This posting is an experiment in the power of blogging. I will find out if it is possible to find someone you’ve lost touch with using a blog posting. For her own privacy, I will only use her nickname here, which is Bubbles and hope that through the story I will share, if she ever finds this blog I might be able to reconnect with her. So here goes our story…

Bubbles was my classmate from Grade 4 to Grade 6 in the Philippines. It was in the 6th Grade where our group of 4 was formed and there is where we became good friends. During this time, I would recall that we were both elected in the student council with her as a P.R.O. if I am not mistaken and I became a marshal. If I recall it correctly, the student council marshal helps out the school staff in upholding peace and order in the campus. I can’t believe how I got into that position. But anyway, as we all know, the P.R.O. is the Public Relations Officer. Bubbles was raised by her parents speaking English at home and that made her standout from the rest of the candidates, plus, she had a “natural” assertive and outgoing personality so that position fitted her perfectly.

When high school started, most of the people from our barkada (group of friends) moved to other schools and only the two of us stayed in the same school. So it was just us then. We belonged to different sections but on our first year, our classrooms were right next to each other so even if we started making new friends we still ended up becoming best friends. That continued all four years, we talked on the phone about our crushes, we joined the same geeky clubs (library club, school newspaper) , we won school contests. She joined and won several Declamation and Speech contests and for me it’s Spelling and Current Events. And of course we hangout after school doing girly high school things we don’t want our parents to know. In our Junior year, we even joined CAT officer training and I was the one who got her into it. Unfortunately, it was only her who made it to the final set of officers selected. It was quite a big disappointment for me but I had to accept it and move on. In our senior year, we became classmates finally and from there we formed a solid 4-girl group. I ended up having to speak English all the time because all 3 of them spoke English. It’s not that they are playing pa-sosyal or that but it’s because one of them grew up in the U.S. and the other one grew up in Nigeria speaking English. At first it was kind of uneasy for me but later on I started to get used to it. However, we could not deny that we were a bit different from the rest of the school. But now looking back, I am grateful for that experience.

Anyways, back to the story. Bubbles was a late bloomer and she honestly accepts that. In Grade school, and maybe even up to our sophomore year, Bubbles was always in front of the line .. and you know the meaning of that. We always formed lines (queues) back in school for reasons of order when going to a school event. The person that is always in front of the line is usually the shortest girl or boy in the class. Bubbles is one year younger than everyone else because as I recall she skipped one year sometime between prep and 2nd grade. So that’s one reason next to being a late bloomer of course. In our junior year, suddenly, the late bloomer blossomed! Boys started noticing her and at first she found these guys irritating and she called them “surot” which meant bed bugs in English. But later on there was one whom she actually did like but I guess it was too late because the guy never continued his advances and then we eventually graduated. At this time, I started getting busy myself not with boys but I started joining a Christian community. I think this is when we started drifting apart. And of course, we ended up in different universities. She went to the blue one and I went to the green one. But even then, she did send me a letter once in a while. That was way back before e-mails and Friendsters. On my 18th birthday, I invited her to my party which was held in my house. Most of my guests were composed of my college and church friends. After that she sent another letter from me and this time she honestly told me that during that party she felt really out of place and that she felt that both of us are really changing and that it was sad to admit that our lives are going on different ways inevitably. She also told me that she is moving to the Netherlands along with her family since her father was assigned there. After that, I still received a couple more letters from the Netherlands. That was in the early 90′s.

I don’t recall really what city she lived in but now I am wondering if she is still here in the same country as me or is she back home in the Philippines. I have come in contact with a common friend who lives in the US and she also didn’t hear anything from her nor from any of our batchmates. She is not in our Friendster group and even if I use google nothing comes out! Where in the world is Bubbles? If you would like to help, feel free to link to this post in your blog or webpage.

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i0kQM3WPWOY]