My Series of Unfortunate Events

These are anecdotes based on true stories. Three fear factor episodes happened in my childhood. Haha! These stories are of the same intensity with that of Jhennybabes falling off a pick up onto the main road full of vehicles when she was in kindergarten. I doubt if you could relate to any of these but I guess you yourself also had childhood experiences of life-threatening proportions. These are my share of those instances where I inched closer to death and nearly saw the light. Enjoy.

"Kuryente"
I got myself electrocuted when I was at the age of 7. It was on a not-so-big-deal basketball game here in our village where my brother brought me to watch a match between teams I barely knew. I was standing at the courtside when a kid who was at the top of an electric post called my attention and dared me to hold on to a part of the post. He told me that I would experience something electrifying. Since I was a kid and with young age come with curiosity and naiveté, I willingly held the metal and waited. Nothing happened. I looked at the kid with provoking eyes saying “What now, was that it?!”

He then asked me to slip off my rubber footwear and stand barefoot on the cold soil. Thinking this kid was crazy, I removed my slippers confidently because I know removing slippers haven’t caused me much so far. Also, I wanted to prove that he was nothing better than a fraud-aspiring power ranger of electricity. And then it happened. My hands were all of a sudden glued to the post and I could not even lift a finger from the grasp. And damn! I became a live human transmitter of electricity from the electric post to the earth. That instance stole the eyes of the audience from the players to mine; I don’t know what was wrong with those people, who just stared at me when I was at the brink of being toasted alive. Good thing was that some Mr. Einstein got hold of a piece of wood and used it to loose me out of my hold.

I sat and rested for a while, the experience indeed was an electrifying one. My brother took me home immediately. At home I slept, exhausted from the amount of voltage that just passed right through me. I woke up just fine. The only thing was that my hair was still standing at its end. It was then that I realized how I just made a guinea pig of myself for a kid who seemed to be experimenting in physics. And I proved not of the kid’s craziness, but mine. Haha!

“Gamot”
My sister had me checked up in a clinic when I was 10 because of severe reoccurrence of allergic reactions. It was not in the clinic of our family’s physician because at that time I think our doctor was out somewhere. Nevertheless, the check up went well and the doctor prescribed a number of things which included a bar of soap, a bottle of lotion, some ointments and quite a lot of tablets. The prescription said that I had to dose 5 tablets a day, which I thought was suspiciously frequent than the normal 3x a day.

Not long after, even before I got used to the meds I felt that the effects were not what they were supposed to be. One night, without warning, breathing started to get so difficult for me. So hard that I could barely stand on my own and I really had to hold on to a wall as I struggled for oxygen. The pain was so excruciating that I already seemed like a fish that was out of the water for too long. Haha! My father, without delay, carried me and rushed to the hospital. For the nth time I was again confined. If only hospitals have Advantage Cards, my mother could already have purchased an oven toaster for the points I earned. Haha!

The diagnosis showed results of yet another allergic reaction from the meds which were presumed to be the cure from my original allergic reactions. We instantly assumed that the fault was of the doctor’s, whom I guess was questioned by medical authorities after for prescribing meds that risked the life of yours truly. From that day on, my family never allowed me to take any medication ever, even the over-the-counter medicines like Biogesic. For years now, I have been relying on natural medications alone.

“Palayok”
It was on the latter days of our grade school years when our Scouting teachers decided to have Filipino games as our final activity. We played tug-of-war, kadang-kadang and like. The final activity was the anticipated pukpok palayok, where plenty of candies and cash are just a pot away from a swarm of boy scouts. Since I was one of the smallest in our class, I really had no plans of aggressively pushing my way into the mob because I might just end up battered in trying to keep up with the big boys.

I remember that I was just standing there waiting for someone to crack open the pot. But, unknowingly, I was all of a sudden so close to the pot. I tried to distance myself because I might be hit by the batuta used by the blindfolded kid but I couldn’t because the kids at the back kept on pushing me closer. Minutes later, it was cracked. The kids started rampaging towards the pot’s debris and started picking coins, candies as the flour filled the air. I of course picked those within reach. While I was engrossed with the sweets that came my way, a kid screamed “Teacher, dumudugo ho ung noo niya!”. Nonchalant with what he said, I continued picking until I saw blood dripping to the floor where the candies were. While still picking (haha!), my eyeglasses suddenly became blurred and filled with what I realized was blood coming out of my forehead. I felt dizzy so I stood up since I already had my hands full.

When I looked at everyone, all I saw was a reddish crowd full of frightened faces. My teachers came rushing and carried me to the clinic to be treated. As I was lying on the bed, I heard my teacher explaining to the principal. He said that I was hit by a fragment of the palayok just above my right eyebrow. They didn’t bring me to the hospital since it was only skin deep and didn’t really fractured my skull (di naman nabasag ung bungo ko). We were all just thankful that it didn’t hit my eye nor my eyeglasses that would have worsened the situation and would’ve bore me lifetime consequences. Thank God I was not tall at that time for that fragment could have hit me in the eyes, nose or mouth or even the neck. Haha!

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So that’s it. Haha! Hope you had fun reading my childhood misfortunes. And mind you, it was really hard picking candies and coins especially when your eyeglass is covered in your own blood. So far, side or after effects from these scary events haven’t surfaced yet so I think I’m growing up normally and fine. Although back then, I seriously thought that I got smarter and got into the Top 5 because of the electrocution. Haha!