Finale: C’est La Vie
That day, after afternoon dismissal, we were preparing to put on the final pieces of our bulletin board together in honor of the Chinese New Year. It was an arduous task of standing in the school lobby, running errands, sticky sweat pouring down our backs and agitations and frustrations running high.
We were about to meet a deadline after all and we only had that night to finish it.
As we prepared to lift the board to an adjacent electric socket, my friend received a text message from her college friend and former scout superior. It was breaking news.
She had been admitted to the University of the Philippines Diliman and had gotten her second choice of course. Suffice to say, we were both shouting at the top of our lungs, acting like the giddy high school girls that we were after receiving such elating news.
For a moment though, during our screaming fest, my heart had skipped a beat. I thought back to my results, to my admission. Would it also be possible for me to achieve my dreams that very day? Would I also be shouting with uncontainable happiness because I had finally gotten what I wanted? My palms were sweating by that point, eager but nervous to find out what fortune had in store for me.
I was praying to God, hoping that I could have the same fate. I was crossing my fingers, reminding myself that maybe results for the Diliman campus had shown up first because it was, after all, the flagship campus. Putting my doubts in the backseat, I wholeheartedly believed in the power of my (minimal) prayers and the miracle of God that He would make way for me to get into Manila, into my dream course.
After we calmed down, we set to work on our bulletin board.
We spent an hour trying to stick the twelve animals of the Chinese zodiac onto the board and even had some teachers help us. As we waited for the adhesive to dry, we walked around the lobby, interested in what our fellow students had to showcase, commenting and laughing at some to lighten the mood. Around six o’clock that evening, my friend, who had gotten her piece of good fortune earlier, decided to ask her sister to check the names of those of us in the bulletin board group who had taken the UPCAT in roster of those who passed.
What she had to say that night literally made me go nuts for a few minutes.
According to the text message her sister sent her, I was destined to go to the University of the Philippines Los Baños taking up BS Biology.
At some point after the news penetrated my thoughts, I used my hands to scratch my cheeks and sank to the ground, groaning for all the world to hear. I began to go through my hysterics, shouting, jumping, screaming.
It was not what I had wanted nor was it what I had expected.
I was furious, beyond a doubt livid. Angry. Seething. I couldn’t believe that He had chosen for me to study so far away from home. I couldn’t believe that the plans for my future I had etched deeply into my mind, heart and soul had taken an alternate route. I couldn’t believe I’d disappointed my mother yet again at the most crucial time. Indeed, at that moment of madness and hysteria, I blamed Him for my misfortune.
My friends tried to comfort me, saying that UP was still UP. I still got in unlike the thousand others who had tried but failed. Among the 70,000 who had taken the UPCAT, I was one among the 10,000 who had passed.
I had to be thankful for that, they told me.
Crying, I could not and would not comprehend their words and it took me my mother to make me calm down. After that, we silently cleaned up and congratulated each other on our good fortunes. I went home rather deflated despite the fact that my siblings had also chipped in to say how lucky I was to have passed at least Los Baños. UP is still UP after all, they said. An experience in living alone couldn’t be all that bad, they added. In fact, it would teach me how to be more independent and worldly. Taking their advice to heart and my mother’s words that she was not at all disappointed, I arrived home feeling a tiny bit better.
As soon as I stepped through the door of our room, I flung my school bag to the side, opened the computer, and spent the next hour scanning the online roster of UPCAT passers for my name though my worst fears had been confirmed.
There had been no mistake.
I had fully calmed down by that time and was interested to know who else had passed the UPCAT so I went online on Facebook. It was then I saw that my classmate who had gotten home earlier had already posted his congratulations on class page and others soon followed. I also offered my congratulations to friends who had also passed. It had been a weary, disappointing yet fun evening for us all.
Homework forgotten in the midst of all the excitement, I went to sleep late.
That was the 18th of January, 2012 when USTET results had also been released.
That (USTET), I had ironically failed.
