Initiation.

I write about this every year. It's basically the same thing, over and over and over until you just want to swear it off for the rest of your life but each one is still a different experience, shared with new individuals, with lots of new anecdotes, bloopers and fails to be told at the next. And it's amazing, how you do this year after year after year and yet there are always more of them whose lives you can change with a few snips and a couple of stitches here and there.

Seems like a circumcised penis never goes out of style. 

Well, in the Philippines at least, where tuli is an initiation into manhood and choosing to stay supot is a surefire way of making it to the club of the teased and taunted. This rite of passage is excruciatingly nerve-wracking, gut-wrenching, penis-retracting for them but boyyyy for us it's loads of fun. I love tuli season. Mostly because this is one of those rare times I feel like I have good hand eye coordination, LOL. And because kids say the darnedest things.

So far..

"Whhhooooo! Ang sarap!" - what a weird kid

"Buti na lang hindi mataba yung nagtutuli sakin" - why thank you hahahaha

"Galingan mo ha ayoko na magpatuli ulit!"

And my favorite conversation this summer:

Me: May girlfriend ka na ba?

Kid: Etong mukha na to magkakagirlfriend?

Me: Fishing ka. Anong gusto mong sabihin ko, pogi ka naman? 

Kid: Pwede mo yun sabihin ate!

Me: [Silence. Roll eyes.]

Kid: Ang liit lang ng ano ko noh? (No, it wasn't)

Me: Fishing ka na naman ba?

Kid: Hehehe.