Sunday Showdown: Pacquiao Vs. What's-His-Name

FYI.


If you see grown men in your neighborhood foaming at the mouth with a vacant look in their eyes while glued to their transistor radios, don't call the police in panic. First off, the police will be in entirely the same state. And second, it's not a new version of the H1N1 virus. They are acting like non-stationary cadavers with AM radio addiction because Manny Pacquiao plays on Sunday.

Yep. The Pinoy champ is playing against some guy from some country who has some belts won in some other fights with some other guys. I dunno. I'm not gonna embarrass myself by speaking 'sports' when I honestly have no idea what it is, except that people sweat when they do it. And smell.

Anyway, I know more about this fight than any other sport stuff (except 90s NBA) because I don't live under a rock. Surprisingly. My male neighbors talk about the match when they meet each other on the street, when they hang out while slugging down cheap whisky, when they lounge in front of their homes with other male neighbors, and even when they are alone. I know this because I heard my uncle argue why Cotto is getting knocked out on the 5th round and not on the 1st while feeding his chickens. By himself.

Of course, we women also share this obsession with Pacquiao and the sport of kicking people's butts. I mean we ask our sport-oriented friends, "What's Pacquiao wearing at the after party?" and we want to know, "What will they name their next child?". We share in the discussions and even get angry when some people liken his mom to Amor. We say, "Hell, no. Amor is prettier than that." See? We care.

The difference is we don't have a countdown posted on our homepage and a blog - with polls and posts as far back as 4 months ago - solely dedicated to a fight that will last all of 20 minutes. We don't get mad when our friend mispronounces Michael Cotto's name, oops sorry did it again (sorry Melv), Miguel Cotto, I mean.

Sure, we have countdowns on our blogs for Harry Potter releases, the next shoe sale, or even the opening of yet another boutique - and that proves the theory that most people might not have heard of but will surely agree with: men and women are different.

*hears gasp from reader*

Oh, don't overreact. Of course, men and women are different. We watch movies for the romance, they watch it for the explosions. We like to talk about the latest Hollywood hookup, they like to talk about the latest draft pick in some team or other. We go to the mall to shop, they go to the mall because we force them to.

One thing's for sure, though. Different as we might be, no matter what we believe in, come Sunday, all Filipinos of either gender and any affiliation located anywhere in the world will be united under one common goal. And that is to grab the remote first. Coz I ain't missing A League Of Their Own.




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