SHOCK, AWE & HORROR

SHOCK, AWE & HORROR

THE PACMAN Vs. THE HITMAN

(PART 1)

By Doods A. Amora, PEE
(April 12, 2009)

THE EAST MEETS THE WEST

The confrontation is still sneaking weeks away, but the brewing tension of a fierce combat smells irresistibly towards one hell of a war. There’ll be non-stop action. There will be blood flowing - lots of them, and someone will fall down.

The Tag: PACQUIAO Vs. HATTON

On May 3 (Manila Time), The Pacman and The Hitman would come to clash a serious business, and everyone expects it.

Big Fames - Big Fight! The names alone are enough to make mouths water.

To their callings, they both have machine guns; and big guns, too. All said and done, each protagonist promised to knock the other out in three rounds!

This time, no more trash tales of ‘aged’, ‘washed-up’, ‘dehydrated’ or ‘passé’ characters... Both are in their prime at 30.

In the ensuing fracas, surely brutal as they come, both fighters are presaged to be tenacious, unyielding and potent. Both are forward-moving, volume-punching aggressors - capable in blasting their opponents for good. Hatton has 32 knock-outs, Manny has 36; nothing to downplay on either sides.

And when the EAST collides with the WEST, it will be nuclear fission in overwhelming proportions! The explosion must be much more deafening than Pacquiao-Dela Hoya and Hatton-Mayweather episodes, combined!

Shock & Awe! How else could it be?


THE EQUATION

Manny has 48 fights in his resume against the demanding future Hall-of-Fame brawlers like Barrera, Morales, Marquez, and more recently, David Diaz and Oscar de la Hoya among others.

But except for Dela Hoya, Pacman’s victories were over small men, by welterweight standards...

On the other hand, Ricky’s numbers boast of 45 bouts against the likes of Urango, Castillo, and Collazo; punctuated with a spectacular victory over the once invincible Kostya Tszyu, and having lost only once to the undefeated pound-for-pound great, Floyd Mayweather Jr.

It goes without saying, Hattons’s lion dens, are all the time, BIG men.

Nevertheless, Ricky is for sure the stronger and bigger fighter, and at 140, he’s fighting at his best weight where he is the Boss. Manny had once tested the density of the 147 pound waters, but boxing skeptics said, “it was a fluke for the one he faced was an aged man who can’t pull the trigger anymore”.

Unlike the ‘recent’ Oscar Dela Hoya, the Hitman Hatton, is a monster in the inside. Aside from his natural powers, “the Hitman is deadly, very capable in using his shoulders, elbows, hips, and torso to set up awesome upper cuts and hooks to the body, while throwing additional shots from unorthodox angles”, as one notable sportswriter wrote.

Indeed, the Hitman, reportedly packs close to a half-ton punching power. And he is not sluggish either. Hatton's punch was clocked in at 32 mph or 51 kph. In a left hook that had floored 32 of his 45 opponents, it means a speed of 46.5 ft per second. This translates to 43 milliseconds (0.043 sec) of near 1,000 lbs of dynamic force of an uppercut to reach a target of two feet distance.


THE FIGHT PLANS

But then, mentally and physically, Hatton and Pacquiao will report for duty prepared with strategic fight plans.

And both fighters have the trade’s finest coaches in their respective corners. Freddie Roach, who has honed Pacquiao into a perpetual punching machine, is confident that Hatton would only last for three short rounds.

But Ricky has the treasure of Floyd Mayweather Sr. in his corner. An astute, deep-rooted boxing shaman, Trainer Mayweather Sr. is predicting that the “Hitman will squash the Pacman like an egg.”

“Freddie, the joke coach Roach, is counting his Easter chickens before they hatch, but there will be no resurrection in the ring for him that night,” said the outspoken trainer.

So then, not only that the two most exciting boxers in the planet will execute toe-to-toe rumba; certainly the world’s two best trainers in Floyd Mayweather Sr. and Freddie Roach are doing the same in their respective corners.

This makes this fight a lot more electrifying. The verbal fisticuffs had already started and more are coming.

“I'm in the Hall of Fame. He's not. I have 23 world champions, he has only one. All his were already champions when he took them over. He has never trained his son. Roger, his brother, did”, said Roach in apparent response to Trainer Mayweather’s offensive poetries.

Expect then that relentless pressure and non-stop assaults showcasing the uppercuts and hooks to the body of Pacman will devour the better part of the evening. Hatton had done it successfully many times before. He will do the same on May 3. Remember, Hatton was able to bring the fight to Mayweather in the early rounds, making the Pretty Boy Floyd uncomfortable at the first half of the fight. That, in itself was quantum performance a few mortals dare to replicate.

Undoubtedly, Ricky Hatton, the stronger fighter, will bring the fight on to Pacquiao right after the opening bell. Forward marching, occasionally weaving his head but with little use of lateral movements, he will slog to grab the Pacman, swarm him, and intimidate him inside the ring. That’s the shortest route to the heavy bombs aimed at Pacquiao’s body and later the concluding hard right to the head.

His mission will be an utter knockout in the early rounds. It has to be quick and the pound-for-pound title will be his.

Expectedly, Hatton will throw his newly mastered decoys, the double jabs followed by intense combinations. Sort of Pacman’s own medicines, the Briton will then swing to the left - that will place him away from Manny’s vaunted left straight and oblige the Filipino to use his right hook.

Pacman’s right hook? Nah! That’s Mayweather Sr’s homework. Hatton has rehearsed it several times in the gym.

But then, this epic match has the makings of a brand new offering never before seen by boxing fans. “The match-up is the best kind of fight ever to be made”, Freddie as quoted.

"To stand in front of Ricky, is not our plan. I expect Ricky to be better than Oscar was, at this point. He is younger, fresher. Ricky gets hit - he wants to fight. Manny gets hit - he wants to fight. They revert back to what they do best. If you hit Manny, he claps his hands together and away he goes." Freddie must have something diversified in his mind and he must have more tricks in his sleeves.

On the other hand, Pacman’s signatures of power and speed are foreshadowed to redeem himself from the obvious disadvantage. Like his latest fight, Manny would be an elusive target to hit. Weaving, bobbing and circling, Pacman will hit his targets at will. His tornadoic speed is not on one punch alone but from two-fisted multiple combos from multiple angles all set up from the speedy, springy legs. Shock and Awe! That’s what he did to Oscar Dela Hoya.

Then, a gory of blood will ooze. Smothering, confusing and denying his opponent air to breathe, that’s how the Pacman dismantles the warrior instincts from his opponent’s wits.

Horror will then creep in slowly and the will to fight effaced... maybe or maybe not.


THE VISION OF THE FIGHT

Let’s go fast forward...

Eight rounds had been history. The Pacmanites are already romping in celebration. In the span of eight chapters, Ricky Hatton only won two marginal rounds. Hatton had been down to the canvas a couple of times - his face now a bloody pulp. Score: 78 - 72 for the Pacman!

Yet, the Mancunian pride is a double edged sword. It can drive one to great heights or drive one to the point of near death in the pursuit of victory.

Hatton chose the latter. If this was what death must be like, then so be it. The eyes in his tiger inside are still sharp & piercing – still determined!

Pacquiao on the other hand, just like his bout with Oscar – except for a few blisters, is unscathed. As Freddie tells him, it’s now a matter of the finishing touches - he is now ready to punctuate a smashing victory.

The bell rings and as if the dreaded cluster bombs falling from the sky, Pacquiao storms at Hatton with a series of blinding combinations. The Hitman akin to the previous rounds, opts to eat lots of leather, it doesn’t matter anyway. Manny is winning...

As the Pacman bobs and weaves; Hatton fires his powerful darts, hitting air... again and again.

Then, at the spur of the moment, the two trade the bests of their body shots. Pak, pak, pak, bog, bog! Machine guns and big guns too! “So what if you are a master body destroyer? I have same tools that I want you to taste!” The Pacman must have that frame of mind at the moment.

All of a sudden, The Hitman clinches The Pacman, and as Hatton bulldozes forward, Pacquiao backpedals to the ropes, to a corner of the squared ring. This is what Ricky is waiting for.

Then, The Hitman stoops his whole configuration down and positions himself to deliver a huge half-ton stab on Pacquiao’s solar plexus.

Kaboom! The Pacman plunges flat on the canvas face down – panting, eyes seemingly crossed, the breathing was painful.

One big hit..., unseen, swift, heavy...!

The Pacmanites, the Hattonites, the Referee, Freddie Roach and even the Hitman himself are stunned, and for a moment all awed, hypnotized. The announcers are shocked and so is the crowd. The Pacmanites - the Filipinos at the venue and those watching on TV’s are shaken, visibly.

The Hattonites on the other hand, realizing imminent victory of their idol, roar in pandemic approval.

Shocked, Awed, Horrified! “Pacquiao is down! Manny’s hurt!” The TV commentators shout.

Meanwhile, as the bile creeps inside Pacman’s system, the deeper, the more infectious the pain is.

Down on the canvas, Manny’s visions roll, he closes his eyes. Then shadows of the past flash back into the soaring panorama. He sees the sight of Torrecampo did the same to him, many years past. Then he sees the silhouettes of his triumphs over Barrera, Morales, Marquez, Diaz, Dela Hoya and the grandeur moments while supplicated in the gorge of the all-time superstars. He then sees faces. Faces of his countrymen, horrified, looking at him and in their eyes he sees but flickers of paling trust and valour.

As his senses involuntarily jerking in partial life, he hears the referee yelling, “six…seven”; somehow floating on the clouds, half groggy, he gets up at the count of eight.

Then the bell rings. Thanks!

In his corner, efforts are frantically tried to revive him.

In his stool, Manny’s thoughts travel into realms of truths. He has been winning fights in a long streak. Now, he has forgotten how it is like to lose. He sees defeat in front of him beckoning into the emptiness of a black hole. Humbly, “I’m losing the war...”, he admits. It pains hard, he wants to sleep and forget. For forgetting even momentarily, is healing to the soul.

Hazily, Pacman looks at Hatton across the ring. There is no miracle. Hatton’s face still pulp. He too, is struggling for dear life. He closes his eyes and calls on the powers above. He had done this before, and he is always heard. With all humility, he implores it again.

He sees a glimpse of the crowd cheering him – same faces of his countrymen, the good men, the bad men, the politicians of all sorts included, the rich, the poor; all extending their arms begging him for a life to be lived. Then he hears sounds resonating agreeably to the ears – pleasingly getting louder and louder in unison. Then he sees the outlines of the Filipino people some 95 million of them, all over the world, praying and saying:

“We need your victory Manny, at least for this moment that we are one”...

Suddenly, a gush of hope and the will for life...!

He again looks straight to Hatton, and tells Freddie and Buboy, “I must win! This is my moment of truth. That is why I’m here. This is for my country!”

The bell rings signalling the tenth canto, a new Pacman hops to meet Hatton in the middle. Never mind that lucky unseen punch, because it never comes again.

Pacquiao hits Hatton real hard. With an assault so stunning no one has ever imagined, in a rapidity no one has ever seen..., and with a strange power mysterious to many, he attacks the Hitman like a swarm of killer bees out for a kill.

As the dust settles... one minute in Round 10, IT’S ALL OVER!

Ricky never gets up as the Hattonites, this time in SHOCK, AWE & HORROR.


DOODS A. AMORA, PEE
(April 12, 2009)

A METAMORPHOSIS

Note:

Domineko du Surigao is the pen name of an ‘invisible writer’ who actually was my townmate, neighbor and friend. He was a big brother and mentor to me in many ways. Not having seen nor heard of me for quite three long decades, here’s his discourse on the subject, ‘METAMORPHOSIS’.

Doods

A METAMORPHOSIS
By Domineko du Surigao

We know what we know viz what we do not. And what we know, we act on or do not...

This is the air pervading in the mind of the author months ago and it was only at this instance that, finally, the need to write it all came into fruition. That, in a manner of speaking, is in itself an evolution or a kind of lethargy awakened by the need to be heard..?

Doods at the onset, the owner of this blogsite, with all the plusses and minuses of being himself is a townmate, neighbor, little brother and above all, a friend to this invisible writer.

In fact, they are namesakes!

This seems to make the subject Doods an easy prey to dissect with. But wrong gentlemen, for reasons that the continuity of their familiarity had been frozen for the past 33 years - that, is owing to the diversities in their chosen paths. And while the subject was occupied in building his professional realm in that span of time, the friend was left in the proverbial pit of anonymity like the frog in the subject’s parable.

Nonetheless, this is the friend’s way of brewing his own tea and serving it with a fitting dough.

Set back. Take it sans prejudice. Never waste anything as overflow…

Lightning play:

What was once in the east
Is now in the west.
- Japanese Haiku

The rock speaks because it is silent;
the sand moves because it is still.
- Zen Philosophy


Then…

Bitbit ng umaga’y isang tula!!
Bukambibig, madugong tula
Na sa mundo’y ibig makialam
At mabasag – saplot ng kamangmangan !

Yaman ay basang papel –
Pluma’t tugmang di makikitil –
Sigaw ng budhi’y ibig ipaalam
Upang dunong sa madla’y mapagtikman !
-excerpts from TULA IV
By Domineko du Surigao


Years had passed since the poem was written and finally found print in the most unexpected medium largely at the insistence of the subject of this intellectual discourse.

Like the literary gem supposedly held within the poem’s lines, the subject Doods, was already a shining jewel in his hometown long before he had shone in the limelight of his inspiring career and accomplishments. Needless to say that starting from the lowest rung, the ‘boy in Doods’ with plenty of marbols in his mind had risen into what he is today: a man of substance, a complete engineer and a big brother to look up to.


LEARNING AS A PROCESS

But glancing back, it was not an easy task all the way. The road was full of potholes, the journey – rough. Still, he prevailed…

The subject’s encounter with the bitter truth began on his first job. He found, among others that what was learned only possessed a modicum of substance viz a viz reality. This, however, is the awakening and enlightening phase of any thought processes as mirrored in the Confucian premise that learning is an infinite cycle.


Knowing, as experienced, is repetitious. It is thru the knowing that we find resilience to cope with the demands of what we seek. It is in finding the path pointing to the truth that we undergo a kind of fulfillment bordering on the spiritual. Self-taught knowledge therefore conveys stranger facts than what was gleaned from the academe. Hence, the birth of his ‘cuaderno’ and consequently, the books it produced thereafter.

And he discovered another truth: that writing became his faithful mistress.

What a sweet reality. For from it, sprang the treatises on the axioms and logarithms of engineering and other facets of his personality. Writing too, as his mistress has transported his train of thoughts into a language that offered awe to the uninitiated and wonderment to the cynics.

Engineering English? Probably irrelevant. Because the point is: what then does it take to write? To write is to weave anew the fragments of the past – then fashion them into moments of splendor - into another flash of wholeness whilst opening more doors into looking beyond. What’s sought, after all, is the purity of truth and the beauty of the interwoven words in the best medium of expression and the simplest inflection of its metaphors. Thus, one feels safe that having written, the words became deeds and that these deeds having been acted and lived, finally defines the man. No fancy words - just the real ones...

Then words merely spoken become in fact, a simple fart in the wind.

So then, where does this repartee sit in with this man we know as Doods? In fact, as the distance reaching this far, the subject has been seen as the centroid and the fulcrum of the mass of knowledge he is imparting to all his audiences be they belong to the engineering discipline or not. He is also a disciple of the principle of creating opportunities when there was none at the time; discovering circumstances where there seems only to be a void in a space of a black hole.

What, then, is the purpose of his CESEEPS Blogspot?

Sigaw ng budhi’y ibig ipaalam
Upang dunong sa madla’y mapagtikman !

That.., is finger pointing to his working mind. That is supposedly, the purpose of all these…


THE METAMORPHOSIS

The subject as his friends knew, is an intransigent fan of the Pacman. Not surprising to this writer, by the way!

With some parallels, Doods and the Pacman have that same propensity to delve into the hypotheses of speed, force and timing - or the mathematical dissection of a problem in a surgical execution of a plan. Doods had some knowledge of what it has to be in the square ring. Of course, that was before the subject has shown a remarkable progress on his belly while indulging on his sedentary and physically inactive life form. Like Freddie Roach, this writer was there when Doods, should we say; 'was still fit, agile and a counter-dude more than three decades ago'.


But like the Pacman that becomes refined in every bout, the subject has in many ways, underwent a very distinguishable change from what he has been to what he is now - hence, the title of this article. And while he had shed most of the shell that enveloped him ages ago, he emerged as a leader in his own field but other than that, he is more like the Zen Policeman as told to us by Eric Van Lustbader.

Read on.

“Many centuries ago, there was a young Buddhist priest who travelled to Tibet to further his understanding of religion and philosophy. In due course, he was accepted into the monastery, but it was some days before he was summoned to the presence of the high lama.

“ ‘I understand that though you are a priest, you do not believe that your spiritual education is complete.’

“ ‘That is correct, sir,’ the young priest said in a somewhat overawed voice.

“ ‘What is it you seek to learn here?’ The old lama asked.

“ ‘Why, all there is to learn,’ the young priest said immediately.

“The old lama looked at him and smiled. ‘We shall see,’ he said. ‘In the meantime, we require you to remain awake and on guard during the night.’

“That night, the young priest was shown to the spot in the exact center of the monastery where he must keep watch. It was a crossing of the four corridors of the stone structure, and from his vantage point, he could see most, if not all the monk’s sleeping cells.

“The hours of the night crept by with agonizing slowness. Nothing happened. The silence became a weight on the young priest’s eyelids, so that once or twice he found himself drifting off into a slight slumber before starting awake. He yawned and stretched to keep himself alert.

“Then all at once, he stood up. He looked from corridor to corridor; sure that he had heard a sound. But there was only the awful silence, claustrophobic as the inside of a tomb. Then he became aware that the sound was an ethereal stirring, as if in his own mind, and he whirled around.

“Suddenly, it burst out of the corridor, coming upon him like a whirlwind, and he felt a chill down his spine. It was as translucent as the wings of an insect; he could clearly see the corridor behind it, through it.

“The young priest feels a fright welling up inside him. What were these forms? Were they the enemies of the Tibetan monks? If so, how was he to combat them when violence was anathema to him? But as if in a dream, he felt rooted to the spot. He did not know whether to fear for the loss of his mind or his life.

“Then he noticed a curious thing. The fear was coming from inside him. When he concentrated his spiritual powers, he realized that the wraiths, whatever or whoever they might be, posed no threat to him or to the people of the monastery. The CHAOS of their rushing to and fro was, in a way, self contained.

“And then the young priest understood everything.

“The wraiths were the spirits of the monks. Unleashed as they slept, freed from the bonds of their daytime work, these spirits were prone to the CHAOS that lurked within the innermost recesses of even the most disciplined mind. They lacked but a single soul – a kind of Zen Policeman – to see them on their proper paths, to keep them from the dangers inherent in CHAOS.



THE AWAKENING

Sometimes ways have to be changed in order to survive the demons peculiar to one’s genius.

This Zen Policeman could be the embodiment of the subject of this exercise – guiding and acquitting his colleagues from the constricting bond of orthodoxy with the old school of thought; setting about to provide harmony among the conflicting concepts permeating within their professional circle and finally propelling the minds into their proper organized state and purpose. Indeed as the lines say, ‘the rock speaks because it is silent; the sand moves because it is still’.

What can be said of the subject’s accumulated elucidation on the field of Electrical Engineering? Nothing sort of wonder if one merely digs on his scholastic record but everything of essence when viewed from the professional contributions and achievements that he had shaped on his person and his profession in particular. What was once the object of his co-workers mischievous tricks is now the prancing Big Chap in a world where ohms and volts remain the main condiments in turning the wheels.

“What was once in the east is now in the west.” That is the essence… The fundamental change in form and oftentimes the habits of a living thing accompanying transformation of a young into an adult is called: Metamorphosis. Can this be it?

The Haiku, in fact, imparts change that man courses thru on life’s strange panorama. Some are swift; some are slow as a snail’s gait. The visual perspective mirrors a different angle when one is perched on a promontory higher than the usual point of view or blander when seen from a lower plane.

It is then that the drama of light and shade comes into play to give meaning and depth to the composition. As in the trials faced man’s quest for the empirical reality.

In the end … it is Doods personified..?



The mystery writer:

Domineko du Surigao
(April, 2009)

Postscript: This invisible writer is known in Nasipit as DNA.