PAPER CUTS: Worth lining up for

I was never a fan of local literature. My book shelf is lined with American and English classics, those from Irish authors, some titles from the Oprah Book Cub, some recent bestsellers, and a few chicklits. Aside from the textbooks that we were obliged as students to read, I can't remember buying a book from a Filipino author, well aside from Ambeth Ocampo's Looking Back during my freshman year in college (which actually ended up as a business venture because my classmates back then were so lazy to do research for our History class so I decided to buy the book and have each story photocopied).

Last Friday, I was fortunate enough to attend the book launch of Paper Cuts, Pam Pastor's (yeah, that girl from PDI) first book. And because I literally ran to National Book Store's Glorietta 5 branch after having auto logged out at 5:30 PM, I even managed to hear her speech, yey!

Characters in the book were there. There's Pam's mom, brother, Jill, Powie, and others. I even ran into a common friend of ours, Joice!

Celebrities present were Raimund Marasigan, Joross Gamboa (or a look-alike maybe), RJ Ledesma, and Tim Yap who came a few minutes after I left.

So many people lined up to get their copies signed. I even saw one carrying five copies!!! That's how good the book is people! The stories were fun and wittingly written.

Pam's famous (hehe!) cupcakes were also present. Oh my, they were so good I ate two. But no worries coz they were mini cupcakes, haha! Other food sponsors were Krispy Kreme and San Mig. Vicki Belo also sent Pam a huge stand-up bouquet of flowers and also gave a few gift certificates for the raffle.

And oh, the raffle! Aside from the Belo certificates, there were toy cameras, Manny Pacquiao-signed chess board, and the "toothbrush" (vibrator to be exact, but was called that way the entire evening for there were kids in the room, LOL!). Surprisingly, the toothbrush was won by a guy. And despite the appeals from so many women in the room, the guy never surrendered the item. :)

I was so bummed that entire day that I didn't have enough powers to take pictures. But I have this:




It was a great night, even if I was on the line for almost two hours. There are only a few things in life that's worth lining up for. And I believe this is one of those things.