High School Never Ends

Yeah of course it ended at around nine years ago. But high school culture continues to dictate the way we live in a sort of bizarre, inexplicable way. Kind of.

Well I got to thinking while driving back to Cebu City after a weekend getaway at a high school friend's farm and then frolic on the beach with grilling on Sunday on one of the towns on the North of Cebu. It was a at least a two to three hour drive. It was an awesome weekend by the way. Booze, pig outs, karaoke and good ol' Filipino hospitality. Most of all it was the ultimate catch up weekend. It was intimate but loud - since there were lots of laughter and the talking was non-stop. Nadia, Reggie and I have not seen each other for almost two years. Not counting those mini-reunions every Christmas season since the atmosphere during those gatherings does not really promote a chance of a heart to heart, mostly it's chit-chat and mingling with each other.

The topic was mostly about high school. You see though the three of us each belonged to a respective clique, we managed to become really close friends for we were united with one thing - gossip. Yeah. If we had the BlackBerries back then we would have given Gossip Girl if she ever existed some tight competition. And of strength was the power of mouth.

We still found out that the three of us still had animosities with the same people since high school. We somehow cannot shake off that even after ten years some people are still irritating and can get through your nerves via FaceBook. We still are entertained by anecdotes from those four years. Tales of droll, laugh out loud moments of growing up. I am still a big believer of the saying, "Being grown up isn't half as fun as growing up."

Basically high school was all about hormones and sadly most people and image was dictated by popularity. I guess in way my school it still had some politics regarding self image and personalities despite being labeled a high school whose students are cream of the crop.

Well you can never really leave high school totally in my opinion. High school just laid out the foundation of what the real world can be - mean and tough. High school was ruled by smart people, rich brats, lean athletes, beautiful people and those that did not really fit the mold were picked on. But part of the population of those that didn't really fit the mold didn't really care. I'd like to think that I didn't really categorize into those roles mostly considered popular by Philippine High School standards. Yes I was in the Top Ten of my class for four years but I wasn't that as hard working. Next I didn't play any sports that much, I just did so that I'd never have to suffer a low grade in Physical Education. Lastly I was awkward in high school. I had bushy hair, forehead acne and was one of the shortest boys in class. But I wasn't picked on. My edge was my personality and my mouth. I was small but I did not back down from a verbal fight and I was perceived as too frank for most tastes. I immersed myself reading books, watching movies and listening to the coolest pop songs.

Though I didn't really care much - a part of me still cared for that popularity bull crap and that was one of the reasons I drifted apart from my best friend in elementary school. He was picked on for being fat and then instead of coming to his defense, I walked the halls non-chalant as he was being teased and often times I would join in the revelry. Totally low on my part there. Way back in high school I socialized with both the so called popular crowd and those who were not. And I'm proud to say I still say hi to these people every time I bumped into them in public places.

After this weekend what we realized that some people do never change after high school. Some of them still give a shit on what other people think about their appearance or the way they dress. Some people still pick on the same people for being different after all these years. Some still as shallow as ever. The three of us are still guilty of being gossipy.

After all the real world whether we like it or not is dictated by high school politics. Somehow we still live in a world where superficiality overrule inner strength. People get jobs because they are "popular" a.k.a connections - also known as nepotism. And sometimes it takes more than brains to close deals or achieve goals.

But the only difference this time around is we are more experience and stronger. We can never really escape high school but we can choose to redeem ourselves by being more hard working and being extra nice to people that we wouldn't have been treating well if this were still high school.