It’s a tough job but somebody’s gotta do it!  I’d just arrived from a 72 hour driving tour ofNorthern Luzon midnight of Monday the 27^th of February when JR, the club secretary, sends me a text the following morning looking for volunteer cars and drivers for the Bb. Pilipinas parade the following day, Tuesday.  I send a message back, declining as graciously as I can, that I’m really tired and that I intend to sleep for about three days straight.  I thought that was the end of that.  A few hours later Rowen Untiveros gives me a call and says that the organizers are really desperate.  I couldn’t very well refuse this fellow.  This is the same guy that made plans and preparations and invited club members to his home in San Pablo for his birthday celebration a couple of years ago - and nobody showed up!  Moreover, despite the club’s collective rudeness on Rowen’s last invitation, he has gone through the trouble of getting us into the Bb. Pilipinas parade.  We’re always complaining that we haven’t got any girls in our fun runs and events, and now this is an event with some of the most beautiful girls in the country.  How could I refuse?  “Okay Rowen, you can count on me.  I’ll be there!”

 The following day comes around and we’re told to be at the Araneta Coliseum at 3pm and I’m there en punto.  ChitoF’s there with Collins and Rowen at a cafe, then Tristan arrives, then Edrich arrives and then Chito gives his brother Edsel a call to join, who arrives a short while later.

As the afternoon sun sets we head on back out to the parking lot where there’s a stage setup for a short presentation of the girls to the public from where they proceed to the cars for the parade.  There are other sports cars there, among them a hot rod and an old military style Willy’s jeep.  I meet a few of the other sports car owners one of whom is another Miata owner, Ed Aguila, the father of Geo Aguila, one of our long lost members.  The guy’s a hoot!  He proposes that we each put in a thousand bucks into a pot, and the guy with a pageant winning girl wins the pot.  I say “game!”  He then shows me his 60’s MGA and tells me that he’s had it since high school and it’s the very reason why he got his son Geo the Miata so he could have the fun of a sports car at an age when it matters most!

The girls arrive in a bus and are awaiting the show and after about an hour they pile out of the bus in their bathing suits and are presented to the reporters and the crowd that’s gathered.  The guys and I are busy ogling the girls and snapping pictures.  Talk about accommodating.  When it comes to pictures, these girls were posing away whenever a camera appeared.

Now each of the participating cars for the parade is given a number that’s stuck on the hood and I notice that each girl also has a number.  I surmise that the number on the girl corresponds to the number stuck on the car.  My car’s got number sixteen and I carefully search the line of girls for girl number sixteen.  Finally, I see number sixteen and immediately make a decision that there’s another girl that I’d rather have.  Not that “sixteen’s” not pretty, but there were others that I preferred.  From the line up that I could see, I chose a couple of other numbers, then I went back to the cars to check on numbers.  Well, “twelve” looks good and the corresponding number “twelve” is on Rowen’s hood which is right next to my car.  But actually I’d really like “fourteen.”  While the other guys are busy watching the show, I search for the number “fourteen” amongst the other cars.  It’s at the far end, and it’s on a hot rod.  I search for Ed Aguila to ask him who the owner of the hot rod is and it’s a guy that I’d already met.  I ask him if he’d care to swap numbers to which he immediately answered in the negative.  Bummer!  Stupid me!  I make a mental note to myself:  There you go again – NEVER ASK! – TAKE!!!!

I decide to let go of number “fourteen” since the hot rod’s owner is now aware of my intentions and proceeded to work on getting number “twelve.”  So without his knowledge, I swapped numbers with Rowen’s car – “twelve” for “sixteen.”  What the heck, if Rowen protests I’ll just buy him some drinks later and get him drunk.

The girls are presented to the crowd and towels are being put on the spot of our Miata’s rear just ahead of the trunk and just behind the cockpit where they intend for each girl to sit.  Chito immediately lets me know of the organizer’s intentions and I for one am not going to allow any weight on that spot as it’s a soft spot and I’ve already got a dent for letting a girl sit there in one of Norman’s bikini-open shows at Subic (if I remember correctly it was Manong that told me “Joey, hwag mo pa-upuin yung girl jan malambot yan.”  Great!  Manong tells me after the fact, may dent tuloy.)  So we tell the organizers that the spot cannot carry weight.  One by one, the girls arrive and we each meet those who are to ride in our cars and they’re told to avoid the earlier designated spot and to sit on the spot over the gas tank to solve our problem.  This presents another problem for Chito since he has a cockpit brace on that spot which prevents a sitting position.  I’ve never seen Chito think so quickly and he immediately removes his passenger side headrest where there is just enough room on top of the seat and the rear shelf for the pretty mestiza candidate to rest her precious butt cheeks on.  Since the girls are climbing onto the upholstery, they’re told by the organizers to remove their spike heeled shoes, and all of them quickly comply.  My car presents its own problems as it has a roll bar which impedes access over the rear shelf, I couldn’t imagine how the girl would sit on the shelf with that roll bar impeding her access.  Pitoy Moreno, the fashion designer, who’s doing some of the supervising, asks number twelve “can you crawl under?”, immediately number “twelve”, who has by now removed her shoes, crawls under my roll bar and seats herself behind the bar in between the seats, and sits with as much poise as she can muster on the rear shelf.  Very dextrous girl she is, and as glamorous as these girls are made out to be, crawling under my roll bar did not look very glamorous at all.  I can’t quite imagine how Edrich’s girl is doing with the center support bar on the roll bar in his car.

What the heck, the girl was all pretty and made up.  As we wait for the parade to get started, we get to know each other and make a little small talk.  Number “twelve’s” name is Meral, who is in third year high school and is eighteen years old, speaks with an accent but can carry on a conversation in Tagalog.  She’s half Turkish and half Filipina and has been in the Philippines for ten months and proudly proclaims that during that time she was able to learn Tagalog.  By the time the parade got underway it was already evening.  The parade proceeds and we slowly go around the Araneta Center, and throughout this, the girl’s waving to the crowd and occasionally receiving compliments on how pretty she is.  At certain points it’s the Miata’s that are getting the compliment and she points this out to me in a jesting manner “don’t mind me, check out his car!”  In between waves she also tells me of the hectic schedule that they’ve been made to undergo for the pageant for the past few weeks but justifies it all as “worth it” as she’ll have a good story to tell even if she doesn’t win.  She also tells me how she loves how Filipino men are so polite and so courteous.  If there’s a Miss Congeniality award this girl should win it.

There’s hardly any communication over our radios and I surmise that the other guys are also doing the chit-chat with their own girls.  The parade winds down and we bid our respective girls good-bye and they proceed back onto their bus and onto their next engagement.  The organizers ask us to go over to Dencio’s where dinner has been prepared for the parade participants.  At Dencio’s, we all exchange stories of our own girls and most memorable was Collins’ story of how his girl, a Filipina American beauty, was dancing in her seat the entire time to which he gave her even more encouragement by cranking up the volume on the disco sounds in his car.

All in all, it was an enjoyable experience and I was quite happy to have participated in it.  I understand from Ed Aguila that it’s his third year to participate in the parade.  I for one won’t hesitate to join next year’s parade, this was a lot of fun!  I understand from Rowen that the organizers have already asked for the engagement of the club for next year’s pageant parade.  Perhaps next year it can be an all Miata parade with the Bb. Pilipinas candidates!

 Joey Bernardez

6 March 2006