Carla and her red-eared turtle!

This is "Darling", the fascinating, teeny weeny turtle. We met this turtle with its equally fascinating owner, Carla, while we were strolling around Greenbelt Chapel. Denise (my daughter) and Gemma (our kasambahay) was so thrilled to see "Darling". We all were!..

I forgot to ask Carla whether this cutie-pie was a he or a she. "Darling" was not even a name but an endearment. Well, that's how it was explained to me by Carla. So, Darling was a red-eared slider turtle with no name and gender!

In this photo, I was prodding Darling to walk towards Gemma's hand. "Tingnan mo, kinakausap ka nya!", Carla said. It was staring back at me and blinked its eyes. It communicates through its eyes. Blinking it once means YES, and twice means NO (or vice versa, I think). Carla was one proud owner of Darling. "Intelligent siya at napakabait". Of course it's mabait! What could a tiny turtle do to harm us? hehe.. I may sound sarcastic, yeah, but it's more of a joke. I actually loved them both. Together, they emanate good feelings!

"DARLING" on the safe hands of Carla

On CARLA:

Carla was such a sweet, cute and all-smile lady. I guess, like Darling, she fascinated me too in a different, happy kind of way. Her being a turtle lover (she has 2 turtles and let them sleep on her bed at night) and her being such a regular church-goer fascinated me. She goes to Greenbelt Chapel almost everyday (and of course to stroll Darling around).

Then, she offered to give me The Face but unfortunately she didn't have one that time. It's the bleeding face of Christ, she explained. "Marami na akong nabigyan nyan". And most of them went back to her and claim some miracles happened in their lives after receiving The Face .. I was skeptical.

But you know what the miracle is? It's meeting her (and Darling) that day and making us play with her pet and making me feel like a giddy child once again. And it's her genuine, sweet smile plastered on her face all of the time that stirred me to smile back at a stranger like her. Those were simple miracles. I don't know, Carla must have sprayed some happy potion in the air. I was happy for some reason. Maybe she was contagious...

Then I went inside the chapel and said a little prayer for sweet Carla and her teeny-weeny turtle.