Toblerone was very very tempting.
Everytime I saw advertisement of it in posters on Malls, I was enraptured by the Toblerone’s olfactory and gastronomic enticements which like irresistible sirens sucked my starved and willing imagination into its taste.
But I was not allowed to eat chocolate…too much…because I was still a child, so I had to content myself again and again merely with powdered chocolate drink, Milo and Ovaltine.
But after how many childhood years, I stopped eating powdered chocolate drink in secret, I got tired of it. And toblerone became my real fantasy for it was maddeningly seductive.
Then one day, while day dreaming inside the classroom, I thought of my dream, my paradise, my heaven and all- toblerone, eating it…gently, up to the last bite. And so, right after the class, my flesh is indeed weak- I soon succumbed to the Chocolate Toblerone Temptation, and with all my life’s fortune, I bought that chocolate in the nearest convenient store with unbounded expectation.
Back home, I searched. Wonderful fortune…there was no one there! I went to my room, locked the door…unwrapped the Toblerone.
And ate it.Wildly, voraciously consumed it.
But…
Hindi masarap…Walay lami!
It was tasteless.
The eagerly anticipated heaven…was tasteless!!!
That was when I was ten years old.
Today. Ten years later, I still do not know why.
Why my toblerone was tasteless.
Today. Ten years ago, my toblerone was badly tasteless.
But the bulad, ginamos, utanon and dukot plus the seasonal pakras, kasili and sawa served in our Apostolate areas are real heaven on earth.
More than the food, I would like to believe that stories, which can be shared around the table, make people come together.
In the simplicity (or scarcity and poverty) of food of our brethren in the areas, stories unfold and those stories, once shared, become the source of laughter and joy and even struggle and sympathy and these stories later on would make the served food, no matter how little and simple, more delicious and enticing to share, to be partaken by each community or household member.
Today. Ten years later, I still do not know why.
Why my toblerone was tasteless. And why the scarced and cheap foods and drinks of our nanays and tatays served to us every Sunday are far tastier.
But I can hazard a guess.
God made my toblerone tasteless.
To teach me an important lesson.
Food is not meant to be eaten alone.
Food is not to be enjoyed alone.
No more than money or land or knowledge or victory or happiness or life itself is meant to be enjoyed alone.
Everything is given to us.
Everything is a gift for us…to share.
That is the lesson I learned from the delicious, tasteless toblerone which I bought and devoured and spat out ten years ago at my home in Quezon City.
Life is entrusted to us…
Life is indeed ours. But ours…to share!
karlcmf
20.10. 2012
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