I'm a Baby!

Varekai was fantastic! Too fantastic that fantastic wouldn’t even begin to describe its fantasticness so I’ll just park all my thoughts and praises on Varekai because this story – “How I Get Started” – is about the life-changing events that transpired after Varekai the show. Read my letter to them.

Dear Sybille,

Hi! Great show! Congratulations to the performers and the artists behind Varekai. That being said, I am writing to you about the major thing that ruined the Cirque de Soleil experience for so many of us. I was one of those complaining after the July 22/3:30PM show when you again refused to honor the senior citizen discounts despite discrepancies in your senior citizen discount rule, discrepancies for which you are entirely responsible.

Hoopla.ph cites in their rules and regulations on senior citizen discount that the discount can only be given on the date of the show for which the ticket was purchased, but when I approached the senior citizen refund window, the lady said that discounts can only be processed before the show. I weakly argued that the show just ended, and that it was raining too hard right before the show began that it wasn’t prudent to run through the storm to get to the box office for the refund. She said that was the rule, so I walked away. But something’s quite not right so I accessed the hoopla website on my cellphone and true enough the rules only stated “same date,” nothing about transacting for the refund before the show. I patiently went back in line. When my mom heard that the party in the adjacent window had the same concern, she led me to that window. I echoed the chinita lady who was with her two senior citizen parents who swore that there was no mention of the “before the show rule” in their website. As if having encountered the exact problem before, ticket the lady took out a supposed print out of the rules and regulations as seen allegedly in their website, only problem is this printout has a 7th rule whereas the website only lists 6. And I was showing her the website on my cellphone as it appeared around 6:30 PM today, July 22. But the print-out has the seventh rule – encircled with a ballpoint pen for emphasis (another indicator that we were not the first to complain about this) – states that the refund can only be processed before the show. How dubious! At this point, the chinita lady’s dad was getting upset so the ticket lady called the French female manager, you, Sybille, and you insisted that the rules on cirquedesoleil.com will be the one honored, not the one listed on hoopla, to which chinita (go, girl!) incredulously remarked that hoopla was the one listed in all their publicity! You said the only thing you can do right now is give your email address (not yours personally, but a generic varekaicustomerservice address) so we could email our concern. You promised that if we did so that day we would get a reply by 10pm. It’s already 10:56pm so I wouldn’t put my hopes up.

While writing this now I again checked the hoopla website, and it’s been changed. It now almost mirrors the cirquedesoleil.com site and when you click enter, it will now just re-direct you to the cirquedesoleil.com website. OK, so I guess if you do reply, will you just deny the existence of the previous website that only has 6 rules (how can I print screen from my cellphone?)

How much are we talking about here? Our seats were worth P3800 each. At 20% off, my parents would have saved a combined amount of P1,520. My parents’ tickets and the other two I bought with it were all charged the full amount when bought, I could easily brush this off, and right now I am. I am no longer after the discount because right now I figured the only way you would give us this discount is if we travel again from Marikina to Manila, such that the amount we will receive may just about cover our gas and food expenses for that discount. Hardly worth my parents’ trouble and embarrassment. My parents were thrilled to be able to help out in the expenses with their senior citizen cards even when I said it wasn’t necessary. I guess we won’t be able to understand the sense of reward and privilege in whatever little discount they could get just by brandishing that card, they wear it like it’s a badge that proves they were productive, hard-working citizens which this society is now bestowing with some perks. I’m not including my parents’ senior citizen id details in this letter because the discount is not the point. I just hope that you would consider this unfortunate incident so that positive adjustments may be made in how you deal with your senior citizen viewers and their families next time.


Maraming salamat po.

Rey

I should’ve warned you to just skip the whole letter thing hehehe.

Anyway, ang tanging pamangkin kong nakasama na si Justin na nagsisisgaw at nagatatalon pa hanggang sa curtain call ay biglang sumakit daw ang ulo at nagsususuka during dinner. So umuwi na agad kami. 8PM na’to so in-anticipate naming ang kasagsagan ng Friday night traffic jam. Suwerte namang matiwasay kaming nakarating ng Buendia para sunduin ang sister ko, nag-C5 hanggang nakarating sa bahay ng parents ko sa Marikina. Walang traffic! Himala! Wala pala sa’ming gustong batiin ‘yun mula nang bumibiyahe kami sa Roxas Boulevard so ngayon lang kami nakapag-celebrate hehe. But no, since nabati nga! Traffic sa Katipunan! Kung kelan mag-isa na lang sa kotse! Hay!

Paglampas ng Miriam, tumambad na ang “yun lang ‘yun?!” na dahilan ng trapik. A mother was trying to CROSS Katipunan from La Vista gate to the U-turn slot across it. Her window was down so you could see her shamelessly looking at the traffic jam she’s caused as she gives them a face that was half-pleading-half-putting-up-a-mean-front. Ambuwisit ‘to, ha! Pagtapat na pagtapat ng kotse ko sa kotse niya, I rolled down my passenger side window, looked at her and waited for her to look at me straight in the eye (which didn’t take long) then I mouthed “Ang bo-bo mo! Ga-go!” She was perhaps still deciphering what I just said, but not wanting to delay everyone much further, I took out my gun from the glove compartment and fired at her car, I dunno know, three times. I am positive I hit her right in the head with my first shot pa lang. I looked around and the witnesses were looking at her then they looked at me, they had this look of shock that quickly shifted to fear-anger then to something I couldn’t quite place but I would imagine it would be the look I’d have whenever someone actually says or does something evil that everybody else was thinking of saying or doing anyway. The shock was not from the act, but for the courage that went into doing it. I felt like they wanted to cheer but out of the littlest respect they have for that woman they just paused then drove along their way. Just before I reached home, I thought I might have to do this regularly, killing as my way of serving this country. I shall call myself the BadAss dot dot dot “The Bad Driver Assassin – Killing Bad Drivers before they Kill More!”