Funny because that night I found myself at, read this, the EMBASSY at the FORT. Well, actually, my friends went in while I went home. Boring boring me. But I had a very good reason...Dean a.k.a. Marko could not get in with his oversized shorts. Me to him: maybe if you like wear your shorts na pakigol (really short ba) and hike up your shirt to show a little tummy, like all those slim, leggy, girls prancing about, then they would let you in. The sign outside was very specific: No oversized shorts. There, less is more, I guess.
This Embassy thing all started when Des, who is a nurse in London and was in town for a vacation, said she wanted to go to a disco. I was blast-ed to the past-ed.
Disco?!? The last disco I went to must have been at Spacer in Tacloban, beside the bowling-an, when I was 14. No, wait, Jaleux along Qeuzon Avenue in front of Burger Machine. No, the last one was at the GARAGE in Carigara, formerly the town's moviehouse that was converted to a warehouse-type disco where women in knee-high black boots and short shorts belted out LAKLAK.
Ruby to me: You don't go to a disco now, you go clubbing.
Ah, clubbing. So that's what they call it now. And so that night, after dinner at a Spanish restaurant in Shnagri-la, we decided to check out the Embassy, based on the recommendation of another highschool classmate who occasionaly goes there with her expat friends. That's the only reason I go, she insisted. Does not want to be a clubber, this one. hehehe.
What I know about that place and that subculture, I get from my once-a-month showbiz tsismis viewing , where the Embassy would be featured from time to time for brawls involving some hotheaded, egotistic artistas.
So our excursion to the Fort extended my immersion of that foreign culture (kay damo foreigners, hekhekhek), and even if I did not actually go inside the Embassy, watching the people outside was already ah, a new experience.
We sat for a good hour at the Cafeteria, the one beside the Embassy, waiting for the clock to strike 12 so the cinderallas (me, pearl, mike, marko) can go home and they (des, roch and bf homer, cha) can proceed next door. That one hour, in between sips of mai tai, we people-watched. I have never seen so many well-dressed party people in one place (but that's because you don't go anywhere, Tonette would say).
All the people there, they all looked liked they jumped out of the fashion magazines. All the latest fashion featured in last week's People's Magazine, US weekly, OK Magazine that I read in my dentist's clinic were all being cat-walked at the Fort. The in crowd. ( in to what?)
Pearl to me: If you are young and you belong to this crowd, it must be difficult trying to keep up. Me to her: Well, they are rich socialites. Pearl to me: No, not everyone who comes here are rich. Some just, you know, keep up with the latest trend.
Ruby to me, the day after: Describe them to me. Me to her: Ok, remember the yuppies of Makati who went to Streetlife? The higher-end of that crowd (I know, I am outdated but you know what I mean). Age range- 20-30s. Have disposable income/allowance. Reads Cosmo/GQ. Metrosexuals. Fashionistas. Manila's own Paris Hiltons.
Not that there is anything wrong with that. The only point I am trying to make is, it was interesting to see people very different from my usual crowd (ok, I do not have enough friends to make up a crowd according to standard definitions, but you know what i mean). And I was amazed how much a place could actually homogenize a crowd, or the other way around.
When my friends and I go out, we go to bars where beer sells for under 35 pesos (if we are feeling a little rich we can even shell out 100 for cover charge). And the usual people I go out with give the exact amount, down to the last peso, to their share of the bill. I was definitely out of my turf.
But that does not make us better people, only poorer people. It also does not mean they are better dressed, just more expensively dressed. Balit, all this only means that the Embassy is not my kind of place. I had fun though, the company was great, the conversation even better, the venue did not matter.
This weekend, I will wash off the taste of that place with a little dash of James Taylor at My Bro's mustache. Or drink tanduay at the kanto (ay, may city ordinance pala against that and there are no kanto boys in my neighborhood). Or grab a beer at the News Desk where lonely, old, desk editors hibernate.
Until the next invitation to go clubbing comes.
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