GotchA!

There is a term here. It is called 'botcha'. Double dead.

As to how you can die after you are already dead is beyond me. Perhaps it is the reincarnation cycle gone wrong. You die and get reincarnated straight into the maws of death. Fish out luck.

I understand it as a term to describe unfresh meat or fish. With pork it comes from already ill pigs and they are then slaughtered and sold to markets. The danger from this is that the source of the pig's illness can then be transferred to those that eat it's flesh.

Similarly with fish it is fish that have already died, harvested floating on the surface. They are then sold to markets as freshly killed fish.

And that is where my story begins. Last Friday.

As you know I am in charge of the food budget. A whopping 250 pesos a day. So armed with my umbrella and wallet I proceeded to the palengke.

pa-leng-keh
breeding place of flies. 

On the way however I met a man who offered me some cheap bangus or milkfish for 50 pesos a kilo. Thinking that I could use the surplus to buy A some strawberry icecream, I grabbed a kilo. Not for a millisecond did it occur to me that there was a reason that that fish was cheap. It was just a man with a really bad business plan and I was taking advantage of his lack of business sense. Or so I thought.

Returned home and did a basic batter for my version of fish and chips. Filleted the bangus and made some home made fries. Deep fried and served with salad vegetables.

Seeing as Ma'am A and Sir J were going to be a while coming home I ate first. Perhaps it was best that I sampled it first after all. A punishment for my thriftiness.

Not long after I had consumed the final morsel of what I would call a top-notch meal, I felt the rumblings of discontent. Like a concrete mixer my stomach was gyrating it's fishy contents.

Thunderous growls entertained A thinking that I had broken wind and filled a few minutes of her saying, "Baho, yayo, ewww."

ba-ho
a soy based drink. Or something smelly.

It was then that I realized that I had been 'botcha'd'.

Like the mud banks of a flooding river, my sphincter control finally crumbled and I sat ungloriously atop the porcelain throne. Sounds of relief echoed below me as I purged those putrid piscine portions. In Tagalog the saying would involve a karayom.

ka-ra-yom
a really small hole.

After ten agonizing minutes I felt that I could stand on my own accord. I exited relieved that I had cleansed myself and that A was still focused on the talking duck, turtle and hamster. Not long after that I felt the need to sit down again...in the bathroom.

This happened several times until Ma'am A came home, wondered why A was left unattended and heard my quiet sobbing. The solution it seems was a serving of coconut juice with a tablet of Loperamide. For me it was like I had swallowed quick drying cement. That bunged it up nice and tight. Nothing was getting out. Salamat to modern science.

sa-la-mat
cheers mate.

I recounted the story of the nice man selling cheap fish, how I had prepared a really nice meal and how my stomach decided to perform an impromptu concert.

She knew straight away that I had bought tainted fish. A slight reproach and a phone call ensured that no-one else would suffer my fate.We had pizza instead.

The moral of the story is,

'e assomigliate ad un'anatra, camminate come un'anatra e comunicate come un'anatra, dovete essere un'anatra.'

I think...


PJ out.