Monday, October 17, 2011

Karina

Back in my first year of college, I didn’t think I’d make as many friends as I have right now. I mean, back then, when I walk in the hallways of the AB building, I felt a little out of place because I didn’t know anyone in campus but after a semester, I finally had a decent amount of friends around. Little did I know, there were others that had it worse.

In order to make sense of how I even began to talk to Karina after a semester of not doing so (she was once the most quiet one in class), we have to go back a month.

In this delusion that I could pick up girls in college, I bought a book to help me. The title? The Playbook by Barney Stinson. Yes, I bought a book “written” by the womanizer from the show How I Met Your Mother. Consider me desperate. Although there was this one trick in that book that nearly worked called “The Fall in Love” and I did that play on this girl last summer 2011. Oh wait, we’re getting a little sidetracked.

Anyway, back to Karina. Using The Playbook, I was pursuing this girl (“Sprite” as she’s known from my “How I Never Met Your Mother” series from my Tumblr blog) and one time, during practice for the Philippine Literature class project, I found out “Sprite” was near the guy’s bathroom. I needed a wingman to help me talk to her but I knew that most of my guy classmates were either incompetent, ignorant, or just busy at the time so I “recruited” Karina. I said “Karina, you’re not doing anything, right? Join me! We’ll talk to this chick that I like.” And that’s how it all started. I could remember what she said about it (the gist of it at least).

Ralph: I have a crush on this girl but she doesn’t know I exist.
Karina: Oh, it’s like an anime! An anime of unrequited love with cherry blossoms around the hallway!

Call it weird but it was the start of a weird friendship that mostly involved jokes about her being lesbian because of her hair.

Karina: It’s not lesbian hair! It’s Tegan (from Tegan and Sara) hair!
Ralph: Let’s use syllogism, shall we? You have Tegan hair; Tegan is a lesbian; Ergo, by the power of syllogism, you have lesbian hair!

It was actually quite hilarious but then she’d punch me. And when she punches me, I’d insult one of her favorite bands - Paramore.

Ralph: Hey, I bought a greatest hits CD of Paramore and all I got was a blank CD.
Karina: This is for Hayley!

Then she proceeded to punch me. Her punches were actually harder than mine, which means she’s freakishly strong or I just hit like a little girl.

Every time someone would ask “Are you two together?” Karina and I would basically tell them no. I’d say “No, no, no. She’s not even pretty” then Karina would threaten to hit me, causing me to hesitatingly say “She’s not my type. Yeah, that’s right!” It’s funnier in person. And it doesn’t sound mean at all.

What I really got from her was some recommendations on which bands to listen to. Thanks to her influence, I started to love musicians like the duo of Tegan and Sara. That’s what I owe her the most. Thanks to her recommendations, I got tired of listening to hard rock and actually appreciated indy music. Not really a big fan of all of them but I garnered respect for the genre (if that’s an actual genre. I’m not sure).

I know I can say more things about her but I can’t just type that in words. It’ll be a whole series for that to be completed. So let’s just end with this.

Karina’s one of the sanest people I’ve met in class (yes, somehow saner than the rest) and really a breath of fresh air to talk to. She’s a great person to hang out with and one of the people that surprised me the most once I got to know her. Who’d have thought that the quietest girl in class (at the time) had so much depth and talent in writing? I believe that she’ll be a successful author in the future but she believes that her poetry books would go for 165 Pesos (I told her that her books could go up to 170. Haha! I kid, I kid).

So, by the off-chance that Karina’s reading this, I’d like to say: Karina, you’re a great friend. You’ll be successful so don’t worry about what the people who say negative things about you because you’re talented and they’re not. You’re good at writing – something people consider easy but when it’s their turn to write, they couldn’t come up with anything worth reading. Talented and with a good personality? Ha, you’re everything a person could ask for in a friend.

BETRAYAL.