The word "ligaw" in Pilipino, a language of which I am totally ignorant, apparently means both "totally lost" and "courtship." And therefore the adjective "ligawin" refers to someone who is both "directionally disabled" or "directionally dyslexic" and also "attractive to persons of the opposite sex." What a wonderful correspondence, especially to those of us who regularly lose the car in the parking lot and to whom a walk in a strange city is a fearful and daring adventure. My lexicography is contributed by a Manila reader whose forthright and thoughtful blog can be accessed at this address.) "Directionally dyslexic" is an ugly phrase, filled with self-loathing; "ligawinitude" trips off the tongue. Well, almost trips; it's certainly superior to "ligawinness" -- which sounds like the female of an extinct predator.
Here are some examples of ligawinitude (fellow sufferers will empathize) which I have borrowed from Ana in Manila:
"I am so ligawin I still lose my way around the UP campus after 30 years working there. I am so ligawin I'd enter the main door of an unfamiliar office, transact my business, and then try to let myself out through the door of a conference room right smack at a dozen people all gaping at me. I am so ligawin that when I eat out, I can get lost going back from the comfort room to my table at a big restaurant till my friends are about ready to page me.... When I am in a strange place and I wish to explore it, I walk a straight path. When I reach a fork, I turn back."
Ana claims to be "the most ligawin person in the world." t's a hard claim to substantiate. The instances of ligawinitude that she cites -- well, I can match them with one hand tied behind my back. We won't crown a world ligawin champion until we tabulate the results of the International Ligawinitude Olympics. Nevertheless, it is curious to me that the ligawinitudinous often boast of the severity of their condition. No one says -- "Oh, I am the most colorblind person in the world," but we (the ligawinoids) take a perverse pride in topping our lost friends. "Loster than thou" is our odd claim.
Because the general public and even our closest friends treat us as comic, we respond by boasting of our affliction. In effect, we identify with those who laugh at us.
The chronically lost require liberation. We're not clowns; we're just subject to ligawinitude.
Which means that we're a) lost and b) sexy.
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