A Filipino Satire by Goliath Letterman

(Not Related to David Letterman)

Part One of a New Series Called “Pacquiaoism”

An East-European sports writer allegedly interviewed recently boxing megastar and now-Philippine Congressman Manny Pacquiao. Here are some of the questions supposedly asked and his alleged answers during the interview:

Q: Filipino-American columnist Jesse Jose, who writes for the MabuhayRadio.com, spells your family name as “Pakyaw.” What’s really the right spelling?

A: It’s Pacquiao.

Q: How do you spell it?

A: P as in Philippines, A as in America, C as in China, Q as in Cuba, U as in Europe, I as in Italy, A as in America again, and O as in Oustralia.

The sports writer just smiles. Then he proceeds to ask more questions.

Q: How true are the reports that you and your promoter Bob Arum will put up a foundation to help educate the financially-disadvantaged students of your home province in the Philippines?

A: Yes, Atty. Bob Arum, his company and I will put up a foundation that will operate the “Pacquiao-Arum and Company University.” But we may decide to name it instead as the “Philippine-American Cultural University.” But in any case, it will be called by its initials, “PAC U.”

Q: What will be the common name or moniker of your university’s students and eventual alumni?

A: Oh, the students and graduates will be called the PACkers, as in Green Bay Packers.

Q: What are your other plans for the PAC U?

A: The main campus will be on Sarangani Island, where I am its congressman. But then we intend to establish another campus in General Santos City, where it can be run by my siblings.

Q: What will you call the university in General Santos City?

A: PAC U II.

Q: Is it true that your mother, Dionisia, wants to finish her schooling at the PAC U, so that she will earn her Ph.D. degree?

A: She doesn’t have to go to college to get her Ph.D. I will just buy her a Pizza Hut franchise. You know this Los Angeles-based writer Bobby Reyes says that Ph.D. also means “Pizza Hut Delivery.” But if my Mommy Dionisia wants to go to college, nobody can stop her.

Editor’s Note: To read Bobby Reyes’s parable on the Ph.D., please click on this link, A Parable of the Filipino Ph.D. in Beverly Hills

Q: If she enrolls at the PAC U, won’t she be called the “Mother PACker?”

P acman did not reply. He merely smiles.

Q: Now that you have won world championships in eight separate weight categories, do you have plans of retiring soon? A Chicago-based Filipino-American writer, Joseph Lariosa, wrote a piece called Eight Is Enough and certainly he had good points in urging you to hang up your boxing gloves.

A: I want to fight until I reach the age of 35, four years from now.

Q: Aside from politics, we heard that you plan to launch a career as a singer in Las Vegas. Is that true?

A: I may join the Las Vegas-based Filipino-American band called the “Society of Seven” as its lead singer. In which case, it may be renamed the “Society of Seven Plus One.”

Q: Why the unique name for a band?

A: Well, if there is the “Minus One” in Karaoke, there can also be a “Plus One,” right? But if the negotiations with the “Society of Seven” don’t push through, I intend to invite the boxers that I defeated to join me in a new band. They can be my back-up singers or musicians. They can have a new well-paying career, aside from “has-been boxers.”

Q: Are you referring to Oscar de la Hoya, David Diaz, Miguel Cotto, Antonio Margarito, Joshua Clottey, Ricky Hatton, Juan Manuel Marquez, Erik Morales and Marco Antonio Barrera?

A: Yes and I will call the band, “Pacman and the Patsies.”

(To be continued . . .)

E ditor’s Note: To view Manny Pacquiao perform as a singer, please click on this YouTube video: