Soul Highway

Brrrr!

Winter is finally here and I'm trying to keep my nose from falling off. People have been wondering whether it would actually snow in this area as other parts of the US had been experiencing heavy snow since December. Environmentalists were quick to deliver dire predictions on TV about the earth's future.

I have no issues with winter delayed. In fact, I am perfectly happy with a snow-less winter. However, the flurries came over a week ago. I didn't even notice it until the husband came home and asked me to look outside the window. Here are some pictures of my first winter in the US. No hurrah for dropping temperatures.

Explorations on TV-land

I have developed an unusual fondness for TV commercials in the US. Granted this country has its share of two-minute spots that are bereft of logic, I am amazed at the audacity of many a commercials I have seen so far. Or maybe I am just visualizing the pandemonium these ads might cause if they were to be shown in the Philippines, assaulting the senses of our good bishops and other moral crusaders. Heck, they even went ballistic over an oversized billboard of a scantily-clad model endorsing a brand of liquor.

Since birth control commercials rarely make their way to Philippine television, watching people advertise NuvaRing is like seeing the kind of movie that convent sisters have sternly warned us against when we were teenagers. Of course, the more they tried to indoctrinate us on keeping our souls – and imagination – pure, the more they fired up our curiosity.

So in the afternoons, when all the business I need to do is taken care of, I sit in front of the TV and soak my mind on advertorials on herpes prevention, Vagisil and other anti-itch crèmes, erectile dysfunction and Viagra, along with an endless parade of diet supplements, exercise machines, cooking implements, car insurance and credit reports. If you want to immerse yourself on American pop culture, I say the TV is a good place to start. Here you see a wide gamut of things about America that you don’t necessarily see on Oprah.

I would say Philippine television is more sanitized to avoid a firestorm. What would padre say if he sees a commercial on personal lubricant on TV? We also know that while Filipinos have always come out in surveys as among the happiest people on earth, there are those who are battling with depression and other emotional problems. However, I do not recall seeing any infomercial on anti-depressants or anything remotely related to psycho-therapy. We tend to keep those things private.

Over here I am inundated with commercials on a variety of health conditions, from an unstoppable bladder to obesity to senility. As a new immigrant, I am rarely bored watching these commercials and welcome the few minutes break in the saga of Jack Bauer or the postmortem happening on CSI.