Maskara ni Tito Donnie

One of the few benefits of expats working in ME is the free board and lodging. Termed as accommodation, employers usually put these people (except for married couples or family) in rooms sized for 2 to 4. This is generally fine, but the bad thing is one doesn't get the chance to choose whom he wishes to share the room with. Worse, other nationalities share in the picture at times. It's like prison cell, you are damped together, and if you find yourself surrounded with big time criminals, you are doomed big-time. But freedom has its ways of yearning.

For those who got their way, having one's own accommodation and accessorizing with all the luxuries is only the beginning. Because for them complete freedom could not be had unless they share their possessed amenities with relatively younger guys - to the point of having to give them up one by one.

But there is irony playing here. Though they finally found freedom, some slowly build their own prison walls by making a "cover". They pretend and shout to the world that the young men that sleep on their beds, use their internet connections, sing to their Mediacom karaoke machines, apply their fountain-of-youth stuffs, and eat their food are - for purpose of misleading the paparazzi's - their relatives. Usually, they instruct their "kid'o cum lover" to say "pamangkin kita" when asked.

I'd say prison because in the process, they limit their world, they constrain their moves, and spend their time together sneaking to avoid any possible confrontation with rest of the pack.

But let me lay down a premise. People are wise nowadays. They know how to distinguish a lie from big fat one. Unless one can mask up a "to-the-detail" lie, then he is up to something. But if not, it's like keeping a bomb waiting to happen.

So, when your neighbor grins whenever he asks the lovely young guy comfortably parading his boxer shorts along the hallway how he is related to you, and the latter answers back by saying you are his "tito", it's probably time to panic.

Check out the mask you're wearing, maybe there's something bizarre painted on it.