a hint of uncertainty. Because if there's anything I've learned for the past months, it would be these things: sometimes we really can't tell what life holds for us. Sometimes we don't always get what we want. Or sometimes we just change in time. And what we want now may not be the what we want several years after.

Amidst all the possible changes, I remain hopeful for my ladies... that wherever we will be 10 years from now, we would still have our conversations (even without the tea).

And lastly, I wish to contradict myself. I am certain... that if ever we do find ourselves living in different parts of the globe someday, we would have at the very least another day to ourselves. After all, didn't we once swear to watch Oprah live? :p

To all my ladies, HUGS and *Cheers*
Hmm, "Cheers" -- that's another story.... :)