Where have all the flowers (and plantitas) gone?
Published Nov 7, 2021 12:12 am
HEARD IT THROUGH THE GRIPEVINE: OUR NEW ABNORMAL
Just the other week, Issa and I were having lunch at Mamou Rockwell, and if there was something she noticed, as we had elected to take one of the socially-distanced indoor tables – it was that while there were less people because of the restrictions, it was distinctly noisier, and people at the other tables were generally talking in unusually loud voices. Issa made the observation that people had forgotten how to modulate because of this pandemic, and I got to thinking how this is so true, and wondering what other things have changed, for better or worse, because of how this COVID situation has stretched and became so ingrained in our everyday lives – and how even within our pandemic “lifetime,” things have already evolved and changed.
This lack of modulation is akin to how we speak when talking to someone who’s hard of hearing, or doesn’t speak our language. With COVID, the reasons this lack of modulating has occurred is threefold. There’s the six feet apart and the face masks we’ve all gotten used to, and that had us all speaking louder than usual. This is exacerbated by how we’ve shifted so much of our social interacting on devices, while using chat room apps; and here again, in the comfort of our designated WFH work spaces, we’re often speaking to the microphones of our devices. Similarly, we speak up, raising our volume a notch or two.
I’d surmise that we're so used to that, that now that things are easing up, we’ve forgotten how to tone it down. So now, that’s just our automatic volume. Think about it, or ask someone near you, so you’ll realize if it’s what you’re doing, and hopefully, can correct that. At Mamou, it became really irritating – as even if they were two, three tables away, it was like they were sitting at our table, and we were party to their unwelcome conversation!
Within this period of COVID, in the early days, we were so hooked on social media for information, and as a vicarious “escape” from being stuck at home. Do you recall how practically everyone and their uncle and aunt, all of a sudden became full-fledged plantitas and plantitos? It was like having a “green thumb” was our surefire way out of mental stress or imminent boredom. Well, thankfully, most of those posts have vanished; and we’re now left with the hard-core plantitas, who discovered they truly had a “green thumb,” and weren’t just riding a trend.
Our Manila Bulletin President and CEO, Emil Yap, has been into plants, flowers, cactus, and even orchids, since the 1980’s; and he used to flash a bemused smile when we’d talk about the craze late last year. I’m certain it’s because he knew that going green in the plantita way isn’t as easy as everyone thought it would be. On top of serious study and research, it also takes patience and having the touch. Plus when the craze took over, it became quite an expensive “hobby.” So I’m now wondering just how many professed “green thumbs” of the last year and eight months have gone thumbs down, with empty and/or idle pots and planters cob-webbed and stored away. With packets of enriched soil left languishing at the far end of some bottom cabinet?
Where are all the sushi bakes and ube-filled pandesals? This time last year, you couldn’t escape posts about how this or that home-based entrepreneur had the best bake or pandesal, how they had hit culinary Nirvana with their little tweak or additive to the basic bake or pandesal recipe. Me, I was more concerned about how a verb such as “bake” had overnight, become a noun.
And while I did like the ube-pandesals, I subscribed to keeping it simple. I thought it lost all reason for being, when it practically became a dessert, because it was too sweet – ube plus Nutella, or chocolate? Or when they added globs of cheese or peanut butter, which I personally felt didn’t combine all that well. At least now, these pandesals are just displayed as regular offerings at most bakeries, and not exalted as the ultimate baking innovation – which I thought was pure “exagg.”
In national governance and political announcements, do you remember when contact tracing was all the rage, and we were playing catch-up to the more developed nations who used contact tracing as the foundation for controlling the pandemic’s spread? Well, is it just me, or am I right in saying that for all the bluster, there never was a true system of contact tracing ever established here? That as the talk and references to C-T began to wane, it just went the way of unicorns and the dodo – pure fantasy or gone extinct.
It’s funny when you think about it, how life here has taken so many somersaults since that fateful March of 2020. I’m sure you have your own wry observations and favorites of what has gone missing, or made its unexpected arrival, since this all began. And even funnier to note that this column today began with a lunch date, and noticing that the people surrounding us were talking in “all caps.”
Just the other week, Issa and I were having lunch at Mamou Rockwell, and if there was something she noticed, as we had elected to take one of the socially-distanced indoor tables – it was that while there were less people because of the restrictions, it was distinctly noisier, and people at the other tables were generally talking in unusually loud voices. Issa made the observation that people had forgotten how to modulate because of this pandemic, and I got to thinking how this is so true, and wondering what other things have changed, for better or worse, because of how this COVID situation has stretched and became so ingrained in our everyday lives – and how even within our pandemic “lifetime,” things have already evolved and changed.
This lack of modulation is akin to how we speak when talking to someone who’s hard of hearing, or doesn’t speak our language. With COVID, the reasons this lack of modulating has occurred is threefold. There’s the six feet apart and the face masks we’ve all gotten used to, and that had us all speaking louder than usual. This is exacerbated by how we’ve shifted so much of our social interacting on devices, while using chat room apps; and here again, in the comfort of our designated WFH work spaces, we’re often speaking to the microphones of our devices. Similarly, we speak up, raising our volume a notch or two.
I’d surmise that we're so used to that, that now that things are easing up, we’ve forgotten how to tone it down. So now, that’s just our automatic volume. Think about it, or ask someone near you, so you’ll realize if it’s what you’re doing, and hopefully, can correct that. At Mamou, it became really irritating – as even if they were two, three tables away, it was like they were sitting at our table, and we were party to their unwelcome conversation!
Within this period of COVID, in the early days, we were so hooked on social media for information, and as a vicarious “escape” from being stuck at home. Do you recall how practically everyone and their uncle and aunt, all of a sudden became full-fledged plantitas and plantitos? It was like having a “green thumb” was our surefire way out of mental stress or imminent boredom. Well, thankfully, most of those posts have vanished; and we’re now left with the hard-core plantitas, who discovered they truly had a “green thumb,” and weren’t just riding a trend.
Our Manila Bulletin President and CEO, Emil Yap, has been into plants, flowers, cactus, and even orchids, since the 1980’s; and he used to flash a bemused smile when we’d talk about the craze late last year. I’m certain it’s because he knew that going green in the plantita way isn’t as easy as everyone thought it would be. On top of serious study and research, it also takes patience and having the touch. Plus when the craze took over, it became quite an expensive “hobby.” So I’m now wondering just how many professed “green thumbs” of the last year and eight months have gone thumbs down, with empty and/or idle pots and planters cob-webbed and stored away. With packets of enriched soil left languishing at the far end of some bottom cabinet?
Where are all the sushi bakes and ube-filled pandesals? This time last year, you couldn’t escape posts about how this or that home-based entrepreneur had the best bake or pandesal, how they had hit culinary Nirvana with their little tweak or additive to the basic bake or pandesal recipe. Me, I was more concerned about how a verb such as “bake” had overnight, become a noun.
And while I did like the ube-pandesals, I subscribed to keeping it simple. I thought it lost all reason for being, when it practically became a dessert, because it was too sweet – ube plus Nutella, or chocolate? Or when they added globs of cheese or peanut butter, which I personally felt didn’t combine all that well. At least now, these pandesals are just displayed as regular offerings at most bakeries, and not exalted as the ultimate baking innovation – which I thought was pure “exagg.”
In national governance and political announcements, do you remember when contact tracing was all the rage, and we were playing catch-up to the more developed nations who used contact tracing as the foundation for controlling the pandemic’s spread? Well, is it just me, or am I right in saying that for all the bluster, there never was a true system of contact tracing ever established here? That as the talk and references to C-T began to wane, it just went the way of unicorns and the dodo – pure fantasy or gone extinct.
It’s funny when you think about it, how life here has taken so many somersaults since that fateful March of 2020. I’m sure you have your own wry observations and favorites of what has gone missing, or made its unexpected arrival, since this all began. And even funnier to note that this column today began with a lunch date, and noticing that the people surrounding us were talking in “all caps.”