"Carry Ko yan"

I had my usual Friday afternoon tête-à-tête with a friend at the cafeteria. The usual chit chats segue into my not so new highlighted golden brown hair. In fact I had to point it out for him to notice the first time he saw me with that new look. Again, he complimented me for looking good in it and we both had a good laugh as I recounted to him how all of a sudden I had no compunction having it done, including the comedic situation of having it actually done. I was ribbing him that perhaps he might want to have his hair dyed as well and during the course he blurted out “hindi ko carry yan” which he immediately corrected as soon as it came out of his mouth, but too late whatever is said is done and cannot be undone. Obviously a slip of the tongue. But nah! I did not pounce on him. I nonchalantly ignored it as a non-issue in deference to his obviously discomfort’s use of the word. Innocent words it may seem, but the words became just so obvious because he immediately corrected himself, a self-censure to disguise what may seem to be an obvious knowledge and use of the gay lingo, at least as I assumed it to be. Was it really a part of gay lingo that he had to immediately correct himself for that? Oh well, for those people in the know it’s a blip-blip, a ching, a bell ringing, a red-flag up that can be easily picked up by a well honed and synced gaydar. But how sharp is my gaydar anyway? It probably needs a lot of sharpening and a lot of tuning coz it obviously is so slow in picking up signal, or is it?

I have known him for close to 10 years already. We go back to our residency-training as batch mates. There were 12 of us in our batch, a pretty close-knit group and through the years we’ve sort of became close as one by one we lost our barkadas to married-family life until there were just 4 of us remaining single. We used to go out a lot sharing the same passion for movies. We even had moviethon on days we don’t want to miss good movies. I must admit I had a huge crush on him way back then, probably fed by voyeuristic opportunity of seeing his yummy ass as he get dressed in the morning during our duty days. I even did something crazy just so I can continue seeing him, but that's another story hahaha...) Somehow that crush fizzled out somewhere I just don’t know when it happened. I now consider him as a good friend, one of the closest friend I have at this profession.

Every now and then my gaydar would pick up something; I just can’t rely if they’re actually tuned and in sync right. So here are some of the ching my gaydar has picked up from him:

1. He’s still single at this age. I have not actually known him pursued any girl on his own. I know he has dated a couple of girls that were actually set up by well-meaning friends. Nothing really came out of it as he has the same lame excuse every time: busy with work that schedule won’t match, not up to standard, etc.

2. A self-confessed Barbara Streisand fan. Oh well, one of the cliché that if you dig Barbara Streisand you must be gay. Or in the local scene - Regine Velasquez. (I don’t know why)

3. He is knowledgeable or at least has seen and/or interested to watch gay-themed and not so obviously gay-themed movies and has actually enjoyed those kind of films.

4. His knowledge or at least occasional slip of the tongue use of gay lingo.

5. He has a “friend” and “business partner” for about 3 years now. In quotation mark because I sense they're more than just “friend” and “business partner.”

Well, those are the things that my rusty gaydar picks up. I just don’t know if it's picking up right. And until I see more proof in the pudding all I can say is “carry ko yan.”