Here, There be Monsters

My mates at the Great Place have gotten used to calling someone Monster.  I'm not really sure who gave that label, but somehow, it stuck.  Now, the name has become commonplace in cryptic talks.  I'm not one to play blameless with regard this;  I have much too much experience labeling people, but still, I try to refrain from using the label as much as possible.  It is one thing to ride with them when they use the code name, and another thing, if I relent and start using it myself.  It is rather fun, I must admit, but it is unfair, and truthfully, uncalled for.

Thinking further on this, it seems that somehow, at every point in one's life, there is this someone that would inevitably be called Monster.  My earliest recollection of a monster was when I was in Grade Four.  Back then, she wasn't even given the dignity of the english term, she was simply called Halimaw, able to terrorize any and all students with her stare.  I remember one time that I was asked to recite, it was all I could do to keep standing.  I was near the back of the class, but her stare was penetrating and deathly, that I was already reeling, my vision fading, and my world spinning.  Her rising voice just made matters worse; I can no longer think cohesively; only discordant words were reaching my slowly darkenning world.  Colorful words and phrases, most notably bugok na itlog (rotten egg) and gunggong (dummy).  I might have fainted somewhere during her tirade, I'm no longer sure.

My next monster was during Freshman High school.  She wasn't really a monster, but rather, a real character.  We called her Ipish -- cockroach, with the deliberate "h" in the end, to make that "sh" sound.  We are fond of taking advantage of any deficiency, especially in speech.  We revel in it.  She was christened Ipish, by the way, because of her fondness for eating mentos, which we used to call moth balls.

My fondest monster was in Third Year high school.  Our adviser at the time was pregnant, and was prone to lashing out on us when we are getting out of hand.  She once almost updended her desk in rage, the desk tipping upon the table of the student in front of her, while she, unmindful of the student's shock, stood up and gave us a long sermon on how we were such unruly, uncouth and unrefined students, with no regard for women, especially pregnant women.  Which was true.  She taught us English -- English Literature to be exact.  Unfortunately for her, she taught us the epic of Beowulf, so we called her Grendel.

Only after a couple of years after graduation did I appreciate the gravity of the labels we made.  I visited my alma mater one time and got into a conversation with my former adviser.  She was incensed at a student of her's, and it was getting hard for her to hide her irritation.  Unable to contain it, she recounted to me how a student of her's had the temerity to write a report paper submitted to Mrs Grendel I------.  When she confronted said student, it was found out that the student honestly thought that that was her first name.  I did not have the heart to tell my former adviser that it was us who coined the name three years prior to the incident.  No one expected the name to stick that strong and that long.

I honestly thought the labels have died in high school, until the Great Place suddenly errupted into the business of labeling.  The monsters have returned, and somehow, everything feels like high school once more.