We give writing workshops at the Ayala Museum. The workshops consist of three two-hour sessions of lectures, exercises, and group discussions held over three weeks. Our participants are mostly working people, so the sessions are held in the evenings, after office hours, with coffee and refreshments. We focus on the practical aspects of writing, like How to stop planning to write something and actually do it, and Good luck waiting for that thunderbolt of inspiration, say Hi to Thor when it happens.
The most recent workshop, on The Personal Essay, concluded last week. The next one, Writing Boot Camp, will start on 3 September 2015. For more information or to make a reservation, email Marj Villaflores, villaflores.md@ayalafoundation.org.
This month we will feature, with their permission, essays by the participants. The last batch was half-standup comedy, half-trauma ward. Some of the authors preferred to use aliases. Everyone actually wrote something.
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Muppet mugshots from Conan
Nerves of Steal
by Peter Imbong
Everyone has a childhood memory of shoplifting—mine was just slightly extended.
Back in grade school, I would pocket erasers from the bookstore in front of my school. This would happen several times a month since the bookstore was my mom’s designated pick-up spot. The erasers weren’t the cheap rubber kind, mind you. These were artist’s erasers, the kind one could mold like putty. I barely used them, but together with my pencil case that had several cylindrical pencil holders that resembled rocket launchers, I loved showing them off to my classmates proud of their 164-piece Crayola collection.
There are many reasons, people say, why a child would steal: a lack of understanding of the value of money, no self-control, peer pressure, a call for attention, or just plain hardship. While my eraser stint was probably born of a longing to look cool, I soon found out that I was simply cheap.
One weekend in high school, I found myself roaming the department store of a run-down commercial complex located near our house, in what others would already consider a province. Called Le Grand Mall, its name belied its true identity. You could tell it was ancient because it still had an underwhelming fountain as its centerpiece, and they had a food court located in the basement that smelled of used cooking oil and feet.
I had brought enough money for a movie and a snack, but decided not to go to the movies because the only halfway interesting film showing starred Nicolas Cage. So I began to roam their half-decent department store in the hopes of finding something interesting.
In the music section, I found 2 CDs I wanted to get. As I didn’t have enough money to get both, I decided to buy one and simply slip the other one into my shopping bag. I thought I had mastered this move from my years of eraser swiping. However, it turns out, compact disks are bigger than erasers.
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