I was initially ecstatic when I found out that I had qualified for the 62nd UP National Writers Workshop (UPNWW), then anxiety quickly started to set in. I would be marooned in a hotel in Baguio, I would miss a week’s worth of clinics, and my work would be scrutinized, dissected, and spat at. But never mind those, what I was really anxious about was the prospect of interacting with total strangers. “But you have dramatically crossed over to extreme extroversion ever since you had to promote your damn book,” Smoketh had accused me. “Sometimes to an embarrassing extent.”

“I was faking it,” I said with a strange mix of unwarranted superiority and pure drama. “I was faking everything!”

I was afraid that my social anxiety might eventually cause me to back-out, so I had to think of the great things the workshop can offer, the career-changing opportunities, the positive things. Top of the list: Twelve strangers in a locked-in environment–sounds like an exciting Agatha Christie or Knives Out murder mystery!

My schizoid-ness was somewhat reduced when I discovered that one of the accepted fellows was Ralph Wiggum, also from the UP College of Medicine but over a decade younger. He had released his first book of tula “Ang Kartograpiya ng Pagguho” at almost the same time I released “Even Ducks Get Liver Cancer and Other Medical Adventures” (The 2022 Manila International Book Fair). The UP National Writers Workshop is a “mid-career” workshop, requiring that the applicant a) has published a book b) has won a Palanca award or c) has published a story in Likhaan, the annual anthology produced by the UP Creative Writing Center. Those requirements may be waived if a work of significant merit is submitted. This year I was accepted as the fellow for “creative non-fiction” after I’ve submitted a 6,000 word manuscript of what should be an excerpt of my second book. This is the push I would need, I told myself. I’ve slowed down from exhaustion upon finishing EDGLC.

When I introduced myself to the staff member doing the registrations she said “Oh you’re the doctor!” I asked her in jest to keep it a secret lest someone gets into an emergency and I wouldn’t know what to do, having dealt almost exclusively with cancer in the past ten years. And true enough Robbie started to have BP spikes on the second day. I usually have a very high threshold for hospital admission. PGH has taught us implicitly to do the medical version of “tiis-ganda” by necessity, i.e., PGH rarely has any vacancy so you better tide-over your cases and manage them as outpatient. I asked Robbie if he has any co-morbid conditions, hoping that a day’s rest and cool breeze to the face might suffice. He said, yes, he had a heart attack and had undergone angioplasty before. I laughed nervously and immediately called up Gay, a doctor friend who lives in Baguio, for leads on where best to send a patient. Side story: When Gay went back to Baguio to start her private practice she tried to register her clinic, but the name “Gay’s Medical Clinic” was rejected by the DTI. “Gay” was deemed as a “sexually-charged term”.

“It’s the six flights of stairs we have to climb daily to get to the conference hall!” we chorused as Robbie was being escorted to the van for his trip to the emergency room. The hotel was in the middle of some major renovations, and the elevator wasn’t functioning.

A day later I was informed that a staff member was having fever and diarrhea, something we couldn’t attribute to the daily six flights of stairs. Fortunately she recovered with rest and oral hydration. Had this been peak COVID season, like April 2020, I imagine that we would have locked her up in her room, fed her by pushing a tray through a slot with a long pole, cordoned off the entire hotel, and judged her severely for not wearing a face shield. And on our last day, another staff member sprained his ankle. Good thing I had my prescription pad, a stethoscope, and an entire pharmacy in my bag, basically because I’m always ready—although the more realistic explanation is that I rarely clean up my bag.

The panelists of this year’s workshop, those tasked to scrutinize our work while being live-streamed on Facebook, included such Philippine literary giants as Butch Dalisay, Jing Pantoja-Hidalgo, Jun Cruz Reyes, Vlad Gonzales, Ramon Guillermo, Luna Sicat-Cleto, Neil Garcia, Vim Nadera, Rolando Tolentino, Joey Baquiran, Charlson Ong, and Eugene Evasco. Each one is an expert in one or more literary genre that was going to be discussed. One of the thrilling aspects of the workshop was getting exposed to genre I wouldn’t have otherwise been interested in. For instance, I never really got into Filipino poetry or children’s literature, and I only learned more about them as the fellows discussed their works. After decades of being in the medical field I finally felt like I was back in a classroom at the UP College of Social Sciences and Philosophy and College of Arts and Letters. Admittedly, it took me a while to re-calibrate and comprehend the things being discussed, and found myself nodding my head to make it seem like I was understanding stuff. Still, I was so thrilled that I was surrounded by intelligent people, and that during coffee breaks people were actually talking about gravitas, inter-text, deconstruction. I had no idea what they were talking about most of the time but I was so into it. I felt so smart!

Each of the twelve fellows was assigned a panelist, and was given 90 minutes to briefly present his or her work. Then it was a free-for-all for the panelists and fellows to give their comments and recommendations. Prof. Jing Hidalgo did my introduction. She read the bio-note I had given her, and she said something along the lines of me being humble because I didn’t pepper my biography with writing awards, workshops attended, and other literary accomplishments. I wanted to whisper to her it’s not really humility, Prof, that’s really all there is to it!

I was hoping everyone would rip my work apart and tell me in detail everything that sucked about it—the failed attempt at humor, the run-on sentences, the wrong usage of prepositions and so on. I wanted them to criticize it to the extreme—if I were to include these 6,000 words in a new book then free literary criticism and copy editing from the best in the field were definitely most welcome. No such dramatic dismemberment occurred to any of us, but it was refreshing to finally hear everyone’s comments on my work before it even goes to any kind of press. I remember asking friends who starred in Even Ducks Get Liver Cancer to read the early manuscript mostly for permission, and even though they all said variations of “sure it’s fine I won’t get offended no need to change anything”, I doubt if they had actually read it.

One of the highlights of the workshop was a poetry competition participated in by some of the workshop fellows and the writers from the Baguio and Cordillera regions. Fellow for tula Dr. Ralph was the over-all champion.

“I was Ralph’s professor at the UP College of Medicine,” I joked to some people over lunch when we first arrived at the hotel. Everyone believed it. Ralph and I then pushed it to, “The last time I saw Ralph he was this small,”, while gesturing to demonstrate the height of a toddler. Some of them snickered, but many still believed it, which made me wonder if the botox I’d just had a few weeks ago was already wearing off.

“I delivered Ralph as a baby,” I pushed even further. “In fact I did Mrs. Fonte’s ultrasound, and saw Ralph as a fetus! I asked him ultrasonically if he wants to live or if he wants to get aborted!” In the middle of a poetry competition guest star Cupkeyk pulled me aside and asked, “is it true that you delivered Ralph? Just how old are you?!”

On the last day Ralph and I just decided to go all the way. “I did Mrs. Fonte’s ultrasound and saw Ralph as a fetus,” I beamed with pride at the lunch table. Some snickered politely, but they were mostly bored at this joke on repeat. “But at the same time… At the same time okay, Ralph was doing my mother’s ultrasound and saw me as a fetus,” I said. To demonstrate I lifted my right leg, Ralph lifted his right leg, and we acted like we were inserting adequately lubricated ultrasound probes into each others’ vaginas.

Cognizant of my level of maturity I asked the fellow for Kuwentong Pambata Iza Reyes, who wrote the children’s book Ang Tahanang Hindi Tumatahan, and May Papa, who wrote and illustrated Estrellita The Little Wishing Star, if they think I have it in me to write a children’s book. They’ve already known me for a few days at this point, and can sufficiently judge if writing X-rated horror comic books like the popular 80’s Kilabot Komiks is a better fit for me.

“If you want to take this seriously,” Iza advised, “it is very important that you exude maturity and not find the Filipino words for genitalia and other sex-related terms funny or awkward. For example, you shouldn’t snicker whenever you hear someone say, tite or puke.

As soon as she said those words I guffawed like a grade 3 student and looked around to see if others were cracking up too. Nobody else was laughing. Throughout the workshop Iza and the other fellows randomly dropped Filipino terms in our conversations as a test. For instance, while we were poring over some books in Mt. Cloud Bookshop, Vida said “Hey Will can you grab that book for me. I’ll have Sir Butch sign it today because I think he’ll be leaving tomorrow morning and BULBOL!”

Or when Iza said “Will, do you think this is moist chocolate cake or dinuguan? Oh it’s dinuguan. Tite!”

Eventually I learned to always be on guard and was able to stop myself from falling into their traps, to the point that I would squirm and contort myself to suppress bursts of laughter. The test turned out to be not only diagnostic but therapeutic as well because I became completely desensitized. I mean, they are just words describing genitals in our native language. Let me try my hand at children’s lit then! (Although I can already imagine the letters of disgust from parents!)

—000—

Day 2 presentors in purple! Abby P (Maikling Kwento), Iza (Story for children), and myself (creative non-fiction)

The aforementioned dinuguan ^^

With my roomie Dominic Sy, author of A Natural History of Empire: Stories. We wanted to make a career out of being cult leaders, so we made a pentagram out of an apple, a banana, two glasses, royal thru orange, and the centerpiece, a moldy biko which we had been wanting to eat on the first day, but haven’t gotten back to 7 days later. Not even the coldness of Baguio could keep it fresh!

Graduation night! With Kate Torralba, whose dress I want to borrow, and whose song Drunk On Your Love has made us recall all the relationships that made us go, “Why you giving me up?!”

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