PAL Interclub: A habit I can’t kick

By Al S. Mendoza

CAGAYAN DE ORO CITY—I wrote this piece in this jewel city of Mindanao called fondly as the city of golden friendship for the warmth and bright smile people here love to exude. Buttressing that reputation is the fact that this is traditionally the only city in the south that terrorists supposedly love to spare from their brutalities.

No long faces.

No snarling.

No hot heads.

I could be the only Mr. Grouch here right now?

Just kidding.

“They do their R & R here that’s why,” said Tom Garcia, my town mate in Mangatarem who made good here with his now-giant security agency business called Valiant and, most recently, the Global Empire Security Services Inc. based in Manila.  “Must really be the huge smile and warm heart that people in this city are noted for that’s why this city is the most peaceful place in Mindanao.”

I can believe that.  Everywhere I go here, I see people smiling, greeting you endlessly with “good morning, sir” if you are in a hotel, a big restaurant or even simply in a joint.  The fruit vendors alone in Divisoria – yes, they also have a Divisoria just like Manila – smile non-stop and you wonder at all if pouting has been erased in this tiny corner of the globe.

I’ve shaken hands with friends here from way back like Ron Canlas, a dear friend of my dear mate Rob Dix of Chix Unlimited, Henry Jainab Tan of Modtrade and Boyet Omaga of Camp Evangelista.  They all are as warm as the sun that kisses Del Monte’s Sweet 16 pineapples each day of the year.

Even my fellow sportswriters from nearby Davao, why, they treat me like I’m John Lennon each time they see me – Moses Billacura of Mindanao Insider Daily, Jon Develos of Mindanao Times, Charles Maxey of Sun-Star Davao, Lito delos Reyes of Bandera, Leonard Palo of Mindanao Mirror and photographers Boy Lim (free-lancer), Bing Gonzales of Mindanao Mirror and Seth delos Reyes of Sun-Star Super Balita.

And what am I doing here again?

Well, I am here covering the 60th edition of the PAL Interclub Golf Tournament for the Philippine Chronicle, the newspaper I transferred to only very recently after being with the Inquirer for 20 years. 

The PAL Interclub is known unofficially as the national team championship for the sheer bigness of the field (78 teams of 10 players each) coming in yearly from across the archipelago and many parts of America and Asia.

Tell you the truth, the PAL Interclub Golf is an event I haven’t missed covering – give or take away one edition – since 1976. Gosh, I’m that old?

It’s become a habit I can’t kick.  And it’s not only in covering it that I find joy in this troubled world of ours. It’s the people I get to see again, I meet for the first time, which guns up the urge for me to keep covering the PAL Interclub.

Since golf is people, what is life without golf?

(For past columns, click http://sundaypunch.prepys.com/archives/category/opinion/general-admission/)

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