I never watched a lot of live basketball. Sure, I watch some on TV when I feel like it, but I've only watched a basketball game in the face twice in my life. The first was when I was nine or ten years old, I think, when my dad brought me and my sister to an MBA game, where the Laguna Lakers lost to the Socsargen Marlins. The second was last night.

Similarly, I've never been to the Araneta Coliseum often. Yes, I was a DLSU student who's never watched a Green Archers game live. I've only been there twice. The first was during the Vertical Horizon concert. The second was last night.

In case you still didn't get it, I don't follow basketball much. Which perhaps makes me what Krizzie describes as a poser. But when I was asked if I wanted tickets - the event dovetailed nicely with my brother's birthday - I figured, why not? It makes for a change.

I think the name "Araneta Coliseum" slides down the tongue well. I also think Manny Pangilinan loves to promote himself. Yes, he organized the event. Yes, he managed to rename the Araneta Coliseum as the Smart Araneta Coliseum. (Sorry, Globe; no events for you.) But the first leg of the Ultimate All-Star Weekend - where nine NBA players, including Kobe Bryant, Kevin Durant and Derrick Rose faced off against the PBA's finest - can be summed up in one sentence: Manny Pangilinan is god. The only thing he has to do is go to politics. To his credit, though, the capacity crowd were applauding him sincerely.

At least 15,000 people hate Mo Twister. That's judging from how loud the boos were when he came out to host the warm-up.

At least 15,000 people have forgiven Joseph Estrada. He was seated at courtside, and when the cameras focused on him, the crowd chanted, "Erap! Erap! Erap!" He gave everyone a wave. I wondered if he's our version of Jack Nicholson.

I was probably the only one who wanted the local players to win. Sure, I get the awesomeness of having nine NBA players - and not fading ones at that - go to the Philippines to play ball, but I just wanted to see the PBA players whoop their asses, for one. Everybody else was loudly booing the PBA players when they first came out to the court, leading James Yap to quip, "idol natin silang lahat, so sana mag-cheer din kayo sa amin."

Everybody was starstruck. Seeing Rabeh al-Hussaini come out to the court with a sketchpad was understandably adorable, especially when he started asking the NBA players for an autograph. The organizers were actually stopping him from doing so. Later, we saw the referees take photos with the players, too.

It was a no-contest. The NBA players (I refuse to call them the Smart All-Stars, since Manny Pangilinan is not my god) won easily, 131-105. But in the beginning it looked like it would be close... but then again, that was Arwind Santos' doing. He scored the first six points for the locals, leading me to quip that it's the NBA versus Arwind Santos. Which looks nice in a headline. What doesn't look nice is when you factor in the guy who brought this really loud horn and decided to distract any PBA player who's on the free throw line.

Unexpectedly, I ended up being this close to a childhood crush. I don't know if anybody remembers Patricia Ann Roque from ABS-CBN's ATBP. Now she's a TV5 reporter who found my dad wearing a Lakers jersey, who ended up interviewing his colleague who watched with us. I was seated beside him. I expect some ribbing from my cousin.

Krizzie is right. I am a poser. Or not. But I felt a bit out of the water last night. It was a good game, and we managed to smuggle our DSLR - a mean feat considering how Karla fared with her point-and-click that only looks like a DSLR the last time we were there. And while I don't still understand why the Philippines loves basketball that much, well, I guess that is the point.

I was worried that I'd be the first one to get to the CCP. That'd mean I'll be the one getting tickets for the whole group, which was already down one: Y2K had to pull out at the very last minute because she had to stay at the office. That'd also mean I'll have to contact Misha, who got all of us free tickets - my concern was, I thought she changed her phone number and, when the time comes that I have to ask her for tickets, I'd be calling nobody.

"Sucks," Y2K said. "I'll watch on Sunday na lang." It was followed by what apparently was Misha's phone number, which I apparently still had.

I did get to the CCP first. I wasn't that surprised, since I came from home, while everybody else came from wherever they're working. I found myself a bit overwhelmed by the crowd that came to watch the films featured in this year's Cinemalaya. The last time I attended was three years ago; I was surrounded by familiar faces from DLSU, as well as actors, filmmakers, or whoever was in between them. This time, well, nothing's changed, but it all felt alien to me, perhaps because I was no longer a student who was required to watch these films; I'm not a civilian showing support for a friend.

I didn't have to call Misha. She found me.

"How are you?" she said, after a quick hello hug.

"Fine," I said.

"Tickets are available at the counter," she said, pointing at the box office.

I wasn't exactly clear what she meant, so I sent a text message to Mae, Arlene and Kimmy - three people whose numbers I was sure I still had. I spent the next thirty minutes taking the scenery in. Filmmakers talking to filmmakers, students talking to students, and me, looking out the front entrance of the main theater, holding the barely-noticeable scar in my left elbow in the process. And then I'd hear some of the ushers talk about the tickets Misha reserved.

Yep, that's pull. I was, after all, watching her short film. Oliver's Apartment - about a male Emma Pillsbury whose gets something in the mail - is competing this year. When I first heard the news, a few months ago from Mae, I instantly remembered one of the few online conversations we had, one during my last term in DLSU, when she was this close to dropping her business courses and pursuing films instead. (I remember it because I wrote about it.) Since then, she apparently took up filmmaking in New York, a fact made obvious by the Big Apple-ness of her short, if not the fact that her actors are American. Or the end title that said "NYU Intensive Filmmaking".

Music started playing in the lobby. I still remember what it means: time to take your seats. I got my ticket - individually labeled and properly spelled, although she calls me Henrik and she wrote Niko instead - and decided to take my seat. I did not get a reply from anyone.

"Hi," she said from the stage. "I'm Misha Balangue, director of Oliver's Apartment."

I realized why she had to wear a lot of make-up. Theater lights.

"My cast couldn't be here tonight... I hope you enjoy watching this film as much as we enjoyed making it. Thank you!"

The shorts package - which includes a dystopian slow-burn and a black-and-white flicker - was over in an hour, a full hour earlier than I expected. It took me ten minutes to see a familiar face - Jed's - and it took me five more minutes to track him down from the crowds.

"Did you see anybody else?" I asked him when I finally did.

"You saw Misha?" he answered. "She had to leave early. Dinner daw."

"Yeah, I only saw her, and nobody else."

Turns out only the two of us made it.

"No!" Y2K replied. "Kimmy and Iel left the office long ago!"

"We didn't see them! And they didn't reply."

"Oh no. They could be stuck in traffic. Lakas ng ulan, eh."

"Maybe. Texted them anyway. Sana mag-reply."

"Aids replied. They're just parking now. Yikes. I'll tell them you got the tix."

"Tapos na eh."

It was a communication breakdown of sorts. The mobile phone jammers at the CCP are so good, you can't get a decent signal even after you've left the theater. For thirty minutes, apparently, they were trying to call me. All that time, I was outside the side entrance, crossing the road and going back, trying to call Mae to no avail, apparently because I was calling the wrong number. So much for assurances.

"Niko, we're at Teriyaki Boy in Harbour Square."

At eight o'clock, finally, familiar faces.

I ended up crashing dinner for six - Aids, Arlene, Ian, Kimmy, Mae and Marielle. They ended up, by accident, paying for my dinner. I ended up paying (I think) for the bouquet of roses they were supposed to give Misha, a plan that would've worked if not for the fact that they only caught the tail-end of Hazard. Then again, Arlene had a pen, Mae had a notepad, and Aids had Misha's home address; the seven of us ended up writing congratulatory notes, and Mae, being the advertising art director, did the drawing.

"We're very proud of her," Arlene said. "After thinking so long of dropping her [commerce] course..."

All throughout, I was feeling proud myself, that I was able to pick up on almost everything they were talking about, when in theory I am terribly out of place. I didn't really have to worry, because we were all proud of a friend's achievement. Except for the fact that I got there on time to watch it.

I decided to hitch a ride with Arlene, since I wanted to spend as less money as possible on a cab which would bring me to my dad's cocktails at the Makati Shangri-La. Mae and Marielle, who was going down somewhere in Makati's fringes, were with us. We were stuck in traffic along Vito Cruz, when Arlene had Mae read a text message she got from a colleague of hers. Seven basic truths, or something.

"Number three: Hindi ka puwedeng huminga ng nakalabas ang dila."

Impossible. The three of us at the back of the car tried, and work.

"Number four: Sinubukan mong gawin ang number three."

Arlene was having a fit of laughter. A pretty serious one. Marielle and Mae realized they were duped. Me? Of course - more so, since I was trying hard to sound smart, I ended up doing it first. A minute later, we headed out to deliver the package, we talked about how expensive going on the Skyway every day is, and I thought a bit about whether to feel too close or too distant. I couldn't decide.

A hater of humankind.

I expected the word misanthrope to have a slightly more convoluted - nay, slightly more academic - definition than that. A hater of humankind. It's to the point, but it's quite harsh, to quote the people who prefer to use the word dislike to express their, umm, hate of certain things.

It's one of those words I never encountered until I was forced to confront its meaning. Yes, I'm on the verge of going there, but I won't take that one last step.

Asia and I were having this conversation about weird, quiet people - there! - which led to our discussion of the word. I actually was the first one to throw the word into the pan.

"She's generally a misanthrope," I said. "I wouldn't know."

"Wow," she said. "Never thought I've encountered a misanthrope before."

"I write a lot, but I never even learned of the term 'misanthrope' until I met her."

"Ganun? Maybe we should stop talking about misanthropes. It's not healthy."

"Interestingly, she has friends."

Perhaps the dictionary definition is too harsh. A hater of humankind? Maybe it should be one who dislikes humankind. Maybe one who dislikes certain qualities of humankind. I'll admit, I latched on to the term when Icka introduced it to me because at the time it just sounded so appealing, but something just didn't feel right. You see, if you absolutely hate everyone with a passion, you should be spending your days sleeping, and your nights crawled up in your bed, in the dark, going existential on yourself. But everything wasn't consistent with my people-are-ganging-up-on-me mindset at the time.

Perhaps the right definition should be one with a deep distrust of humankind. You know, you can still deal with people, but you approach everything with an unhealthy dose of suspicion, a belief that everyone is out to screw with you.

With that in mind, well, perhaps I am a misanthrope myself.

Cue my stock response: I wasn't always that way. I was very friendly when I was a kid, and I still am friendly now. But along the way, people bullied me for no reason. Along the way, people decided that I wasn't worth being a friend. Along the way, people decided I was too weird for them. And all that made me become more suspicious - more guarded is a euphemism, but I'll say more suspicious instead - of people. Nobody is ever concerned about me; all they want is to see me dead.

I was really cranky last night. I was watching the news and found myself complaining more than usual. People complain about billboards and then set new ones up. People complain about the existence of zoos but they don't know what they're talking about, mostly because they're elitists with their heads up their asses. You get the idea. I was just complaining about everything being so wrong.

Maybe I am confused. Maybe I am not a misanthrope after all; maybe I'm just cynical, which is something I openly admit to, and something that isn't universally considered as terribly wrong... yet.

But I had that conversation with my mother again. I think my mother hates me. Or, at least, I think my mother hates the way I think. "Galit ka sa mundo?" she'd always ask me, and then she'd go, "ang bigat-bigat siguro ng dinadala mo," in a very sarcastic tone, like she just wants to get rid of you or something. Or maybe I feel that way because she never really listens to my complaints, because she always excuses herself from my rants by saying that I've said it over and over again, when in fact there's always something new for me to be annoyed at.

"Alam mo," she'd say, "magbago ka naman. Hindi lahat ng tao magbabago para sa'yo."

Palagi na lang ganyan, I'd think. Ako na lang dapat nagbabago.

When you get dealt with that way, pretty much every single time, you will have the urge to crawl back to whatever shell you came from and just stay there. What's the use? you'd ask. I tried my best and nothing ever happens. People go on about working hard to get what you want but, alas, some people are just very lucky, and some people are the complete opposite. Some people get a favorable response, and then there are people like me, who's traumatized enough to consider himself a misanthrope. One who has a deep mistrust of humankind, and the way they build relationships, and get ahead in life, and everything else in between.

And yet here I am, hoping to make friends, trying to make friends, despite this deep-seated suspicion that all that I do - all that I ever do - will end in nothing. Which happened many times before.

Perhaps I should just settle for cynical.

Girls will not be able to break my heart anymore.

When I decide that I like someone so much that she deserves a slot in my handful of involuntary daydreams, it starts off a vicious cycle that ends with me hating myself for letting it happen all over again.

Sure, something may be completely off with my plans - the worst being that I never really leave the bench and enter the court - but my inability to actually act on my feelings doesn't mean I deserve to get hurt. I know what I can and cannot do. I cannot be like everyone else, or most of everyone else. I cannot come up to a girl and say I like her, more so in the past five years or so.

You'll say that I bring all the pain on myself.

Sure. I like you, you see. I see you spend more time with everybody else. I cannot have you for just one day. Okay, I did. Well, I almost did. And then you said no.

I know what I can and cannot do, and while I cannot have you, I can be happy with you. Even for that one moment. But I can't.

Why not look around, then? Lots of fish in the sea. But I'm growing old and, along with it, I'm getting more cynical. Then I'd probably be more outright with it - no, I actually am - and in the future, I'll probably give up on girls altogether. It's just not worth getting hurt over and over again. Maybe I should turn gay and go for guys again? It should be a different experience. But I guess the pain will still be the same, if not worse.

I got a Google+ invite from Paw yesterday.

Technically I begged her for one.

I told myself a few days ago that I wouldn't mind being late on that bandwagon. After all, it took me ages to get on Facebook. (It took me ages to get on Friendster, even.) And then I realized that I'm being left behind by the most vocal proponents of "everybody else" so I decided to, well, to hell with it - jump on the bandwagon, see where it goes.

I wasted some time yesterday finding people and adding them in circles. I only found ten people - it is a beta version, after all - and proceeded to categorize them according to how I met them. (That's all I'm going to say. In theory, you're not supposed to know which circle people put you into.) Google+ is best described as a Facebook/Twitter hybrid: you don't need to allow people to follow you, but you can limit your posts to certain people. Circles, in this case. So I can just add people and not wait for a confirmation - it's pretty much liking a Facebook fan page as opposed to adding someone.

(Gah, I sound like a social media maven. I wonder how many hits this blog entry will get?)

The circles thing is what sets Google+ apart from the rest. Another attempt to replicate real-life conversations. You won't tell your boss your deepest, darkest secrets, right? Same way you won't tell the people you just know, but aren't close with, your deepest darkest secrets. Also mirroring that reality is the fact that - like I said - you're not supposed to know which circle people put you into. For all you know, you treat them as a friend and they just assigned you to "People I Don't Give A Shit About". It's not like Facebook, where - unless you fiddled around with your privacy settings - everybody sees everything you post.

Yes, I'm being paranoid about this.

Once upon a time, everybody was either a friend or an enemy. Either you were nice to the guy or you weren't. Either you were told "friends tayo!" or "hindi tayo bati!" Sure, it kills off the nuances of best friends and barkadas, but it made for easier decisions.

As we grew up, these nuances begged to be noticed. So you had best friends, you had close friends, and you had friends you are nice to but never really bothered spending time with, because life wouldn't let that happen. You had acquaintances who just happen to be there. You had frenemies (whatever they called that at the start of the millenium) and you had enemies. And then you have your nemeses.

And then you find yourself having to deal with all these connections and all these places in your hierarchy. Sure, in theory you just let things be. And sure, this is me being paranoid. You put people in certain positions, and then they shift away from it, to the left or to the right, and you end up resisting it, because you know it's going to ruin the balance you meticulously maintain. I know we're supposed to be best friends, but your actions suggest otherwise, you'd go. I'd like to keep things the way they are. But you, on the other hand...

The end result: you have friends that don't treat you as friends, and you have enemies that don't treat you as enemies.

And you don't know which one's which.

I was rereading this article off the copy of The Guardian my dad brought home from London last year. It pretty much talks about the slow burn I was outlining in the earlier paragraphs: the time when you shift from one position to another, without any announcement, and without you being prepared. Someone makes the decision, and you're left out cold. And you're left wondering why you even bother honoring the agreement.

It's pretty much like trying to post a reply on a friend's Facebook post, only to find that you cannot post a reply, while your other friends can. You get frustrated, and you're forced to move on.

And then you realize that you're doing the same thing, and others are going through the same things you do - only you blow it up, because you're paranoid.

Why do you feel so entitled? What makes you so fucking important, Nicksy?