Contest Finalist #3: Eliyahu

Hudyo

Ema Virginia was the primary nurse for New Square's Rebbitzen during the '80s. I distinctly recall her smiling and waving from her bedside. The curious neighborhood Orthodox Jewish children reminded me of the provincial squalor kids in Quezon City, Philippines. I'm not sure who threw stones at me anymore.

Ema worked the night shift for many years, squeezing in two hours of sleep, daily. I think I've inherited her alertness, in that respect. I take intermittent naps, throughout the day. I suppose I can wake up on time for mid-day prayers more often, actually.

Ema was really quite beautiful in her innocence and long, ebony bangs — upon immigrating Stateside. We don't talk much these days. A silent, bitter recognition. And her hair has had the appearance of a Sheitel since (she's a breast cancer survivor).

Each year, she plants Ampalaya in her exotic tire garden.

Talong

Nitzavim

Then there's David Levi, an old soulful teen crashing in a Monsey basement, below a renovated Ye-Shiva residence. One morning, a spattering of shocked students stand at attention, upon my fashionably-late, but desperate disruption, beside the bimah. The Rabbi puts his index finger to the lips, completes a prayer in whispers, while I catch my breath, then escorts me to where David was couch-surfing. From the top of the stairs, pre-pubescent kids peek in on our drowsy conversation, cajoling David to "daven with us." Unwavering, they shut the door, continue to shift their wooden chairs, back and forth, the shadowy ceiling screeching above us. He was cursing up a storm, really sore at the general state of things. We decide to sneak out and go on a simkha ride to Brooklyn, chain-smoking Reds along West Side Highway (eventually ending up at an Egyptian Hookah bar on the Lower East Side)... Finally come home, the following foggy morning, where he proceeds to take the wheel of my ghetto vehicle, embodying Neo-Speedracer: papawheeling over suburban curbs, skidding DNA knots around the pristine block, all the while ignoring my pleas, lingol, and wrecking the breakpad in the process.

David told me he only dons a yarmulke when traveling through Monsey, as a sign of respect, honor; otherwise, he's just like any other anonymous rebellious punk — Hasidic Hitchhiker — getting their kicks along this pearl-studded journey of ours known as Mabuhai.

I think that's why Eliyahu Ha'Navi ascended to Shamayim in a fiery chariot so hastily:

We're still consolidating Bahay Yosef, where identifying as Filipin@ and Jewish is an unlikely work-in-progress, much like an impending marriage: until a Bamboo Ketubah exchange at the altar between Yesha-Beis Efrayim.

And I miss giving complimentary Poi shows to off-duty IDF soldiers in Tel Aviv (aka The Little Manila of Israel), very, very much.

Menorah in front of Knesset

Crouching Eli, Engaged Yin & Yang

In the meantime, I cherish the company of birds — from Eagles to Pigeons to Sparrows to Ravens to Duchifat to Doves to Twitter-Anghél.

Ibónim

Inspired by Aliza Hausman

I worked as a Mental Health Worker in Westchester, New York (home to Professor Xavier's Shul for Gifted Youngsters) — where I'd have a hasty smoke during lunch breaks. Remember the time, when the concentration camps were finally liberated? When the prisoners of hope were given cigarettes by the army companies: and ravaged them, they were so famished? One day, I realized I had no matches left in my book. Since Filipinim are known to scavenge for manna in wilderness shantytowns, I naturally bowed my head, my pearl vision cast to the ground, scanning the periphery about me, dejected. Like Aba. Suddenly, I notice a bird land on the stairs leading up to the entrance of the youth ward. I squint, as it pecked away, knocking on the concrete slab — weeds and tiny sticks and leaves, rustling. Instinctively, the bird soars, when I notice a single, unlit match buried among the thorns......