I stepped out of the house with the gunpowder gray sky threatening to ruin my day. Get an umbrella you idiot, I thought to myself. I just brought a wad of cash and the paperback The Brothers Karamazov (in case I'd be bored stiff on queues) with me and left everything else, viz. purse, cosmetics, phone, and umbrella, keeping the trip to the gynecologist as minimalistic as possible. Sure I can wade through the rain soaking my pants and feet under my umbrella but I can always cower elsewhere reading a book while waiting for the rain to abate, in case it'll ever come.

The second floor hallway at the East Avenue Medical Center was cramped with people lined up along side the corridors of their obstetricians, gynecologists, pediatricians, and what have you, who occupied adjacent rooms on each side of the hallway. I poked my head in every clinic that notified the "Doctor Is In" and drawled stupidly at every secretary if I can have an appointment with the gyne. "Oh she just left," one said. "He's on a lunch break," said another. "Could you come back in five minutes?" With my patience drained, I promised my imaginary God that if the gynecologist in the next room would be present I'd further commit myself to the betterment of the Philippine society. I faced the fifth door, inhaled a lungful of hope, and bolted the door open. The secretary was nowhere to be found--blast it! And just as I was about to swivel around and curse myself for praying, a short bony old hag materialized at the door of the smaller consultation room inside. Her hair was short and wavy, pulled taut with a hairband that made her forehead, eyebows, and catty eyes appear cosmetically face-lifted. From the nose down, her wrinkles lined her face like spiderwebs.

"Yes?" she squeaked. Her lips were painted bloody red and her warm smile folded the deep wrinkles around her mouth.

"Doctor Unmentionable?" I staggered, guessing she was the secretary who'd just been caught spying on the doctor's files of ghastly pictures of vaginal and phallic diseases.

"Yes?" she repeated as if she'd completely ignored my question.

"I'm looking for Dr. Unmentionable, the, uhm, ob-gyne?"

I assumed she had a hearing problem and half-expected the doctor was on break when she replied, "I am she. How can I help you?"

And the rest is private...

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