I-sa, Dala-wa, Tat-lo….let’s rock!

What’s your favorite childhood Sunday morning routine?
Mine was rushing to my maternal grandma’s place and flipping through her Weekend Magazine to look for Larry Alcala on his Slice Of Life cartoon.

“Slice of Life” is Larry Alcala’s (1926-2002) best known cartoon and has accompanied the kids of my generation during idle Sunday mornings. More than having the typical Pinoy life featured in the iconic cartoon, the real kick comes out of the finding “Larry” out of the whole cartoon. Think “Where’s Waldo” only much cooler. He can be on the top, the bottom, at the side or somewhere on the frame. I remember flipping the magazine over and over and over until I can finally find Larry. Sometimes, The Queen and I will race–and whoever finds Larry gets bragging rights.

We spend a part of our Sunday morning looking for this:

Larry Alcala, “the Dean of Filipino Cartoonist” joined the Great Artist in the Sky in 2002. But his works will live on forever — especially now that a Filipino clothing brand, Solo, is bringing the art of Larry Alcala straight to the shirts and other clothing choices of today’s youth.

So, one day while hopping on my favorite blogs, I came across this contest announcement at Reluctant Stylista. Alex of the “Reluctant Stylista” is offering the lucky winner her own Solo shirt from the Larry Alcala collection, featuring the familiar artwork of the master cartoonist. Throwing caution to the wind (since I haven’t joined any blogger contest ever), I submitted my name and promptly forgot about it. Until one day when Alex contacted me via email and told me that I won the contest! (Mang Larry must be smiling at me from Heaven)

Anyway, here is the shirt courtesy of Solo and the Reluctant Stylista:

“I-sa, dala-wa, tat-lo, a-pat, li-ma…Tsaaaaaa!”

This is what we Pinoy kids used to say when we play “Teks”, these 2 x 2 sized play cards, usually drawn with Komiks excerpts which we used to trade and play with. I remember that my mom used to threaten me that she will cook all my “teks” (one shoe box full) and feed me the soup if I don’t stop trawling the streets in the middle of Manila heat asking neighborhood kids to fight me with teks. This, aside from the usual bodily harm that follows, especially after she caught me brawling with kids older than me after they conned me with 2 inches worth of “teks”.

I love my shirt! And the fact that it was a size “S” and FIT ME SO EFFING WELL made me smile the whole day that I finally decided to wear it. I was looking for a very important day to wear my shirt (that’s how much I loved it)…and what could be a more apt day than a scheduled photo shoot with the company endorser?

So, I wore it Sunday and earned heaps of praises, not to mention upped my cool ante for sporting a Larry Alcala Shirt by Solo

Sorry, I did not have any solo pictures during the shoot. So I filched the above photo from the requisite group photo with the Creatives team. I was wearing my latest favorite hat from The Landmark, my Solo shirt, jeans from Bench, belt from People Are People and my trusty and long-suffering ankle boots from Rockport.

Wanna meet the whole team–and give face to the infamous Drama Queens and Emo Kings of my department? Well, here they are:

And of course, with the much-written about Mr. G:

I am looking forward to wearing this shirt again…thanks Alex of Reluctant Stylista, thanks Solo…