Last Saturday me and two of my friends went to the third installment of the FlipTop Battle League dubbed as "AHON". It is the modern day "talastasan" where two persons battle each other through spitting rhymes that eventually disses the opponent for 3 rounds, 1 minute a piece. No mic, no beat, just plain silent ambiance and a roaring crowd after a sick rhyme or verse was spilled. Each battle has an assigned judges and ofcourse there is two categories which is the Filipino and English.
It was the first hiphop event I ever watched in person, as well as my peers that night. To think that two of my friends (Jon, DonDon) was more on the rock genre, but didnt mind to go with me because they already knew what kind of event were going into. Thanks to You Tube.
There are alot of people upon arriving at the venue, alot of hiphop heads, I mean alot or almost all of them, which is my kind of ambiance. You can feel the warm welcome of everyone, the community was f*cking great, even DonDon was shocked to experience how the hiphop community that night has such of a welcoming gesture. He stated for a couple of times that night that he wants to be a "hiphop" and that was way f*cking funny. We had the chance to great some local hiphop heads or the e-celebrity of the local hiphop game, and they too where responsive and chatted with us. It was a hell of a night. Speaking of hell, the air-conditioning that night was a disaster. It was like 38 degree celsius inside, everyone was sweating to death. Even the organizers are shouting "te wala na ba ilalakas un aircon nyo? Pati mga itlog namin basa na." and it was like hundred fifty plus people inside, everybody was struggling of the heat.
The event was really good, thumbs up to FlipTop and the organizers. Each drop of sweat was like worth it or some what really really WORTH IT! We called it a night after seeing the much anticipated battle of Loonie and Zaito, because we were too tired it was like 4am.
The only thing that ruined our night was those bunch of un-educated people a block away from the venue. They were trying to punk us by threatening us with force, telling us "sino sa inyo gumulpe sa kaibigan namin". Jon was right "lumang tugtugin na yun" and thank God a jeepney rolled past us and we quickly hopped on even though that aint our way. Unfaithfully to a "manong" inside the jeepney who was quite exposed into the window was punched. Karma will strike them back, those jologs mutha f*ckers.
Either way, were gonna be back for the coming FlipTop Battle League events. I believe the next one is going to be in July.
Photos grabbed from Jerik Platon's FaceBook account.
