ABSENCE OF DIALTONE

ABSENCE OF DIALT ONE
April 27, 1993 – 4:00 p.m.

Absence of dial tone in the telephone is not very uncommon but this time it has been many hours and no dial tone yet. I told Jonathan to go to the neighbor, dial 173 and inquire why our unit has no dial tone.

So, it was a case of temporary disconnection for being unable to pay the amount of P253.o4. It was 4:00 p.m. so I told Paul to hurry up and pay. I thought that Terry paid the bill before she went abroad.

Anyway it will be connected tomorrow yet. So, we cannot call Bee to greet her Happy Birthday. But tomorrow is not too late as time in America is several hours delayed behind Philippine time.

There is no blackout tonight. Power cut-off was done at daytime: 12:30 t0 4:30 p.

This experience is a welcome improvement but the non-functioning telephone will be a pest to interested callers.

8:30 p.m.: Lorenz (Bee’s Boy friend) came bringing with him Pizza pie from Angelinos’s to celebrate Bee’s birthday. One good characteristic of Lorenz is his thoughtfulness. I hope it is genuine.

So, Lorenz, Paul, Peter and I, celebrated Bee’s birthday complete with picture-taking. Afterwards Otan and Lorenz went to the country club to call Bee by long distance. They pretended they were only calling a friend nearby so that the twenty minutes long distance call was charge to Ayala Alabang Country Club. Wise guys, they are.

Lorenz invited Otan to play billiard at BF Homes, Paul watched TV in his room and I was left in the kitchen, dining with all the electric power that I needed. I felt a little drowned by the b rightness of the night. Blackout makes everything doubly bright when the lights become available.

With lights everywhere but no telephone ringing makes the surrounding somewhat eerie. The silence in the house is deafening. I could imagine how lonely most of the mansions in the village are. Most of them are occupied by few people, each one barely seeing each other. They communicate through the facilities of the intercom. It is not living but mere existence.