No such thing as a comfort zone here.

We had our church's 34th anniversary last Sunday. And since it is quite natural for Filipinos to get up on stage and sing whenever they get a chance, someone in our church thought we might like to do the same. Let's just say that we were not exactly looking forward to our time on stage!
The day came, we had practised singing our song with each other but not our accompanist. Hmmm, this might turn out to be interesting.

We had asked the lady who would be playing the piano for us if she was going to be ok to do it. I guess we should realise by now that Filipinos really don't like to say 'no' so she say "Yes, yes, it will be fine."

Our time finally comes and we get up on stage, only to look down and see someone totally new behind the piano with our original accompanist looking on!

Lara and I glance at each other nervously, knowing there's no way to back out now. In the end, it turned out well, even though I'm pretty sure the music was being played by sight - quite impressive....

Some people there even mentioned that they want us to sing again. But maybe they were just being polite...... :)

Black Friday singing

Ok, here's the challenge:

Turn your speakers up to a reasonble volume, start the movie playing at 5:30 in the morning and let it repeat for about 12 hours.

If you do this, you will be all the more able to sympathise with us.

Just down the hill from the OMF guesthouse in Calapan, there is a Catholic grotto. Every year, on Black Friday, people (with the aid of a loudspeaker, of course) sing through the passion of Jesus Christ narrative.

I'm not sure how it works, or how they could possibly keep on singing ALL day. We were told that they don't repeat anything. Who knows?

Either way, the one thing that was definitely repetitive was the tune - I was convinced the next day that I could still hear them singing, not just in my head, but in the grotto down the hill!



But for all the negative impressions I had of what they were doing, there were many questions raised.

Do they sing a sorrowful song (some sections certainly sounded that way)? Is it with heavy hearts that they do this?

Is there joy in their singing? I wish I could have understood them.

Is it a mix of both sorrow and joy? Or maybe they sing because that was what happened last year, because that is the tradition.

One thing is for sure - their committment was real. We could see it, or rather, hear it. In a strange way, I feel rebuked by their committment. Sometimes, it's just too easy to let the days slide by without remembering (and I mean remembering in a purposeful way) what the Cross achieved.

Well, I'm not sure how to end this, and as usual, there are more questions than answers.

For the moment, I'm ok with that.