The rain all throughout the day of August 5 in my place at Pacita Complex didn’t stop until 5 p.m.
I made a concession to myself that if the downpour wouldn’t subside after five I would just stay home instead of braving the floods to the Cultural Center of the Philippines (CCP) in Pasay City.
As heavens answered my intentions, I prepared to go out when the rain had stopped and to see what the roads had in store for me. I even monitored the water levels around Pacita 1 and 2 with entertainment writer and blogger Arnie Alesna who lives a few blocks away who hadn’t express his attendance to the opening of the 2022 Cinemalaya Philippine Independent Film Festival. Arnie said our streets are usually flooded and gave me a piece of advice to just take my tricycle ride en route to the Old National Highway in San Pedro, Laguna either via Pacita 1 or Rosa Virgen to get my bus ride to Magallanes.
Curiously, riding on a trike to surely deliver me from the onslaught of high waters, there was no floods on my way out to Ice Plant Elvinda where I would take my bus ride.
I thanked God I could still catch up even though at the tail end of the opening program of Cinemalaya 18 at angelus time. I could watch Martika Ramirez Escobar’s celebrated opus, “Leonor Will Never Die,” this year’s opening film of Cinemalaya. I could imagine the excitement and enthusiasm of my colleagues and film buffs, finally, about the offline version of the annual fest interrupted by the COVID-19 pandemic in two years online event.
I arrived at Magallanes at quarter to six. I generally hopped my way to the jeepney terminal or if there was a cab along the way I could flag it down. But no taxi in sight. Until I reached LRT-MRT Taft.
I decided to climb up the LRT to get off at Vito Cruz to take whatever transport was available to CCP—a tricycle or a cab or whatever.
Walking down the LRT in front of De La Salle University was the water world before me.
I texted the CCP PR people of the recent developments in the event. Glaiza Lee replied the opening film was about to start because it was already past seven.
I was still on the northbound side of Taft and had not seen any available ride to at least catch the first ten minutes of Escobar’s masterpiece. There was a decrepit trike which charged me P100 and another, at P150. But the vehicles going to the western part of Vito Cruz were standing still. I was going to- and- fro the avenue to shield me from the wet elements.
I again texted Glaiza and she said that the opening film had reeled off for at least thirty minutes. Oh! I wanted to watch the entire thing from the beginning, what the lead character Leonor had unconsciously undergone when she fell into a coma.
According Lee, “marami naman pong nanood there were many who are watching)” when I asked her if there were people inside the Main Theater.
That was a nice sight despite the stormy night.
Yes, the show went on.
It is an adage very famous in the entertainment scene.
Come hell or high water, as long as professionalism reigns in the middle of any hassles.
I finally decided against going to CCP because the floods hadn’t ebbed down and if ever I would take in the trike ride I still wouldn’t make it as the vehicles were on standstill. More so, I would drown because the water was above knee.
I just monitored the proceedings in the social media and I saw a multitude of Cinemalaya enthusiasts and supporters filling the rafters of the theater.
Laurice Guillen, the President of Cinemalaya Foundation was in her element as she posed for photo-ops with actor John Lloyd Cruz who was the official photographer of the Cinemalaya Gallery. Vicky Belarmino of the Cinema Division was smiling happily in the crowd while National Artist for Film Ricky Lee was proud of the outcome of the Cinemalaya opening most of his students in screenwriting were this year’s contenders in the main categories of filmmaking.
Welcome to the 18th Cinemalaya whose showing of films starts today (Saturday, August 6, 2022).