“RJ is a newspaper columnist whose humor column, "Pogi from a Parallel Universe" comes out every Wednesday in the For Men section of the Philippine Star, the Editor-in-Chief of UNO Magazine, a seasoned television, events and weddings/debut host and actor."
It started with an atomic mushroom and ended with a magic set of words.
For over a year and a half, my beloved Lifestyle editor (and wedding ninang) Tita Millet Mananquil along with my desk Editor Scott Garceau (yes, he is beloved to me too) allowed me (well, allowed may not be to the appropriate word. Tolerated is more like it) to chronicle my merry march towards domestic incarceration.
And, voila, “I Do or I Die! RJ Ledesma’s Imaginary Guide to Getting Married and Other Man-Made Disasters (As Told to him by his Yaya)” was born! For my three female readers, fellow DOMs and my No Girlfriend Since Birth (NGSB) barkada who have not been religiously following this column since its inception, here a few excerpts from the book. I beseech you to pick up a copy of the book and help me finance RJ Ledesma’ foundation for his baby’s college education plan.
On the engagement:
I recall a telephone conversation with one of my best friends whom I first confided in with regard to my marriage plans. Although I confess that I couldn’t really understand him clearly because his voice sounded muffled. I think it was because he was hiding in the closet while his wife was screaming for him to give her a pedicure.
“RJ,” he whispered, “marriage has its ups and downs. And the best way to deal with the downs is with anti-inflammatory medication. But when you’ve screwed up really bad, the best thing that you can give her is the memory of a great engagement.”
Heeding the dictates of my inner cheese, I decided that I would serenade her for my proposal. (Some of you might be under the impression that I was gunning for the best marriage proposal of the year, but you must understand that the very idea that I was dating this fantastic woman is almost as unbelievable as this chief executive surviving her term of office. We knew of each other in college, but during those days our paths never crossed. One of us was a cheerleader slash model, the other was a debate team captain slash geek. And to this day, I still don’t know what she saw in a cheerleader like me.)
So I came up with an engagement song list that I thought would capture the spirit of a twilight marriage proposal, however “Afternoon Delight” or “Don’t Let the Sun Go Down on Me” didn’t seem quite right. After much soul-searching and weaning myself away from WRock, I decided on a medley of three songs that were a cross section of boy band pop, drippy romance and classic Frank Sinatra (because you can never go wrong with Frank): Wet Wet Wet’s “Love is All Around,” Julia Fordham by way of Nina’s “Love Moves in Mysterious Ways,” and Frank Sinatra’s “Someday.” I was tempted to sneak in Sting’s “Every Breath You Take” and Adam Sandler’s comical “I Wanna Grow Old With You,” but after a good smacking in the head by my best friend, he reminded me, “This is a harana (serenade), you fool, not a night at the karaoke club.”
During the proposal, I tried to belt out the rest of my well-crafted medley, but the lyrics had melted away from my head once she hid her tears behind her hand. So I just hummed out the tunes to the songs that I had so agonizingly memorized and inconveniently forgotten, and drew her close to me as we swayed to the beat of our hearts.
“Why are you crying?” I asked.
“Because this is not the dress I wanted to wear for my engagement.” We both laughed.
“My love for you has grown like a mustard seed.” I proclaimed. She crumpled her nose and raised an eyebrow. Later I found out that she thought I had said, “My love for you has grown like an atomic mushroom.” Up to now, I am still unsure as to what sort of hard drugs she had taken before our trip to Tagaytay. But after the initial confusion, she finally recognized the next line: “I love you and I would like to do yoga with you for the rest of my life.”
I pulled out a small red box from my coat pocket and slowly coaxed it open.
“Will you marry me?”
And so here we were in a torch-lit garden along the windswept mountain ridges of Tagaytay overlooking Taal Volcano, with the sun lazily descending over the lake, and blessed by the presence of those nearest and dearest to us. What would be her answer?
“Yes,” she cooed.
Whew. I didn’t have to sorrowfully consume copious amounts of alcohol that night.
On the wedding preparations:
I didn’t really plan to get involved in my wedding preparations for health reasons. This is because I always thought that a bride-to-be was much like a boxer in training for a title bout. They are fierce, they are focused, and if you distract them in any way they will leave you a candidate for brain damage. If I left my fiancée alone to pick the patterns for her bridesmaids’ dresses, she would leave me alone to plan for my pre- and post- bachelor’s parties. (No, love. I promise you that was just a joke. There will be no other girls in the room aside from those you can watch in the videoke. Just because we were holding the bachelor’s parties in Airforce One doesn’t mean that there is anything else going on.)
There is a reason why there is a glut of wedding magazines, wedding checklists and wedding management software applications for the brides-to-be, but there is no such equivalent for the grooms-to-be. This is because there are only five things a man must know in preparation for his wedding day:
Men may not know this, but our significant others have been play-acting their ideal wedding scenario in their heads since they were little children. My fiancée shared with me that when she was eight years old, her dream was to dress like Cinderella in her wedding gown while she walked down the aisle. When she was a teenager, she wanted to dress like Princess Diana in her wedding dress. And as an, ehem, young adult, she wants to dress like Eva Longoria in her wedding gown.
On the other hand, we have slightly different childhood dreams from their fiancées. At eight years old, my dream was to become a superhero. When I was a teenager, my dream was to become a bomba (naked) star. When I was in my twenties, my dream was to become filthy rich. When I hit my thirties, I wanted to keep my dreams simple. So I wanted to become a filthy rich superhero bomba star.
On the Pamanhikan:
Ah, the pamanhikan. It is a time-honored ritual in our country, much the same way that pagtutuli (circumcision) and self-flagellation during Holy Week are rituals. All these rituals involve some pain, some bloodletting and some close encounters with the loss of genitalia. However, remember that the pamanhikan is only the penultimate step in this ritualized hazing process. Before your potential father-in-law can even cock a rifle at your forehead, grit his teeth and blurt out, “Ano ba yung plano mo para sa anak ko (What are your plans for my daughter)?” in front of your whole family, you must first undergo the background checks, the massive credit card loans, and the failed assassination attempts that form part of your panliligaw (courtship).
And as all Pinoy men know, when you make ligaw (court) a woman, you are making ligaw the totality of that woman. And that sum total includes her lola, her lola’s yaya, her titos, her titas, her cousins, her pamangkins (buy her godkids something that looks really expensive), her relatives within the sixth degree of consanguinity, her family friends, her barkada, her high school classmates, her college classmates, her officemates, her supervisor, her gym partners, her kickboxing teacher (be especially nice to him), her church community, her father confessor (try not to go to confession with him), her barangay captain, her manicurista, her hair stylist, everyone in the contacts list of her cellphone, and all of her Facebook friends. And, of course, her yaya (but make sure your own yaya knows that she occupies a special place in your heart).
All eyes on the dinner table slowly turned toward my fiancee’s dad. Her dad uncrossed his arms, placed both his hands on the table. Everyone stopped fidgeting in his seat. He lifted the wine glass to his mouth, took a sip, and, in his best Marlon Brando impression, rasped “When you spoke to me about..,” he paused and took another sip of wine. “I think you are very good for each other and that you asked my daughter at the right time in her life. So, I told myself when I got back to Manila I would give you an answer.” He looked up at the ceiling and exhaled. “Which is maybe yes.”
I got up from my seat to shake her dad’s hand. But as I approached him, he stood up and extended both his arms. “Welcome to the family,” he smiled and gave me a nice, firm hug. While we hugged, my future father-in-law bent down and whispered into my ear. “Remember, the prenuptial agreement has a two-year redemption period.” Then he hugged me tighter. “But I’ve always let it lapse.” Now let’s get you fitted with a chastity belt.
On the wedding day:
When the church doors swung open, I thought my bride would surprise me with some drama. But there were no smoke machines, no midget circus acrobats and no slow moving doves from a John Woo movie. Watching my bride glide down the aisle was dramatic enough. And she glided down like an angel. I wished time would slow to a crawl so that everyone in the church could marvel at how radiant my bride looked that evening. And it almost felt that way as she moved slowly yet regally toward the altar. Later on I found out she moved so slowly because the wedding dress weighed about three hundred pounds.
It took her a good thirty minutes to make her way down the aisle because one of her Bible-thumping aunts hopped in front of the walkway and played patintero with my soon-to-be-bride while screeching, “Pray to the Lord! Pray to the Heavens! Pray to God that he is the right one for yooouuu!!!” After my mom had knocked her aunt out with a stiletto heel, we thought that everything would proceed smoothly, except that her dad had feigned a heart attack.
When my bride and I finally plopped down from exhaustion onto our matrimonial bed, all legal-like and church-approved, I turned over to her and excitedly whispered. “There’s one last thing that I have to do.”
Her eyes grew large. “You don’t need that anymore, love. We’re married now!”
I picked up my cellphone and held it in front of her face. I scrolled over to her name on my phone’s contact list, and edited her entry. She looked at me and broke out into a smile when my phone finally read ‘Vanessa Ledesma.’
“Wala nang bawian (There’s no more refund),” I snickered. Then I gently lifted her head, and gently kissed my wife on the lips. And this was as close to heaven as I was ever going to get.
Thanks RJ, this is my first read after your column in today’s paper Phil Star. Actually, my first time to this site. After browsing a bit, I think I should be calling you Idol! Okay I’ll read your other write up. Kudos again!
RJ this is really an awesome Imaginary Guide. Smart, insanely decent…unorthrodox literary prowess. I wonder how Math books could have been more interesting (since you’re in Mathtinik) if you’ll be one of its authors. Keep it up & you’ll definitely hit big time for your baby’s foundation.
Thanks Jepoy for your feedback, much much appreciated:) Writing a weekly humor column is really taxing, but comments like yours make it worth the while:) Please do keep on reading the column and the blog!
Idol! Witty and funny as always.. Your masterpiece LMYSHTM will always be one of my faves because i actually laughed out loud reading it, and i’ll admit it, a goldmine of info cause’ i finally understood the reason for the random (constant) acts of manipulation and carinio brutal from my girlfriend. Congrats to finally being a husband without getting ur parts pickled.
Will be finally getting a copy of your latest and i know i’ll be smirking from start to finish. Ciao!
Oh wow, Mr. Ledesma! Kinikilig ako! Hahaha! This is so beautiful, what you wrote. Wishing you and Mrs. Ledesma happiness and prosperity! Emphasis on the prosperity!
Thanks so much for your kind feedback Jumboliit:) You might want to check out my other book, “I Do or I Die!” as well
Thanks Aimee. The I Do or I Die essay actually is part of my book “I Do or I Die”. If you want todo kilig, please pick up a copy of the book:)
Awwww!!! So sweet!!
I’m a sucker for love stories 
Wahh!! Kilig! I am sooo gonna get a copy of this book!!
i wanna get an autograph from you too, i do see you at mass every sunday (yeah, i go to Santuario! ^^) but i don’t wanna break the solemnity of the mass. it’s only once i saw you out of mass, and that was in MetroComic Con but i got cold feet and decided to not get an autograph and a picture, when i got my senses knocked into me by my cousins, we tried to look for you to get the autograph but you were no where to be found…
Mr. Ledesma!! That’s So Kakakilig and Amazing!! Your such a great writer!! I am Sooo Gonna get a copy of your books!! And maybe i’ll Also get an autograph, I always see you in mass (yeah I go to santuario ^^) but then I try to control myself because i don’t want to disturb the solemnity of the mass. And it’s only once i saw you outside mass, it was in MetroComic Con, I was going to ask for a picture and autograph but then i got cold feet, When my cousins finally knocked the sense into me you were no where to be found.
HI Zmaclang! Thanks so much for your kind feedback:) Much appreciated:) Yes, please do get a copy of the book, it’s available at most National Bookstores and Powebooks:) Please follow me on twitter (rjled), I will be announcing the launch of my third book, “Is It Hot In Here or Is It Me?” over twitter. Would love to have you there and I can sign your books:)
I just love your book I do or i die. Where can I get a copy Lies My Yaya should have told me?
Thanks for the kind words Al! If I am not mistaken, they should still have copies in National Bookstore or Powerbooks:) My third book will be out soon as well:) ‘Is It Hot In Here or Is It Me? RJ’s guide to Flirting, Body Language and Pick-up Artists’. I hope you can come to the book launch!
Mr. Ledesma…your book is the bomb! genius!..haha been laughing from the beginning to the end. I’m now finding copy of the other book and waiting for that new one to hit the bookstores! yay! ^ ^
your book is instrumental to me, for im halfway reading this when my own wedding got screwed and didn’t push through..luckily with the funny stories I have read…it some what lessen the impact of it.^ ^ haha! So! you host wedding…maybe ill get your service when the right time (one) comes. that will be so cool! More power and God Bless!
Hi RJ! I just might be your biggest Ilonggo fan. I never fail to get a dose of your Pogi from a Parallel Universe every week. I love the way you manipulate the English language – your political undertones coupled with sardonic wit, and your ability to tell somebody to go to hell in such a way that he would actually look forward to the trip. I’m an aspiring writer, and your writing style influences me. Hope you inspire others too.
Thanks so much for your kind reply:) Writing a humor column week in and week out can be very challenging (and brain-draining to say the least). So when I receive messages like yours, they inspire me to keep on churning out work that will be thoroughly enjoyed by others. In other words, you inspire me as much as I inspire you:) Please watch out for my third book that will come out later this year “Is It Hot In Here or Is It Me?” that will be available from National and Powerbooks nationwide:)
Hi RJ. you are a very good writer, very creative. i like the way you write as you give a good description of everything; it would be as if we are actually watching what you say! i have been your fan since royal true orange days and i like watching your shows. your funny and articulate. i hope that someday i will see you and i could have your autograph on your books that i have. may you have more books to publish!
Thanks for your kind feedback, Mia:) Much appreciated:) People like you are the inspiration that keep me writing! I hope you can come to my upcoming book launch in November:) I will be posting the book launch here on my site and also in my column. Thanks again!
Good that I bloghopped today…or else I wouldn’t know that you already have 3 books.
Sana some of my friends could do me a favor. I really want to get a copy of your books.
Kilig. Tawa. Ngiti. Hagikgik. may kasama pang “awwwww”. Excerpts pa lang ng book mo ang binasa ko…nagawa mo na agad akong patawanin (at pakiligin).
Congrats!
Ayie
Abu Dhabi – UAE