Tuesday, November 13, 2012

Wanted: Kilig

Kilig is a tagalog word that doesn’t have an English equivalent. I like to think it’s because it’s such a beautiful and dangerous thing. The closest thing that can describe/define the word is butterflies in one’s stomach – it basically makes you all mushy and giggly inside.

My friend, Lei, is in want of kilig.

The first thing we need to discuss is why. I am a firm believer that everybody deserves and needs kilig in their lives. Seriously. It’s the stuff of magic (and procreation, but I’m getting ahead of myself) and dreams and unicorns and rainbows. The mere fact that it exists is a wonder in itself since let’s face it, a whole lot of people don’t need love or kilig to procreate. For some people, all that’s needed is alcohol and maybe some stupid notion that the world needs their offspring. Lei is a perfectly pretty, smart, and capable woman. (I’ve said this before, but I’ll say it again: Had she been born a man, women would be flinging themselves at his feet, begging for him to sire their children.) It’s a wonder however, that she keeps encountering rat bastards and until about a year and a half ago, we had been making Spinster Contingency plans together.

Her heart has been broken several times, and seriously, this shit has to stop. Her most recent heartrending adventure involved a guy who was okay on paper. He’s moderately successful, not married, and was sufficiently smart enough to keep up. My friend had again fallen victim to good packaging.

Do you know why chips come in those shiny packages? We’re drawn to pictures on the outside of the bags, barely paying attention to the helpful nutritional information at the back, because fuck calories, you’re already sure that crispy goodness awaits inside.

We’ve all fallen victim to this wretched thing. We take the bag of chips to the checkout counter, happy until we get home and discover that roaches had beaten us to the punch. The classic mistake is that we hold on to the bag.

Wait, I’ve digressed. Obviously, I have a whole slew of things to say about this, and not all of them I can say aloud in front of my mother, who will wash my mouth with muriatic acid. And believe me, my Nanay has an entire shelf of patience for me and my foul mouth.

The last rat bastard she dated, who we shall call Not-Derek Ramsay, slept around because decency is apparently too much to ask. (If decency is something that you feel you can’t provide, then by all means, say so. If you can’t be decent, I hope to Batman that you can be fair because for all you know, that’s what you’d wish you had been once you’re staring at the undercarriage of my car after I’ve run you over repeatedly. Sorry, Hulk mode.)  

Anyway, like I said, my friend Lei needs kilig. She’s great, but you’ll need to deserve it. You need metaphorical balls (not just the anatomical appendages) to date her, because seriously any woman with a good head on her shoulders will require you to possess balls of solid steel.

According to my friend Mabie, it’s a tall order. “It’s hard to find a guy with his own set of those when the girls have emptied the shelves long before,” says the woman with a self-awarded Ph.D. on Heartbreak. “What we need is a guy whom we can entrust our own balls of solid steel for practical use and safekeeping. We have a uterus already for crying out loud!”

Lei, in addition to having in her possession a set of metaphorical balls and a uterus, has a career, cares deeply for her family, and can give you all the happiness in the world. I want for her to realize that she doesn’t deserve a roach-infested bag of chips. She deserves a lot more. And I think that’s the fatal flaw in all of us. We tolerate what we think we deserve, not realizing that we deserve the world, we deserve fidelity for heaven’s sake, and we deserve respect.

So again. My friend is in want of kilig. She REQUIRES kilig. No, not that shallow idea of having somebody she can have coffee with or can have sex with. She deserves somebody who will give her kilig for the rest of her life.

P.S. Can you help me find kilig for my friend? Or better yet, can YOU provide kilig for Lei? If you feel you can, then please say so in the comments below. You'll need to prepare a Certificate of Singleness, a certificate from a psychiatrist that you are of sound sanity, and a 1000-word essay about why you deserve somebody as awesome as Lei.

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