YOUNG ARTIST RONALD BOHLANDER, visiting again from Dusseldorf, Germany, fretted on the holiday table, wondering.
His ears didn’t ring or hurt from all the varied, multi-colored explosions. No soot, unlike last year, in his German nostrils.
The pyrotechnics were there, okay. But there seemed to be a shortage of ammunition.
It’s strange. The biggest year for the Pinoy athlete was sent off with what would go down as the shortest, lightest New Year revelry here in years.
The skies lit up, as usual. But in most areas of the metropolis, glorious, colorful fireworks would expire before they could peak to perfect carnival madness.
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Base guitarist Emman Diaz surmised that the varied New Year’s Eve explosions lasted only 30 minutes.
“Mga alas dose medya, ubos, tapos na (By half past 12 midnight, it was over),” he said yesterday.
Most of the inner streets appeared intact, unlike before when they would get mangled, reduced to a pitiful mess the morning after.
So why a short, relatively light celebration when this was the right time to scream and pour it all out?
This was no way to celebrate the overall victory of Team Philippines in the last Southeast Asian Games, whose gold medalists were treated by an overwhelmed government and its First Gentleman to a splurging holiday at the Hong Kong Disneyland.
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Why? Who would dare venture an educated guess?
Out there in California, Manny Pacquiao turned 27 on Dec. 17 at the Wild Card Gym in Hollywood, away from his family.
For the holidays, the sweetest moments were only phone calls, loving words from his wife and kids in GenSan, as he opted to stay in camp.
Don’t dare ask Pacquiao why he’s making this terrible sacrifice.
Everybody knows he’s preparing for the biggest fight of his life.
Pacquiao, RP national sports treasure, is fighting a full-scale, there’s-no-tomorrow war against Mexican boxing legend Erik Morales, who had previously gored, bloodied and beaten him.
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In Manila, Butch Ramirez, head of the Philippine Sports Commission, bared they are setting up a national sports institute which should hasten the search for future gold medalists, not only in the Asian Games but in the Olympics as well.
But the guessing game continues on why there’s relative quiet now for the usually noisy Pinoy, not only during the holidays, but also in the case of Pacquiao who appears to be training in seclusion.
Are we finally learning that loudness, bloated self-importance, the assorted “pa-ek-ek,” bragging and screaming claims of superiority are all empty goads to victory?
The greatest thing our underdog athletes had kept with them, as they ventured into the last SEA Games, was a quiet heroic heart, strong and determined.
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Another question: Is the Pinoy saving his noisiest, his loudest scream for the Pacquiao fight, when there certainly would be dancing in the streets in the event of victory?
It’s not exactly cock-eyed to surmise that a big Pacquiao win in Las Vegas on Jan. 21 could tell on the rate of the peso against the US dollar.
The fight has soared, burned bright to be that grand.
Of course, there’s hometown gladness now that Pacquiao has refused to again adopt his previous stance when he claimed he would just run over Morales, whom Pacman thought would be there for the picking.
Out in the corner sari-sari (variety) store, a crop-headed boxing diehard assured that Pacquiao should be able to beat and stop Morales either in seven or eight rounds.
Morales is good, sharp, he said, but they will now be using thinner fight gloves, unlike last March.
Mind you, this young man is not alone as he gathers all his fanatic energies preparing for the screaming victory dance.
Countless other Pacquiao fans follow the same line of thinking.
That’s a lot of nonsense.
