Of friends, washing clothes and vitamin string quartet

Would you have yourself inked by a 90-year-old Kalinga lady?
This question haunts me all night because of my friend Lauren who paid me a visit yesterday. I was all so shocked with the lizard tattoo on her left arm! Lauren, my good friend from old film days, the one who dresses in post modern Gothic-est flair with a flowing feminine long skirt and rainbow colored scarf to complete her unique modern goddess twist that she mastered through the years. Now imagine her with a tattoo. Only Lauren can pull that off, in a graceful way I might say.

The tattoo is more valuable because of this Kalinga lady who inked her. She is a 90 year old lady who used pomelo spine to ink her clients, she is a rare national jewel as she is famous for traditional way of tattooing (Kalinga tribal art) and she alone knows how to do it. There is this worry about not passing the valuable art to younger generation because she has no kids, but good thing she is training some folks around the area. There was also this anecdote about her refusing to ink non-Filipinos before.

Anyways, I am going to hurry up to prepare for lunch. I spent hours washing clothes yesterday and it made me feel very productive. I should start doing this routinely. Getting a high from listening to Here Comes the Sun by Vitamin String Quartet, very lovely.