We later learned from some immigration lawyer that he should have just stayed in America while they worked on converting his tourist visa. Or something like that. I only overheard these things as a twelve year. Nobody really took their time to explain things to me. Even when it came to members of my own immediate family. And this was one I would never see again for decades later.
Meanwhile, my parents worked on getting my second oldest brother, the middle child, to the United States. My mom petitioned him, and by summer of 1993, he did arrive to live with us.
I did not have a lot of friends at this time. No one close, anyway. I had classmates who I associated with, but never really spend time with anyone outside of school. So I thought it would be nice to have my brother come live with us and actually stay and not just visit.
Now, this brother and I were never really that close. But still, he was my brother. I thought I would finally have an ally in this foreign land. At first, especially during summer, we kind of got along. He would even sometimes put his arms around me, which I did really like, but was still kind of odd to me, especially after a couple of years of not seeing him.
But things kind of changed once school started. I was in the eighth grade at this point. I transferred from Catholic school to public school to save money. He was a freshman in college, and my mom could only afford community college. Now I don't know if he struggled with adjusting to life in the States, but he never let on about any troubles. He did continue to hang on to a lot of his ways in the Philippines that he thought was really cool, and I just remember constantly thinking, no one knows you and no one cares about that here.
We just kind of drifted apart. We had a few fights. One of the main ones was on a Saturday afternoon. For weeks, we had this routine of watching the same lineup every weekend. I can't recall specifically now, but it was "The A-Team", "Three's Company", "Mr. Belvedere" and maybe a couple other shows and not necessarily in that order. Anyway, that one day just before one of the shows was about to begin, he just decided he wanted to watch something else. And it took me by surprise. I had been looking forward to the show, especially since they would always show commercials. I was pretty much shocked and the sudden change in behavior. And we argued loudly about it.
We only had one TV at this point. The other one was broken. Also, the VCR was broken. My brother thought he knew how to fix things, when he actually didn't. He probably meant well, but one of his ways was banging on the side of the machine. And then if that didn't work, bang it harder. My mom wasn't happy with that, and he was upset with getting the blame for breaking things.
I got sick at some point in the springtime. I was out of school for a few days, maybe even for a whole week or more. Actually, it is also possible that I was sick around spring break, and that was why I was out of school so much. I mentioned my brother previously because during these times when I was sick, I can't remember ever interacting with him. He had a little room with a curtain, and he spent most of his time there by himself.
At some point, we got a membership at this video store around the corner. They happened to have WWF video tapes and for a while I was renting different WrestleManias and Summer Slams and Royal Rumbles. By the time I was sick, I was on the Survivor Series series. When I got a little better that I could get out of bed but still not go to school, I would go to the video store and return the tapes and rent other ones.
Nowadays, when I'm just kind of sick but not really sick, well enough to walk but a little groggy, my nose a little stuffy, it makes me feel like watching the Survivor Series.
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