Allison and Kid

Chapter 5: Maybe

My good morning is her good night and her sunset is my sunrise. It's usual for her to sleep late. It's always after twelve. It's actually complementing my routine because my class starts at 8 in the morning and ends at 10. During those hours, she's usually watching series or movies. I even suggested Peaky Blinders to her because that's my favorite. Then after my class, we'd talk again then after few hours, she'll go to sleep and that's also my time for brunch.

She's not an early bird. She hates waking up early. While she's asleep, I do a lot of things too like working out, doing some errands, watching series, watching debates, and many more. Like Allison, I also like to keep myself busy.

Since Allison reads a lot and she knows a lot of stuff, I was challenged to read about different things too. She's smart and I don't want to end up saying nothing and of course, I want to be impressive. I know it's hard to impress a smart girl. So that's what I did. I read stuff about gender and sex, politics, education, equality, feminism and many more. I'd love to have a debate with her.

One time, I opened up a topic about education because I want to know her thoughts so I asked her,

"Do you think our education system is good enough?"

"Do you mean the education system here in the Philippines?" she asked back

"Yeah" I answered

"Of course it isn't good enough."

"Oh, let me know your thoughts, Allie. "

"Of course it's not good. Our country wasn't ready when they started to implement K to 12 Curriculum. It was forced even if things are not yet well prepared."

"Actually, Allie, K to 12 is good and it's for Filipinos too. It aims for us to be globally competitive."

"Yeah, I totally understand that but I'm talking about the preparedness here. I agree that Filipinos will be more globally competitive with that curriculum but it's not appropriate to implement something without proper readiness."

"But we're talking about the quality of education"

"Exactly! How can we have an excellent quality of education if our students are having a hard time? Lack of preparedness will affect the quality of education that we have. Before implementation, classrooms are already a problem due to the huge number of students per section. What more this time, eh? There's an additional two years for Senior High School. It's not a problem for private schools and public schools with huge area and proper budget but how about the schools in rural area? Especially the schools in remote areas?"

"Oh, I see. There's a bigger picture to look up to."

"Let me also include the resources such as books and other materials in school. I still see the first batch of Senior High School students as hamsters observed in a laboratory because of problems such as those. Actually there's a lot to say but I don't think we have an extravagant time for me to elaborate further."

"That's few for you?"

"Yeah."

Reading her statements made me want to see her saying those. She told me everything in five minutes. Of course the sending and receiving of messages were included on that time. She have a lot in mind. For sure she's a good speaker. She's very keen. I never met a girl like her before.

"Do you remember the time when I went to Philippines for a vacation?" I asked

"No"

"That was when I asked you if my former adviser was still teaching in our alma mater."

"Oh, yes! I remember."

"I should have asked you out. Nagkape man lang sana tayo."

"Why?"

"You're very interesting and persuasive. How can a small girl have a big voice like yours?"

"Di ako utu-uto, Daniel."

"I am not kidding. I think I wasted my time back then. I should have known you like this before."

I mean it. I should have known her before. I really think that I wasted all of my time on Jona but also because of that, I found out that she's cheating on me. I really hope that this happened earlier so that even for once, maybe I was able to be with her.

Well, time is always tricky and it knows the perfect timing. Of all times, it happened during this pandemic. I was there for three weeks and been to malls near her but our paths never crossed. Maybe we were in the same place but never seen each other. Maybe she just came after I passed by. Maybe we bumped into each other without knowing it. Maybe good things are waiting ahead. Maybe there's something more than this.