I began writing and
illustrating the book right after my girlfriend Cynthia left for Europe
for a short vacation. Within those 20 days we were e-mailing each other
constantly (I had enough courage to visit the malls to check my e-mail
despite the recent bombings).
Aside from that uncomfortable experience of missing a loved one (which is actually one of the underlying themes in the book), there's also this sense of fascination in taking into account how small the planet has become where one can now receive letters, not in weeks or days, but in seconds. A far cry from the old mailing system which, with its new name 'snail mail', describes exactly that -- slow and primitive. All this, thanks to technology. And with the millenium fever still floating in my head then, I couldn't stop telling myself that overused line: The future is here.
I've always
been fascinated by the 'future'. Somehow, the word itself brings visions
of space travel, flying cars and laser guns. Such childhood flights of
fancy are seldom taken seriously. Yet now we are closer than we think
to actually living the promises of science fiction. Although the wonders
of advanced technology, as is always associated with themes that concern
the future never fail to amaze me, it is the lifestyle of the people living
in this future world I find most intriguing. This I tried to incorporate
in the book by letting the reader take glimpse of a future world through
the eyes of a commoner. In some ways the book does serve as a reader's
guide to late 21st century Manila.
